It's time to kill the argument that DPS abilities keep healers from healing.

[CrimsonGunner]

i have had enough, you call yourself "pure healers" / "actual healers" maybe even "healing masters" but you are actually the stuff people in party pray not to enter, the people that you want to avoid and you know what you are called, the leachers.

what do you lot see in your fantasy?

A)your party is full hp and you just sit there and once they hit you scream "DONT WORRY I WILL HEAL YOU" and from 99% hp he gets to 100%

B) your party members say help and you say "dont worry heres a heal" and you smile like a fool

then let me tell you what reality see instead and what your party truly see:

for A, yea that is another afk person that won't do anything, either we bare with him weights and just continue until the end or kick him and either wait for a normal healer or even lets do it solo cause we can't wait for 15+ min until a healer will join(but you probably its not cause they are soooooooo many healers that the gameplay actually keeps them playing, HAHAHHAHA ).

for B, the party scream for help not because they are hurt and need heal ,they scream at you cause after they did all the work, passed the very tight dps checks in runs that you lazily did not help cause "me pure healer, me only heal".
the party is about to hit enrage, they don't need further healing and instead to actually be helpful and be supportive to the party and help end the long hard progging experience, they are about to fail(cause the game actually designed to make you pick up your slack on dps, yes you the "pure healer" ) and you "princesses" don't want to lift a finger cause pressing 1-2 to actually help is hard and prefer to ignore their cries and expect that pressing 1 basic spell an entire run is actually a luxury and people need to be honored by the fact that healers bother to press them when they don't heal.

but guess what we "would-be healers", the healers who not only heal also want to contribute to our party, the healers that when they don't heal actually want to support the party in any way we can, the ones that throw every buff we can when we don't heal: like reduce damage, so people can keep going without worry, throw buffs that increase performance or throw debuffs at enemies to actually weaken them and if we have neither then we might actually pull up our sleeves and join the fray and actually do dps if we are able proabably care more then you about healing.

yes i would call you leachers cause if you were actually pure healers you would actually read what people are saying ,how they actually want to heal more ,how they want to help more in a party in all times in meaningful ways when they don't need to heal and actually debate and throw valid points., you know like normal people who like healing would do.
but no, you are not, you are so scared you actually will lift a finger that you just reject anything said about actually contributing more, claiming "all they want is dps so i dismiss your call" or "who cares if it actually happens cause its 1 run from many" or "you just want a dps that can heal so just go for a different role" when said people actually advocate how they want to heal and support more, all to just justify the fact that the true toxic behavior comes from you.

[Punslinger]

All this(sic) problem are just from the assumption that healers have to be pressing something 100% of the time.

A reasonable assumption, given that the alternative to pressing something is pressing nothing. If you are standing around intentionally doing nothing, then you are sandbagging your team, and asking seven other players to carry your lazy ass.

There are plenty of games where supports don't have to deal any damage and just have downtime between healing.

Then go play those games, and stop asking the rest of us to carry you.

Only in XIV do people complain "dps dps I want to dps" as a healer.

Overwatch says, "Hi."

As you all say not every role has to be the same, dps and tanks are already told to press buttons 100% of the time and optimize their damage, so why can't healers have less stressful gameplay to satisfy players who would rather not have to optimize every second of the fight to press one more glare?

If any of the tone-police here are wondering why we call people Sylphies and look down on them, I present this comment as Exhibit A. This is a person who is whining that Glare-spam is already too galaxy-brained for them to handle, while explicitly confirming that they want healing to be the FF14 Easy Mode role for lazy players.

[Liam_Harper]

A...Are you seriously proposing that in order to fix healer's gameplay we should just not play the game the majority of the time?

This is hilarious 10/10 trolling

They're in the top 50 in the world for AST logs this Savage tier. They're 100% hard trolling.

There's nothing like Sylphie justification to really rile up the forums, so it's easy bait. To be fair, after several years of Glare, Glare, Glare and just being told it's going to stay that way indefinitely, I don't blame us.

[Hjihna]

I've lurked these forums for a bit, as someone who's generally interested in what people have to say, and not a very good healer, all told. I understand the frustration with having not very much to do, tho I'm personally still engaged enough just learning fights or maintaining awareness (and, frankly, spamming Holy). But like...does it make sense to approach the question of boredom from the perspective of 1) someone who knows all their fights and can plan them out and 2) starting new pulls on failed mechanics because we assume that's a wipe anyway?

