What I've realized about healing in XIV...

[Gameplayzero]

Will I acquiesce that they could toss on another DoT or something? Sure. But if you want an AST to have to manage stackslike a MNK or have anything that complicated I just feel like it would be a disaster.

honestly 1 or 2 more dots (or just giving back old rotations) for healers would be great. As you've said a lot of the player base doesn't really care about optimization. The loss of the dots healers had before SB definitely hurt the rotations. Would be great if they could emulate what we had before because it wouldn't make things too complicated, but would add some difficulty.

[Nicodemus_Mercy]

Not for nothing, but I see people posting that healers and tanks are "dumbed down" and "simple to play". If tanks and healers were as complex to play as most of the dps are you'd see even fewer of them. So be careful what you wish for...

Tanks and Healers don't need to be made "complex" or "interesting". All that will do is make dps queue times even longer :P and healers certainly don't need any sort of complexity regarding their dps! Healers and tanks need to be "simple" and "effective", otherwise even fewer people will play the roles.

Now that doesn't mean mob gameplay can't be adjusted so healers spend more time healing, which we saw a bit of with the SB dungeons. I definitely heal more in SB dungeons than I had to in prior content and I don't think that's just due to not over-gearing the content.

[Archamgel]

Tanks and Healers don't need to be made "complex" or "interesting". All that will do is make dps queue times even longer :P and healers certainly don't need any sort of complexity regarding their dps! Healers and tanks need to be "simple" and "effective", otherwise even fewer people will play the roles.t.

I disagree.

They can at least make some of the healer and tank more complex and interesting. It can be pretty mind numbing. I usually solo-heal all the ex's, and even then, it is super boring unless some players forget the lightning before a Hishme (?) that I need to do some more healing for, but even then it isn't much more interesting. Some jobs could be more difficult and feel rewarding for playing them to their utmost. It could even bring people into trying healing and tanking.

[KalinOrthos]

snip :3

Actually, I'm going to have to disagree with you on this. Like I said before, I've really drifted away from healing for a good number of reasons, but I don't hate healing. Hell, back in WoW, Holy Priest, Mistweaver Monk, and Restoration Shamans were my jam, they were fun and engaging. Healing in this game just...isn't. I can speculate a few reasons as to why that is, but really, there's nothing here for me to keep playing AST when I have more fun and engaging and dynamic gameplay with MCH, PLD, BRD, and even SMN and SAM.

There's also a reason why we didn't see a massive influx of healers and tanks in Heavensward; people who do heal and tank, will heal and tank, and the people who won't, won't. It's that same song and dance for every MMO, with every expansion: you will always, ALWAYS have dedicated DPS, tanks, and healers, because that's the role that the player wants to play. By making a certain role unengaging, all you are going to do is push people away who enjoy the gameplay of a healer towards something more supporty and engaging.

Should a lower skill floor exist to make a class easy for new players to pick up and learn? Definitely. But low skill floor does not equal simple with no complexity.

[loreleidiangelo]

I also sympathize with you - it sucks that this style of healing isn't for you. I don't think that that justifies changing up the entire healer and damage model for the game but I can appreciate that it's a facet of the game you don't enjoy.

I will say that the "go savage" argument is less about you having content to do and more about you understanding how hard it would be for a savage healer to have a complicated DPS rotation. Whether or not you play savage changing the identity of healers to something that suddenly just can't put out damage in savage seems unfair to me.

Will I acquiesce that they could toss on another DoT or something? Sure. But if you want an AST to have to manage stackslike a MNK or have anything that complicated I just feel like it would be a disaster.

Can't speak for anyone else in the thread, but I don't want more "complicated" healer DPS rotations - I want stuff to actually heal. I want boss autos that aren't a joke and healer spells pared down so that a single Cure III doesn't fill up half the party's health bar with the push of a button. I don't want regens to be enough to sustain a tank through everything but a tank buster, I don't want powerful oGCDs that I can just drop on a player so that I don't have to take time out from DPSing. I want healing at the more casual levels of content to be a bit more engaging, and less about trying to get casts off while trying to deal with a bunch of stupid dance party mechs.

As a caveat to all that though...I'm aware that the game changing in that direction is pretty unlikely, hence why I've resubbed to WoW. I still keep playing XIV because I'm raiding with friends again, but for casual dungeons and whatnot I have a much more fun time in Warcraft. Everyone is entitled to their own opinions and preferences of course, but there's mine.

