Quote Originally Posted by Penthea View Post
Disclaimer: not played WoW since the end of WoD, but as far as I know the healing has changed very little.

I was a hardcore raider healer in WoW. FFXIV's healing is very different.

The mana efficiency of healers in FF far outpaces WoW, so that allows FF healers to weave in dps. Healer dps is very effective in FF but it hits like a wet noodle in WoW. In WoW unless you have specific healing/defensive/mana gaining mechanics that use dps abilities, there is little to no reason for healers to dps in combat as it's a waste of precious mana and a gcd wasted on stupidly low numbers. (unless you greatly outgear the content)

Additionally out of combat hp and mp regen is several times faster in FF, so there is far less downtime between pulls. If a tank doesn't wait for you to regen mp in WoW you may need all the mana you have for just healing, whereas in FF due to the higher rate of mp regen you are more likely to have a higher percentage of mana at the next pull which leaves more room for dps.
A lot's actually changed since WoD, not that healer DPS to some degree hasn't been around since Vanilla and even been partly meta since BC. Legion has since made healer DPS basically mana-free, which has greatly increased the expectation to fill in wherever possible unless certain that you absolutely need that mana for future heals. Discipline priests, additionally, can ONLY heal through dealing damage.

Not to say that pre-Legion WoW isn't a fine example of what healers can be, but just know that that is where that path of development landed, whether naturally or by additional designer impetus.