Help with Minstrel healing Rev

Hey guys, I’m a power Shiro main. Sword/shield+staff. I decided to mess around with Ventari and had a blast.I’m wondering about the viability of rev healers (minstrel) before going and investing time and money into the gearHelp

Healing rev is great for 1 raid boss as handkiter, and good but not "meta" in other raids as well as in fracs. That's not to say it's not good, but in general it's not the go-to option for a healer (that would be druid and sometimes heal tempest) so realistically, few groups will be looking for a heal rev. In wvw it's good if you want to siege stuff and not bad in open wvw zergfights, but hammer backline is probably better in almost every situation. I enjoy the ventari playstyle too and I made a minstrel set for my rev, everything full ascended but I used it maybe three times or smth, in fact I ended up transfering it to my firebrand for wvw.

IMO it's pretty clunky to run and has lots of annoying limitations. I've seen maybe two healer revs in fractals during the last two years.

I like to play Ventari rev for three reasons:-I like big green numbers. Nothing more satisfying than seeing those juicy 10k+ heals from NH. I have mained healers in all other MMOs I have played, so the spec naturally speaks to me.-I like the playstyle. I appreciate the challenge and enjoy having to micromanage the tablet. It offers a unique style of healing that is harder to master.-I like the aesthetic and concept. It's just so damn pretty and it legit makes me happy to look at.

However, the spec undoubtedly has its limitations. In WvW it is absolutely outclassed by the Firebrand. Frankly I just refuse to play FB because I find its level of support to be pretty busted, and also boring to play. I would say Ventari rev's limitations fall into the below categories:-Ventari shines brightest with clustered players using predictable movements. Sadly it doesn't always work out this way given the mobile nature of GW2. I find this is why it seems to do the best in squads of 10+ since people tend to hug the commander.-Energy management is maximized via swapping legends, but swapping legends means you won't be able to use the tablet for 10+ seconds. Although the energy cost for Ventari skills are a bit more reasonable than most other legends, it is still extremely taxing in intense fights that require you to be very reactive and mix positioning, cleansing, healing, and even self-defense. You can only do so much at once. This is when I wish it was possible to double-attune so I could focus exclusively on tablet-ing without frequently feeling starved for energy.

This is just my own personal experience, but I am still newer to WvW. At the end of the day, if you enjoy it I would say go for it. If you end up not having much success or not liking it, you can always transfer your gear to a Firebrand. I'm tempted to see how Minstrel's shout warrior works out too, lol.

imo you can forget about minstrels for ventari rev, the only boons i worry about are swiftness and regen, which as a rev you already perma those boons, also minstrels takes away from you total healing output, i dont like the meta magi setup because i find that to be horribly squishy for the content i do, full clerics or full nomads or like me nomad armor clerics trinkets nomad weaps, i can do open pve, dungeons, and wvw,-in wvw fb and other classes handle boons and push out more boons than a rev, but since they cannot perma boon the boons a rev can perma boon they use minstresl-mintrels is way too expensive to make for some wanting to just try out ventari rev-in wvw your going to want to play more backline mobile heals if your starting out until your sure of you ability and dont mind mixing it up in the fray, moving in and out swapping herald /ventari based on the situation-in my current setup im almost fully capable of solo healing pof bounty trains, since people like to just stand there and get spanked by mobs

• here a little something, in wvw, your zerg just pushed, fight ha[ppend and your now pulling back, the fbs are on tag but a couple idiots are out in africa bout to get ranged bombed, your in herald swap to ventari for that healing buff send the tablet to them, heals on the pas through, natural harmony for juciy burst heal, projectile hate, pull tablet back thru them to top em off and them idiots will never knyow who just saved them
• in all honesty ventari rev in open world pve and wvw is very satisfying, you just gotta understand that you are not unkillable and you gotta stay moving.
• also watching people try to kill a misntrels fb being supported by a ventari rev is mega lols

In terms of burst heal, it's the best in the game. I made a full ascended Minstrel with monk runes and I regularly pump out 11k+ heals (on 5 allies) with Natural Harmony. You can also stack quite a few other healing methods for more. Staff 4, Sigil of Renewal, Song of the Mists (when you switch to Ventari). All of these will heal for well over 2k in an AoE as well with all the Ventari traits. There are downsides however. The tablet takes a lot of practice to get used to. Even then, people will run in unpredictable directions at times (especially when they are low and need the heals the most). I find it really satisfying to use though.

Unfortunately in terms of overall support, Firebrand outshines it with all of the boons, condition clear, heals, and reflects. It's way more support and it's way easier to play. I'm like that other guy though, I'd rather just not play FB.

