Healer dps is unfairly boring

[Lastelli]

I totally get wanting more complex/engaging gameplay as a healer. Where we arrive at an impasse is that I am adamant about this more complex and engaging gameplay to come from more GCDs spent towards healing, NOT DPSing. I understand completely that with encounter design the way it is now, the only feasible answer is to add more complex DPS for healers. You need to understand that I push for a different alternative because again, healer DPS even for 3.0 SCH was always painfully boring to me.

Then you're pushing for something that is not realistic. Give up. Devs will NEVER rework the whole healing kit of the three jobs (which is required to shift the focus more on GCD healing), and change their encounter design.

Many people asking for more engaging dps rotations do not necessarily think that the only way to make healers more interesting is by giving them more diversity in their offensive kit. They just realize, given the devs track record, that they will not deviate from the current design, so they're asking for the only thing they know they can get...because they had it in previous expansions.

I thought it was common knowledge healer DPS is pretty garbage because they're meant to heal, and solo fights involve just outlasting whatever is trying to kill you by healing and slowly picking at their health.

Common knowledge? More like common misconception.

[Saefinn]

snip.

I think how you want things is a fair request. You'd rather be more pushed to the healing side.

But I'm in the frame of mind of, there's no reason why we can't have both. Reduce our healing downtime to make that more engaging and make DPS more engaging (and I miss the status effects from DPS skills too). The standard people are asking for DPS is the one SE already set in ARR and HW, rather than anything unreasonable. And I don't think it'd require a rework of encounter design, just encounter rework would be needed if they stick to the current healer design philosophy. Potencies can be nerfs, skills can be gutted. See Blue Mage healing: bare minimal healing kit, engaging healing experience (by comparison), engaging DPS experience. In reference to the poster above me "they will never rework the whole healing kit of the three jobs", then I look to Dark Knight and Machinist who had their entirely healing kit reworked. Then I look at how Paladin went from a dull 1,2,3 rotation tank to one that's pretty varied and interesting. Then I look at ARR/HW BRD, which I hated and SB/ShB BRD which feel a lot different, play a lot different and I enjoy. Or the fact that SMN is close to being a complete redesign, because it used to be a DoT mage, but maintaining DoT's is now only a small part of it. I mean, seeing how they've dealt with healers, sure, is enough to make me pessimistic they'd not bother with it, but at the same time, I don't think them doing it is unrealistic given they /have/ completely reworked stuff before, so 'NEVER' is a bit too definite.

However, having a balance of healing focus and DPS focus I felt it kinda was there for ARR SCH. By struggling to keep health up versus WHM, I found I was healing more on SCH versus WHM and using more of my toolkit competently to compensate that weakness. At the same time, I had a varied DPS for when inevitably I had downtime. I don't think they'll fully clear healer downtime and of course, healers will need to do a certain amount of content solo, so that side should also be engaging. And to me, I view the reason SCH got nice DoT's was because they'd have less downtime and probably why SCH was OP when they have SCH more of an ability to get people's HP up because their downtime was increased which meant they could do more damage.

The downside is that this raises the skill floor for playing healers and less approachable for people on the lower end of the scale of skill or experience. However, I think that could be mitigated is different healers embraced different play styles. Because, again, I think this was something they had right in ARR, SCH gave me more work to do versus WHM and WHM was what I tended to recommend to newbies who had never healed but was prepared to help out with learning SCH. Maybe WHM was still too intimidating for some? If so, it might have been good justification for a 4th healer respecting those who praise ShB's healer design.

[Crushnight]

I\\'m well aware of what the healers used to have. I am by no means the best healer out there, but I have been doing it and participating in these discussions for a long time. If you feel this needs to be explained to me, then you don\\'t know where I am coming from at all.

Their DPS, even 3.0 SCH, was never engaging for me. It was ALWAYS what I did when heals weren\\'t needed, which was most of the time. This should quickly add up to my boredom in general with the role due to having such a high DPS uptime. However, this boredom was really only present and exacerbated during encounters with a low threat level such as dungeons, unsynced runs, MSQ instances, FATES, etc.

