I’m your party healer.
I’m the one at the back of the room that needs to be close enough to the front of the room to keep the tank alive (and the DPS on occasions)
I have needs that aren’t being met.
I need mana occasionally, although admittedly you are generally conscious of this.
What you aren’t conscious of is my need for 3 other things.
I need loot.
I see you riffling the corpses while I quickly mana up. I see the items you grab and I share in the silver.
I don’t get to loot myself though, normally when my mana bar starts moving up, you start moving on.
Do I fish for the green item, or chase you down around the corner, into the next room?
I need to skin things
See those animal corpses littered on the floor… They are my daily cash injection. I don’t skin them instantly, skinning is a channeled ability.
If I am skinning, I can’t, maybe even won’t heal you.
You got to loot, you got to skin, all while I was preparing to save you from the next hit.
I’ll get there and Rez you when I’m finished.
I need to pluck
Yep I’m a herbalist as well.
Yes it sucks to be me.
You know when you see that Ore vein and you run off and fight the mobs to get your metal? You know, when I am standing right behind you pumping heals into you, while you grab your rocks?
Do me a favor, clear the mobs around the herbs for me and/or wait for me to pluck my fill.
You’re AFK, I’m AFK
I know, these are all minor inconveniences, but I have realized lately if I want to do anything other than chase the tank bout, I need to go AFK.
I didn’t want to, but I realize now that while I am rezzing you, while I am healing you, while I am regaining mana, you are going AFK.
That’s cool…
Just be warned that once it’s all done, I will be going AFK. I will be plucking flowers, skinning rugs and looking for loot.
I may even head to the fridge, the toaster, the kettle, the toilet and grab a smoke…
Sucks to be you.
Overhealer and I’m OK?
Actually I don’t know what I am complaining about, generally I have nothing to do.
I throw up an Earth Shield. I drop a Riptide. I go off looting.
- I get excited when the tank loses 10% health and wind up a big healing wave.
- I get excited when the DPS take splash damage and I can wind up a chain heal.
- I love it when a pull goes wrong and we pull two groups… and a pat. At least then I get to do something.
Keep the mana in the bank
Maybe I need to stop topping off the tank.
Maybe I need to let the DPS hurt a little.
Apart from being good healing practice in reducing over heal it would conserve my mana so we can just steadily work through the instance.
Exchange chain heals for chain lightning
Maybe I should pump out a bit of DPS. Run the mana tank dry preventing additional damage rather than curing the odd bit.
Maybe I should have a bit of fun and start pulling. You know, when the tank has one or two groups firmly under control, maybe I should pull the next one.
More heals
If I pull them I will have to spam heal myself and give the tank the challenge of pulling the mobs of me before we both drop.
Do you Overheal or AFK heal?
What do you experienced healers do?
Do you go make a coffee while the pull commences and pop back to top them off before the next pull?
Gnomer and Out, Squidly and Stout!
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http://gnomeaggedon.net/2009/10/07/im-afk-heals-and-im-ok/
I have had experience with a healer pulling.
I have a pally, he was mid-40s and got talked into tanking SM for a random PUG. I did have tanking gear and a tanking spec. I did not have any tanking experience.
I was terrified of getting people killed but we were stomping the place so badly that the healer told me to stay in one place and just chain-cast consecration. He proceeded to run to the next rooms and bring all the mobs back to me.
Clearing the library has never been so stressful! Looking back on it, it was fun and exciting, but at the time I was freaked out I was going to screw it up.
Ha!
That’s taking it to extremes… but I can visualize the white knuckles and drops of sweat…
followed by the cheeky smile 10 minutes later…
I would *love* it if more mid-level tanks realized that combat ends 3-5 seconds later for me than it does for them.
I never get to loot anything.
And since I’m always back of the pack, they usually ninja any ore nodes we come across before I get there too. Yes, it’s ninja-ing. Taking any limited resource that’s available only to the group is ninja-ing. You want the node, roll on it, like anything else that’s a group resource. >_<
I get to loot now… I run back into the previous (not current) room, while the rest go forward into the next room.
