Tales from Duty Finder: Some make you laugh, some make you cry. Let's vent.

[HyoMinPark]

There are a few examples, most of them in content most healers will never do, that may require healers to use lucid outside of general mp management. They're rare enough to be considered the exception and not the norm. They can learn the mechanics adjust for that one fight out of 500 they'll have to do that is otherwise

A12 normal was a regular 8-man raid. As was O12. I can’t tell you the number of healers I have seen get smacked by bosses in both of those because they refuse to manage their hate. This advice was never just applied to Savage or Ultimate. Heck, I’ve seen healers rip off of tanks in 24-mans because they think the only spell on their hotbars is Medica II. Same with DPS because they apparently think pressing Diversion is some big-brain advanced strat for top-tier players. The hope is, is that this is no longer an issue—but that never meant that it was inherently the tank’s fault in the past either. Normal modes and 24-mans are content that “most healers” will probably do. Just because they weren’t Savage didn’t excuse them from responsibility.

I’ve DPS’d and healed for tanks that have tanked dungeons before in their DPS stance and never had issues with aggro on healer or DPS (DRK was pretty good at this because their snap aggro was really good after they got some buffs in...4.3(?); WAR was also good if they had IR and could Decimate spam trash packs). But I also take care to manage mine to make everyone’s job easier: theirs, mine, and the healers. BRDs don’t particularly make the best tanks, and I don’t want to die. The issue that you described a couple posts back is more than likely an experienced tank—aside from PLD having trash aggro generation in Sword Oath (which was an issue in my Alphascape static during o12 prog—until they paired me and the DRG with the WAR, which could hold off of me better while still optimizing in Deliverance). Should he have turned on stance if he was having that much issue with aggro? Yes. However, that doesn’t pardon party members from enmity management. It still applies even with bad tanks—if for nothing else than to ensure YOU don’t hit the floor.

[Kaylessa]

A12 normal was a regular 8-man raid. As was O12. I can’t tell you the number of healers I have seen get smacked by bosses in both of those because they refuse to manage their hate. This advice was never just applied to Savage or Ultimate. Heck, I’ve seen healers rip off of tanks in 24-mans because they think the only spell on their hotbars is Medica II. Same with DPS because they apparently think pressing Diversion is some big-brain advanced strat for top-tier players. The hope is, is that this is no longer an issue—but that never meant that it was inherently the tank’s fault in the past either. Normal modes and 24-mans are content that “most healers” will probably do. Just because they weren’t Savage didn’t excuse them from responsibility.

I’ve DPS’d and healed for tanks that have tanked dungeons before in their DPS stance and never had issues with aggro on healer or DPS (DRK was pretty good at this because their snap aggro was really good after they got some buffs in...4.3(?); WAR was also good if they had IR and could Decimate spam trash packs). But I also take care to manage mine to make everyone’s job easier: theirs, mine, and the healers. BRDs don’t particularly make the best tanks, and I don’t want to die. The issue that you described a couple posts back is more than likely an experienced tank—aside from PLD having trash aggro generation in Sword Oath (which was an issue in my Alphascape static during o12 prog—until they paired me and the DRG with the WAR, which could hold off of me better while still optimizing in Deliverance). Should he have turned on stance if he was having that much issue with aggro? Yes. However, that doesn’t pardon party members from enmity management. It still applies even with bad tanks—if for nothing else than to ensure YOU don’t hit the floor.

I did not say there are zero fights nor did I say they were only for savage, I said they are rare enough to be considered the exception and not the norm. And for those fights the healer can learn the mechanics to progress just like everybody else. You don't learn a rule for a few fights, you learn a rule for basic advice on when to apply a skill, then you learn exceptions as you go along.

Also healers that pre-medica 2 can take the painful lumps as they go. They'll figure it out.

Also I'm not advocating for healers to take on extra responsibility because the tank wanted to tank in DPS stance. Just like healers who pre-medica 2, tanks who tank in DPS stance get whatever's coming to them. If the run ends smoothly hooray for everybody, but it's not the healers job to cover for those tanks just like it's not the tanks job to cover for healers who pre apply regen. You can if you're feeling nice, but it's not a rule I will be advocating for.

