3.2 PLD: Clemency and Divine Veil

[winsock]

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Unfortunately, Imma need to answer your questions with a question. The same one of posed in those previous topics. You probably still wont agree with me, but hopefully I can shine some light on why I take the stance that I do.

"At what point would PLD step too far into the healer role? Where is that line?"

There is only a finite amount of healing to do and we play a game in which healers dps solely because the alternative is being idle. There simply isnt enough to heal to keep healers busy.

So how many healer actions should PLD be able to take from healers before it crosses the line?
A small handful of medicas / media IIs?
A few cures?
For the ppl on the "Clemency should be insta-cast" train:
The majority of the clutch heals?

To address your side topic about brez:
Brez is its own can of worms and my personal opinion about PLD not having brez is completely separate from the role issue described above. Keeping brez with the squishy classes means your group cannot recover if poorly handled mechanics result in party wide damage high enough to one-shot squishy classes. In other words, it helps ensure squishy classes have an opportunity to survive group-based mechanics based on group performance, rather than their classes armor/vit cap.

[keyburz]

I dont see a problem with giving paladin battle rez. Most of the time, both tanks are busy in 8 man content. If you happen to have a paladin, and happen to need a raise, and the healers happen to be preoccupied, and the pld just happens to be offtank and not getting ready to switch, and also has 8 seconds to cast, AND also has enough mana to cast, cmon. Just give him raise. We have a dps that can raise (summoner) so why not have a tank that can do it as well. Its not like giving paladin the ability to raise in combat is suddenly going to change the entire game. It would be considered the most unreliable method of raising somebody, so whats the big deal anyways. The chance of that paladin even pulling off a raise is slim to none due to being the focus of damage.

Now, if we're talking giving paladin raise plus swiftcast, then that would be broken. Ever tried raising somebody without swiftcast? Ever tried raising someone without swiftcast while a mob is attacking you? Consider that, and then realize theres nothing wrong with letting paladin have raise without swiftcast.

[Reynhart]

Keeping brez with the squishy classes means your group cannot recover if poorly handled mechanics result in party wide damage high enough to one-shot squishy classes. In other words, it helps ensure squishy classes have an opportunity to survive group-based mechanics based on group performance, rather than their classes armor/vit cap.

I still don't understand why you want to force this. Why couldn't a group recover thanks to the action of one person ?

After all, healers are not the one who take the most damage, so it's not that far fetched to suppose than a healer can outsurvive most DPS and tanks, just by being at long range and not the very high on the enmity list. So, thanks to the LB3, one healer can make the group recover, even if everyone else screw their part.
And I'm pretty sure I already linked one video to you where a WHM does exactly that, saving the group from a wipe during an Ifrit battle.

And we're still talking about raising one person, with a full casting time, while you'd be the only one alive, so while being hit by every mobs in the fight...so, basically, with Hallowed Ground required.

As for where to draw the line on PLD's healing prowess ? I'll stick to single target one time heal...basically, what Cure and Clemency are, if we had a way to tie the former one to our main stat.

[winsock]

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There is nothing wrong with the situation you described. In your scenario, someone needs a res because they likely made an individual mistake such as not dodging an AoE in time, standing too close to the tank, etc. Unfortunately, this isn't the only scenario that can occur when you give PLD brez.

Here is a problem scenario:
You take off your Sabatons and slip into a pair of some hipster duckbills, tick that roulette box as a caster, and join your duty when the queue pops.

You enter "howdy!" into your chatbox on the loading screen, send it to your party, and hear a drum roll on a timpani before your party engages Ravana.

You're doing really well, pulling more than your own weight even. You get the the butterfly phase. If you're a DPS, you are on it during this phase. Top performer in your party. If you're a healer, everyone is alive and well, plus you're helping to kill the butterflies.

Unfortunately, the offtank and remaining dps arent as focused. Some butterflies become swords and Ravana's Ultimate kills some, but not all of the party. No matter which caster you picked, you're a part of this causality count because you're squishy. This is where PLD brez becomes a trickier issue.

It goes without say that if everyone in this game was invincible it would be boring, and that a "point of no return" needs to be set somewhere. Currently, its tied to the squishiest party members, so in the above example: The group mechanic was not cleared well enough to give squishier party members any opportunity for survival. You were doing everything you should have been doing, but died (along with all the other squishies in the party) solely because your class is more limited on armor / vit. This was the failure of the group, not you individually. As a result, the group wipes and tries again. This is fair right? The group failed pretty hard at a group mechanic and needs to try again.

