Can Healers Stop Running Ahead in Dungeons

[Shurrikhan]

I'd have to still disagree. Perhaps if the post I quoted said "Most boring in some situation, most high-pressure in others." I would agree; however the way the post was written made them sound simultaneous. "Push the button or everybody dies!" is not simultaneously dull and high-pressure just because pushing a button is dull; it's just high pressure, because even though the action is dull, it's the context which is exciting. Whereas for something to be dull, there usually isn't any excitement at all, context or no.

Which is where I'll go back to the beginning of my post: if he separated the situations, I might have agreed. However, I will hold that a job cannot simultaneously be boring and high-pressure. Especially when that second argument is a weak point as well; I've heard tanks say that tanking is the easiest job in the game, then turn around and say healing is the most taxing and high pressure. Only for healers to disagree and say DPSing is the most high pressure due to managing a long stringed rotation in the middle of a lot of complex mechanics.

Actually, the more I type the more something comes to mind. Everything is dull in dungeon based content, and everything is high pressure in the harder content. Which hearkens back to context is king. So I'll cede that something can be dull in one context, and high pressure in another context entirely. However, in dungeon content, all three roles are just as dull.

I guess we can agree to disagree then.

I don't find min-maxing even leveling dungeons at all dull, once there are tool sufficient for there to be a difference in my gameplay and the total time taken between them. There's opportunity, and roughly proportionate reward, and therefore there is a manageable challenge to it.

The fact that that min-maxing isn't made necessary by fatal punishment doesn't take away from its opportunities for engagement. Inversely, something that provides no challenge to the player beyond the basest means is still going to be dull, no matter the pressure placed upon it. Any duty that, to you, "would be boring if not for the pressure placed upon you" is something I wouldn't start if I knew such was the case, would despise completing, and would leave the moment my actions weren't placing others at risk, never to do it again. It would high pressure, and it would be painfully dull. To me, those two things can be simultaneous. If I have to force myself engaged, rather than the gameplay itself engaging me, that's boring -- no matter how well I might accomplish its job for it. You don't stick 6 players in an empty desert and say that the desert itself wasn't dull just because the players found out they could enjoy talking to each other... in the complete absence of anything else to do.

A competitive match in Overwatch or SC2, etc. can be duller than a non-ranked one if there are fewer opportunities to actually do something, to outplay in macro or micro. Stakes alone do not engagement make. Nor does the possibility of time wasted. That's just an extreme level of sunk cost fallacy at play if one comes to think so.

Again, I'm not saying that tanking in XIV is dull, to me, at least. Neither do I find it particular high-pressure. But no amount of pressure is necessarily going to make it less boring. You can be bored while being frazzled and stressed out. Their not mutual exclusives. So if someone does find XIV tanking to be both dull and too pressured... so be it.

[Dzian]

One of the reasons tanking is dull is because there's no variety in it. You know exactly when the tank buster will happen and exactly when you'll need cooldowns. And you know all of this before youve even pulled a boss. Because it's exactly the same as the last time you caught him. That is dull bland and boring.. i use to main a tank roll but these days I just don't bother it's so mundane..

They need to make encounters less scripted and more random. Throw out a tank buster when I'm not expecting one make fights unpredictable would also keep them interesting for longer as each encounter would be slightly different to the last and not an exact repeat

[Dualgunner]

You can be bored while being frazzled and stressed out. Their not mutual exclusives. So if someone does find XIV tanking to be both dull and too pressured... so be it.

I'll agree to disagree, here. I'm trying to figure out the best way to word it, but I feel that boredom and high-pressure are mutually exclusive things. Of all the emotions I'd say I have pushing a button to stop a lot of people from dying, to go back to your first response to me, I wouldn't say boredom is one of them. That seems to be where we differ as people, because where you say you wouldn't play high pressure content that bored you, I'd say the high pressure is the engaging factor.