[kidalutz]

Meridianum
I have no idea what has been going on but every single queue pop has been the exact same thing non stop for a month.

Tanks that dont know when to stop so party can down things with cannons DPS that has zero clue how to aoe and healers that dont cast a single heal coupled with intersectional AFKers for whatever reason I think I'm getting trolled when I select MSQ roulette as well because 9/10 times its meridianum the place with the THE WORST XP gain at the end of usually far far worse runs than anything I've seen in Praetorium even back in the day when it was hey hit escape and watch that crap in the inn room.

[HyoMinPark]

I did not say there are zero fights nor did I say they were only for savage, I said they are rare enough to be considered the exception and not the norm. And for those fights the healer can learn the mechanics to progress just like everybody else. You don't learn a rule for a few fights, you learn a rule for basic advice on when to apply a skill, then you learn exceptions as you go along.

Also healers that pre-medica 2 can take the painful lumps as they go. They'll figure it out.

Also I'm not advocating for healers to take on extra responsibility because the tank wanted to tank in DPS stance. Just like healers who pre-medica 2, tanks who tank in DPS stance get whatever's coming to them. If the run ends smoothly hooray for everybody, but it's not the healers job to cover for those tanks just like it's not the tanks job to cover for healers who pre apply regen. You can if you're feeling nice, but it's not a rule I will be advocating for.

Normal mode raids commonly have intermissions where bosses are untargetable. As do normal mode trials (I think literally every normal trial this expac had intermissions where healers can still generate aggro but an MT cannot). There are far more “exceptions” than I think you realize. Not everyone just runs dungeons where intermissions aren’t really a thing (though some bosses have them—the last boss of Ghimlyt Dark does).

I’m not even talking about pre-pull Medica IIs or Regens, so I don’t know why you’re bringing that up. I’m talking about spamming Medica II as if it is the only skill on their bar. This is fairly common for DF WHMs. They also like to do heals like Medica II > Medica > Plenary for literally no reason, completely invalidating their regens and causing a massive overheal, which also does not help their enmity, since overhealing still generates aggro. Unfortunately for WHM, with Assize practically being a damage button now, some of the overhealing they do is not inherently their fault. However, I am still mindful of my hate when I play the job because I don’t particularly enjoy eating tank autos or busters to the face. Not exactly my idea of a good time.

Have you done Orbonne Monastery? Do you know the intermission during Ultima, the High Seraph where there’s a healer check (bubble phase where we’re falling and people are taking steady damage the entire time)? I’ve seen many healers get smacked by her when she comes back because they heal so much during that phase (some of which is necessary, but there’s also a lot of Medica II spam like it’s Medica in there), but they won’t drop their hate afterwards. A tank can do nothing to mitigate that, as Ultima is not targetable for them to build enmity on (whether they are in stance or not), but the healers still generate it and are on her aggro table. I have to Lucid there because I’m on the bring of ripping aggro myself—on AST or WHM, doesn’t matter which—and I am a healer that does not blatantly overheal.

O12N is also fairly healer heavy with Cosmo Memory and Suppression+Tank meteors (oh, and Laser Shower). So healers have to be mindful there. Especially since the tanks cannot Shirk one another since they have to tank their respective bosses. DPS always have to be mindful regardless—you do zero damage when you’re dead, after all, so might as well take the lengths to not die.

If you die due to stubbornness over not wanting to press one button, well. You get what’s coming to you, too, I guess. At least, that’s my take on it.

[Kaylessa]

I’m not even talking about pre-pull Medica IIs or Regens, so I don’t know why you’re bringing that up. I’m talking about spamming Medica II as if it is the only skill on their bar. This is fairly common for DF WHMs. They also like to do heals like Medica II > Medica > Plenary for literally no reason, completely invalidating their regens and causing a massive overheal, which also does not help their enmity, since overhealing still generates aggro.

