01-10-2009, 09:43 PM
With all this talk of healing in PvP, it is reminding me vaguely of a discussion I saw a while ago about apportioning blame in PvE groups. The original poster was obviously a healer; going on about how whenever anything, ever goes wrong in a pve instance, the healer gets the blame first and gets yelled at and kicked, etc., and that obviously 9 times out of 10 the problem is that the tank is a drooling retard, or that the DPS is playing via vocal commands to a team of trained mice, due to a full body cast, and that they should all learn to affect a proper degree of self loathing, rather than placing it on the surrogate of the healer. Because, naturally, healers are beautiful, unique snowflakes who command respect and admiration simply by clicking their class at character creation.
You might be able to infer that I do not feel that this person's assessment is objective and accurate. I feel that I come at this with a decent perspective--I've played DPS for nearly four years. But my main right now is an 80 warrior. And I'm levelling a right mean Boomkin who has healed more instances post-60 than any other alt I've levelled has even stepped into.
I feel that it is fairly obvious when someone is doing something wrong in pickup groups. You'll see that the DPS is pulling a mob off the tank and running around like a chicken with its head cut off trying to solo it. Or the tank will admit that he doesn't own a shield. Or the healer will go, "I am so high right now" and try to mind control rats half the fight.
That considered, one thing I have always seen is, even if it is quite obvious that the healer is the group's mouth-breather (you have to have at least one), most groups I've been in will not say anything. So long as there's a chance that they can just suffer through and finish the instance, then they will be worried more about losing the healer than kicking him, and won't want to say anything that might make him leave. And at the end of the run, they will apply their faces to their keyboards, issue a primal scream of rage, say, "Good run, thanks." and hearth. Because the healers simply command power. They are necessary, and they are hard to replace, and even a bad one is better than not having one.
On that note: Worst group member you've ever had?
Mine was just a couple weeks ago. I was healing Blood Furnace on my druid, and invited a random rogue. This rogue was wearing spellpower gear, specced into mutilate while wielding a sword and mace, and completely incoherent. This rogue tried to outroll my druid on a caster mace, averaged 150 DPS in most fights (at level 64), and in general spent most of the run standing next to my character (healer--you know, way on the other end of the world from melee range) spinning in circles. It was awesome.
You might be able to infer that I do not feel that this person's assessment is objective and accurate. I feel that I come at this with a decent perspective--I've played DPS for nearly four years. But my main right now is an 80 warrior. And I'm levelling a right mean Boomkin who has healed more instances post-60 than any other alt I've levelled has even stepped into.
I feel that it is fairly obvious when someone is doing something wrong in pickup groups. You'll see that the DPS is pulling a mob off the tank and running around like a chicken with its head cut off trying to solo it. Or the tank will admit that he doesn't own a shield. Or the healer will go, "I am so high right now" and try to mind control rats half the fight.
That considered, one thing I have always seen is, even if it is quite obvious that the healer is the group's mouth-breather (you have to have at least one), most groups I've been in will not say anything. So long as there's a chance that they can just suffer through and finish the instance, then they will be worried more about losing the healer than kicking him, and won't want to say anything that might make him leave. And at the end of the run, they will apply their faces to their keyboards, issue a primal scream of rage, say, "Good run, thanks." and hearth. Because the healers simply command power. They are necessary, and they are hard to replace, and even a bad one is better than not having one.
On that note: Worst group member you've ever had?
Mine was just a couple weeks ago. I was healing Blood Furnace on my druid, and invited a random rogue. This rogue was wearing spellpower gear, specced into mutilate while wielding a sword and mace, and completely incoherent. This rogue tried to outroll my druid on a caster mace, averaged 150 DPS in most fights (at level 64), and in general spent most of the run standing next to my character (healer--you know, way on the other end of the world from melee range) spinning in circles. It was awesome.