healers need a serious overhaul

[Cirque-it]

Also, Piety is useless with the mana management that healers have now. The only time it has ever been useful is for safe progression in early Savage/Ultimate (the healer theorycrafters do make High Piety builds if someone wants to play it super safe during prog). AST saw some use out of it during early ShB—but that was due to them literally being MP negative if they had to do more than two raises, or if they died. Which is poor design of the job at that point. Now, I think they went a little overboard with the MP adjustments they made to it recently as I literally never run out of mana (just like HW AST haha), but AST did need something more to help out its MP issues. Because it was pretty bad.

yeah I socketed a lot of Piety for week 1 then swapped out after week 2 once we cleared E9s and E10s.... I needed the piety in that week though.. With the amount of deaths.

Cirque-it, if you're reading this please don't take it as an attack

I'm not (really)

I appreciate al the help your attempting to provide but in all honesty... I have seen al that information before on xivanalysis.. But I do have an issue with a lot of the info on that site.
First of all. Every single piece of data on that site is directed at one thing only... damage... its all theory crafting around getting the absolute most out of your damage in every single way possible....
For someone whom has always played healers in games, its unpleasent to say the least...
Slide casting, uptime, never using heal GCD's but doing everyone you can to only use oGCD's when you heal
The frowning upon overhealing, or to ever not be casting. (moving is doing something too...)
+ the general rule that applies to EVERY static I have seen when it comes to loot priority.... DPS -> tank -> heals

I remember in other games (i wont name em) where it was the other way around in some raids, other raids had tanks prioritized, etc... but EVERYTHING in this game is about Damage damage damage...
There are a lot of players that dont actually enjoy "meter-whoring" as we used to call it in ((other game))

Your very Helpful post(I do admit it IS helpfull) actually only proves my point... every tip you gave was directed at improving my damage... it makes me sad...

[HyoMinPark]

I appreciate al the help your attempting to provide but in all honesty... I have seen al that information before on xivanalysis.. But I do have an issue with a lot of the info on that site.
First of all. Every single piece of data on that site is directed at one thing only... damage... its all theory crafting around getting the absolute most out of your damage in every single way possible....
For someone whom has always played healers in games, its unpleasent to say the least...
Slide casting, uptime, never using heal GCD's but doing everyone you can to only use oGCD's when you heal
The frowning upon overhealing, or to ever not be casting. (moving is doing something too...)

If I may try to shed some light on this—

It all boils down to what I said prior: healers simply do too much damage to not be “green DPS” most of a fight (not the entire fight—they are still responsible for healing). There also isn’t enough damage to warrant healing all the time—and all damage is scripted. So it’s very easy to develop the muscle memory to just know where your heals should fall; when your oGCDs are used; when you may have to GCD heal. There’s no such thing as unexpected or unscripted damage, which makes healing even more simplified. SB actually had crit auto-attacks from raid bosses to try and prompt healers to be ready to heal a tank—and I actually miss them because they meant you needed to keep an eye on the tank and not just slap a regen on them 9 times out of 10–because outside of busters, regens is more than enough to keep them up, with very limited spot healing being actually necessary.

Regarding prioritizing your oGCDs over GCDS—it’s simply because they’re free heals. And several of them are extremely powerful compared to GCD heals (e.g., Indomitability versus Succor/ET+Succor; Earthly Star or Celestial Opposition versus Helios/(Diurnal) Aspected Helios; Afflatus Rapture versus Medica II). GCDs are better spent on damage because, again, healers are very powerful in this game. Plus, with regards to WHM, using Rapture over Medica/Medica II allows for them to weave and avoiding clipping their GCD. For all jobs clipping is considered bad, as you end up delaying your next global—and then every global after that is off, barring downtime in a fight that allows for you to realign them to fit your rotation better. It’s actually considered a design flaw that clipping is so commonplace in WHM, and that they have very few weave options for things like Assize, Asylum, and Divine Benison compared to AST and SCH..

