Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Love rather than loot will turn me into a healer

There’s a discussion going on in the blogosphere about if you should hand out some extra rewards to tanks and healers. It sparked from a guest post at World of Matticus by Gordon from We Fly Spitfire. Blessing of Kings, Big Bear Butt , Spinksville and Forbearance among others have commented on it.

A lot has been said about how much or how little the dpsers are contributing to the success of the group. Some argue that we’re quite disposable, more or less dead meat nowadays (as opposed to when there at least was a need for good, reliable cc), while others point out that enrage timers are hard to beat without sufficient dps and that GOOD dpsers are just as rare as good tanks and healers.

The enjoyable stress
Gordon talks a lot about the stress and pressure that comes with the tanking and healer roles. He seems to regard this task as a burden. The poor tanks and healers have to work harder than anyone else in the group and this justifies an extra reward.

Frankly I just can’t see it that way. When did running an instance become a burden or a job? I thought we did this for relaxation and entertainment (with possible exception for a few gold farmers, if there still are any around these days).

Admittedly my experiences as a tank or a healer are restricted to my druid alt who is currently lvl 73, so I don’t claim to be any expert. But as far as I’m concerned, the pressure put on me as a healer is a reward in itself. It’s the very reason for me to want to turn into a tree!

I enjoy the feeling that I’m really making a difference. An instance can be four-manned or three-manned, but only as long as there’s a healer and a tank in the group. As a healer I’m running the show as a team with the tank. I enjoy the adrenaline rushes, not only during the bosses, but during almost every single pack. I enjoy sweating and swearing and responding to the challenge! I enjoy not being able to follow the guild chat since’ I’m totally focused on what I’m doing.

There isn’t such a thing as a facerolling easy instance as long as I’m on my little druid. The stress kick I get from a normal five-man instance would require a major new boss fight if I was on my mage. I find it highly enjoyable and it definitely isn’t something I expect extra rewards for doing.

Encouraging healing and tanking
Still – I admit there is an issue concerning the incentives for choosing a role as a tank or healer. Apparently something is keeping people away from it - otherwise we wouldn’t face the unbalances in the Dungeonfinder system, where a healer or tank will get a group within a second, while a dps can expect to queue for at least 10 minutes, if not more.

The question is: can we get more willing tankers or healers simply bribing them with extra emblems, gold or even special drops, only-for-them? I sincerely doubt it.

The best thing that Blizzard possibly could to do encourage players to try out a healing or tanking role is already done. It was when they introduced the dual spec, so that all players always could have an easily available dps spec to bring out for questing – either for levelling purposes or for knocking off dailies. Gone are the days when healers had to either waste tons of gold on respeccing or put up with painfully slow killing as they were questing.

However it’s evident that the removal of this obstacle wasn’t enough. There still aren’t enough people who are willing to bring up as many new tanks and healers as we need to make balanced groups to beat the content.

The lack of patience
I think the major problem is player attitude – how we treat our healers and tanks. There is absolutely no forbearance, no patience, no understanding for the fact that everyone is new at some point and has to start somewhere – gearing up and learning to play their class in this specific roll.

Although you can gear up a bit outside of instances, it’s rather hard not to say impossible to learn how to heal a party by questing. You have to make your errors and climb the learning curve in a real instance environment. Even players who realize this need seem to think: “fine, you need to learn, but please don’t do it in my party. I don’t have time for this.”

Calli at Pew Pew Lazers put it well in a recent rant, which has epic proportions but is well worth reading.

He points out the rather ridiculous expectations players of today have on the time and easiness of an instance run and the gear level of the tanks. Some players even prefer a deserter debuff and making the queue once again to giving a tank with less than 4 pieces of T9 a shot.

I can’t but agree. It’s absolutely astonishing how spoiled players are, how we expect literally every encounter in the game to be on farm mode from the very beginning and any instance to be cleared without any causalities within 20 minutes.

