Has anyone quit healing?

[Renathras]

I suppose it makes it rather difficult for us to converse when we aren't even using the same sets of definitions for the terminology.

Ty originated the spicy talk with a discussion on difficulty, not optimization.

The problem is, they end up being the same thing in a meta of "damage >>>>> everything else". No one cares, for example, that you have the most MP and HPS efficient healing. People who DO care only care that you did that for the sake of optimizing DPS. If you have the perfect healing CD plan and then sit on your hands when not using your oGCDs, no one is going to praise you as a fantastic healer. So the only optimization, in a practical sense, that matters is damage.

And with a meta of damage beats everything, that means that the harder damage is to optimize, in a very real sense (and for all practical purposes), that is the Job's difficulty. Even when healing needs to be optimized to achieve that, as you're fond of pointing out, that is only another way of saying "optimizing DPS".

So I think we're still talking about difficulty, you're just using a different word for it.

Your dish argument seems to be more akin to aesthetics than to spice or difficulty, and so not...directly relevant.

I think the "four meats" in this case are "Tank, Healer, Melee, Ranged/Caster", not the four Healers themselves. But regardless, even if we look at it that way, consider the opposite: You're saying if people love Chicken (WHM) and hate Beef (SCH), Pork (AST?), or Fish (Sage), that you're only going to make Chicken that is medium or hotter. And if they don't like spicy, you're telling them they have to go eat one of the other three dishes. Then you tell them all of those dishes, too, are only served as medium or hotter, and if they want something mild, they have to leave the restaurant and go eat somewhere else because you don't cater to them.

I feel that's far more detrimental.

EDIT:

Now, if you were arguing for each Job to have specs, and the specs offer different difficulties - but the exact same output, so doing a harder difficulty is you just intentionally taking on more work knowing you will not in any way be rewarded for doing so - then I'd be fine with that. But I can't imagine they'll EVER actually do that.

FF11 arguably does because of the SubJob system, and WoW does within a Spec due to the way the Talent system works (e.g. you can pick all actives or you can pick all passives or you can pick a combination of the two - but this is also horribly unbalanced as there's almost always a "best" option; they are not all equally viable)...but FF14 does not, and I can't imagine them making it do so.

The closest we've ever really had to that was dAST/nAST, since it let you actively swap between effectively two specs.

[ForsakenRoe]

I suppose it makes it rather difficult for us to converse when we aren't even using the same sets of definitions for the terminology.

Ty originated the spicy talk with a discussion on difficulty, not optimization.

The problem is, they end up being the same thing in a meta of "damage >>>>> everything else". No one cares, for example, that you have the most MP and HPS efficient healing. People who DO care only care that you did that for the sake of optimizing DPS. If you have the perfect healing CD plan and then sit on your hands when not using your oGCDs, no one is going to praise you as a fantastic healer. So the only optimization, in a practical sense, that matters is damage.

And with a meta of damage beats everything, that means that the harder damage is to optimize, in a very real sense (and for all practical purposes), that is the Job's difficulty. Even when healing needs to be optimized to achieve that, as you're fond of pointing out, that is only another way of saying "optimizing DPS".

So I think we're still talking about difficulty, you're just using a different word for it.

Your dish argument seems to be more akin to aesthetics than to spice or difficulty, and so not...directly relevant.

I think the "four meats" in this case are "Tank, Healer, Melee, Ranged/Caster", not the four Healers themselves. But regardless, even if we look at it that way, consider the opposite: You're saying if people love Chicken (WHM) and hate Beef (SCH), Pork (AST?), or Fish (Sage), that you're only going to make Chicken that is medium or hotter. And if they don't like spicy, you're telling them they have to go eat one of the other three dishes. Then you tell them all of those dishes, too, are only served as medium or hotter, and if they want something mild, they have to leave the restaurant and go eat somewhere else because you don't cater to them.

I feel that's far more detrimental.

That conclusion is like, the exact opposite of what I'm aiming for. The point is that in a casual piece of content like EX roulette, you don't need to use damage AT ALL, because the content does not expect that from the player. As such, the level of skill with the class the player that the game demands, in that content, is 'mild spice' level. If you are a mild spice gamer, then you can do EX roulette and that is fine. The hotter levels of spice, in this context, are for the players who prefer to 'spice up their gameplay' with more complexity. If a current Chicken/WHM enjoyer like myself wanted to have 'more spice' (ie, a more engaging rotation), the takeaway doesn't do that level of spice. I get Korma or Tikka Masala at best. If I want Vindaloo spice, they tell me I have to have the Beef/AST dish. Some people don't want Beef Vindaloo though. I don't play AST atm because it's too much APM and makes my hands ache. I played it for week 1 prog of P4S and my hands were agony for the rest of the night after getting off of the PC. Other people like that APM and that's cool too. I do not see why it's a seemingly controversial take to have a low skill floor and a high skill ceiling on all four healers.