Regarding overhealing—once you have topped everyone off, all other healing is irrelevant. It does nothing. It’s a waste of the resources you have put out. Some overhealing is inevitable (especially on regen healers, since you can’t avoid HoTs ticking beyond maximum HP all the time, or things like Indom and Star criting and healing a person beyond their HP cap), but aiming for a low overheal is ideal because it means you are making the most out of your resources (meaning mana, oGCDS, and GCDs) and not wasting them. You can’t heal beyond 100% HP, so why spend resources on things that will go beyond what your party members need?

+ the general rule that applies to EVERY static I have seen when it comes to loot priority.... DPS -> tank -> heals

For gear priority, in most midcore/hardcore statics, gear is distributed that way because of how damage is in this game. DPS are at the top, with tanks after, and then healers last. That isn’t to say that healers aren’t wonderful assets for damage: it’s just that damage is so important in this game that it’s more worth it to prioritize higher damage dealers first. Even within DPS, some groups assign priority based on where a DPS job stands in terms of their personal damage. For example, I play DNC in my static. I am the lowest in terms of damage among the DPS, so I am fourth place for getting upgrades. Our MNK/SAM and RDM are number one and two respectfully because they deal more damage than me. Our NIN is third.

More healing power isn’t necessary because healers are already extremely overpowered in this game (particularly with all of their oGCD tools they have). Even at minimum item level during Week 1/Week 2, there is nothing in a fight that is impossible to heal and that requires gear upgrades. The only thing more gear would provide is more HP cushioning, more potent heals (which, again, isn’t necessary because healers are already overpowered), and eventual removal/shifting of raidwide mitigative tools such as Soil, Reprisal, tank AOE mitigation (Shake It Off, Dark Missionary, Divine Veil, Passage of Arms), and ranged AOE mitigation (Shield Samba, Troubadour, Tactician).

I remember in other games (i wont name em) where it was the other way around in some raids, other raids had tanks prioritized, etc... but EVERYTHING in this game is about Damage damage damage...

And that is the fault of the developers and how they designed encounters. They didn’t bother to make things hit harder—things are actually steadily getting easier to heal, alongside healers gaining more and more tools to through at raid damage. They didn’t bother to make use of things like crowd-control, debuffs, or even use Esuna (it’s virtually useless in all level-cap content, as most Savage/Ultimate debuffs are not cleansable). They haven’t given healers the support utility that DPS jobs have—AST and SCH do have some raidwide buffs/utility (cards/Divination and Chain Strat), but DPS maintain the majority of these support tools, so the healers don’t have much to do with that kind of raid utility.

There are a lot of players that dont actually enjoy "meter-whoring" as we used to call it in ((other game))

Which is fine. Join groups that are casual and do not care about parsing—there are plenty out there. But for others, parsing and chasing leaderboards are what they find enjoyable. It’s also the only purpose BiS gear really has outside of new Ultimates. It’s overpowered for everything else, as all content but Ultimate can be done in the new crafted gear that comes out every raid tier. With better gear comes better leaderboard chasing.

It sounds like to me that you attempted to join statics that were not on the same page as yourself with regards to static goals. There are plenty out there that don’t care about The Website That Shall Not Be Named or parsing in general. I would recommend looking for the more softcore/casual groups, or casual midcore that don’t care too much about damage and just raid to raid. Do be warned that the mentality of healing only-no DPS on a healer will not fly in content with randoms because it is the majority mindset in this game that healers should DPS when they aren’t having to heal.

[tdb]

For gear priority, in most midcore/hardcore statics, gear is distributed that way because of how damage is in this game. DPS are at the top, with tanks after, and then healers last. That isn’t to say that healers aren’t wonderful assets for damage: it’s just that damage is so important in this game that it’s more worth it to prioritize higher damage dealers first. Even within DPS, some groups assign priority based on where a DPS job stands in terms of their personal damage. For example, I play DNC in my static. I am the lowest in terms of damage among the DPS, so I am fourth place for getting upgrades. Our MNK/SAM and RDM are number one and two respectfully because they deal more damage than me. Our NIN is third.