I\\'ve always had the most fun healing when I am pushed, and the DPS uptime drops significantly. This is why I encourage tanks to pull the whole effin dungeon, and spend most of my time in random groups. However, I can admit that some skills such as Aero 3 and Shadow Flare were very satisfying to use. I definitely see nothing wrong with giving healers their AoE DoTs back, and I am confident they will return.

I don\\'t think that is the best solution currently in the future sure but not for the current problems.

The devs have proven multiple times they do not care for previous expansions content when designing new jobs or reworking old jobs. Any new healer rework and any encounter design that tailors to it would be for the newest expansion in mind only. Asking any new healer to wait until you hit 81 and do dungeons then you\\'ll start having a good time is asking for lot of effort or money just to see if true.

Asking for dps skills back can be added earlier and this adds a little more engagement during the downtime (that gets worse the more competent the group is + all previous dungeons get nerfed on top from when they were current) and can be done earlier in levels, any new healing tools would be redundant we just don\\'t need them anymore at earlier levels we were plenty sufficient before they added more in ShB.

Adding back dps skills earlier for healers would be better for healers to keep engagement for newer healers and make them want to stay and not hope for bad players for enjoyment in group content or something less mind numbing for solo content, than a healing fight design rework that would be exclusive to 6.0 content. The devs need to actually think for once about how do these changes affect the previous experience (they won\\'t but they should).

1 thing is clear no matter what the devs do to healers they do not care how it effects ARR, HW, SB, and come 6.0 ShB content.

[Saefinn]

And for even more fun you could cross-class Aero for an additional 18s dot for single-target or manually put it up on a small group to effectively get five dots (six if you count Shadowflare).

Since Protect, Stoneskin, Swiftcast, Cleric Stance from cnj and thm were already locked in on Scholar I also had the choice to pick Blizzard 2 over Aero. Even a short while we could pick Thunder, but that was remove relativiely early. I remember trying Blizzard 2, but standing still pressing one button in a pack really wasn't anywhere as fun as individually placing Aero and having more to keep track of. So it was good I had the choice.

This is also true. To me Blizzard II was an AoE version of Ruin. After I've got all my DoT's down and baned, Shadowflare up then I could just follow with a few Blizzard II until I need to go back and reapply.

Once you start looking at what we had, it's a lot that was lost. Although on paper it looks like half of our abilities, but in practice, it's cut our skill use more dramatically than half before you get onto cross class stuff that was lost by them changing that system.

[Gemina]

Then you're pushing for something that is not realistic. Give up. Devs will NEVER rework the whole healing kit of the three jobs (which is required to shift the focus more on GCD healing), and change their encounter design.

Many people asking for more engaging dps rotations do not necessarily think that the only way to make healers more interesting is by giving them more diversity in their offensive kit. They just realize, given the devs track record, that they will not deviate from the current design, so they're asking for the only thing they know they can get...because they had it in previous expansions.

Ah, so you mean join the rest of you who have given up? Is that what you're saying? I find very little truth in your statement. Some healers don't care to heal at all, and love that 90% DPS uptime, and simply want more skills to squeeze into that window. If you want to use the dev track record, then what makes you think healers will ever be as they once were? Their track record has shown to continue to strip healers of offensive skills each expansion.

And I'm not asking for healing kits to be reworked. Whatever gave that impression? All I suggested was giving healers their AoE DoTs back, which makes sense considering most jobs have ST and AoE variants of skills. I'm not even really asking for encounter design to be changed all that much either with the exception of reducing DPS uptime.

I find that the problem is the devs won't budge EITHER way. No more offense to fill in downtime. No additional healing requirement to reduce the downtime. We basically now have two factions of healers who are unhappy due in large part to the indecisiveness of the devs.

[Deceptus]

Decent healers who had any independent thought were thinking this when they released the previews.

"Wait until it goes live and THEN make judgements" we were told.

