Let's all brace ourselves for no healer mention in any capacity for the upcoming LL

[GrimGale]

"We evaluated WHM concerns and decided not to do anything about them"

"We've noticed a lack of healers in low level content, so rather than make the design and leveling progression of healers fun at lower levels, we've decided to replace the playerbase with NPCs."

[ASkellington]

"We've noticed a lack of healers in low level content, so rather than make the design and leveling progression of healers fun at lower levels, we've decided to replace the playerbase with NPCs."

May as well just remove healers at this point.


....Oh wait

[Silver-Strider]

May as well just remove healers at this point.


....Oh wait

Lack of incentive to play healers at the start of the game means less healers at endgame and with how frustrated veteran healers are with our lackluster toolkits, we have no incentive to do endgame content either. It's a lose lose situation at the end of the day.
I can just spam Dead Ends with Trusts for my tombstones. The 1st 2 extremes and savage raids can be cleared without healers so there's some level of endgame available without bothering with healers. If healers are only needed for 2 fights in the entire game, there's a problem

[Allegor]

Lack of incentive to play healers at the start of the game means less healers at endgame and with how frustrated veteran healers are with our lackluster toolkits, we have no incentive to do endgame content either. It's a lose lose situation at the end of the day.
I can just spam Dead Ends with Trusts for my tombstones. The 1st 2 extremes and savage raids can be cleared without healers so there's some level of endgame available without bothering with healers. If healers are only needed for 2 fights in the entire game, there's a problem

I don't raid savage/ex so I'm bound to play devil's advocate just out of curiosity: is running with 1/no healer the new norm because healing is that trivial, or is a healer-less comp something that *can* be done with great group coordination, but most still stick to the status quo (2 healers)? I mean, I still think that spamming a single dps skill ad nauseum and catering to the lowest common denominator are ...questionable decisions, but I guess unless healers become objectively redundant even in the most casual of content, the devs will keep insisting they're "ok"

[ASkellington]

I don't raid savage/ex so I'm bound to play devil's advocate just out of curiosity: is running with 1/no healer the new norm because healing is that trivial, or is a healer-less comp something that *can* be done with great group coordination, but most still stick to the status quo (2 healers)? I mean, I still think that spamming a single dps skill ad nauseum and catering to the lowest common denominator are ...questionable decisions, but I guess unless healers become objectively redundant even in the most casual of content, the devs will keep insisting they're "ok"

It is something that can be done. Several times where I've died to mechanics in a dungeon in EW while I was still learning the fight w/o a RDM or SMN the tank and dps have gone on with out me at ~70% hp with 0 issues. Granted, none of the tanks were DRK... but DRK also has the lowest sustain of the tanks.

Edit: just saw the raid part.

Yeah its very likely. A good healer can solo most normal raids and trials. A good healer can do the same with EX. Savage... dunno if its common yet for the current Savage to be puggable by 1 healer.

[Silver-Strider]

I don't raid savage/ex so I'm bound to play devil's advocate just out of curiosity: is running with 1/no healer the new norm because healing is that trivial, or is a healer-less comp something that *can* be done with great group coordination, but most still stick to the status quo (2 healers)? I mean, I still think that spamming a single dps skill ad nauseum and catering to the lowest common denominator are ...questionable decisions, but I guess unless healers become objectively redundant even in the most casual of content, the devs will keep insisting they're "ok"

It's not common practice, just something that can be done. However, since it can be done without them, if Healers become so scarce that people become frustrated enough to just try it the alternative way (with all tank groups or a healthy amount of SMN/RDM/DNC) then it could become more common practice. Solo healing is also possible if there isn't a mechanic that targets 2 healers specifically and the party is skilled enough.

It's just a hypothetical situation that could end up happening, and considering that WAR+3 DPS parties are popping it more often for dungeons at least, it's already starting.