Again, and I cannot state this enough, if you are in casual content, the whole 'extra optimization' thing is completely irrelevant. Look again at the chart I made. You, Ren, said you cleared P5S on week 3 or 4 in pugs. I'd say that puts you about halfway between the green and red bars in terms of what you're expecting from the classes. So the orange bars are, for you, completely irrelevant. This isn't intended as a dig at you, it's to show 'you have decided not to push yourself to the point where those bars become relevant to you'. If you were to play SGE, you wouldn't have a problem of 'I can't handle the Hot level of spicy rotation this class is capable of, so I can't clear the new EX trial with it', because the EX trial does not ask for the Orange bar. It wouldn't even be asking for the Red bar, it'd be like halfway between the Red and the Green. Hell, the full extent of the Orange bar doesn't apply to ME either, because I don't intend to go for rank 1 parses, or speedclear raids. But, it IS a yardstick by which to measure myself still. I might never reach 100% of that orange bar, but I can still see if I got from 75% of the way up it to 80%, and feel good about that too.

Like, take the whole suggestion I made of SGE having a gameplay revolving around Augmenting your damage to create damage>heal interactions. Maximising the effectiveness of that system, to get to zero damage-loss GCDs, would be the Orange bar. But you could get through EX roulette by just using Prognosis, Diagnosis and Dyskrasia spam (which would all cost 0 MP under my system). Just like how you could clear that EX roulette with Prognosis, Diagnosis and Dyskrasia right now. The skill floor would be unaffected. The skill ceiling would be raised a lot. The mid-point of the skill expression bellcurve would be moved slightly upward, due to the ceiling getting moved so much distance. The idea of 'raise the skill ceiling without affecting the skill floor' shouldn't be controversial, and it's not even difficult to implement, considering the game we're playing. We have solo instances that you can literally AFK and clear, THAT is the skill floor at times.

And again, I added the 3 categories to give more context, a more accurate presentation of the breakdown of what I want from the classes. If I were to just have an overall rating like you guys, everything would be in Medium, due to how averaging everything out would work out. And then we'd have 'why are all the healers in Medium why do you even have the other categories' again. Yes, the bars all refer to difficulty. But that isn't a problem, because the game itself also has expectations based on difficulty. The game doesn't demand a tank know how to do their rotation perfectly, or even to pop CDs apparently, in EX roulette. You could Overpower/Total Eclipse spam your way through a dungeon and still clear. Old PLD was a good example of what I hope for, from healers (besides the 'drop atonements' that was jank): You could press whatever really in a EX roulette and clear. You could drop your DOT a bit in EX trial and clear. But week 1 savage, and optimizing to get a rank 1 parse, involved catering specific amounts of skillspeed to get exact GCD timings, spreadsheet memes, etc. Low skill floor, high skill ceiling.

I think the "four meats" in this case are "Tank, Healer, Melee, Ranged/Caster", not the four Healers themselves. But regardless, even if we look at it that way, consider the opposite: You're saying if people love Chicken (WHM) and hate Beef (SCH), Pork (AST?), or Fish (Sage), that you're only going to make Chicken that is medium or hotter. And if they don't like spicy, you're telling them they have to go eat one of the other three dishes. Then you tell them all of those dishes, too, are only served as medium or hotter, and if they want something mild, they have to leave the restaurant and go eat somewhere else because you don't cater to them.

This part gets it's own dedicated section, and we're going back to wings for this one for one paragraph. Bear with me on it. You ever watch Hot Ones or something like that? I don't really watch it, but it's suitable for the metaphor. So, rather than the 'meats' (healers) being served in a sauce, maybe it's better to explain my mental image as like, serving the customer their 'meat' (in this example, wings) and a selection of sauces of varying spice levels. They can then choose if they want to go with Teriyaki-EX, Savage Sriracha or the 'FFLogs Fireball Special' to put on that wing, depending on how hard they want to sweat.

Other people's restaurant menus in here might have WHM Korma, SCH Madras, AST Vindaloo, SGE Jalfrezi.

