Learning to play a Healer in FF14

[BahamaLlama]

Heya all,

I've been playing a healer (Scholar) for around 50-60% of my full playtime (around 110 hours) and I feel I've been doing alright. I'm currently sat at level 63-64 and doing the Stormblood MSQ.

But, I decided to look through forums and other things, to find out that I've been playing it wrong. I want to be as good as I can be on a job and fully utilise everything I'm given, but, It's hard getting out of the mind-set of how healing worked in WoW.

In WoW, you'd want everyone to be at 100% health at all times, so, you'd be spamming healing most of the time.

It seems FF14 is different. I've constantly been told I am over-healing too much, I don't need to worry about people's health until around 50% etc.

I also barely use any of my oGCD's, nor do I ever use my Aetherflow unless I'm putting down the shield. I mainly use my GCD heals a lot of the time and use my fairy regen whenever it's off of CD. But, after reading posts and such, it seems a lot of good healers barely use their GCD's and mainly heal through their oGCD's.

So, since I've decided that I wish to change up how I play the game so that I can improve on things, what advice, tips or things should I be doing/not doing that would be a good thing to learn now to help me get better?

I'm also going to look into re-mapping my keybinds as well, since i have everything kinda spread out and all over the place. So, to me, it's not difficult to follow. But, at the same time, if I streamline my buttons, I'll actually have a place for things rather than "I'll put it here" then instantly forget I put it there xD.

Thanks in advance!

[tathen]

If you have time to DPS your tank is lazy, only time healer should be DPSing is boss fights cos the tank cant pull any thing, at the end of a dungeon run everyone should be alive and the healer should have anxiety.

[Johny_Geth]

"But i decided look through forums" - best idea ever, lol.

[Hobo Misanthropus]

Originally posted by tathen:

If you have time to DPS your tank is lazy, only time healer should be DPSing is boss fights cos the tank cant pull any thing, at the end of a dungeon run everyone should be alive and the healer should have anxiety.

wat. Even wall pulls, healers will have time to DPS if the tank is properly mitigating. Dark Knight, which is the worst-case scenario for a healer, you can typically alternate your AOE/Single DPS spell and a heal. For Warrior once they get Raw Intuition, you can usually ignore them the entire pull.

For OP: Yes, high level healing is mostly done with OGDC abilities, with your GCD's being used on your damage kit whenever possible, but as a healer you have to build a certain level of intuition and instinct. Some of this can be generalized, but some of it will be fight specific.

The reason why healers prioritize OGCD heals over GCD is one steeped in a concept known as opportunity cost. Using a GCD has a higher opportunity cost than an oGCD. Typical GCD spells require you remain stationary, they have casting times, and of course affect the global cooldown. OGCD are a lot more flexible, but more importantly they preserve your GCD for damage (Which in itself means you have to heal less, and fights typically get more dangerous they longer they drag out) or an emergency heal when someone took damage they weren't supposed to.

[Hex]

Originally posted by tathen:

If you have time to DPS your tank is lazy, only time healer should be DPSing is boss fights cos the tank cant pull any thing, at the end of a dungeon run everyone should be alive and the healer should have anxiety.

Wat? This is ridiculous. As SCH you can spam art of war on every pull. Even on the massive pulls in ShB dungeons.

See, this here folks is why the novice network is trash, it's full of people giving garbage "advice" like this.

[BahamaLlama]

Originally posted by Hobo Misanthropus:

Originally posted by tathen:

If you have time to DPS your tank is lazy, only time healer should be DPSing is boss fights cos the tank cant pull any thing, at the end of a dungeon run everyone should be alive and the healer should have anxiety.

wat. Even wall pulls, healers will have time to DPS if the tank is properly mitigating. Dark Knight, which is the worst-case scenario for a healer, you can typically alternate your AOE/Single DPS spell and a heal. For Warrior once they get Raw Intuition, you can usually ignore them the entire pull.

For OP: Yes, high level healing is mostly done with OGDC abilities, with your GCD's being used on your damage kit whenever possible, but as a healer you have to build a certain level of intuition and instinct. Some of this can be generalized, but some of it will be fight specific.

The reason why healers prioritize OGCD heals over GCD is one steeped in a concept known as opportunity cost. Using a GCD has a higher opportunity cost than an oGCD. Typical GCD spells require you remain stationary, they have casting times, and of course affect the global cooldown. OGCD are a lot more flexible, but more importantly they preserve your GCD for damage (Which in itself means you have to heal less, and fights typically get more dangerous they longer they drag out) or an emergency heal when someone took damage they weren't supposed to.

Okay, that makes sense. I'm also not asking for someone to explain how to heal exactly, it's more to do with having a do's and don'ts that will allow me to improve as I keep playing.

