Breakfast Topic: Healers are the drummers of WoW
by Matthew Rossi 
Jan 7th 2010 at 8:00AM
This isn't meant to denigrate DPS or tanks. Heck, I'm a tank or DPS more than I'm a healer nowadays. But I believe strongly that healing is the silent motive force for a successful run, that a great deal of the pressure is placed on a healer's shoulders without the showy nature of the tanking role or the meter busting fun of the DPS roles. Healers are like the drummer, often ignored, but absolutely vital.
So here's your chance to agree or disagree, as well as to go even further. Are DPS the guitar? Is the tank the bass player? Have I gone completely insane? Do we even need that last question?
Filed under: Druid, Paladin, Priest, Shaman, Breakfast Topics
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 10)
Arbitor Jan 7th 2010 8:03AM
Without healers, a boss's attacks (or any raid mobs really) would kill us.
With healers, we feel like god.
That is all.
Cthulu Jan 7th 2010 8:06AM
No doubt that healing is a thankless job at time. No flash or zing but guaranteed if someone dies or health is low they know right where to look. DPS is very important and can make a job easier but without strong healers people die. And dead DPS is no dps. Dead tanks tend to let mobs go wild and see the previous sentance.
I am a healer and I am proud.
Markainion Jan 7th 2010 9:05AM
Move powerful even in PVP than in PVE. I sure hope Blizzard come up with some creative way to make healer more valuable to non healer classes in Cataclysm, without weakling the rest of us like burst damaged did when introduced in Wraith. Currently good PVP healer are both the tank an healer for a good PVP team. I mean there is no other position more important.
jrizutko Jan 7th 2010 11:54AM
My main is a resto shaman, with an elemental offspec. For just about any of the iLevel 200 dungeons, I go elemental and we run 4 DPS and a tank. Most bosses live less than 25 seconds unless they have elaborate scripting.
Of course, I would never do it with a newish tank, but if your tank is mostly in 232 gear, and you don't have any fire standers in your group, you just need someone in an offspec who can pop a small handful of heals on the run between fights.
Obviously the rules change in the 232 iLevel 5-mans, where healers are once again gods amongst avatars.
Pyromelter Jan 7th 2010 12:11PM
I think jriz is right, espcially with tanks nowadays, it seems like they take almost no damage (save for the icc5 mans and toc5). But I do like the idea of "healers as drummers" - they control the tempo, if a healer is geared and never close to OOM it can be super fast paced, if they aren't as geared or are spamming big aoe heals or something for no reason then the group will slow down.
shadowQQ Jan 7th 2010 12:24PM
With this analogy in mind - what class/role would Dave Grohl have?
jrizutko Jan 7th 2010 12:32PM
@ShadowQQ - Druid.
BigBadGooz Jan 7th 2010 1:05PM
Resto shaman I am a drumer and a guitarest I can hit 2k dps while healing 5 mans and on some lower ilevel instances I dps as well my hybrid taxes at work.
Columhcille Jan 7th 2010 2:19PM
It's true that without healers, everyone would die quickly in a raid -very VERY quickly if you're in ICC raid. With that said however, the healers have to have a raid group that knows their part well enough that they aren't being pushed beyond their heal abilities.. at some point, you can't heal through certain unnecissary damage or if a boss parries a melee attacking in the wrong place and he hits the tank twice for 40k-50k dmg in under point-oh-five seconds.. there's nothing that can be done about that heal-wise.
Yes, raids rely heavily on good healers, but you can't have dps or tanks that let crappy performance slide in the group to be successful, either.
Concerning this same topic for healers is that Healers -in my oppinion- tend to face harder split-second choices in group than anyone else.. period.
Take the Lady Deathwhisper fight for example...
in a raid at times if there's not enough dispellers etc, say there's two or three Curse of Torpid going out, tons of raid damage, and the tank's about to die..
tank is ever-first-priority.. heal him first. but then DPS complain about having said curse and it not being dispelled right away and getting spell locked.. or not getting heals because we then had to decurse the curse that was causing them to be spell locked etc... which will take two or three GCDs to dispell!
This is a type of priority-making decision healers haev to make... also...
