Mr Happy Interview with Yoshida: Glare Mages

[Semirhage]

To further clarify after reading my other post again, I don't mean you can't differentiate *how* healers contribute to damage. I mean that you'd roughly need to put a sliding scale of pDPS to rDPS/utility in, like the magic DPS have.

I maintain that the ugly root of a lot of the problems in the healer role is the absolutist insistence the devs have that WHM be the dumb slow ungabunga healer that isn't allowed to meaningfully evolve, or have utility, or manage anything impactful, ever. Alright, starting a train of thought here. Okay, that's a start, so you forbade most utility, and most specifically damage increasing utility is forbidden. So Black Mage then? That's the no-utility magic DPS, we can work with that.

Oh except it can't be difficult to maintain that personal damage at all, because that's also forbidden. So. Hm. We have a job that's pretty rigidly boxed into the "personal damage" corner, but also have forbidden that personal damage from having a source that requires more than one functioning synapse to maintain. Well.....so what does that mean for, say, Scholar? It's fairly light on the party utility as of Shadowbringers; its only rDPS increase is CS. Scholars want a more involved damage rotation, totally get it and am behind it.

But oh wait, we've already defined WHM as putting out more personal damage than SCH, as personal damage is its only meaningful contribution. Sooo...even if SCH's damage rotation is more complex than WHM's, it also has to output less for more work, otherwise SCH is just straight up better than WHM.

The "glare"(heh)ing question here is...so...why is WHM's damage rotation so stupid again? It's dragging the rest of the role down to its level of simplicity, lest the rest of the role complain they do more work for less output.

And the devs answered that question with "oh shoot you're right. Better make everyone just as dumb so they can't complain they're doing more work for less!". Instead of the obvious answer.

[CrimsonGunner]

To further clarify after reading my other post again, I don't mean you can't differentiate *how* healers contribute to damage. I mean that you'd roughly need to put a sliding scale of pDPS to rDPS/utility in, like the magic DPS have.

I maintain that the ugly root of a lot of the problems in the healer role is the absolutist insistence the devs have that WHM be the dumb slow ungabunga healer that isn't allowed to meaningfully evolve, or have utility, or manage anything impactful, ever. Alright, starting a train of thought here. Okay, that's a start, so you forbade most utility, and most specifically damage increasing utility is forbidden. So Black Mage then? That's the no-utility magic DPS, we can work with that.

Oh except it can't be difficult to maintain that personal damage at all, because that's also forbidden. So. Hm. We have a job that's pretty rigidly boxed into the "personal damage" corner, but also have forbidden that personal damage from having a source that requires more than one functioning synapse to maintain. Well.....so what does that mean for, say, Scholar? It's fairly light on the party utility as of Shadowbringers; its only rDPS increase is CS. Scholars want a more involved damage rotation, totally get it and am behind it.

But oh wait, we've already defined WHM as putting out more personal damage than SCH, as personal damage is its only meaningful contribution. Sooo...even if SCH's damage rotation is more complex than WHM's, it also has to output less for more work, otherwise SCH is just straight up better than WHM.

The "glare"(heh)ing question here is...so...why is WHM's damage rotation so stupid again? It's dragging the rest of the role down to its level of simplicity, lest the rest of the role complain they do more work for less output.

And the devs answered that question with "oh shoot you're right. Better make everyone just as dumb so they can't complain they're doing more work for less!". Instead of the obvious answer.

hmmm isn't it already true with the magic dps we have really? blm still being higher then the rest while having the easiest to learn of the 3 while the rest make up for it in utility and more instant/waving options?
my point is whm is not at fault its SE fault and they pinpoint it on whm, if they really cared as seen from the caster dps and their development the healers could have been fun and maintain a status que like they do in performance (pDPS/rDPS) while still being their own and having fun kits to play

[Acece]

hmmm isn't it already true with the magic dps we have really? blm still being higher then the rest while having the easiest to learn of the 3 while the rest make up for it in utility and more instant/waving options?

blm is the hardest magic dps to play well in a savage raid. whm is by far the easiest.

