Healing is now a state of permanent hatred.

[DiznypKC]

I feel like this is a forum thing. Healing to my knowledge is not a hated thing.. Then again we could be speaking from completely different experiences. None of my friend groups hate healing. So I'm not very sure where this is coming from. If anything I love healing this expansion.. well lack thereof. Once you know the timing of a fight most healing can be cut to a minimal. I barely heal in Cinder Drift Extreme. Outside of my ogcd's I only cast Aspected Helios twice.. and one was 10s pre-pull. I'm not sure what people mean when they say they "hate healing" is it because you dont have to heal or because you feel like you have to heal too much? If its the latter then there is a problem on your end.

Quick Recent History Lesson:

Healer discussion (this one, anyway) has been going on since ShB media tours, on here, Reddit, and Discord. A lot of healers looked at the tool tips and said, “Hold up, something’s wrong here.”

Other non-healer mains said, “It’ll be fine, just wait until the expansion drops.”

Expansion dropped. We said, “This isn’t fun. We’re spamming on button 90% of the battles and MSQ/solo instances are tedious.”

They said, “Wait until Savage drops.”

Savage dropped. We said, “Still not any better.”

They said, “Play a DPS then.”

A lot of us did, or left the game altogether. There’s a whole thread on if/why people have quit healing.

The larger problem has been going on since Heavensward. Fun, balanced Healers are the unicorn of this game. It’s not just a forum thing.

[Kummies]

Quick Recent History Lesson:

Healer discussion (this one, anyway) has been going on since ShB media tours, on here, Reddit, and Discord. A lot of healers looked at the tool tips and said, “Hold up, something’s wrong here.”

Other non-healer mains said, “It’ll be fine, just wait until the expansion drops.”

Expansion dropped. We said, “This isn’t fun. We’re spamming on button 90% of the battles and MSQ/solo instances are tedious.”

They said, “Wait until Savage drops.”

Savage dropped. We said, “Still not any better.”

They said, “Play a DPS then.”

A lot of us did, or left the game altogether. There’s a whole thread on if/why people have quit healing.

The larger problem has been going on since Heavensward. Fun, balanced Healers are the unicorn of this game. It’s not just a forum thing.

I'm not sure why you keep saying 'we' like you are the ambassador for Healers United. I never complained about the healer changes because I personally like to see how things will play out. There was definitely some healer things that needed to be adjust come ShB launch but as of right now I'd say the healers are more balanced then they have ever been. Again, I'm sorry that you are not having fun on the role you wanted to play but you don't speak for the majority of healers and neither do the forums. In my limited time being here I've realized alot of you are vocal but usually the minority in opinions.

[Mesarthim]

I'm not sure why you keep saying 'we' like you are the ambassador for Healers United. I never complained about the healer changes because I personally like to see how things will play out. There was definitely some healer things that needed to be adjust come ShB launch but as of right now I'd say the healers are more balanced then they have ever been. Again, I'm sorry that you are not having fun on the role you wanted to play but you don't speak for the majority of healers and neither do the forums. In my limited time being here I've realized alot of you are vocal but usually the minority in opinions.

Is that why I see a lot of distaste for healing everywhere I look? Of course my mistake. I forgot your lot are the only kind that's ever correct. You must be living under a rock when even the JP side of the game has complaints about healing. Well duh some people enjoy healing but don't act like there hasn't been drawbacks to how they've treated healers too.

I don't see why you had to write common sense like you can't tell context. Why do you have to post acting like they spoke for you?

[Kummies]

Is that why I see a lot of distaste for healing everywhere I look? Of course my mistake. I forgot your lot are the only kind that's ever correct.

That's not to say I dismiss your side's opinion, but you need to stop dismissing people who disagree with you. You must be living under a rock when even the JP side of the game has complaints about healing. Drop the holier than thou attitude while you're at it.

I don't see where I acted like I was better then everyone else. All I said was that I disagreed. I'm not the one acting over-dramatic and acting like its the end of the healer role because some skills got taken away and some numbers adjust.. Please quote me on when I dismissed ANYONE who has disagreed with me? I'll wait. I've kindly pointed out that not everyone shares the same opinions as the forums. I mean, where are you looking that you see so much distaste in healing because the only place I see it at this magnitude is here. So please link those too. I'd like to see what is making the healer roles so unfun to them.

[Mesarthim]

I don't see where I acted like I was better then everyone else. All I said was that I disagreed. I'm not the one acting over-dramatic and acting like its the end of the healer role because some skills got taken away and some numbers adjust.. Please quote me on when I dismissed ANYONE who has disagreed with me? I'll wait. I've kindly pointed out that not everyone shares the same opinions as the forums. I mean, where are you looking that you see so much distaste in healing because the only place I see it at this magnitude is here. So please link those too. I'd like to see what is making the healer roles so unfun to them.

