Quote Originally Posted by Aldracity View Post
I agree that there should be a mechanic to discourage overhealing, but I think threat ends up having the wrong effect.

If the tank is facing mobs the wrong way and AoEs are flying around everywhere, it's clear that the tank is at fault. If a DPS goes full burst rotation on the wrong mob in an AoE pull and gains aggro, it's the DPS's fault and they end up dying. In all these cases, it's abundantly clear that the player at fault is what's causing the issue.

Healers on the other hand? Overhealing a target does not inherently create a problem. Yes, it's a problem on extended bosses when the healer runs out of mana, but in shorter fights there's no clear, direct feedback. That's supposed to be what the extra threat is for, but it ends up sending the wrong message because a loss of aggro is more intuitively attributed to a failure of the tank than a failure of the healer.
Well guess what?

If a Tank doesn't their CD's right and the healers' MP pool dies the slow death you probably won't notice that it was the tank's fault. If a DD pops Blood for Blood before an unavoidable attack and the healers can't keep them alive no-one'll know it was their fault. If you've been clearing a fight easily for weeks but today everyone dies because the Monk forgot to use Mantra at that one crucial time then whose fault is it? Did you even know when and how they used it?

And the elephant in the room: when you're healing 8-man content with a sub-par partner and you bravely hold the whole team by yourself for so many long minutes before eventually breaking, does it look like you made valiant efforts and played your very best game? No, it looks like you're incompetent.


Like it or not, you succeed as a team or fail as a team, and responsibilities can't always be clear-cut. I think that's what makes MMOs team games rather than to parallel solo games.