[CrimsonGunner]

blm is the hardest magic dps to play well in a savage raid. whm is by far the easiest.

that is why i said the easiest to learn not play. to make it a bit more clear you basically catch the mechanics of the class and how to work it quite easy. having astral fire to be dps mode while having umbral ice being the mana regen mode and rotating around those 2. the job is mostly the classic static caster where u sit in one place most of the fight casting spells to make the most use of it but what makes it hard is actually doing that in an heavy movement settings making blm the hardest to play in savage and beyond tier cause there will be many moments where u need to cast and move at the same times to keep damage going or even risking losing your phases.

[Acece]

that is why i said the easiest to learn not play.

like skill floor yeah. Whm can def be low skill floor but high skill celling job.

[CrimsonGunner]

like skill floor yeah. Whm can def be low skill floor but high skill celling job.

exactly

[ty_taurus]

To further clarify after reading my other post again, I don't mean you can't differentiate *how* healers contribute to damage. I mean that you'd roughly need to put a sliding scale of pDPS to rDPS/utility in, like the magic DPS have.

I maintain that the ugly root of a lot of the problems in the healer role is the absolutist insistence the devs have that WHM be the dumb slow ungabunga healer that isn't allowed to meaningfully evolve, or have utility, or manage anything impactful, ever. Alright, starting a train of thought here. Okay, that's a start, so you forbade most utility, and most specifically damage increasing utility is forbidden. So Black Mage then? That's the no-utility magic DPS, we can work with that.

Oh except it can't be difficult to maintain that personal damage at all, because that's also forbidden. So. Hm. We have a job that's pretty rigidly boxed into the "personal damage" corner, but also have forbidden that personal damage from having a source that requires more than one functioning synapse to maintain. Well.....so what does that mean for, say, Scholar? It's fairly light on the party utility as of Shadowbringers; its only rDPS increase is CS. Scholars want a more involved damage rotation, totally get it and am behind it.

But oh wait, we've already defined WHM as putting out more personal damage than SCH, as personal damage is its only meaningful contribution. Sooo...even if SCH's damage rotation is more complex than WHM's, it also has to output less for more work, otherwise SCH is just straight up better than WHM.

The "glare"(heh)ing question here is...so...why is WHM's damage rotation so stupid again? It's dragging the rest of the role down to its level of simplicity, lest the rest of the role complain they do more work for less output.

And the devs answered that question with "oh shoot you're right. Better make everyone just as dumb so they can't complain they're doing more work for less!". Instead of the obvious answer.

Something that's also quite peculiar is that while Chain Stratagem makes sense thematically, why on earth did they add a powerful DPS utility OGCD onto the healer that's already designed to be the most aggressive? Like yeah, they would rather burn the game and everyone in it than give DPS utility to WHM, but purely from a design standpoint, it would be way more fitting to give that to a healer that's supposed to be more heal intensive and doesn't have many OGCD heals to fall back on.

I think there is something to be said about Afflatus Misery's potential, but they're not taking advantage of that at all. With the right lily actions, you could totally have WHM tone down on forefront aggression in favor of spinning huge bursts of AM damage through healing.

Back to SCH, though, I really wish they never gave SCH Chain Stratagem because now they really can't take it away unless they actually do rebuild the job from the group up.

[Semirhage]

Something that's also quite peculiar is that while Chain Stratagem makes sense thematically, why on earth did they add a powerful DPS utility OGCD onto the healer that's already designed to be the most aggressive? Like yeah, they would rather burn the game and everyone in it than give DPS utility to WHM, but purely from a design standpoint, it would be way more fitting to give that to a healer that's supposed to be more heal intensive and doesn't have many OGCD heals to fall back on.

I think there is something to be said about Afflatus Misery's potential, but they're not taking advantage of that at all. With the right lily actions, you could totally have WHM tone down on forefront aggression in favor of spinning huge bursts of AM damage through healing.

Back to SCH, though, I really wish they never gave SCH Chain Stratagem because now they really can't take it away unless they actually do rebuild the job from the group up.

