a_sprague Posted July 10, 2012 Share Posted July 10, 2012 A lot of times in lower level FP's on my main, I'd see healers trying to DPS alongside the DPS. Is this common practice? I have two skill bars set up on my Scoundrel, one for levelling (where 1, 2, 3, 4, etc. are all attack skills, and I have my heals on a clickable bar), and one for healing (1 is still my basic blaster shot, but the other numbers are assigned to heals). Is it expected of healers to contribute to DPS? Or is it like WoW, where we basically just sit back and heal when needed? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chaqen Posted July 10, 2012 Share Posted July 10, 2012 If there is no damage to heal, it is best to contribute a bit of dps instead of standing about twiddling your thumbs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CaptainApop Posted July 10, 2012 Share Posted July 10, 2012 (edited) If there is no damage to heal, it is best to contribute a bit of dps instead of standing about twiddling your thumbs. This basically. Scoundrels/operatives are in one of the best positions to do so in my perspective. Two things you should know about your dps buttons. Pistol Whip ---> Emergency med pack will net you three energy overall.Backblast will cost you one energy overall. You can neatly sub these in without negatively effecting your energy or healing in any meaningful way while still contributing some not insignificant damage. Naturally if the fight is healing intensive then using diagnostic scan in place of these fillers would be preferable. ( I don't know the name of the scoundrel mirror for diagnostic scan sorry :L) As for your other damaging buttons they have a much more situational use. If you do have literally nothing to heal then throw out a det pack whenever you can. A nice niche I've found for us is actually burst aoe damage. We can pool 3 Upper hands for carbine burst ( again, don't know the mirror), pop freighter fly by and throw grenades. Doing all of it will blow your energy bar but there are certain points where you can abuse this to reduce the amount of healing you actually need to do. For example the add packs on Kephess in denova. Edited July 11, 2012 by CaptainApop Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pubsam Posted July 11, 2012 Share Posted July 11, 2012 I actually find it more difficult to help DPS on my Operative since I have to be in melee to really accomplish anything. Not saying it's impossible, but it takes more of my attention than to just be a turret at range. The time lost running to a mob usually makes it not worth it to me. On my Sage though, i am constantly DPSing. In HM FPs I probably cast more damage spells than heals, and I routinely help DPS in burn phases in Ops without encountering any resource problems. It's a lot of fun. I healed for years in WoW and I would hardly ever hit a non-heal spell for any occasion. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tobradex Posted July 11, 2012 Share Posted July 11, 2012 (edited) A great way to add DPS when you are full on energy and there is little to heal is to throw in an orbital strike. While it has a bit of a cast time, it does significant damage and you can heal after it lands. This is good DPS on single target and exceptional as AoE. When fighting against any boss, I try to always keep a corrosive dart dot on the mob to add a bit of dps from ranged. If you are concerned about energy, you can also just use your free blaster fire (forgot what it is called). You can even just use that to add dps while you are resting up more energy. While adding DPS in FP probably is not neccesary (depending on the group), it is good practice. There have been a few ops where I have added significant DPS and the raid barely beat the enrage timer, or killed the boss after the enrage timer goes off. In these sketchy raid groups a healers added damage done can make the difference of downing the boss or not. One last note. When there are multiple mobs bunched up, don't be afraid of using our AoE Carbine Burst that uses a TA; It is instant cast and does a significant amount of damage. Edited July 11, 2012 by Tobradex Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyGarth Posted July 16, 2012 Share Posted July 16, 2012 when I'm healing i feel useless if i'm just doing nothing and waiting to cast my next heal over time, so i use my basic attack since it's free, grenades and DoTs, but if energy starts to get low than i go back to healing alone. I've had some fairly bad DPS in the past so i figure a little help can go a long way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobmcbo Posted July 17, 2012 Share Posted July 17, 2012 yeah, try to do damage when nobody needs healing. It's probably most useful to throw out a DoT or 2 since it helps with the damage even while you heal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChikenSammichPie Posted July 18, 2012 Share Posted July 18, 2012 I do it because I'm bored and want trash/bosses to go faster, but it makes me overheat and become useless for healing. Eh. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cleet_Xia Posted July 18, 2012 Share Posted July 18, 2012 31/10/0 seer sage, I dps as much as I can when healing isn't required. There just isn't really a reason not to. On longer fights I don't use my dots anymore, because they do less damage per force than project or disturbance. And Tk throw channels so long that is effectively very cheap to use. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lexiekaboom Posted July 18, 2012 Share Posted July 18, 2012 Really depends on what you are doing. 11 points in the healing tree will get you by content you have over leveled just fine. When you hit 50 you're going to want 31 points in healing for sure, but once you have black-hole gear and so do the people you group with, go back to 11 points and put 30 in DPS and DPS all you want. My guild, who's core is full augmented BH don't even use a "healer" for flash points any more. Our DPS troopers go into combat support cell for bosses while in full dps spec. The rest of the zone he's DPSing and tossing a few probes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
azurefrog Posted July 18, 2012 Share Posted July 18, 2012 I actually find it more difficult to help DPS on my Operative since I have to be in melee to really accomplish anything. Not saying it's impossible, but it takes more of my attention than to just be a turret at range. The time lost running to a mob usually makes it not worth it to me. On my Sage though, i am constantly DPSing. In HM FPs I probably cast more damage spells than heals, and I routinely help DPS in burn phases in Ops without encountering any resource problems. It's a lot of fun. I healed for years in WoW and I would hardly ever hit a non-heal spell for any occasion. Sabotage charge, thermal grenade and vital shot all have a 30m range. Do you really have so little healing pressure in a HM FP that you have the energy to spare to DPS more than that? I haven't started running HMs yet, but I was expecting them to be more intense than that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikebevo Posted July 19, 2012 Share Posted July 19, 2012 (edited) Sabotage charge, thermal grenade and vital shot all have a 30m range. Do you really have so little healing pressure in a HM FP that you have the energy to spare to DPS more than that? I haven't started running HMs yet, but I was expecting them to be more intense than that. It is going to depend on the HMFP, your groups skill and their equipment.. A good, well geared group and then you will be able to do a little DPS, just be careful. "I didn't have energy because I was DPSing" is not an excuse your group will accept when the tank or dps dies. I would stick with the second reply in this thread by CaptainApop. Pistol Whip grants Upper Hand which makes it not only useful on the dps side but on the healing side. So my best advice is error on the side of being ready to heal, your job in the FP is to heal, the DPS job is to cause damage. If you are doing these with guild mates or a regular group, you will learn their strengths and weakness and when you need energy in reserve and when you can spend it on DPS. You will learn to judges others gear and set up, so you will have a pretty good idea what to expect even with PUGs. You will also figure out when your group DPS’s is limited and you have to do damage to avoid enrage timers. Just remember if everyone lives up until enrage, then you as a healer have done your job. If everyone dies while you’re dps, then as a healer you will be blamed. When I’m not sure about a group, I will use Pistol Whip and Backblast like CaptainApop stated, I also use interrupts, Flash Grenade and dirty kick during many of the fights to limit damage to myself and the group. I also use dirty kick other times, but not sure if it is an energy cost effective attack, but it sure is fun, but I make sure I have energy and 3 stacks of upper hand first and foremost. Edited July 19, 2012 by mikebevo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kupo Posted July 19, 2012 Share Posted July 19, 2012 (edited) I dps sometimes simply because I get bored if I'm not pushing buttons. But yeah, our duty is to keep our group's HP up, so interrupts and stuns are handy when we're not busy. Damage prevented > damage healed, after all. Edited July 19, 2012 by Kupo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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