Sunday, September 20, 2015

Earning Commendations as a Healer in FFXIV

There is a minor debate in the FFXIV community as to the proper way to play healers in random groups. FFXIV healing is not super-spammy. If you heal efficiently, you often have several free GCDs. So many good healers add damage during those free GCDs, as damage spells cost very little mana. Indeed, edge healers learn to go into the damage stance (Cleric stance - reduces healing, increases damage) at appropriate times in order to maximize the amount of damage they can do.

This has led to a discussion of the role of healers in random groups. Should you expect the healer in a random group to add damage? Or is a healer who solely heals--as is normal in many other MMOs--acceptable?

This in turn encouraged some good healers conduct experiments on random groups. They did several runs maximizing damage, while still keeping everyone alive. Then they did several runs where they did no damage, and just focused on keeping people topped off. Universally, it's been found that the pure healing runs yield more commendations from the other party members. This implies that the FFXIV community prefers the pure healing style.

This has caused some consternation among the edge healers. Why does the FFXIV community not recognize the optimum play-style?

I think that the answer is more psychological than anything else. In a random group, you don't know how much you can trust the unknown healer. So a healer who doesn't deal damage, but does keep everyone topped off creates a feeling of safety. That gives the other group members confidence and makes life easier for them.

Aggressively dealing damage as a healer generally means letting people drop in health a bit, and not topping them off right away. With an unknown healer, this can be a bit nerve-wracking for the other party members. Is the healer actually bad, and going to let someone die? Do I need to play more defensively to compensate?

So the best way to get commendations as a healer in random groups is to make your group feel utterly safe, and allow them to enjoy a smooth run without concern. In a group where everyone knows and trusts each other, this is not the best way to play. But in a random group, generating trust is often more important than strict performance.

11 comments:

  1. Weird. Most runs I do where the healer _doesn't_ add damage people get snotty about lazy healers. I primarily PLD tank so *shrug* I have enough tools if the healer wants to spam Holy once in a while I can survive just fine.

    Granted, my anecdotes aren't necessarily a good counterpoint, and your hypothesis makes sense to me.

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    1. Well, I've never really seen anyone complain about healers doing dps as either a PLD or WHM, personally. I'm more going off of reddit and forum threads where I've seen this issue being discussed.

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  2. Don't play FFXIV but your explanation certainly seems logical. I'm always worried that people will think I'm flaky when I deal damage as a healer in WoW.

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    1. Personally, when I play my healer, I stay in healing stance and only throw out DoTs for the most part. So far it seems pretty acceptable.

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  3. I was in a run a few months back where a dps got pissy because the Healer was doing dmg. He said he wasn't going to dps until the Healer actually healed. He was kicked a few minutes later.

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    1. Who was kicked, the healer or the dps?

      But yeah, if it appears that the healer is focusing on dps, it can make the other people nervous, since they don't trust the healer yet. The dps chose a bad way of handling the issue, but his fears can be real.

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    2. It was the DPS. We were almost to the first boss. No one was taking damage so it was doing okay. The healers pet was doing the majority of the healing.

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  4. I've had more than a few players tell me to take Cleric Stance (the healers' DPS stance, significantly reduces healing output) off because "my main focus should be healing". I don't think your explanation is correct, honestly. I think it's more of a matter of "less-than-edge" players not recognizing that dealing damage in Cleric Stance if so often optimal play for a healer, not noticing that the healer is taking it off when actually healing, and just following a self-imposed (or brought from other games) mandate that "healers should only heal".

    As for my experience, I've gotten more than a few commendations when DPSing as much as possible, even when doing so caused some deaths (oops!). And I'd never give a commendation to a healer unless I see Cleric Stance pop on as often as possible.

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    1. I don't think you're taking into account the possibility of weak healers. Since you're the healer, you're always competent. But weak healers are an issue in random runs. I main PLD, and very often if the healer "feels" weaker than normal, I'll start being more aggressive with cooldowns to compensate.

      The first thing a group desires is reassurance that the healer is in fact competent.

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  5. This is interesting! I play WHM and average 1 commendation per run. I always assume it's from the tank who also usually gets mine unless they really suck or one DPS is really outstanding. In roulette runs I stance dance quite a bit and no one has ever said anything about it (let's not talk about Bismarck and me forgetting about being in cleric stance, causing a wipe,ahem). I will experiment and not DPS for a couple runs.

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    1. Well, often it won't really matter for comms. A healer who keeps people alive still gets the standard comms. I almost never stance dance as a healer (though I do toss out DoTs), and I get a fair number of comms as well.

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