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Tanking - Are healers suppose to dps/heal?


TheMove

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I have tanked in alot of MMOs and been tanking on my Jugg alot in swtor pre 50. In my flashpoints Im getting alot of healers that throw a couple heals and "try" to dps. Half the time Im struggling just to live poping all my cool downs and meds while I see the stupid healer attacking mobs and I have to spend all my time trying to get the aggro off them. Its making tanking 3xs harder than it should be and a chore.

 

I just wanted to ask if healers are expected to dps in flashpoints? Im getting alot more healers attacking all the mobs than I do in other MMOs.

 

Wanted to check before I start opening my mouth. Its driving me insane.

Edited by TheMove
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I just wanted to ask if healers are expected to dps in flashpoints?

 

If everyone is already topped off and damage is coming in slowly and manageably, most people would expect the healer to toss out some extra DPS. Of course, in the situations you're discussing where you're not even remotely topped off and are struggling just to stay alive, it's not expected in the least.

 

It sounds to me like you're mostly dealing with DPS that queued up as healers for the faster queue: they're not acting like healers because they're not really healers. It's annoying when it happens, but you should not feel like you're providing unwarranted criticism when they're spending more time attacking than healing, especially if they're putting the group at risk by behaving as such.

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I just played a OP speced into heals from lvl 10-40 and easily kept my group healed every flashpoint I took part of.

 

To me it feels like some of these healers are not even speced into healing and they think they can get by. Just wanted to make sure. I will be kicking them from my group from now on.

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I dislike when healers try to DPS instead of watching health bars. Healer DPS is so pitiful, you might as well stand and wait for healing to be done instead.

 

Unless the healer is a discipline priest in WoW (when the discipline priest casts smite on the boss/monster it heals those around the mob), the healer shouldn't be DPSing. I'm pretty sure no healer in Swtor has anything like that though, so they shouldn't be DPSing.

Edited by Chiramu
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I dislike when healers try to DPS instead of watching health bars. Healer DPS is so pitiful, you might as well stand and wait for healing to be done instead.

 

I'll echo what Kitu said and additionally say that every little bit helps. If they're confident they can get back to healing me when I need it then I'm perfectly fine with that. Then again, as the OP points out - that group would be one I too would get nervous about.

 

 

To the OP, that sounds like a case of the cocky-veteran player type. The people who got one toon to 50 and think they know how to play. Perhaps they're bored or trying to relax or cursing at their screen because you aren't tanking to their liking while encounters aren't as quick as they hoped. It happens, you're best bet is to just tough it out and encounter people who you can enjoy playing with and in return they enjoy playing with you and then kill and mame together.

Edited by tXHereticXt
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loads of times i have to kill some nonelites myself if i dont want them hitting me when i play healer... Ofc keeping the group alive has priority, but i´ll keep throwing dots and lighting at mobs as long as my group is topped of and i have enough force to do so and still keep my group alive.
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There are a lot of "DPS" healers in the lower levels, which is why I refuse to tank lower level FPs. I also play a healer and get annoyed when DPS queues as a tank. It's a two way street with both roles doing it and making the other role struggle.

 

As far as normal mobs beating on the healer, It's the tanks job to hold aggro on the more threatening mobs, silvers/golds/champs/boss the normals should be killed first by the dps which is why most tanks will maybe hit them with an aoe or default attack just to get initial aggro. But it's really the DPSs job to know the kill order and actually do it.

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I have tanked in alot of MMOs and been tanking on my Jugg alot in swtor pre 50. In my flashpoints Im getting alot of healers that throw a couple heals and "try" to dps. Half the time Im struggling just to live poping all my cool downs and meds while I see the stupid healer attacking mobs and I have to spend all my time trying to get the aggro off them. Its making tanking 3xs harder than it should be and a chore.

 

I just wanted to ask if healers are expected to dps in flashpoints? Im getting alot more healers attacking all the mobs than I do in other MMOs.

 

Wanted to check before I start opening my mouth. Its driving me insane.

 

This may not relate to you specifically but on the whole the lower level FPs and Heroics can really suck for a healer -- between poor tanks, poor dps, poor CC and poorly geared players.

 

While I think a healer should focus on healing and staying alive (both attention and energy points) I've been in groups were my (appreciable, but not sustained) DPS was more effective than healing to help eliminate the aggro that I struggled to keep healing at lower level. Say when an enemy is close to dead, especially.

 

Also, I don't know if some might be generating Tactical Advantage (which provides more heals) by using Shiv -- which isn't the way I approach it in PvE but it could be another reason.

 

Otherwise, it could be people not playing their role, which is too common. I have had the same problem as the OP repeatedly with my Guardian -- not getting heals for whatever reason. Though sometimes the healer is incapacitated and no one is defending him/her.

 

Also, too, if you're going to be the primary tank... say something. It's amazing how often that isn't established. As in "If you want me to draw aggro, I need regular heals."

