Forum post of the day: Heals and heels
by Amanda Dean 
Aug 3rd 2008 at 6:00AM
Decent healing is often a key factor in determining victory and defeat in a battle ground. Resto and Holy specced characters have quite the job set out for them. Druids, Paladins, Priests, and Shamans regularly face a healing quandary. Is it better to spend time and man healing another player or continuing to do as much damage as possible. Zanhart of Medivh believes that any character than can heal in the battlegrounds, should heal. He finds it particularly insulting when a player heals him or herself while comrades die around them.
Some agreed with him that anyone who can heal should, but most people dissented. There were several themes to the responses:
- Paying a subscription fee allows any player the right to play however they like.
- DPSers in substandard gear are a waste of heals and mana.
- Non-healing specs often have such poor healing abilities that the battleground is better off with them continuing to dps.
- Some people just don't find healing to be fun.
The original poster defended his points by arguing about selfishness and the need for team work. It is very true that battlegrounds go smoother when everyone works together. It seems most prefer more glamorous DPS and capturing roles to mundane things like healing and defense. As a Mage who's interested in teamwork, I'll assume he drops a table without discussion every battleground. Oh wait, only level 36.
I have a hard time not healing. I've played Holy Priest and Resto Shaman, usually topping the healing charts. On my Retadin, I simply can't heal most of the time. Sure I'll heal folks up at the end of a fight, drop a bubble when I can spare a cooldown or use my Lay on Hands in a clutch situations. I hate seeing my teammates health drop and being powerless to do much about it. But my heals as Retribution specced are just dreadful. So why don't I just switch her to Holy? Because I want to experience something that is not healing for a while.
Filed under: Druid, Paladin, Priest, Shaman, Analysis / Opinion, PvP, Forums, Battlegrounds, Forum Post of the Day
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)
gs Aug 3rd 2008 7:28AM
If your going to heal in battlegrounds try Healbot. Works pretty well. Before 2.4 the av skin was much cleaner not sure why it changed but it's still useful.
http://wow.curse.com/downloads/details/3802/
Kraum Aug 3rd 2008 11:00AM
Healing is by far the most important aspect of the game. If your a healer, you essentially playing every class in the game. You enable a mage to continue casting his frost bolts or sheep, or the warrior to get his execute off.
Imagine 3 people and a healer, that healer enables those 3 people to live, for 2 min longer which means 3x2 min of dps, cc and domination , especially when the other teams 4 people have no heals.
Healing is by far more powerful then damage. The best healer in the game heals more then the best damage output in the game. This alone is evidence of the importance of healing.
restored Aug 3rd 2008 1:54PM
ive been resto since lvl 10 on my shaman. but that doesnt mean everyone else did...one of my friends is a RET palidan and there is no changing his mind lol...i have afeeling that when your rolling ur first charachter that the spec you level with becomes attached to you.
Fly Aug 3rd 2008 7:33AM
As much as I enjoy the articles on wowinsider, including your previous articles, Amanda. I still really don't see what heels have to do with the story? I actually thought this would be a gender-talk article. O_o
Chris Anthony Aug 3rd 2008 8:34AM
Amanda almost certainly intends the "heels" in the title to mean "dishonorable or untrustworthy people", a slang use of the word that's been around since the early 20th century but that's fallen into disuse recently.
DeZo Aug 3rd 2008 7:38AM
I have a resto drood who regularly heals in BG's. I just like to know that the faith of the battle can be on his wide Tauren shoulders(:
Personally, playing a rogue and a resto drood, I like healing bg's more, since its more satisfying to see a victory when my drood had a bigger part of it.
non healing specced players should heal only when there are not enough healers around them. Otherwise they don't have the spec and, probably, the UI to do it efficiently.
If you see that people around you die too much - try to help it a little - it will be in your best interest anyway.
You might also find it more motivational to know that healers gets the most HK's in bg's.
Tyler Aug 3rd 2008 7:42AM
Frankly Zanhart of Medivh is an idiot.
SilentDave Aug 3rd 2008 7:49AM
I agree with the play how you feel ideal, although I must admit when I see a healing spec whatever stand by and not heal!.. well... I cast my mind back to a particular AB whereby we had 3 holy priests and no-one got healed anywhere, they were not afk either, I consider that leeching as they're not contributing to the effort.
If I chose to not attack with my hunter or rogue I would be flagged AFK etc. I guess what the OP in that thread should have done is approached it from the angle of people that dont play their spec.
I guess we often think of leechers simply sitting still not doing anything at all, but when someone actively moves and still contributes zero effort we tend to turn a disgruntled blind eye to it.
I must say, where possible, when I do get healed I always try to /thank that person or whisper a thanks to that person, same if someone helps me out of a possible gank situation, although I'm usually dead by then lol
Zarfay Aug 3rd 2008 7:57AM
I am a resto spec shammy and I heal when I can (mainly when farming honour in AV) but it is often pointless because they may die when your DPS could have just finished the fight.
It all comes down to the situation.
Also it is blatant disrespect to tell players to respec holy/resto you don't see people telling frost mages to respec fire for additional DPS do you? As I said its disrespectful to force people to respec just because they CAN heal.
endofcake Aug 3rd 2008 8:01AM
A caveat: I wrote this response to the article while very angry and influenced by much sugary candy, take nothing of what I say as a slander upon your character.
