peacenote wrote: »

Sparxlost wrote: »

peacenote wrote: »

Part of me is against this as the LAST thing we need is people asking for healing parses. As a measure of a healer this would be extremely flawed.

However, there is part of me that would appreciate some type of controlled repeatable situation where I could test my effectiveness as a healer in different scenarios. I say "situation" because I'm not sure a dummy would cut it. HPS generally is not a good number to follow as it depends on how much damage people are taking and how good my fellow healer is in a trial. But it would be interesting to be able to more easily test, say, infused vs. arcane traits, or whether dropping springs or orbs first is more effective, or how many casts of BoL is needed to fully heal someone. I'm just giving some examples of things people might want to try to become a stronger healer in their class.

Right now to do these things one has to get in a group and it has to be in the sweet spot of not steamrolling content but not so green there's no way you can have a consistent pull.

I almost would want like a simulation room where groups of dummies take controlled, sustained damage with a boss where you could practice healing and parsing.

Anyway. Dummies in general frustrate me because they are a pain to reset and you can't even do it if it's not your own house. I feel like we could use some improvements in this area generally. But for healers I think we'd need something very well done to be more useful than harmful to the role. And right now I am skeptical that we'd get something well done. I feel very burned by the heavy-handed AwA implementation... at least parts of ZOS don't seem to understand what makes healing fun (ahem pale order/vampire functionality ahem) or how many people like to play with alts and track game progress. I kind of feel like healing is fun IN SPITE of changes ZOS has made lately as opposed to because of them and each patch I worry something will drop that'll ruin it completely.

Testing is different from practice
having a good idea of how much hps healers typically need would make building so much easier because it would eliminate bar space from overhealing for utility or damage...
if you wanted to get better in the field i would suggest doing veteran dungeons as they make good practice for end-game content i would also suggest dragonstar arena....

Well. I would counter by saying that, right now, DPS have dummies that allow for both testing and practice. They can be used to test out builds. But they also serve as a way for DPS to practice and tighten up their rotations in a controlled situation. Perhaps a healing dummy would allow for some testing, but it wouldn't be equivalent to what DPS can do with dummies. Therefore I think my point still stands. One, if we get only a healing dummy and not a full simulation healers will be judged by the limitations of the dummies which is misleading and oversimplifies the role. Two, healers have no way to tighten up and practice skill order and priority without requiring others to join and be patient with them. DPS can use dummies and tanks can go into any instance anywhere with a boss that doesn't have a one-shot mechanic to practice blocking, staying alive, self-healing, etc. without requiring others to come along for the practice. I have friends who go to areas of the world when they are sparsely populated and just solo world bosses as practice. But a healer has no good way to practice healing multiple party members while managing procs and parsing in between without jumping into content.

I personally am in a trial prog group, but I'm thinking back to how I grew as a healer. Before almost all queued dungeon runs either steamrolled content or went PAINFULLY slowly with inexperienced players (tanks who can't taunt and DPS who can't pass even small DPS checks). I'm not sure I'd be an effective healer if I learned to heal in today's environment. But I learned before power creep and before the gap between the floor and the ceiling was so wide and most dungeon runs allowed groups to see mechanics for a more consistent experience. This is why I'm thinking a simulation may be needed to fill the gap now. Also, a healing scenario that measures your DPS, buffs, and ensures you keep multiple targets alive might go a long way towards educating folks about what is really expected of healers and what the role really means.

Sparxlost wrote: »

say you are a sorc healer with a ton of crit using crit surge and idk any other aoe healing abilities that dont have to be recast for awhile then you could focus on damage and blocking or whatever..... having healing dummies behind you at the end of the parse just gives you an idea of how much healing you pushed out for the group over that time...