Healer design is still terrible and I'm tired of apologizing for it.

[Risvertasashi]

The problems with the content do not change at min-item level. XIV's healers are explicitly designed around everyone else making way more mistakes than you should reasonably expect in the long run, because their encounters are entirely based on finding the safe spot, which one person CAN do in cases like Zodiark. That invariably makes balancing between newbies and the speedclear/world-first meta worse. If you're expected to dodge everything, you're gonna try and dodge everything. but if your primary mechanical test irrespective of role is dodging things, you shouldn't be surprised when things feel stale and/or frustrating. The result of that design is healer kits have an extremely limited shelf life. What people are asking for is for SE to do something to prevent healers from getting stale as a result of that, either by changing the encounters such that penalties for getting hit by a positional mistake are lower but unavoidable damage is higher yet overall potential damage intake in those spike windows remains the same (you know, making mechanics less punishing in isolation, but still require healers when things are going well), or by giving healers things to focus on when things -are- going well. In my opinion, both should happen, because multi-dot management ultimately lets people like FuzzyMuffin meet expectations by only gunning for 100% DoT uptime while people who do want to maximize their support potential have appropriate pressure DURING prog AND more things to micromanage after they're done prog.

The ultimate result of dodging is this game feels super easy for veterans but impossibly annoying for newcomers to get into if they rush. The design's gotta let up somewhere, and shifting the tempo of encounters is generally a good way to do that.

Oddly enough, some of the better healing experiences I've had were in games are where damage is 100% avoidable. But the key difference is they're harder to predict; not on set timelines, etc.

You touch on this when you comment dodging is easy for veterans. Even in a fight like Z extreme, you're often looking to see if the safe spot is in one of two locations (Slightly more for the stars, but there will always be a safe spot in the front half of the arena). The fights rigidly conform to patterns, have set timelines where there might be 2 paths or maybe you don't know if the mechanic will be "in" or "out" but it always occurs at the same time so you're ready for both.

A game that's as set or predictable as FF14, then, runs into several problems. At least in harder content or content meant to present a challenge... Even messing up once has to often be lethal (or in the case of ultimates and harder savages, a group wipe event). A lot of damage has to be unavoidable, but not too much so a healer death can be recoverable at least a little bit of the time.

But even if you do all that, the whole GCD uptime design means there's a lot of healing/recovery downtime. And thus... we run into the stale healer problem, not limited to ex primals but even extending up into ultimates.

[AFuzzyMu11in]

Oddly enough, some of the better healing experiences I've had were in games are where damage is 100% avoidable. But the key difference is they're harder to predict; not on set timelines, etc.

You touch on this when you comment dodging is easy for veterans. Even in a fight like Z extreme, you're often looking to see if the safe spot is in one of two locations (Slightly more for the stars, but there will always be a safe spot in the front half of the arena). The fights rigidly conform to patterns, have set timelines where there might be 2 paths or maybe you don't know if the mechanic will be "in" or "out" but it always occurs at the same time so you're ready for both.

A game that's as set or predictable as FF14, then, runs into several problems. At least in harder content or content meant to present a challenge... Even messing up once has to often be lethal (or in the case of ultimates and harder savages, a group wipe event). A lot of damage has to be unavoidable, but not too much so a healer death can be recoverable at least a little bit of the time.

But even if you do all that, the whole GCD uptime design means there's a lot of healing/recovery downtime. And thus... we run into the stale healer problem, not limited to ex primals but even extending up into ultimates.

Z extreme is an abomination of a mechanic with the rotation. So, I would never hold someone accountable for choosing to follow the leader and never learn it.

[Grimoire-M]

Oddly enough, some of the better healing experiences I've had were in games are where damage is 100% avoidable. But the key difference is they're harder to predict; not on set timelines, etc.

You touch on this when you comment dodging is easy for veterans. Even in a fight like Z extreme, you're often looking to see if the safe spot is in one of two locations (Slightly more for the stars, but there will always be a safe spot in the front half of the arena). The fights rigidly conform to patterns, have set timelines where there might be 2 paths or maybe you don't know if the mechanic will be "in" or "out" but it always occurs at the same time so you're ready for both.

