Healer role design change?

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Originally Posted by ty_taurus

1. Rebalance DPS values between Healers and Tanks to be much closer.
- Healers are currently last in line to get their gear in many premades groups. This would at least allow healers to be interchangeable with tanks in terms of gear priority.

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That wouldn't change the gearing priority. Healers were dealing comparable damage to tanks in Shadowbringers yet the same priority persisted. It's due to the role being in a unique position to gain damage since Healers are the only job that change their rotation from prog to re-clears. You'll press significantly less GCDs, thus you'll deal more damage whereas tanks will basically be completely static save for the occasional "safety Tomahawk"

Even with that aside, there's simply no reason for healers to do the same damage as tanks in their present state. They're pressing one button compare to the juggling Gunbreaker deals with or the oGCD fest Dark Knight has. Besides, gear priority is static dependent. Plenty on the more casual side and even some midcore do FFA.

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Originally Posted by vetch

Either I don't understand, or that's not really dynamic control of your damage profile. It's just the overcap management that all jobs have to do to optimize, i.e. not letting it sit unused such that it costs you a use over the course of the fight, and not using it so late that you don't have all charges ready for the burst window.

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You implied that 120s raid cycles would cripple any damage-based-healer's control over burst healing for the sake of healing (rather than just for exploiting damage windows). But consider:

• If I have 2 charges on a 30s CD attack, I have 2 uses per cycle that I can time to wherever I wish per 30s period without any nominal rDPS loss.
• If I have 3 charges on a 20s CD attack (Addersgall, but offensive), I have 3 uses per cycle that I can time to wherever I wish per 40s period without any nominal rDPS loss.
• Drop that to 2 charges on that 20s CD attack, and I have 4 uses per cycle that I can time to wherever I wish per 20s period without any nominal rDPS loss.
• Etc., etc.

That's not some small amount of flexibility, and if nearly the whole of the kit had similar levels of flexibility, that's far more than enough. No one's claimed that damage-based-healing suddenly suddenly circumvent how cooldowns work; rather, the variants and features surrounding how cooldowns already work are more than enough to leave any such job with more than enough room to operate even if saving all that they can (which still would be a small portion of the total potency output per 120s) for each 2-minute raidbuff cycle.

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The way you're presenting it, your DPS healer would be able to pour on self-buffs/oGCDs to increase damage-healing when needed

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I have yet to mention a single self-buff for this? (The only example of buffs was in regard to Discipline Priest, which has no native oGCDs, and whose buffs create a balancing act between focus healing and total healing.)

And yes, you'd be able to, within a given period, use as many or few oGCDs as their bankability allows. And that's before even including gauge-builders (for lulls) and gauge-spenders (for burst), etc.

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wouldn't you be under pressure to manage them for max DPS with minimal consideration of their heal value, while leaving any uncovered healing to a co-healer who'll still have a bunch of free oGCDs or lilies with no opportunity cost, unlike yours?

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Again, even in those cases where neither you nor your co-healer need your heals for healing (see: Energy Drain), that's a non-issue; that's the point at which you'd already be using Energy Drain over the otherwise usually far more efficient Sacred Soil or Excog (in terms of additional filler attacks that can be cast from removing the need to GCD-heal) or casting Lily heals just to prep Misery-cleave. It's not a territory worth judging a single job design by; it neither breaks uniquely there, nor to unique extent.

At worst, the job would have slightly greater rDPS shifts between "farm" and "speedrun" status than most other healers because it has more control over its offensive ppgcd (potency per GCD) and pp15s (the amount of potency which can fully exploit the 15s of 2-minute cycles' every buff).


Again:
I'm not even a fan of damage-based-healers. To me, it typically feels flat compared to healers with more direct means each of damage and healing, especially in games with significant ppgcd and available burst (or, throughput in general) from both healer's offense and healing (i.e., where a healer going fully offensive would actually be tactically significant and noticeable on more than just a parser).

But, their problem isn't that some of their healing would be directed by raid cycles; all healers already have that same constraint, by the fact that they're equally obliged not to use a single GCD heal under raid buffs.

Rather, their issue is simply that they can't swing their throughput between damage and healing as much as most healers, because they're one and the same for them, which typically leaves any job of that overarching design with a lower ceiling to their sense of interplay/adaptiveness/risk-reward.

Depending on the context (in terms of healer the relative value of healer output [especially, offensive], short-term checks, difficulty, etc.), that loss may be purely theoretical, but as long as we're talking overarching designs, that does seem worth noting.

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

Even with that aside, there's simply no reason for healers to do the same damage as tanks in their present state. They're pressing one button compare to the juggling Gunbreaker deals with or the oGCD fest Dark Knight has.