If a new tank takes his time to actually mark things and ponder a bit upon on how to make a pull or wait for the healer to gain mana, you can bet that someone will yell: “Gogogo”, followed by a “Gtg soon, hurry!”

And I honestly don’t think ANY kind of extra loot can be enough to compensate for some of the douchebaggery fresh tanks had healers have to put up with.

What I want as a healer
My druid has recently taken her first stumbling steps waving her branches in the Northrend instances. What will it take to make her continue to offer her healing services through the Dungeon finder system, rather than questing, hiding in the shadows as a kitty or just giving up the whole project, sticking to one of my dps characters?

Well, it takes two things. The first, and definitely the most crucial one, is cooperative tanks. Tanks who don’t dismiss me when I admit that I’m new to healing, but rather adjust their pace and the size of packs they’re pulling to what I’m capable of healing through. Tanks who give me time, if not to loot and skin (oh what a mistake to pick skinning as a profession for a healer!), at least enough for me to have a drink every now and then.

The second thing it takes is a little bit of encouragement from the fellow players in the party. You can’t overestimate how much the feedback you get from your first healing or tanking experiences ever in the game mean - how it can inspire you to pick a challenging, stressful path– or how it can scare you away from ever trying such a thing again.

A few days ago I ran my first Nexus and UK in a random group consisting of only players at the right level. And I was lucky enough to get one of those insightful and patient tanks. Of course I overhealed a lot, nervously staring at the health bars, resulting in rather long drinking pauses when the party had to wait patiently for me. Of course I got tunnel vision, resulting in rather stupid standing-in-fire actions from my side. But somehow we managed to make our way through it and the party was up for another instance with me as a healer. Words can’t describe what a boost this was to my self confidence!

As we separated after UK, as I had to leave for real life stuff, the leader said: “I’m sure you’ll make a fine healer at lvl 80”. It may not sound as anything special, but I tell you, for the terrified newbie healer, it meant more than any drop Gordon could have brought me. I was exhausted from the tension and strain, but my healing heart was glowing with pride.

My simple conclusion is: All you need is love.

Give me a cheer and a hug and I’ll heal my arse off for you in any instance you like. Regardless of what awards it offers.

35 comments:

MLW said...

There is still a hierarchy of disposable players. When a DPS dies, life goes on. When a healer dies, you're on borrowed time. When the tank dies, the fight is over and everyone loses. Only some deaths are the fault of the player, but your mistakes matter more when your death matters.

You don't just need love. Some roles need more love than others.

Anonymous said...

The problem is that there is nothing anyone can do to -enforce- a positive attitude, so that isn't a workable solution. I agree that a group that is more polite, more skilled and more knowledgeable would be the best thing we can ask for as support roles. That just isn't going to happen. What is being suggested is a form of enticement from Blizzard, a way to say "you'll deal with extremely crappy people, but look! Goodies!" Personally, I'm ambivalent to the proposal; I will heal my one heroic a day on each of my characters anyway.

Anonymous said...

I have not tanked since the LFD tool came out. I started tanking a couple of weeks before the LFD came out. I have only tanked outside of my guild once and I have found that running with guildies is more forgiving than a PUG. There are still a lot of instances that I have not run yet. Personally, I am not sure that there is any reward out there that would get me to run as a tank in a PUG. Being in that stage in between confidence and lack of it I am not sure that there are a lot of players that will tolerate my pace or lack of intimate knowledge of the instances.

To me an enjoyable run out weighs any possible reward.

Klepsacovic said...

How to be a new tank in 5-mans: A brief guide.
1) Communicate with the healer. They are your best friend. Your lifeline. They complete you.
2) Go at your own pace. Let DPS die if they pull. If you talked with the healer, they will play their part of not bailing out impatient idiots.
That's about it.

Ngita said...

Running a heroic is not a burden. Gearing a tank to the point where dps dont instantly leave ie 4pce t9 is somewhat of a problem.

