Quote Originally Posted by Renathras View Post
Right right, but the COMPLAINT before was people being bored on healers. Now they certainly aren't bored, but what is the consequence of that? Blamed. Instead of being bored they're being blamed, and thus the non-baby mode healers are also not healing, and as a result, there's a shortage. It being in PF doesn't work as a defense as that's kind of the proxy everyone generally uses for there being a healing shortage in the first place - and was when healing content was easy and there was a supposed shortage. It seems the shortage is worse, not better.

You can argue it's because people aren't using mitigation, but that was true before and not causing this issue. Though I agree WHM desperately needs another, relatively accessible mitigation CD (Asylum or Plenary would make good candidates, imo)

It's not the game hasn't prepared people for this. It's that the parsing meta-game has convinced people that GCDs spent healing are bad, and so people have actively avoided them so long, they don't use them now that they need to. That is, people weren't unprepared for this damage BY THE GAME, people are unprepared for this damage because of the parsing/theorycrafting meta chase.

I do agree that more complex raiding with survival/mitigation being everyone's responsibility again isn't a bad thing.

The issue is, it won't "iron itself out" if SE goes high and right and reverts to the easier stuff because the non-baby mode healers aren't stepping into that gap left by the baby mode healers quitting. SE will read that as "Well, making healing harder causes healer shortages, so...let's make healing easier again". Which is why I say if people that want hardmode to continue don't stop playing their DPS alts and start healing in those PF groups sitting waiting for healers left and right...

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As I've said before, Reddit isn't exactly free from self-selection bias. It can't be boring AND blamed for other people's screw-ups at the same time. If it's being blamed for other people's screw-ups (and the things listed were lack of mitigation use, not people standing in the bad), then that means the outgoing healing is pretty strong and thus healing is harder, not "boring". The two can't be true, in this context, at the same time. The damage gulf between mitigated and non-mitigated is not 1 button spam on the one side and everyone dead blaming the healer on the other. Mitigation abilities mitigate 5-10% damage, not 50% or more which would make healing trivial in the one case and braindead in the other. The argument doesn't make sense.
People were and still are bored of healing. The newest raid tier has shown to be a lot of fun to actually heal from the feedback I've seen. The issue is that PF specifically is getting frustrated due to parties hitting walls and not progressing. It is about the game leaving the players unprepared.

Before this raid tier, you ddint' need to mitigate auto attacks. You didn't need more than an occasional Benison or Soteria or Exaltation, etc. on the tank. Now that those things are required, it's pushing people out of their comfort zone, which is something the community would gradually get used to if we maintain this demand for healing. People wanting to use their GCDs for damage is not the issue. It's expecting that one OGCD is enough when it won't be, and trying to break from the muscle memory that you might need to use 2, or weave in an OGCD after a GCD heal. We don't have the preestablished expectation that this is what's necessary for that kind of healing, and the other roles not using mitigation because that mitigation wasn't essential before is making it tougher on healers to keep up with the damage while still trying to optimize their DPS, because their DPS is also required in order to beat the enrage.

People wanting to maximize the value of their heals so they can maximize their DPS contributions is not the evil that you think it is. It's the natural flow of how players get better at a role and is not to be demonized because 'it's not the healer's job.' It's going to require experience and getting familiar with a more intense requirement of healing to smoothen out the issues people are facing, but its other players blaming you when its not your fault that is driving people away right now. And people are also upvoting comments about healing still being boring in spite of these healing requires. The number 1 comment on the current healer sortage Reddit doesn't offer much information, but it's:

"Not that fun, getting majority of blame even when DPS/Tanks dont mitigate"

With nearly 300 upvotes.