Dear Healers who don't DPS

[Bourne_Endeavor]

For you it seems to be easy to do o2n and you can push dmg their as you said, while you can't understand people not doing much dmg there. Fine, others could argue, it is easy to do dmg in savage, so what would you argue against that, if you don't agree with them? Perspective plays an huge part here. For you it could be easy, but this doesn't mean that it is easy for everyone, either from an skill or confident pov for others. If you want an answer from me, then i would say there is enough time in every content to do dmg. Savage or not. But we shouldn't ignore the difference in skill, exp and so on.

No one is ignoring the difference in skill or other variations. That being said, many healers simply refuse to deal damage based on principle or react to the slightest bit of damage. The issue isn't skill related, but the insistence by some that this okay. The whole point of a pragmatic discussion is to, well, discuss what makes a good healer and how they might improve. Coddling people, especially once they're stepping into Savage, does nothing except muddy the already polluted waters of PF. You needn't be rude to explain FFXIV simply isn't a healing centric game. Furthermore, by the time you've reached Omega Normal, the excuse of "new" loses significant merit. You've had a wealth of 50+ content where the incoming damage is often meager at best. Why haven't you practiced even simply doting mobs?

As for where the problem stems. It's a myriad of things, though I will argue laziness is arguably the highest contributing factor; second only to nerves. Others would be the aforementioned "principle" or coming from different MMOs where healers weren't essentially support DPS.

[Cynfael]

Did I read a few pages back that someone mentioned "risk" involved in healer DPS? That was a weak argument even when we had old CS. I actually think that this perception of risk might be one of the biggest barriers to healing-only healers becoming fully participatory.

Too many healers still play largely on reaction, and if the players who have avoided healer DPS out of an excess of caution kept in mind how the game runs largely on a 2.5s GCD and is scripted out the wazoo, there might be better healer gameplay across the board.

[Miste]

The problem with your argument is that 90% of all healers are not using every gcd to do something and they are not 90% of the time doing dmg, even if very, very good healers (probably only 5% of the community) actually do it.

But we shouldn't ignore the difference in skill, exp and so on.

I think the main issue is that you seem to think most of us in here want healers to 100% be able to ABC (always be casting), but that isn't the point we were trying to say at all. We were saying it was the goal just like you said, we are not saying it is the ultimatum and you MUST do it. It's just something we should all try to do to contribute and it is totally fine if everyone contributes different amounts as long as they are putting effort.

Definitely no one is ignoring the difference in skill, exp, and so on. That's why people are arguing with you. You are making assumptions about what our stance is. No one in here said they go into DF and call anyone bad for not playing how we think they should. We just ask and encourage healers to practice and get better like any role and at least "try" even if the beginning is just one DPS spell per encounter.

I get it people have less experience, less skill, and maybe some people have disabilities, but one spell to show you are trying is honestly something really achievable even for those players and even for new players and that is the starting point. Even below average players could handle 1 spell, believe me.

Also the reason these threads happen is because some healers refuse to DPS on principle ("I'm a healer I only need to heal") and not because they can't do it and they use that as an excuse to not even try to improve, and also some really are purposefully being lazy and openly admit to it. I never assume that is the case, but its just fact it is the case sometimes.

Ah as I was writing this Bourne beat me to it xD

In insight, we should have done better at reading/understanding each others posts. And sry, if you did feel insulted or something about my "emotional" comment. Didn't mean it that way

Nah, not insulted, you'd have to do a whole lot more to get me to feel that way. Mostly I feel it is an impolite thing to ask a stranger in a discussion forum, because really anyone elses emotions are just not anyone's business and it has absolutely nothing to do with the discussion we were having so it is pointless on top of impolite in my opinion. Also asking "why are you emotional?" means you already assumed I was emotional over it. Assumptions about how someone feels about something is usually a bad idea.

But, thank you for the apology and for clarifying. I don't take it to heart anyhow and I wouldn't dislike you just for doing something I find impolite so don't worry about it. It wasn't like it was harassment, it was just not necessary.