Have you done Orbonne Monastery? Do you know the intermission during Ultima, the High Seraph where there’s a healer check (bubble phase where we’re falling and people are taking steady damage the entire time)? I’ve seen many healers get smacked by her when she comes back because they heal so much during that phase (some of which is necessary, but there’s also a lot of Medica II spam like it’s Medica in there), but they won’t drop their hate afterwards. A tank can do nothing to mitigate that, as Ultima is not targetable for them to build enmity on (whether they are in stance or not), but the healers still generate it and are on her aggro table. I have to Lucid there because I’m on the bring of ripping aggro myself—on AST or WHM, doesn’t matter which—and I am a healer that does not blatantly overheal.

O12N is also fairly healer heavy with Cosmo Memory and Suppression+Tank meteors. So healers have to be mindful there. Especially since the tanks cannot Shirk one another since they have to tank their respective bosses. DPS always have to be mindful regardless—you do zero damage when you’re dead, after all, so might as well take the lengths to not die.

If you die due to stubbornness over not wanting to press one button, well. You get what’s coming to you, too, I guess. At least, that’s my take on it.

Yes overhealing is a massive problem in the duty finder, part of that is because healers don't know what to expect. They don't know what to expect from the fight so they don't know when the moves are coming, and they don't know what to expect from their party members because everybody is likely a stranger. It's much easier to not overheal when they're in a static and know what everyone is going to do and what the fight entails. I've seen plenty of really experienced healers get smacked in the duty finder because suddenly everybody has one quarter health and they're spread to the four corners - welcome to duty finder land, also known as chaosville.

Question - why would you want to place a general rule for healers for one fight they will do in the far future? Get their lucid dreaming rotation down, learn to not overheal, (while at the same time sorta overhealing when pugging, because pugging) then adjust for the few fights they'll encounter where they have to use it for something different. For the vast majority of cases lucid is used for mp management, they'll learn exceptions along the way.

[HyoMinPark]

Yes overhealing is a massive problem in the duty finder, part of that is because healers don't know what to expect. They don't know what to expect from the fight so they don't know when the moves are coming, and they don't know what to expect from their party members because everybody is likely a stranger. It's much easier to not overheal when they're in a static and know what everyone is going to do and what the fight entails. I've seen plenty of really experienced healers get smacked in the duty finder because suddenly everybody has one quarter health and they're spread to the four corners - welcome to duty finder land, also known as chaosville.

Damage is all scripted in this game. So all these healers need to do is learn the dance. This applies to every piece of content—bosses always have a set rotation, especially in Stormblood since they got rid of where you could push them to skip mechanics in certain fights. Now they just do mechanics based on a fight timeline as opposed to MP (though, sometimes skips could be dicey if one wasn’t prepared). Healers don’t need to blatantly overheal in fights they know because the rotation will never change. However, that doesn’t stop WHMs from attempting to secure that 100% Medica II HoT uptime. Regardless of how often they’ve done the fight.

The only healers I excuse for blatant overhealing are those that are new to a fight and aren’t sure what to expect. However, most of the cases I see are not from new healers. It’s very common to see healers just put up HoTs when everyone is at full health and with no AOE coming out for some time. That’s just not necessary.

Question - why would you want to place a general rule for healers for one fight they will do in the far future? Get their lucid dreaming rotation down, learn to not overheal, (while at the same time sorta overhealing when pugging, because pugging) then adjust for the few fights they'll encounter where they have to use it for something different. For the vast majority of cases lucid is used for mp management, they'll learn exceptions along the way.

These fights aren’t always “far future”. For any healer that gets to level cap fairly quickly, they will experience more normal mode trials and raids just from doing dailies/weeklies compared to dungeons. Especially if they run the latter to get token drops for gear. Same for 24-mans.