Is that one upgrade each in that order and then another round, or do you aim to fully gear one person before giving upgrades to the next? The former makes sense, but the latter would feel unfair to me. It's your static of course, but if I joined a static and found out I have to wait months before being allowed to get any loot I probably wouldn't stay with them. I know there's also the book drops everyone gets, but it takes a while to get any gear with those.

[HyoMinPark]

Is that one upgrade each in that order and then another round, or do you aim to fully gear one person before giving upgrades to the next? The former makes sense, but the latter would feel unfair to me. It's your static of course, but if I joined a static and found out I have to wait months before being allowed to get any loot I probably wouldn't stay with them. I know there's also the book drops everyone gets, but it takes a while to get any gear with those.

It is a priority based on BiS sets. And no, we don’t funnel all gear into one DPS first. For example, if the MNK, SAM, and NIN all needed head piece, gloves, and pants, we would do upgrades like: MNK/SAM gets pants, RDM gets head, and NIN gets gloves. Each one would get something. It’s not a matter of waiting months. I’ve actually already got near full BiS minus the stuff from E12S. I’ll get my last ring this week since the NIN and I both needed all Savage accessories and alternated drops each week. They also prioritized jobs that needed specific pieces to fix skill speed/spell speed issues. So like our NIN got a drop week 1 to combat his high skill speed.

The twines and glazes go to whomever can use them that week. Even tanks and healers. At this point, though, I think we’re doing /random for them. I personally don’t need any more for DNC, so the ones I get are all for healer gear, since it’s my secondary.

[Liam_Harper]

Add more bosses like Cúchulainn where there's a constant DoT on the party that's manageable with HoTs, but still chips away more than the HoTs can heal for. Add in mobs that strengthen the DoT's effect (not by a lot) that DPS need to get rid of ASAP, and you've pretty much increased the challenge of content without overdoing it.

It's probably not that simple. A higher frequency of damage would be a great start, the 30-60+ second intervals where we barely need to heal are far too lenient, but more damage intake would not be the magical fix.

-For a start, there's a massive difference between a group of average players near minimum ilv progging a fight and a team of skilled players in BiS, mapping cooldowns and mitigation and coordinating heals. Gear, heal mapping, coordination, mitigation all drastically reduce healing needed when combined together. But while fights shouldn't be braindead-easy, Enix would still have to make sure they are possible for average players who have the basics right. It's difficult to design fights that are possible to clear for normal players but still challenging for the skilled group in BiS.
-Secondly, group composition is very rigid. In a game like WoW, you have 20 players in Mythic and up to 30 in Normal/Heroic and they can be flexible with their healers, bringing more when learning a fight and cutting down when geared and knowing the mechanics. In ff14 we always have 2 healers and mechanics often even try to force this. Two is a difficult number to balance for, since one healer dying or incompetent is half your healers gone.
-Third the game plays slowly. 2.5 sec GCD's, animation delays, clipping, server ticks and so on make it hard to design random reactive fast-paced healing, or gameplay in general. Thus mechanics in FF14 are generally quite scripted and predictable.

Personally I feel the current design of healers is the right direction and they should simply embrace the Battle Medic concept instead of considering reworks that can't work or trying to make "pure healers". To create healers that heal-spam the entire game engine and encounter design needs a major rework and that's not realistic. There will always be downtime in ff14 encounters. The very nature and design of the fights and the benefits gear, mitigation and proper planning provide ensure this.
Dps is actually the best downtime filler by far. Buffs or debuffs work well too and have a place, but have set durations or CD's, while DPS is always useful to the team, flows well and can be used the entire fight at any free moment healing isn't needed.