Tanking or healing a instance knowing that the momentary distraction of the phone/doorbell ringing or someone having a real life conversation will lead to deaths/wipes people leaving is a burden As dps? you can just follow/auto attack. If you attack the wrong target 90% of the time the tank/healer will save you anyway.

This was a group in heroic UP 2 days ago, Zone in, buff, mage starts a table and tank is pulling. Run ahead heal the tank. Go back to grab some food and the phone rings, Its the boss asking how my day went, I type wait please and 5 seconds later the tank has pulled out of los, I run into los, tell the boss to wait. tank has double pulled and is at 30% hp, Tank dies 2 seconds later, we all die. Tank says you suck, leaves party, another dps leaves party and we requeue for another tank. In the meantime i finish my 60 second phone conversation which is basically no problems, enjoy your holiday.

Fitz said...

Learning to play a healer for Larisa is likely a lot like me learning to play a tank over at Healer Trek. However, my foray into the tanking world with my Death Knight has been fun and I've learned a lot more about seeing the dungeons and the pulls so differently now. Healing is definitely the way I wow, so I'll throw some HoT's and encouragement your way anytime! Good luck with the druid.

And don't let one or two bad experiences in LFG determine your fate. I've met some real mean diva tanks as well as some really wonderful tanks. Hang in there!

Tessy said...

I want what you want. Give me love and understanding and I can heal anything for you.

However, you often get the opposite in randoms, or at least often enough to make you feel like you never want to do it again.

It's come to the point where I spent 1 k gold on a dual spec for my priest and rather wait ten minutes to get her a dps spot than get an insta-spot as a healer.

It would require really awesome and guaranteed loot for me to go healing pugs with her again.

Leeho said...

I can't see where does the "healing and tanking is harder than dps-ing" thing come from.
On my shammy - enh\resto - i heal through everything but progress raids just cause healing is way easier, and i don't want to be focused so much while running old content, like heroics, weekly dungeons or ToC.
My friend doesn't tank on his feral - cause it's piss easy and boring. Stay there, smash one button. He runs heroics as dps.
There are easy-to-play dps specs, there are hard-to-play tank and healing specs, but not all of them are.

Kyff said...

What strange game are you playing, wehere a healer at level 73 of 80 levels is considered a noob?

You should know how to heal and develop sufficient self esteem way earlier.

Vorne said...

Bottom line here is 5 or 10 toons go into a instance all have a part to play, all are needed to finish that instance and if you lose your Dps you die as well.
If for any reason Blizz decided to give extra rewards to tanks and healers i would stop doing instances on that day and would call for a realm wide Dps strike , dunno if that would work but hey ya never know :)

Larísa said...

@Jormundgaard: it also depends on the experience. A new tank or healer needs more appreciation and compassion than an experienced one imo.

@moarhps: I honestly can’t think of any offer of extra loot that would be sufficient to cover for bad player attitudes.


@Anonymous: I feel the same. But at some point you need to take the step. And besides there aren’t enough alts in my guild at the appropriate level to make up a full party whenever I’m up for an instance, so if I want to try instance running on my druid I just have to do it, scary or not.

@Klepsacovic: That’s a very nice guide!

@Ngita: that’s true. You really can’t take your eyes of the screen on those roles. But still I think it’s more a matter of mentality than of the possible rewards when you decide to tank or heal.

@Fitz: oh yes, I definitely agree that the instances are completely different when you see them from another perspective.

@Tessy: ouch. It hasn’t been that bad for me – yet. But then I’m far from entering heroics. I suspect that can be much worse.

@Olga: I guess everything becomes easy once you know your stuff. To me healing and tanking is extremely complicated, but it’s probably got to do with my lack of experience.

