Has anyone quit healing?

I still can't get over how art of war replaced Miasma II, Shadowflare, and Bane spreading Bio and Miasma to multiple enemies. It hurts.

I can't even bring myself to even want to do a roulette as a healer. I didn't even have to hard cast a single heal as a SCH. All I did was Art of War spam the entire time. I can't see how that's even fun or at least engaging. Literally one. Single. Spell. It blows my mind honestly. Yoshi P for the love of all things, you have to see this isn't fun. It's time to go back to the old ways, even if you don't believe so, believe in your community.

AST was my secondary after WAR before Shadowbringers came out. I think it lost a lot of its identity and flavour. I think the cards became more about what they mathematically achieve, rather than what they strategically imply. Honestly I was fine with all of the cards except Ewer and Spire. Not every card had to be Balance for me to enjoy it, just like not every attack needs to be a crit. Just to be something that could feel genuinely useful was enough. The change to cards and dilution of the Time Mage flavour took away a lot of what I loved about the job and now I don't even have a gearset for it. I play SCH if PvP really needs a healer but that's about it.

I am not a healer main so my opinion may not count as much, though Scholar was the job that said to me "FFXIV is the game for me" and AST was a huge thrill for me to play every day. It's a shame both of them have changed in ways that really neutered my interest. I really respect what the developers have done since the release of Shadowbringers for both jobs; AST at least controls much better now. That said I feel like they exaggerated the healer design problems and felt all three had to be turned on their head, when really SCH and AST just needed a little refinement and WHM definitely needed some fundamental tweaks.

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Originally Posted by MitsukiKimura

That's your opinion then. I'm sorry you like dull and boring gameplay of a healer. Most of us want our fun back in our classes.

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Alright, someone wants to take their disdain for healers getting lack of attention, out on me.

You say it like you're speaking for everyone else here at the forum, or better yet everyone in the game. I don't share your feelings on this matter, but you seem to take it(and personally) as though there is something wrong with me for liking something you declare to be dull and boring. I'm not blind to the problems, at least for AST. I'm a controller user and while I've gotten rather good at it, that doesn't mean it can't be a total nightmare sometimes. Card system is crap, this is a no brainer, but there is nothing wrong with Melafic's damage which you want to nerf. Melafic doesn't even compete with Glare LOL, but you wanna nerf it. That's what gets me. You harp on wanting something to spice of the job and your bright idea for doing this is to nerf the damage of an already hurting for more power, spell. Yes. Stop healing. Stay far away from it. Don't come back.

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Originally Posted by Rasikko

Alright, someone wants to take their disdain for healers getting lack of attention, out on me.

You say it like you're speaking for everyone else here at the forum, or better yet everyone in the game. I don't share your feelings on this matter, but you seem to take it(and personally) as though there is something wrong with me for liking something you declare to be dull and boring. I'm not blind to the problems, at least for AST. I'm a controller user and while I've gotten rather good at it, that doesn't mean it can't be a total nightmare sometimes. Card system is crap, this is a no brainer, but there is nothing wrong with Melafic's damage which you want to nerf. Melafic doesn't even compete with Glare LOL, but you wanna nerf it. That's what gets me. You harp on wanting something to spice of the job and your bright idea for doing this is to nerf the damage of an already hurting for more power, spell. Yes. Stop healing. Stay far away from it. Don't come back.

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You obviously haven't even bothered to read other people's concerns and complaints about the healers classes. AST is a support healer, it's damage doesn't need to be upgraded that will just make other healers Inferior, AST's power should come from it's support not from its base damage. Yes it is Dull and boring and other people agree with me, you can stop being blind and wake up and realize it. I do take it personally seeing as I played AST since Heavenwards all the way to Shadowbringer expansion and yes I have a right to be upset at the changes. Square Enix is taking a wrong step in this direction. Yes we all just been DYING to have Malefic Buffed. Lets Ignore all the other things we lost and had gutted, screw my cards and time extenders I need that 10 Potency Buff!

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Originally Posted by Rasikko

Alright, someone wants to take their disdain for healers getting lack of attention, out on me.

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If there's anyone taking something personally it's you for seeming to take the time to write out this nice paragraph in response. Just like how you're entitled to your opinion, everyone else is also entitled to theirs.

Get over it.

