You can't heal a boss to death... but what if you could?

LioraValkyrie

tl:dr - change Force Siphon to target allies and redistribute a percentage of overhealing you apply to them as damage to nearby enemies.

So, some guildies and I have been running vet dlc dungeons every night recently and have found, with the possible exception of Bloodroot Forge, that they are easier with 3 dds and a tank than with 2 dds, a tank and a healer. The reason for this is simple: in a group of 4 skilled players, all of them are perfectly capable of looking after their own health and resources. By replacing a healer with a 3rd dd, you simply add 30k+ extra dps to the mix, which makes everything melt like butter. This is unfortunate and kind of sad, especially for my friend who mains a healer.

Consequently, I've been brainstorming a few ideas that might help to rectify this issue...

Revise Force Siphon
- This skill is terrible, and I believe I am correct in assuming that very few people use it. It is the last skill to be accessed on the restoration skill tree, but the least powerful. Let's rectify this...
- > Apply Force Siphon to an ally, instead of an enemy. You may have up to 3 Force Siphons active at one time. 25% of all Overhealing received by that ally is redistributed as damage to enemies within 5 metres of them.

The effect: healers can contribute significantly to group dps by casting healing spells! This also rewards risky play from magicka dds, who will contribute more dps by getting within melee range of their targets.

Revise Healing Ritual
- This skill is terrible, and I have never seen anybody use it. The 1.5 second cast time means that everybody is dead by the time it actually casts. Let's rectify this...
- > Rename to Reinforcing Ritual. Keep the cast time. Refresh any damage shield active on an ally within 10m to its maximum duration.
- -> Morph 1 also replenishes 30% of all damage shields affected.
- -> Morph 2 also refreshes the duration of any heal over time buffs an ally has cast on themselves.

The effect: dds can keep their shields and vigours up for longer, so can focus more on their rotations with less dps loss. This also synergises with the revised version of Force Siphon - damage shields up for longer means more overhealing.

Revise Guard
- This skill is possibly ok, but very few people use it. Let's rectify this...
- > Guard and its morphs can now be applied to up to 3 allied targets.

The effect: This will put more pressure on the tank, but also increase group dps (with the increased crit damage from Mystic Guard) and give more reason for the healer to heal them. Also, dds and the healer will be taking less damage, which will proc the revised Force Siphon overhealing ability.

Bone Shield
- This skill is underused, and the synergy is very unreliable.
-> Convert to a magicka ability. Make the synergy more reliable.

The effect: This will synergize well with Reinforcing Ritual and the revised Force Siphon.

I believe that, if you combine these skill concepts together, a Force Siphon Healer with a Guard Tank could potentially be a better option than running 3 dds. The role of the healer would be transformed to be more about exploiting the dps benefits of keeping your group at maximum health (with this version of Force Siphon, HPS might actually become a thing!) rather than simply replenishing health when it goes away - a job any class and role can usually do for themselves with enough experience.

*edited to add tl:dr, because I read back through my post and it's long!

s7732425ub17_ESO

I came here hoping to discuss a new boss mechanic that spawns adds that have to be healed up to full health in x seconds or else the boss enrages.

LioraValkyrie

s7732425ub17_ESO wrote: »

I came here hoping to discuss a new boss mechanic that spawns adds that have to be healed up to full health in x seconds or else the boss enrages.

I kind of like that idea, too

starkerealm

I thought this was going to be like the old, healing spells damage the undead mechanic from D&D.

EvilCroc

Just let us use BoL on bosses to damage them.

Aurielle

Revamping healing skills to give them more offensive utility isn't a bad idea, necessarily, though I do think that some of the percentages you've suggested here would be WAY overpowered (especially when combined with sets like Spell Power Cure). Also, your suggestion for Healing Ritual could break Cyrodiil. It's hard enough to kill shield-stacking sorcs as it is WITHOUT a pocket healer refreshing their shields every 1.5 seconds.

Runefang

Doesn't make much sense to me though, you just turned the healer into a DPS? Still doesn't mean you need a healer over a DPS right?

I'd rather see the bosses just deal significantly more damage that actually required a healer and a proper tank.

Anyway this is why I roll a nightblade healer. In most dungeons all I need to do to heal is cast refreshing path and funnel health, nobody has to self heal and I deal a good portion of the damage. Some harder vet dungeons require mutagen and the occasional healing ward.

Smasherx74

tl;dr bad idea

LioraValkyrie

Just putting my thoughts out there. Probably not good ideas. Just ideas. Anyway, thanks for taking a look.

Runefang

LioraValkyrie wrote: »

Just putting my thoughts out there. Probably not good ideas. Just ideas. Anyway, thanks for taking a look.

You're not wrong that the roles of healer and tank need to be looked at though.

raj72616a

healer can be giving spc buff, combat prayer, warhorn, off balance, minor vulnerability, not taking their class specific skills into account.
would that not be a good enough buff to total dps already?

Runefang

raj72616a wrote: »

healer can be giving spc buff, combat prayer, warhorn, off balance, minor vulnerability, not taking their class specific skills into account.
would that not be a good enough buff to total dps already?

In 4-man content that won't increase the group dps compared to simply having another DD.