Exactly. I always found it really odd that they seem to really get this when it comes to caster DPS, but when they get to designing healers it's just random BS thrown wherever. Oh, SCH is the healer based on a DPS class? So that means it's the highest personal damage healer right? Which would make it the lowest damage util...oh nevermind it had haste and a crit buff. WHM is the thematic "passive" healer, so it has a bunch of buffs right? Uh, guess not. Okay, I get that you've made...a choice here with personal damage vs raid buffs. So WHM has the most oGCD heals to keep that even more crucial personal damage uptime righ...oh. No that's AST. Which is also the most buff-heavy healer. Eeeehhhh? Head scratching.

Healers have a hoarder pile of really confusing design decisions that make their identities an incoherent mess. Their stated identities aren't reflected in their kits, those kits don't have the internal synergy that supports the identities they *do* have, and they're all balanced around the lowest common denominator because they've identified one of them as both the simplest, and the most powerful (as far as damage output goes). Anyone who says healers in this game are well-designed is like speaking an alien language to me.

[ty_taurus]

Exactly. I always found it really odd that they seem to really get this when it comes to caster DPS, but when they get to designing healers it's just random BS thrown wherever. Oh, SCH is the healer based on a DPS class? So that means it's the highest personal damage healer right? Which would make it the lowest damage util...oh nevermind it had haste and a crit buff. WHM is the thematic "passive" healer, so it has a bunch of buffs right? Uh, guess not. Okay, I get that you've made...a choice here with personal damage vs raid buffs. So WHM has the most oGCD heals to keep that even more crucial personal damage uptime righ...oh. No that's AST. Which is also the most buff-heavy healer. Eeeehhhh? Head scratching.

Healers have a hoarder pile of really confusing design decisions that make their identities an incoherent mess. Their stated identities aren't reflected in their kits, those kits don't have the internal synergy that supports the identities they *do* have, and they're all balanced around the lowest common denominator because they've identified one of them as both the simplest, and the most powerful (as far as damage output goes). Anyone who says healers in this game are well-designed is like speaking an alien language to me.

It all comes down to just a lack of healing experience really. If they had just 1 designer that understood healing and that the team turned to for healing design, we would be in such a better position, and I'd be willing to bet healing would be better for everyone from the most casual of players to the more experienced players if they hired someone for that.

[Nizzi]

Something that's also quite peculiar is that while Chain Stratagem makes sense thematically, why on earth did they add a powerful DPS utility OGCD onto the healer that's already designed to be the most aggressive? Like yeah, they would rather burn the game and everyone in it than give DPS utility to WHM, but purely from a design standpoint, it would be way more fitting to give that to a healer that's supposed to be more heal intensive and doesn't have many OGCD heals to fall back on.

I think there is something to be said about Afflatus Misery's potential, but they're not taking advantage of that at all. With the right lily actions, you could totally have WHM tone down on forefront aggression in favor of spinning huge bursts of AM damage through healing.

Back to SCH, though, I really wish they never gave SCH Chain Stratagem because now they really can't take it away unless they actually do rebuild the job from the group up.

Honestly I really don't get why Scholar is retaining Chain Stratagem, especially with the "split" between shield and regen healers coming in Endwalker. With AST as a regen healer with incredibly powerful oGCD heals, why would you want to take WHM over it? AST offers buffs to the party and is able to heal well, and "healing well" is WHM's thing, right? So if we're playing by the designation that the developers are now saying they're designing by, wouldn't it make more sense for WHM to get party buffs to compensate for this too if WHM's only utility DPS wise is that it does "high DPS"?

And if we go look at the new "shield healer" group, there's Scholar, and then there's Sage. Scholar has Chain Strat, which is a crit buff that will be up every other window because of it's 120s cooldown. Sage? It has high personal DPS. Awesome - but the problem here is that raid buffs are incredibly good, and unless SGE has incredible DPS that makes it a better pick than Scholar, why would you take it over the Chain Strat bot? It's possible this could be the case, but honestly I don't see it happening because the one point where WHM was "meta" over SCH and people were taking in AST+WHM, SE quickly buffed Bio and Broil to correct that (even if it did also include an Energy Drain nerf).

So really, when you have two healers that are in different groups that they're trying to create that are able to buff in raid windows, and then you have two healers that are in different groups that can't contribute anything in those windows other than "they hit the 1 button real good", why wouldn't you still just bring in AST+SCH? I know we'll have to wait until Endwalker to see, but I honestly don't see the "meta" changing at all.