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It's almost as if I said "Healers should have a similar ratio of offensive actions to healing actions that tanks have for offensive actions to mitigation actions. You can still have 1 more simple healer and 1 more complex healer like the tanks, but that shouldn't mean 60% of your actions are whatever flavor of Glare each job is sentenced to." in the same post that you quoted.

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Originally Posted by ty_taurus

It's almost as if I said "Healers should have a similar ratio of offensive actions to healing actions that tanks have for offensive actions to mitigation actions. You can still have 1 more simple healer and 1 more complex healer like the tanks, but that shouldn't mean 60% of your actions are whatever flavor of Glare each job is sentenced to." in the same post that you quoted.

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And it's almost like I said, "Healers were dealing comparable damage to tanks in Shadowbringers yet the same priority persisted" in that same post you quoted. Not to mention explaining that said priority exists for more than one reason.

Putting aside the snide remarks, they're never going to design healers with the same offensive toolkit tank do. After ten years that much is pretty apparent. Even if they do relent, which I think they should, and give back some offensive options for healers. It will come in the form of another DoT or maybe a second Glare equivalent. Otherwise, you might see something comparable to what Astro has now with cards. We're never going to have healers weaving the absurd amount of purely offensive oGCDs Dark Knight does.

Not only do they simply not want to design healers that way, it also runs into several problems with fight design. Imagine Dark Knight had to heal in between its burst windows or even Warrior had to delay IR Fell Cleave to keep the party alive? A lot of players won't want to trade their damage for heals. We already see that now, especially with White Mage. They're not pressing Rapture during any burst windows, party be damned. Another issue is general mechanic design. Unless every new button added is an instant cast, healer movement will become more of an issue. Both scenarios result in them taking a damage loss... which circles back to the crux of my point: healers will always be expected to sacrifice damage which is the primary reason they're last in gear priority. That won't change even if they had Warrior's rotation, which is about as far as SE will ever go.

None of this really matters though because it's mostly the higher end statics that have a gear priority. Like I said, you can have plenty of groups who don't. So this isn't really a problem that needs addressing.

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

Putting aside the snide remarks, they're never going to design healers with the same offensive toolkit tank do. After ten years that much is pretty apparent. Even if they do relent, which I think they should, and give back some offensive options for healers. It will come in the form of another DoT or maybe a second Glare equivalent. Otherwise, you might see something comparable to what Astro has now with cards. We're never going to have healers weaving the absurd amount of purely offensive oGCDs Dark Knight does.

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My original post was about what needs to happen to fix the healer role. Whether or not the design team ever will is an entirely different conversation, which is why I feel it was disingenuous to criticize one point with a problem that I already answered in the same original post. If you don't think that will ever come to pass, then that's a different conversation. I also thought Red Mage would never come to pass prior to Stormblood because it didn't match the holy trinity format established by XIV, and here we are. People are allowed to change their minds after all. They changed their minds about bow mage. After the release of Super Smash Bros Brawl, the producer stated Animal Crossing would never get a fighter added to the series because it wouldn't make sense. Fast forward 4 years and Villager was the first newcomer announced for the 4th game. People change their minds sometimes.

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

Not only do they simply not want to design healers that way, it also runs into several problems with fight design. Imagine Dark Knight had to heal in between its burst windows or even Warrior had to delay IR Fell Cleave to keep the party alive?

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Um... Tanks already have to weave mitigation and healing in the middle of their rotations and burst windows now. You don't think tanks have to manage things like Reprisal, Divine Veil, Shake it Off, or other kinds of tools regularly? Even DPS do that. I do that as a Dancer all the time. Sometimes I even need multiple healing/mitigation cooldowns during my buff window. Anyone who thinks healers are playing some different type of game than the other two roles just isn't playing healer correctly.

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

And it's almost like I said, "Healers were dealing comparable damage to tanks in Shadowbringers yet the same priority persisted" in that same post you quoted. Not to mention explaining that said priority exists for more than one reason.

Putting aside the snide remarks

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That fact in no way precludes Taurus's suggestion, though? And reminding you of a portion you clearly skipped over --without any warrant at the time by which to dismiss the possibility that healers could ever have more than "another DoT or maybe a second Glare equivalent"-- is not being snide.

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They're not pressing Rapture during any burst windows, party be damned.

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They almost always... are, though, when not doing so would cause a death.

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healers will always be expected to sacrifice damage

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...*Looks up.* ... *Looks back below.* ...

So, which is it then?

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Imagine Dark Knight had to heal in between its burst windows or even Warrior had to delay IR Fell Cleave to keep the party alive?

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DRK has no ST heals outside of its offensive combo, but... they absolutely do frequently have to weave in their other forms of sustain right within their burst windows.

We don't have to imagine it; it's... the norm. And has been since the start.

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Unless every new button added is an instant cast, healer movement will become more of an issue.

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It'd replace... a Glare-equivalent (1.5s cast). Unless it'd constrain movement more than a Glare (1.5s cast)... why would an extra attack in any way reduce healer mobility?