I haven't stopped yet, but honestly, it's a shell of what it used to be and pretty boring. AST in particular was a tragedy greater even than the 7th Umbral Calamity and must be undone. If history must be unwritten, let it be unwritten.

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Originally Posted by EnigmaticDodo

I haven't stopped yet, but honestly, it's a shell of what it used to be and pretty boring. AST in particular was a tragedy greater even than the 7th Umbral Calamity and must be undone. If history must be unwritten, let it be unwritten.

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https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D24UJlLWsAACe8M.jpg

I get what Mitsuki is saying, improve the cards, but to improve the cards something has to give and that'd have to be DPS, so a weaker malefic, this is for the sake of balance. rDPS is what groups care about and improvements to cards would raise AST's and potentially too far ahead of SCH's and WHM's.

But actually, I don't think nerfing it is needed, because SCH and WHM need to be a in better place too, because both need more to do in their downtime and stuff that also feels impactful and meaningful. By solving that problem, you might not need to nerf anything.

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Originally Posted by Saefinn

I get what Mitsuki is saying, improve the cards, but to improve the cards something has to give and that'd have to be DPS, so a weaker malefic, this is for the sake of balance. rDPS is what groups care about and improvements to cards would raise AST's and potentially too far ahead of SCH's and WHM's.

But actually, I don't think nerfing it is needed, because SCH and WHM need to be a in better place too, because both need more to do in their downtime and stuff that also feels impactful and meaningful. By solving that problem, you might not need to nerf anything.

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I'm not asking for the cards to be buffed even more. I'm asking for the cards to be fun again with different effects on each card aka bring back its lore. I don't want another Bard situation to happen to AST having our cards become even worse with a 3% arrow effect or 3% more crit. The reason why I think nerfing malefic is a good start is because I want our cards to be fun and feel like it's making a difference, without having to nerf them into the ground with the way they did the bards songs.

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Originally Posted by MitsukiKimura

I'm not asking for the cards to be buffed even more. I'm asking for the cards to be fun again with different effects on each card aka bring back its lore. I don't want another Bard situation to happen to AST having our cards become even worse with a 3% arrow effect or 3% more crit. The reason why I think nerfing malefic is a good start is because I want our cards to be fun and feel like it's making a difference, without having to nerf them into the ground with the way they did the bards songs.

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Oh I know, which is why I said "improvements" rather than "buffs". I agree that by making them more meaningful again would mean something else has to give and malefic is a perfectly acceptable thing to nerf.

I guess the downside would be for solo stuff, I don't know how much a nerf would impact doing solo DPS on stuff as AST, like for story.

But there also remains the option to give WHM and SCH more too, as they are in a position where they need it. So AST would still have the weakest DPS with a more meaningful card system and at the same time, not step on WHM's or SCH's toes in terms of DPS.

Wow, I am shocked this thread is still going (and at 30+ pages no less).
I guess I'll update while I'm at it: after the original post, I actually stopped playing for a few months. Had no drive to. It was unintentional and unusual (I usually get bored around a year or a year and a half into an expansion and then wait for the next one). Upon returning, I tried AST again but I really just couldn't do it. I've since learnt that my biggest issue with AST is actually a gamepad issue with how the execution of the cards work, so at least I know it's "not just me." The card system is actually not gamepad friendly and it really needs to get fixed ASAP because that's a gameplay fault and nothing to do with the effects of the cards. It genuinely makes it nearly unplayable for gamepad players. (Nearly is the keyword. It's not impossible.)

I still have an issue with the cards effects. That in itself makes it super unfun. It basically loses the intent of the AST class. (It's meant to be an adaptive healer, and if you're just fishing for Bole I'm convinced you're not playing AST well or even right and should go back to WHM or SCH or whatever other class you played before [sorry, these are fighting words, but it's true] because that was what essentially ruined the class for everyone who does play the class right/well.).
WHM was originally my main and I will never go back to it. I don't care how good it gets, I hate it.
SCH has effectively lost its identity just like AST has, so I'm not inclined to play that either (my alt is a level 54 SCH. I never got far on it, but I did like what I knew of it).

