A comment to my last post reminded me of one thing I forgot to mention…
Listen up all you leet dpsers. What do you think your most important job is in any boss fight? Dps right? Sorry, wrong. It’s staying alive. I’m sure about half of the people reading this post, just stopped, which is unfortunate, because they’re probably the asshats who die early in every boss fight. But, in the hope that some of you are still reading, I’ll continue. Why is it so important that you stay alive? I’ll get to that, but first lets address the reasons you die. I find that most dps deaths come from four causes:
- Aggro Whores - Warlocks and rogues, I’m talking to you. These are the guys who go all out like every boss fight is a race you can win in the first minute. Inevitably they pull aggro, die early, and blame the healers. Also they ALWAYS claim to have used their aggro reducing abilites like Vanish, Feign Death, and Soul Shatter. Somehow these abilities always get resisted, or just plain don’t work. It’s not their fault! The best part is when they brag about how they consistently break 2000 dps. Yes, you hit it for about 30 seconds. Then you die. If I thought you were smart enough to understand basic math, I’d point out that if you managed to stay alive the whole fight and cut your dps in half you’d do more damage.
- Lazy Hybrids - Am I the only raid leader that is fed up with enhancement shamans. Do you guys even put your healing spells on your action bars? Same goes for you feral druids. And don’t bother posting any stupid comments about how tough it is for you to shift forms or drop out of shadow. Don’t bother whining about how mana inefficient you are. If you die, you are out of mana. If you die, you don’t put any more dps. You can take a quick break and heal yourself. I play a hybrid myself, and every time my health goes below about 80% I cast a quick heal. That’s why I’m still alive and dpsing, while your bitching about not getting heals.
- Blind Fuckers - This is the only explanation I’ve been able to come up with for those useless morons who can’t MOVE OUT OF THE FUCKING FIRE! Seriously, move. That’s what the mouse and those little arrow buttons are for. Use them.
- Lazy Raiders - These are the guys who can’t be bothered to click on the bandage or healing buttons on their hot bars. Maybe they never even bothered to put them on their bars. Or they’re too busy making a fucking sandwich or something. I’d swear some of the dps I’ve raided with don’t even bother to bring consumables to raids.
So why is it so important to stay alive? SImple. Every person that dies, reduces the chance of winning a boss fight. In most fights the effect is small, in some fights like Archimonde, it’s enormous. But even in the fights where you have a nice long enrage timer, every dps death adds up. Think of it this way. Let’s say you’re in a raid with 2 tanks, 8 healers, and 15 dps. For simplicity let’s say the tanks do half the damage that a dps does. If you’re fighting a boss with 8 million health and all your dps do around the same damage, each dps will need to do 500k damage to kill the boss. At say 1000 dps the fight would last a little over eight minutes. But one shithead dies right at the beginning. Now the rest of the dps need to cover his 500k damage. Which adds 30 seconds to the fight. Doesn’t seem like much, but that’s 30 seconds during which your healers are low on mana, your tanks might be running out of oh shit abilities like Last Stand, and that enrage timer is just a little closer. And every dps that dies makes it worse.
When we got our first Illidari Council kill, there were some contributing factors, like changes to healing assignments and better interrupt rotations, but the number one reason we won was that people stayed alive. And when we missed the interrupts on two heals in the last minute of the fight and the Main Tank died right as they enraged, the only reason we won, is because we still had enough people alive that we burned them down in ten seconds before they could wipe the raid.
So stay alive. Your raid leader will thank you.
26 responses so far ↓
1 Oomoons // Sep 29, 2008 at 7:13 pm
Oh so true.
I sometimes lead raids for our guild. i read through your backlog, nice blog.
As far as DPS splat is concerned my “favourite” is RoS phase 2. We call “healers oom” yet who do we see splatting themselves? the interrupters….
We even had Supremus enrage the other week.
DPS reading this… stay alive please.
2 Hokuto // Sep 30, 2008 at 9:07 am
Heh, I was going to comment about RoS too. P2, couple locks/mages one-shotting themselves… At least nobody can blame us (healers) for that too.
3 Elliptic // Sep 30, 2008 at 12:22 pm
This is certainly true, especially using consumables. There are certain fights however, especially in Sunwell, that require dpsers to trust healers. You are going to be low, even as low as 20%, and you can’t drop shadowform to heal yourself, etc, because you just won’t beat the dps check. Black Temple is a lot more forgiving in that respect.
Just weighing in from a healer’s perspective.
