Suggestion as to how to get people to become healers.

[Kosmos992k]

The thought occurs that if the tanks armor was good enough to ignore auto attack damage like water of a ducks back, and was able to absorb/mitigate more special attack damage, then tanks would really be tanks and healers could spend less time focusing on maintaining the tank during normal action. On the flip side, if DPS were receiving incoming damage from auto attacks and skills, they would need more attention from the healer.

This would put much more pressure on tanks to maintain crowd control, and make healing much more variable - and require more attention.

But for this to happen, there would need to be a few more adds/trash mobs, tanks would have to have a bit more in the way of crowd control skill and tank armor would need to be buffed vs ordinary weapon-skills and auto-attacks. There would no doubt be complaints about tanks being so 'tanky'. To be fair to all, this would be something that happens in a party only - basically when the tank has someone to protect, their defensive abilities should be come sharper, just as a healer should become stronger at heals and DDs should be just that bit more lethal. In other words, during party content our respective roles should be stronger than they are in solo content.

So, let's see, plucking numbers from mid-air, during light /full party content a tank's DEF scores should be +20%, Healers heal potency should be +20% and DDs output should be +20%. This would really focus people's attention on their roles, healers would need to focus more on actually healing and removing debuffs, tanks would focus more on crowd control and their tank stance to protect DDs and healers, and DDs would be the undisputed kinds of offense with the obvious responsibility of killing things, but their increased damage while partied would mean tanks have to remain in tank stance much more to maintain proper control... Strengthen the main aspects of each role in the trinity, rather than blurring the lines. This will make it easier for players who want to heal to do just that and perhaps make the role both clearer and more attractive.

[Atlaworks]

Let's dissect! Again!

And I'll say it again, you clearly don't understand how little healing is actually required in the bulk of content in this game. I suspect most of the people who are objecting to healer DPS being removed are of that mindset because frankly, there's very little else to do even as an AST. It's not that half of our toolkit is DPS, it's that the majority of encounters entirely revolve around doing DPS.

And I'll say it again, if you want healers who don't bitch constantly about their DPS and care about damage more than healing, make healing more fun. We can all agree healing is boring, right? So the solution is to make it not boring, not make healers even less focused on doing their job. I understand how healing works, and my opinion is just as valid as yours. Don't try to short change me.

Some math for you. Looking over the last expert I logged, I cast 55 heals in a 17:30 run with 401 casts in total. So lets go with 1 in 7 casts being a heal, the rest being dps. Cleric stance was up for over 80% of the run. The run was entirely safe, no one died, no one was sweating. So what's going on here?

You're doing your job before you DPS. Thus, I have no problem with you in this theoretical scenario. In fact, in this theoretical scenario, I would praise how you handle your role. Good job! Now shut up about your DPS, I don't care.

I'm a career healer/support who's likely cast more heals than many people on this forum have had hot dinners (And I've got a 4 digit magelo profile to back that up). Why am I doing so much more dps than I am healing? Because there is literally nothing else to do with my GCDs beyond giving in and just watching rubbish on netflix/youtube whilst mashing 1 key with the tank on follow. I'd much rather be buffing, healing and doing actual support work like I could in FFXI with my BRD but that's just not an option and frankly with 4 man groups, I'm not sure it's even a possibility.

On a small tangent, I don't like hearing "I'm a career X" in MMOs because it sounds silly, but that's a topic for another day. You're not wrong, but you're also missing my point. My point has never been "Take away all healer DPS", and I made that point vehemently in my last post. I just think healers shouldn't focus on DPS more than healing. If you want to make healing roles better, you need to fix the healing, not just tack on more DPS. This topic is about Cleric Stance- the request is to just remove it entirely so healers can have a 100% healing and DPSing uptime with no risk or loss in damage. Which I disagree with because giving healers more DPS isn't going to make healing less boring. You want to attract people to healing roles? Good healers? Fix healing, don't just make them green DPS. We want the same thing, dude.

If you want to play the disagree=kick game, save it for SE themselves as this situation is entirely their fault, AST in it's current form is both a massive mistake and a missed opportunity. Unless we get a new healer class mid expansion or the class design team manage to do a full scale rejig of AST around buffing rather than personal DPS, things just aren't going to change unless Yoshida is willing to up the base difficulty of the game as a whole for healers whilst also dialling back the speed at which players progress with gear.

Hey, I agree, the healing meta is SE's fault, they don't like it, I don't like it, most people don't like it. That's why this topic is about spitballing changes to fix that. Do I expect anything to come out of this topic? Hell no, but it's nice to dream, right? Still, gotta hand it to you- I've had to cut up posts in this topic for a while and yours is currently the most sane example, so thanks.

But now, let's move on to another one to cut up.