I'm totally having healing withdrawals, especially when there's a reall rough run (because those get my BLOOD GOING! WOO!) but... I just can't play the classes. I physically can't play AST. I might level SCH on my main despite it being less than AST in terms of what it does. But probably not at the same time. So, yeah, I've effectively quit healing. DPS life for me now, I guess. It's boring. (Side note: I do tank, but only solo and for friends. It's always been that way, so crappy healers did not encourage me to go on the tank route. Because I'm a royal pansy)

Never post anything on the forums but I'd figure I'd throw my two cents in. Main healer since I started playing the game back in 2.2. Over the years in multiple raid tiers, I've progged on all 3 healers depending on what was needed per fight (or what my new cohealer mained each tier). In SB, I spent most of the time on sch due to its design between the micro managing aetherflow, pet abilities, and fey gauge as well as a decent amount of dps abilities to try and maximize. Edens gate is the first tier I did not prog and still have yet to even try to heal mainly because of how clunky, disjointed, and unsatisfying the job feels now. I still feel the need to go and try to play healer as I've enjoyed healing in this game for many years now but the current design leaves alot to be desired.

My biggest issue is that AST had the most potential to be something great with the cards and time mage aspect. They could have simply expanded off the old card system implementing different kind of healing effects to maybe an enhanced royal road, horoscope should change maybe a cards buff to what would benefit the job most since horoscope is essentially future telling or anything. There is just so much they could have done but instead we got a bunch of balances lol even the parser voice still calls every card balance...

That coupled with AST ability to not heal in the beginning just started the drastic downfall of that job to now a terrible job to play although I play it still is mainly cause it’s my favorite and only healer I preferred since I started healing in HW

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Originally Posted by Aomine1992

My biggest issue is that AST had the most potential to be something great with the cards and time mage aspect. They could have simply expanded off the old card system implementing different kind of healing effects to maybe an enhanced royal road, horoscope should change maybe a cards buff to what would benefit the job most since horoscope is essentially future telling or anything. There is just so much they could have done but instead we got a bunch of balances lol even the parser voice still calls every card balance...

That coupled with AST ability to not heal in the beginning just started the drastic downfall of that job to now a terrible job to play although I play it still is mainly cause it’s my favorite and only healer I preferred since I started healing in HW

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It's sad honestly because the lore of the Astrologian is all about reading the future. Well there's no need to anymore if you already know what kind of card you're going to draw. Honestly if they can turn Minor Arcana into a quick step progress, then why not do the same for Royal road? There's so much potential that can be done with the cards but out of every possible detail, they completely made the worst choice of all. Now I won't even do daily content such as roulettes or anything as a healer, if I have to sit and wait 25 minutes as a DPS to get a que then I'm perfectly fine with it. At least there's enjoyment out of playing dps classes than to drag my feet going as a healer to do it.

Ho ho ho. It's oh so quiet, it's oh so still, and soon current iteration of our jobs has persisted for over half a year with but nary a word. Thought I'd shamelessly copycat Mitsuki and make my own collage of missed skills, traits and pet actions. Suppose as a christmas wishlist.

Still barely find myself filling healthbars these days if not on BLU. Here's to 2020 being more kind to our jobs.

No, because i still like watching the health bars go up... even if we're barely doing that anymore.

DPS is just not for me in this game, well at least none of the ones that exist are really doing anything for me, and forget about tanking.

I've been playing SCH since HW and I main a healer role in every game that I play. This expansion hasn't made me quit playing SCH, it's just made me really sad about it. I'm always going to heal, but I've never had so many reasons to be upset about my job before now. I miss controlling my fairy. I miss my dots. I miss feeling like I'm doing something besides spamming 1 button throughout a 10-minute savage fight. At this rate my keyboard's going to need a new 3 key because of the 300 casts of broil I do every pull.

I'm not going to quit healing, but I really wish SE would fix things so I didn't have to be sad. I almost feel like my healer died in SHB and I'm working with a lifeless android. Where'd my SCH go? :(

It's pretty disappointing watching a friend try healing for the first time and having to downplay how bad the dps is. Or how much the new astrologian card system flies in the face of lore. Or just bad game design in general. "So wait if I get a party with two ranged or two melee dps I'm kind of just screwed and it doesn't matter how I give cards to?"

Please revert these changes, preferably before the next expansion. I really miss how much more fun it used to be.

Tank changes in this Xpac have not been friendly to healers. The dumbing down of the role and adding a gunblade tank at the same time is just a recipe for disaster. I can barely make it through roulettes because my tanks are consistently brain dead.