I ask, because those are assumptions (however true in your case) that are naturally going to make healing more boring. You're essentially taking the worst-case scenario for healer engagement and using it as the basis for balance. DPS don't DPS less when everyone does their jobs better. Tanks don't tank less when everyone does their jobs better. But healers DO heal less when everyone does their jobs better. Healers heal less if everyone knows the fight (which does take time and effort, even if it doesn't require any great amount of skill). Healers don't even get opportunities to try and recover, if you just restart on failed mechanics so you can get a clean run. (I'll note that for recoverable fights, I and the healers I've played with have pulled out the stops and sometimes succeeded or sometimes failed, but generally had fun) Hell, healers heal less when people have better gear! (which is maybe an argument for smaller allowed iLvl ranges) You're looking at a best-case scenario for play (however achievable you think it is), which is actually a worst case scenario for healing.

Now, do healers deserve to be punished for playing better, or with better players? No. But I'm not sure it makes sense to balance healing around *the exact least engaging scenario for healer play,* no matter how awful y'all vets feel about it. Wanting more DPS options or utility toolkits or better-tuned fights sounds good and all, but all those things would make learning to heal more difficult...and without RADICAL changes to the FFXIV fight formula, I don't even think they're a solution to the malaise. I don't think there's any content that won't be a faceroll when you've learned it and optimized the way you play. People complain about dungeons being mass pull hallways, but then resent the less linear ARR dungeons when they get them in roulette. People complain about raids all being arena fights, but then bitch about mobs. People complain about how gear trivializes fights, but will still gear as best they can. So long as damage is predictable and manageable by healers of less skill, more skilled healers will figure it out and optimize and get bored. No?

[Rosa_Frandlia]

If you just remove glare it fixes the problem entirely.


All this problem are just from the assumption that healers have to be pressing something 100% of the time. There are plenty of games where supports don't have to deal any damage and just have downtime between healing. Only in XIV do people complain "dps dps I want to dps" as a healer. As you all say not every role has to be the same, dps and tanks are already told to press buttons 100% of the time and optimize their damage, so why can't healers have less stressful gameplay to satisfy players who would rather not have to optimize every second of the fight to press one more glare?

Question for you. If you removed DPS from healers how would we get through the MSQ and the solo duties? This would turn healers into a limited job that is unable to do the MSQ. Is that what you want? Also, in those duties should healers have only 1 spell to cast as that isn't riveting game play.

[Drkdays]

I've lurked these forums for a bit, as someone who's generally interested in what people have to say, and not a very good healer, all told. I understand the frustration with having not very much to do, tho I'm personally still engaged enough just learning fights or maintaining awareness (and, frankly, spamming Holy). But like...does it make sense to approach the question of boredom from the perspective of 1) someone who knows all their fights and can plan them out and 2) starting new pulls on failed mechanics because we assume that's a wipe anyway?

I ask, because those are assumptions (however true in your case) that are naturally going to make healing more boring. You're essentially taking the worst-case scenario for healer engagement and using it as the basis for balance. DPS don't DPS less when everyone does their jobs better. Tanks don't tank less when everyone does their jobs better. But healers DO heal less when everyone does their jobs better. Healers heal less if everyone knows the fight (which does take time and effort, even if it doesn't require any great amount of skill). Healers don't even get opportunities to try and recover, if you just restart on failed mechanics so you can get a clean run. (I'll note that for recoverable fights, I and the healers I've played with have pulled out the stops and sometimes succeeded or sometimes failed, but generally had fun) Hell, healers heal less when people have better gear! (which is maybe an argument for smaller allowed iLvl ranges) You're looking at a best-case scenario for play (however achievable you think it is), which is actually a worst case scenario for healing.

