So I’ve been playing WoW for… a while now. I’ve always been DPS and have tried my hand at Tanking and have been kind of/somewhat successful (though I tend to get in my head and it’s somewhat stressful). I’ve gotten used to the queues being DPS, but recently I was inspired by some streamers to give Healing a shot.
Holy sh*t is it beyond stressful. I’m in the process of simply learning the class, make sure to say something beforehand, but if we wipe or have any problems whatsoever people immediately drop. This in turn makes the next dungeon even MORE stressful and anxiety inducing to the point that I don’t even want to try anymore.
(As a sidenote with the experiences I’ve been having, I’ve always been in awe of healers who are good (especially in PvP) but I have a newfound respect for them)
All that being said, I wanted to ask those who main healers, how do you do it? How do you keep your stress down? What did you do to learn more effectively? How can I be a better healer?
Edit: This community is great. Thanks for all of the tips. I took all the advice here that I could and suddenly it’s a lot less stressful and I’m… actually having fun? Discipline seems to be great as I’m not just standing around: I have to take a proactive role in DPSing, making sure people have Forbearance up to take advantage of everything - it’s great!
What healing class are you? I would try for your first healer as a holy priest. Very oh I see damage taken let’s heal that now. Also what helps so much is your set up. Mouse over macros is what saves me with good easy to access key binds. I use a 12 button mouse but check out some key bind videos on how to be effective.
Not everything is the healers fault. Sometimes people mess up mechanics and then they are punished with tons of damage. Sometimes this damage cant be recoverable.
I do my best when I can, and let the chips fall where they lay. If people wanna be jerks about it, I will explain that they had the option to heal as well and passed on it when they chose dps, and if they want to continue to be jerks, I can also explain that I can literally heal everyone else but them for the rest of the run if they dont chill out.
This. Pug groups I do holy spec because I don’t trust them not to fail to mechanics. Even experienced healers can’t out heal that damage. New expansion with little power right now, you can’t soak mechanics like you could in end of BFA heroics or low keys.
It just takes time and practice. My wife is good at it. I, however, am not. Not everything is your fault, dont blame yourself.
As a tank player of 13yrs I can tell you, we still mess up. Not even big obvious things. Wanna know what happens if I let my SoTR buff drop because I was being a smooth brain? I suddenly go from 90%-ish to like 15-20%. Unless you’re watching my buffs, you dont see it. But it can get me, and the rest of the group killed. (On relevant content of course)
Tanking a pack of mobs and I just start doing damage? I now dont have Avengers Shield for that Reanimator who’s casting an 80% heal on the Skeleton Giant who we almost have killed.
Things like this happen all the time, its key to remember that while not everything is your fault, you need to be able to identify and own up when it IS your fault.
Figure out what your playstyle weakness in that role is, and either practice it until you get good at it or get creative and find ways to avoid that situation entirely.
Dont let anyone tell you if you should heal or tank or whatever. That’s for you to decide and practice. If you do it a good bit and still dont think it’s for you, then hey, you at least have knowledge FROM THAT ROLES POINT OF VIEW, to bring back to your previous role.
Example: I healed for a good bit, I just dont care for it. But as a dps or tank, if I can cleanse myself, I will lose dps just to make sure the healer doesnt have to waste a gcd on that poison eating my face off.
As someone who tanks/heal in other mmorpgs, and did those roles in classic while i played classic…
I wont do endgame healing or tanking in retail. Way too sweaty, far to many mechanics to have memorized, and the community is 10000% intolerant to learning and would rather disband a dungeon run mid run than simply type what im doing wrong in chat.
Its just not worth the headache. Community is too anti-social to find a small group to learn with, also i have time issues making that not viable, gotta do all my mandatory weekly stuff before new time gate is open and all…no time for those kinds of things i just dont have the free time.
At least you are giving it a try. I tried 2 dungeons and got yelled at. Now I just run around as a Holy PLD and RP as a healer. I don’t even try to go into dungeons. No one wants to give you a chance to learn. I guess I got into this too late.