Embracing battle medic as a design could involve increasing the frequency of incoming damage (we're primarily Healers after all), making the dps kit more engaging and rewarding and treating healer damage as actual flowing dps that works with the toolkit (not against it), like tanks, which means no more clipping, ghosting, immobility, unnecessarily high taxes, lack of weave windows and so on, so it feels smooth to play. Also Piety could at the least get the Tenacity treatment and increase damage too.

Just my opinion on the matter.

Yeah but let's be real here. Most people by far only look at the player's summary page which shows percentile of DPS with no details.

Source?

It's your static of course, but if I joined a static and found out I have to wait months before being allowed to get any loot I probably wouldn't stay with them. I know there's also the book drops everyone gets, but it takes a while to get any gear with those.

I feel statics should be about having a team mindset, rather than gaining loot for personal benefit. The only purpose Savage loot really serves is to reclear faster, prog faster and to parse higher. If your reason for quitting a static is "I want to be able to get a marginally higher parse a few weeks sooner to show off" then you aren't really fit for a static. It doesn't take months to reach your turn anyway, the whole group will be geared just as fast, if not faster, than if it was free-for-all".

[tdb]

I feel statics should be about having a team mindset, rather than gaining loot for personal benefit. The only purpose Savage loot really serves is to reclear faster, prog faster and to parse higher. If your reason for quitting a static is "I want to be able to get a marginally higher parse a few weeks sooner to show off" then you aren't really fit for a static. It doesn't take months to reach your turn anyway, the whole group will be geared just as fast, if not faster, than if it was free-for-all".

It's not about getting a higher parse, it's about being appreciated as a member of the team. It's fine if the DPS get the first pick each week. But if the DPS get all loot until they're fully geared, then the tanks, before healers are finally allowed to get something, that makes me feel like a third-rate citizen as a healer.

It's a bit hard to find information on how the loot drops work. Most clear videos cut off just before the chests are opened and guide videos usually don't show the ending at all. From the ones that did include loot it seems that 2-3 gear coffers are dropped per stage, and some also drop a Cryptlurker upgrade item and/or a special tomestone for the weapon. The total amount from all stages seems about enough for fully gearing one character, so depending on how the distribution of coffers matches gear slots, worst case is that a healer would need to wait six weeks from the start of the tier before getting any loot.

[Rilifane]

It's not about getting a higher parse, it's about being appreciated as a member of the team. It's fine if the DPS get the first pick each week. But if the DPS get all loot until they're fully geared, then the tanks, before healers are finally allowed to get something, that makes me feel like a third-rate citizen as a healer.

It's a bit hard to find information on how the loot drops work. Most clear videos cut off just before the chests are opened and guide videos usually don't show the ending at all. From the ones that did include loot it seems that 2-3 gear coffers are dropped per stage, and some also drop a Cryptlurker upgrade item and/or a special tomestone for the weapon. The total amount from all stages seems about enough for fully gearing one character, so depending on how the distribution of coffers matches gear slots, worst case is that a healer would need to wait six weeks from the start of the tier before getting any loot.

As scripted and low incoming damage in savage is, healers are still important.
The main difference is that they don't need gear to perform their role efficiently and well and gear upgrades have very little impact compared to a dps and to an extend, even tanks. As a healer in raids I feel gear is just wasted on me and will gladly hand it over to a dps or tank anytime and take whatever is left. If I have enough to get by and not be a one shot even through mitigation, that's fine.
Gear makes healing more comfy but with two healers being overkill in most savage fights, it's the last thing I need in our static. In a chaotic PF party it may feel nice but definitely not in a coordinated static.