 

P.S. Advise the uniformed healer to concentrate on cc if they are bored and have energy to waste. Also, if people rush and get out of the healer's LoS, that's partly their fault.

 

In any case, I don't think the majority really appreciates the roles in full and the tactical POV until you play both tank and healer.

Edited by ProtocolX
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I've been both a tank and healer in several mmo's.

 

In this game my healing char is a level 45 merc.

 

And found that healing in this game is a lot different than for instance in wow:

Healer dps is quite helpfull, and what's the use of standing still when your team is healed and you got some hot's on all of them?

 

it's better to off dps with auto attacks/unload when you have 0 heat.

ofcourse do not use any heat abilities when the team needs healing. save your heat for that.

but auto attacking is only helpfull, not harmfull with a teamfight, and in most bossfights I still seem to be able to do around 20-50k damage done on the boss, while keeping my team fully healed as every auto attack I do is around 1k damage total as healer.

 

Imo a healers rotation of importance:

 

Keeping the healer alive> Keeping the tank alive>Keeping the dps alive> crowd control>removing debuffs>dps

Edited by Eterud
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On trash pulls people will never be below 90% health and I will dps and cc in between in FPs and never have a problem with that. Only time anyone has a problem doing their job and more in a FP is if they are terrible or just not paying attention.

 

Bosses and Ops I will not waste time on trying to dps though as you're better off making sure people are being topped off and your energy bar close to full for the big spikes.

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I dislike when healers try to DPS instead of watching health bars. Healer DPS is so pitiful, you might as well stand and wait for healing to be done instead.

 

Pitiful or not, it can be the difference between wiping or not.

Couple of weeks ago we were on EC hm, with 2 new dps getting to know the fights. Probes on minefield were enraging on us, so I whispered the other sorc healer to put Affliction and Crushing Darkness on it. It was no problem, since everything was being interrupted so not much damage and we managed to get a kill. Between unnecesarly wiping or kicking 2 new people, I chose to dps a bit. Not a big deal and it does make a difference.

 

 

 

loads of times i have to kill some nonelites myself if i dont want them hitting me when i play healer... Ofc keeping the group alive has priority, but i´ll keep throwing dots and lighting at mobs as long as my group is topped of and i have enough force to do so and still keep my group alive.

 

Yup, I have to do that bunch of times. Lots of DPS still oblivious about killing the weakling first so they don't go for the healer.

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I dislike when healers try to DPS instead of watching health bars. Healer DPS is so pitiful, you might as well stand and wait for healing to be done instead..

 

My sawbones can take out a weak in one hit, the same as my sentinel and she can't do it any faster. I have out dps'ed a dps guardian in a trash pull in HM TfB (lucky crit hit on a flyby, I guess, but pulled over 2000 dps and 1300 hps (like 970 EHS)). similarly geared dps will do better dps than me, but I know I can out dps most Tionese and Columi players for short burst.

 

That said, I don't because my job is to heal and even when I have everyone topped off I don't throw out my best damage producers because I have to maintain energy reserves to heal. The only time I worry about dps more than healing is when the tank and dps refuse to do their job and I am tanking the mobs while they have gold fever. Then I will kill the mobs (still with one eye on the tank) before resuming heals as normal. Even when killing the mods, I stay ready to throw a heal at the tank and to a lesser extent dps, so I still am not using my most energy consuming attacks, unless coolhead is up.

 

My job is to heal, first and formost, I will heal anyone anytime even through their own stupidity. I once healed a dps commando through standing in lava the entire fight in HM EV.

Edited by mikebevo
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I usually get annoyed if the healer doesn't DPS in FPs. Especially since 75% of the time the DPS are horrible.

 

Honestly going to start tanking as rage spec in soresu with tank gear. Can't stand fights taking forever, especially in the T1 stuff. Most of the time I'd rather have 3 DPS... 25k health with solid avoidance means I'm not dying anytime soon lol

Edited by Racter
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I play my 50 Sage as a healer/DPS hybrid because I find that fun. But not to worry as I almost never am involved in group play so I'm unlikely to run into you in these situations, and even if I did, I would advertise myself as a hybrid to set expectations (I'm really "only" missing the area heal, but of course that can be a biggie in certain situations).

 

However, my best method of force regen on this character is through DPS (TK throw), so I do that a lot since it has 0 activation and CD and is thus my spam ability if I'm not needing to do anything else.

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If im in a group i will always primarily chuck heals at the tank, and a few onto anyone else who might need a boost. If no one is taking much damage then i will throw dps out for a bit, even if its just to build my charges up.

 

What i wont do however is keep healing dps toons who continue to pull aggro off the tank!

Edited by Ravnik
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Really depends on the healer. My friend Scott played as a Healer Merc (or whatever the BH healer is), and in EC SM (and HM) would pop out some DPS when he had time, but he never stopped healing in order to do some DPS, on the other hand we had another healer that could barely handle healing the raid, and never DPS'd.

