Guild Wars 2

Hello,

so now not raids and high lvl fractals have come live healer builds have become needed. So with this in mind I have a few questions:

1. Is it Zealot gear? Or Cleric? Can some1 fill the role of a tank and a healer at the same time? (That would prefer Cleric gear.) Or Zealot, to have some dps left?

2. What classes are viable? Many has healer capabilities but I dont know how certain class mechanics fit in with the boss mechanics. Moving around that tablet seems a little annoying for example. I’m gravitating towards ele or gua, but I’m open to any class.

3. Would a raid healer/support spec work in high lvl fracs? As far as I know toughness scaling screws up the classic zerker meta anyways on the highest lvls, so the question is if I should make condi gear for my toons or cleric/zealot/cele?

ty

Well…not sure healers are ideal for Fractals, but there’s worse places to have one, I guess. =P

1. As for gear, if you run druid, then go for Magi’s. It doesn’t have the toughness that can mess with a tank like Cleric’s and the dps gain from Zealot’s is negligible. The extra health also allows you to step into damage for a bit so that you can heal yourself and regen your celestial avatar form.

2. Druid, and to a lesser extent, ele are the only real healers. Rev has a healing form, but it needs some serious love from a balance patch.

3. It works…but you can get through with full dps, so it’s just a slower alternative to other classes you could take. However, a lot of people really only do Fractals on the easy levels to farm the dailies, in which case it doesn’t matter what you bring anyways.

Dahkeus.8243:

Well…not sure healers are ideal for Fractals, but there’s worse places to have one, I guess. =P

1. As for gear, if you run druid, then go for Magi’s. It doesn’t have the toughness that can mess with a tank like Cleric’s and the dps gain from Zealot’s is negligible. The extra health also allows you to step into damage for a bit so that you can heal yourself and regen your celestial avatar form.

2. Druid, and to a lesser extent, ele are the only real healers. Rev has a healing form, but it needs some serious love from a balance patch.

3. It works…but you can get through with full dps, so it’s just a slower alternative to other classes you could take. However, a lot of people really only do Fractals on the easy levels to farm the dailies, in which case it doesn’t matter what you bring anyways.

I think zealot is the current way to go for druid in raids, not magis.

Zealot or just zerker.

Depends on the strenght of your raid group. The better the group, the more dps you can squeeze out of your healer.

But please don’t go full zerk in a pug. You can try that in a month or so, when the average raid experience of players is higher.

if you’re camping staff take healing on your gear, if you’re going sword or condi take berserker and viper gear respectively.

First of all: thank you for the answers!

I’m more or less getting the picture. But I have an other question now.

Why only druid? Is it something with the numbers? I mean healing-power scaling or coefficients and stuff like that… Or is it the healing mechanics of the class? Like druid is the most flexible when it comes to switching between burst healing and sustained healing?

Ok a bit of an info dump on the 3 classes I’ve tried/successfully healed on:

First off, sigil of transference, rice balls and rune of the monk = 275 healing power, 30% outgoing healing and 15% boon duration. The bountiful utilities potions are another 10% boon duration if you don’t mind dropping the gold. This is more important than what healing power you would get from gear.

For gear stats specifically, I would go against clerics as there is a lot of toughness and it could conflict with the tank’s aggro. Some groups like the healer to tank, some like chrono tanks etc so this really depends on the group. The buffs to healing in the first section is why you can go zerker or viper’s for healing if your group is decent enough. I’m rich enough to afford an ascended light/heavy zealots set so I can use those on my herald/tempest but my druid gets by fine with zerker+monk. Since trinkets are easier to swap out for raw stats, depending on my group, I’ll swap trinkets between zerker, celestial and magi for a bit more healing/tankiness if needed.

A bit more specific on bosses:
VG: I don’t like herald or tempest on VG because they do the best healing/damage in melee/can’t heal the front and backline well at the same time. In theory staff tempest can water auto attack the front line and aura heal the backline but meh. Depending on the group comp though, these classes can work but I’ve defaulted to druid after multiple weeks at it. Spirits can be traited for 1500 radius aoe on their effects, staff/long bow+ quickdraw means easy mobility and sustain heal on the frontline while celestial can be used to burst heal every 15 seconds for the green circle (F5, 3, 4, F5 to also cc the red circles before they reach you while getting max stacks on gotl,)

What I like about druid in general is how versatile the builds can be. While there is an obvious optimal healer build (sword/axe or axe/torch) for max power or condi dps, a lot of their builds work. I’ve tried longbow/longbow quick draw for a ranged group with shout healing to charge up astral. Almost full glyphs in max dps melee builds. Full spirit builds for dps buffs and protection and clutch resses. They adapt well for all situations while always being able to buff their group. They can also be the tank with the right trinkets. They’re great overall and I’ve also used one at Sab and Gorsy.

