The truth is my Pve confidence is shot.
If people I respected could dick me around for 3 weeks then even lie about their reasons for it on guild forums, well why bother caring.
So when in a 10 man and with not so geared tanks they decide that a 3rd healer is required. I have no choice.
Nor the following week when someone gets saved and so a scrub mage that is pugged gets the dps spot I wanted because they need a healer.
So thus becomes this fear, and is a fear I am going to get stuck as heals, and it doesnt matter whose butt I kick in BH or how much I spent on a Darkmoon card , or try and have pride that my dps set is gemmed and enchanted to perfection, because when I am healing against my will all I can think about is how much I am hating it.
And it’s not the healing I hate, I like pvp healing I like healing on my druid. I had a 2nd priest in wrath that didnt have a dps set because all she did was heal.
When I am on my main, the one I put the most effort/love/care into. I want to dps.
But someone will always need a healer.
The fear that I will be put on the spot and asked/expected/have to heal becomes so great that you don’t want to play in case you get asked, and its always a reasonable request. It’s not even their fault. When you look at the resources available – and you have a shadow priest with a spec and gear it’s not unreasonable to ask. Except, its every time.
And the truth was that everyone would rather a healer then a dps, and I have been led to believe it was the only reason why I got the raiding position I did so many weeks ago, that even though they lied and did need dps – they were desperate for heals, and was the only reason why I got taken.
Yes I stuffed it up. I’ll blame the bad lag to some degree, my isp has it on public record – but as the time passed and I realised it didn’t matter how many hoops I jumped through it was never going to matter I had already lost heart, and I am having difficulty finding it again, because even if I did get to dps now I am convinced that I would frack up again, because every time I have raided so far in Cata, it’s been with ” I do not want to heal” going through my head.
So this is a bit of a QQ, but maybe its been part of the motivational block I have had for playing because I haven’t been able to say what I wanted to say.
/goes off to hide on a baby shammy alt.
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Pugnacious Priest's Warcraft Blog 
I feel what you’re going through, similar happened to me in LK when I wanted to tank on my pally, but we never had the guild healers that could progress so I always got the short end of the stick ;(
I think dual specs are partly the reason to why dual roles are so readily expected from hybrids now, it hasn’t always been like this.
I don’t heal in PvE, and even though I’ve raided with both a priest and a shaman, I’ve always had a PvP offspec. It makes me less of a perfect raid member, but it keeps me in the spot I want.
I think you are in your right to make sure you’re in the position you want to be in. It’s okay to compromise and heal a few times, but obviously not all the time. Sounds like you are being used.
Not always used, just the easiest option
reroll lock/mage. problem solved.
Whatever the ‘problem’ is, whether it be that you’re always asked to heal rather than DPS or being displeased with changes to one’s class, /reroll (insert similar class-type here) isn’t necessarily a viable or acceptable solution.
Some players favor one class over others, for various reasons. According to her About page, Pugnacious has 2 active priests as well as a mage. She wants to DPS with her priest; she’s obviously smart enough to know that she could reroll if she wanted to, but prefers to play her priest main.
On a personal note, I’ve faced several issues with the druid class. As a feral, I’ve often been disappointed with certain aspects of my class (different problem), but I’ve resisted rerolling as a rogue (your solution) because… it’s not a druid. It’s just not the same. Classes may be more homogenized than ever, but they’re not so similar that they’ve become interchangeable to people who have classes that they enjoy most, in particular roles, for certain situations.
To Pugnaciouspriest: Hopefully you’ll find a solution that allows you to raid as DPS without too much trouble. I wish you the best.
The solution is a firm no . Its at the point where I would rather not raid at all ( currently only once a week now ) then heal.
Good for you! 🙂
Well in the current days of wow, to be perfectly honest, the differences between playing a Shadow Priest and a say Affliction Warlock are minimal. I bet that if you bind your keys accordingly you might end up with pressing the same key sequence for your pve rotation.
The part about healing / non-healing is a bit more complex that that: I think your issue could be rephrased as “they don’t want me as dps, they want me only when they lack healers” : which means that either you should up your game as a damage dealer or you should try to find a less biased group of people, because if your problem isnt performance based, I bet its a quite social issue.
I have so totally been there. I’d say I got over it, but truth is that my priest hasn’t set foot in an instance since October. Getting the ol’ shuffle from your raid leader – “we just need you to heal every now and then” – is an all too familiar feeling. That wasn’t what ultimately caused me to snap, but it laid the foundation.
The only reason I didn’t quit playing completely is that I found a home on another server for my hunter. Not saying that’s what you need to do, just that there may yet be hope for you to get to do what you enjoy, but it might require taking a deep breath and taking a plunge of some sort.
I wish you luck.
Funnily enough I do have a hunter on Another server that recently leveled to 85 for the purpose of hiding 🙂
sorry to hear about your raid issues! I am also a priest and can appreciate the feeling. Whenever there’s a shortage of healers, the group turns to you immediately.
On another note – I just wanted to delurk and tell you how much I enjoy your blog!!!
You are awesome!
I’ve healed 1 & 1/2 times all the time I played WoW.
One in LK hc10, the 1/2 just a week ago on Halfus hc (at the end I went back to shadow and that was how we got the kill).
Both of them heavily favoured Disc gimmicks and being the only priest in our raiding team I “had” to do it. But at all times it was clear that it was only for those particular fights.