I main two healers. Monk 1st, and Druid 2nd.
Been healing on Druid since end of BC, started on Monk in Bfa. Monk is my current favorite, but druid is not far behind. It is a different mindset then DPS’ing for sure.
You have to be able to prioritize on the fly in split seconds sometimes… Usually… You, Tank, Top DPS. 5 mans and Raids are completely different though.
Better yet, once you learn the fights you can start predicting the damage. Depending on the type of healer you are you can throw a Shield or HoT on someone prior to the damage you predict is coming.
All the different healing classes have strengths/weaknesses (just like dps/tanks) How well you do is also a result of how well the group is doing mechanics… if tank isn’t using their defensive abilities well or the dps can’t figure out “DON"T STAND IN BAD” you will struggle a lot more…
Also… mana drinks… bring LOTS… depending on the group you are running you may need to top up after several pulls and always try to start a boss fight with 90% or more mana
its been a while since i healed, but what kept me sane was adopting the rule of “I heal who i want, when i want, give me lip and you can walk back from that death.” granted i was usually with a friend or two, but ive definitely stopped healing certain players for being a jerk. and their extra anger amused me.
I don’t do really high end content anymore but I did start into Mythic raids when they were introduced, so take my info with a grain of salt.
I am just most comfortable healing. I am most at home as a Rest Shaman. I like the reactive play style. Sometimes I get a little stress, but to me its good stress. I just never feel the same way as DPS, although tanking can be fun if I have actually learned the dungeons.
The trick is learn priorities.
tank
yourself
everyone else
Some switch 1 & 2 but to me, you will die if the tank is gone. My son usually tanks for me and him and I have finished fights just the 2 of us with all ups dead (from standing in fire). As much as I will argue against healers HAVING to DPS, I do DPS, interrupt and stun as much as possible.
Just relax and realize people dying is acceptable as long as you don’t all die. You can Rez people after the fight…
ya, 1 & 2 sometimes switch… Early in fight I do me then tank… towards the end I’ll swap it knowing if a tank has CDs to burn they can finish of the boss with me down… been in lots of stuff where me and the tank (took 10 mins…) to down a boss after dps died (or left…)
I am lucky because I always run with the same tank, my son. We have been playing together since BC. He usually is a paladin and I know his play style as well as my own.
If I focus on healing him, interrupting and stunning, I know I can count on an instance heal on me if I miss myself tunneling on him.
There is a lot of information out there that can be helpful. Healing is about knowing your spells, what what to use in different circumstances. Get you ui setup so you can do the job effectively and efficiently. From there is it practice, practice and practice until it becomes second nature.
Battlegrounds can be a helpful place to learn and the healing proving grounds are excellent. You don’t HAVE to shoot for gold but be comfortable at silver. Once your comfortable and know what your spells can do the anxiety slips away.
i sorta locked myself to my particular class and spec by going out of my way to accomplish things on this character i typically don’t bother with like achievements and several reputations. played it all throughout this year for the sole purpose of having an actual main for once.
has nothing to do with playing the class, but there it is. after playing it enough, its easy to understand where you make a mistake and where someone else does. if someone’s giving you garbage for not healing them, you can usually determine if it was them or not. had someone in scarlet halls stand in and die in one of the pulsating fire aoes flameweaver koegler throws out. dude yells out “WHERES THE HEALS” and i already knew it wasn’t my fault, just telling him “outside the fire aoe”. i feel its important to know that you can only heal so much and not to let a player or group get you down if they are garbage and taking excessive amounts of unnecessary damage.
more class specific is knowing to save certain moves or, really, any moves at all on priority targets. that is always a toss up between you and the tank and whatever dps isn’t being dumb. if one dps is consistently draining on your mp and they keep exploding due to something avoidable, you can safely ignore them. maybe stick a heal on them every now and then since your efforts keeping them around might distract you from the tank. you could also leap of faith them, i suppose. dunno if i’m hitting a character limit. it’s not counting.
