The curious case of Healer Hall of Novice

[Fynlar]

My biggest gripe with it is the lack of a party list. It is supposed to teach you about instance healing and you have a party list when in any 4 or 8 man content. There is no reason SE couldn't do this with the novice hall.

There are times though where you need to heal things that are not in your party list, so I think it's still important to force people to do that.

Using a ps4 controller as a healer with no party list is a huge pain.

Yeah, uhh... it really shouldn't be. If it is, that may be something you want to address with your configuration.

[Chiramu]

I just completed this, I had zero troubles with healing the NPCs and switching the Cleric Stance for DPS.

All you do is just watch the HP bars above peoples' heads. I keep an eye on both PT list and HP bars on the tank while I'm DPSing, just practice more OP, you do not need to use Medica on the NPCs as neither of them take massive amounts of damage(that would be serious overhealing if you used Medica for this).

[Noxifer]

Yeah, my point in this wasn't whether you should or shouldn't use AoE heals, but that they don't give you access to all the tools in your toolbox. It limits overall versatility.

Also, the Healer training doesn't teach how to cure debuffs. I know that is unfortunately intentional, since SCH doesn't get Leeches until late, but it's still rather annoying.

Tank and DPS training gives full access to all of their abilities, but healer is gimped... and healers are so very important that they should have additional higher-level training somewhere.

Well, Conjurer also doesn't get Esuna until level 18, and these exercises are level 15. So that kind of makes sense over-all.

Still, it would be nice if they'd add more lessons for later levels, like level 20, 25 and 30, expanding on some of the new skills/spells, and at the last one giving suggestions for how to open up their job (and which secondary class they'd need to level to 15).

I hope they'll find some way to make it possible to add those NPCs temporarily to your party list, whether it's by treating them as "pets" (similar to fairies/carbies) or "companions" (like your chocobo). Though both have the issue of only allowing one of each type belonging to you, and if you're in addition to that doing it as Arcanist (or synched SMN/SCH), you'd already have a pet. I hope.
One would think, theoretically, that it should be possible to "copy" either of those systems, tweak it a little to allow more than one in your party, and name it NPC or similar. It's also possible they're already working on something similar to this, in preparation for the sometimes-mentioned "GC mercenary" system they might or might not add to the game, where you can bring NPCs into dungeons.

I just completed this, I had zero troubles with healing the NPCs and switching the Cleric Stance for DPS.

I didn't really have any trouble as such, though it got a tad hairy once or twice during the 'oh noes! an add appeared!' lesson. That's not really the point, though. The point is that Medica is part of the Conjurer toolset (as is Succor for SCH, though it wouldn't be available during sync anyway), and by not having the NPCs in the party you can't affect them with Medica.

I know during the tank lessons, one is "use your aggro combo, don't use any other skills D:", so clearly they can determine what skill you're using. So (again theoretically, and based on the 'if they added the NPCs to your party list' scenario) it should be possible to have the trainer comment if you use Medica, warning that it's not always the most effective spell, and that it can draw the enemies attention at a much faster rate (since you're also healing party members who aren't damaged, i.e. overhealing).

[Gokuhan]

While I agree with you, the Hall of Novice is there to help beginners with the basics, not train them to be masters in their field.

[Jaik]

The lack of the targets being in your party is pretty annoying for sure but if you use a mouseover heal macro you avoid that - I have found that it is a lot easier than using F1-4 to switch targets and then heal - move mouse and press one button - faster and you can keep your focus on the boss or whatever else

[Roxas_Andrade]

Both DPS are hit with a powerful attack. You and the tank are fine. An unavoidable AoE hits in two seconds. What do you cast?

Tip #3 - Know the order of importance
1st - YOU - Because f**k em!
2nd - Potential love interest to you
3rd - Who really cares?

[Gameplayzero]

Yeah, uhh... it really shouldn't be. If it is, that may be something you want to address with your configuration.

now it just sounds like you are being a contrarian since you aren't explaining the easiest way to handle this (or if you are even a controller user for that matter). ON ps4 at least you have the mouse over feature as shady as it can be, but on ps3? Trying to target specific 24 man raids with just a dpad is horrible.

again if there is an easy solution to configure this then please do say so, but don't do the typical internet thing of "oh its easy/I never have this problem and you are bad because of it" cliche. Plenty of people in this thread have already mentioned this. As a ps4 player i'm inclined to agree.

I just completed this, I had zero troubles with healing the NPCs and switching the Cleric Stance for DPS.

All you do is just watch the HP bars above peoples' heads. I keep an eye on both PT list and HP bars on the tank while I'm DPSing, just practice more OP, you do not need to use Medica on the NPCs as neither of them take massive amounts of damage(that would be serious overhealing if you used Medica for this).

thats not the issue. The issue is that this doesn't simulate how people operate in a real dungeon. People typically aren't going to manually click on their targets (with controllers at least) and not using all of your toolkit to figure out what works best imo isn't good teaching. (if i'm wrong please correct me since I haven't done hall of novice) but if they are trying to teach you not to spam AoE heals why not just say "spamming your aoe heal is not advisable in certain situations and drains your mp"? People can say that is their intent naturally, but those people don't work at square AND other tutorials outright just tell you stuff like that. OP knows how to heal haha.