To Retort or not to RetortFollow

An older post but felt I needed to ask this again :)

OK, so we’ve all experienced it, you pick up the pug and head off to that random, the run’s going ok and then for whatever reason someone dies, maybe it’s your fault (I mean it happens, nobody’s perfect) or most likely it’s not, or it’s just bad luck, whatever.. And then it starts… OMFG,WTF,NOHEALZ,******,NOOB etc etc you know the situation, the abuse, we’ve all been there .. and yes stronger sanctions from Blizz are needed for it but that’s a different thread.

So the real question is what’s the best way to respond?

1) Ignore it – stoically plough on through having to listen to it
2) Exit
3) Try and reason with the unreasonable
4) Try and patiently explain what actually did go wrong even to those who are usually not listening
5) Fight fire with fire … (some of my fav’s listed below, lifted from the web))

I'm Rez spec'd
I can heal your health bar, but I can't heal stupid and believe me you really are
That was half the dungeon. I do dungeons, not jailbreaks
I'll heal better if you tank/dps better
I am trying to top the Rez meter..
I’m after the 1000000 rez’s achievement
Heal? I thought I was just here for the Fort buff
It's more mana efficient to resurrect than to heal
I’m a priest, I prayed for you! The Gods didn't answer

The 3 Basic Rules Of Grouping:
If the tank dies, it's the healer's fault
If the healer dies, it's the tank's fault
If DPS dies, it's their own fault – control your aggro and use your CC

/p Now resurrecting %t.
/p Side effects may include headache, nausea, dizziness, loss of appetite, vomiting, insomnia, or **** retention. If you are pregnant or have a pace maker, please read additional warning labels before clicking 'accept'. Resurrection is not for everyone; please consult your healer before dying.

Sorry, all of our healbot operators are busy right now but please leave your request after the tone …
For renew please type OMFGHEALMENOOB
For greater heal yell HEALZUF*CKINGRETARD
For circle of healing type FFSWTFUDOING
Or please leave a message and we’ll get back to you

Sorry I was distracted by the telly
I've lost that lovin' healing... oooohhh… . that lovin’ healing …
I was busy rolling my face across my keyboard …
It was the tank or you, I decided on a cheaper repair bill

I’m so tempted to go with a few of these on macros, I know it’s wrong, right, right … must…. resist….

:o)

So, what do you think is the right thing to do… and what do you actually do?

If "it happens, nobody is perfect", then I'd say sorry about that.

If people were standing in fire, I'd ask them not to.

If they are simply being unreasonable, I may suggest they find another healer more to their liking and leave.

I dealt with this a little bit even just last night. My first line of defense against blame is to explain to the group why someone died, and what they can do to avoid it in the future. If there are still issues and I continue to be blamed, I will either vote to kick the person in question, or leave the group myself.

I heal because I enjoy it, and because I get faster queue times. I don't heal to be abused by people who don't know what the **** they're doing.

That is strange. Maybe it has something to do with resto druids having a reputation as being an easy healing class, where as priests are a lot more challenging? Either that, or it's just a coincidence.

Maybe it's because I'm not raiding, but I don't understand the stigma on Priests as a healing class. I had to scrape my way through regulars and heroics on my Druid back in the day (of Cataclysm launch) and it was a freakin' nightmare to just keep the tank alive. My Priest (83) can heal most available dungeons by throwing out a Prayer of Mending and spamming Smite.

I don't know, maybe heroics are different, but right now my Priest seems so overpowered it's hilarious. Flash Heal crits for 30k and adds a 14k shield on top of it. My Druid's Regrowth crits for maybe 24k and heals for another 2.5k over time.



Should probably mention that there are 2k spell power and two levels between my Druid and Priest. With my Druid being level 85.

Edited, Aug 22nd 2011 7:47pm by Mazra

Nothing 2600 spirit and 100k+ mana doesn't cure for Holy Priests! ;)

I was originally told to only go 2k spirit, but that just wasn't enough when the stuff hit the fan; which is pretty often it seems. I turned it into a 2500 spirit goal and once I hit that, Holy Priest healing was cake IMO. I completely agree with Mazra: I feel Holy Priests are OP healing (when you have enough spirit for your needs), but on Shaman it's hard for me, to the point I really don't heal much anymore on it.

Druids don't have a "whole bunch" of HoT spells they can throw around anymore. They have Rejuvenation, which is similar to Renew, except it costs more mana. They have Wild Growth, which is similar to Prayer of Healing, except it costs more mana. Lifebloom is kept up on the tank at all times and not something you throw around unless you pop Tree of Life first.

My point, however, was that Druids' go-to fast heal, the heal supposedly cast if lots of healing is needed, is weaker than any of the other equivalents out there. It also costs more mana than Flash Heal.

As for Swiftmend and Efflorescence, I compare those to Power Word: Shield and Prayer of Mending. I also compare Living Seed to Divine Aegis. I know you said that you can't compare the spells directly, but Blizzard homogenized the healing classes. They even said so themselves in their pre-Cata launch updates. They wanted all healers to be able to perform all roles equally. They just forgot about 5-mans for the first six months of the expansion.

There's a difference in the number of targets, but you can refresh Renew with any direct target heal while in Serenity Chakra (The direct healing one) as a holy priest.



What you just said kind of makes them the exact same spell.



There are differences, yes. That's Blizzard's attempt at keeping things different. However, Blizzard did say that they homogenized the healing classes. Each healer has the trinity: the weak cheap heal, the fast inefficient heal, and the slow efficient big heal. You can see these in all healing classes. There are always going to be differences, but they're a hell of a lot more similar now than ever before.

And Wild Growth reminds me a lot more of Circle of Healing than anything. Their glyphs are even the same.

Edited, Aug 24th 2011 10:02am by IDrownFish

That's kinda obvious. Just saying that you need to look at the overall healing rather than just picking single spells.

Regrowth doesn't have to heal for as much as Flash Heal or Flash of Light when it's assumed that you have another HoT ticking anyway or could add it within a GCD if needed. Same deal with the randomness of Shaman heals. You can't exactly predict when Earth Shield or Earthliving will proc, yet you know that they actually WILL be up and add to your total healing. (Ignoring the 100% chance for Earthliving when you picked up Blessing of the Eternals and your target's health is below 35%).

It's not like anybody would compare a Frost Bolt to an Arcane Blast and evaluate performance just on that single spell - just because they're kinda the same. Mortal Strike and Obliterate? Rip and Rupture?

Yeah I guess that's where druids apparently were just not quite compatible with the homogenization of healers. Nourish should have been the spell to use for the quick heal, just like it used to be.

WHY they chose to change that after truly trying to shove Nourish down our throats in Wrath is beyond my comprehension.

I got that kind of abuse from a tank recently, when it was blatantly his fault that he died for standing where he shouldn't and it subsequently caused a wipe. Irl my jaw dropped, I'd not experienced abuse in a long time (I'm quick to apologise for mistakes that are mine). Anyhow I didn't need to say a word, the dps had noticed, they stood up for me and kicked the tank from the group.

Imo explain if you can, as the offenders will never learn. PuGs are all too often unforgiving and impatient.

It tends to be bad players that exit, and good players that kick the bad players.

Edited, Aug 26th 2011 7:23am by Callu