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Originally Posted by RinaB

Tank changes in this Xpac have not been friendly to healers. The dumbing down of the role and adding a gunblade tank at the same time is just a recipe for disaster. I can barely make it through roulettes because my tanks are consistently brain dead.

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The proverbial !@#$ is going to hit the fan if they try to add a fourth hero one day. The jobs need more of a healing identity than just "shield or healing over time". Someone once suggested giving astrologian the ability to stagger damage as a way to tie into the lore of changing fate which I thought was pretty interesting. They've never been able to properly balance nocturnal and diurnal sect.

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Originally Posted by Vitreus

The proverbial !@#$ is going to hit the fan if they try to add a fourth hero one day. The jobs need more of a healing identity than just "shield or healing over time". Someone once suggested giving astrologian the ability to stagger damage as a way to tie into the lore of changing fate which I thought was pretty interesting. They've never been able to properly balance nocturnal and diurnal sect.

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I don't think there's so much an identity issue with the healers, however, there is definitely more options out there for ways of healing, which might be useful for when/if we get a 4th healer.

Arguably the healing aspect is fairly unique between the 3 healing jobs and still plays to the identity of their respective jobs. And this is where the 'but' comes in. Their identities are redundant and as a result they feel very samey. So in effect we get an oxymoron, unique, yet the same.

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Originally Posted by Saefinn

I don't think there's so much an identity issue with the healers, however, there is definitely more options out there for ways of healing, which might be useful for when/if we get a 4th healer.

Arguably the healing aspect is fairly unique between the 3 healing jobs and still plays to the identity of their respective jobs. And this is where the 'but' comes in. Their identities are redundant and as a result they feel very samey. So in effect we get an oxymoron, unique, yet the same.

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it isn't much unique if all 3 do the same skill with different animation,as far as SE done in terms of identity ,you might as well throw the lore out straight to the garbage with healers ,they are now same skills with the only different's are if its gcd/ogcd and animation.(its clear SE stop caring about their identity when their kit doesn't even show almost a shred of lore or connection to it at all)
seeing how SE actually talked about a fucking ass and how they will fix it instead of real issues being brought up ,let ignore the cards & skills that we lost or the identity lost this 5.0 changes brought to healers but focus on actual gameplay problems as pet ghosting or controller based players and AST card system ,this is damn infuriating especially since they actually bother to talk about issues for every other job and answer them.(i could have tolerated any other job issue being spoken instead of this 2b ass bullshit explanation )

i mean they even pulled 2 different solutions for smn/sch and gave summoner the option to have bahamut immediate casting when summoned while scholar seraph got a 2 second delay upon summon,i am feeling close to dropping being a healer in 14 cause SE keep showing they don't give shit about them.

I temporarily put healing AND tanking aside due to the bad decisions made of the role re-works, but I'm now naturally coming around to playing both roles again due to them not being reverted back anytime soon, if at all :\

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Originally Posted by CrimsonGunner

it isn't much unique if all 3 do the same skill with different animation,as far as SE done in terms of identity ,you might as well throw the lore out straight to the garbage with healers ,they are now same skills with the only different's are if its gcd/ogcd and animation.(its clear SE stop caring about their identity when their kit doesn't even show almost a shred of lore or connection to it at all)
seeing how SE actually talked about a fucking ass and how they will fix it instead of real issues being brought up ,let ignore the cards & skills that we lost or the identity lost this 5.0 changes brought to healers but focus on actual gameplay problems as pet ghosting or controller based players and AST card system ,this is damn infuriating especially since they actually bother to talk about issues for every other job and answer them.(i could have tolerated any other job issue being spoken instead of this 2b ass bullshit explanation )

i mean they even pulled 2 different solutions for smn/sch and gave summoner the option to have bahamut immediate casting when summoned while scholar seraph got a 2 second delay upon summon,i am feeling close to dropping being a healer in 14 cause SE keep showing they don't give shit about them.

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Oh there's definitely problems, in this respect you're preaching to the choir.

The point I was trying to get across is that if encounter design was designed to push us to actually optimise our healing ability better or to think more about what we're using, then we'd have separate experiences between WHM, SCH and AST. However, I see this as being a difficult and unrealistic goal for SE to achieve, which is why I'm actually in favour of removing the bloat. BUT in the very rare moment where it feels like I've been pushed to use my toolkit efficiently, I've liked it and it has felt less homogenised, but we're talking bad groups that facilitate that environment for me. In these moments I've thought "maybe I can see what they were trying to do". When I was levelling SCH from 70 to 80, I had a couple of dungeons where I was like "I might actually start enjoying this" and then had that soon taken away and go back to being boring again.


