To YoshiP, here's what too stress-free: Healer edition

I wouldn't say there was no reason to use Cleric Stance and DPS back then. Here's the thing, DPS was absolutely optional during ARR, but it's still optional today in nearly every corner of FFXIV shy of EX and beyond, and even there a lot of fights don't necessarily require healer DPS once a party has started updating their gear. The key differences between then and now are that: enemies had nastier, more frequent auto attacks that could crit; tanks were less durable; our healing tools were far more limited and we could very rarely heal and DPS at the same time; but most importantly of all, our perception of the game as a community was different.

Back then, how powerful and helpful healer DPS was wasn't well known, not to mention Cleric Stance was an extremely punishing ultimatum that many players simply weren't comfortable juggling while other players were relying on them, especially when a tank could die much more quickly than today. At the same time, no, seeing a healer in Cleric Stance was not an indication of a bad healer, but you often would see healers that simply didn't and would either idle or spam Cure/Physick on the tank even if they had full HP in case they might take a nasty auto attack crit. Over time, as our familiarity with the game grew, our understanding of healer DPS developed over time. It was the later half of ARR and going into HW that people started to realize how pointless it was for a healer to do nothing or waste overhealing on a tank that doesn't need it and started to promote DPSing when healing was not required. But even then, that doesn't mean we already had the hyper aggressive DPS spam environment we had today.

That is more a product of how heavily power crept our healing tools are for an environment that asks for a fraction of what we're capable of so infrequently that you're more likely to forget to heal because it's been so long since the party last took damage than you are likely to not have enough healing.

The reason they took out protect-like skills is it turned every single end-game encounter into a ritual of remembering to cast all your buff spells before each pull. It was never something you'd renew in combat and I'm not even sure if there was much use in using stoneskin except on prepull. What I find more confusing is why shell and protect went away and weren't repurposed into more immediate use skills, like how rampart works or how a scholar shield works.

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Originally Posted by KisaiTenshi

This is how ARR healing worked:
Tank runs off without tank stance
You follow with cleric stance off
Monsters actually do like 20% and 50% damage to the tank, and 90% damage to DPS who step in bad. There was no reason to ever use cleric stance, and you never had to in regular duties, ever. You just had people on the forum complain about it from their misconception of how this game isn't like the other popular MMO. It became a signal that you're playing with bad healer if you ever saw cleric stance on, just like you had to wait for Protect and Stoneskin.

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What? Am I misreading what you're saying here?

https://youtu.be/wb3MAb1wg5A?si=eo03aBiqZpZqW60w&t=317

World first Coil Turn 9. Watch that SCH's bars closely @5:20....

Granted I was playing at a fairly high bordering on world prog level at 2.x-3.x but man, suggesting that cleric stance on = bad healer back then is wildly wrong sir.

To be fair, I was pretty cautious with DPS in early ARR (Primarily due to resource scarcity rather than a fear of people immediately face planting mind), once we had more gear later on in the tier and especially once HW landed, the DPS taps truely opened especially in more casual content. I could do huge DPS in dungeons as SCH whilst having absolutely no trouble safely healing the group through mistakes as needed. Even WHM had it's moments thanks to how powerful early Holy was as well as the CC and 'mitigation' it brought to the table.

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There is no skill or strategy in how healing works anymore.

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I do agree here and with your points about our utility being stripped away though. I'm a big advocate for buffing/debuffing being an avenue that shouldn't be overlooked.

One thing that could be made a lot more stress free for healers is the MSQ. My suggestion for that would be bringing back Cleric Stance as a version of BLU's Basic Instinct, something to give them all the damage output of a DPS while outside of dungeons (and maybe with Trusts since their damage output is so low).


But for overall gameplay of healers, more offensive options to use the various secondary resources... SCH has Energy Drain but with 100 potency it could use an upgrade, but it's a good way to clear out Aetherflow charges if it finishes CD before you needed to use all 3.
Similarly for WHM, an option to use Lilies to attack. Maybe bring Seraph Strike from PvP to PvE as a Lily spender. And SGE's Addersting attacks could use a buff as Toxikon is basically an insta cast Dosis.

AST is supposed to be getting a rework so I don't know what it'll be like in 7.0.

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Originally Posted by Colt47

The reason they took out protect-like skills is it turned every single end-game encounter into a ritual of remembering to cast all your buff spells before each pull. It was never something you'd renew in combat and I'm not even sure if there was much use in using stoneskin except on prepull. What I find more confusing is why shell and protect went away and weren't repurposed into more immediate use skills, like how rampart works or how a scholar shield works.

