Are you having trouble healing in PvP?

[Akhn]

After reading all of these healing threads, I would like to share some PvP healing tips to help you guys out. Why? Because I am confused and I don't understand why others are having trouble healing in PvP. I am a level 50 full-time healing operative, and I have zero issue keeping my targets alive until we have the entire enemy team chasing us.

 

The first step to being as successful healer is having a good player to heal. Unlike Warhammer Online, it is difficult to "carry" your team as a pure healer. (This is a good thing.) A "good" player is probably hard to find. A good player does a ton of DPS, they use there defensive cool downs to help you get big heals off, and they don't overextend into 8 enemy players. Most of all they are prepared to run away (Lol cowards?) when your group is in trouble. A bad DPS stays there for the last 15% of his life DPSing away as he dies, while a good DPS gets away, quickly heals, and gets right back into the fight. If anyone accuses you of being a "healbot", explain to them that this is in fact a TEAM GAME, and tell them to go back to their FPS genre.

 

The second step is learning your personal position and kiting. In my SWTOR experience the biggest threat to your healing capability is chain interrupts on your main heal. This means don't expect to ever be able to stand still and heal through a good player's DPS. If you get more than one person attacking you, you need to kite. This is wear your DPS friends come into play, as you kite and they peel for you. Don't be in a position to get interrupted, knocked out of LoS, or chain stunned. It's pretty easy to stay in proper position when you are healing from max range. Another key aspect of your positioning is learning how to follow your DPS around the map. You need to learn how to hide out of sight of the enemy, but in sight of your target. You need to learn how to follow them around in huttball, where enemies can come from all sides. Communication over vent really helps this aspect. Learning how resolve works will also save your life, basically you should save your CC break for the stun that gives you a full white resolve bar.

 

The third step is continuing to play and learn your class mechanics. The game has only been officially out for 11 days. No one has mastered anything. I know that I still let my Tactical Advantage drop as an Operative healer, and it gets me killed. Using your healing abilities properly will obviously be essential to being a good PvP healer, but it is also the proper use of your defensive cool downs. I won't go into class specific details, (If you want operative tips feel free to PM me.) but I can say a few general things. If you are serious about PvP and you're not biochem, you need to change that. The stims, medpacs, and adrenals are key to surviving. The adrenal stacks with a relic activation as well, making it more essential. If you ever die without using all of your available defensive cool downs, it is completely your fault. While I will admit that when good DPS attack you, and interrupt, there is not much you can do, I can say for a fact if you don't use your defensive cool downs properly you will die to even bad dps.

 

That is all I want to comment on for now. I will say that the 30% reduced healing really doesn't phase me at all. This is because my DPS friend uses his defensive cool downs properly, has medpacs, and doesn't overextend. Hopefully these tips lead you in the right direction for solving your PvP healing troubles.

Edited December 31, 2011 by Akhn