So we did

"Maybe SE will finally make mobs hit harder so healer's will have to heal!"

Nope. Still casting just as many GCD's on damage spells as before. Just now the rotation is 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2

And again and again we were proved right. It's like the FFXIV development team has no idea that healers have to be able to complete the MSQ. They need damage to do that.

[Volkaj]

I find that the problem is the devs won't budge EITHER way. No more offense to fill in downtime. No additional healing requirement to reduce the downtime. We basically now have two factions of healers who are unhappy due in large part to the indecisiveness of the devs.

I have this uneasy feeling that the devs simply do not care about how healers are actually played. Its not that devs want to push towards pure healing, towards DPS/healing hybrid, its just that they don't care.

Healing kits right now are basically priority lists, without much synergy between the pieces (SCH's 60,70,80 skills anyone?). A lot of people were expecting DNC to be a healer on release, and yet it completely surprised the devs to hear it. The focus of the one bit of info we got pre-ShB about healers was a focus on pure healing, and that turned out to be completely out of touch with the actual content released. The #1 thing asked for WHM in SB was some sort of DPS utility, and they still didn't get any come ShB. AST was way underpowered at ShB's launch. SCH was missing Energy Drain, a key skill. SB's SCH did not have Miasma 2 on release. The one feature everyone loved about SB's AST, its cards, had all its fun sucked out.

I personally don't mind if healers are made fun through healing or DPS mechanics (although the latter are more likely since it doesn't involve changing old content and helps in solo duties). But it just seems the devs don't care.

[Gemina]

snip.

On the contrary, I would love more DPS skills. Just not any kind of a true DPS rotation. I don't feel this is a good design for healers, and will very likely not make it into FFXIV. But more offensive skills that interact with the battlefield or are rewarded to the healer. I really enjoy skills like Earthly Star that give the player something to think about before actually using it. Skills like Misery that work based on a return. I am all for things like this, but at the same time want to spend more time healing. If this requires raising the skill ceiling a bit, then I am for that too. Accessibility doesn't have to come through over simplification.

[Mavrias]

Ah, so you mean join the rest of you who have given up? Is that what you're saying? I find very little truth in your statement. Some healers don't care to heal at all, and love that 90% DPS uptime, and simply want more skills to squeeze into that window. If you want to use the dev track record, then what makes you think healers will ever be as they once were? Their track record has shown to continue to strip healers of offensive skills each expansion.

And I'm not asking for healing kits to be reworked. Whatever gave that impression? All I suggested was giving healers their AoE DoTs back, which makes sense considering most jobs have ST and AoE variants of skills. I'm not even really asking for encounter design to be changed all that much either with the exception of reducing DPS uptime.

I find that the problem is the devs won't budge EITHER way. No more offense to fill in downtime. No additional healing requirement to reduce the downtime. We basically now have two factions of healers who are unhappy due in large part to the indecisiveness of the devs.

Reworking healing kits is not going to give you "more interesting" healing. They would need to redesign their whole encounter philosophy and they have refused to do so.

Nerfing or changing healing kits while leaving the encounter design as is, is just going to boil down to "find the minimum amount of GCD healing required and fill the rest of your time with dps," the way its always been.


You seem to have a problem with those asking for more interesting things to fill that time with.

[ForteNightshade]

Gasp! It's like they want the healers to actually focus on healing!

I understand the complaint, but DPSing as a healer is a bonus for making sure everyone is okay. Healers have so much support especially between SCH and AST that even if they aren't casting their DPS skills their support skills more than make up for it.

Remember when this was the go to response for healer DPS being dumbed down? Meanwhile, we look at how Scholar and Astro actually play in 5.x, and what to do you know. They're still primarily spamming Broil and Malefic, respectively. In fact, I looked up a Scholar I know who cleared TEA. 250 DPS abilities compared to 103 healing abilities (both GCD and oGCD compared). So about that "we want healers to heal more" argument. Hardest content in the game and healers are still spending 60% of it dealing damage.