My group is currently struggling with throwing bombs fast enough at Sabetha so we haven’t had a successful kill yet (getting there) and gorsy has been killed a few times now. I’ve tried tempest and druid for both of these and they both work because these are bosses that your group stays collectively stacked in melee. Haven’t tried herald yet but I think it would do much better on these two for similar reasons that tempest is working better for me here. It’s still a clunky healer but has the most outgoing healing modifiers and can reach +106-110 % outgoing healing. Regen alone with that will become 500-700 healing per second with those modifiers + healing power. I’ll try it after reset this week but I wouldn’t go for it.

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

Ok a bit of an info dump on the 3 classes I’ve tried/successfully healed on:

First off, sigil of transference, rice balls and rune of the monk = 275 healing power, 30% outgoing healing and 15% boon duration. The bountiful utilities potions are another 10% boon duration if you don’t mind dropping the gold. This is more important than what healing power you would get from gear.

For gear stats specifically, I would go against clerics as there is a lot of toughness and it could conflict with the tank’s aggro. Some groups like the healer to tank, some like chrono tanks etc so this really depends on the group. The buffs to healing in the first section is why you can go zerker or viper’s for healing if your group is decent enough. I’m rich enough to afford an ascended light/heavy zealots set so I can use those on my herald/tempest but my druid gets by fine with zerker+monk. Since trinkets are easier to swap out for raw stats, depending on my group, I’ll swap trinkets between zerker, celestial and magi for a bit more healing/tankiness if needed.

A bit more specific on bosses:
VG: I don’t like herald or tempest on VG because they do the best healing/damage in melee/can’t heal the front and backline well at the same time. In theory staff tempest can water auto attack the front line and aura heal the backline but meh. Depending on the group comp though, these classes can work but I’ve defaulted to druid after multiple weeks at it. Spirits can be traited for 1500 radius aoe on their effects, staff/long bow+ quickdraw means easy mobility and sustain heal on the frontline while celestial can be used to burst heal every 15 seconds for the green circle (F5, 3, 4, F5 to also cc the red circles before they reach you while getting max stacks on gotl,)

What I like about druid in general is how versatile the builds can be. While there is an obvious optimal healer build (sword/axe or axe/torch) for max power or condi dps, a lot of their builds work. I’ve tried longbow/longbow quick draw for a ranged group with shout healing to charge up astral. Almost full glyphs in max dps melee builds. Full spirit builds for dps buffs and protection and clutch resses. They adapt well for all situations while always being able to buff their group. They can also be the tank with the right trinkets. They’re great overall and I’ve also used one at Sab and Gorsy.

My group is currently struggling with throwing bombs fast enough at Sabetha so we haven’t had a successful kill yet (getting there) and gorsy has been killed a few times now. I’ve tried tempest and druid for both of these and they both work because these are bosses that your group stays collectively stacked in melee. Haven’t tried herald yet but I think it would do much better on these two for similar reasons that tempest is working better for me here. It’s still a clunky healer but has the most outgoing healing modifiers and can reach +106-110 % outgoing healing. Regen alone with that will become 500-700 healing per second with those modifiers + healing power. I’ll try it after reset this week but I wouldn’t go for it.

Thx for the detailed answer. One last question: How come guardians are not even on the table? :O

Guardian heals are kind of like herald or tempest healers: Better off in melee and therefore most people haven’t used them since VG is the first boss and needs that healer on the green circle/ranged group. I think this has given them a bad name. DnT did use one as a tank for VG though. They may not be the best healer but I think they could actually work in other fights.

Symbol heals, aoe F2 passive, mace auto, regen, protection and elite signet for sustain vs the ~1k passive dmg every 3 seconds.

Then all the block combo traits for more healing: Invigorating bulwark, Communal defense, pure of heart, retributive armor and mace/shield in general.

Dodge heal, receive the light, shield 5.2 and merciful intervention for more burst healing.