The context of my post changed because it was hastily written. But I've grown very tired of having to constantly recount all of the problems with healers over the course of two major patches with no word from the devs. Just see Billy's and Kalise for examples. There is a noticeable amount off less healers ingame too. Of course queues will proceed but a lot of the time tank queues are having to wait (but not always). 24 mans also have a lack of healers, etc.

Likely only going to get worse of they shun healers for a third expansion.

I suppose I should apologize but I've gotten tired of seeing posts where people act like healers are the best thing in the world because "they" feel it is fine. Perhaps I took that out on you. People have their right to enjoy it but it is certainly not in the best position in terms of fun for everyone. Everyone.

And god help me if I get into what is wrong with AST and SCH, and to a lesser degree WHM.

[Kummies]

The context of my post changed because it was hastily written. But I've grown very tired of having to constantly recount all of the problems with healers over the course of two major patches with no word from the devs. Just see Billy's and Kalise for examples. There is a noticeable amount off less healers ingame too. Of course queues will proceed but a lot of the time tank queues are having to wait (but not always). 24 mans also have a lack of healers, etc.

Likely only going to get worse of they shun healers for a third expansion.

I suppose I should apologize but I've gotten tired of seeing posts where people act like healers are the best thing in the world because "they" feel it is fine. Perhaps I took that out on you. People have their right to enjoy it but it is certainly not in the best position in terms of fun for everyone. Everyone.

And god help me if I get into what is wrong with AST and SCH, and to a lesser degree WHM.

I'm sorry that you are frustrated and I'm sorry if what I said came off the wrong way but I simply can not grasp why people are so upset.

Lets look at what changed and maybe then you or someone else can point me in the direction I need to face because I must be missing something.

AST: Got the card system reworked. Lost cleric stance. Lost time dilation.

Only thing I see people complain about on AST are some QoL changes for some skills. Also some people dont like the new cards. Others have a problem with the opener on controller.

WHM: Lilies got reworked (?). Lost Cleric stance. (This is the healer I am least familiar with because I find it extremely boring with little to no challenge but with big reward with its blood lilies)

and then there is ... SCH: Prob took the most hits from the move from SB to ShB. Lost like 3 dps skills and cleric stance.

Now if you are speaking from a SCH perspective, I can sympathize with you. You lost skills but it was to streamline you with the other healers. So from what I've listed I don't see much that has changed (dps related) for healers in the move from SB to ShB.. Hell, AST dps skills are the same since SB. And WHM got a new dps skill..

Soo what is making healers so unfun for you all? Was it losing cleric stance or something? Or not getting enough dps skills?

[Volkaj]

Soo what is making healers so unfun for you all? Was it losing cleric stance or something? Or not getting enough dps skills?

In terms of just DPS, SCH lost Miasma, Miasma II, Bane, Shadowflare, Cleric Stance, Selene, Quickened Aetherflow and had its fairy skills be put as OGCDs rather than pet OGCDs. Bio also got its duration increased to 30s.

What does this change in terms of gameplay?

No Miasma means one less DoT to keep track of.
Bio duration at 30s means perfect alignment with most cooldowns, which translate into a more static flow.
No Miasma II single-target weaving, with its dynamics: melee range, high MP cost, DoT.
No Quickened Aetherflow to get more MP, DPS and healing out if you knew how to use your Aetherflow stacks properly.
No Shadowflare.
No Miasma + Bio + Bane.
No using fairy skills while casting.

Stormblood's SCH didn't have a thrilling DPS rotation compared to actual DPS and tanks, sure.
But that small DPS toolkit, combined with the healing kit, was what made SCH fun to play and optimize.

You can absolutely still optimize, but it isn't gonna be getting extra Energy Drains, snuffing healing GCDs out, getting higher DoT uptime, etc.
Its gonna be one more Broil III.

[Saefinn]

I'm sorry that you are frustrated and I'm sorry if what I said came off the wrong way but I simply can not grasp why people are so upset.

Lets look at what changed and maybe then you or someone else can point me in the direction I need to face because I must be missing something.

AST: Got the card system reworked. Lost cleric stance. Lost time dilation.

Only thing I see people complain about on AST are some QoL changes for some skills. Also some people dont like the new cards. Others have a problem with the opener on controller.

WHM: Lilies got reworked (?). Lost Cleric stance. (This is the healer I am least familiar with because I find it extremely boring with little to no challenge but with big reward with its blood lilies)

and then there is ... SCH: Prob took the most hits from the move from SB to ShB. Lost like 3 dps skills and cleric stance.

Now if you are speaking from a SCH perspective, I can sympathize with you. You lost skills but it was to streamline you with the other healers. So from what I've listed I don't see much that has changed (dps related) for healers in the move from SB to ShB.. Hell, AST dps skills are the same since SB. And WHM got a new dps skill..

