Do A Lot of Healers Keyboard Turn?

[Ariedan]

I've actually noticed that a lot with healers, too. I think that's one of the reasons I didn't like healing, actually. I had to both keybind and mousebind my spells, because while I preferred to heal with my mouse, and found it difficult to heal and turn out. If it's just fire, you can strafe, but there are times when turning around prevails over a simple strafe.

[Garrot]

This one of of those,(Make you think) kinda threads..I honestly didn't know without observing myself in group..

I do both...I use a Nostromo N52 game pad..Have for years and years..I use the directional pad and assist with the mouse for faster movements..I also keybind on the pad of course for frequent used spells and mouse click for the Trinkets and Oh Shits as I call them..

[orcstar]

I've actually noticed that a lot with healers, too. I think that's one of the reasons I didn't like healing, actually. I had to both keybind and mousebind my spells, because while I preferred to heal with my mouse, and found it difficult to heal and turn out. If it's just fire, you can strafe, but there are times when turning around prevails over a simple strafe.

When on my healer I move using strafe and turn the camera during global cooldowns and spells with a cast time.

[Goomba]

I said screw it and bought a logitech g13 gamepad, to tell u the truth....got tired of trying to decide whether to kbd turn or mouse turn.....now I have a little joystick to move my toon....

interesting thing about that....the left/right come autobound to strafe keys.....at first I was going to change that (easy to change, and the pad comes programmed for FPS games, I think)....then I decided that maybe it would be good to try it that way because I could stay focused on the area I was looking at....then someone broadcast the camera command to go to max camera distance for ony....i now run that way all the time....i can see the whole fight, move out of fire/poison the shortest distance to safety without taking my eyes off the person(s) I'm supposed to be seeing and healing, etc....

so quick answer is that I use both.....but in combat, I tend to use my mini joystick.....except for icehowl....only way I avoid him consistently is to grab the screen with my mouse to look around and see where I need to run and then run....but I'm not having to heal when I do that, and I transition quickly back to joystick once I'm re-oriented and he's stunned while we all beat on him

[Nicki]

I don't keyboard turn its far too slow when I need to turn, strafe is more than good for 90% of encounters as a healer you rarely have to turn your camera which is a good thing because of how raid frames are designed.

[Spiritus]

Similar to many other answers here, I do both. If healing is intensive and I need to move, then I keyboard "strafe." If, for some reason, I need to do a full 180, then I do so quickly w/ my mouse. If I'm not healing anything, I use my mouse.

[Maèl]

I also have a n52te and I use the keypad thingie for toggeling auto run, strafing and walking backwards. I use the mouse to turn. Haven't bound the turning keys to anything. Heigan dance and Hodir can be a b*tch, tho.

As a healer you will have to heal a lot while on the run and not necessarily always the same target. This implies that you have your mousepointer at your disposal even while running. In my case even while being rocket-propelled
Yay for tinkering priests!

You can easily tell if a healer has done PvP or not. It teaches you to run and heal. Or you are dead. Or not where you need to be. And then you are dead. In short: you are dead.

[SNB]

I used to keyboard turn but I wanted to get rid of it.
And it is actually really easty to do, by defauly strafe is on Q and E and turning on A and D, bind strafe to A and D and remove Q and E as movement keys.
Play a few days with this (join a few bg's for example) and you will get used to it really really quickly, once you fully master it you will always have the edge.
Especially if you want to do arena's you really can't afford to keyboard turn.

[Brittmari]

It's been hinted at here, but just a reminder...

As a healer, with the sole exception of Penance I believe, you can cast no matter what direction you are facing. So you should use your down time to face the direction you might need to run in case you get targeted for something (e.g. Kologarn Eyebeams).

So whether you keyboard turn or mouse turn, think about what you might need to run to avoid while you're watching videos and studying strats, and have a plan before you go in. That way, you can continue to be one step ahead of the stupid dps'ers who go into every fight unprepared to do anything but pew pew.

[Knighterrant81]

I was an arena healer (as disc) long before I was a raid healer (as holy). I long ago rebound my turn keys to strafe and never looked back.

The truth is, as a healer, especially a 25 man raid healer, you need your mouse to target, so you're going to have to find some way to move without using your mouse.

[Bashal]

The truth is, as a healer, especially a 25 man raid healer, you need your mouse to target, so you're going to have to find some way to move without using your mouse.

Yup. No matter how you heal, whether it's mouseover macros, VuhDo, Clique/Grid, Healbot, etc., you can't get away from having your mouse over raid frames (or equivalent). If you're in the middle of doing your thing and suddenly have to move... you have to have some method of starting to move immediately, whether that's strafing or just being able to quickly get your mouse in position to move. But when there's no urgency to it, when you just want to reposition yourself, keyboard turning is fine.

[Ollin]

Depending on what you're doing keyboard turning may or may not be permissible.

DPS? Almost never.
Tanking? Again, almost never.
Healing? Sometimes.