I advocate for healers to accept that they have more responsibilities outside of just keeping everyone alive. While that may be their number one responsibility, it doesn’t end there. Same for DPS—their number one responsibility is to deal as much damage as possible, but they also have other things that they may need to do: some may have to make sure to utilize their support/utility, for example; in the past, all were responsible for enmity, especially since Diversion was offered to all DPS except BRD/MCH and they lost nothing to use it. We were also responsible for resource management (e.g., Goad, Mana Shift, Refresh/Tactician) and AOEing, yet there were so many DPS that refused to do either even when asked to.

Most Lucids are for MP. However, there were instances where they were also for aggro (and, in the case of BLM—and SMN to an extent—Lucid was a second aggro tool because MP is a joke for both of them). If you have to use it for aggro, you should probably use it. Even if it deviates from your initial planning. Because dying to taking aggro probably also deviates from your plan, I’m sure; and it also won’t do your MP management any favors. Especially on a job like AST that struggles so much with MP economy.


My rule is to stop being selfish and petty just because you get angry that a tank isn’t in tank stance. That doesn’t magically negate your other responsibilities, and that’s the main issue I take with your statements. They aren’t born from a desire to play properly, but from a anger because you’re mad at the tank for “not doing their job”. If they are holding aggro, they are doing their job. Being in stance or out of it was irrelevant. I guess this rule doesn’t apply much anymore since stance comes with zero penalty, but I still advocate for not being petty.


I am not going to derail this thread any further. If you want to continue the discussion, my Discord tag is in my signature. Feel free to message me there.

[Skivvy]

Was working on WT last night, and ended up in a raid with a co-healer who would only cast cure/II, medica II & regen on the full party. Can't say I've seen that before in all my years. I was half tempted to visit them after and give them a wee bit of a head's up, but it was late and I ended up logging off :X

[Anselmet]

A couple of people have tried to tell me in this topic that lucid is used for something different. Including a certain someone who grouped lucid with diversion in "popping it before the battle started" then tried to point out that because refresh was an "additonal effect" it's secondary in importance. That is part of the conversation you jumped into, btw.

Ma'am I was on my phone and typing in the middle of the night. I meant diversion to pop before battle. My logic is still more sound than yours bc I don't have my pride impeding me from being a good healer. Like seriously I quoted the skill as it was in the game. It was under additional effect meaning it WAS the secondary effect. Good god you're stuck on yourself.

Also here is what I said. Notice how I said it not LUCID DREAMING out right. I was being non specific on accident and bc of a language barrier and being tired. But okay totally said pop lucid dreaming pre battle. For everyone else, note how I didn't say they to make it both skills.

Nah, you're wrong. Both diversion and lucid dreaming are off the gbcd and are easily weaved in between skills. It also there to be popped before battles. If one button is too hard of a concept for a dps or a healer, then that says way more about them then the tank. Agro is easily, boringly easy to establish in this game. If a tank losing agro after its been established then the dps is trying to rip agro off the tank, which means I have zero sympathy. I mean diversion and lucid dreaming are literally under ROLE SKILLS. I know you may find that very criptic as to why they are there, but many of us have uncovered its secrets and used our roles effectively. Meaning, we hit diversion and lucid dreaming bc not only is it good team work, good manners, BUT PART OF YOUR BLOODY ROLE.

[Cincierta]

Was working on WT last night, and ended up in a raid with a co-healer who would only cast cure/II, medica II & regen on the full party. Can't say I've seen that before in all my years. I was half tempted to visit them after and give them a wee bit of a head's up, but it was late and I ended up logging off :X

So. Many. 6's...and those regens Jimminy Crickets.

[Kaylessa]

Ma'am I was on my phone and typing in the middle of the night. I meant diversion to pop before battle. My logic is still more sound than yours bc I don't have my pride impeding me from being a good healer. Like seriously I quoted the skill as it was in the game. It was under additional effect meaning it WAS the secondary effect. Good god you're stuck on yourself.

Also here is what I said. Notice how I said it not LUCID DREAMING. I was being non specific on accident and bc of a language barrier. But okay totally said pop lucid dreaming pre battle. Note how I didn't say they to make it both skills.

For healers it is not, and never will be, the "secondary effect."