[KalinOrthos]

Can't speak for anyone else in the thread, but I don't want more "complicated" healer DPS rotations - I want stuff to actually heal. I want boss autos that aren't a joke and healer spells pared down so that a single Cure III doesn't fill up half the party's health bar with the push of a button. I don't want regens to be enough to sustain a tank through everything but a tank buster, I don't want powerful oGCDs that I can just drop on a player so that I don't have to take time out from DPSing. I want healing at the more casual levels of content to be a bit more engaging, and less about trying to get casts off while trying to deal with a bunch of stupid dance party mechs.

As a caveat to all that though...I'm aware that the game changing in that direction is pretty unlikely, hence why I've resubbed to WoW. I still keep playing XIV because I'm raiding with friends again, but for casual dungeons and whatnot I have a much more fun time in Warcraft. Everyone is entitled to their own opinions and preferences of course, but there's mine.

I won't go as far as to resub to WoW, that game's homogenization of its classes really drove me away, but I'm 100% with you on all points.

[loreleidiangelo]

I won't go as far as to resub to WoW, that game's homogenization of its classes really drove me away, but I'm 100% with you on all points.

Is this in regards to DPS, or...? I wouldn't say their healers are particularly homogenized, at least compared to here. (I main healer, so if your point is about tanks or DPS that's fair.) I still maintain that Restoration Druid is one of the best-designed healers I've ever played in an MMO.

[KalinOrthos]

100% agree about trees. I just couldn't really get into Resto druids, simply because bears, cats, and moonkin just really didn't appeal to me. Honestly, healers are probably the most dynamic of the classes in that game, but even then, getting to the point where I unsubbed, there felt like such an insubstantial difference between Resto Shaman and Holy Priest, except that priests were less position-based. The real bland-ing started in Warlords, and was sort of undone in Legion but not enough to my liking. Hell, my real dislike for the game started when they ruined everything that made brewmasters fun and active in Warlords. And everything just sort of fell apart for me after that. I'm probably horribly biased but...I dunno, it just felt so samey and boring right at the end.

[RichardButte]

Your argument boils down to feelings

My argument boils down to the fact that AST, WHM, and SCH are very clearly labeled as "healers", not "shitty DPS who keep health bars topped off".

why should we become WoW when it already exists?

Suggesting that XIV's healers be at least as deep and interesting as XIV's DPS ≠ turning XIV into WoW.

I said earlier (though I forget if it was this thread or another) that XIV's DPS classes are worlds more complex than WoW's, yet XIV's healers are comparatively simple to both DPS in XIV and healers in WoW.

If healers in XIV had rotations that were as fun and engaging as the DPS classes in this game, I would LOVE healing, period.

But again, this all comes down to how damage is done to players in this game: it's feast or famine. Either the tank/group takes a huge burst of damage, or the tank is taking tickle damage from AA.

And someone else mentioned this (again, not sure if it was this thread) and it bears repeating: healing potency in XIV is INSANELY high, especially in comparison to other MMOs, but even just in the context of XIV we have so many healing spells that can easily recover 50%+ of a tank's HP in one cast.

This is the other reason spiky damage sucks: SE's only way to answer spiky damage was with spiky heals, meaning that refilling HP bars is typically a simple matter before it's back to DPSing again.

If I wanted to DPS, I'd have rolled a DPS. I rolled a healer to HEAL.

So, basically this:

Can't speak for anyone else in the thread, but I don't want more "complicated" healer DPS rotations - I want stuff to actually heal. I want boss autos that aren't a joke and healer spells pared down so that a single Cure III doesn't fill up half the party's health bar with the push of a button. I don't want regens to be enough to sustain a tank through everything but a tank buster, I don't want powerful oGCDs that I can just drop on a player so that I don't have to take time out from DPSing. I want healing at the more casual levels of content to be a bit more engaging, and less about trying to get casts off while trying to deal with a bunch of stupid dance party mechs.

[Jade3173]

By making a certain role unengaging, all you are going to do is push people away who enjoy the gameplay of a healer towards something more supporty and engaging.

I healed through 2.X as WHM, healed through 3.X as AST, tried to stay as AST in 4.0 but found Bard to be far more interesting now that it really fills in that "supporty" feel and feels so much more amazing than being an AST, even with the shield healing style that I prefer. Trying SCH at the moment and just...no. Still hate pet healing (unless it's super low dungeon and I'm just a green symbol DPS cause Eos can heal everything) and the shields just feel like wet paper that cost 1/8th of my MP bar. Seriously, kudos to people who raid as SCH nowadays.