[Azuri]

I don't raid savage/ex so I'm bound to play devil's advocate just out of curiosity: is running with 1/no healer the new norm because healing is that trivial, or is a healer-less comp something that *can* be done with great group coordination, but most still stick to the status quo (2 healers)? I mean, I still think that spamming a single dps skill ad nauseum and catering to the lowest common denominator are ...questionable decisions, but I guess unless healers become objectively redundant even in the most casual of content, the devs will keep insisting they're "ok"

There is a single reason why one-healer groups aren't more common in Savage - FFlogs only accepts parses for 2 tank/2 healers/4 DPS groups under "standard composition". If this were to change, we would see a lot more one-healer groups at all levels. And especially at the highest level of play like speeds.

It was already noticeable with older EXs like Titania and Innocence at the end of ShB. Since parsing those fights was a meme at that point they were very often done with just one healer.

[ForteNightshade]

I don't raid savage/ex so I'm bound to play devil's advocate just out of curiosity: is running with 1/no healer the new norm because healing is that trivial, or is a healer-less comp something that *can* be done with great group coordination, but most still stick to the status quo (2 healers)? I mean, I still think that spamming a single dps skill ad nauseum and catering to the lowest common denominator are ...questionable decisions, but I guess unless healers become objectively redundant even in the most casual of content, the devs will keep insisting they're "ok"

Technically, yes. Every single fight, up to and including Ultimate, can and has been solo healed. Some are just incredibly annoying to do because of mechanics specifically targeting healers. This tier they were surprisingly lenient with that though as Fire Pinax is the only mechanic you'd have to get creative about. You can leave a three stack, so split the raid according (Range/Healer, Melee and Tanks) and you're golden.

Beyond Healer specific mechanics, the other major reason is what Azuri said above: FFlogs. Gear is another factor since it takes so long to gear multiple jobs.

[WaxSw]

I don't raid savage/ex so I'm bound to play devil's advocate just out of curiosity: is running with 1/no healer the new norm because healing is that trivial, or is a healer-less comp something that *can* be done with great group coordination, but most still stick to the status quo (2 healers)? I mean, I still think that spamming a single dps skill ad nauseum and catering to the lowest common denominator are ...questionable decisions, but I guess unless healers become objectively redundant even in the most casual of content, the devs will keep insisting they're "ok"

Depends on mechanics of the fight first, if there are mechanics that target 2 healers (like 3-4 people stacks) is unlikely as it would potentially make the fight harder or even a rng fest, if there is no mechanics like that depends on the difficulty:

-Normal mode (max level dungeons): Super common, a lot of people cap the tomes by farming the latest dungeons with no healer, just 1 tank and 3 dps as their sustain tends to be more than enough for such low damage and the dps gain is huge.

-Extremes: In current content exs is not uncommon but not the norm, for example the 1st extreme of this expansion has been farmed with 1 healer consistently since it was released but it requires healers that are consistent and dont die to mechanics for obvious reasons (or jobs that can rez said healer), for outgeared fights on the other hand is rather common to see 1 healer parties as the group can kill stuff significantly faster and be able to clear even if the healer dies.

-Savages: very very very unlikely to find one simply because this is the difficulty in which most people try to get better logs and 1 healer parties dont fall under standard comp, as the tier gets older most people may try it as a way to get loot faster if they have a good healer or just for fun, we are already seeing examples of the latter with the p1s-p2s solo tank clear and p1s-p2s 1 healer clear.

-Ultimate: Same case as Savages but with the 1 healer comps and solo tank comps being way more hard to find however we've already seen a solo tank clear of ucob and 1 healer clears of TEA

Healers tend to be a safety net more than a necessity so the better the team is the more likely they are to drop 1 healer in favour of more dps

[RinaShinomiya]

"We've noticed a lack of healers in low level content, so rather than make the design and leveling progression of healers fun at lower levels, we've decided to replace the playerbase with NPCs."

I am very excited to re-experience the entire story with "Eager Conjurer" by my side.