If you're having fun with healer, great! I want to have fun again, too.

[Gaethan_Tessula]

A large, commonly overlooked issue and the reason healing likely works the way it does: Controller users can heal perfectly fine on current design: spot heals, OGCD weaving and DPS but if you alter things to be about single target, hard targeting and places where mouse-over macros rule the domain that parity is gone. It isn't a fun answer, and it puts some heat on console players, but it's def a part of why things are the way they are.

I will dispute controller being any real impediment to more taxing healer-checks in fights. I was playing on console during 3.1, and was just fine handling the dragoon jumps during Thordan EX add phase, which involved spot healing several targeted DPS while also keeping the tanks up. The 2.5 second GCD is a bigger concession to controller, and it does not take that long to smash the d-pad a maximum of four times up or down to target a given party member.

If people can play combo-heavy fighting games at a professional level on pad, and they do, then people can handle spot-healing in FF14. Or, for an even more extreme example, look at Devil May Cry players - a lot of the major content creators for DMC play on pad, and the APM required for their combos puts most MMOs to shame. I've had personal experience doing both (top 16 in a Blazblue CP major; beat DMC 5 on Dante Must Die with S rankings for all stages with all characters).

I won't deny that keyboard and mouse (or stick, for fighting games) grants some real advantages for certain gaming genres, e.g. holding down multiple buttons (negative edging). However, FF14 is nowhere close to the threshold where controller becomes a major handicap.

[Rika007]

I will contest that controller is any real impediment to more taxing healer-checks in fights. I was playing on console during 3.1, and was just fine handling the dragoon jumps during Thordan EX add phase, which involved spot healing several targeted DPS while also keeping the tanks up. The 2.5 second GCD is a bigger concession to controller, and it does not take that long to smash the d-pad a maximum of four times up or down to target a given party member.

If people can play combo-heavy fighting games at a professional level on pad, and they do, then people can handle spot-healing in FF14. Or, for an even more extreme example, look at Devil May Cry players - a lot of the major content creators for DMC play on pad, and the APM required for their combos puts most MMOs to shame. I've had personal experience doing both (top 16 in a Blazblue CP major; beat DMC 5 on Dante Must Die with S rankings for all stages with all characters).

I won't deny that keyboard and mouse (or stick, for fighting games) grants some real advantages for certain gaming genres, e.g. holding down multiple buttons (negative edging). However, FF14 is nowhere close to the threshold where controller becomes a major handicap.

Literally are ultimate level raiders playing AST on controller and doing incredible at it. This is just not a valid excuse anymore. We as a player base learned controllers were not an impediment to high level play somewhere around Heavensward.

[Sacred-Oblivion]

As a tank I want my healers to be happy and enjoying their role *hugs*

[ForteNightshade]

And I still don't understand why they even removed dps buttons from healers. They don't want to overwhelm casual players...? Those players who don't care about better play anyway. They wouldn't have touched those 'optional' buttons anyway. Honestly, why can't the healers have more interesting gameplay mechanics while keeping the core healing spells a bit on the easy side? But whatever, I have long given up about healers, and I don't think the devs will ever give them an overhaul. I only do story content anymore and while WHM feels so suboptimal to play it still gets the job done. I just feel sorry for those who still have hope and are still fighting for more fun healing classes.

Because the dev team has a mistaken belief that all those DPS abilities were what led casual players to feel Healers were too difficult or overwhelming when that was never the case. We see that now as those same players who didn't want to manage Aero III still aren't pressing Glare III constantly but rather spamming useless heals just like they did two expansions ago. It also didn't really attract new players to healers in any sizable large like they assumed. What they need to understand is tanks and healers attract certain types of players and nothing you do will convince others to pick them up if they weren't interested to begin with. A lot of people simply prefer doing damage and that's it. Yoshida even acknowledged this, and gave it as a reason they'll always add at least one new DPS per expansion.

It largely boils down to accessibility above all else. They don't want the skill ceiling to be more than a few feet above the floor, if even that high. Hence why jobs are so simplified nowadays.

[QooEr]

It largely boils down to accessibility above all else. They don't want the skill ceiling to be more than a few feet above the floor, if even that high. Hence why jobs are so simplified nowadays.

the most ironic thing is they never actually made healing easier. they keep the terrible pitfall of freecure which makes worse players worse while any half decent player knows to avoid it like the plague. they nerfed the fairy heals so scholar actually has to know how to heal. if they wanted to truly lower the skill floor theyd get rid of the awful base heals that bad players resort to instead of cutting on dps options that they dont touch in the first place. or they would stop giving overpowered ogcd heals to ast when bad players dont even touch them to begin with.