4 SamuriWar // Sep 30, 2008 at 2:42 pm
Once I was in some guild where a hybrid class was reprimanded by the raiding leaders for healing their own health during the Naj’entus fight right before spine was to be broken because they were at less than half normal health.
I had some thoughts that this was short sighted and even maybe stupid of the leaders, but they felt that the healers needed to properly get everyone back to full before breaking the shield and not nerfed DPS’ers mana. Didn’t staying around there much more
5 lethalnl // Oct 1, 2008 at 10:51 am
theirs 2 sides to the coin here, fights like p2 RoS are totally up to the dpsers to survive, you get a certain amout of healing
now you gotta determine when to not cast for a sec to save yourself, while doing enough damage to make it go down before your OOm
and for the healers to anticipate who will need the most healing
either one fails, somebody will die
i for one know the max i can possibly crit for with(out) deaden, and cancel cast if that is needed hp-wise
but you see mages sometimes just 2 shotting themselves or stupid stuff like that
thats dpser error
if a dpser is on 60% hp for 6 seconds, and cant safely cast is just healer error and will eventually lead to a OOm wipe
and fights like archi, a good dpser there (taken not melee) will take 0 damage there apart from burst and grip
which if needed is solved by a press of the healthstone keybind (or in my case drain life a bit)
i personally top the meters and 99% of the time just survive till the very end
sometimes i really wonder why some ppl fail the most obvious things…repeatedly
6 you'rebad // Oct 2, 2008 at 5:01 pm
People go OOM in p2 of Reliquary? Go visit the badge vendor and use your free gear, it’s better than what a lot of people had the first time those bosses were being downed.
Your rants are awful and I assume you follow suit. Hybrids should not waste their mana, EVER, to heal themselves. At most a bandage, but there is not one difficult fight in TBC that requires any excellent performances from healers. Tanks>DPS>Healers. Tank has higher mitigation he takes less damage, less healing is needed. DPS does more damage, mob dies faster, less healing is needed. See the trend here? Healers should have plenty of time and mana to cover everyone, even those hybrids that heal for 3x less and have half the mana pool a healer does.
You want to rant? Rant about how shitty your healers are for not being able to sustain or how shitty your tanks are for not being able to hold threat over 2k dps.
7 spastic // Oct 3, 2008 at 2:01 am
No, you just raid with tards like yourself, go back to whiping in kara and STFU
8 admin // Oct 3, 2008 at 2:02 pm
Shamans can’t use whips.
9 Omatre // Oct 3, 2008 at 9:41 pm
@you’rebad
So what you’re saying, is a healing class, even if its an offspec, should not heal themselves if they are low on HP, they should stand and wait for a heal from a healer who may be otherwise pre-occupied with healing classes that CAN’T heal themselves?
Brilliant observation…oh my bad, I meant you’re a ignorant clueless dolt.
You’re the same person that won’t use a HP pot, or a healtstone, or bandage, because consumables are a burden on your game. You ARE the example he clearly pointed out.
10 Will // Oct 4, 2008 at 8:04 pm
Angry can you post your armory link somewhere. I feel the same way and I play a hunter!!! May want to transfer!
11 brangwen // Oct 5, 2008 at 8:05 pm
Dear you’rebad,
Clearly you are SO AWESOME that you have never had to raid in a guild that is not getting server first downings. Get your head out of the clouds and come raiding with us normal humans once in a while. Aren’t you sick of being dragged through content by people who must be better than you are based on the understanding of WoW you just demonstrated?
As Omatre said, you are the issue that us healers have and probably tanks as you pull aggro “ZOMG our tank cant keep 2k DPS that’s why I pulled aggro and died” *facepalm*. You and your epeen can go over there and stay out of my raid, thanks.
You cant DPS dead, ergo stay alive however you can.
Yours sincerely,
Brangwen
12 brangwen // Oct 5, 2008 at 8:06 pm
EDIT: TPS for tanks, not DPS - typo
Sorry about that.
13 Jov // Oct 6, 2008 at 2:58 pm
/agree with Brangwen.
Seriously, if the options are die because healers are healing someone else, or heal yourself, you sure as hell better heal yourself. Your DPS while dead = 0.
14 ActuallyKilledIlly // Oct 6, 2008 at 4:33 pm
My T4-ish feral druid has about 5K mana, unbuffed. My druid, shifting from cat form to caster and healing, restored her 12K health in 21-25 seconds, which cost anywhere from 2.9K to 4.5K mana, depending on the spells she used, plus the 600 mana shift-back.