@Kyff: this is an effect of the rather quick levelling these days. Combine the lower amount of required xp with being rested and carrying heirloom gear… You don’t spend that much time on each level. And besides I found it much harder than I had thought to find groups as I was levelling. So it turned out to be more of questing and less of instance running than I had hoped for. Because of this I’m still quite new to this and therefore lack some confidence. The random dungeon finder will probably change the situation. I have a guildie levelling a dk, and we have plans on doing dungeons now, with him as a tank and me as a healer. Then we can fill up with random dps:ers. I think that will be a good way for me to get more experience without being to afraid and intimidated by some scrub “gogogo-players.”

@Vorne: yeah, I would agree with Jong at Forbearance in this one. In the end it's all about teamwork.

We Fly Spitfires said...

I think you said it well yourself:

"I think the major problem is player attitude – how we treat our healers and tanks. There is absolutely no forbearance, no patience, no understanding for the fact that everyone is new at some point and has to start somewhere – gearing up and learning to play their class in this specific roll."

Basically this is why tanking and healing is more stressful: other player's attitudes towards you. It's very hard to slack as a tank or healer and get away with it but on the contrary, DPS classes aren't under the same pressure and often it will go unnoticed if they take their eye off the ball for a few minutes. This is a strong case as to why DPSing is more 'enjoyable' and certainly more popular.

On the subject of rewards, I'd like to say that the article draws comparisons between real society and gaming. Workers quite frequently get performance bonuses in real life due to our capitalistic nature - we reward with material goods. It's why employees get attracted to banks with huge bonuses. Whether it's right or wrong, it's unfortunately something that goes on.

Anyhoo, nice post :) /hug

We Fly Spitfires said...

Oh I forgot to add one thing!

Before you dimiss the relationship between bonuses in real life to rewards in a computer game by saying that aren't related, remember that games like WoW already reward those that work the 'hardest' - raiders. Raid rewards are certainly more attractive that non-raid rewards in order to reflect the extra time and effort required to obtain them. This is undeniably a capitalistic tendancy that mimics real life.

If a game like WoW was to institute real equality, then everyone would be given a full set of raid gear the moment they logged into the game, regardless of what they've achieved. Essentially the online version of Communism :)

Anyway, sorry for the rambles!

Carra said...

Any post that features a Beatles automatically gets twice as good ;)

I've said it dozens of times before: people are afraid of taking up the responsibility of tanking or healing. Part of that does indeed come from the fact that people have no patience with new players. And no major changes such as dual specs are going to change this behavior.

There's one simple solution: add more DPS to a group. One tank, one healer, five dps? Would lower the queues for DPS.

Lucrosus, US-Hyjal said...

I kind of wish there was an additonal checkbox in the LFG tool: "Speed Run". If you're overgeared and are expecting the same, check this box, and get grouped with people with ilvl 232+ gear. If you dont check that box, you get grouped with people with lower gear ilvl. Gear level isnt everything, but it at least can tell you you're with toons who are new to the instances or used to them.

That being said, I play a mage as a main, a tree as a "main alt", and am bringing a prot pally into the fold as a third. I think all parts, DPS, heals, tank, are equal but different. DPS isn't necessarily just spamming spells. If the healer pulls aggro, try to pick up that mob. Look for curses to decurse, know if/when the tank can support AoE or if you have to single target focus. As heals, there's tank healing, obviously, but know when to anticipate group heals, like when you see one of those skellies in FoS pop spell reflect before a mage's missiles hit, etc. I'm still new to tanking, and to say the least, its hectic, mostly because I've been running with overgeared DPS and its hard to hold aggro. Some guildies LOLed and said they're just breaking me in, which I agree with, but damn is it hard to think about rotations and positioning when mobs are getting pulled every which way.

Each class needs "love" and mad props. A great tank can carry so-so DPS and a so-so healer. An awesome healer can make a so-so tank look outstanding. A group with 3 7k DPSers is going to burn through everything before the tank knows whats going on. Each archetype needs its own love :)

lonomonkey said...