I'll try to justify what I mean better and bear in mind I am only specifically speaking about healing, not DPS or AST's cards.

If put adequately under pressure I'd expect to see people being more conservative with their oGCD's because they have a cool down, so they have to be more efficient with what else they've got. An efficient Scholar, as an example, might have to better manage and rotate their faerie/seraph skills and any damage mitigation. I might end up thinking about when I use Excog, I might think about when I might want to use Emergency Tactics or Deployment Tactics and then I might be more conscious about when I deploy Seraph. I might think about when I force a critlo. These are all things that WHM and AST don't have equivalents of. It'd be less thinking about where there is cross over, but more about how I am using it. Cross over isn't a bad thing, 2.0 SCH and WHM had some. FFXI SCH, RDM and WHM all had a lot. But it is how their other skills are used is where the uniqueness comes from, which I'd argue is missing.



And arguably this is where the problem lies. Those skills are practically redundant. Using them seems to be more to increase our down time where we can DPS, than feel a pressure or need to use them effectively.

Don't get me wrong, I also see the problems with the toolkit, but I don't think it's a wholly bad toolkit. I just think it's a hugely unsuitable toolkit that needs some work.

If they wanted to stick with the same healing toolkit moving forward, then they'd have to make it more useful, basically. If they wanted to persist with current game design and balance then the current healing toolkit is bloated and needs trimming - IE: see my rants about how BLU is more fun to heal because it doesn't have many healing spells.


On a side note. I keep seeing the controller player and AST one propping up. I'm a controller player and I don't get this problem. I wonder how many people know about Extended crossbars? Pretty much by holding down 1 non-awkwardly placed button you double what's easily/quickly available to you without page switching. As one who wants more DPS abilities on his SCH, I'm starting to feel SE should put this feature on default and give good instructions on how to use it so people don't complain about having too many abilities and give me back mine. :P

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Originally Posted by Saefinn

On a side note. I keep seeing the controller player and AST one propping up. I'm a controller player and I don't get this problem. I wonder how many people know about Extended crossbars? Pretty much by holding down 1 non-awkwardly placed button you double what's easily/quickly available to you without page switching. As one who wants more DPS abilities on his SCH, I'm starting to feel SE should put this feature on default and give good instructions on how to use it so people don't complain about having too many abilities and give me back mine. :P

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This seems to be a pretty common problem in general. I play on controller as well with AST and I have a bunch of free buttons I've used for food, mounts, emotes and a focus target number lol. some classes like machinist and warrior have so few buttons I wouldn't even know what to do with all the empty space. I'm pretty new to healing so I can't really say much on class changes but I do see a lot of people going on about nothing but dps. seems to me they wanted to put the focus back on actual healing instead of standing there dpsing for days.

I played wow for about 8 years and healed the last 2 of them and blizzard pretty much went the same direction albeit a bit too far in certain xpacs like mists of pandaria. for those who don't know what I'm talking about they essentially made tanks and party members get hit like trucks and healers had to heal their asses off with zero time to dps. however this game seems to be kind of stuck trying to figure out what it wants. tanks are easy mode joke now where the only real challenge is staggering mitigators and managing their cooldowns and healing is noticeably more difficult from 71-80 but it's more because certain spells feel weak and not because of content difficulty.

Maybe I'm totally wrong and need to main AST longer and continue to get more experience but that's just my current observation.

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Originally Posted by RinaB

This seems to be a pretty common problem in general. I play on controller as well with AST and I have a bunch of free buttons I've used for food, mounts, emotes and a focus target number lol. some classes like machinist and warrior have so few buttons I wouldn't even know what to do with all the empty space. I'm pretty new to healing so I can't really say much on class changes but I do see a lot of people going on about nothing but dps. seems to me they wanted to put the focus back on actual healing instead of standing there dpsing for days.

I played wow for about 8 years and healed the last 2 of them and blizzard pretty much went the same direction albeit a bit too far in certain xpacs like mists of pandaria. for those who don't know what I'm talking about they essentially made tanks and party members get hit like trucks and healers had to heal their asses off with zero time to dps. however this game seems to be kind of stuck trying to figure out what it wants. tanks are easy mode joke now where the only real challenge is staggering mitigators and managing their cooldowns and healing is noticeably more difficult from 71-80 but it's more because certain spells feel weak and not because of content difficulty.