Having additional instant cast attacks wouldn't just have a neutral effect on healer movement; it'd make healers more mobile.
Technically, so would just clumping up its ppgcd in general, as long as the added attacks are at all bankable, even if they still retained that 1.5s cast time (since the relative penalty of moving -- per lost filler damage -- would be less).

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

Not only do they simply not want to design healers that way, it also runs into several problems with fight design. Imagine Dark Knight had to heal in between its burst windows or even Warrior had to delay IR Fell Cleave to keep the party alive? A lot of players won't want to trade their damage for heals. We already see that now, especially with White Mage. They're not pressing Rapture during any burst windows, party be damned.

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I really don't think the healer role should be designed around someone who doesn't have their priorities straight. If a healer is not pressing a heal during a burst window when it's needed, they are a bad healer, same as a GNB that refuses to press cooldowns during Gnashing Fang combo, why do we call the tank that doesn't want to press cooldowns during burst a bad player but we think the healer that doesn't want to put out necessary heals mid-burst should have the role designed around them?

It's the same with the whole SCH aetherflow debate. If you need to use a Sacred Soil, you use it. Why should things be changed if someone says they feel bad for not using it on an Energy Drain?

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Originally Posted by ty_taurus

My original post was about what needs to happen to fix the healer role. Whether or not the design team ever will is an entirely different conversation, which is why I feel it was disingenuous to criticize one point with a problem that I already answered in the same original post. If you don't think that will ever come to pass, then that's a different conversation. I also thought Red Mage would never come to pass prior to Stormblood because it didn't match the holy trinity format established by XIV, and here we are. People are allowed to change their minds after all. They changed their minds about bow mage. After the release of Super Smash Bros Brawl, the producer stated Animal Crossing would never get a fighter added to the series because it wouldn't make sense. Fast forward 4 years and Villager was the first newcomer announced for the 4th game. People change their minds sometimes.

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Yes, however what I replied to, specifically, has nothing to do with fixing the healer role but is simply a preference on gear distribution. You're now conflating healer design and how individual statics decide they want to divvy out loot. Both are subjective but only one is an actual design issue.

Red Mage is a poor example because adding a new job is far easier than completely overhauling an entire role. Likewise, Bowmage died because it was near universally hated. Which, much to many of our chagrin, is not the case for healers. It's like those bemoaning EW Summoner. Some may despise the changes but considering it's widely considered the most popular job in the game now, there isn't exactly much incentive to scale it back.

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Originally Posted by ty_taurus

Um... Tanks already have to weave mitigation and healing in the middle of their rotations and burst windows now. You don't think tanks have to manage things like Reprisal, Divine Veil, Shake it Off, or other kinds of tools regularly? Even DPS do that. I do that as a Dancer all the time. Sometimes I even need multiple healing/mitigation cooldowns during my buff window. Anyone who thinks healers are playing some different type of game than the other two roles just isn't playing healer correctly.

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I never said they didn't. What I implied is you'd either have to add several more buttons on top of what the tanks already have or completely overhaul the healing kits to make this new design work. To be fair, I probably should have worded that better. Nevertheless, they simply aren't going to do the latter because that isn't the design philosophy they want for healers. None of which is to say I agree with it but not only have they spent two expansions downscaling the complexity of everything, they specifically addressed people asking for a return to Heavensward and said they had no intention of doing so. Considering the sheer popularity of the game right now, there isn't exactly an incentive to turn around and aim for a complex direction.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

They almost always... are, though, when not doing so would cause a death.

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No, they are not. Outside of the casual demographic, who isn't all that concerned about healer design whatsoever, they aren't GCD healing during burst windows beyond very early prog where nobody cares about damage. They'll cover those scenarios with oGCDs and external mitigation from other roles. If Reprisal is missed, more often than not someone will die because you're not getting a shield. Now if they notice they may adjust in time but that shouldn't be the expectation when Reprisal should have been there.

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

Even with that aside, there's simply no reason for healers WAR to do the same damage as tanks GNB in their present state. They're pressing one button a very simple rotation, compare to the juggling Gunbreaker deals with or the oGCD fest Dark Knight has. Besides, gear priority is static dependent. Plenty on the more casual side and even some midcore do FFA.

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And yet WAR does indeed keep up, very well, with the damage that GNB does, in fact it also often beats DRK. It's almost like the number of buttons in the rotation plays little to zero impact on the balance of how much damage they do. Which means the number of buttons the healers have atm, should not be a factor in how much damage they do relative to tanks. Besides that though, the point is that some people are asking for healers to have more buttons, which by your logic of 'more button = more damage potential', would result in what Ty says, where healers and tanks, played optimally, would do roughly the same damage

It was funny seeing WHM outdps PLD in SHB though, just because of the whole 'it's a rdps gain for the PLD to use Req on Clemency, rather than forcing the WHM to drop a Glare for a Cure2', of course, this degenerative gameplay is an affront to the natural order of 'healers are sixth class citizens in the game' and had to be crushed immediately, can't have those WHMs getting a taste of fun/rewarding gameplay

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

Red Mage is a poor example because adding a new job is far easier than completely overhauling an entire role. Likewise, Bowmage died because it was near universally hated. Which, much to many of our chagrin, is not the case for healers.