I did not learn how to heal, I learned those fight from a gimmick perspective. When I queue for randoms I suck up the 30 mins wait but I have fun doing them! What’s the point of a 10 secs queue for 45 mins of misery?
Yes, a firm “NO” is the answer, however that may be harder than it should be because there is already expectations that you’ll suck it up and do it. You’ll be the one accused of throwing a tantrum.
Don’t bend!
As Calissa says “You’re awesome!”, but it only really shows when you’re shining in a Purple Haze.
*hugs* it really sucks to get jerked around with raid seating. I hope you’ll find a guild that is a better fit — and that will be direct/honest with you.
I can understand your pain and if you really don’t want to heal you should stand your ground. I am in a position to where I am needed as a healer quite often so I just bite the bullet and try to do my best.
While healing is not harder it does feel a lot more stressful. Especially when I start out as DPS and have to switch to heals. It takes me a bit to get in to a good flow/mind set. I suppose it is better than not being able to raid at all in my case.
Hope you situation works out for the best.
Youre the one with the brains here. Im wathincg for your posts.
I have raided with four different raid groups on three different servers, and have never, ever been asked to heal.
The key is to make yourself known as “a kick ass shadow priest” and NOT “a shadow priest that’s willing to heal”. Stand your ground. If your current raid group can’t respect that, find another one.
And when you go looking, try the following:
Realm forums
General recruitment forums (both WoW official forums – try them both)
MMO-Champion recruitment forums
Shadowpriest.com recruitment
Go to WoWLemmings.com, filter your realm type (US or Oceanic – but you are US, if I recall correctly) and priests, and search through the posts of the last several shadow priests looking for guilds – all of them will give you links to guilds looking for shadow priests that tried to recruit that particular one.
When you post what you are looking for on both realm forums and general recruitment forums (you should show up on wowlemmings automatically), make sure you state that you are ONLY interested in dpsing.
Don’t worry, you’ll eventually find a group that needs a solid dps. If your group ends up short on healers at any time, do not volunteer. Do not declare a healing offspec. Hell, do what I do – claim a shadow pvp offspec, end of story. You do not heal. You do not want to heal. You do not want to open yourself up to the possibility of healing, even temporarily. Collect NO healing-specific pieces – DE/vendor all healing trinkets.
You are not a priest, you are a shadow priest – make it known. No rerolling – out dps the warlocks, and that’ll be the end of that. Out dps the mages and hunters, and you’ll really be rocking – no one will ask you to reroll then.
Trust me, there ARE plenty of groups out there looking for solid shadow priests. We bring VE, and while it has been nerfed, it is still extra healing. We bring very high, competitive dps, even against the “pure” dps classes (I know this for a fact). There is no reason why you should be shoved into a healing position if you don’t want to be. Don’t volunteer, tell people you don’t want to and even that you are terrible at it (even if you aren’t), and people will quit asking.
I think what it really comes down to is that if your guild can’t respect your wishes and there are others that can step up and heal but won’t you should find a new guild.
I was topping the charts again last night as Shadow and was looking forward to testing my new gear and rocking them all night but the heals just were not there to progress so I was asked to switch.
It is better to progress than be top dps on a wipe fest IMO but I choose to be available to heal if needed. I am lucky enough to be in a guild that appreciates and respects that and not force me to heal.
Hugs!
It must be awful to be shoehorned into a role you dislike. Maybe it’s time to put your foot down, say “I hate healing, and I’m not going to do it anymore,” and turn your healing spec into a pvp one?
Personally, I enjoy the challenge of being a competent switch-hitter, but I know it’s not for everyone. I wish you best of luck in finding a solution that makes you happy.
Hey Pugnacious, I stumbled upon your blog awhile ago and have been reading from then onwards. I just wanted to let you know that if you are not able to raid in the position that you want then I say it is time to find another guild that will accept you as a DPSer. This is your game time, you should be having fun! If that guild doesn’t want you as a DPSer, then find a new one that will and leave. If you ever make a alt on Nazgrel-US, send me a message you’d be welcome in my guild!
sadly i was in exactly the same position as you, the “off spec healing” was no more than a no one else of the guild elite wants to roll a healer.
i agreed to do it short term then shortly after dps spots were being filled by newcomers, so now i’m a social member after putting my foot down.
Oddly, I’m the reverse. I swapped to my priest to heal during wrath, due to lack of healers, and I neded up dps more than I healed at times, and hated it. Absolutely hated it. I did it because it had to be done, but when I ended up healing once in 6 raids, I was over it.
I’ve had go back to healing the same for Cata and I no longer have a DPS spec on that toon. My GM knows I won’t DPS unless it is abosultely dire, and he’s unlikely to ask me.
My advice, a little late, is to get rid of your healing spec for a bit. My guild has a SP with a PvE and a PvP shadow spec. It takes away the easy option for a while and forces them ot look at other choices. No one shoudl ahve to continuously do something they don’t want. We rotate our offspec healers/dps so no one has to do it too much.
As for the comments that a SP is much the same as an afflcition lock – it isn’t. My much loved, much missed, affliction warlock is nothing like a shadow priest. If it was, I’d not have detested being shadow quite so much *grin*
Its karma actually
I tell u hfvcking hate most priests u know why cause they refuse to heal the dps well go fvck urselves anyway buddy i bet its karma suck it up its good for u..