Obviously not before I have stated a few times that they can go when ever they want, but if they want heals they better wait for me…
I ran Mana Tombs last night because the Horde were steamrolling the whole Bloodlust BG circuit.
A DK tank in training (I think being instructed by the DPS DK).
it’s been a long time since I was in there and I was burning mana like it was naphalm…. whooosh!
The 1st room, they pulled the whole room… they all had aggro we died.
As they ran back I pointed out I wanted one heal target and no more than 2 packs of mobs, or I left.
The DPS DK died a few times during that run… well a few more times than we all did. 2xsoul stones, 1x reincarnate & a couple of ghost runs…
They had no idea that mana existed though… I’d be on 5% and they be off pulling…
“Where’s the heals” would call a DK
“Back drinking mana” would say the Boomkin.
“Don’t worry, I’m coming to rez” would say Squidly
Wow. I think I am guilty on almost all counts when I tank 5 mans.
Pull multiple packs with no warning? – check
Chain pull the entire instance including bosses? – check
Have zero awareness of other people looting mobs? – check
Ignore herbs completely since I don’t pick flowers? – check
Skinning? What? Where? Huh? – check
About the only time I wait for anything is when someone dies, or the healer is completely oom.
Sorry! I never knew! Honest!
And here I was thinking I was an uber tank because I could hold aggro and mitigate damage and not waste time waiting for… well for anything really.
my bad
lol… well it’s the healer’s responsibility to speak up… but after the 4th or 5th time, it’s easier to just rez the party after staying out of aggro radius
Mind you, I’m still in Outland… If I remember right chain pulling never really happened to 80 when we got access to silly gear. Even then it was more limited than Northrend.
I look forward to the day I have a bottomless mana supply… at the moment I am pulling int and MP5, mana totems, mana spring totems and still coming up low, if not dry (last night was the worst I think)
Mind you, the painful Lock in the party needed the MP5 healers cloak… I told him so, but… whatever… Northrend is 3.5 bars away
There are 3 bars that a tank needs to look at.
Mobs bar, in case of a cast
Own health bar, in case of oh-shit buttons
Healers mana-bar, mana-bar=0 means dead tank, dead tank not good.
“dead tank not good”
Not as a standard rule, no
One of the many reasons I am leveling a priest is so that when I get bored of healing, I can do some DPS. Sadly, I’m going Disc healing, cuz I like bubble healing, but I might dual spec into holy DPS just for shiggles. I get bored standing around all the time on my pally.
“Oh, you’re dying and want heals? …Nah, you have 70% health. I’ll wait till you have 30%…Look at that! Nice big crit heal! You’re back to 100%! Time for sleep…”
Yeah, and with BoL up, I can just heal a DPS or something who’s standing in the fire, and not worry about the tank at all for another minute and a half. It sucks.
I can haz ore nao?
I have started relaxing on the heals now..people can feel their pain… especially the locks waiting until after combat to blow their health for mana…
What’s with that?
I had a great lock on day that would suck his health bar dry while tapping the last mob or two in a pull.
net result… full health and mana bar.
I’m sure there was a little loss in dps, but there was no loss in downtime.
The lock I was healing in Mana Tombs the other night was running off to do battle at 10% health… I let him sweat, he was well down the healing priority list
So locks only get my heals if I am over flowing with mana now
I feel very fortunate to have a lvl 80 warrior tank and a lvl 80 resto shaman. When I tank I learn things that drive me crazy about healers, and then when I switch to my healer I make sure I don’t do those things to the tank.
On the flip side, when I heal, I learn things that tanks do that are just awful and when I switch to my tank I make sure that I don’t do those awful things.
Granted that leaves me out of the dps loop, but I feel like most of the principles are the same. Don’t go rushing off, wait for everyone to get ready for the next pull, give people time to loot/skin/herb/whatever. Keep a good pace (not too slow, not too fast). And so on.
See I just loot stuff mid-pull. Kinda of like an instant cast.
Anything that makes me drink more is annoying so I don’t usually DPS while healing.
If your tank is watching til your mana bar is full make sure you get your skins first.
I also don’t run up in range of the tank when he gets ready to pull the next mob til *I’m ready*. Then if he pulls while I’m 50 yards back and drinking shame on him.