How is Summoner a hybrid? It's a pure DPS job outside of a few selected support abilities every single other DPS job has as well.

You've got a revive and a heal. That's as close to a hybrid you're gonna get in FF14. You want to heal, but want more DPS? Go play summoner. You want to keep your healing but do more DPS? You're doing two roles at once now. You can't heal your cake and damage it too. You heal, or you DPS. Either one can be auxiliary, but both are not going to be your main role.

Other than that, being a healer in this game means healing and doing DPS. That's their job (and their job isn't defined by their role name but in fact their abilities and play style and what they're capable of, just like BRD and MCH aren't just DPS but support as well). If they're only doing one of them (when there's use for the other), they're not doing their job. In fact the less they're able to focus on healing (while still keeping everyone alive) and the more they can focus on DPS, the better they are playing. The more they're supporting their party. That's how this game is designed.

Your job is to heal. You're a healer. Healer DPS isn't factored into tuning endgame content because your job isn't DPS. DPS is there to alleviate soloing and help support dedicated roles if you want, but it's not mandatory- it's not part of your job. Your job is to heal. Now, if you're more concerned about your DPS than your he- wait hold on.

I'm not interested in being only a healer. I'm not interested in being only a DPS either. I want to be both and in this game I can (just like I could in FFXI as a healer as well, only to a lesser extent). You can say people like me shouldn't be playing these jobs as much as you want, but in fact I'm pretty good at them, enjoy playing them and the people I play with enjoy having me in their team, so that's all that I need.

So you do care more about DPS than healing. Maybe you should go play summoner, like I suggested! Then you can support your party with raises and lowball heals but still do big numbers! But you ain't breakin' the trinity. You don't get to be a healer AND a DPS. Hell, bards are gonna break that with a support role before you get your "I'm a DPS and a healer" wish. But from what I can glean, you just wanna do two jobs at once in a game with a really strictly enforced trinity group system, so you might just have a bad time. But hey, keep enjoying yourself. I don't give a damn what you like, and frankly hope you have fun and continue playing. Shine on, you angry diamond, be a strong independent healer who don't need no DPS.

Just don't do it near me, thanks.

Yes, I too wonder if you even have any experience of actually playing a healer in this game in the first place? Or are you just here to tell others how you imagine they should (not) be playing their main role?

Don't try to marginalize my opinion by saying I'm unqualified. That'll just make me tell you to piss off. My opinion is just as valid as yours is. I've done healing in this game, but I don't like it- because of the reasons listed in this topic, mostly. I don't like healers being shunned for not DPSing and how the meta is "Bad healers don't DPS", and while I can I find it jarring compared to healing in other games, where I had to focus more on healing to begin with. Plus, the two friends I play with in my linkshell both mainline healing classes, so it'd be a little redundant.

But hey, let's end on a high note for this one, why don't we?

Because I am sick of seeing people attacking cleric stance when real issue is tanks! Plus tank stance switching is more complex then a cleric toggle, so it is just me being curious why people seem to put cleric in such a bad light and think dropping it will add more healers, and nothing is said on tank stances.

Cleric stance isn't the real issue in this topic about cleric stance! It's tanks! MENTOR tanks!

[Mycow8me]

Because I am sick of seeing people attacking cleric stance when real issue is tanks!

I'm done.

[Kosmos992k]

**snip about sommoners**
You've got a revive and a heal. That's as close to a hybrid you're gonna get in FF14. You want to heal, but want more DPS? Go play summoner. You want to keep your healing but do more DPS? You're doing two roles at once now. You can't heal your cake and damage it too. You heal, or you DPS. Either one can be auxiliary, but both are not going to be your main role.

Paladin should/could be a hybrid also, they have access to cure and Clemency. If their cure was based on their weapon potency, it might be worth something. Finally, give Paladins a battle raise trait and you have the perfect hybrid healer - and I would totally play the crap out of it.

[Taika]

You've got a revive and a heal. That's as close to a hybrid you're gonna get in FF14. You want to heal, but want more DPS? Go play summoner.

Summoner has a revive, yes (so does PLD), but they don't even have an effective healing spell. That's not even close to making the job a hybrid.

You want to keep your healing but do more DPS? You're doing two roles at once now. You can't heal your cake and damage it too. You heal, or you DPS. Either one can be auxiliary, but both are not going to be your main role.

Healer in this game is a role that includes both healing and DPS. You can look at pretty much any data from healer players to see this to be true. You can look at their abilities to see this to be true. You can look at the content and battle design to see this to be true. On the other hand, there is nothing to support your claim that healer role in this game would only involve healing. Everything points towards the opposite.

Healer DPS isn't factored into tuning endgame content because your job isn't DPS.

