Tera Online: Mystic Solo & Healing SM

My Mystic hit level 26 last week.  Friday evening I decided to try my first instance in Tera Online. Initially, I tried getting in a group via chat.  I didn't want to main heal my first time doing an instance or for that matter, healing a real group.  I've healed people through taking down BAMs here-n-there but that's nothing compared to dungeon encounters.  No luck getting a group in chat I used the LFG tool, knowing by doing so, I stood a good chance of being the healer.  

Groups is formed and summoned into the instance.  And yes, I'm the healer.  Yikes!  I make sure to let them know this is my first instance and attempt at healing a real group.  Someone commented I might be on the low side for it having just turned 26.  The tank said, "Not so good" and commenced to pulling mobs.

I'll let the video speak for itself.  All in all, it wasn't a bad experience.  I wished the tank had occasionally explained what he was about to do.  NOT ONE SINGLE ENCOUNTER was ever discussed. Chat was fucking silent.  He just mowed forward, with or without us.  Luckily, I managed to keep up.

 

I fumbled the ball several times in my anxiety about pulling multiple rooms and being inexperienced. Things I need to do better in the future:

• DO NOT under any circumstances move spells around just before going into an instance!
  When you're flustered muscle memory kicks in and you start going by "what was" instead of "what is".  I'd moved around my cleanse and swapped the tank and healing pet locations.
• Really remind people to use the healing motes since they also purge/cleanse.  Most of the motes I placed around the encounters weren't used, even when people were in dire straights.
• Get used to casting the player buffs.  I don't use them when questing because they drain mana for every second their up and mobs die so quickly they're not needed.  However, in boss fights they're useful.  I'm not sure my mana could have sustained having one up anyway.
• Investigate options for expanding my mana pool.  I have crystals that increase the pool and others that regen.  Perhaps there are more options.  My heal is a small heal + HOT so I tend to be proactive and keep players topped off in case they're the victim of an alpha/enraged attack.
• REMEMBER TO MEZZ what's hitting me before I attempt to summon Thrall of Life.  The one time I really almost died, the caster after me kept interrupting my summon.

It's interesting and helpful to watch footage of yourself playing.  I have a better sense of what I struggled with and how I might improve it in the future.  I'm glad I did the run and intend run it a few more times.  

We raced through it so quickly there was no time to look around or savior the experience.  If I'm going to be doing instances as a healer, it may be time to find a guild.  Communicating over voice would help tremendously and it's always more fun with guildies than a random PUG.

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Comments

[Sarzan]

Iirc you get blue skittles that will help you out mana wise at lvl 28 or so. Sounds to me that your party was noobish since they never or rarely used the red skittles at all. I can understand the MT not dragging the boss around to get them but the rest should have been using them up when near half health.

I've been thinking about the guild thing too but I haven't been spending near enough time in game to warrant looking for one...

[Alysianah]

I joined Blood Rain to see what the guild quests were all about. they're basically the same mobs you're already killing which makes turn-in 2-fo-1. Also the rewards are supposed to be highly coveted for end game gear.

I want to get the Priest in there too but they have a min level requirement. Was either 26 or 30.

[NoAstronomer]

I've healed Bastion of Lok twice and my observation is that some players just won't use the red orbs. Apparently pressing 'F' messes up their rotation or something. They wait for, or even demand, a direct heal. I tried to reserve the direct heal for the tank or melee DPS.

Mike's pro-tip on dropping orbs in instances: if the tank has body pulled a bunch of mobs wait until he gets a hit in before dropping an orb. This applies especially in rooms with lots of minions. Otherwise even the small amount of aggro the orb generates will cause the mobs to make a beeline for you. Trust me on this.

[Alysianah]

Very silly. Tera did a good job at dropping them during the introductory leveling experience so there's no excuse for not realizing what they are for. Then other people eat them like candy, stealing them from someone that might need even if they're full health.

I was in a BAM group where someone ran for an orb everytime I dropped one like it was loot. Idiot. LOL

Thanks for the tip. Didn't realize creating and orb pulled aggro. I hope to do BOL at some point this weekend.

[AnnaBella]

"some will rush in before you're set"... why does that sound so familiar? oh yeah, people have been rushing in before the healer is set since the dawn of MMORPGs... lol

I haven't played this game (yet!) but I'm pretty sure I won't be playing healer like I usually do if I decide to play it...

[Alysianah]

More players is always a good thing. However, as the quality in F2P MMOs increases so will the number of players who have zero MMO group experience. This sucks if you pug as healer or tank.

However, leveling as a healer in this game is really nice. At this point they weren't hit with the worst DPS because they can heal. The Priest easily out does my Mystic in damage, ability to chain pull mobs and AOE. She's my new main. :-)

[Telwyn]

I play priest as my main and I've only done a few dungeons so far. It's just a pain as even the more patient vets want to 'gogogo' through everything. Worst still I don't have completion of SManor on my character as I was rushing to catch the group (which started fighting without their newb healer) so I missed the starter animation - which meant I never got credit for the (orange) story quest.

I've since joined a guild but they're mostly doing end game stuff. It's just a pain to be leveling in a game that's been out a while (not just Tera, LOTRO and Rift were the same experience). :-/

I have to say I *really* hate the 'silent efficiency' mentality that pervades this genre.

[Alysianah]

I totally understand. I'm on a Priest now which I enjoy the best of the 3 classes I've tried. I had to run SM 3 times to complete the quests. The first 2 times the group had already started via the instance matching system. Someone bailed after their 1st wipe. I came in on the 2nd boss and we had no deaths or close calls so not sure what the initial problem was but they were RUSHING thru everything.

As much as I enjoy that you don't have to chat to quest or do world events ala GW2, it's much harder to deal with in dungeons. Guess it's a double edge sword. I like for over world content to be apparrent where people instantly understand what to do and can easily jump in to do their part. Bad thing it conditions us to attempt doing the same in a dungeon.