I'm with Gordon here. I just started tanking seriously after years of dpsing and healing and people really have ludicrous expectations about tanks. As soon as something goes wrong it's always the tank fault, sometimes the healer. It can get to you to have 4 other people constantly asking to go faster, take less damage, etc...

Not saying that dps have it easy just that they won't get yelled at as often.

krizzlybear said...

Healers get so much shit. It sickens me. I'm supportive of extra rewards for tanks and healers, but I doubt it is enough incentive to put up with the crap in LFG. It's all DPS from here for me.

Anonymous said...

You definitely hit it when you said "player attitude". My druid hit 80 right after the new year. I spent most of my time leveling via battlegrounds/5 mans and then topping of with questing in between - so I'm certainly not an expert by any means either.

It's amazing how often the stupid dps and suicidal tanks are the ones that spend time belittling healers in groups. I can't heal through laziness and I certainly can't heal stupidity - but that doesn't make me a bad healer.

That being said, I'd like to take a minute to thank every dps and tank that took the 10 seconds out of their day to say "good heals". Simple words but they mean a lot to me as a new healer (really, I've only been healing heroics for less than 2 weeks now). I make a point to do the same for tanks and dps out there as well, hopefully the good kharma will win out over the asshats.

and /agree with Lucrosus. An option like "speed run" would be awesome b/c I don't know how many times I've gotten into groups only to find out we're only doing 2 bosses or to have the tank say "I'm going fast so keep up". Believe it or not, there are days where I don't mind taking my time.

Lazy Sunday drives ftw.

jeffo said...

"As a healer I’m running the show as a team with the tank."

This is a two-way street. We get angry with dps who are impatient, or don't act as part of the team, yet we make statements like this one that intentionally or unintentionally cut dps right out of the team. The attitude of so many tanks and healers as displayed here and in many of the responses to so many of the blog posts is 'DPS don't matter.' I think this problem was started when Blizzard decided to make every pull in every instance an AoE fest. If instances had more pulls requiring crowd control then maybe we'd stop seeing things in terms of 'us and them' and more in terms of 'team.'

Daergel said...

I see the instant grouping you get as a tank reward enough - I waited nearly half an hour as a dps to get into a pug dungeon, and in that time my tank would have completed an easier hc or be very nearly finished and on to the next. If you extrapolate that out over the longer term, how many more emblems is that? I work it out as around double!

But then I am a "sucky tank and a pattetic noob" (sic), clarified to me by a dk in VH who pulled everything in sight and got pissy when I quit the group after he went off on one

Tanking can be a thankless job too, but also highly rewarding, much like healing

Quicksilver said...

I do agree with jeffo. This bullshit about tanks/healers being somewhat better is just crap stirred by the deplorable state of wotlk 5 mans.

And it is strictly the 5 mans where you get to say tank and healers are essential and dps arent. And at the same time, who the fuck cares about 5 mans anyways...

Raids are where everything matters and nobody here can fucking say dps has a lesser role in raids.

Bad dps is raids is just as bad as bad healers/tanks and good dps are the same best addition as good tanks/healers.

Lets take ICC:

-Marrowgar:
*tanks just stand on top of each other spamming their shit.
*healers aoe heal like usual
*dps must, stand out of the fire, run from storm, free spiked people, not get aggro etc.

-Deathwhisper:
*This is an all-dps fight, imo, while tanks and healers have a moderate challenge/role.

-Deathbringer:
*low dps = dead raid
*dps not killing adds/getting hit = wipe.
tanks just have to tank, healers just have to spam heals.

-Festergut:
*tanks just stand on top of each other and taunt sometimes
*healers just spam heals and eventually move with spores.
* dps must pull 7.5k dps despite the large movement or its a wipe.

(that's all I've seen for the moment, got problems with my cpu)

So, seriously, it seems to me that in all these encounters tanks have it pretty much faceroll. Threat is always over the roof so no pb there. Just spam buttons while occasionally taunting off the other tank.

