Yoshi-P: "If you want more engaging content, go play Ultimate"

[tearagion]

Healing in FF14 feels better than any other MMO I have healed in (and I have healed in ever major MMO)

99% of the complaints seem to come from people that haven't healed in an MMO before this one.

sure am glad I haven't healed in any other major mmos then, because healing in this one is dogshit compared to itself 5 years ago lol

[ASkellington]

Healing in FF14 feels better than any other MMO I have healed in (and I have healed in ever major MMO)

99% of the complaints seem to come from people that haven't healed in an MMO before this one.

Uh huh. I've healed in FFXIV, WoW, ESO, and some few Korean MMO who aren't even big enough to name save maybe ArcheAge and AA was mainly PvP. There are plenty of other healers who have much more extensive profiles than mine even going back to Ultima Online, Swtor, Ever Quest and so on.

Just because FFXIV's healers in some respects are better than other MMOs does not mean that it isn't bad or worse than others. WoW for instance has better DISTINCT healers with different healing styles than FFXIV by MILES. You can even compare FFXIV to itself when its PvP has better defined healers than its PvE.

[Midareyukki]

Healing in FF14 feels better than any other MMO I have healed in (and I have healed in ever major MMO)

99% of the complaints seem to come from people that haven't healed in an MMO before this one.

If it feels better than other MMOs, it doesn't necessarily mean it is better than other MMOs.

And I did play a healer build in GW2's Engineer before FF14. Sure, not the same, but it definitely felt far more engaging and the gimmicks were way more interesting and creative than what FF14 has, especially nowadays. 14's healing is basic and straightforward, and while there's nothing wrong with that approach (and actually makes things easier to grasp), it doesn't mean it's engaging.

And I look at older MMOs and the way they made their healers, and they for sure manage to do things differently and interestingly than anything Square's ever willing to try. A healer that makes use of damaging skills to heal people was something people asked for years ago, and the best they can give us is Kardia.

[PirateRyanG]

Uh huh. I've healed in FFXIV, WoW, ESO, and some few Korean MMO who aren't even big enough to name save maybe ArcheAge and AA was mainly PvP. There are plenty of other healers who have much more extensive profiles than mine even going back to Ultima Online, Swtor, Ever Quest and so on.

Just because FFXIV's healers in some respects are better than other MMOs does not mean that it isn't bad or worse than others. WoW for instance has better DISTINCT healers with different healing styles than FFXIV by MILES. You can even compare FFXIV to itself when its PvP has better defined healers than its PvE.

ESO healing is 99% DPSing across 6-8 spells and 2 ULTs. You can't even target your healing spells. A good chunk of the spells that sit on your hotbars are never used, and they exist purely to provide boosts to the other spells (or speed up your ULT generation)

WOW nowadays is just a spam heal. It isn't engaging. You are busy healing, but nothing feels 'great' to heal.

[Midareyukki]

but nothing feels 'great' to heal

That sounds to me like you prefer old-school style healing, where you see the person's health bar shoot up and have high numbers?

At least, that's one of two things people refer to when they say "it feels great to heal". Either it's a fight that's comfortable to heal, or it stimulates the monkey brain by giving them big numbers.

But there's nothing wrong with a more passive kit. Because FF14 has a far more active kit where you do use 90% of your cooldowns on a target, and you STILL aren't going to use all of it during a fight. So neither situation is necessarily any better, as you end up with kits that either are too situational or just go by unused half the time because there's something better.

[ASkellington]

ESO healing is 99% DPSing across 6-8 spells and 2 ULTs. You can't even target your healing spells. A good chunk of the spells that sit on your hotbars are never used, and they exist purely to provide boosts to the other spells (or speed up your ULT generation)

WOW nowadays is just a spam heal. It isn't engaging. You are busy healing, but nothing feels 'great' to heal.

And yet Druid plays nothing like Shaman who plays nothing like Priest (either spec) who plays nothing like Monk. But here any differences between healer in how they heal have pretty much been stripped away since the start of Shb with the exception of AST since it still has several delayed heal abilities.

I don't care for ESO's healing, but at least there, if I didn't need as many healing spells I could still support my team with extra damage by subbing out skills. I hated the idea that some extra abilities were tied to sets/weapons effects, but give them credit - its unique to ESO and you CAN make playstyles around it that are fun to use even if they aren't competitive.

WoW has something FFXIV got rid of - resource management. The only classes in the entire game that really need to pay attention to mana is DRK (arguable) and BLM. Healer? I'm AST. I have Astrodyne to straight up REPLACE lucid dreaming on top of every draw giving me 500mp (down from 800 may I add). 90% of the abilities I use as ANY healer cost 0 mana meaning I only use it for Raises, in which case, you may as well remove raise from the role, give it to every class on a limit and remove MP while you're at it. And piety too, because its a useless bar that the vast majority of classes don't even engage in.

Job gauges for managing resources mean nothing atm because there is no meaningful choices to make for it so they're a piss poor replacement.