[Levian]

Anyone mind if I share a recipe for homemade pancakes I found off a random website? I mean, this thread literally can't be derailed any more than it currently is.

Only if you've tried it and it's good enough to be worth sharing. We won't be your recipe guinea pigs, but I'm sure we would all appreciate a recipe for good pancakes.

[MoroMurasaki]

Did I read a few pages back that someone mentioned "risk" involved in healer DPS? That was a weak argument even when we had old CS. I actually think that this perception of risk might be one of the biggest barriers to healing-only healers becoming fully participatory.

Too many healers still play largely on reaction, and if the players who have avoided healer DPS out of an excess of caution kept in mind how the game runs largely on a 2.5s GCD and is scripted out the wazoo, there might be better healer gameplay across the board.

I think you might have meant this?

I did. But does this mean for example an healer should never use earthly star, since it does dmg? Nope, not at all. There would be no downside to use es as there is no downside to use your aggro combo. Using those kind of skills that do both, is a good thing and doesn't hinder your ability to do your main task and there is no risk using them at all. So why would you not use them, unless you want to do an silly argument in a forum. Can we stop using silly examples aswell? If you really can't take the game design into account, then there is nothing to discuss anymore. let me re-phrase your sentence.... "asking a tank to tank out of tank stance for more dps, is more than their very basic role requires".

-> doing dmg as healer, outside of skills like earthly star
Downside= People can die, if you don't heal correctly -> risk

-> tanking out of tank stance
Downside= less aggro generation, less mitigation -> risk

Using earthly star or aggro combo -> no downside.

We can talk all day long about the theory, about definitions, but when it comes down to it, you have to consider how the game is designed and can't ignore it. So saying, "oh now healers only have to heal. Might aswell use ony vita then, right, RIGHT? or doing the same for flash, is just silly and adds nothing to the discussion. Use common sense, thx. Everyone who plays healer for a long time and tries to push himself to the limit, did make mistakes, which lead to either people or the whole group to die. Your goal is to heal everyhing with insant heals of both healers and trust your (/the other healer) reggen after all. Addionally you heal with the mindset, "people need only enough hp to survive" and not "people need to be full asap". Playing around with that, trying to push yourself has the downside, that mistakes will be costly and people will die. Now, of course this is the mindest experienced healers have and can't be used for newer healer. But still, the downside even if you play much more save, remains. If you are casting dmg skill and misjudge the dmg an tank buster for instance does, then the tanks and if not rezz asap the group will die.

I think the best rebuttal to all of that is to acknowledge that risk is not a bad thing inherently. A lot of the time taking a risk is well worth the reward. Healer DPS is based around risk; you understand the fight enough to anticipate most big damage and the rest of the time you're playing god with the party's health bars. Will people die sometimes? Yes. The fact here is that the DPS contributed by a healer in proportion to the amount of time someone dies as a direct result of healer DPS is so good that the general population still thinks it's a good idea.

The risk is worth the reward. That's why almost everyone in this thread, irrespective of the side of the argument they are on, has made it clear at one point or another that they do DPS on healers.

[Deceptus]

Did I read a few pages back that someone mentioned "risk" involved in healer DPS? That was a weak argument even when we had old CS. .

In lower level content, I never turned CS off because I could heal as effectively with it on just as much as off.

[Raqrie_Tohka]

I tried doing damage as a AST in a raid once. I did less than one-fifth the damage of an actual dps, had to struggle with mana, GCDs and my sanity for both healing, dps-ing and carding, and the whitemage still did more damage and had almost full mana. Needless to say I wasn't a big fan of dpsing as a healer in raids from then on. (The dps-focused WHM did only about a quarter the dps of an actual dps). If two healers dpsing did less than half the damage of an actual dps, I wonder, what's the whole point?

If I wanted to do dps I'd go as a dps. We know parsing isn't discussed in the game, but from my experience, even in dungeons, healers and their extra bit of dps just isn't so crucial that it is justified to demand them to dps. Especially if it puts more stress on their healing, mana management, and in case of classes like Ast having to mange cards too, is just ridiculous.