Healers have it a bit harder as the fights are aoe intense.

dps on the other hand carries all the burden in most of these fights.
One premature death or 2 = wipe.

Need I say more? Seriosly, you whiny tanks should just gtfo. Just because you carry a group in 5 mans doesnt mean anything.

Blizzard is all to blame for designing such faceroll instances which everyone can aoe. Honestly, do the effort of mentally going back to TBC, and remember the heroics back then, visualize Heroic MgT and all it implied for the tank, healer and dps, and then rethink your useless posts on your blogs...

Nobody cares about 5 mans, as they are simply a dumb and grindy way to get the daily Emblems of Frost, or some more badges for people gearing alts.

Bring your arguements regarding raiding, and then we'll talk...

(p.s. I raid on a mage, healer priest and tank dk and I put the same effort into all, and NO, I do not feel entitled to more. Tank and healer is WAY easier to gear anyway)

Melfina said...

A positive attitude goes a long way, but sadly the Sanity Tap has stripped most of mine.

Now that I've got some healing experience under my belt, I can say that, for me, healing a pug 5 man is far less stressful than dpsing one. As a dps I can always do better, and recount is judging me. As a healer, if no one dies, I did my job right, and for H TOC and the ICC 5mans, I'm happy if I only lose one person per fight.

It amazes me how much pressure we put on tanks, and how they manage to deal with it I've no idea. So, in the interests of being kind to the tanks, repeat this mantra...
"It is not always the tank's fault. It can be the fault of one or more dps or the healer, or a lack of teamwork, or a bad strategy or no strategy at all."

It could also be chain pulling preventing the healer from regaining enough mana to heal, and folks, when your healer sits to drink, your deaths are officially your own fault.

IN the end it all boils down to the Golden Rule, but the day that everyone manages to live by that rule, well, let's just say I'm not holding my breath.

G-Rebel said...

/hug

Dual specs has not been the answer so far, how could it be the answer of the future? All it affords is a healer fed up with being underappreicated to switch to DPS spec and stay there to spite everyone else.

Healing is stressful, no doubt, I've healed from Deadmines through ICC and each fight, being different, has its stressors.

One other note, why do debates exist about the importance of one roll over another? Try running a 5 man or a raid without DPS, without a healer, or without a tank...how did that work for you? Lack of patience = greater selfishness, that's what we're suffering from. People thinking one role is more important, tanks running and not waiting even for their healer, DPS yelling GOGOGGOGOGO, it's all about "me me me me me me". It's sick.

Here's some /love, Larisa. I think you'll do great with your healer, just great. And if we are ever in a group, "ty for the heals...in advace".

Hatch said...

"I think the major problem is player attitude – how we treat our healers and tanks."

YES YES A THOUSAND TIMES YES

Zaph said...

I am a prot pally with a second spec for holy. I have a warlock alt at 73. When I run heroics, I tank. So from a tank's perspective, I can honestly say that no, tank's should not get extra rewards. Do we "deserve" the short queue times? No, it's just the state of things now. Healing and dps is just as complex as tanking and each class deserves to be treated with respect. Players just need to be gracious and understanding with everyone else. So many people forget that they started at the beginning too.

Rude people bring out the worst in me and I have, on occasion, re-paid them in kind, but that is wrong too, adding to the problem. I wish there was a spec for Patience! Talent points that have to be earned on the other side of the keyboard, I guess!

Cobalt said...

I have a slightly different opinion on why there aren't as many healers and tanks. Or rather, why everyone wants to be DPS.

Being DPS is competitive, to be the top of the charts, to be a star. The DPS get all the glory, and when you're raised DPS as I was (magey goodness), it's hard to realize that being a healer or a tank can be just as gratifying. I agree with you on "love", both of those vital roles don't get as much glory as they should.