A game that's as set or predictable as FF14, then, runs into several problems. At least in harder content or content meant to present a challenge... Even messing up once has to often be lethal (or in the case of ultimates and harder savages, a group wipe event). A lot of damage has to be unavoidable, but not too much so a healer death can be recoverable at least a little bit of the time.

But even if you do all that, the whole GCD uptime design means there's a lot of healing/recovery downtime. And thus... we run into the stale healer problem, not limited to ex primals but even extending up into ultimates.

The fact XIV leans hard on its predictable scripting is definitely part of the dodge problem, though even when it's unpredictable I don't think playing Where's Waldo mid-fight is necessarily fun by itself. Spread & stack markers/tethers at least make you coordinate with your group which creates more dynamic tension, and I generally find mechanics that encourage that interaction to be more fun in a group environment. Still, I don't expect SE's predictability to ever change until they clean up their AI. The bug abuses involving cleave routines on ARR/HW Bosses look very similar to the breaks with Stormblood Bahamut, which makes me think it is a universal problem. I don't think that's gone away just because they turned the ranges up of tank busters to 150y or abuse fixed boss positioning/timing to get things to perform properly. But I suspect that work is probably why they can't do it. It seems way more reasonable to ask for more raid-wides and prey markers, and to design fights around macro-management mechanics that essentially act as soft-enrages by triggering those mechanics. You can technically do that with some basic add spawns with guaranteed routines that demand crowd control without ever putting down an actual AoE at all if it weren't for those abuse cases. But it could be done with their hidden AI host mob doing a quick headcount while running a background timer for when those things are supposed to happen. Or by introducing something as seemingly boring yet persistent as Nisi or Allagan Rot hot potato and putting in appropriate fail-safes. All of those are fine, if you tune around the potential spikes.

The tools and systems are certainly there, they just need to be willing to explore them again, using the context of how they've built around their mistakes to make it work. I just think sacrificing position-based mechanics for ones that demand consistent player interaction is the easier ask and more interesting space. RNG is RNG, and I don't think RNG fixes XIV's problems without other layers like that being put in place first.

[Leigaon]

...even in casual content you can have more interesting healing without going to such extremes. great gubal library's first miniboss autoattacks the party randomly, and it sure as hell ensures i have to at least actually pay attention to the party list more than once a minute, which is something i cannot say of even some savage floors. (anyone remember e7s lmao??) ...

Okay, I took a look at a guide for E-12 savage phase 1. Lots of dancing. What comes up to me with the library example is something like the first boss in the Vault that targets a random person. For the trash or the environment of the dungeon as a whole you're then looking at wide area damage from mobs or environment, target players other than the tank for damage. Taking the savage examples and putting them into casual content (to a lesser extent) as players roam through dungeons or instances, that would make for more exciting healing gameplay?

Along with the other suggestions of cool down adjustment, expanding abilities (the AST synergy example that was given) along with a 1 - 2 - 3 combo for offensive spells. This would all come out to be fun healing?

[OtakuSempai]

Okay, I took a look at a guide for E-12 savage phase 1. Lots of dancing. What comes up to me with the library example is something like the first boss in the Vault that targets a random person. For the trash or the environment of the dungeon as a whole you're then looking at wide area damage from mobs or environment, target players other than the tank for damage. Taking the savage examples and putting them into casual content (to a lesser extent) as players roam through dungeons or instances, that would make for more exciting healing gameplay?

... along with a 1 - 2 - 3 combo for offensive spells.

I don't think anyone here is advocating for 1-2-3 combo for healer downtime rotations. Sure, it would be an easy way to spice up gameplay for healers during downtime and would probably cost minimal dev resources, but it would be lazy and uninspired.

Personally, I would love to see more resource management involved in the moment to moment gameplay, which would allow more depth for veteran players while not being overbearing on new players.

Let me have more ways to interact with kardia and addersting on sage for example. Or ways to manipulate seals/cards that change up your damage phase on ast. Maybe have a mini blm rotation on whm that used stone and wind abilities that interacted with lilies. There's a lot you can add that adds more interaction with the existing kits/job guages without adding a full on damage rotation per se.