[ForteNightshade]

the most ironic thing is they never actually made healing easier. they keep the terrible pitfall of freecure which makes worse players worse while any half decent player knows to avoid it like the plague. they nerfed the fairy heals so scholar actually has to know how to heal. if they wanted to truly lower the skill floor theyd get rid of the awful base heals that bad players resort to instead of cutting on dps options that they dont touch in the first place. or they would stop giving overpowered ogcd heals to ast when bad players dont even touch them to begin with.

Their whole design philosophy really is at odds with itself, isn't it? They keep emphasising how they want to encourage healers to heal more yet continuously slap in more overpowered oGCDs that do the precise opposite. I feel the fairy nerf was largely them thinking Scholars would heal more because they still think we prioritize GCD healing. Hence White Mage's stubborn design. Speaking of, I've never been able to find the interview but on the discussion reddit, it was brought up Yoshida saying they kept Cure I for healers that wanted to focus more on healing. Is it bad I can actually believe that just on face value even if Cure I is absolutely garbage "healing" above 50?

I'd love to actually see the dev team complete a Savage tier just to see how they actually play. I wanna bet they GCD a lot, especially as nobody on the dev team mains healer.

[GrimGale]

A large, commonly overlooked issue and the reason healing likely works the way it does: Controller users can heal perfectly fine on current design: spot heals, OGCD weaving and DPS but if you alter things to be about single target, hard targeting and places where mouse-over macros rule the domain that parity is gone. It isn't a fun answer, and it puts some heat on console players, but it's def a part of why things are the way they are.

A solution is probably to take the current path to the point of hybrid design, making responsibility roles more of a toggle and accepting DPS as the games core (which it already is). That iis what I figured the end goal of current combat revamping was was until Yoshi P also told healers they shouldn't have to DPS and showed heavy reluctance to offer more DPS options.

So, now I don't have even a faint guess on what he wants anymore, which is worrying. Healers don't have to heal, healers don't have to DPS so what do we do? I really don't want to sit and just push one button for the entirty of combat. I was farming Zodiark yesterday and all I could think of was "Gee, this reminds me of Frost Mage in Molten Core back in the day, ten minutes of pressing the 1 key.

The thing is I really like a lot of of the newer job design, it focuses on fun, flash and the actual fight difficulty rather than frustration but Healers are too far in the wrong direction. We don't have cool primals and melee combos and finishers. We get to Broil IV 180 times in one fight.

I play with controller on PC and I am pretty fast at targeting. It takes only a few taps on your pad (at most 4 up or 4 down) to select any party member on the party list. I play Astro on controller too and I manage to weave my cards in. You can change target immediately after you start casting and 1.5s is more than enough to target anybody on the party and fling a card.

The issue isn't Controller I'd say, its more server ticks and how the game processes information. Now that certain effects apply before the end of the cast this has been alleviated but I can't count the amount of times I've Lustrated a corpse or my Benediction went on CD yet the target died.

[XceptOne]

I'm still fairly fresh to the game I say, only got to EW but a few hours ago and been healing most of my journey since, even more so now I've unlocked SGE and gods damn healing is fun, always on your toes and that's good for me!

[BrokentoothMarch]

I'm still fairly fresh to the game I say, only got to EW but a few hours ago and been healing most of my journey since, even more so now I've unlocked SGE and gods damn healing is fun, always on your toes and that's good for me!

Not to invalidate your excitement but... What? On your toes? I've played since release of HW and endured the butchering of AST in SB, only to finally quit healing in late ShB and continue tanking into EW. In essence: I feel like I might be a veteran and my veterans opinion is that I unironically, legitimately, actually have fallen asleep healing.

The experience is painful and boring. A job that feels meant for people who want to clear content without putting in any actual effort. To say nothing of all the tools tanks have to stay alive devoid of a healer. If your tank isn't a DRK, a healer is hardly even necessary as anything other than a mediocre DPS.

If, as a healer, you're kept on your toes? I weep for you. That speaks more about your parties than anything else.

[ForteNightshade]

If, as a healer, you're kept on your toes? I weep for you. That speaks more about your parties than anything else.

To be fair, a new healer isn't going to necessarily how overpowered oGCDs truly are and just how little healing you can comfortably get away with. Plus being new means the monotony of spamming the same nuke hasn't quite set in yet. Of course, it wouldn't be entirely fair to dismiss the notion some people do actually enjoy the current healer design even if many of us fundamentally disagree.