But the imbalance will remain, I'm afraid, as long as there are selfish, competitive, phallus-measuring idiots out there. DPS gets the glory.

lonomonkey said...

@Okrane

I have trouble believing that you tank or heal in raids with what you just said. Dps don't have it easy either but the big difference is that when a dps messes up he either does less dps for a few secs or he ends up dead. There's very few instance where it will spell doom for everyone.

If a tank or healer misses a beat, no matter how small that's 9 or 24 other people getting to run back and pay repairs. And it may look like we stand on each other but there's much more to it than that.

So please, before saying things like gtfo walk a mile in other people shoes.

Anonymous said...

I think you hit the nail on the head with this one. The main reason I don't like tanking or healing PuGs (my main is a resto/feral druid) is the attitude of people.

As a healer or a tank you have other players "lives" in your hands. I always do my very best to keep my group alive either by healing or by holding aggro. I don't expect gratitude for this, since like the rest of the group, I'm only doing my job. However, I would appreciate if people didn't blatently ignore fight mechanics, ignore my calls for mana breaks and go bonkers every time I make the slightest mistake.

At the end of the day healing and tanking are often thankless jobs where people will focus mostly on your faults. If I'm playing my mage however, people happily suckle on my e-peen should I hit 6k+ DPS, which only requires half the effort from me.

/rant off

Tesh said...

The only thing that will make me play in the tank or healer role (yay for being able to shift as a Druid!) is if it's fun. If it's a chore, loot just won't do it.

Yes, indeed, I need to love what I'm doing, or I won't do it.

Funny how that works out.

Ngita said...

@ Okrane S, If you dont care about 5 mans then why do you care about what blizzard could do to make more healers and tanks participate in that role in 5 mans?

In raids DPS are important, I am not going to argue about how equally important. I am concerned about the slippage of the healer role from 8-9 in BT to 5 in ICC, but good dps can make or break your raids.

If your not concerned on your holy priest about dps taking mp5 items, the abundance of relativly useless + hit gear and the fact the crit/haste and haste/spirit are considered ideal dps items I do have to wonder how much you play it.

As for your little chart for example on Marrowgar you forgot to mention how important the tanks communicating and stacking is while dodgeing flames. Something no dps have to do besides the hunters. Healers have to do exactly the same things as dps do except its heal the bonespike targets not dps it.

Larísa said...

@We Fly Spitfire: no worries, I like your rambles!
/hug!
I just don’t know if compensating the bad player attitude with extra loot will make any difference. Either you like being put under stress – or you don’t. It’s much about your mindset and playstyle.

@Carra: Five dps? Oh my. But yeah, why not, if they at the same time ramped up the difficulty of the heroics quite a bit, adding enrage timers etc? Making them into 7-mans instead of 5-mans… Might be interesting!

@Lucrosus: true, true. We all need some love. The speedrun checkbox could be an idea, even though I’m afraid it might be overused. Some players tend to overestimate their own capacity.

@Lonomonkey: Actually as dps:er I never blame anyone but myself if I get killed in an instance. I assume I did something stupid – like standing in fire or not managing my aggro correctly. But when I’m a healer I never blame anyone but myself either! I should have kept everyone alive, it’s my job. Hm… that doesn’t make sense, does it? Always blaming Larísa, no matter what. But that’s just my mindset.

@Krizzlybear: you’re giving up on your healing druid?

@Eury: ”Belive it or not, there are days where I don’t mind taking my time. Lazy Sunday drives ftw”. Hear, hear!

@Jeffo: Mind you, my main is a dps:er and as late as a few days ago I wrote about how exchangeable I feel as a dps and how much I enjoyed to kick a really stupid tank or healer… I know what you mean. But no matter what you think about it – there IS a bond there. I didn’t know how strong it was until I tried healing myself. Then it dawned upon me.

@Daergel: yeah, the short waiting time is definitely a reward. A natural market mechanism.