My shadow priest, self-buffed, has 8.9K mana and 8K HP, with +694 healing (since she’s in frozen shadowweave, which is shadow-only). Healing herself to full takes 17 seconds and about 3K mana, including the shift-back.
I can tell you right now that any healing-spec’d healer in equvalent gear will do the same amount of healing in half the time for half the mana. Causing your dps to lose 30 seconds of DPS time and, in the case of the spriest, lose the buff she’s giving the group AND decreasing her overall dps, just to heal themselves is ridiculous.
If you’re relying on your DPS to do more than 1) not stand in things, 2) bandage and 3) use health pots/healthstones, you’re screwing up. Your healers are screwing up. And you better figure out the major malfunction before you get to fights in which the single-target damage is unavoidable, i.e. Brut and even single-target agonizing flames. What would you do if you had brought a rogue instead of a feral druid and he had gotten hit instead?
Great, I’m glad I do 0 DPS when dead. Losing 30 seconds of DPS time to bring myself to full health because the healers can’t be bothered to throw a chain heal/lifebloom/rejuv/renew/flash of light on me will mean the difference between a 2% wipe and kill. Sorry bucko.
15 brangwen // Oct 6, 2008 at 11:22 pm
Seems actuallykilledilly has totally missed the point. And is obviously more interested in damage meters than anything else.
But then, anyone who tries to make their point more valid by saying trying to argue from authority (ie “I know more than you because I said I have done it, therefore you are wrong/have no idea”). Sorry, that is not a valid argument style mate.
And your argument that RESTORING YOURSELF TO FULL HEALTH is fail. Did we ever say that? No. We said STAY ALIVE. If that means casting a heal spell to get themselves out of the danger zone, then I expect my raiders to do that (and they do, and we win some pretty epic fights because of it). So your DPS goes down for oh 10s while you change forms and cast that one saving heal spell. OH NOES! But now you can (in 20s say when your pots come off CD) chug that mana pot and spend the next 5 mins DPSing when previously (had you not cast that one spell on yourself) you wouldnt have.
This isnt about lazy healers (because sometimes we are flat out simply healing the tanks and the raid damage we are SUPPOSED to be healing… oh I wont bother getting into the maths of onflow effects of DPS fucking up), but about DPS that dont get it. If you have a bee in your bonnet about lazy healers, perhaps you need new healers. Good ones are hard to come by. No seriously, they are.
I am amused that everyone who blames the healers is a DPS class…. Hmm…. and so far they are all using an argument from authority (logical fallacy). I really reckon they should go run in a guild that is most of the way through BT and I suspect that they will find a VERY different game to the one they are used to.
16 Teleros // Oct 7, 2008 at 5:47 am
“So what you’re saying, is a healing class, even if its an offspec, should not heal themselves if they are low on HP, they should stand and wait for a heal from a healer who may be otherwise pre-occupied with healing classes that CAN’T heal themselves?”
If possible, yes. Things should get a lot easier when the WotLK patch is out, but until then I (as a Retadin) rely on other people’s heals to keep my mana bar topped up too (and 0 mana = almost 0 DPS for a Retadin, funnily enough
).
Of course, I say “if possible” - P3 on RoS I tend to heal myself when the DoTs get painful, and in general I’ll do it if it looks like I’ll be hugging the floor otherwise. However, with a proper group of healers that should not be happening (or happening very rarely) in the first place, as AKI above says.
Finally, it also depends on how easily you’re downing the bosses: if you’re only just getting a boss down, or learning the fight, then hybrids healing themselves is probably going to be a good thing (eg with the main post). If on the other hand you’re on BT run #447 to farm your 4th alt’s T6 set… it probably doesn’t matter as much
.
17 mikeful // Oct 7, 2008 at 7:14 am
Excellent post. You’ve got another new regular reader.
18 flour // Oct 7, 2008 at 7:40 am
I’m having ARL withdrawals. Are you doing RL shit? Get your ass back to your chair and post, damn you.
19 druidchick // Oct 7, 2008 at 11:14 am
@AKI: I don’t understand ur argument. Look… Healers heal, that’s their job. If for some reason you AREN’T getting healed, there’s gonna be a reason, like they’re oom, they’re busy keeping the MT up, whatever. Angry Man is sayin, Do wut u can to stay alive, especially if you have means to heal yourself. What is there to argue?
