What the term "healer" means to me

[Connor]

I've played Final Fantasy games where the white mages could blast nearly as well as the black mages.

Which ones? From memory in FFI White Mages only have Holy, in III they only have Aero/Stone(plus Tornado and Quake)/Holy. In V there aren’t any offensive white Mage spells because you can just set black magic. Garnet and Eiko had offensive options through summons and Holy, but that’s because they’re healers and summoners squished together (it would be a bit weird if Ifrit and Shiva healers the party lol. I’m not massively experienced with XI but from what I understand healers there are more focused on buffing/debuffing and healing than offense, particularly for White Mages , and Scholars too were often called on for healing and support (though they can also access offense with Dark Arts).

Not saying that any of this somehow contradicts what you’re saying, just why my own thoughts on the matter differed from your own. And I mean, it would be more weird if everyone perceived things the exact same way. I think the fact that everyone has such different views on what a ‘healer’ is suggest that developers should maybe try and accommodate more than one playstyle for the role. I said that coming into something expecting one thing just to be handed another can feel jarring, but that applies to players who see healers as being more involved and offense-oriented too. Like, if they made all healers full-on ‘only healing’, they’d be ignoring a large part of the playerbase. Conversely though, if they did the same but with DPS and gave healers full-on DPS rotations, they’re still ignoring a large part of the playerbase that would like a more passive/supportive role. People who want a more offensive oriented healer playstyle aren’t happy with current healers, but players who want a more supportive playstyle aren’t happy either.

[Urthdigger]

Which ones? From memory in FFI White Mages only have Holy, in III they only have Aero/Stone(plus Tornado and Quake)/Holy. In V there aren’t any offensive white Mage spells because you can just set black magic. Garnet and Eiko had offensive options through summons and Holy, but that’s because they’re healers and summoners squished together (it would be a bit weird if Ifrit and Shiva healers the party lol. I’m not massively experienced with XI but from what I understand healers there are more focused on buffing/debuffing and healing than offense, particularly for White Mages , and Scholars too were often called on for healing and support (though they can also access offense with Dark Arts).

Not saying that any of this somehow contradicts what you’re saying, just why my own thoughts on the matter differed from your own. And I mean, it would be more weird if everyone perceived things the exact same way. I think the fact that everyone has such different views on what a ‘healer’ is suggest that developers should maybe try and accommodate more than one playstyle for the role. I said that coming into something expecting one thing just to be handed another can feel jarring, but that applies to players who see healers as being more involved and offense-oriented too. Like, if they made all healers full-on ‘only healing’, they’d be ignoring a large part of the playerbase. Conversely though, if they did the same but with DPS and gave healers full-on DPS rotations, they’re still ignoring a large part of the playerbase that would like a more passive/supportive role. People who want a more offensive oriented healer playstyle aren’t happy with current healers, but players who want a more supportive playstyle aren’t happy either.

In FF1, White Mages could use hammers which weren't too bad at melee damage, and had an array of spells specifically for killing undead, often straight up obliterating them unless outleveled.

In FF3, White Magic had a few damaging spells and could only use fairly physically weak staves and rods. This is perhaps the purest healer WHM has ever been, but even then their spells were on par with BLM of similar levels, they just had a larger gap between spells.

In FFIV, Rosa could deal considerable damage with a bow and arrows.

In FFV, as mentioned WHM can just equip black magic on the side with the magic power to use it (The same stat governs both, and is based on character not job)

In FFVII, Aeris (Kinda placed as the WHM of the group given her limit breaks and weapon choice) also is your best BLM due to having one stat factor into both.

In both FFIX and FFX, as stated, healer and summoner were kinda rolled into one.

In FFXI, while the playerbase often preferred WHM to only heal, resting to recover MP whenever they didn't, this was because this was an old school MMO where you literally did not recover MP without resting, making MP regeneration vital for reducing downtime when leveling. In truth, WHM could do a considerable amount of damage with clubs, usually through magical weaponskills like Seraph Strike, and they were the only job able to use the weaponskill Hexastrike until Seekers of Adoulin came out.

Every other FF game lacks a dedicated healer class, or I have no experience with it (coughthirteencough). Regardless, I think it's fair to say that healers have always been expected to deal damage in Final Fantasy, or at least had the capability to do so.