Untested but I think they could keep a group up. Not optimal as they don’t have the best team buffs or personal damage though. Now I’m kind of tempted to try this…

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

Guardian heals are kind of like herald or tempest healers: Better off in melee and therefore most people haven’t used them since VG is the first boss and needs that healer on the green circle/ranged group. I think this has given them a bad name. DnT did use one as a tank for VG though. They may not be the best healer but I think they could actually work in other fights.

Symbol heals, aoe F2 passive, mace auto, regen, protection and elite signet for sustain vs the ~1k passive dmg every 3 seconds.

Then all the block combo traits for more healing: Invigorating bulwark, Communal defense, pure of heart, retributive armor and mace/shield in general.

Dodge heal, receive the light, shield 5.2 and merciful intervention for more burst healing.

Untested but I think they could keep a group up. Not optimal as they don’t have the best team buffs or personal damage though. Now I’m kind of tempted to try this…

I’d really love to hear about your results.

As far as fractals as concerned you can get away with Berserker’s. The key there would be you have to offset the lack of Healing Power with increased Outgoing healing %. In those instances you don’t so much need sustained healing as much as your need occasional burst healing.

The reason Druid has so much screen time is due to Grace of the Land and various Spirits which increases outgoing damage (both power and condi). They have great healing coefficients and can stack outgoing healing % very well (30-50% comfortably with a proper build), but the extra selling point is the ability to buff damage which is critical to successful attempts.

While other classes do offer healing they don’t offer buffs nearly as impactful as what a Druid offers. Personally, we’ve had a very good time with a Rev Healer so I’m not saying Druid is end-all-be-all.

New fractals are even easier than old ones, healer definitely isn’t needed.

Tonight I couldn’t sleep so I went to a friend’s twitch channel and watched some of our old fractals videos.
At 38 mossman did more, hell, he did twice the damage he does now at 90. At 50 he’d easily wipe out 70-100% of my guardian’s health with a single attack, if he caught me off-guard (pun unintended). The difference between “then” and “now” is incredible.
And appalling.

I don’t understand how someone would feel useful when playing healer in new fractals. You can allow your team to never dodge so you don’t lose boons, I suppose; that’s pretty much it.

deSade.9437:

Tonight I couldn’t sleep so I went to a friend’s twitch channel and watched some of our old fractals videos.
At 38 mossman did more, hell, he did twice the damage he does now at 90. At 50 he’d easily wipe out 70-100% of my guardian’s health with a single attack, if he caught me off-guard (pun unintended). The difference between “then” and “now” is incredible.
And appalling.

I don’t understand how someone would feel useful when playing healer in new fractals. You can allow your team to never dodge so you don’t lose boons, I suppose; that’s pretty much it.

Are you comparing to pre or post introduction of instabilities?

recorded aug 2014

At a certain point in the video I make a mistake, get caught by an aa and poof, my health just disappears

hey,

I’ve been full clearing the raid since the second week and have played mostly heals. Druid is the best healer because of unique damage buffs. In a very experienced group you can also go full zerk on Druid, whereas other healers would struggle in this armor. Other than a dozen or so full clears on druid, I have successfully done VG and Gors on a Guard healer and have done VG on a Rev healer.

As for OP’s questions:
1. For armor+weapons I go zealots, and for trinkets I use celestial or berserker (no matter what class). Celestial gives you a lot of wiggle room and I generally suggest using them at all times. I use monk runes and sigils are water and force. The only raid timer so tight that you need a healer in berserkers is a Gorseval no updraft run :P

2. Druid, Guard, Ele, and Rev are all viable. For ease of use I would suggest against Rev. Druid outshines all others in terms of versatility (movement, cc, ranged heals) and party damage, and will make first clears easier and smoother. I haven’t actually tried tempest heals (someone else in our guild sometimes runs it and is successful), but both tempest and guard generally need to be in melee range to be effective which limits the amount of other roles/jobs you can do (such as range tanking Sabetha).

3. I haven’t done fracs since HoT, but some guildmates said a druid can be nice for higher levels (if in zealots+zerks). I believe the toughness has been standardized across 50-100 so you no longer benefit from everyone in condi.

edit: read through the comments a bit and seems like people are curious about guard. I actually really enjoy guard on VG because you can aegis the lightning group if you time it correctly and still stay near melee range. I ran zeal for damage (valor is awesome for communal defenses and monks focus though), honor, and virtues. Slot skills were Healing Breeze, mercy sig, merciful intervention, retreat, and courage sig (RF also works). Weapons were zealots mace/shield and hammer, force+water on both. Zealot armor with monk runes and celestial trinkets.