[Leigaon]

I don't think anyone here is advocating for 1-2-3 combo for healer downtime rotations. Sure, it would be an easy way to spice up gameplay for healers during downtime and would probably cost minimal dev resources, but it would be lazy and uninspired.

Personally, I would love to see more resource management involved in the moment to moment gameplay, which would allow more depth for veteran players while not being overbearing on new players.

Let me have more ways to interact with kardia and addersting on sage for example. Or ways to manipulate seals/cards that change up your damage phase on ast. Maybe have a mini blm rotation on whm that used stone and wind abilities that interacted with lilies. There's a lot you can add that adds more interaction with the existing kits/job guages without adding a full on damage rotation per se.

If no one wants the 1 - 2 - 3 combo, are you looking at offensive spells that trigger other spells whether they're offensive or defensive? Would you like to have a Light magic / wind magic / water magic stances or something similar to BLM orbs?

What would you want to manipulate on AST cards? Duration? Power of Buff? AoE? Changing Buff?

Would you change how Lilies are accumulated right now to fit into the game play others might find more meaningful? Or would you rather they are gathered by other abilities and expanding it? Or would you like to have it on a timer like with Sage?

[Semirhage]

Healer kits are so noninteractive that you could do practially anything to them and they'd be more engaging. You could give one of their DoTs a Thundercloud-like mechanic. You could add a Greased Lightning reward for keeping your GCD rolling. You could make regen ticks upgrade the main damage spam into a Ruin 4. You could increase the damage refund from Misery so there's actual incentive to use it instead of making it a strict loss. You could add a buff that activates when you use a GCD heal that doesn't overheal. Add ways to pop regens early so they don't just have their one single passive effect.

You could add one of these things. Or all of them. Or a different set of design principles entirely. There's a limitless galaxy of design ideas that's better than Dot 1111111111 Dot refresh 1111111111 Dot refresh oGCD heal 1111111111 Dot refresh 1111 oGCD heal 11111

[QooEr]

What would you want to manipulate on AST cards? Duration? Power of Buff? AoE? Changing Buff?

this is literally what i miss the most from pre shb ast. even if "all" they did was making every card a dps buff, it would Still be better than current cards because youd have royal road to play with the potency/duration/range of cards, and time dilation/celestial opposition to extend both buffs and heals.

[HyoMinPark]

If no one wants the 1 - 2 - 3 combo, are you looking at offensive spells that trigger other spells whether they're offensive or defensive? Would you like to have a Light magic / wind magic / water magic stances or something similar to BLM orbs?

I’d be happy with a second DoT to manage on healers. Pre-ShB WHM had Aero II and Aero III—both were different durations, so you had to monitor both; and Aero III was even an AOE DoT, so it was something different to throw on things like dungeon pulls rather than spamming Holy until your eyes bleed. SCH used to have Bio I, Bio II, Miasma, and Miasma II; and I honestly loved juggling all of those. I’d settle for even just Bio I and Bio II at this point (different durations, please, so I have something to pay attention to and not just refresh them back to back all the time). AST lost its multiple DoTs with SB, but it still had the cards; so I can kind of excuse it for having just 1 DoT 1 Nuke since there’s a bit more to do.

What would you want to manipulate on AST cards? Duration? Power of Buff? AoE? Changing Buff?

Yes, actually. That’s how AST used to be designed. Each card did something different—3 were offensive buffs and 3 were utility cards. Royal Road could Extend, Enhance, or Expand the buffs; they weren’t just rinky-dink single targets all the time. ShB changed that to make them all 3%/6% buff cards and threw the Seal mechanic on there as justification for keeping all 6 versus trashing 4 of them.