 

I think everyone would take a healer who could throw out some damage every now and then, as long as the group (FP or raid) stayed up to full health.

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There are some things you might consider before you start chewing on people.

 

1. If you're talking about a sage healer, both of their big heals will often overheal if cast on a target with more than 80% health. If that target already has the Rejuvenate HoT on them. If you've got the lockout debuff from Force Armor on, they're going to let you fluctuate between 65% and 95% health ~ In most cases.

 

2. There is a bug that sometimes causes the health bars in the party frame to not be updated accurately. Sometimes they do not show that players are damaged, and other times they show damage that has already been healed. The bug doesn't appear to effect everyone, and it doesn't show up too frequently. But it obviously can cause a party wipe as a healer might drop the tank, or run themselves OOF trying to heal damage that just won't go away.

 

3. Pushback messes up healing a lot. If your healers are getting torn to pieces by adds, they have no choice but to dps and heal themselves. If you're expecting the DPS players to take care of the adds, and they are not, you better expect to use your defensive CDs on rotation. If you find that the DPS are heading straight to the target your tanking in every fight, keep a close watch on your healer ~ or you won't get any healing.

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That was one of things I always hated about healing in EQ2, the expectation there was X healing AND Y DPS. It was obnoxiou and if you wiped on content it was almost always blamed on the healer because they spent too much time healing and not DPSing, or too much time DPSing and not healing. You just couldn't win.

 

I always tell my healers to throw DPS as long as the following criteria are met...

a) everyone's health is at a managable state AND

b) you will not overtax your resources AND

c) you have nothing else to do

 

A sage doting up the boss or a scoundrel dropping a flyby on the boss does me no good if a minute later they are out of resources and we are wiping because they spent their resources trying to help out with DPS and now can't heal anyone. And if we are hitting enrage and wiping then it's the DPS that has to get their game up, not the healers needing to DPS.

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I have tanked in alot of MMOs and been tanking on my Jugg alot in swtor pre 50. In my flashpoints Im getting alot of healers that throw a couple heals and "try" to dps. Half the time Im struggling just to live poping all my cool downs and meds while I see the stupid healer attacking mobs and I have to spend all my time trying to get the aggro off them. Its making tanking 3xs harder than it should be and a chore.

 

I just wanted to ask if healers are expected to dps in flashpoints? Im getting alot more healers attacking all the mobs than I do in other MMOs.

 

Wanted to check before I start opening my mouth. Its driving me insane.

 

Yes and no, I have both level 50 healer and tank..as a healer and I will dps if needed. My primary focus is to make sure everyone is in good health. However, if you find yourself hitting enraged timers due to low dps..the a healer needs to dps..

 

If you have good dps, that is a different story. However, I will go with my guild that is all in 61's and or 63's. and mobs drop like flies..I might throw out a bit of dps here and there just because I can.

 

So to keep it simple, it all depends..group makeup, gear make up..etc.. Also if you healer is good and knows how to manage resources. New level 50 healers, I would avoid any dps until you are better geared and have a better understanding of end game healing.

Edited by Phill
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I've never done a healer until SW:TOR, usually dps and it was initially hard to get out of that mindset:)

 

Personally, if I'm there to heal then that's what I do. Force Armor, Force Lift etc...sure but I don't go looking for the chance to toss out some DPS. I'd rather a fight take a little longer without my DPS contributing, then have a wipe because I miscalculated on resources or something.

 

That being said, I don't try to keep everyone at full. That's not my job. My job is to keep everyone standing. Don't ***** at me if your health drops to 50% or less, especially if your AOE broke my CC and you got reamed. Don't ***** at me because you're jumping all over the place breaking LOS. Don't make healing harder than it has to be or I won't go out of my way. Unless you're the tank, in which case I always follow your lead.

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That being said, I don't try to keep everyone at full. That's not my job. My job is to keep everyone standing. Don't ***** at me if your health drops to 50% or less, especially if your AOE broke my CC and you got reamed. Don't ***** at me because you're jumping all over the place breaking LOS. Don't make healing harder than it has to be or I won't go out of my way. Unless you're the tank, in which case I always follow your lead.

 

This.

 

I wouldn't play a healer that did nothing but heal unless the fight required it. And IMO if you disagree feel free to get another. Especially annoying when you have to start cc'ing and some d.a. keeps breaking. That's 95% a dps though.

 

Like the others have said, sounds like a class queued as healer while dps spec'd.

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It's because of how the group finder works. If you're a class that has a healing tree, even if you're dps spec, when you Q for a flashpoint, by default, it selects Heals and DPS. So a lot of times, DPS who Q don't unclick the heal option and they're selected as the healer for the flashpoint and half the time don't even know it, or just refuse to do it.
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