Take Lady Deathwhisper fight again as an example...say the tank is about to die and you have a split second to make a decision...you have no CDs up so you can't make an instant cast while on the run, but you have a Ghost coming at you that you know will explode on top of you and probably one-shot you and you'll die..
but you have that split second to cast one final heal!.. do you save yourself so another tank might be able to pick the boss up and let the current tank die while you run away?.....
or do you sit tight, pray for the best and take the hit knowingly while you get off that last successful heal that should theoretically keep the tank up long enough for him to hit a CD or a potion or another healer to pick up heals on him?!?!
So inevitably, maybe you take the hit and the tank lives but you die "because you were standing in the way of said ghostly mob" .. so you take the fall, take the blame and get chewed out by officers over it later because "its easy to avoid that!" .. but not when you're chosing life or death of your tank.. or your priority heal target.. or the possibly entire well-being of the raid based on your one decision.!!!
muahahah the mighty decisive power of the healer!! Don't think the healer is ignorant of dmg you're taking! A decent healer is never unaware of what is going on. If you're not getting heals it may just be a choice not to heal you because you're not high on the priority list atm or.. maybe you did something stupid and the healer is letting you die because they find you more a threat to the well-being of the group and would rather have you out of the way first.. lol! I HAVE DONE THAT! let ppl die on purpose. many times. After that they tend to behave themselves and learn what to do and do it right!
Gamer am I Jan 7th 2010 8:03AM
I'd say the tank is the singer more than the bassist. He's the one who is in control the most, who says the way things are going to go. He's the one everyone focuses on the most. But yes, the healer is definitely the drummer: sometimes unnoticed, but if he isn't doing well, you will notice very quickly.
Arbitor Jan 7th 2010 8:05AM
To add to that, I would say the dps are definitely the guitarists.
But they're not just that.
They are the upstaging, attention hogging, "Holier than thou" kind of guitarists.
blindlinus Jan 7th 2010 8:07AM
/agreed
to continue with the analogy, the "singer" (tank) can lead the group in any fashion they choose, but if the "drummer" (healer) is unable to keep up the rhythm, the group will most likely fail as a whole. unless you have an off-healer with half a brain... no analogy there.
loop_not_defined Jan 7th 2010 8:17AM
@Arbitor
Does this make the tanks the egotistical, self-centered, "I don't need any of you" lead singers? The ones that fade into obscurity because nobody will work with them?
Speaking as a tank and DPS:
Everybody's got a role, try to be polite. Please. Thank you.
P.S. I couldn't think of a stereotype for drummers/healers. Maybe they secretly practice singing, in hopes of becoming front-stage some day? Maybe Paladins are the Phil Collins of WoW.
Tifa Jan 7th 2010 8:39AM
@blindlinus -- The offhealer would be the electric drum guy that does just enough to keep the beat going by pressing his drum pad erratically. (ex. Mr Hahn from Linkin Park) lol
Bob Jan 7th 2010 8:50AM
/tangent I don't know what drummers you guys know, but I don't think that I've ever seen a drummer who was quiet or would ever let anyone fail to notice them. The drummers I know are prone to all the exact kind of "look-at-me" attention whoring that we are attributing to the other roles.
Jarvish Jan 7th 2010 10:43AM
I thought immediately of Axl Rose when you said tanks are the lead singers.
michel.meeuwissen Jan 7th 2010 10:45AM
Totally :) Matthew, are you reading my mind by any chance? I was just thinking exactly this last week! Healers - drums, tanks - vocals, DPS - some bass, some guitars haha, nice anology.
Dah Jan 7th 2010 10:49AM
Ya, a healer is important of course, but they seldom seem to make a difference in a 5-man (although they can easily make or break a raid) since they are so easy nowadays. Instead, having a tank that can pull quickly without pulling too much along with some competent dps make the big difference in how long you spend in an instance. /my2cents
remlap79 Jan 7th 2010 12:00PM
I would say that the tank and the healer have the synergy that a drummer and bassist have. They are the foundation of the group and when either of them tries to act out or be too showy it makes for a harder time for the other members of our 5 man "band".
gffcom Jan 7th 2010 2:26PM
I think Healers are the producers.... without them, the music doesn't happen. Tanks are the music, they set the tempo and the flavor of the run. The DPS are like teen age boy-band singers all fighting like little girls to be the center of attention.