I don’t know how familiar you are with old AST, but here’s a quick summary of what each card and Royal Road effect did by the end of SB (there were potency changes and duration changes for several from HW until then):
- Bole: +20% mitigation on target for 30 seconds (perfect on a tank for dungeon pulls)
- Balance: +10% damage on target for 30 seconds (everyone’s favorite card)
- Spear: +10% critical hit change on target for 30 seconds (before it was a cooldown reduction that only worked on CDs used while it was active on a party member; very lackluster and usually used as Royal Road fodder. When they changed it, it became SB BRD and MNK’s favorite card)
- Arrow: +10% weaponskill cast and recast speed increase for 30 seconds (BLM’s favorite card; SAMs also didn’t mind it. Perfect card if you wanted to punish/troll your MCH or NIN, too)
- Spire: TP regeneration for 20 seconds (Royal Road or Minor Arcana fodder most of the time - easily the least missed card buff)
- Ewer: MP regeneration for 20 seconds (actually decent for AST in SB since they had MP issues if you didn’t time Lucid + COpp for extended mana regen on cooldown, or if your party lacked a physical ranged with Refresh/caster with Mana Shift)

Royal Road effects:
- Bole or Balance = Enhanced effect, which gave you +150% enhanced effect of the card
- Spear or Arrow = Extended effect, which doubled the duration of the card
- Spire or Ewer = Expanded effect, which halved the effect of the card but expanded it to the whole party (e.g., Expanded Balanced was +5% for the whole party for 30 seconds)

Throw in COpp and Time Dilation to extend the effects further on the party or a single party member, and AST was so much fun.

I may just be an AST boomer, but I really cannot express how much fun I had on AST with the old card system versus the system we have now. And I’ll never not miss it.

Would you change how Lilies are accumulated right now to fit into the game play others might find more meaningful? Or would you rather they are gathered by other abilities and expanding it? Or would you like to have it on a timer like with Sage?

Personally, I find Addersgall to be a better Lily/Aetherflow system. It’s passive and generates on its own; the skills tied to it are oGCD so that you don’t have to use a GCD to burn the resource—WHM doesn’t really need to use their lilies for weaves anymore with the cast time change, so they lost a lot of utility there; and mobility is higher since slidecasting is easier now. Addersgall also doesn’t have a damage ability tied to it that results in either a resource burn (Energy Drain) or a DPS loss (Misery). If they want to keep Misery on the Lilies, then they need to make it worth using the lilies to build for it. Right now, Misery is a huge DPS loss outside of generating it during downtime. Much like Addersting on SGE, and I have similar complaints about it and Toxikon.

[Anacrusys]

I’ve been maining healers here and in WoW for many years and played them all at max levels. So far only SCH and SGE at 90 though. Unfortunately, I like all of the WoW healers better than my EW healers. This is not a go play WoW advertisement I know they are hurting right now. I don’t like posting WoW stuff on FF board, but I’m frustrated with the healers. I’m very surprised The FF design team didn’t use some of the concepts years ago. Side note: I’m on PS5 here so targetting is much worse. In WoW, I have mouseover macros for all healing and dispels. I can mouse over their party/raid frames to cast without clicking them.

The WoW healers IMO are more involved, diverse, and higher skill cap. Their kits are totally unique when you switch from one to another it’s an entirely new experience. Lots of Synergy between skills. The healers all have at least 5 dps skills, 3 movement skills, crowd control. You have to manage mana, other resources, and buffs.

Disipline Priest is ranged and does most of its healing by damaging mobs. hard to play well and has 8 dps skills. Ramps up healing. Their Penance skill channels while moving, dps’s on mobs, and heals on players, very cool for one key.
Holy priest is a ranged primarily reaction style healer the most straightforward and can have up to 7 dps skills.
Holy paladin is a melee healer with mostly melee and some ranged dps skills. Does some healing with dps skills
Mistweaver monk is a half ranged and half melee healer with insane mobility. Can do some of its healing with melee dps skills, some channeling
Restoration Druid is a primarily HoT healer with 5 different hots. Has three different forms bear, cat, and normal, can melee and ranged dps, several dots as well.
Restoration Shaman focuses on totem healing with several other cool healing tools.

If you want to see details look at the spell summaries, rotation/cd’s, talents sections in this guide.

https://www.icy-veins.com/wow/class-guides