I think that it is quite commonplace for someone's "solution" to healing is to go back in time. I get it. You enjoyed AST back then, and I think it is always easier to recall the positive especially when nostalgia comes in. If you turn over some mental stones though, you might recall that there were a TON of problems with healing back then. The gripes were non stop, and it was late in SB that the devs told us they were looking into healing. AST was crazy broken back then. This wasn't because of their cards per se, but because of their utility. AST back then quite possibly had more utility by itself than all of the current jobs in ShB combined.

I think from their perspective they did fix/balance healers. They intentionally made healer DPS the way it is. I have no doubt that they encourage healers to contribute to the damage pool, but they want healers focused on repairing damage. I am quite positive that when healers tunnel vision, or leave dead players on the floor, it drives these guys nuts. It could even be possible that players doing that yesteryear is what lead to healer DPS as is today.

My question for you is, if a huge part of the fun was to help with whatever you can, then what's the problem? There is nothing stopping you from doing that now. Losing job synergy was this dev team's response to players having particular compositions in endgame, and they want all jobs to be relevant. In order to do that, they all have to have selfish mechanics with their skills and a certain amount of homogenization within their respective roles.

In close, I feel we ARE on the middle ground. The game, generally speaking is put together quite well, and it is very enjoyable to play in the various content it offers the playerbase. But there are areas to improve, and this is a good thing; as this team should always be aiming to improve the game. However, their idea of improving the game is not by going backwards. They have other aspirations.