Will Healers Still be Forced to DPS in 4.0 Due to Lax Content?

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Originally Posted by Mahkii

I am fairly confident that quests from level 60 to 70 in 4.0 will require you as a healer to DPS if you do not already have someone else doing it for you.

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Care to explain that confidence?

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Originally Posted by Clethoria

Care to explain that confidence?

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Because that's been the trend for years. Solo quests for battle Jobs almost always require killing something; I can only think of a couple offhand where you can do nothing but heal helper NPCs and still win without falling asleep first.

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Originally Posted by Ilenya

For what it's worth, there have been some pretty healer focused fights. Unnerfed Pharos Sirius being the first that comes to mind. Not in regards to the output of damage, but because of all the stuff they had to focus on.

Odin Trial is pretty damage heavy if people aren't on the ball, too, at least when I ran it last.

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I was thinking the same recently.
Odin was actually interesting for every jobs.

Mechanics were not hards to understand, but mistakes were severly punished (bad healing, bad tanking and CD management and bad healing).
That's why it was so hard to beat in duty finder btw.

I would be happy to see another Odin's in SB. I'm glad you made me remember it.

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Originally Posted by Cynfael

Because that's been the trend for years. Solo quests for battle Jobs almost always require killing something; I can only think of a couple offhand where you can do nothing but heal helper NPCs and still win without falling asleep first.

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I thought they meant group instances. Solo duties are like elaborate DPS checks.

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Originally Posted by Clethoria

I thought they meant group instances. Solo duties are like elaborate DPS checks.

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Oh, I see what you were thinking. It hadn't crossed my mind only because I can't imagine SE making quests that require 4-man Duties difficult enough to force healer DPS.

The healer should probably be doing it anyway, but yeah, it's highly unlikely that it will be required by the mechanics.

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Originally Posted by Aramina

That would also be a good way to cut the healer population. That scenario sounds dreadful.

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I wouldn't call spamming a braindead rotation fun either. At least with mana management being a thing you'd have to actually pay attention to that. Though 2x/3x is a tad much for my tastes.

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Originally Posted by Thunda_Cat_SMASH

I wouldn't call spamming a braindead rotation fun either. At least with mana management being a thing you'd have to actually pay attention to that. Though 2x/3x is a tad much for my tastes.

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XIV is a rotation simulator with the added bonus of the floor is lava.

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Originally Posted by Thunda_Cat_SMASH

I wouldn't call spamming a braindead rotation fun either. At least with mana management being a thing you'd have to actually pay attention to that. Though 2x/3x is a tad much for my tastes.

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Every rotation can be called braindead when you know how to execute it. Old argument is not only old, it's pretty much universal to the genre.

Mana management as a mechanic isn't necessarily a bad thing in and of itself, but you have to tread a very fine line since not being able to use abilities is inherently the opposite of fun. When you have certain powerful abilities with high resource costs that reward you commensurately for skillful application, that's an acceptable risk vs. reward; when your basic Job function itself forces you to become a miser and possibly even to stand around waiting for resource regeneration, then something is wrong with the game design.

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Originally Posted by Thunda_Cat_SMASH

I wouldn't call spamming a braindead rotation fun either. At least with mana management being a thing you'd have to actually pay attention to that. Though 2x/3x is a tad much for my tastes.

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I guess it's a good thing I never said spamming a braindead rotation was fun either. Mana management, as he suggested, is pretty much the least exciting thing that could be done. I want to be active, not hope to have enough mana or sit and do nothing to make sure I will have enough when an emergency arises.

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Originally Posted by Aramina

Mana management

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I'd argue that resource management being a thing would make healing a more fun role in this game, as you'd actually have meaningful decisions when you played the role, as opposed to just trying to push more deeps for the evulz. Course, I also find resource management to be incredibly fun. o3o

I kinda wish we had an mp system like in TacticsOgre, where it starts every fight at 0 and steadily fills up as time passes rather than just having everyone at Max at the start. That was actually fun.

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Originally Posted by Thunda_Cat_SMASH

I'd argue that resource management being a thing would make healing a more fun role in this game, as you'd actually have meaningful decisions when you played the role, as opposed to just trying to push more deeps for the evulz. Course, I also find resource management to be incredibly fun. o3o

I kinda wish we had an mp system like in TacticsOgre, where it starts every fight at 0 and steadily fills up as time passes rather than just having everyone at Max at the start. That was actually fun.

