Differentiating healer identities

[KarmaYraeon]

My problem, then, with "consistency" is that it's neither an identity nor a gimick. It can be a feature of a job's design, but by itself, it's not enough to build a job.

As it stands, that is the problem with current white mage to be honest. In terms of identity, I feel it should be a mirror to BLM in in the sense that its identity is to be the healer with long cast times and powerful gcds as a consequence. Its output per gcd is better rewarded and/or less punishing than it would be on other healers. To take it to the same extreme as blm, you could outright make it the turret healer that spends most of its time standing still, with a few tools to help with its mobilty. Or perhaps you could set it up in such a way that its a matter of balancing healing and dps in similar fashion to redmage with its black and white mana. For example;

Cure, Cure II, Cure III, Medica, Medica II:
Additional effect: Grants two Touch of Earth or removes one Touch of Light, to a maximum of 6.
Touch of Earth effect: Increases damage dealt by certain spells by 50%.

Glare III, Dia, Holy, Afflatus Misery:
Additional effect: Grants two Touch of Light or removes one Touch of Earth, to a maximum of 6.
Touch of Light effect: Increases healing magic potency of certain spells by 20%.

What this would mean is that, assuming you used 3 gcds to heal, you would then get 6 gcd's of bonus damage on glare, dia, holy or afflatus misery to gradually compensate the damage you would have lost. In terms of minmaxing for end content, you could go so far as to make sure you get at least one use of Touch of Earth on afflatus misery or dia (assuming it applies to more than just the initial damage) for the extra dps overall, which in turn also makes the lilies a net positive rather than just neutral. Alternatively rather than stacks you could simply make it some kind of linear gauge that just gradually increases to a fixed amount, and you spend portions at a time, like sch's faerie gauge. In either case, you are compensating for the dps otherwise lost because of gcd healing, without making it a forced aspect of the class' rotation or functionality, except for the singular case of using it to empower Aff. Misery.

Another idea is that you could focus more on the lilies instead, and give white mage a soft rotation as mentioned here.

As for its gimmick, I would assume that would be its lilies, unless you imagined something else?

[ForsakenRoe]

I saw. I could make a longer post discussing various concepts as a potential rework like you have in yours, since I have different ideas than what you have presented. But in general, I feel like whm doesn't necessarily need more buttons (though additional tools would be nice and everyone likes a flashy new button) but instead a revision of its already existing tools to revisit the idea that it is the powerhouse GCD healer. To give it the same sort of power as what other healers do with ogcds. To make it more reliable when doing so without losing out on damage like the others would.

The idea I linked adds 4 buttons, two of which are to give WHM the ability to spend it's lilies on shielding instead of healing (because healing isnt always needed, and it'd give WHM a way to actually mitigate things more often than once per 2min), but they can be left out if absolutely needed. For the sake of argument, lets say they are, and we just add the other two buttons, a GCD damage skill, and a GCD AOE heal that is damage neutral. Those two buttons already fit easily onto my hotbars on account of WHM having less buttons than a lot of other classes in the game, but even then if we really need to have more space to add them, we can make Cure 2 an upgrade to Cure 1, and Medica 2 an upgrade to Medica 1. Revision of it's existing tools isn't going to cut it here, because the main problem with not just WHM, but healers in general, is that their damage kits are just too barren as is. We cant do much to 'revise' Glare and Dia into something more interesting, if it's only those two skills we're working with. We could change Dia to be 12 seconds duration like my suggestion, but that on it's own isn't really going to do much to help. It just changes us from 2111111111112111 to 2111121111211112.

Adding one extra button would also not really do much on it's own. The reason it works better when you put them together is the idea that the 'extra button' generates more gauge than a Glare cast does. It gets the player to the new powerful healing tool faster, meaning damage feeds healing, like you suggested. WHM already can push a lot of burst healing power when needed, with Plenary Indulgence > Rapture, or PI>Cure3 if we really need to. PI-Rapture is 600 potency per GCD and it's damage neutral now that Misery got buffed. Outside of condensing Cure1/2 and Medica1/2 in the way I suggested, I don't really see what else we could do to change up what it's other skills do. Plenary combined with Thin Air? Only thing that comes to mind is not changes to the effect, but just QOL changes like 'Assize has 2 charges, so you can hold one for healing if needed' (cough UCOB) or 'Tetra has 2 charges'. I'm rambling, but my point is, we don't need to revise the tools WHM has to let it compete better against the other healers, because it doesn't have as many tools as they do to begin with. It's a tale as old as time, when we ask 'how does AST handle J-Waves or Curtain Call, constant waves of damage', they can say 'Celestial Opposition, Collective Unconscious, Earthly Star, Horoscope, Macrocosmos, Neutral Sect shielding'. WHM has Temperance, Asylum, Assize if it lines up, Lilybell, 3 Raptures and then it's out, and has to spam Medica or Cure3. Giving it the changes I suggested would at least give it 2 more GCDs of healing from the gauge spender, which might not be 'enough' but it's at least a start. Changing what other stuff does won't help enough I think, since it's already 'behind' in number of tools. Unless you're thinking of adding the PVP style regen to Temperance as an additional effect, which sure I'd take that

[Succor]

While I agree it's great for healers (or any class) to have different identities, it's difficult in practice to differentiate too much. Being different means having different strengths and weaknesses. But then people start complaining "why can class X do Y and I can't??? It's so unfair, I'm being punished for playing X!!!!", so devs make everything more same-y and bland. And then conversely people complain that everything is too similar.

