Could a "fully offensive healer" work in FFXIV?

[Genz]

Here's an idea
Remove healers completely and rework jobs so they have their own way to mitigate damage / heal.
Big brain time

Yeah, Gw2 did that and it was awful.

The joke is that FFXIV is already in a similar situation since fights are always more focused on one-shot gimmicks and un-removable vulnerability, so "healing" becomes so unimportant that it doesn't really exist anymore. In both games, DPS have to do their own work to stay alive (self-heal in GW2, avoid aoe/do gimmicks in FFXIV)

[Omedon]

So if i were to give my opinion, it shouldn't be a healer's role to do dps as a rule, but rather something that you do IF you can, meaning that if people is not making mistakes and they're not eating more damage than they should then that should be rewarded as an opening to put some resources in to dealing dps, maybe a a dot or a few casts once in a while if your team does great, but that's it.

See, I'd love to see this be the communal social compact of modern healing, but, especially in FFXIV, my impression has always been an expectation of DPS on the part of the healer. It's a big reason why all healing gear I loot is vendored and I don't even consider starting a hoard for leveling a healing class/job.

HOWEVER... again, I'm mostly a "trust guy," and I know for a fact that the scions wouldn't sass me for not DPSing as a healer, so it's not impossible that I'll go that route some day, since I can level from literally 1-wherever in Deep dungeons or NPC dungeon parties, and deep dungeons I'd mostly go "DPS unless there's an emergency."

[Ignithe]

An interesting question about healer/dps hybrids is whether or not to introduce a hybrid tax (lowering output to balance against being able to do both). If a healer role were to be able to do serious dps and heals, it could be more beneficial from a balance point of view.

I've seen games with this meta come out, and the gimmick becomes to down the boss before mechanics can kill the party. By downing the boss a % faster is to deal with a % fewer mechanics, including damage. So dps becomes a mitigation tool, in a sense. Once a game goes down this path, it is hard for any other kind of healing to be relevant, and that is probably why we won't see this kind of healer in FF14.

[LisSquid]

The joke is that FFXIV is already in a similar situation since fights are always more focused on one-shot gimmicks and un-removable vulnerability, so "healing" becomes so unimportant that it doesn't really exist anymore. In both games, DPS have to do their own work to stay alive (self-heal in GW2, avoid aoe/do gimmicks in FFXIV)

Was just talking about this to the guild from ESO (this seems to be the general trend among mmos, save a handful). Stems from end of expansion healers being so powerful that the most brain dead priest could carry an entire raid to victory with the good ol' "Stand in fire to DPS higher!"

To curb this, the design has skewed to where healing is only needed for scripted raidwides. One vuln stack means the next mistake is going to kill you, full hp or not, in content where it matters. Using a GCD heal on that person then becomes a waste. In ESO, it has become so bad that you ideally do not want to bring healers to content unless there's specifically a heal check. Even then, Vigor (a class unrestricted stamina heal) is so strong that you only need one or two dps to slot it to beat it half the time. This is even in raids, too.

I know exactly what OP is talking about with a fully offensive healer, and DISC was one of the most punishing, yet rewarding, healers to play in any mmo I've had my grubby hands on. Juggling atonement around your party and only having two actual healing spells (one that is only temporary hp, the other is a shield) is big pressure. When you learned an encounter, though? You felt like a god.

I like the WHM ability Assize. It does damage, it restores mp, and it does a truckload of raid healing. This is a great ability to find use for, but with how little damage there seems to be, and how many lilies I generate between big damage, it usually feels like I'm wasting on overheal somewhere to get that blood lily fed. Perhaps SE can take a look at Assize and think a bit about synergizing healing and damage in a way that compliments their encounter design. They already script fights around 60s CDs, and I'm sure more than a few healers would be thankful for more than spamming one GCD an entire fight.

[Alexandre_Noireau]

Yeah, Gw2 did that and it was awful.

Kinda it isn't, in fact is one of the main features of the game and it actually works wonders. There is a reason it has both good PvE and PvP with the same combat. The problems of GW2 are far from it's combat and classes, is more of being unable to achieve "consistency".

The problem with XIV is in fact the lack of customization and hiperfocus on balance and strict adherance to roles. The removal of stuff like elements and statuses, and sticking to the obtuse and since the 70`flawed trinity. There is a fourth role, there is support, and healing and support should be diferent. We need parties of 5s and 10s. We need elements and status back. Etc. Balance has given absolutely nothing to this game. Unlike GW2, we don't even have a decent PvP or PvE/P hibrid experience worth all this resources wasted on making sure everyone uses the same skills in the same order wearing the exact same gear pieces repeating the same gearing process... Yeah, someone get these people mathematical uncertainty. Besides, dances are also getting old.

Who is happy about this ? The Ultimate raiders ? Is it worth the wait and resources ?

I wanna be an evasion off tank self-regen dragoon. Besides Estinien is getting much better instances and main scenario quest than us anyway.

[Enjuden]

We have them, they're called WHM, AST, SCH, and SGE. Doesn't mean it isn't boring right now (it is), but that's the situation right now.