Non-healing Emp

Not for long...

I've got one at Level 35. Thugs/FF MM. She keeps me busy just on my pets!

Need to work on her endurance problems though.

A quick infusion of hitpoints to an ally means nothing if your character gets shot down and unable to heal itself, no?

First of all, you're the only one who can see those notes. So star/note people to your hearts content. Second of all, these people were A) Obviously not worth spending your time on, and B) Taking the game way to seriously.

And yes, you were and are overreacting. It's pretty silly to skip one of the key aspects of your powerset just because some people get whiny over heals. The difference between skipping Minerals in the stone armor set and skipping your heals in an empath set is this: You can't use minerals while you are using the main armor toggle (Granite). You can, however, use your heals to supplement your buffs and damage.

Finally, play your character however you want to. People make pet-less masterminds, so it's really not that far off an idea that someone would decide to make a heal-less empath. But don't get angry when people criticize the idea. This is a far cry from merely skipping speed boost on a kin, or the like.

I wouldn't be surprised if you got harsher reactions from strangers for skipping the heals than you'd get for 'not healing enough and letting them die', though.

As others have said, go with Healing Aura instead. You're half a blaster, so plan on getting aggro. It's a darned good self heal. Keep it in your tray. Maybe even take Provoke to make sure you get aggro. Empathy + some form of mez protection is a perfectly good tankfender, with Regeneration Aura rivaling Instant Healing for you and anyone lucky enough to be nearby when you fire it, and plenty of recovery to run as many toggles as you want.

Heal Other, Absorb Pain, and Resurrect, on the other hand, are not particularly good powers. None is set-defining by any measure. They've got long animation times, delayed effects (AP, almost as much corpse healing as Transfusion!), annoyingly short ranges. You have a boatload of other options for rescuing a teammate. Boatload plus one, if you took Provoke.

Some people object to non-standard builds, but pay them no mind. Good team leaders will expect you to follow just two simple build rules:

1) Take what you want.
2) Use what you take.

Believe it or not, lots of players violate these two rules with their build. Especially for buffing powers. Give me a guy who skipped Heal Other/Speed Boost/Insulation Shield, and took, slotted and spams a nice secondary blast instead -- and /Ice has plenty of those. Don't give me a guy who took Heal Other/Speed Boost/Insulation Shield, and slotted it poorly and/or doesn't use it correctly and/or doesn't use it at all. Be the former; the game already has way too many of the latter.

Teaming tip: Don't say you are an Empath when you are LFT (except in regeneration intensive content, like Hami raids). Simply say you're a Defender. PuG leaders looking for an Empath (except at Hami raids) will probably object to your build. PuG leaders looking for a Defender will get exactly what they wanted from you.

In fairness, PuGs looking for an Empath are probably best avoided entirely.