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You could very easily reintroduce Protect as a precursor to Aquaveil. Give it an 8% damage reduction available for white mage at level, maybe 22 or something, and it later upgrades into Aquaveil later. You could do the same with Stoneskin and Divine Benison, though I'd rather see Aquaveil and Benison merge rather than have two buttons that exist for mostly the same purpose.

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Originally Posted by ty_taurus

During the interviews where YoshiP talked about Shadowbringers feedback and players asking for more DPS abilities, he described what was essentially Addersting--that you would be able to apply a barrier through an attack that, when broken, would enable another attack. This works in PVP, but in PVE, the only barrier that earns Addersting are not generated from attacks, indicating this was changed before EW officially launched.

Regardless, the outcome of Addersting is truly awful. I've seen people defend it, but I cannot agree. The actual value Toxikon provides is nearly 0. It might sound like it has a nice concept to it, but what's the difference between a Sage who uses Toxikon and a Sage who doesn't? Assuming everything else is consistent, the difference is so microscopic that it has no realistic impact on the outcome of any fight.

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I don't think Toxikon is completely useless, but it's definitely not in a great spot. On single target it's just a movement tool, and on multi target it is a slight gain over Dyskrasia provided you don't shield in combat. I mainly use it by shielding on trash pulls while we're still running to get sting stacks and then dump it all on Toxikon once we're stopped. If I happen to have sting stacks when we're on a boss, I'll use it if I need to move a long distance and I can't be in the boss's behind to use Phlegma.

I agree that it should definitely be changed though.

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Originally Posted by Bibine_Bine

I don't think Toxikon is completely useless, but it's definitely not in a great spot. On single target it's just a movement tool, and on multi target it is a slight gain over Dyskrasia provided you don't shield in combat. I mainly use it by shielding on trash pulls while we're still running to get sting stacks and then dump it all on Toxikon once we're stopped. If I happen to have sting stacks when we're on a boss, I'll use it if I need to move a long distance and I can't be in the boss's behind to use Phlegma.

I agree that it should definitely be changed though.

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Right, but are you using Toxikon because it’s genuinely useful to you and allowing you to accomplish things you otherwise couldn’t? Or are you simply using it just because it’s there and you might as well? How different is your performance with Addersting vs your performance without it? If you didn’t use Toxikon, what would happen? Would you lose fights that you could’ve otherwise have won? Are you saving time by speeding up the length of a fight?

What you described I could also have said about Stormblood lilies, that they aren’t that bad because hey, maybe I’ll get an extra Assize out of it. That’s, what? An extra 0.2% of my total damage maybe? It could be worse right?

I’m not trying to be antagonistic. My point is just, is this actually a useful system, or are you simply making the best out of something that is ultimately accomplishing nothing that you wouldn’t really accomplish without it?

It was why stormblood lilies never got changed, hilariously useless but didn’t really actually hinder WHM’s gameplay unlike something like 5.0 energy drain or 6.0 lilies

Toxicon is just modern SB lily’s

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Originally Posted by IDontPetLalas

I would rather have difficulty be in the encounter design than be in constantly looking at a resource bar, which I have experienced elsewhere (and they ending up rolling back since it was too strict) - especially if that penalizes only a few jobs. Square has taken the decision of introducing body checks, and simplifying jobs- they could have made other decisions to make encounters more interesting.

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To be clear, I'm not asking for tunnel vision gameplay on MP bars. That's exactly why I don't play DRK. That's also why I don't like SAM's gameplay having to constantly balance my kenki gauge to keep enough for the long recasts but not overcap either, but if that's the jam of people with resource management, who am I to deny them some designs that do?

You didn't exactly need to be glued to your MP or TP bar before on most jobs. Giving a glance at it from time to time, like for when using the old variants of Lucid (which you still kinda do today even if less so), is enough as far as I'm concerned. The same way you checked your MP bar on Bard for when to use Foe Requiem, or on rphys in HW for when to use your MP in order to refresh the party.

I'm curious of what other decisions you refer to though? Don't tease me like that..

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Originally Posted by CaptainLagbeard

One thing that could be made a lot more stress free for healers is the MSQ. My suggestion for that would be bringing back Cleric Stance as a version of BLU's Basic Instinct, something to give them all the damage output of a DPS while outside of dungeons (and maybe with Trusts since their damage output is so low).

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Honestly I think if they didn't go this route that Cleric Stance should be a WHM only mechanic where you can additional DPS abilities while cleric stance is on. You could even swap some abilities while under cleric stance for added skill level like having misery replace lilybell, so that you can keep the amount of buttons more condensed. Have different ways of using damage as well as healing also makes each healer different from each other. In this case, stance dancing would be unique to WHM.