Maybe I'm totally wrong and need to main AST longer and continue to get more experience but that's just my current observation.

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It's not so much the desire for DPS but the desire for more to do in our downtime. Whilst on paper it looks like the changes have more of a healing focus, the problem is that we are now in a position where we are healing too well, which results in less healing and more DPS. For Stormblood we had more DPS options on SCH/WHM and a card system people found more interesting on AST to break up that downtime. Fortunately playing AST you'll feel this probably less because you have more to do in your downtime versus SCH or WHM. This is also why if I am going to heal something for somebody that I'll pick AST, despite SCH being my baby. For us to have more of a healing focus with our current skills then the content would need to be adjusted to better utilise them.

It seems like an odd paradox, but my Blue Mage only has 4 healing spells and a buttload of DPS abilities and I have much more of a healing focus playing it than I do my Scholar, which has very few DPS abilities but a buttload of healing ones. Whilst I still get downtime on BLU, thanks to the DPS abilities the downtime remains interesting. On my SCH my downtime is spam Art of War or spam Broil with the odd Energy Drain or Biolysis, which is very uninspired because it feels like: 12111111111111311111111112111

With 70-80, some of the dungeons arguably were misleading to me because I felt like that I might end up enjoying healing in ShB just not any other content. The problem I found was once I was geared and everybody in my party is geared, healing was a lot easier again.

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Originally Posted by Saefinn

On a side note. I keep seeing the controller player and AST one propping up. I'm a controller player and I don't get this problem. I wonder how many people know about Extended crossbars? Pretty much by holding down 1 non-awkwardly placed button you double what's easily/quickly available to you without page switching. As one who wants more DPS abilities on his SCH, I'm starting to feel SE should put this feature on default and give good instructions on how to use it so people don't complain about having too many abilities and give me back mine. :P

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The contoler concerns aren't really about the number skills ast has but about targeting party members, perhaps you ment to include something about macros? That is a solution that has been mentioned in these forums since shadow bringers launched but macros have stigmas attached to them so its not a popular solution.

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Originally Posted by Aurturia

The contoler concerns aren't really about the number skills ast has but about targeting party members, perhaps you ment to include something about macros? That is a solution that has been mentioned in these forums since shadow bringers launched but macros have stigmas attached to them so its not a popular solution.

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Targeting party members is easy on a controller, just press up or down on your DPAD, I can do this plenty quick enough to target who I need. Granted, I know AST has to do it a lot more, but there's generally a structure to how your party is ordered. Tank -> Healers -> Melee -> Ranged. So if i get something like a Bole, I'll know to go 'up' from the tank I've got targeted to end up on the 'ranged' part of my list, as an example. It ends up being a quicker way of doing it/reacting in a fight where I might need to be quicker.

And enemy targeting isn't so awful and there are ways you can mitigate that, like I do when tanking, you AoE and then you can get the full list of mobs and cycle down the list with LB(L1) + Up or Down.

And I don't use any macros on my AST. Extended Crossbars is a feature available to controllers but it is turned off by default, but it's a really useful feature. Like anything involving the controller in this game there's a learning curve. And whilst there is a learning curve to playing controllers, they are actually very ergonomic and well designed, it's just a little confusing to begin with, but I think I'd struggle to go back to mouse + keyboard. So it's going to frustrate me if "controller limitations" ever becomes an issue should those limitations be because people don't know how can expand the usability of their controller (and in fairness, it's not exactly sign posted)

But what Extended Cross bars does is it allows me to access an additional page of my crossbars without me clunkily changing the cross bar page, it's just by holding down one extra button.
For example
If I RT(R2) + LT(L2) then I get the Right half of my Page 2 crossbar
If I LT(L2) + RT(R2) then I get the Left half of my Page 2 crossbar

There is also the additional option of double tap RT and double tap LT to get access to even more abilities. Personally this option doesn't flow for me and the Extended Crossbars is plenty for me. But they may be useful to somebody else.

It means I can set up my crossbars around those controls. I can have all of my healing ability on page 1, I have my DPS abilities on page 2 and any extra lesser used abilities there too. Because I can just hold down an extra button if I'm going into DPS mode and release it when I need to heal. But in effect it doubles my reach. And this works wonderfully when playing something like AST, SMN or NIN where I might be jumping around my crossbars.