Now, do healers deserve to be punished for playing better, or with better players? No. But I'm not sure it makes sense to balance healing around *the exact least engaging scenario for healer play,* no matter how awful y'all vets feel about it. Wanting more DPS options or utility toolkits or better-tuned fights sounds good and all, but all those things would make learning to heal more difficult...and without RADICAL changes to the FFXIV fight formula, I don't even think they're a solution to the malaise. I don't think there's any content that won't be a faceroll when you've learned it and optimized the way you play. People complain about dungeons being mass pull hallways, but then resent the less linear ARR dungeons when they get them in roulette. People complain about raids all being arena fights, but then bitch about mobs. People complain about how gear trivializes fights, but will still gear as best they can. So long as damage is predictable and manageable by healers of less skill, more skilled healers will figure it out and optimize and get bored. No?

Reposting because yes.

[GrimGale]

But like...does it make sense to approach the question of boredom from the perspective of 1) someone who knows all their fights and can plan them out and 2) starting new pulls on failed mechanics because we assume that's a wipe anyway?

It does make sense if you consider experience and optimization to be the natural result of playing the game. If Devs create content to be run repeatedly and make said content require a Healer then they must design the jobs to adapt to a player base that has the capacity to evolve and learn.

You say that designing jobs around the worse possible scenario for healing doesn't make sense, but it also doesn't make sense to design jobs around the best scenario for healing either, knowing how much these two scenarios will naturally vary the moment your players get to know the fights and gear up.

The fact remains Healing dowtime occurs naturally. Devs should account for that.

[Rilifane]

snippy snip

People despise ARR dungeons because we lost a ton of our skills from actual ARR era, ilvl sync got more and more lenient with time, we had several potency buffs to skills and lost aggro and MP management. We leave every button that's remotely fun at the entrance and use 123 for ST with the occasional 4 and 5 and 1212 or just 1111 for aoe for the entire dungeon. On dps, mind you. On healer we have even less buttons.
With the original toolkit and maybe even some cross class shenanigans, many ARR dungeons were fun. Much more than any of the current hallway dungeons with a perfect 3 packs - 1 boss rotation 3 times.

The fights are already balanced around worst case scenarios in terms of party and especially healer gameplay.
Casual content unavoidable damage occurs with gaps of sometimes a full minute between hits. Avoidable damage usually hits for so little a single heal is all it takes to take care of it. Resses are only limited by healer MP. No enrages, so no pressure to even keep people alive at all cost.

But everyone that has gotten past the sprout stage of "keep everyone topped at all times, keep shields and regens up, oGCDs are for emergencies, only dps when everyone is full HP and I had nothing to heal for a few GCDs" has nothing.
Not even endgame fights are balanced with more experienced healers in mind and to add insult to injury, we have a single button to fill our downtime.
More dps skills will not make it harder to heal. Period. It won't.
It will make it harder to optimize dps. But not healing itself.
If you feel uncomfortable using them, don't use them or only a few of them until you heal more efficiently to give you more time to focus on other things.

If a healer feels overwhelmed because of so many dps buttons and then fails at healing, that has nothing to do with the amount of dps buttons. It's on them, because they set the wrong priority and focused on all the downtime fillers instead of their primary role. It doesn't just "sound good and all", it's the only way to keep the skill floor low while raising the skill ceiling.
Or should vet healers be permanently bored just because someone can't handle a skill on their hotbar they're not using anyway because they're still struggling with just healing even when doing it fulltime?

[Sebazy]

I've lurked these forums for a bit, as someone who's generally interested in what people have to say, and not a very good healer, all told. I understand the frustration with having not very much to do, tho I'm personally still engaged enough just learning fights or maintaining awareness (and, frankly, spamming Holy). But like...does it make sense to approach the question of boredom from the perspective of 1) someone who knows all their fights and can plan them out and 2) starting new pulls on failed mechanics because we assume that's a wipe anyway?

In my opinion, the clear answer is to aim for somewhere in the middle surely? Right now healing is tuned to the lowest common denominator in the majority of content pre Extremes. I fully appreciate that it's not viable to have everything auto attack like Clown Kefka but the game could really do with some small semblance of a difficulty curve once you hit the end game. The fact that the first pull in a level 65 dungeon is arguably more dangerous to heal than just about any 'expert' dungeon speaks volumes about how poorly healing is tuned in this game overall. I'm not really sure what you mean by point 2) though? That's a speed run or very specific progression thing. People don't tend to force a wipe after a failure unless they are confident they aren't going to beat enrage or are just going for logs. I'm not sure why you would try to make a point of it in this discussion? I've certainly not seen that suggested as a point elsewhere here.

