PvP in this game is an afterthought and it shows

[Pibz]

The pvp system is a mess, I've said it since 2013 and while it has improved, except them going back to 3-way frontlines for some god forsaken reason, there's still a lot of work to do, which they've been mostly shown to be incapable of delivering at this point

But..

Making healers so incredibly strong is mind boggling to me, look at any succesful MMO right now that has a functioning PVP system, the healers are generally the weakest, they take more damage, they are more suscetible to CC but they have A LOT of utility and heals. In this game a single DPS will not kill a healer without an LB. They're built like tanks.

There is no fixing this system. I can understand balancing PVE and PVP spells together is a huge challenge, I can accept removing some spells that are available in PVE from PVP or changing them for PVP but absolutely gimping a job and boiling it down to 10 spells is a joke.

I've yet to find a game where healers being present or not doesn't completely change the balance between fighting groups. It's just what the nature of healing does. In WoW if you have a healer and the opposing team doesn't, outside of big gear deficits between the teams, the team with the healers will win almost assuredly.

The problem isn't that the healers are "too strong" (they've been severely gimped in recent years and it didn't fix anything, made it worse in fact), the problem is that a completely and ridiculously disproportional amount of responsibility is placed on them. Your healer is new and doesn't know what he's doing? Well you lose where as you can get away with having any other role being worse than the rest of the team. THIS is the big design flaw, one that i doubt they will ever address

However the idea that the system isn't fixable is just completely ridiculous

[Commander_Justitia]

Your healer is new and doesn't know what he's doing? Well you lose

That is not a design flaw, it is the flaw of the player queueing into a Ranked PvP mode, when he has no single clue how to use his heals. You read savage guides, you read trial guides, you look up your rotation, you buy bufffood for raid, you get the best in slot gear, all that for PvE - but in PvP everybody doesn't care what his skills do and gets away with it?!

If I see a healer going into ranked PvP, then spamming his damage spells instead of healing his team, no, it is not the system I blame - I am gonna blame the healer for not healing anything than himself (maybe, half of the new healer don't even manage that).

Why is a 3 way frontlines mode bad? Guild Wars 2 does it for Open WorldvsWorldvsWorld PvP too and it was pretty fun. Do you only not like it because the achievements tied to it are only rewarded to the first place? That doesn't make the PvP mode bad dude.
2 way PvP would mean, one side gives up because they are 300 points behind and the other group farmed battle highs, but with 2 groups you can overcome them. PvP already rewards you for doing nothing, don't make it even easier. Already the idea to be able to queue at whatever jobs for frontline is bad, we need players of every role just like in feast.

Just think about the impact of your desired changes first, people demanded so often changes that turned out to be even shittier, only to complain even more then as if they knew it all along. Prominent example would be rank decay for top100, there is no good way to implement decay in ff14 at this point, we are not league of legends or whatever.

[Stormfur]

That is not a design flaw, it is the flaw of the player queueing into a Ranked PvP mode, when he has no single clue how to use his heals.

To be fair though, the game doesn't exactly do a good job of guiding you in that. You need to hope that some high-rank PVP player has made a video or that you can join a Discord and ask. Even PVE has the Novice Hall. PVP actively tells you to just "get in there and do it." When you're accustomed to pretty much having your hand held starting out in the PVE world, you naturally think PVP is going to be similar, and it's jarring when it isn't.

Right now, PVP in FFXIV is very carrot-and-stick, but the stick is coated in barbed wire and set on fire. It's the equivalent of tying your arms and legs together and telling you to swim. Why do it, then? Everyone has their reasons but for myself, I like trying to improve and working toward a goal. I might never get there, but I'll certainly give it my best. I like the competition and having the results to show for my efforts. But by the same token, the way Feast is set up is abysmally punishing - more than a game should be.