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If you want meaningful costs and decisions for when you use healing abilities, the SCH class design revolves around it.

Also Cleric Stance was a significantly meaningful decision to commit to, which was its own brand of fun. MP limitations are easily the most uninspired throttle they could implement.

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Originally Posted by Thunda_Cat_SMASH

I'd argue that resource management being a thing would make healing a more fun role in this game, as you'd actually have meaningful decisions when you played the role, as opposed to just trying to push more deeps for the evulz. Course, I also find resource management to be incredibly fun. o3o

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To each his/her own. What I find fun is using the right heal on the right person at the right time, which (unfortunately) doesn't really exist here. Resource management wouldn't add anything to it (IMHO) other than make it even more boring. Do I cast a spell or not? Do I have enough mana or not? isn't really a thought provoking scenario. It can be done if there are a variety of heals eg: slow but cheap, fast but expensive, etc... but again, doesn't exist here. :)

Also, could you leave off the dpslol a little bit, please... it's really not relevant to every conversation. *sigh* It makes it really hard to attempt to have an actual discussion with you when you dismiss everything as people just wanting to/expecting people to dps. DPSing as a healer (for me) is a means to an end (not being bored to tears), nothing more nothing less.

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Originally Posted by Aramina

DPSing as a healer (for me) is a means to an end (not being bored to tears), nothing more nothing less.

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This. It's using as many of the GCDs you have available in a given fight as efficiently as possible. I don't think anybody who actually cares about DPSing a healer would mind much if they had to heal more, so long as their time was being used efficiently.

Since DPSing is more efficient than standing around picking your nose, that's what we do.

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Originally Posted by IttyBitty

This. It's using as many of the GCDs you have available in a given fight as efficiently as possible. I don't think anybody who actually cares about DPSing a healer would mind much if they had to heal more, so long as their time was being used efficiently.

Since DPSing is more efficient than standing around picking your nose, that's what we do.

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Yep. I would do cartwheels if we needed to heal more. Unfortunately we don't, so my options are dps or stand there praying someone will take damage so I will have something to do and as boring as dots/bane/broil/broil/broil etc may be, it's better than nothing at all.

I don't think healers are being 'force' to DPS, but the major problem seems to be with cleric stance dance, the amount of bad players that can't handle a 5sec CD is incredibly...so SE decide to take it off so more healers can DPS.
So in a sense they telling you to DPS more.
Now this is what's really gonna separate the good from the bad.
The good healers from before are gonna shine on an the bad is gonna be worse because it will understand that the problem is not on the job but in the player.

Nobody is forcing me to DPS. As a WHM it's honestly the only other thing SE gave me besides heals and no content in this game requires me to be casting heals 100% of the time. Besides, Assize and Holy are too fun not to use.

On a serious note with the change to CS my fetters are off! I'm free to cast whatever I want as long as I watch my mana and keep deaths to a minimum. Why can't I spend my free time tossing rocks at mobs to help my party mates out?

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Originally Posted by vigioX-Sun

I don't think healers are being 'force' to DPS, but the major problem seems to be with cleric stance dance, the amount of bad players that can't handle a 5sec CD is incredibly...so SE decide to take it off so more healers can DPS.
So in a sense they telling you to DPS more.
Now this is what's really gonna separate the good from the bad.
The good healers from before are gonna shine on an the bad is gonna be worse because it will understand that the problem is not on the job but in the player.

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I wouldn't say it's entirely bad players. Sometimes that ability can be a little wonky, I've had it turn itself right back on after i pressed to turn it off.

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Originally Posted by Aramina

To each his/her own. What I find fun is using the right heal on the right person at the right time, which (unfortunately) doesn't really exist here. Resource management wouldn't add anything to it (IMHO) other than make it even more boring. Do I cast a spell or not? Do I have enough mana or not? isn't really a thought provoking scenario. It can be done if there are a variety of heals eg: slow but cheap, fast but expensive, etc... but again, doesn't exist here. :)

Also, could you leave off the dpslol a little bit, please... it's really not relevant to every conversation. *sigh* It makes it really hard to attempt to have an actual discussion with you when you dismiss everything as people just wanting to/expecting people to dps. DPSing as a healer (for me) is a means to an end (not being bored to tears), nothing more nothing less.