Mine has WHM Korma, Madras, Jalfrezi, Vindaloo
SCH Korma, Madras, Jalfrezi, Vindaloo
AST Korma, Madras, Jalfrezi, Vindaloo
SGE Korma, Madras, Jalfrezi, Vindaloo

My hypothetical restaurant doesn't need to say 'ooh sorry we don't do that dish with X meat, you'll have to get Y meat instead for that'. So I don't understand why I'm the one who's being limiting in this situation. Instead, I feel like I'm giving the broadest choice possible. Unless the argument is 'only the absolutely top possible level of minmax is valid for comparison purposes', which, no I've definitely put thought into 'how does this affect the casual playerbase'.

Now, if you were arguing for each Job to have specs, and the specs offer different difficulties - but the exact same output, so doing a harder easier difficulty is you just intentionally taking on more less work knowing you will not in any way be rewarded penalized for doing so -

See how weird this sounds when it's flipped? Why would, for example, a DRK who just throws out Edge whenever, who misaligns their Living Shadow/Shadowbringers from burst windows, and who just refuses to use Bloodspiller and overcaps the gauge for the entire fight, be allowed to have 'the same output' as one who is sweating to push maximum damage? The answer is, as I've outlined above, that the game expects the latter level of skill expression in some content, and not all. So the former DRK who just facerolls the keyboard is able to clear EX roulette just fine, but must practice if they want to tackle Savage. Same as I'd want for healers, Glarespam is not even required at all to clear EX roulette, and is more than enough to clear EX trials. You don't even need to put Dia on your hotbars to clear EX trial. But Savage would ask you to use the rest of your kit too.

If this game were to have 'specs' I'd do a lot more with it than just 'different rotation for the same job', I'd use it for like, giving a different role to each job. SMN/SCH split style. GLD/MRD could have a DPS spec, DRG/NIN/SAM could have tank specs, MNK could have a healer spec that uses Riddle of Water or something, MCH could have a healer spec that uses healing multitools (autocrossbow that fires syringes or something idk), DNC could be a healer like everyone thought it would be. And finally, at long last, BLU would have a spec where it is a regular ass job and can do content with people. Someone made this many years ago (when HW was current) and I thought it was cool as hell. At the time I thought 'damn I'd be a Valkyrie main so fast' but now I'm a healer. I'd probably mostly play Rune Knight

[ataren3]

This seems to be much more of an encounter design issue than anything. Encounters need more lax enrages, less big spikes of damage and more gradual but consistent damage that needs to be healed, and Healer oGCDs need to be nerfed majorly, probably as much as by half. Doing those things would take us back to the ARR/HW combat design.

Oh 100% it's because of the fight design. The issue with their flavor of fights is it focuses on healers doing DPS than healing. When looking at it from an outside perspective, it'd be a nightmare to redesign old & current fights to make healers require more healing. It's much easier to give healers more oGCD heals so they can focus on making that DPS check.

It's just unfortunate that it's setup that way and I'd really love to see an attempt at making heal checks more active. But at the same time I'm not holding my breath.

[Renathras]

Oh 100% it's because of the fight design. The issue with their flavor of fights is it focuses on healers doing DPS than healing. When looking at it from an outside perspective, it'd be a nightmare to redesign old & current fights to make healers require more healing. It's much easier to give healers more oGCD heals so they can focus on making that DPS check.

It's just unfortunate that it's setup that way and I'd really love to see an attempt at making heal checks more active. But at the same time I'm not holding my breath.

I see this argument a lot, but I don't get it.

...why would they have to redesign old fights?

ARR fights all required more consistent healing (bosses could even crit randomly), and it was largely GCD healing since the only oGCD heals in the game were Benediction, Lustrate, and...Embrace/Whispering Dawn?

They changed the fight design over the course of HW to the point that SB was the modern design we have now, but they didn't go back and change the ARR fights. They still exist as they have. Most dungeons still are the same (the redesigns are almost exclusively a few layouts from the 1.0 dungeons like Thousand Maws, and adding the Trust system, which they already did with Squadrons they just wanted better AI and less "brute force" just making the NPCs absolute units so they could face tank their way through...)

That is, they didn't redesign old and current fights when they moved from the "more healing" to the current "less healing, mostly done with oGCDs" model. Why would they need to backdate changes going back?

Now, I would say it's definitely an expansion-level change. You wouldn't want to change mid-tier or part-way through a given expansion since the kits and the fights would be at odds with current content. But when going to 7.0, 8.0, X.0, that's when you'd make the change, largely like they did with 4.0 and, really, 5.0.