Soo what is making healers so unfun for you all? Was it losing cleric stance or something? Or not getting enough dps skills?

I'd say, the problem is probably more HW->ShB, but SB was still enjoyable. I've healed since 2.0 and one trend I've noticed is that are our healing kits get more comprehensive the content does not match it. What we end up getting is an increased downtime. In making the healing kits more comprehensive, what we do in our downtime is made less comprehensive.

For losses, WHM has actually lost a lot. But their losses were gradual. SCH's, however, was sudden. WHM has had a history of nerfs, and there were improvements this time around, like Planery Indulgence was better and Lilies are less dumb, but not necessarily the improvements needed because more was taken away. Add that some of their abilities ended up being made into cross class without really getting anything back for them, as well as losing some too or the effectiveness of them.

The loss of Cleric Stance was twofold, one in that what it did was changed and then what it was changed to was removed, but its original version offered a dynamic of risk/reward we used to have as healers we don't have anymore, it was clunky but it could have been improved rather than removed. Scholar used to have additional status effects on their DPS abilities too, which was a part of their damage mitigation schtick, which as a nice added touch. AST could stun, SCH could silence and offer other types of CC through debuffs in their DPS skills, WHM could (and fortunately still can) stun - these all had their place.


AST on paper looks the least affected by the changes, but those changes remove some of the core parts people found interesting about the cards, there was the argument over balance fishing and the answer to that seemed to be...make every card the balance, no real RNG, no variety, no Royal Road dynamic, sure some argued there were times the cards they got were useless, but there's better ways of fixing that. No Time Dilation or the old Celestial Opposition (in the old way it worked) and these are all dynamics that added to what AST's could manage in their down time and how it felt to play. Heck, I loved Royal Road, because it reminded me of FFXI SCH with stratagems but with a little RNG, it was a nice depth of choice/utility to the card system, which has been replaced with 1 ability & effect. Sure 'balance' fishing is gone when every card is the balance, but now I have seal fishing, so this hasn't solved that problem. Just that every card is now useful. They could have just use the old card system and the new Lord/Lady system and no card would ever be useless. Can't use it? Minor Arcana and get a base use. Can use it? Sweet, may it work. For me, AST is in the best place of all 3 in terms of fun, because it has a higher APM and Nocturnal Sect is the weakest version of healing ATM so i have more to engage with as a result, hence I'll AST when I end up doing stuff as a healer, despite being a former SCH main. And it still feels like it's a shadow of its former self.

In effect, the feeling is that the healer jobs overall have been stripped. Sure there's more dynamics on their healing side than before, but the issue is that the content and potencies don't match them. So in effect, particularly with experienced healers (though not exclusively), we're in a position where healer downtime has increased over the years (and I feel it is the highest in Shadowbringers) but what we can do in that downtime has been stripped and thus we find it boring. This process wasn't just the changes from SB -> ShB, but some of the most drastic were made in this expansion.

I think if there was a push in content design to put more dynamic use of our healing toolkit, I don't think we'd be so bored. But in most case scenarios, light healing is only required and you can half-arse it.

And I think we'd be okay with the 'half-arse it' approach as long as there was more to do during this increased downtime. Because there'd be content that is hard where we can heal harder and moments where we might get a bigger use of that toolkit, such as a struggling party or an intense fight.

And the content where we're half-arsing it, a newbie healer, somebody learning or less confident might not be. They might benefit from that extra space. Because if the content and potencies were tweaked more to make full use of our healing skills, then it'd be a tougher learning curve. If we embraced that downtime IS a thing and filled it, the skill floor stays low, whilst raising the skill ceiling.

[Kalise]

There was definitely some healer things that needed to be adjust come ShB launch but as of right now I'd say the healers are more balanced then they have ever been.

This is true.

However, most of the qualms about Healers is not predicated on their balance.

Most of the qualms stem from how FUN they are to play. But since ALL 3 Healers have been homogenized down into 1 nuke, 1 DoT, 1 AoE nuke for the majority of their gameplay, they're all equally balanced and equally boring as sin.

Again, I'm sorry that you are not having fun on the role you wanted to play but you don't speak for the majority of healers and neither do the forums. In my limited time being here I've realized alot of you are vocal but usually the minority in opinions.

Forums don't necessarily equate to being the voice of the majority...

However, it's notable that in game, queueing up for duties sees a significant lack of healers. With queues for TANKS (The role notorious for being the most lacking role in all MMO's and indeed was the case for all of FFXIV's life up until ShB) being far longer a wait than for Healers.

Which is indicative that people simply aren't playing Healers as much here in ShB, which would suggest a number of people are unhappy with the state of them.