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I'd personally argue that the overhaul to cards going into 5.0 is equal in scale to Bowmage being reverted. I'd argue that removing an entire playstyle (noct sect) is equal in scale to Bowmage being reverted. Both of these happened to the same class, Healers have definitely seen Bowmage level changes. We just find the direction of the changes we got to be akin to the implementation of Bowmage, not the reversion

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

they specifically addressed people asking for a return to Heavensward and said they had no intention of doing so. Considering the sheer popularity of the game right now, there isn't exactly an incentive to turn around and aim for a complex direction.

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Which is why I, and hopefully others if I've managed to convince anyone with my rambling, think that, since we the disgruntled healer mains hate 5.0 onwards, SE hates the idea of 3.0 or earlier, that 4.0 is the ideal middleground. No Cleric Stance dance rubbish, no Astrodyne/blandcards, SCH has several DOTs, AST has 'interesting cards' but no Royal Road (keeping Div as the 'predictable, 2min raidbuff' = easier to balance it's RDPS contribution), WHM keeps it's remade Lily/Misery system (which also addresses it's MP management issues from earlier incarnations), etc.

There's only so many times a player can run through a EX roulette smashing Art of War and zero healing GCDs before they start to think 'hmm I wonder if it'd be more fun to do this on a DPS, even if that does mean a queue time to sit through'. Oddly, I don't recall many complaints that 'oh I can't keep up with all these DOTs on SCH'. In fact, I don't remember any at all. All I remember from those times was 'Why is WHM lily so bad' and 'Why is AST so damn good'. The solution to anyone with common sense is 'buff WHM to be as good as AST and SCH'. SE's 'solution' was to kneecap SCH and AST down to WHM, because WHM is the 'face of healing' and if that's bland as hell, everything needs to be bland as hell to match

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

No, they are not. Outside of the casual demographic, who isn't all that concerned about healer design whatsoever, they aren't GCD healing during burst windows beyond very early prog where nobody cares about damage.

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I cannot speak for every WHM player, but I can assure you that if I need to Rapture during a burst window to keep everyone alive, I will absolutely Rapture during a burst window. It's not costing a Glare when I Rapture inside raidbuffs vs outside, it's costing me 'the damage boost that the raidbuffs apply to that Glare', I still get the Glare's damage back via Misery at a later point. In that regard, the damage cost is actually quite negligible, in the group I reclear with atm it would lose Brotherhood, Mug, Techstep and Searing Light/Embolden depending on what the caster is playing. By my maths, that combo of buffs (with embolden since it's bigger, for the sake of the example) puts Glare's effective potency at 376.8, meaning my 'lost damage' from 'Rapture at wrong time' is 67p. That is basically one tick of Dia. It's 2/3 of an Energy Drain. I'll happily pay 'one tick of Dia' worth of damage for the sake of safety

Besides that, there's plenty of examples where the boss does a set of mechanics that require healing, during the 2min window, and while other more competent healers than me might have ways to avoid having to heal until the buffs fall off, I'm of the mind that 'I don't care I just want this reclear out of the way, so I'll press Rapture it's not that big a deal'

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Originally Posted by ForsakenRoe

The solution to anyone with common sense is 'buff WHM to be as good as AST and SCH'. SE's 'solution' was to kneecap SCH and AST down to WHM, because WHM is the 'face of healing' and if that's bland as hell, everything needs to be bland as hell to match

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I'm always gonna butt heads with you here, but that's the most never going to happen thing of all the things that will never happen. Square has made it clear that WHM's "identity" is The Boring One That Sucks. If you bring back Stormblood healers, AST and SCH will simply resume their collective status as the Overpowered Ones Who Are The Best At Everything. "Bringing WHM up" in Stormblood's paradigm is waaaay more than potencies. The other two could mitigate in several different ways. And had a bunch of free burst heals and regens. And party damage buffs. AOE Esuna. MP refresh. Excellent personal damage. WHM was missing entire categories of personal capability that the other two had in spades, plus they could handily cover the vanilla blandness that WHM brought to the table.

I'd love a well-designed WHM that had actual utility. But as we've seen, Square would rather destroy the entire role than give WHM so much as a fecking raidbuff. "They just need to bring WHM up a bit" is what was bandied about the forums a lot back in Stormblood. It was also not even close to true given how OP AST/SCH was.