20 Turnaan // Oct 7, 2008 at 4:44 pm
Anyone who posts here that hybrids shouldn’t ever heal themselves because it will cut into their almighty dps time is a bad raider. There, I said it. You’re bad and you’re keeping your raid back.
Plus, you’re a hybrid and you’ll never do as much dps as I do anyway, so stop even trying!
21 Kevin // Oct 9, 2008 at 1:19 am
Life so with fail, over make heal above, no kill and wait.
Bring easy no time let healer do other important.
WHY NO CARE
NOT WORK HEALER HAVE
DIE FOR MIND NOT VERY DEEP
Is simple happen every know when
22 Hjalle // Oct 9, 2008 at 8:53 am
Healers should heal,
tanks should tank
and dps should dps!
Even if you are a hybrid you have a certain assignment in a raid.
If poeple die from lack of heals bring another healer, if they die from lack of skills tell em of.
What you have to do in a raidgrup is trust your raidmmembers to do their job.
You should be able to trust your healers, never seen a lock do life drain in a raid.
/Hjalle-Holy since 2005
23 DruidDude // Oct 9, 2008 at 12:44 pm
We have a saying on RoS phase 2:
Don’t crit your pants.
24 Anon // Oct 11, 2008 at 12:02 pm
While I agree with #3-4… I don’t completely agree with #1-2.
There is a bit of a concept of tanks being able to
handle the extra aggro through better
equipment, and in most raids people do get buffs like salvation and talents that even further reduce their threat gains. Sometimes there needs to be some holding back I suppose but ideal circumstances are where the tank/tanks can handle it. D:
As far as #2 goes… If I was a feral druid there would be no way in hell I’d pop a heal even if I wasn’t tanking. If anything I’d pop a potion or bandage, but not use any of my mana for a cheapass heal that doesn’t do jack unless I have a healing set macro’d to swap to.
You pop a heal if you go below 80% and thats why your still alive? Referring to a spell correct? I’ll even give your hardcore/lifeless ass the assumption that you have a +healing set macro’d. But is that really a major reason your still alive when you only just went to 80%?
I suppose you have a slight point that it helps the healers a -tiny- bit, however you never mention how its the healers job to keep people alive. They don’t just heal the tanks, and if they only healed tanks everyone would be dead at some point or another. Warlocks have to life tap for their mana so they’d get fried… Etc.
In the end, my stance is that potions/healthstones/bandages = OK.
Casting spells your not even specced for and may or may not have an alternative gear set macro’d for?…. Remind me never to raid with you if I ever start playing that stupid game again, you sound like the person who made me quit in the first place. Why so serious? :p
25 filament@blackrock // Oct 28, 2008 at 10:59 am
in the best case scenario you want your tanks to be dealing maximum tps that is able to support maximum dps.
any dps that treats the fight like a race and wipes the raid because of it is just plain stupid, but then it is wrong to tell ALL your damn dps to take it slow because somebody *might* over aggro. such a view point usually comes from a non-dps raid leader. it is a safe and conservative perspective, but it is not the kind that will take you far in sunwell.
#1. for true progression raiding you need every damn dpser to treat the fight like a race. that means having a dmg meter to monitor effort in real time. it means trusting your healers to top you off instead of pausing from your actual job to do theirs.
#2. as a result of #1, you will find dpsers who have zero aggro management, and dpsers who do not take reasonable measures to stay alive (pot/fast heal spell/bandage) when the healers are focused on more important targets. it is the RAID LEADER’S RESPONSIBILITY to weed out these errant dps and remove them from the guild.
#3. you are now left with an elite few. that is your progression guild.
sorry, but dps is skill, not all gear. you may not admit it, but the state of your dps is what will carry you through all your progression. the golden key to progression is not staying alive. it is doing maximum damage AND staying alive. true, corpses do no dps, but then again, the raid leader should not be inviting corpses to the raid.
playing safe can get you further than the reckless idiot, but i say again to bolster my one and only original point: such attitude would not have carried you far in sunwell pre 3.0.
26 Alyz // Dec 30, 2008 at 5:38 pm
@ Hjalle:
I do not agree. There’s a reason why blizzard gave us more than our average healing/tanking/dps spell. Use them!
I’m a resto druid and if my raid will ask me to hibernate big angry dragonkin then I will hibernate big angry dragonkin even when it means I’ll be able to throw less healing around. Why? Because by doing that I’ll help the raid alot more than I could ever help as just a healer.
There are things that ONLY I can do (and this goes for everyone else aswell).
Not as a healer. But as a druid.
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