[ForsakenRoe]

While I agree it's great for healers (or any class) to have different identities, it's difficult in practice to differentiate too much. Being different means having different strengths and weaknesses. But then people start complaining "why can class X do Y and I can't??? It's so unfair, I'm being punished for playing X!!!!", so devs make everything more same-y and bland. And then conversely people complain that everything is too similar.

Because the playerbase doesn't recognise anything re: Identity as valid unless it contributes to damage. At no point have I heard anyone say 'Thal's Balls, I wish we had Expedient for this mechanic', but I've heard many many times that 'fk sake why is AST so much stronger than WHM' because of the cards, or 'lmao SGE is shit if you don't play SCH you're griefing' re: Chain Strat's contribution to RDPS. We as a playerbase need to accept that there are multiple forms of homogenization, some are acceptable/necessary (tank mits are a good example), some are not necessary (healer rotations do not all need to be 1 nuke 1 dot). As an example, if we were to make all four healers able to apply shields, with varying degrees of efficiency, this would be 'homogenization'. It'd blur the line between Pure and Barrier even more than it is. However I would support that design choice, because by making that 'homogenization', we can remove 'homogenization' elsewhere, for example, by having 'shield check' mechanics in the fights from then on. We've seen Pure Heal checks, like 'everyone is set to 1HP and you have to get them to max!' like White Hole or Heartless Archangel. But there are comparatively a fraction of 'Shield Heal checks', the only one that comes to mind and is critically important to 'succeed' is the Vulcan Bursts (2 of them, total) in UWU. Shield to block the AOE, or the knockback sends you to the wall. We see that check in UWU, because the devs are able to guarantee there will be at least one Barrier healer in the party (solo heal memes aside), but if every healer was capable of applying a shield, for a mechanic that could be coded to just check 'is there a shield? yes/no?', we could see these Shield-checks in lower forms of content, like dungeons or story Trials.

Besides, if the Barrier healers have 'limited access to Pure healing (Indom, Ixochole, Pneuma) and regens (Whispering Dawn, Physis)', then surely it'd only make sense to balance that out right? And since I'm pretty sure the SCHs won't enjoy having more moves lobotomized from their fairy, giving the WHM and AST ways to apply shields (limited) would be fair in my eyes. WHMs used to have Protect and Shell in older games, Nul-Element skills in others and Stoneskin here, so it's not like 'applies a barrier' is completely out of left field for them. Give them 2 GCDs, a ST/AOE Lily spender that applies a barrier (at a weaker potency than the pure healing of Solace/Rapture, to keep them as higher prio for the 'Pure healer'), and give AST the ability to swap Sects in combat, changing their regens to shields, and letting them get wild with mixing and matching the effects. Nocturnal Collective for damage mitigation into Diurnal Celestial Opposition for the regen after the hit? Nocturnal Horoscope to apply a shield when it times out, while the party is split up for Ruby Light 5? etc

sorry tangent tldr: noone cares unless it's damage. if they give WHM a 2min that says 'increases damage of party by X%' then you could watch how fast AST gets dropped in speedrun meta parties in real time(subject to value of X)

[Jukebox12]

I would love to see a pure HoT healer

[IceBlueNinja]

I would love blue mage to just be a full time job. You can be in healing stance and have so much dps rotations makes you wanna make a check list cause of so much to do. wonder when 80 increase coming for it...boy it gets stale waiting every 3+ months for just some bread crumbs of content once main stiry of an exp is done.

[Deceptus]

While I agree it's great for healers (or any class) to have different identities, it's difficult in practice to differentiate too much. Being different means having different strengths and weaknesses. But then people start complaining "why can class X do Y and I can't??? It's so unfair, I'm being punished for playing X!!!!", so devs make everything more same-y and bland. And then conversely people complain that everything is too similar.

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.

[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.

[WaxSw]

While I agree it's great for healers (or any class) to have different identities, it's difficult in practice to differentiate too much. Being different means having different strengths and weaknesses. But then people start complaining "why can class X do Y and I can't??? It's so unfair, I'm being punished for playing X!!!!", so devs make everything more same-y and bland. And then conversely people complain that everything is too similar.

I think ironically that the whole "why can class X do Y and I can't??? It's so unfair, I'm being punished for playing X!!!!" mentality is a consequence of excesive homogenization. When every class all that can do is X the one that can do X and Y shines more because the rest of the classes simply don't have anything else. Look at Whm vs Ast in P3s, Ast shined there not only because it could do the X of Whm in the almost the same way but also because a significant Y that was the macrocosmos cheese that Whm coudn't even come close to. Whms felt bad there (and the whole tier) not because Ast had Macro per se but because their job mechanics were simply "Ast but worse".

If instead of trying to make cookie cutter healers, with every healer sharing similar tools, we focused on having jobs that while sharing a baseline have unique ways to approach the content (i.e Whm more GCD focused but with ways to make those GCDs dps neutral while Ast more focused on timed mechanics like star) then those differences woudn't be so harming because while a job could X and Y other could X and Z

[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