I've played a priest for as long as I've played Wow. It's physically painful for me to NOT heal someone else in a battleground if they're being attacked, even when I'm full shadow spec (from when I think "I'm going to take a break from healing and just enjoy some nice ,quiet dps time, or I'm going to go bat-shit crazy"). There is almost always no whispered thanks or congratulations on topping the healing charts, but the compulsion is still there to heal people, even if I'm silently screaming in my head "nonononononomana". Little green bars haunt my nightmares every night.
Come to think of it, I must be a horrible little masochist.
I've met other healers in the game. They're easily separated into three groups.
The first consists of people who are selfish little sods who demand you kiss the ground they tread on if they're going to consider healing you in bgs (and elsewhere). These are the drama queens. They want to be special.
The second group is made up of that rare bean who actually... wait for it...LIKES TO HEAL because they like OTHER PEOPLE. (I couldn't believe this altruistic reason at first too, but the evidence is damning). They are hard to find, but I think these are the best healers in the game. They really do care about you. The main point is, however, that they are hard to find.
The third group is made up of the poor sods who rolled a class that CAN, in theory, heal, and were heavily encouraged to do so. They might be very good at healing, or they might suck ass, but they heal.
I would rather a few healers who want to and enjoy healing do the healing in a bg rather than a lot of people who can, in theory, heal, but do not enjoy healing give half-hearted attempts. (The prima donnas should just go diaf, imo.)
Happily now, I play a hunter, and, upon my oath! it has made me less an angry person.
endofcake Aug 3rd 2008 9:52AM
Oh, I forgot to say that the only people who are on my "watch list" - the list of people I will always heal, #1 priority - are the people who've taken a few moments in bgs to be kind and help me survive a bit longer when a rogue decides to be smart and find the enemy healer. The people I will never heal - and there is of course a list - are mostly people who scream at me for calling out incs and requesting help defending a node/graveyard/etc. Small acts of kindness go a long way.
Shast Aug 13th 2008 1:19PM
I fall into your 2nd category. I quit wow and now I'm about to make a return because I can't stand and watch my friends play without remembering how much I LOVED healing. I love being resto because of how the difference it makes. Take 8 versus 15: The odds are low but when it's a race against the clock, healing my ass off can allow that my team to put up a helluva fight and thus slow the progress of the other. I enjoy healing. Watching the mayhem around me... tabbing to target the enemy to see which team mate of mine they're trying to down first. Focus heal and chain heal off of that team member... it's just fun.
Furthermore, I like the internal debate with myself; Is it "without me they die" or "without them I die"? Knowing how the dps continues because of heals and the other way around helps me visualize the relationship I have with the battlefield whether I like my team mates or not.
I just wanted to throw that out there.
Jason Aug 3rd 2008 8:02AM
There's also the other side of the story. I love healing in battlegrounds with my holy priest. The problem is that I cannot defend myself. People do notice the healing they receive, but don't pay attention to whomever gives it.
So I have both lack of healing on my warrior and lack of support on my holy priest. The real problem is however that most people are selfish bastards, which is ironic since they decided to play a multiplayer game.
Marc Aug 3rd 2008 9:31AM
When I see a healer I immediately switch to priest's opponent dropping everything else. I wish more people did the same.
Iwanttobeasleep Aug 3rd 2008 11:33AM
This. If someone is complaining about healing classes not healing, they had better kill that fucking rogue that's keeping me stunlocked, because I sure as hell can't.
That's why I usually try to find someone who is doing good and follow them around for the rest of the bg. I still heal the other people around us, but you get someone who knows that they're going to be getting heals as long as you're alive and you don't die half as much.
Cookie McWeaksauce Aug 3rd 2008 4:53PM
Yup that's the big problem, most people don't do much to keep their healers alive. I don't really blame them, because it's hard to keep track of everything in a BG, and if you're busy trying to kill the opposing group's healer, you probably won't notice if someone from that group breaks off to go after -your- healer. But still, it needs to be done.
Healing is the most important single part of a winning BG team (organization is more important, but that's more of an overall thing), but no matter how many healers you have, they can't do much good if they're always getting killed 10 seconds into a fight.
zappo Aug 4th 2008 12:39PM
Cookie - That's one thing I learned about PvP healing though, it's not just healing and getting defended - it's also about taking care of yourself. I used to have this PvE attitude where tank was always supposed to keep adds off me, so when I healed at Balinda and kept dying because of the elemental summoned, I was upset. Eventually I learned how to heal-tank the elemental which allows everyone else to do the serious work.
Anyway a part of smart healing is using terain to your advantage. When your heals come down from nowhere like a gift from the heal fairy it means that the enemy will struggle to take you out. Catch 22 is that no one is going to defend you either.
If you really want to encourage healing defense, I've found that the best tactic is to mark healers with lucky charm raid icons. Maybe it's a mental thing but it tends to mark a rally point when you see that target getting hit.
tehvoid Aug 3rd 2008 8:02AM
He would be some point if he was not a mage. Non "hybrid" class should not talk about role others must play or spec'. Enough of "Go spec protection/Holy"!
happydays Aug 3rd 2008 8:15AM
Y so... SRS?
former customer Aug 3rd 2008 8:16AM
People who don't heal themselves and complain about others not healing are like people who complain about no one guarding the flags while they are in the thick of the zerg, hypocrites.
Play how you want, people who role hybrids generally do so for variety anyway. I stopped healing warriors and rogues after they brought about the massive bear nerfs of 2.0.10