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This really nails it, healer dps is a thing because its the only thing to do with the hefty amounts of healing downtime. The closest one to having more to do is AST who does all their card stuff frequently.

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Originally Posted by MrSmiley

This really nails it, healer dps is a thing because its the only thing to do with the hefty amounts of healing downtime. The closest one to having more to do is AST who does all their card stuff frequently.

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Except all that (AST card usage) can and should be done between GCDs, not in place of them.

Maybe real support spells someday? Maybe?

There's a very good reason why healing is so powerful and easy in this game (regarding non-savage difficulty). In fact, there are three:

1. Removing gear checks as much as possible. An i230 healer should be able to do his roulette, just like an i270. Obviously, the i270's job will be easier. But the point still stands. Gear checks are lame.
2. Because "pure healers" are actually very bad players. The skill difference between good and bad healers is huge. Some "pure healers" are casting Cure almost all the time because of a poor (read: almost nonexistent) regen and oGCD management. So, SE has to tune dungeons to allow a bad player to still succeed. At least if they don't want to lose that player's subscription.
3. The skill level of party members can be day and night. Again, you should still be able to succeed even if your party is a complete disaster (to a some extent.)

So, to everyone saying that healers have too much downtime, and that healing is too easy, you have to understand the reasons why that is. And also understand that this will not change because of these reasons.
It's not a design mistake, it's completly deliberate. FFXIV is designed in a way that once a healer's job becomes easy enough (being because of gear, good party member or good healer), then downtime is supposed to be filled with damage skills. That's just how it is.

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Originally Posted by Fyce

So, to everyone saying that healers have too much downtime, and that healing is too easy, you have to understand the reasons why that is. And also understand that this will not change because of these reasons.
It's not a design mistake, it's completly deliberate. FFXIV is designed in a way that once a healer's job becomes easy enough (being because of gear, good party member or good healer), then downtime is supposed to be filled with damage skills. That's just how it is.

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I don't think anyone is saying that it is a mistake (as in accident). I know full well it is deliberate, BUT the thing is it does not have to be this way. I have played pretty much every MMO that has been on the market for the past 20 years and this is the ONLY one that has been like this. Maybe this is how they want it (clearly it is... at least for the time being) but that won't stop me from hoping that one day it may not be so. Plenty of other games have a very large casual contingency yet somehow they are able to provide more healing opportunity.

This game is honestly way too easy at the base level for both healers and tanks. Support roles have been going downhill since EQ1, even EQ2s Enchanter was a vastly stronger killer than EQ1s in terms of damage sourced from them, and they were still pretty weak initially.

I do agree MP maintenance is probably the most obvious culprit for the healer issues, its too easy to maintain. I cring every time I see a WHM recast that 1500MP Medica II that has 13s left rather than save 500MP by using Medica 1, but that wont do diddly squat to their ability to make it through a fight.

I'm hoping the changes to CC and the focus moving from mana replenishment on core abilities to trying not to use it in the first place (Thin Air/Lightspeed synergy) are precursors to wanting to make duch things more important than... ROFL regens will do everything for me. Only form of healer efficiency recognized here is non healing GCD availability/use. Good use of CDs and not wasting MP on overhealing are meh whatevers.

A serious lack of fights that use all available tanks too. We bring 3 to 24mans now and are lucky if we have any reason to use 2 more than 3 times during the whole raid for more than... 5 min, barring MT dying. And lack of tank use and tank interesting fights makes healing burden less as well. One of the things I liked about early Alexander Gordias: Fist of the Father, dividing the tanks among the 2 healers.

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Originally Posted by Fyce

It's not a design mistake, it's completly deliberate. FFXIV is designed in a way that once a healer's job becomes easy enough (being because of gear, good party member or good healer), then downtime is supposed to be filled with damage skills. That's just how it is.

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Therein lies the problem because the devs cry foul at our expectations for healer DPS yet cannot appreciate why such expectations exist. The same applies to tanks doing mass pulls, which we know the devs are less than fond of. When content is tuned this easy, people push the limits. I don't even do mass pulls for speed, I do them to feel like a tank since anything less than six mobs means I may as well delete my cooldowns. I'll certainly have no need of them. Frankly, I would argue it is a design flaw due to the devs desire to bridge the skill gap. They have made around about amendments, which I do like, but have missed this game's lack of difficulty contributes significantly to that skill gap. When players can clear content with gear a year out of date, what incentive do they have to improve? There is no sense of urgency; no need to progress. So when they attempt Savage, it utterly demolishes them since the normal mode equivalent barely requires five people.