In the same scenario with a brezzing PLD. The Ulimate wipes part of the party. The MT blows cds, PLD uses brez on a the WHM, WHM uses benediction and SoS, and the party is on the road to recovery. Your group didnt clear the mechanic in this scenario, it bypassed because a PLD was in the group. And as a caster class, you're just along for the ride. There was nothing more you could have done to avoid death or contribute to group success. The PLD really didnt do much either, it just had high ehp and hit a button.

Why couldn't a group recover thanks to the action of one person ?

The problem isn't "one person" recovering the group. The problems are the scenarios where the PLD is the "only person" who can be that one person because of its ehp.

[Malicewolf]

Who cares if a PLD merges a bit into the healer role? It's a PLD... a white magic using, armor clad knight. It is LITERALLY a class meant to be half healer, half fighter. If anything, I don't think PLD have ENOUGH of a cross into the healer role, or the magic role in general to be honest. 70% of our moves are still focused purely on the knight side and has nothing to do with our magic aspect of being a PLD.

And if you don't need to heal, so what?! A healer is allowed to attack. If anything, it annoys me when I see a healer jumping in the background during a dungeon and running around instead of DPS'ing because they think, "I'm a healer" with their MP is sitting in the 10k range as they say they need to save their MP. I'm not saying I expect a healer to perform amazing DPS, but everything helps. If your party has given you the opportunity to help in DPS because there isn't healing that needs to be done, take advantage of it. I was in Ifrit HM for a trial roulette yesterday. 1 regen on the MT was all that was needed for a majority of the fight. I spent 80% of the time in cleric stance. I hope a healer wouldn't be sitting there in the background waiting to top off everyone during a fight like that.

Turning DV into a mantra just seems... silly... I don't see any issue whatsoever with DV providing a shield to all party members within range. The fact that we can now proc it ourselves was a GREAT addition to this patch. I can't tell you how many healers just let my DV go to waste even with my macro announcing it. I often proc'd it before fights BECAUSE healers didn't pay attention and simply hope that the end of it will catch a party wide AoE before expiring. I even had SMN's and BLM's heal me because healers were too stubborn to or not paying attention before this update. Now, I can use it when necessary and time it myself.

As for Clemency... are you really complaining that you have assistance healing? Do you tell your co-healer go DPS or something on older content? Cause those definitely no longer require dual healers. If a PLD is wasting his time healing unnecessarily instead of doing dmg, then it is an overall lose anyways. The only time I use clemency in the first place is when the healers ARE dropping the ball. I HAVE prevented people from wiping myself when the healers get overwhelmed with too much party wide damage. I've done this with cover and hallowed ground as well. Should we get rid of these things for PLD as well? God forbid a PLD does something to save a wipe! That's obviously only a healer's job (sarcasm)!

And Clemency took a HUGE hit from the update in exchange for 1 second less casting. My clemency WITHOUT convalescence before the update was 6500. Now, I'm lucky to get 6000 WITH convalescence on. Our ability to solo took a huge hit honestly. Our attack power dropped, our heals got weaker, and the things they updated to "help" us are mostly things that only help in party content. Now, I honestly liked this update even though i took (along with all tanks) a pretty big decrease to our power.

[Reynhart]

This was the failure of the group, not you individually. As a result, the group wipes and tries again. This is fair right? The group failed pretty hard at a group mechanic and needs to try again.

You again take a very precise example than will happen once in a while to prove that this would be game-breaking.
In Ravana, would you had less swords, then even mages can survive with proper mitigation and regen. would you had more swords, then even the tanks would die.
If you were in Bismarck and fail to kill the two adds, everyone would be OS, even tanks.

Saying that a brezz would disrupt the balance because it can save a wipe during a full moon at midnight if it snows outside is hardly a frequent situation.

As for bypassing mechanics, it's exactly what PLD does. If you happen to have two PLD for your Ravana, you wouldn't care about prey, and everyone else could run around like chickens without any issue.

Oh, and by the way, where do you draw the line on healers before they step too much on the damage territory ?

Our ability to solo took a huge hit honestly.

Just to be sure. What could you solo earlier than you can't anymore ?

[Malicewolf]

You're using the ravana example again. But a PLD can already break this exact scenario you describe WITHOUT brez. Divine veil to give everyone an extra 1k+ buffer, usually healers also put up their regen's and buffs as well. PLD can now cover a healer, pop hallowed ground and perhaps a defensive buff as well if you want to be safe with the time frame as hallowed ground lasts only 10 seconds (so if you mess up the timing, it may end right as ravana attacks). I have done this before though and I have saved wipes doing so.