Ast controller issues stem from optimisation.

In a 8 man party the max you have to press up and down on the dpad to target someone is 4, no matter how you adjust your party list this number remains.

Now in opener you have max 5 gcds to get out 3 seal Divination. 1 combust, 4 malefics.

Cards are rng 50/50 between range and melee.

Between every gcd in opener you have to press dpad up to 4 times to select party member, play/MA, retarget boss, draw (if sleeve draw has worn off), before you can malefic.

And this is if your lucky to not get a reseal and have to redraw.

So it is a lot of quick button presses in a short span of time with added rng factor with no way to mitigate it, that is creating the issue.

Casually playing this issue is nowhere near as apparent but the moment you try to really optimise Ast on controller it gets very awkward very fast and no amount of cross hotbars fix it, in fact mine are full of macros for targeting party members despite their delay it is certainly easier to deal with especially with mechanics or dumb dumbs on top.

The other solution to the opener people have come up with is ignore the seals and just get Divination out, which speaks volumes to the level of class design don't it.

Oops forgot to add ofc you use lightspeed to give yourself as much breathing room as possible between your gcds

I say fair enough if it's a problem progressively worse as you try to optimise, as the toughest content I've done on my AST is Eden Normal as I've mostly given up healing, I'm not going to argue against any points about optimising it outside of casual content and accept those who have taken AST there will know better.

Though I am curious what the solution would be? I feel like this would have been an issue present in the old system, because you still made a choice on who to give what buff.

And yeah, I agree about the Divination thing, I try to do it properly, but sometimes it just feels more sensible to just get a weaker Divination when you can't fish for the right cards (so much for ending card fishing)

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Originally Posted by Saefinn

I say fair enough if it's a problem progressively worse as you try to optimise, as the toughest content I've done on my AST is Eden Normal as I've mostly given up healing, I'm not going to argue against any points about optimising it outside of casual content and accept those who have taken AST there will know better.

Though I am curious what the solution would be? I feel like this would have been an issue present in the old system, because you still made a choice on who to give what buff.

And yeah, I agree about the Divination thing, I try to do it properly, but sometimes it just feels more sensible to just get a weaker Divination when you can't fish for the right cards (so much for ending card fishing)

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Well looking back at the old cards aoe spread was great but i think the real difference was just that you didn't draw so often. Sleeve draw buts a lot of stress on dealing out cards while juggling other tasks. But SE seems to be a bit stubborn about these sorts of things so I think they'll try several ways to fix this system before they fall back to the old one. But one of those fixes what ever it is might be good enough, who knows?

Having mained SCH/WHM throughout Stormblood and WHM through SHB; healing in normal content is extremely boring.

Unless, I'm undergeared,making serious mistakes or party members making mistakes,I rarely use GCD heals. Most of my time is spent spamming Glare/Holy.

Fights are not designed around healing.

Switching over to Dancer feels like I'm playing a totally different game with regards to combat content. Even being a crafter main is more exciting/engaging than healing.

Only q as healer now when I want fast qs/tomestones.

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Originally Posted by Aurturia

Well looking back at the old cards aoe spread was great but i think the real difference was just that you didn't draw so often. Sleeve draw buts a lot of stress on dealing out cards while juggling other tasks. But SE seems to be a bit stubborn about these sorts of things so I think they'll try several ways to fix this system before they fall back to the old one. But one of those fixes what ever it is might be good enough, who knows?

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Ahah, I gotcha. That makes sense. Annoyingly SE did say they're not going to change the card system, but who knows, maybe they'll change their mind, after all they said MCH was fine and they got their job redesigned after they accepted this was definitely not the case.

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Originally Posted by Aurturia

Well looking back at the old cards aoe spread was great but i think the real difference was just that you didn't draw so often. Sleeve draw buts a lot of stress on dealing out cards while juggling other tasks. But SE seems to be a bit stubborn about these sorts of things so I think they'll try several ways to fix this system before they fall back to the old one. But one of those fixes what ever it is might be good enough, who knows?