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Originally Posted by Aramina

I don't think anyone is saying that it is a mistake (as in accident). I know full well it is deliberate, BUT the thing is it does not have to be this way. I have played pretty much every MMO that has been on the market for the past 20 years and this is the ONLY one that has been like this. Maybe this is how they want it (clearly it is... at least for the time being) but that won't stop me from hoping that one day it may not be so. Plenty of other games have a very large casual contingency yet somehow they are able to provide more healing opportunity.

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When people say that it's "badly designed", they often think that the reasons beind these design decisions are bad or that there's simply no reason behind it. So, I just wanted to remind everyone that reasons do exist and that they were good and legitimate ones.
That aside, I'll have to disagree on your stance that "evey MMORPG does it the other way". A lot of modern "action" MMORPG aren't focused on HPS that much. Besides, healers often play the role of CC supports with a variety of offensive CC skills and buffs that doesn't do much in terms of healing. "Pure healing" is something even D&D doesn't do. And successful MMO with a "WoW" gameplay are quite old now. Stuff change. The "old ways" aren't guaranteed to be the best. Especially not when the audience changes as well.

Raising HPS requirements will only do one thing only: make bad healers have to switch, or even quit the game.

I don't think that making healing harder would make it more fun. It will just take a few GCD that you'd spend on casting Stone, and make you use Cure instead. For me, both are just a button to push, it doesn't make much of a difference. It only raises the chances of failure, and thus the overall amount of wipes we'll have to deal with.

So, maybe that the current balance is a bit leaning towards the easy side slightly too much, but it's hard not to be biased as we now had to spent many months being overgeared, thanks to (or because of) the Creator being easier, and ways of getting i270 being plenty.
Hard to tell if Stormblood will be as easy.

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Originally Posted by Bourne_Endeavor

Therein lies the problem because the devs cry foul at our expectations for healer DPS yet cannot appreciate why such expectations exist. The same applies to tanks doing mass pulls, which we know the devs are less than fond of. When content is tuned this easy, people push the limits. I don't even do mass pulls for speed, I do them to feel like a tank since anything less than six mobs means I may as well delete my cooldowns. I'll certainly have no need of them. Frankly, I would argue it is a design flaw due to the devs desire to bridge the skill gap. They have made around about amendments, which I do like, but have missed this game's lack of difficulty contributes significantly to that skill gap. When players can clear content with gear a year out of date, what incentive do they have to improve? There is no sense of urgency; no need to progress. So when they attempt Savage, it utterly demolishes them since the normal mode equivalent barely requires five people.

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As I said, my post was focused on non-savage content. It's true that the only incentive to gear up in "normal" content is solely to improve clear times. But isn't that enough? Do you really want to have some 4-man dungeons in your roulette that can't be cleared simply because your healer cannot keep up with HPS just because of his gear? I don't think it'd be fun, honestly. And it appears that the devs are on my side on this.

On the other hand, regarding savage content, a lot of groups simply cannot clear a fight if they don't gear up. They just hit a wall where they say "well, we'll have to farm the previous battles to gear up a bit, and spend a few weeks of tomes as well". So, here's your incentive.

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Originally Posted by Fyce

I don't think that making healing harder would make it more fun. It will just take a few GCD that you'd spend on casting Stone, and make you use Cure instead. For me, both are just a button to push, it doesn't make much of a difference. It only raises the chances of failure, and thus the overall amount of wipes we'll have to deal with.

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That's fair, I can see what you mean. Let's see if I can explain how I see things though.... I want my contributions to be meaningful. While doing dps is certainly not meaningless, in that damage is never meaningless, it is also not meaningful for the most part. Whether I dps or not is not going to make or break an encounter and if what I do doesn't matter in the long run... why am I there? If healing requirements were higher than I would have a sense of accomplishment knowing that had I not done my part then we would have failed. I do understand your point though about other people not wanting to be in the situation where if someone fails then they don't complete their objective, so admittedly, my views are a touch on the selfish side if I think of it that way. :P Maybe Savage raiding *is* the answer but I find it a bit sad that there is effectively nothing in between pants-on-head and must commit to x amount of time.