The Healing role has problems:

- for veteran healers either to FFXIV or to the role across MMOs there is nothing for them to get good at and therefor has lack luster enjoyment/engagement and when asked by said players to have some further enjoyment the developers have said - *look at title of this thread*
- healers barely have any distinction between the two of them in healing playstyles and are continually called either clones or "X but with"
- in several pieces of content from dungeons to savage you can run without them or with just one even when said content was current
- things in the past that had valid issues that only needed to be tweaked or have more thought put into them, were straight up removed instead (AST cards, Selene) and the mains of those affected classes were pretty much told by the devs themselves "no, you're wrong, our way is better" when they shouldn't have been removed to begin with

[IDontPetLalas]

And yet Druid plays nothing like Shaman who plays nothing like Priest (either spec) who plays nothing like Monk. But here any differences between healer in how they heal have pretty much been stripped away since the start of Shb with the exception of AST since it still has several delayed heal abilities.

I don't care for ESO's healing, but at least there, if I didn't need as many healing spells I could still support my team with extra damage by subbing out skills. I hated the idea that some extra abilities were tied to sets/weapons effects, but give them credit - its unique to ESO and you CAN make playstyles around it that are fun to use even if they aren't competitive.

*snip for length*
Job gauges for managing resources mean nothing atm because there is no meaningful choices to make for it so they're a piss poor replacement.

The Healing role has problems:

- for veteran healers either to FFXIV or to the role across MMOs there is nothing for them to get good at and therefor has lack luster enjoyment/engagement and when asked by said players to have some further enjoyment the developers have said - *look at title of this thread*
- healers barely have any distinction between the two of them in healing playstyles and are continually called either clones or "X but with"
- in several pieces of content from dungeons to savage you can run without them or with just one even when said content was current
- things in the past that had valid issues that only needed to be tweaked or have more thought put into them, were straight up removed instead (AST cards, Selene) and the mains of those affected classes were pretty much told by the devs themselves "no, you're wrong, our way is better" when they shouldn't have been removed to begin with

I'm really not a big fan of resource management, having played job/classes in other games where in some cases I almost couldn't look away from my gauge , my rotation had to be 100% spot-on otherwise my DPS would be ruined, my resource management would be borked. We're not talking top 1% of players, more an achievable top 25%. I wouldn't want that level of stress in normal content.

However, in everything else you wrote, very well summarized. I would only add that there is some difference in healers in PVP, and for those people who are tired of seeing the same template in PVE that can be refreshing.

[ASkellington]

I'm really not a big fan of resource management, having played job/classes in other games where in some cases I almost couldn't look away from my gauge , my rotation had to be 100% spot-on otherwise my DPS would be ruined, my resource management would be borked. We're not talking top 1% of players, more an achievable top 25%. I wouldn't want that level of stress in normal content.

However, in everything else you wrote, very well summarized. I would only add that there is some difference in healers in PVP, and for those people who are tired of seeing the same template in PVE that can be refreshing.

Oh I have mentioned PvP is better than PvE in at least giving battle content as far as job design goes and the level of resource management like you describe isn't what I'm looking for either.

But



That is what my AST abilities look like. There are WAY too many skills that are 0 cost that aren't balanced by CDs appropriately. That is what I mean.

Perfect example of a well designed ability for AST atm is Macrocosmos. Not only does it cost mana, something I have in abundance, its also on a 3min timer, which means I have to pick and choose when exactly I should use the ability. In isolation outside of current combat design at least. Which is the level of thought I want out of healers.

As it stands right now, I can straight up IGNORE Macrocosmos because ES does exactly what it does for 0 mana, damage is scripted enough to where I will always have ES up when I need it (~ every 60s) and in the event I don't have ES I have Celestial Opposition and Collective Unconciousness which are ALSO 0 cost and up every 60s. My own kit invalidates itself and it is stupid.

[Midareyukki]

As it stands right now, I can straight up IGNORE Macrocosmos because ES does exactly what it does for 0 mana, damage is scripted enough to where I will always have ES up when I need it (~ every 60s) and in the event I don't have ES I have Celestial Opposition and Collective Unconciousness which are ALSO 0 cost and up every 60s. My own kit invalidates itself and it is stupid.

Well... In AoE you mean. The only time it actually was better than Essential Dignity was P3S to cheese that one mechanic. It otherwise is as you say, a glorified raid-wide Benediction that scales off of how much damage people take. It's meant to be the answer to stuff like Panhaima for multi-hitting\hard-hitting raidwides... but if you know there isn't a major mechanic coming up, you can generally use other skills that will end up healing for no mana anyway. Timing Earthly Star to go off after a big raidwide is one such example.

[ASkellington]

Well... In AoE you mean. The only time it actually was better than Essential Dignity was P3S to cheese that one mechanic. It otherwise is as you say, a glorified raid-wide Benediction that scales off of how much damage people take. It's meant to be the answer to stuff like Panhaima for multi-hitting\hard-hitting raidwides... but if you know there isn't a major mechanic coming up, you can generally use other skills that will end up healing for no mana anyway. Timing Earthly Star to go off after a big raidwide is one such example.

If we're talking about single targets Exaltation > CI/ED lol. Tank busters are so infrequent and damage other wise doesn't really matter since a tanks rotation heals them. But yeah.