[Kabooa]

If two healers dpsing did less than half the damage of an actual dps, I wonder, what's the whole point? .

It's damage you didn't have otherwise. Even in Savage, there's specific periods of time where you can DPS without worry. However, the healer's ability to safely do damage is dependent on the Turnks and the Durps not taking avoidable damage, mitigating properly, and utilizing raid wide refreshes as they come up.

8.5 members worth of DPS is more than 8.0, and when you get comfortable with whatever spreadsheet encounter they designed, it's not all that stressful. But it really only matters in Savage.

[MoroMurasaki]

I tried doing damage as a AST in a raid once. I did less than one-fifth the damage of an actual dps, had to struggle with mana, GCDs and my sanity for both healing, dps-ing and carding, and the whitemage still did more damage and had almost full mana. Needless to say I wasn't a big fan of dpsing as a healer in raids from then on. (The dps-focused WHM did only about a quarter the dps of an actual dps). If two healers dpsing did less than half the damage of an actual dps, I wonder, what's the whole point?


If I wanted to do dps I'd go as a dps. We know parsing isn't discussed in the game, but from my experience, even in dungeons, healers and their extra bit of dps just isn't so crucial that it is justified to demand them to dps. Especially if it puts more stress on their healing, mana management, and in case of classes like Ast having to mange cards too, is just ridiculous.

The idea is that if you're looking at potential increases in party DPS for an 8man group where the healers aren't currently DPSing the easiest large DPS increase available to you is your healers. Each healer adding 500-1k DPS is 1-2k DPS more than you had and it's a lot easier than trying to squeeze that same additional amount from your tanks/DPS assuming none of them are currently making huge mistakes.

In terms of dungeons I virtually always come out ahead of the tank and ahead of actual DPS regularly enough that it isn't a rarity. I am not alone in that. One of the best examples is Sebazy, they actually have logs up for specific pulls where they're putting out so much AoE it's insane which have been linked in this very thread. Between the laughably low healing requirements outside of some mega pulls and the generally superior AoE damage healers put out discounting healer damage in 4man is just silly to me.

You're entitled to your opinion but all of the reasoning you use to back it up is literally the opposite of the experiences that many people in this thread have shared.

I will say I find DPSing on AST to feel the worst of any healer - between the mp management, staying on your cards, the extreme simplicity and then the comparably lackluster results due to low potency it can sometimes feel pointless. Play those same runs as an aggressive WHM though and you'll be surprised how much better it feels.

[era1Ne]

I tried doing damage as a AST in a raid once. I did less than one-fifth the damage of an actual dps, had to struggle with mana, GCDs and my sanity for both healing, dps-ing and carding, and the whitemage still did more damage and had almost full mana. Needless to say I wasn't a big fan of dpsing as a healer in raids from then on. (The dps-focused WHM did only about a quarter the dps of an actual dps). If two healers dpsing did less than half the damage of an actual dps, I wonder, what's the whole point?

Very good healers can be an "fifth dd" together essentially and then you can kill fights faster or on progress sometimes at all. For instance, if your group in savage struggles to "fight against" the enrage timer in an fight, because people are dying or you haven't got the skill with very low ilvl to make it, then healer dmg can make or break the run. Technically healer dmg is not necessary, since the fights are NOT designed with healer dmg in mind, but there can be circumstances like people dying, not skilled enough and then healer dmg can be the last % to clear the fight. Even if both healers aren't good enough to be an "fifth dd" together, every bit of dmg can be crucial.

Now, of course i completely understand that dealing dmg in savage can be difficult, especially if you want be very efficient as an healer team, since you plan out some or all heals, while letting people drop really low. Still working on that and learning myself. But it is possible and for me very fun. I don't know how you play as healer, but if mana is an issue, maybe you use lucid to late, which is an very common mistake healer do. Usually i'd use it at 70% of my mana pool and as an ast for example, you can use lucid when you extend an balance with CO for example, because then lucid gets extended as well. Everyone talks about balance, but imo Celes is the best skill for ast in this game, since you can do so much with it and thinking about new ways to use the skill is fun