Because healers can't tab-target and have to deal with far more possible targets than anyone else the need for your mouse as a targeting tool takes priority over using it to turn when the alternative is a raid death.

I need to turn...
Is someone about to die?
Is there raid damage that needs healing, and do I need to target them?
How badly do I need to turn? Strafe?

It sounds complicated, but it's really not.

Now, if you're a healer and you KEYBOARD TARGET (I have a friend who does this and he wonders why we won't let him raid) you have issues. Keyboard targeting is the healer equivalent of keyboard turning, only worse.

[Roana]

Depending on what you're doing keyboard turning may or may not be permissible.

DPS? Almost never.
Tanking? Again, almost never.
Healing? Sometimes.

Permissible is a strong word. There's rarely any reason to favor a specific turning method in PvE, so either mouseturning or keyboard turning will work fine. (The reason to keyboard turn as a tank, of course, is so that you have two hands on the keyboard, which gives you quicker access to more abilities, as opposed to giving up one hand's function almost entirely for quick turning.)

This is after all not PvP, where players want to purposely get behind you or otherwise exploit the limited options to maneuver with standard computer devices for their benefit. PvE encounters are generally designed so that they are not limited by a specific choice of input device.

[Therelin]

maybe i am just a weird healer but i am always moving lol....i dont think i have EVER stood still in a boss fight maybe except Deconstructor in Ulduar but i get bored just kind of standing there so i am usually moving around....but that is just my play style and it works for me.....

[Kindralas]

Take Icehowl for example. You *need* to turn, strafing won't always work. But you don't need to target heal while running away from Icehowl, while stunned, select a target (tank healers select their tanks, raid healers target ANYTHING) and press their instant cast spells (holy shock+FoL/PW:S+ProM/Riptide+(NS+HW)/renew+ProM/rejuv+lifebloom(+swiftmend) or for raid healers CoH/WG/(NS+CH if they felt the need), etc.)

Icehowl's a pretty bad example, for a number of reasons. One, you never have to do anything but get out of the way. If someone didn't die from the stomp, they're not going to die from anything before Icehowl comes out of his stun (and if he enrages, you've got other problems.) Also, on Heroic, you're dead if you're his target or next to his target, since you're wasting a second or so turning, or you're not running the right way.

Strafing always works. Face the center when he jumps (in fact, you can pretty much always face the center), when let out of the stun, strafe, tapping forward if you're running into a wall or one of the little alcove things.

More generally, keyboard turning is never permissible in any circumstance, period. That's a lie, I suppose. If you're eating an ice cream cone and wandering around Dalaran, then sure, go ahead. Keyboard turning accomplishes in two seconds what mouse turning accomplishes in less than a tenth. Whatever advantage you gain in not messing up your mouse placement, you lose in the fact that it's taking you forever to get out of the way. And as someone else has said, raiding nowadays is getting out of the way of things. Take every advantage you can get in movement.

I make correlations between this and people who click to target before casting heals. I'm sure you can do it and make it work. The best healer I've seen is a target caster. However, you can improve your skills immensely by learning to use Clique or target=mouseover macros, and by mouse turning.

One of the fundamental lessons that makes anyone a better raider: Just because it works doesn't mean it can't work better.

[Clementine]

I only have forward, backward, and strafe. Right-clicking with mouse does all my turning for me. My A and D are additional spell binds.

[OMMG]

I keyboard turn. Because of my addons. I have tried keybinding all my heals but i don't feel as confident as i do with my vuudoo. I feel that if i have my mouse and at least 4 of my 5 fingers free on my keyboard hand im always ready for some sort of spike dmg or stupid raid dps standing in stupid stuff. But i just boils down to personal preference and skill and reaction time.

[staunchee]

i think everyone missed one part, the OP is a mouse turner and doesnt want to revert back to keyboard turning if he becomes a healer.

i play ret, holy pally and i can only play ret with mouse turning and moving with keybind attacks, while healing i tend to use more keyboard movements with mouseover macros

i had to learn to mouse turn when i started raiding as ret, and for me, i cant play ret keyboard turning, your mind tends to hardwire your hands and such to certain playstyles, even on my alts i play them all slightly differently but when i go back to ret i still play the same

so i say rol the healer man, you wont revert back to a keyboard turning lolrogue cause your mind is too used to playing that toon in a certain way.

[Clementine]

I don't see any healing class beyond a priest and maybe a paladin needing to use that many keybinds. The rest of you guys probably just hit enough to utilize main few numbers plus shift modified number keybinds. Why would you have to revert back to keyboard turning.

[Roana]

More generally, keyboard turning is never permissible in any circumstance, period. That's a lie, I suppose. If you're eating an ice cream cone and wandering around Dalaran, then sure, go ahead. Keyboard turning accomplishes in two seconds what mouse turning accomplishes in less than a tenth.

2 seconds would be a full 360 degree turn (I've timed it), which is rather pointless. You never need to turn more than about 90 degrees (.5 seconds) in PvE. There are people who play on higher latency than that.