BTW I only use it in WvW. It may be easier in PvE since people can stack and remain relatively stationary a lot of the time.

Really appreciate the help guys. I can’t stop playing Ventari. The tablet is just amazing when you start rolling with it with some skill. I’m gonna go for ascended minstrel and to hell with the meta lol, I just really hope Anet can show it some love and keep it on par with the other support healers in terms of numbers. With so few healing classes in the game I feel like it’s that much more important to ensure that there is a range of options in terms of viability, and not just have “Druid, Firebrand, or bust”

@TheRubberDucky.1045 said:imo you can forget about minstrels for ventari rev, the only boons i worry about are swiftness and regen, which as a rev you already perma those boons, also minstrels takes away from you total healing output, i dont like the meta magi setup because i find that to be horribly squishy for the content i do, full clerics or full nomads or like me nomad armor clerics trinkets nomad weaps, i can do open pve, dungeons, and wvw,-in wvw fb and other classes handle boons and push out more boons than a rev, but since they cannot perma boon the boons a rev can perma boon they use minstresl-mintrels is way too expensive to make for some wanting to just try out ventari rev-in wvw your going to want to play more backline mobile heals if your starting out until your sure of you ability and dont mind mixing it up in the fray, moving in and out swapping herald /ventari based on the situation-in my current setup im almost fully capable of solo healing pof bounty trains, since people like to just stand there and get spanked by mobs

• here a little something, in wvw, your zerg just pushed, fight ha[ppend and your now pulling back, the fbs are on tag but a couple idiots are out in africa bout to get ranged bombed, your in herald swap to ventari for that healing buff send the tablet to them, heals on the pas through, natural harmony for juciy burst heal, projectile hate, pull tablet back thru them to top em off and them idiots will never knyow who just saved them
• in all honesty ventari rev in open world pve and wvw is very satisfying, you just gotta understand that you are not unkillable and you gotta stay moving.
• also watching people try to kill a misntrels fb being supported by a ventari rev is mega lols

I personally think the boon duration of minstrels is still really helpful. Generally speaking a rev's regen will tick for higher than a firebrand's, and the protection uptime is really nice too with max boon dura if not using glint. Also, minstrel's is really helpful if using Mallyx for the secondary stance for higher resistance uptime. I also generally find the survivability boost of minstrels to be worth it. It synergies nicely with the outgoing healing oil too, if you feel like putting the gold down for that, and that makes up for the lack of healing power. Overall though, I could see how you'd prefer to maximize healing power more. I suppose it just depends on the role you're trying to emphasize the most. Me personally, I find that I overheal often, so the relatively minor sacrifice in healing power for the boon duration feels worth it to me.

Ventari Rev actually has the most healing output of any class and a ton of really broken defensive utility (power cleanse/hard cc/permanent projectile denial)... It's just nobody cares about that stuff in PvE because meta groups are composed (and copied by the pug community) under the assumption that everyone there knows how to do mechanics and not face tank everything. So a build that's insane in healing will always be back burner since you don't really need it if people know where their evade button is--with a few gimmicky exceptions like Hand Kiting or hard carrying River of Souls.

@"Pterikdactyl.7630" said:

@TheRubberDucky.1045 said:imo you can forget about minstrels for ventari rev, the only boons i worry about are swiftness and regen, which as a rev you already perma those boons, also minstrels takes away from you total healing output, i dont like the meta magi setup because i find that to be horribly squishy for the content i do, full clerics or full nomads or like me nomad armor clerics trinkets nomad weaps, i can do open pve, dungeons, and wvw,-in wvw fb and other classes handle boons and push out more boons than a rev, but since they cannot perma boon the boons a rev can perma boon they use minstresl-mintrels is way too expensive to make for some wanting to just try out ventari rev-in wvw your going to want to play more backline mobile heals if your starting out until your sure of you ability and dont mind mixing it up in the fray, moving in and out swapping herald /ventari based on the situation-in my current setup im almost fully capable of solo healing pof bounty trains, since people like to just stand there and get spanked by mobs

• here a little something, in wvw, your zerg just pushed, fight ha[ppend and your now pulling back, the fbs are on tag but a couple idiots are out in africa bout to get ranged bombed, your in herald swap to ventari for that healing buff send the tablet to them, heals on the pas through, natural harmony for juciy burst heal, projectile hate, pull tablet back thru them to top em off and them idiots will never knyow who just saved them
• in all honesty ventari rev in open world pve and wvw is very satisfying, you just gotta understand that you are not unkillable and you gotta stay moving.
• also watching people try to kill a misntrels fb being supported by a ventari rev is mega lols

fair points,