Differentiating healer identities

[Succor]

We went from 4 different tanks (offensive, defensive, magic mitigation, burst) to MT/OT, then that didn't even pan out so we're left with 4 tanks that are clones of each other.

The FFXIV dev team can't even balance MT/OT or Shield/Regen healers (IMHO). Everything has to be the same. Meanwhile, there's lots of variance on the DPS side of the house.

Shows you where their priorities are.

Does MT/OT mean main tank and off-tank? how do they play differently in FFXIV? (I have no experience with tanking here).

In general yeah, the priority of all games is on DPS, because that's what most players enjoy - melting mobs. Support roles (tanks and healers) are more niche and rely on others to excel, hence there are fewer of them. For what it's worth, even dps is homogenized, like the SMN being stripped of its DoTs AND pets, which was a very unique playstyle. At least some dps classes can offer off heals, rez, and some support.

Back to healers and tanks, I think that on paper it would be nice to have offensive/defensive etc supporters, but in practice one type will always perform better and outshine the rest (leading to the complaints I explained in a previous post). If every job in a role is the same with a palette swap, it's easier to balance and minimize complaints.

Note that I'm not justifying this logic, I'm just explaining what I think is happening here.

[ForsakenRoe]

Does MT/OT mean main tank and off-tank? how do they play differently in FFXIV? (I have no experience with tanking here).

Deceptus meant that, when SHB was first doing the media rounds, and GNB had been announced, there was plans by SE to recategorise the tanks. Two would become 'Main Tanks', having more CDs to help themselves survive TBs, more self sustain, etc. At the time I assumed this meant DRK/WAR, as their kit naturally leaned more towards MT. On the other hand, the other two tanks would become 'Off Tanks', having less defense of their own, but making up for it by having a variety of tools to help support the MT to take TBs they normally wouldn't have the CDs spare to. At the time, I thought the new GNB would fall under this along with PLD, due to Intervention and Cover existing.

What happened instead is that SE thankfully realised 'Hang on, tankbusters often apply a vuln that forces a swap, we need to have the OT also have CDs to survive since they'll have the boss's aggro at certain times' and eventually it became what we have now: 4 tanks, who can MT or OT. Which begs the question, 'why did SE do the same thing with healers, via the pure/barrier split?'

Back to healers and tanks, I think that on paper it would be nice to have offensive/defensive etc supporters, but in practice one type will always perform better and outshine the rest (leading to the complaints I explained in a previous post). If every job in a role is the same with a palette swap, it's easier to balance and minimize complaints.

Issue is, they CAN'T balance stuff. Even with every healer being reduced to one nuke, one dot, and maybe one extra 'sprinkle' like Assize or Phlegma, they still can't balance the non-raidbuff healers vs the raidbuff healers. Because the strength of raidbuffs varies throughout the patch lifecycle. At the start, the selfish DPS healer is stronger, as noone has gear, noone fully knows the fight and when to capitalize on raidbuffs, etc. You can see this with the DPS too, SAM started at the top of the charts. As the tier goes on, however, people get better at the fight, people get better geared, and so the raidbuffs get more and more packed with damage, eventually outscaling the selfish damage classes. SAM is now bottom of the chart for the melee, despite being top of the chart for the whole of prog. Personally, I don't think it CAN be balanced without completely reworking how raidbuffs work (if they were additive instead of multiplicative, for example), but until then AST/SCH is going to always end up the dominant comp for healers in speedruns. Thankfully though, this disparity in damage only matters to people who do speedruns, and people who think they're good enough to do speedruns (but actually aren't)

Whm's felt bad there (and the whole tier) not because Ast had Macro per se but because their job mechanics where simply "Ast but worse".

P3S is a good example, because it showcases both sides of the design issue. On one hand, it's undeniable that WHM has an easier time in Fountain of Fire than an AST. Slap down that Lilybell and ignore the damage entirely, job done. This is good design, AST has more issues doing the mechanic, maybe it has to use an extra tool to compensate, but it's able to do the mechanic fairly comfortably, but WHM can do it even easier. Life's Agonies is the opposite, a terrible design. Where not just WHM, but all 3 non-AST healers, have to spam healing, mit, or just straight up heal LB, AST is able undo all of the damage of the mechanic instantly, with one tool. Not even a combination of parts of it's kit, one single button. This is Bad (with a capital B) design. If Life's Agonies hit and did zero 'damage', instead having the hits set your HP directly to 0 (or 1 with the buff so you don't die), Macrocosmos would not work on it. This would even the playing field so EVERY healer has to partake in the mechanic, instead of one getting a VIP pass to skip it. Macrocosmos would still find use in other parts of the fight, such as Gloryplumes, or the raidwide OF Life's Agonies.

Before it got buffed to 20s instead of 15s, I had an idea for the WHM plant, of changing it to a 90s CD but knocking it down to 4 pulses. This would give it a different niche to Macro, that of 'it's up twice as often'. It'd help WHM's depressing OGCD game, it'd be useable on a lot more mechanics, it'd feel 'pretty strong' compared to Macro's 'it can literally delete a mechanic, but only once per 3min'. Unfortunately I did not get my wish. I also asked for 2 charges on Assize, 2 charges on Tetra, and Misery to be made OGCD to make it only a 30p loss of damage (which would be a gain due to raidbuffs), but SE instead buffed it's potency to match 4 glares and become damage neutral, different method same result. Still waiting for the Assize/Tetra charges though