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I'm actually noticing a lot of overlooked issues in ShB...like a lot. it feels like this xpac was very rushed out and although the timing of it for players couldn't have come sooner it just feels like a Swiss cheese xpac. where's the patch to fix helmets on the new races? why do 3/4 tanks have 2 charge gap closers out or in combat and Warrior is stuck with vanilla wow charge? why do we get no seals out of combat with AST? why are there no hard mode dungeons anymore? why do we still have to talk to 100 different vendors on 100 different tabs to buy and augment gear? why doesn't Eulmore have an inn? I could go on for a long time and I'm sorry I'm getting way off topic here but I'm afraid of this game going the route of wow...xpacs coming faster at the expense of quality control and content.

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Originally Posted by RinaB

I'm actually noticing a lot of overlooked issues in ShB...like a lot. it feels like this xpac was very rushed out and although the timing of it for players couldn't have come sooner it just feels like a Swiss cheese xpac. where's the patch to fix helmets on the new races? why do 3/4 tanks have 2 charge gap closers out or in combat and Warrior is stuck with vanilla wow charge? why do we get no seals out of combat with AST? why are there no hard mode dungeons anymore? why do we still have to talk to 100 different vendors on 100 different tabs to buy and augment gear? why doesn't Eulmore have an inn? I could go on for a long time and I'm sorry I'm getting way off topic here but I'm afraid of this game going the route of wow...xpacs coming faster at the expense of quality control and content.

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It's because they have dedicated more ressources in crafting, gathering and PVP, every patch, and have reduced those from PVE jobs.
That's why they have chosen the easy way "homogenization" concerning tanks and healers role instead of putting more effort and time into it.
I think it's fine to have every area developped for targeting more people, I can't deny that (and I love fishing).
However, I prefer Quality to Quantity, personally, and PVE jobs are the main activity here !
It shouldn't be handled as the equivalent of Crafter, Gather, PVP, Blue Mage or everything else.

would just like to add to this thread, a couple of friends on mine, one a life time sch the other a fresh healer both dropped their books. the former did it a few months ago but has quit ff14 until 5.2 and said she decided not to play sch when she returns, the other has done all healers to 70 and basically given up finding whm too boring and not suited to his playstyle, ast stressful with no payoff and sch dull and "not feeling like a pet class"

hell the only reason i havent quit healing altogether (2.0 whm, 3.0-5.0 ast) is because queue times and gil from being healer in need constantly. Were it not for those, that would have been another healer leaving.

Tbh if they gave the bard 5.1 treatment to the healers, that would be something after all, a lot of AST's until the pvp changes retired from main game stuff but still played pvp because it felt closer to the astrologian we loved.

This thread and at least one other (maybe a couple) are nearly 40 pages long and months worth of player feedback. The majority don't like the changes and have offered bandaids, the minority like the changes... Meanwhile, they did a quick fix to 2B's tights based on player feedback despite that having a lot less feedback and only for a couple weeks.

I get picking battles wisely, and 2B's tights was definitely not a battle they should want to pick... but if the majority of your member base (because, from what I understood in JP threads a while back, they were unhappy as well) is unhappy with the changes to their classes that they didn't even ask for, then that's a pretty big issue. Worst of all, they won't even acknowledge us half the time. It's frustrating (both us and them I'm sure).

Please consider fixing our classes, SE, and let them play as they're meant to be played. Thank you

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Originally Posted by MOZZYSTAR

This thread and at least one other (maybe a couple) are nearly 40 pages long and months worth of player feedback. The majority don't like the changes and have offered bandaids, the minority like the changes... Meanwhile, they did a quick fix to 2B's tights based on player feedback despite that having a lot less feedback and only for a couple weeks.

I get picking battles wisely, and 2B's tights was definitely not a battle they should want to pick... but if the majority of your member base (because, from what I understood in JP threads a while back, they were unhappy as well) is unhappy with the changes to their classes that they didn't even ask for, then that's a pretty big issue. Worst of all, they won't even acknowledge us half the time. It's frustrating (both us and them I'm sure).

Please consider fixing our classes, SE, and let them play as they're meant to be played. Thank you

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I guess what bothers me the most is that Celestial Opposition lost its stun -- which I would have been less angry about, if another healer job (WHM) had lost theirs, because I'd just assume that Squeenix didn't want healers to have a stun. But JEBUS the fact that the other job's stun was already better than AST's and wasn't touched, really just pisses me off.

And don't get me wrong: there are still buttloads of issues with AST, e.g. the card system, but taking away our stun was a real slap in the face.