Having a hard time understanding party dynamics.

[Decconi]

I apologize, but help me out here. I just starting playing this game again starting yesterday. I can't quite figure out what the roles are in a group. For example lets say FFXI, there was a couple of DD, a tank, healer, and support. Pretty easy right? It seems different in this game for me.

I ran my first party tonight, I am a CNJ so I was the healer. Well I guess this is where I'm lost. Since the group sizes are 8. I really don't understand how many healers, tanks, and DD are in a group. From what I could tell there were a bunch of tanks (2+,) a few others that can heal, and a couple of DD. But I was the main healer? It was a very odd experience for me as you can tell how I'm rambling.

I died almost every pull from threat, I didn't cure too much, but i died from links constantly. I just don't understand the party make up. I most likely died from a combination of misunderstanding the group make up and what everyone's roles are.

So I guess my question is, could someone explain to me what groups are commonly supposed to look like? I want to be a more effective healer with this knowledge. I mean, are there Off tanks, off healers, etc? Its confusing to me.

Thank you!

[Raldo]

Sounds like the people in your group sucked at keeping adds off the healer. If somebody needs healing and nobody is paying attention to the links, then it's not your fault.

If you're in a party that's pulling links (and you should be, links directly give additional exp!) then someone needs to be paying enough attention to hold hate on the adds.

Only a few pieces of advice I'd give directly to a healer:
1) Don't over-cure. Enmity is tricky with adds, you'll get yourself killed if you overdo it. People can heal themselves a bit, so keeping people at 100% isn't required.
2) Stoneskin is a very low-enmity way of preventing damage, meaning you have to cure less, meaning you pull less hate. AOE stoneskin is great for sapping up the minor damage that the rest of the group takes.
3) Unless they've changed something since pre-1.20, Curaga is a HUGE amount of enmity and should be avoided except for emergencies or when not in battle.


I'm not even going to try to get into party setups, since I've seen so many different ones work in exp parties, including some with no dedicated tank at all. Setups will get thrown for another loop once 1.21 comes along with the job system.

[Estellios]

I want to add that hate works differently in this game than it does in FF11. In FF11, as long as no action was taken against the aggro/linked enemies, they would keep attacking their target and not get hate on anyone healing. In this game, understandably, healing any target that has enmity on that enemy would give you hate like normal. So if your puller gets a bunch of links and you heal them before anyone else has gotten hate on the adds, you are going to be taking hate.

Your party should be splitting up to take care of the adds. Tankier characters (Gladiators and Marauders, occasionally Pugilists) should be holding their own enemies each and building up enmity while the rest of the party gangs up on enemies one by one, either that or have your party split up into units to take care of each add. Provoke and/or Flash should be more than enough hate to prevent enemies from going after you immediately, as long as you don't overcure and possibly stick with Cure initially instead of Cura. As Raldo suggested, keeping Stoneskin on your party as much as possible will help immensely.

Also another note, don't think you have to go with an exact "X Healers, X tanks, X DDs" setups. As long as the party is flexible and everyone has access to some way to heal themselves, you should be able to make do with whatever is available. All the classes are quite versatile. For example, CNJ is the designated healer of the game, but most people underestimate its ability to nuke with aero and stone spells. With Cleric stance up, your damage is actually really high.

[Decconi]

Thanks for the info! I believe it had a lot to do with the lack of tanking by the tanks. Makes me feel better that you guys have responded with a lot of helpful info. Thanks a ton for responding to my call for help. I definitely will feel better LFG again.

Thanks!

[Soukyuu]

Basically what the others said. Usually, one healer per party is fine unless you are fighting tough mobs that are over 5 levels over your level.

As for adds, I usually SS the puller before it moves out and then wait till all adds are claimed then recasts SS on everyone. By the time SS is worn out, the DDs should have generated enough hate so you can heal. I even made a point of NOT healing until everything is claimed, which seems to work after people die a few times.... only had to do it once so far though, so most of the time you won't have to do this.

[Decconi]

Thanks Soukyuu. It was hard for me to heal some of those guys. I forgot that most tanks have healing abilities as well. Learning a little bit each day and from the strong forums support has been great! Thanks much!