[Sunspawn]

One of the reasons tanking is dull is because there's no variety in it. You know exactly when the tank buster will happen and exactly when you'll need cooldowns. And you know all of this before youve even pulled a boss. Because it's exactly the same as the last time you caught him. That is dull bland and boring.. i use to main a tank roll but these days I just don't bother it's so mundane..

They need to make encounters less scripted and more random. Throw out a tank buster when I'm not expecting one make fights unpredictable would also keep them interesting for longer as each encounter would be slightly different to the last and not an exact repeat

Except that tankbusters are mostly intended to be unsurvivable without cooldowns, so throwing tankbusters when you are not ready for them will just kill you without you being able to do anything about it.

[Zeldert-Castiel]

As someone who tried all roles, this made me uncomfortable...

I started a a healer, and I know that healers run ahead is bad since not all tanks can pull immediately, especially when I'm overgeared. I tend to run between DPSes to make sure I don't accidentally pull mobs.
When running dungeons and trials as a tank, I make sure the party's ready for my pull. I'm okay with healers and DPSes who accidentally pull mobs, not the one who pull constantly. It's not their job to pull. I make sure the healer can heal me.

[Aelio]

I'm surprised this thread is still going lol. It's all just common sense to me, the tank tanks, the tank pulls, the tank takes the damage, etc. Things happen and that's not a problem, I don't really sweat the small stuff. Nobody is required to go at anyone's preferred speed. I've even had tanks that I can tell are trying to learn a new class or something and this personally doesn't bother me at all. I just sit back, heal, and support the group. If I was a dps, I would have more of an urge to kill things and stuff might happen, that's fine, things don't have to be perfect, just don't be a belligerent douche lol. Some people have speedy expectations and that's on them. There is no "entitlement" here, it's called game mechanics lol. Y'all are crazy

[Shurrikhan]

I'm surprised this thread is still going lol. It's all just common sense to me, the tank tanks, the tank pulls, the tank takes the damage, etc.

It ends up less than common sense when you go from "we should clear as quickly as we can" to "only X may take damage, and even if X is in a better position than Y to fill Y's role for a few GCDs, and vice versa, neither should ever do anything but their own tasks."

What's the harm in someone ripping off a tank if the ripped mob is not going to lose out on AoE damage and will die before reaching the DPS without the DPS even having to run? What's the harm in a healer gathering mobs for AoEs, if his sprint is still available while the tank's is not, if he can take literally no effective damage from doing so? The mobs were still being tanked in either case -- which is to say that they were handled in a way that reduced incoming damage and improved the efficiency of damage the party could put out (through (a) sooner access to full AoEs and/or (b) through fewer healer GCDs that need be lost to healing or fewer tank GCDs that need be spent in a damage-reducing stance).

One can't help but wonder what would have happened to these specialist-as-the-only-one-who-can-complete-a-role-related-task hyper-fixated people in A4S during the isolated add-fight when a tank isn't available...

You lost me at algebra.

X and Y are just shorthand for "any given person" and "any second given person".

To reiterate more simply -- tanking (reducing effective raid damage taken and increasing raid damage doable by opening up space, redirecting enemy attention, and repositioning or grouping enemy mobs) something that is something any character can perform. It is any action which acts to that effect. It is not, however, any action as performed by a tank. A tank has the best toolkit for tanking, but that does not mean that a tank will tank simply because it possesses a, in most ways, superior tanking toolkit; that toolkit needs to actually be used effectively. Similarly, that toolkit does not make it uniquely capable of most of those tasks. Anyone who can create distance over which enemy attacks are ineffectual, bait out AoEs away from others, and gather enemies, etc., can to some degree tank. "Tanking hits" in the sense of surviving otherwise one-shot attacks (or, "tank-busters") is the only unique advantage available to tanking specialists.

Far too often people conflate a tank's unique ability to survive a massive strike, or their greater mitigation efficiency, with a need to command attention of every mob from the moment they are engaged to the moment they die, even if it means taking longer and, in effect, more damage, all without the risk of even taking an extra healing GCD actually paying off. If it's best practice, it will correlate pretty well directly to speed. If it has no, or a negative, impact on speed, then something's gone wrong -- likely due to a role being either slightly misinterpreted, or not capitalized upon well enough.

