Lets all take a deep breath

[Saefinn]

-Square Enix announces change that makes healers concerned-
-Healers complain-
"Please wait and see you're overreacting"
-Turns out healers were right-
"Maybe they'll fix it"

Repeat cycle.

Admittedly I can see how the changes have potential for being a positive direction for healers. Because I think the "WHM mode" and "SCH mode" mentality of AST sets it back fully embracing its own identity and if anything I think 5.0 changes that move some of the Nocturnal's sects advantages over to Diurnal I think has room for it to do that. If done right, this could mean AST can embrace it's own identity more. If not don't right, this could mean AST is WHM with cards. And SAG would then be Gundam SCH.

Whilst I think the announced changes if done right would be a good thing for healers and healer balance, I fear they're not going to do enough to make it work properly and AST is just going to end up needlessly loosing a niche.

My worry comes out of the fact that it feels like the devs look at healer problems, they see the problem and adjust the bit that on paper sounds like it'll fix the problem but doesn't. Taking a look at all this talk of healing and DPS focus. On paper it looks like the 5.0 changes would "give them more of a healing focus and less of a DPS focus" because they took away DPS spells and gave more healing spells. When in reality it doesn't work that way and if anything made them less healing focused and more DPS focused. Whether that was the devs' intention and whether it was to simplify DPS I realise is up for debate.

But what I could see happening is, they take away shield healing aspects from AST and still make SCH and SAG good "pure" healers. If SCH and SAG are good enough pure healers, then you could find AST and WHM get left behind, which has happened to WHM before, where WHM's identity as a 'pure' healer was erased by the fact SCH can pure heal well enough. Or they just all end up well rounded and this distinction of "shield" and "pure" healer is completely redundant and they've not achieved what they set out to do.


However, /because/ I can see the potential if they do it right that I am going to concede and say "I will reserve judgement until we know more" but for certain I raise concerns, because we know their track record with healers and it's easy to see where the pitfalls are.

I am hoping this ends up being "this is where they give healers a shake up & the direction they need" as opposed to "devs hang onto concepts that are no longer relevant and healers remain a problem because they don't understand how people play them and not address the real issues".