TL;DR I guess ultimately my complaint is less about the difficulty (or lack thereof) of story/side dungeons and more about a lack of content for people who want their play to be purposeful, even if they do not have the desire/ability to commit to a static.

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Originally Posted by TaleraRistain

There are plenty of older MMOs like that. EverQuest was famous for the tank being just a tank and a healer being just a healer and the CC classes being all about CC.

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Even Everquest had a decent amount of depth if you were willing to take risks. The things I got up to back then on my Shaman are nigh unimaginable in a modern MMO primarily due to overcautious developers and strictly vertical progression centred around tightly regulated itemisation. So many good memories of my comedy solos as well as some of the low man feats my guild pulled off =(

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Originally Posted by Cynfael

In games where crowd control is powerful, you might end up with some CC classes that are incredibly desirable but a horrible pain in the ass to level without help since their game-breaking CC is balanced by their tedious or non-existent damage capability.

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And just when I was basking in the glory days, you had to go and remind me of the trauma that was trying to keep the guild's Enchanter teams onside and off strike =( My Shammies were so much easier to work with for some reason!

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Originally Posted by Fyce

As I said, my post was focused on non-savage content. It's true that the only incentive to gear up in "normal" content is solely to improve clear times. But isn't that enough? Do you really want to have some 4-man dungeons in your roulette that can't be cleared simply because your healer cannot keep up with HPS just because of his gear? I don't think it'd be fun, honestly. And it appears that the devs are on my side on this.

On the other hand, regarding savage content, a lot of groups simply cannot clear a fight if they don't gear up. They just hit a wall where they say "well, we'll have to farm the previous battles to gear up a bit, and spend a few weeks of tomes as well". So, here's your incentive.

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To an extent, yes. I don't think current Experts should be easily doable in gear a large portion of the playerbase has replaced. Xelphatol released with a minimum ilvl 210 when anyone who played throughout 3.3 had 240 while 250 was the new standard. This meant we outgeared both Experts by upwards of 40 ilvls without even touching Savage or the EX Primals. Gear levels is not the only issue. There is no mob priority or need to heal half the time. I hearken back to the healer DPS expectation and how Yoshida said he dislikes us in Cleric Stance so much. Well, I'm sorry, but if I wasn't, I may as well make dinner while playing otherwise I'll literally being standing around. Even the easiest content should incentivize the roles selected. PotD on the higher floors does a decent job without going overboard. You have to heal fairly regularly and mass pulls are ill-advised. If dungeons started off hitting pretty hard so you were less inclined to pull the room, but as you gear, you can get away with more. That would feel rewarding. Most of Heavensward's were faceroll at release. The exceptions were Leveling ironically. Balesar's Wall and Solm Al Hard had some good ideas too.

Savage doesn't have this problem but EX saw a steady decline in difficulty. Incidentally, the ease of Zurvan led to the "Skip Soar or Disband" mindset. In all fairness to the devs though, they've mentioned mechanic skips like Soar were a mistake. So hopefully they correct that.

Just to clarify since you mentioned it to Aramina. I am not advocate for just a HP spike, but instead greater variety. I often use PotD as a template because it does a lot of things right. You have priority mobs to discourage aoe spamming; surprise spawns; patrolling mobs; higher damage in lieu higher HP. All of these give PotD a bit of dynamism and make even a couple mobs more interesting. The reason people find dungeons boring, in my opinion, is there's nothing to them. We just pull everything and aoe them all down. Doesn't matter what they do or what they look like; just aoe 'em all down.

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Originally Posted by Bourne_Endeavor

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Don't get me wrong, I completly understand where you're coming from and what you want in terms of design. But, again, the more you raise healer's expectations (from a healing perspective), the more people will fail.

In the infamous 111 pages thread, one defender of the "princess healers" posted this video. The time stamp I put in the link highlight a wipe on Ziggy because of a number of bad decisions and lack of appropriate reactions from the Healer in particular (running in 3 AoE, failing to do the mechanic, and then failing to heal herself). If you ask more from that kind of healer, they will not be able to clear in a reasonable amount of time unless they get good teammates to carry them. This is already a ~38mn run on a main story dungeon. You really can't give them one or two more wipes.