I've also been the ONLY one to survive that part of the fight. I can tell you, my hp was NOT in a position to be able to take ravana on afterwards. If I used hallowed ground for his attack, then I would be trying to cast an 8 second long cast to res my healer. All this time, praying ravana doesn't interrupt me or simply kill me before i complete it. If I have hallowed ground after his attack, my hp is by no means high. I am barely standing. hallowed ground lasts 10 seconds, brez would be 8 of it. The healer would have to accept and heal me immediately and I mean IMMEDIATELY. Otherwise, I'm likely only a hit or two away from death from ravana as my hallowed ground ends. If a PLD was able to micro manage a convalescence AND a clemency as well a brez during his hallowed ground time frame, then by damn, he deserves to have saved that wipe!

Just to be sure. What could you solo earlier than you can't anymore ?

Wanderer's Palace 2nd boss. But that's because I can no longer regain my hp in time after a toad if I F up the guessing game for his stupid color buff crap. I MIGHT of been able to get through if I wasn't so damn unlucky with guessing the colors (i literally hit the dmg buff last on both attempts). I could recover if I focused on just riot blade for MP, using sheltron, and clemency until he died, but with a clemency of 4500, it just simply wasn't enough anymore to sustain me. Might still be able to do it if I wasn't so god awful unlucky, but didn't feel like attempting after 3 wipes.

[Nyalia]

Your arguments make zero sense. Any tank skill that reduces damage taken reduces the amount of healing that needs to be done. Looking purely at the total amount of healing that needs to be done throughout a battle, the PLD skill that reduces it the most isn't Clemency. It's Shield Oath. Shield Oath on the MT is taking away 20% of the MT damage dealt during the fight, meaning there's 20% less total healing because of that one skill. That means it's intruding on the sacred realm of the healer and needs the damage reduction removed, right? Maybe we should remove all mitigation from tanks so the healer has more to do? Armor reduces the amount of healing needed too, and shields are terrible that way.

I guess PLDs should only wear cloth, only have swords, and only have access to DPS/aggro-generation skills? Well, the more DPS in a fight, the sooner it ends. The sooner it ends, the less total healing is needed throughout the fight. I guess we should remove DPS skills from tanks as well? It's not like they're a DPS class, after all. Let's remove all GLA/PLD skills except Savage Blade, Flash, and Provoke. That'll keep them pesky PLDs from interfering with a healer's job!

[winsock]

You again take a very precise example than will happen once in a while to prove that this would be game-breaking.
In Ravana, would you had less swords, then even mages can survive with proper mitigation and regen. would you had more swords, then even the tanks would die.
If you were in Bismarck and fail to kill the two adds, everyone would be OS, even tanks.

How bout other trials like the chrysalis? or dungeons with increasing damage damage buffs, etc?

Oh, and by the way, where do you draw the line on healers before they step too much on the damage territory ?

You mean "DPS" territory, right? i.e. the "DPS" role.
I fail to see where to toe stepping currently occurs? DPS is "Damage per second". How does a healer doing damage prevent a DPS from maintaining high DPS for a fight?

[Malicewolf]

How bout other trials like the chrysalis? or dungeons with increasing damage damage buffs, etc?

You mean "DPS" territory, right? i.e. the "DPS" role.
I fail to see where to toe stepping currently occurs? DPS is "Damage per second". How does a healer doing damage prevent a DPS from maintaining high DPS for a fight?

Chrysalis? Really? You mean that fight where the wipe mechanic CANNOT be avoided even with hallowed ground? Yea, brez will totally ruin that fight. And if you're talking about the healers having to sustain the MT from triple, a PLD can just hallowed ground through one of them. If you are doing the fight well, you only have to deal with it twice. A stoneskin and galvanize will sustain a MT through that well enough so long as the healers are paying attention. And if the dungeon has an increasing dmg buff, once again, how will a PLD with brez save the wipe?! There is a dmg buff! If the dmg buff caused the party to wipe in the first place, why do you think raising 1 player in 8 seconds is going to save a wipe?!

And for "DPS" territory argument... what does a PLD healing a bit do to prevent a healer from maintaining the parties health? I can't tell you how many times I've used clemency to find I targeted someone the healer did and healed them a second after the healer did. Yes, I often use it to be safe and sometimes I DO end up helping tremendously, but healers are always the better option for healing.

I just don't understand your need for a healer to be the only thing allowed to give heals. As a NIN i have second wind and have used it to see the healer heal me right after. That is also a wasted heal. Should we get rid of second wind? Why aren't you complaining about WAR's too? They have self heals! They're wasting your precious time that you could of been healing instead of doing something else! How dare they.