Rant on healers acting as a dps role

[Kinseykinz]

I can't find the source (read it sometime this last week), but Y-P recently talked about how people were using healer and tank DPS to clear Alexander content below the expected gear level which...pretty much implies that when at the expected gear threshold that tank and healer DPS shouldn't be required to clear, but if you are below that threshold then healer and tank DPS will be required.

Edit: Found the source
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...w_with_yoship/

The irony in this of course is this:

With higher ilvls, it's much easier to risk tanks and healers in dps stance. So...you know, when you're lower ilvl/learning, you'd prefer to 'turtle up' so to speak, but can't effectively (why healer and tank dps is the meta), but once you have the ivl, it's BURN ALL THE BABIES!!! time anyway, and people naturally would be pushing dps on all roles more.


Still, because those who first cleared it had to do it w/ tanks and heals contributing dps, and since that is actually only easier to do as ilvl's increase, it's generally expected everyone on the team is doing something at all times...and for heals, that means if you're not healing (or refreshing mana for an incoming big healing output moment), you should be dpsing.

On easier content, it's even more expected you assist w/ dps rather than overheal/do nothing.

Basically in any fight, at any time, the secondary healer has 5 options:

1. Assist with healing b/c the incoming damage is more than a solo healer can easily/safely keep up with (only happens at most for 10% of any given fight)
2. Overheal/cause healing partner to overheal b/c you both healing= way more healing output than is required (what would happen if both healed most of fight)
3. DPS. Since healing is covered atm (either by another person or just in general), and since the MP reserves are fine, DPS is a way to contribute to the battle in a positive manner.
4. Stand around doing nothing waiting to be useful.

this last one shouldn't really count , but esp for learning parties, is something to consider as the secondary healer's role too:
5. Be party's 'training wheels'. IE you are 'first raise'/healer of the 'you stood in the bad' etc. In this case, you likely might not be able to dps...but as party learns fight, you should be able to totally be free of this role. and able to do one of the 4 things listed previously.

You need to keep in mind, in some content, even true solo healers (they are the only healer in group atm) find time to dps. If you have the mana, time, and health levels are being maintained, you probably should be dpsing on heals...just like OT's will be in DPS stance until they are needed to tank something. Healers have to do the same. No one would accept the OT just standing off in the corner until they had to swap/pick up adds...same idea for healers. If you only need 2 healers actually healing for 10% of the battle, then for the other 90% someone (or both depending on content) should be dpsing.

[Supersun]

I wasn't saying that healer's shouldn't DPS, but that theoretically they shouldn't be required to DPS to clear a DPS check.

Just because they don't need to DPS does that mean that they shouldn't? Of course not, if anything even though it's not "required" a healer DPSing can create some leeway in case of error or "worst case scenario" and there was no error then you simply finish that much faster.

In terms of laying blame, anyone so quick to lay blame on anyone other than themselves are idiots and surprisingly more often than not the one laying blame is usually the one that was slacking the most.

If "blame" is required, just analyze the situation and try to figure out what everyone could have done better in general and give calm and collected feedback to everyone.

But yeah, will people blame healers because their DPS wasn't high enough. Sure, but that's nothing new. People blame the healers for everything. That's why my personal rule of thumb is, "It's always the DDs fault"