So, when I say that increasing the healer's responsability in terms of healing will make some people quit the job, I really mean it. One might say something like "if they're so bad at healing, then they shouldn't be playing with that role! Especially if that lowers the skill floor for other healers". But I don't think that SE likes that idea, at all. This is why the design of the healer role is like that: you have a very low skill floor when it comes to healing, but if you want to squeeze every GCD you can, then oGCD and risk management comes in play. Besides, that goes quite well with the Final Fantasy franchise.

FFXIV is a mainstream game. So SE has to please a wide variety of players. The current healer design is a very good compromise in that aspect.

Again, I understand that people who choose to play healer want to heal. But that's not possible in the "core" content. Hardcore progression is where they should be heading if they want a challenge in terms of healing, as oGCD, GCD, MP and HPS management is crucial.

I truely think that this is the best they can do to please everyone as much as possible.

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Originally Posted by Fyce

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Resultant question then: "Would the game be in a better place if shit healers were to get good or get out?"

That potential sub number of princess healers with no other role is quite a blow, but then, so too can be the numbers lost to lack of interest among more skilled players.

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Originally Posted by Bourne_Endeavor

Just to clarify since you mentioned it to Aramina. I am not advocate for just a HP spike, but instead greater variety. I often use PotD as a template because it does a lot of things right. You have priority mobs to discourage aoe spamming; surprise spawns; patrolling mobs; higher damage in lieu higher HP. All of these give PotD a bit of dynamism and make even a couple mobs more interesting. The reason people find dungeons boring, in my opinion, is there's nothing to them. We just pull everything and aoe them all down. Doesn't matter what they do or what they look like; just aoe 'em all down.

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As much as I'm generally a critic of PotD, in odd comps or at high floors at least, this is a concept really worth enjoying and one I'd love to see entered into more of the dungeon experience. Heck, it's probably the first thing in XIV to actually feel like a (traditional/archetypal) dungeon experience. The rest, while enjoyable when making the most of the paradigm, are pedal-powered roller coasters.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

As much as I'm generally a critic of PotD, in odd comps or at high floors at least, this is a concept really worth enjoying and one I'd love to see entered into more of the dungeon experience. Heck, it's probably the first thing in XIV to actually feel like a (traditional/archetypal) dungeon experience. The rest, while enjoyable when making the most of the paradigm, are pedal-powered roller coasters.

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To piggyback you guys a bit: I, too, am not advocating a simple "shit hits harder" deal. I want to have to think about what I am casting, when I am casting, and on whom I am casting it.

As to whether or not it would be better or not for sub numbers? Clearly I can't answer that, none of us can, but I have always been of the mind that it is better to (potentially) overtune and have to come down a notch rather than not try at all.

Also: Gear acts as a natural nerf to content. For story dungeons low (no) difficulty is fine... but there could be actual expert dungeons (seperate from MSQ) that maybe not everyone is intended to do on day 1. Maybe they need to get some more gear to cover for any lack in skill.

My opinion is: As long as ANY DPS Job is taking ANY non Roomwide AoE for ANY reason other than latency, they have not even remotely the right to utter even ONE peep if the Healer is only casting heal spells. Even more so in Stormblood, where Gap Closers (Melee) and restoration of mobility seems to be a thing.

When in doubt, give 'DPS Buster' abilities to boss enemies that are aimed at people with the DPS Role, and deal something like 5 to 50 times the amount of HP one can potentially stack. There is a reason why SSS requires inflated output on Damage classes - and that is to train them to do well enough ON THEIR OWN so that they then, with party buffs, have spare time to dodge stuff and do mechanics. DPS Greed should be punished with non avoidable deaths left, right and center.

They tried the idea of hard-hitting mobs and a high healing requirement with Pharos Sirius, as the instance was incredibly punishing for groups lacking primal weapons and a decent amount of darklight gear. While there were other things difficult about the instance, such as Siren's multitude of new and original debuffs to learn for the first time, it was the high mob damage that led the community into complaining up a storm until the instance was nerfed and toned down. Seriously, people would abandon immediately if they got it in roulette, and for DPS queues this was an ultimate frustration.