[Aelio]

It ends up less than common sense when you go from "we should clear as quickly as we can" to "only X may take damage, and even if X is in a better position than Y to fill Y's role for a few GCDs, and vice versa, neither should ever do anything but their own tasks.".

You lost me at algebra. All anyone has to do is their best, nothing else is required of them. It's all about expectation at the end of the day. Sometimes people expect the roads to be clear when they drive to work, sometimes they aren't cause that's life. Sometimes, you expect someone to know the dungeon and their class like the back of their hand and also to move at your desired speed and pull the desired amount of mobs you see fit; at the end of the day it's expectation. Maybe it's my expectation that people understand the role of a tank, I suppose I'm guilty for that but the mechanics of the game, and pretty much any game, lay out what the role of the tank, healer, and dps are supposed to be, we wouldn't have roles for them otherwise.

If you are in a group where people are being obnoxious, just do you, all you can do at the end of the day is the best you can, don't sweat it. Hopefully these "experienced wonderful players" will offer advice and try to help but if the end result ends up in you getting kicked then so be it. I haven't ran into that myself but just saying, don't get discouraged. These things take time. It takes time to learn mechanics, dungeons etc and to be able to perform, if you choose to do so (it's really not required and sometimes just makes things more stressful imo), how some of these other players are performing. Tanks can be just as guilty of this as well. Running ahead without paying any mind to your group or even testing the capabilities of your healer isn't a wise decision imo. There's that expectation again... Now those that accept the consequences of their actions and provide constructive criticism and adapt to the party to make it through, I don't have a problem with. To be honest, I don't have a problem with any of it anymore. You play how you want, I'm gonna play how I want. If you don't like it, you can vote dismiss, I'll get into another group in 5 seconds lol. And that's the mentality people should have. You can't control what other people do, and if they have narrow minded expectations, that's on them.

All of that being said, yes we all like for things to move rather quickly and to get done in a timely fashion, I want this too. I've had some pretty bad tanks myself that don't know how to hold aggro etc. and it's frustrating but I just do my best to support the group and make it through, that's me. I do offer advice but sometimes they don't read lol.

[Aelio]

What I'm trying to say is, leave others to their expectations, you do the best you can and know that that is good enough. In time you will learn, you will improve, or maybe you're just fine the way you are and you just need a different group. It's pretty circumstantial so play it by ear but the last thing you want are people who are afraid to tank/heal because of others expectation and a hostile community.

[Aelio]

One can't help but wonder what would have happened to these specialist-as-the-only-one-who-can-complete-a-role-related-task hyper-fixated people in A4S during the isolated add-fight when a tank isn't available...

Moving past the math, yes this is another point I would like to make. I think sometimes, I felt this way myself starting out, people think that cause they are the tank they should control every tiny aspect there is. I strongly believe you should follow your tank and have a little trust but there may be times were help is good and other roles can do things. This is maybe another thing that should be said, don't feel like you have to control everything as a tank cause you can't. The more you accept that the more fun you will have. If others want to play as they will, let them, it is a game at the end of the day.

There is constructive outside role playing (not that kind) and there is unconstructive. I'm mainly referring to the unconstructive but on the same note, don't feel as a tank that you have to control every little aspect. This honestly took me time to learn. If someone wants to run off and do w/e, there is literally nothing you can do about it anyway. Which goes back to my do the best you can and that's it. Don't feel bad cause someone ran off and did w/e they wanted, if you can grab w/e they did then cool, if not, cool still. Be breezy and just do the best you can.

Edit: I don't read all of your stuff for some reason but I see you were more being overly critical of the role of a tank to always take the dmg etc. Of course there are instances, specially boss fights, where the tank should remain on the boss and the DPS should handle adds. If the tank can grab them kudos but many times yall can drop em just as fast. I was referring mainly to the common sense of roles and common sense in general but thanks for the input, I hope I added some clarity to the situation.