I ask, because those are assumptions (however true in your case) that are naturally going to make healing more boring. You're essentially taking the worst-case scenario for healer engagement and using it as the basis for balance. DPS don't DPS less when everyone does their jobs better. Tanks don't tank less when everyone does their jobs better. But healers DO heal less when everyone does their jobs better. Healers heal less if everyone knows the fight (which does take time and effort, even if it doesn't require any great amount of skill). Healers don't even get opportunities to try and recover, if you just restart on failed mechanics so you can get a clean run. (I'll note that for recoverable fights, I and the healers I've played with have pulled out the stops and sometimes succeeded or sometimes failed, but generally had fun) Hell, healers heal less when people have better gear! (which is maybe an argument for smaller allowed iLvl ranges) You're looking at a best-case scenario for play (however achievable you think it is), which is actually a worst case scenario for healing.

Ok hang on a second. Can we please pump the brakes on this whole deal of 'all runs get wiped if someone fails something' angle? It's borderline hyperbole and just not typical outside of specific logs runs and such. You only have to go back a page or two to see where I've used charts from my own runs where we've had 8 deaths and still merrily trundled on to a clear.

Back on track though. You need to add the fact that Healer's heal considerably less as they do their own job better. This is even more so in casual content. Case in point, Amaurot last boss:

Two comedy deaths vs No deaths

Spot the difference. He got a swiftcast raise and a Regen. Nothing more was needed as this was enough to top him before the next AoE. His comedy deaths didn't ruin my run, in fact it barely made any difference at all.

You are falling into the same trap of overvaluing the impact of other's mistakes on your gameplay. If you can avoid overreacting to these mistakes it'll make you a much more efficient healer whilst also helping to reduce the risk of someone else's error snowballing into mistakes of your own.

Now, do healers deserve to be punished for playing better, or with better players? No. But I'm not sure it makes sense to balance healing around *the exact least engaging scenario for healer play,* no matter how awful y'all vets feel about it.

So..... how do we feel about tuning gameplay to slot somewhere in the middle? The world isn't black and white. Not everything has to be done to one extreme or the other. We live in an analogue existence so I'm not sure why the middle ground doesn't seem to exist in your views here?

Wanting more DPS options or utility toolkits or better-tuned fights sounds good and all, but all those things would make learning to heal more difficult

We've had more DPS options. Was Creator considered to be a hard tier because of them? No. Not even remotely. It was arguably the easiest raid tier yet when it landed.

The same can be said for utility as well. Again, I'm really not sure how you can link having more utility with making healing more difficult? Healer's could merrily sail through everything short of Coil without ever touching Virus or Eye for an Eye.

I don't think there's any content that won't be a faceroll when you've learned it and optimized the way you play. People complain about dungeons being mass pull hallways, but then resent the less linear ARR dungeons when they get them in roulette. People complain about raids all being arena fights, but then bitch about mobs. People complain about how gear trivializes fights, but will still gear as best they can. So long as damage is predictable and manageable by healers of less skill, more skilled healers will figure it out and optimize and get bored. No?

It feels like your nitpicking various random moans from elsewhere and bringing them into this thread to try and bulk up your point TBH, I'm not really sure why half of these points are relevant to this?

Why wouldn't people gear as best as they can? That's the carrot that drives the end game and progression as a whole in a vertical MMO. This doesn't change the fact that a lot of content is either undertuned from the moment it lands or that gear just scales too strongly to keep things interesting beyond a month's worth of upgrades. Perhaps this is something that the stat squish will address though.

Damage being entirely predictable and manageable is the a big part of the overall problem though. The overarching formula and gameplay for healers has only really regressed over the last 5 years of raid content, so it's inevitable that it'll be stale and optimised to within an inch of it's life by this point.

[Sebazy]

starting new pulls on failed mechanics because we assume that's a wipe anyway?

Healers don't even get opportunities to try and recover, if you just restart on failed mechanics so you can get a clean run. (I'll note that for recoverable fights, I and the healers I've played with have pulled out the stops and sometimes succeeded or sometimes failed, but generally had fun)

To these points specifically, I raise you:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ry2a-1DZ-mE