@Okrane S: I don’t really know who you’re arguing against. I never said that tanks or healers should get more rewards, did I? Especially in raiding I think it’s a team work and you’re absolutely right that the role of a dps.er can be quite as stressful as the one of a healer and tank, especially if you’re fighting an enrage timer and everyone will evaluate your performance in a recount log afterwards…

@Melfina: I guess I’ll feel less stressed about healing once I get more experience.
But yeah, tanking is probably even more special since you’re always expected to take the leadership.

@G-Rebel: Thank you for the /love and /hug. Very much appreciated!

@Zaph: Yeah, sometimes I can’t help wishing there was an addon that could measure your Patience Performance and Teamworker Score as well as your dps and gearscore…
For some reason things that can’t be measured aren’t valued, no matter how important they are.

@Thebarrenschat: I think what makes me most annoyed is when I don’t get mana breaks. I know that when I’m starting a fight with mana at 30 percent and Innervate on cd, I’m more or less bound to fail, even if I’m potting (sigh, why did they take away the chain potting ability?). And if we wipe I and everyone else will blame me, if nothing else unconsciously. We died, so apparently the healer didn’t do the job, right? And there’s absolutely nothing I can do about it.

@Tesh: you’re playing for FUN? What planet are you coming from?:)

Leeho said...

You may know what to do, but it doesn't make the job necessary easier (though being unfamiliar with it does make it harder anyway). I didn't mean the period you learn how to heal, tank, or dps - it's a mess, and it's more stressful for healing and tanking than for dpsing. I meant that when you have two specs and are fine with both, it's not necessary that your dpsing spec will be easier for you to play. And not all tanks and healers are at their learning stage.
Though as your post was mostly about first experience, it maybe would be right to admit that learning healing or tanking role is more difficult. You are learning how to dps things from lvl 1, so you're soon pretty familiar with it. But you can't try tanking or healing without being in a group with others, so your learning process requires their patience.

Ooke said...

I go into random heroics as tank or healer when I want it to be fast, I go as dps when I'm just looking for something relatively stress free and a few extra emblems to stack on the hundreds I have stashed away. (not frost of course)

I think instant or near instant queues is reward enough for choosing to tank or heal. One thing I do note that all the jerks, assholes and impatient folks makes me a better tank or a healer. When everything is going 100% either role can be quite boring but when shit hits the fan is where you find out if you're truly good or not.

And besides healing or tanking lets you laugh at "the dumb". My favorite is watching melee and sometimes ranged kill themselves on fights like Krystallus.

CSeraph said...

The thing about tanking and healing is that it gets you coming and going.

This is to say - it is much harder to gear for tanking than for any other role, and harder to learn to tank and heal effectively than to dps.

However, once you have geared to content, and begun to over-gear content, there is nothing worse than tanking and particularly healing that content.

There is no pleasure left in tanking anything in ToC for me, it is all absolute rote. Ask any healer about how fun healing a 50k overgeared block tank through UK is.

By contrast, DPSing ToC is still plenty fun. I can see how my new gear stacks up, always work to improve my rotations and positioning, and am in constant competition with my friends and guildmates. The target disappears for heals/tanks in content you have mastered, much faster and more completely than for DPS.

Anonymous said...

very nice sentiments pigtail.
I totally agree with you since all I have ever been is a tank and healer...a tank on my warrior, dk and pally and also duel spec as a pally healer.
Been playing since before BC and recently switched to dps for lfg to see how other tanks and heals play and quite honestly I was appalled...both because of their poor attitude and shitty play style...especially the tanks...most of them thought they had all epics on and forgot (or never read up on it to begin with) the number one rule of tanking...Holding Aggro.
playing about 3 years ago was way more enjoyable....although Blizzard has tried to make it easier...seems like the only ppl they attract to the game now are ill-manered kids and dirty double douchebags...srry to say :(