Healer DPS is actually factored into tuning endgame content in the sense that most difficult content is not possible to clear without it when it's released (you can look at the world first parses to check it yourself in case you weren't aware of it). To say healer DPS isn't factored in is to say the players aren't actually meant to beat the content, which doesn't make any sense.

So you do care more about DPS than healing.

I care about supporting my party as well as I can no matter which job I'm playing. I try to do what's the most useful to my group in each situation. Sometimes it's healing, sometimes it's DPS (the better everyone is playing the more often it's DPS).

Maybe you should go play summoner, like I suggested! Then you can support your party with raises and lowball heals but still do big numbers! But you ain't breakin' the trinity. You don't get to be a healer AND a DPS.

There is no clear-cut trinity in this game outside role names and certain setups and role functions. Tanks are specialised in enmity and defense, but they also have DPS stances and rotations and are sometimes focused more on that than tanking. It's the same for healers.

Hell, bards are gonna break that with a support role before you get your "I'm a DPS and a healer" wish. But from what I can glean, you just wanna do two jobs at once in a game with a really strictly enforced trinity group system, so you might just have a bad time. But hey, keep enjoying yourself. I don't give a damn what you like, and frankly hope you have fun and continue playing. Shine on, you angry diamond, be a strong independent healer who don't need no DPS.

Just don't do it near me, thanks.

I don't even know how to reply to this. Someone here seems angry, but that's definitely not me.

Don't try to marginalize my opinion by saying I'm unqualified. That'll just make me tell you to piss off. My opinion is just as valid as yours is.

It's a valid question because you truly don't seem to understand how healing works in this game and what the healing requirements are like in this game. My opinion is more than just an opinion, it's based on experience and knowledge: I have played healer roles in all content in this game from 1.0 and cleared Coil (not Savage) and Alexander Savage as healer. In addition to my own experience, I follow parse numbers from different healers and groups to see how much damage is coming in and how much healing is required to cover that. I'm talking about how healing actually works in this game as it is, not about how I feel about it.

Edit:

Since this entire post is just discreding me and telling me "lol u mad bro" I'm just going to generally disregard your entire post and tell you to get out.

The whole thing reeks of smarm and "I'm not mad :^)".

I did not mean to discredit you, if I would have I wouldn't have actually bothered to read it and reply to each of your points. You may interpret my post in any way you wish, but I don't think you've given me any reason to be mad at you.

[Critical-Limit]

for sure I'll stop healing if they just take it away without adding complexity elsewhere

[Atlaworks]

Paladin should/could be a hybrid also, they have access to cure and Clemency. If their cure was based on their weapon potency, it might be worth something. Finally, give Paladins a battle raise trait and you have the perfect hybrid healer - and I would totally play the crap out of it.

You're totally right! Thanks for the heads up. Somehow, I always forget about Clemency.

Snip

Since this entire post is just discreding me and telling me "lol u mad bro" I'm just going to generally disregard your entire post and tell you to get out.

The whole thing reeks of smarm and "I'm not mad :^)".

[Bourne_Endeavor]

You've got a revive and a heal. That's as close to a hybrid you're gonna get in FF14. You want to heal, but want more DPS? Go play summoner. You want to keep your healing but do more DPS? You're doing two roles at once now. You can't heal your cake and damage it too. You heal, or you DPS. Either one can be auxiliary, but both are not going to be your main role.

First and foremost, Summoner healing is garbage. Any Summoner casting Physic needs to be boinked on the head. As for Raise, it's a utility they shouldn't have to use unless the entire raid is going to hell. Healers always get priority Raise duty because you don't want to cut into Summoner's DPS.

Your job is to heal. You're a healer. Healer DPS isn't factored into tuning endgame content because your job isn't DPS. DPS is there to alleviate soloing and help support dedicated roles if you want, but it's not mandatory- it's not part of your job. Your job is to heal. Now, if you're more concerned about your DPS than your he- wait hold on.

Here though, is where you are objectively wrong. Healing is hybrid by its very nature. As already outlined above, it's built into the job once you begin optimizing. A healer concerned with their DPS has already maximized the healing aspect and now wants to learn balancing the two between stance dancing. That is simply how healing works in FFXIV currently. It is little different than how tanks focus less on tanking and more on DPS because once you've reached the mitigation threshold, all that matters is how much damage you do regardless of the job you play.

[RukiaFae]

This is like the strength tank argument all over again. I hope SE steps up to plate and makes a decision like they did in that situation.

[Bourne_Endeavor]

This is like the strength tank argument all over again. I hope SE steps up to plate and makes a decision like they did in that situation.

This is why I suspect Cleric will be removed and all healer damage will scale through mind. Of course, that has the added effect of solidifies the healer DPS meta. It wouldn't even be an option anymore. So... who knows.