Revisiting the physick question

[zuzu-bq]

Vercure isn't really there to be a decent heal anyways. So even if they make Physick heal for the same on SMN, why would it be good even?

I don't think Vercure is a mistake though, people just randomly do the weak heals of it thinking they're helping when in fact they're not and just wasting time not dpsing. Vercure is neat to get a Dualcast proc on downtimes though, and its a fun mechanic to work around.

[PrismaticDaybreak]

Although I do miss the usefulness Physick had back in ARR content, it did practically become unnecessary in the expansions that followed. I'd be lying if I said I didn't want Physick to now be based on INT instead of MND, but going forward it might be in better interests to just have a trait to evolve it in to something more useful whether it be a pet enhancing action or some kind of ally/party utility.

We also do need to consider that if Physick was updated to effect INT, we'll have people complaining that BLM has no healing/rezzing actions whilst the other two casters do, and then it'll just be whiny threads of wanting to them to have fair access.

Those threads already exist haha

[Shihen]

In solo content incoming damage should be going into the pet and is handled by Sustain, in party content there should already be at least one healer. It's hard to imagine a situation that calls for Physick on SMN at all. The real problem is that an ability that hasn't survived the game's scaling remains untouched. I can only guess they have internal reasons for keeping it around but IMO if it scales off MND it should be found on, and only on, a job that has some way of using MND.

Also will get hate for saying so, but that interview answer is a cop-out. SMN + Cure != RDM, and suddenly jumping to "We don't want to make all the jobs the same" is one hell of a leap. No one is asking for all the jobs to be the same, and even if they copypasted Vercure directly into SMN, the job would still be as different from RDM as MNK is from DRG is from NIN is from SAM. They're just asking why SMN has a spell it doesn't ever need to cast.

[Claviusnex]

When they reimplemented it, I was grateful (as were many), but what they should have done is have it be a SMN trait that upgrades Physick to Sustain.

This was my thought too. When you pick the SMN path at level 30 Physick is replaced with Sustain.

[Kurando]

This was my thought too. When you pick the SMN path at level 30 Physick is replaced with Sustain.

I think they need to have/keep Sustain as an Arcanist rather than waiting to unlock Summoner. Because although there might be rare occasions that ACN would need to heal their pet, the micro management is still there and the whole point of returning Sustain was for pet use and ACN is no different.

Keep Sustain as a separate action (for ACN/SMN/SCH) but evolve Physick in to maybe an anti-heal (reduces or prevent HP recovery). Yes it would be niche use but fits with the debuffs of SMN.

[Deceptus]

All they had to do was have SMN change Physic to Sustain via a trait in 4.0 and there wouldn't have been an issue.

[Hasrat]

Personally, I'd be against any of these changes to reduce/remove Physick. I understand the reasoning and all, but, having healed a low level dungeon on ACN (FC-mate was on wrong job when registered), I enjoy the option of having it in case of emergency. It'd be nice to have in less challenging content, just in case the healer DCs or poorly geared/skilled, etc.

It's kinda fun to be a back-up tank/healer when situations arise and you don't want stand around doing nothing waiting for a refill.

[Cynfael]

Personally, I'd be against any of these changes to reduce/remove Physick. I understand the reasoning and all, but, having healed a low level dungeon on ACN (FC-mate was on wrong job when registered), I enjoy the option of having it in case of emergency. It'd be nice to have in less challenging content, just in case the healer DCs or poorly geared/skilled, etc.

It's kinda fun to be a back-up tank/healer when situations arise and you don't want stand around doing nothing waiting for a refill.

I definitely understand where you're coming from, and I've had those moments myself in the past.

I suppose my issue is that I don't see that sort of gameplay being a persistent sort of fun except possibly for the player who deliberately runs very low-level dungeons constantly and frequently runs into major group problems (in other words, for very, very few people). Once the leveling phase is over and the expectations of lvl 50-70 gameplay set in, Physick becomes a truly vestigial spell for the SMN. Considering that most players seem to level at a fairly rapid pace and settle into running mostly higher level content on a regular basis, it doesn't make a great deal of sense to have Physick taking up a slot.

Does it have to be removed? No. However, I think that replacing it with something that adds value past fixing derps in Sastasha NM might offer more enjoyment and practicality in the long run.

[Joe777]

Historically in the series, there is also no reason for SMN not to be able to heal, SMNs have used both black and white magic in previous titles. Examples such as, child Rydia, Terra, Garnet and Yuna.

FF6 and FF10 did not have magic limitations. Any character in those games if done right can have both black and white magic regardless of their inherent class and are therefore bad examples for this. Rydia is also a bad example since when she grew up she lost all her White Magic which would in this case imply SMN should too, which is basically saying drop Physick and Resurrection. As for Garnet: She never learned Black Magic, all White and Summon.

[Shirolumi]

They only have physic because of the dumb smn/sch split from arcanist which they regretted. I think and hope that its removed come 5.0 and that they differentiate sch and smn more from eachother.