And even after only a few kills we already had a couple of free for all items, meaning everyone who needs it already got it. And even if it's not BiS, it's an upgrade so there's always the option to take an upgrade that may not be perfect but is still an improvement.

nononono you're missing the point.... I have nothing against meter whoring itself.. I just dont want to be a part of it. thats why I play healers... Its fine to have meter whoring... for people who play DPS. The healers and tanks should be concerned with with keeping their "friends" alive... let the DPS worry about the "Web Site that shall not be names"

You're missing one important point here: although it's all about dps, only an efficient use of your own toolkit and coordination with your co heal allows you to really push dps. The dps you are or are not doing is just a result of your level of gameplay when it comes to your primary function: healing. Only a good healer can become a good green dps. Statics are more willing to take someone who is not yet doing a lot of dps but has the healing part of their class down, meaning they know the fight, the incoming damage and prepare instead of blindly reacting, they use their whole toolkit and keep their oGCD heals rolling, they don't miss important cd uses, line up raid buffs properly, neither overheal too much nor snipe their co heal etc.
Because they may still grow into a really good green dps or at least never crumble under pressure when things go south.

It sounds more like you don't want to be judged for performance but even in games with full-time healers it was all about performance for most endgame players.
Because a good full-time healer, that used their own toolkit efficiently and worked with their co healer(s) gave the static the option to drop a healer for another dps because more dps is always useful. Or it at least allowed healers to spec and play more offensively as a makeshift solution until they reached the threshold for dropping a healer.
It is still all about performance and dps.

Someone who has healbot gameplay level in FFXIV still wouldn't be welcome in many statics in those games because it's clear from the beginning that they will neither enable the static to drop a healer later nor will they be the one switching to dps.

[tdb]

As scripted and low incoming damage in savage is, healers are still important.
The main difference is that they don't need gear to perform their role efficiently and well and gear upgrades have very little impact compared to a dps and to an extend, even tanks. As a healer in raids I feel gear is just wasted on me and will gladly hand it over to a dps or tank anytime and take whatever is left. If I have enough to get by and not be a one shot even through mitigation, that's fine.
Gear makes healing more comfy but with two healers being overkill in most savage fights, it's the last thing I need in our static. In a chaotic PF party it may feel nice but definitely not in a coordinated static.

Sure, on a logical level it makes sense. But on an emotional level it still feels bad if everyone else gets shiny new stuff and I don't. Maybe it's more of a failure in game design that makes healers an afterthought rather than the group being jackasses, but that doesn't change the fact that it feels bad.

Not that you have to worry about getting me in your savage group any time soon, if ever. Recently my interest in the game as a whole has been on the level of "I guess I'll have to do an expert to not miss out on the tomestones" and none of my friends have played in weeks so I'll probably take a break after I get my cryptlurker weapon. Kinda wish the game had less daily/weekly things to grind so it would be easier to just leave.

[Cirque-it]

It sounds like to me that you attempted to join statics that were not on the same page as yourself with regards to static goals. There are plenty out there that don’t care about The Website That Shall Not Be Named or parsing in general.

nononono you're missing the point.... I have nothing against meter whoring itself.. I just dont want to be a part of it. thats why I play healers... Its fine to have meter whoring... for people who play DPS. The healers and tanks should be concerned with with keeping their "friends" alive... let the DPS worry about the "Web Site that shall not be names"

[Liam_Harper]

As for static loot, the priority list I’ve seen written dps > tank > healer is dumb. It’s a team game, 8 players. Every member is pulling their weight so deserve an equal opportunity to role. That’s how I run things, it’s how I’ll always run my static

Nothing wrong with your way at all, but calling others methods dumb is being short-sighted yourself. Gear in a static is simply a tool to achieve your goal. If I, as a healer, have far less use for that tool than the dps, I don't even want it. I'd prefer it went to the team and provided greater contribution.

The healers and tanks should be concerned with with keeping their "friends" alive... let the DPS worry about the "Web Site that shall not be names"

We are concerned with that, it's the primary goal. But if doing both that and damage as a healer is of similar difficulty to doing high damage as a DPS, then it's natural that you'd be expected to do both if you wanted to be viewed as a good player. It's about putting in as much effort into your gameplay as the rest of the group. In the same way DPS aim to have close to 100% uptime pressing their buttons correctly, healers should aim to have nearly 100% uptime pressing buttons correctly too.