I know that I don't need to keep people at 100% health, and will eventually break this habit. But, I also spam GCD's, which means less DPS, meaning mobs/bosses take longer to kill. These 2 kinda fall hand-in-hand for me, as the less I keep people at 100%, the less I'm going to be spamming GCD's and just using mainly oGCD's.

I was just wondering if there's anything else I should learn to pick up whilst I improve. I know that 90% of my improvement will come from me with trial and error, and not people online. Just wanted to see what other things are in that last 10% :D

[Hex]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osvUOqeDwD0

This will help you! ;D

["string"]

give a doctor a gun while something is interfering your patient, hit that thing and cure your patient.

[______]

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2442540233
A to Z

[Kiana]

Originally posted by Co2 Coke:

give a doctor a gun while something is interfering your patient, hit that thing and cure your patient.

Dead mobs deal no damage. (Unless they explode, but those are exceptions.)

[GeminiEclipse]

Basically do damage, unless someone will die. Use OGCDs because it means you can do more damage (or healing). If you aren't sure if someone will die then it's ok to be cautious.

But do damage.

[MOSLEY]

Originally posted by tathen:

If you have time to DPS your tank is lazy, only time healer should be DPSing is boss fights cos the tank cant pull any thing, at the end of a dungeon run everyone should be alive and the healer should have anxiety.

This is painfully incorrect.

[Jethro]

Tanks in FF are incredibly self sufficient.

Unlike WoW dmg here comes in waves and is very predictable unless people aren't doing mechanics right. For those cases, you got your OGCDs for the most part.

If you follow two basic rules and read what your skills do you're set.

Rule 1: ABC -> Always Be Casting
Keep your GCD rolling. That means use dmg skills if healing isn't necessary.

Rule 2: The only hitpoint that matters is the last one.
Your job is to keep the team alive not at full HP all the time.

[Rhyagelle]

I'll take a healer that keeps me capped/overheals than the Astrologian that lets everyone go down to so little health you can't even see it because they want to DPS as much as they can and as long as they can, resulting in 5-6 deaths per run with them. lol

Jokes aside, I was also like that when I started healer glass (started with base game option), but eventually I learned that they do not need to be 100% all of the time. I think with time as you adjust to the game, you'll start to do that too. Beyond that, I would suggest watching Healer guides on Youtube. They can actually help quite a lot.

Hope you're having fun in FFXIV, by the way! :)

[Hex]

Originally posted by Jethro:

Tanks in FF are incredibly self sufficient.

Unlike WoW dmg here comes in waves and is very predictable unless people aren't doing mechanics right. For those cases, you got your OGCDs for the most part.

If you follow two basic rules and read what your skills do you're set.

Rule 1: ABC -> Always Be Casting
Keep your GCD rolling. That means use dmg skills if healing isn't necessary.

Rule 2: The only hitpoint that matters is the last one.
Your job is to keep the team alive not at full HP all the time.

While generally true, you can't trust random tanks in dungeons to have a clue. Moderating your healing vs dps output is something you just learn over time.

It's shocking how many tanks even at 80+ have 0 clue about anything.

[Taran Tatsuuchi]

Originally posted by Hobo Misanthropus:

Originally posted by tathen:

If you have time to DPS your tank is lazy, only time healer should be DPSing is boss fights cos the tank cant pull any thing, at the end of a dungeon run everyone should be alive and the healer should have anxiety.

wat. Even wall pulls, healers will have time to DPS if the tank is properly mitigating. Dark Knight, which is the worst-case scenario for a healer, you can typically alternate your AOE/Single DPS spell and a heal. For Warrior once they get Raw Intuition, you can usually ignore them the entire pull.

For OP: Yes, high level healing is mostly done with OGDC abilities, with your GCD's being used on your damage kit whenever possible, but as a healer you have to build a certain level of intuition and instinct. Some of this can be generalized, but some of it will be fight specific.

The reason why healers prioritize OGCD heals over GCD is one steeped in a concept known as opportunity cost. Using a GCD has a higher opportunity cost than an oGCD. Typical GCD spells require you remain stationary, they have casting times, and of course affect the global cooldown. OGCD are a lot more flexible, but more importantly they preserve your GCD for damage (Which in itself means you have to heal less, and fights typically get more dangerous they longer they drag out) or an emergency heal when someone took damage they weren't supposed to.

I had a rough time doing a stone vigil as sage a while back....

Had only 1 single target heal, kardion was useless because I couldn't spare a gcd to do damage skills...

And that tank didn't give me time to regen mp.
Running off and grabbing the next group before the current one ended.

There was at least one wipe due to not being able to heal anymore after mp was out and lucid not having come back up yet.
They did not respond to my chat call about my mp situation.

Sage didn't have any burst healing at that level.