Healers please

[ElciaDeiLinus]

Ironically, I find I have significantly more problems with healers that only heal. I literally can't even remember the last time I died because a healer tunneled on DPS. Typically, a player that is focusing 100% on healing is doing so because they aren't comfortable with their role or are just plain bad, and end up managing their healing really poorly regardless.

I think one of the problems driving this thread is that people assume because they struggle with something, that everyone else does, because most people percieve themselves as average or even above-average. Just because you may have difficulty juggling healing and dpsing, doesn't mean that it's a common state for other players. The reason the mentality of healers doing damage is so widespread is because most players don't feel that it's difficult or risky, and it makes runs in all content significantly faster and smoother.

The topic of the thread isn't healers who are able to balance dps and healing- it's very clearly about healers who spam damage and let others die and groups wipe, or just have the other healer do all the healing and not help- which according to some is good group play.

Whether it's because they're uncomfortable at healer, tunneling dps, or just think others shouldn't take damage so you don't heal them out of spite- healers not healing is becoming more common, and I don't really think this is all an effort from healers to make other players better by teaching them through wipes.

You say you find healers who just heal a bigger issue than those who don't damage... but a healer that just heals, you're still going to finish anything below maybe savage/ult. A healer that just deals damage, you're going to wipe constantly and not finish anything.

Obviously, a healer that does exactly enough healing to keep people alive and everything else is damage is ideal, and great if you can do that... but just as you said, even if you're able to do that and never let someone die unless it's something impossible to save (ie- someone eating every vuln stack), doesn't mean that's a common state for everyone.

[LittleImp]

The topic of the thread isn't healers who are able to balance dps and healing- it's very clearly about healers who spam damage and let others die and groups wipe, or just have the other healer do all the healing and not help- which according to some is good group play.

new players- who come into the game, get yelled at for healing in dungeons, get told by content creators to only heal at low health... then get into groups and are spamming damage spells as the group wipes over and over.

You were saying that the way new healers are taught to approach healing is a fundamental part of some supposed wide-spread problem where healers aren't healing. That implies you believe this approach should change, and I disagree. People don't interpret phrases like "The only health point that matters is the last one" literally, and I've seen zero evidence that this supposed widespread problem exists. I spend a lot of time spamming Mentor roulette, and just don't see this in game at all.

You say you find healers who just heal a bigger issue than those who don't damage... but a healer that just heals, you're still going to finish anything below maybe savage/ult. A healer that just deals damage, you're going to wipe constantly and not finish anything.

I have never seen a healer refuse to heal in a normal mode to the degree that it genuinely obstructed the party. I've seen co-healers that barely heal in normal modes, but the healing requirements in that content tend to be so low that even an inexperienced player can readily solo-heal them with minimal disruption to the way they usually play.

There is something I have seen, however, at all levels of the game from normals to Ultimate; Healers that underperform and struggle will frequently try to offload blame onto their co-healer. I've watched people launch into rants about how their co-healer "isn't doing anything", only to have to explain to the person that their co-healer is outhealing them: They just aren't getting carried as hard as they are used to and are experiencing what it's like to hold up their end of the partnership. It's the commonality of that type of situation that makes people very incredulous of threads like this.

Also, Healers and Tanks shouldn't receive blame for failing to adjust to someone else's mistake; Effective recovery is something that should be praised, but never expected and certainly not criticized in its absence. If someone dies because they ate an aoe shortly before a raid-wide, that's 100% on them. I've seen waaay too may instances of "WHERE WERE THE HEALS" moments where someone tries to offload responsibility for their own mistake onto the healer.

EDIT:

If you never encounter that, great- but if you do encounter that, is that good play? Is not healing and letting groups wipe good play as a healer? Encouraging that, and there are people here straight up saying they won't heal players even if that could save them because they'd rather dps, is encouraging really bad play.

Please stop trying to create crazy straw-men. I will not engage with unrealistic hypothetical scenarios.