They will likely never go back to such a design because randos will cry, and even if we like to think the community has grown in experience since then, there will always be subscribed players of various skill levels, some of which may not be very high, and S-E intends to cater to all. It's the lesson they've been learning, which is why story-scenes are linked to Alexander Normal rather than gating an awesome Louisoux cutscene behind a difficult second coil raid encounter that only a tiny percentage of the population saw in-game prior to Heavensward. Cater to the masses, and if that means it's easy in general for the skilled, then they just need to seek out their challenges in the content designed for them (extreme primals and savage raids).

It's not an ideal system, but one that approaches the greatest number of people.

Which means again, that a dps that eats avoidable AoE should get not a single heal. If the group disbands, so be it.

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Originally Posted by Lesan

Which means again, that a dps that eats avoidable AoE should get not a single heal. If the group disbands, so be it.

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Not sure how that is at all relevant to the conversation.

That said, "If you play badly then I will play badly too!" isn't a good look. Sorry.

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Originally Posted by Aramina

Not sure how that is at all relevant to the conversation.

That said, "If you play badly then I will play badly too!" isn't a good look. Sorry.

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It is more meant as a 'They have not a shred of a right to demand the Healer to dodge, heal AND dps, when they only focus on damage and ignore the dodging, making the healer have to heal more to compensate.'

Because by the 'You only need to heal after big attacks!!!111' logic, any heal used on a non tank to refill after a non roomwide aoe is wasted potential DPS.

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Originally Posted by Lesan

Which means again, that a dps that eats avoidable AoE should get not a single heal. If the group disbands, so be it.

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Wasting your own time isn't any more conducive though. Additionally there are two schools of thought here, because sometimes a DPS knows they will not die to an AoE and so they eat it to maximize DPS uptime. This is almost always an annoyance for healers because they invariably end up reacting to it, but there's a solid logic behind it. Alternatively they could have made a mistake, or just be daft. It's not always easy to tell without talking to them first.

Regardless you're in whatever duty to achieve your goal, and your time is better spent getting your rewards rather than sulking or counter-trolling on principle, unless those are your actual goals instead. Work with the team you have to get it done, or abandon and find a different group if they're just too incompatible with you; whatever you decide make sure you're doing what you can to have the most fun during your video game time, though if you get enjoyment from being smug and purposefully being a poor player then don't be surprised if people abandon party and waste your time in response.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lesan

It is more meant as a 'They have not a shred of a right to demand the Healer to dodge, heal AND dps, when they only focus on damage and ignore the dodging, making the healer have to heal more to compensate.'

Because by the 'You only need to heal after big attacks!!!111' logic, any heal used on a non tank to refill after a non roomwide aoe is wasted potential DPS.

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Fair enough. :)

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Originally Posted by LegoTechnic

Wasting your own time isn't any more conducive though. Additionally there are two schools of thought here, because sometimes a DPS knows they will not die to an AoE and so they eat it to maximize DPS uptime. This is almost always an annoyance for healers because they invariably end up reacting to it, but there's a solid logic behind it. Alternatively they could have made a mistake, or just be daft. It's not always easy to tell without talking to them first.

Regardless you're in whatever duty to achieve your goal, and your time is better spent getting your rewards rather than sulking or counter-trolling on principle, unless those are your actual goals instead. Work with the team you have to get it done, or abandon and find a different group if they're just too incompatible with you; whatever you decide make sure you're doing what you can to have the most fun during your video game time, though if you get enjoyment from being smug and purposefully being a poor player then don't be surprised if people abandon party and waste your time in response.

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I know, right; god forbid we admit that the question of action priority (in this case healing vs. attacking) is more accurately represented by a flow chart than it is by a rigid set of expectations or rules.

The people who complain about not having enough healing to do and being "forced" to DPS would probably be among the first to complain about being turned into a straight-up healbot.

Can the healing/support game in FFXIV be improved? Sure, I will agree that there is room to make it more interesting without crossing the line into healbot territory. On the other hand, I'm far from convinced that the playstyle we have now with interwoven healing and DPS is so terrible.

The thing is, I WANT to DPS. And very often, its the actual DPS Role players that ruin that plan by only focusing on the 'Damage' part, which is fine - as long as they can cover 100% of damage taken by avoidable AoE. If they choose to focus on Damage only, I am free to focus on Healing, more and more, to the point of only renewing my dots on the boss. Because right now, the 5 Seconds it takes to be able to detoggle Cleric Stance means that some parser greedy DPS has eaten the current set of avoidable AoE, and will get slain by the next. And this will most likely not improve either....