I think the issue is there are always Healer shortages, which is what prompted the "dumbing down" in the first place. A lot of Healer players don't like DPS gameplay and don't want to engage with it anymore than they have to, while others prefer the DPS gameplay and like being a balance/plate juggling/Support-Healer hybrid. If the game HAD a proper Support role, that might make things better by covering more bases (and some DPS players like Support roles as well, they just don't like Healer). In most of the polling for Pantheon of the playerbase - granted, a biased sample, but I think it's still somewhat instructive - on average, around 20% of the players want to be Tanks, around 20% Healers, around 30% Support, and around 30% DPS. But most games don't have a Support role, so Support players are shoehorned into playing either Tanks, Healers, or whatever DPS have Support abilities like RDM or DNC.

But as it is in FFXIV, if they lean towards either camp, they alienate the other and make the Healer shortage worse. So they're kind of stuck.

See how weird this sounds when it's flipped?

Not weird at all if your argument is "the spice is just a thing on the side and shouldn't influence people's ability to play as they want and clear content". If that's not your argument...then you're misusing the metric being discussed. That's my problem with your argument, I think. On the one hand, you say you just want the change so people can enjoy the role more and don't want to take away from people that enjoy it as it is today. But your prescription would take away access to content from them (if they play as they do today), and you don't have a problem with that, while pretending that you aren't trying to do it. That is, you're pitching your argument as "this won't affect people who don't want to up their game", but then you say "...and those people who won't up their game can't clear the content they can right now". Well, that's affecting them, so...

If this game were to have 'specs' I'd do a lot more with it than just 'different rotation for the same job', I'd use it for like, giving a different role to each job.

Maybe, but honestly I don't even think that's needed. Considering players can level all Jobs, and many Final Fantasy Jobs don't work that way. For example, Black Mage tanks...aren't a thing. Though Red Mage healers...sometimes are. A lot of that just comes down to design. Like FF11's Job/SubJob system allowed for some crazy stuff. NIN and DNC Tanks, SMN and RDM Healers, etc. Honestly, it's a game I really should get into sometime, but...maybe if they ever make a combination 11/14 sub and/or 11 update...

So, rather than the 'meats' (healers) being served in a sauce, maybe it's better to explain my mental image as like, serving the customer their 'meat' (in this example, wings) and a selection of sauces of varying spice levels.

lol, honestly? I think we should drop the meat/sauce/dish metaphor. We're all using it in different ways, so it isn't really that useful for trying to make sense of things. XD

So I don't understand why I'm the one who's being limiting in this situation.

Really and truly?

Hm...let me put it this way:

Suppose we went to play WoW and we had two designs presented to us. In one design, you're being told that 2 classes in the game play like you enjoy. You might not like the aesthetics, but you can play the game in a way you find fun enough. Maybe you don't like edgy, but Death Knight and Demon Hunter are the two that play the way you want. The other design, though, has no class at all that plays the way you want. Aesthetic or no, you literally have no place in the game and people tell you to quit because you're not welcome and that what you want to play is some other game.

Which of those is more limiting to you?

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BTW: That's me, I don't like edgy. But in that case, I'd pick the one I like best of the two and roll with it.

It's like now, if the only Healer that got to keep a decent (and by decent, I mean current) system was AST (and they actually fixed the stupid card hyperweaving to lower it to present WHM difficulty and APM overall), I'd swap to it. A bit grudgingly, since it is literally the one I like least in terms of both aesthetics and how it functions, but I'd go with it if it played like WHM does today (so no oGCD cards, things like Earthly Star changed to Assize, etc etc). /shrug

Of course, given that many people LIKE those things about AST, that would just upset far more people than leaving WHM and/or SGE alone as they are today would, since in those cases, the people are used to the present playstyles.

[ForsakenRoe]

You are purposely construing the point I am making into something it is not. If someone is doing 'challenging content' like Savage, there is an expectation, not just by me, but by the game too, that they are of a certain skill level. My point is, for the like hundredth time, if someone is a casual and only does EX roulette, they will not need to change anything about how they play. If they do Savage week 1, of course they will need to change their rotation to match the new class design, just like any class. PLDs had to learn a new rotation when it got overhauled this patch. BUT, if someone does week 14 Savage, when they have full tomestone gear and overgear the fight, then they don't need to change their rotation, because they make up for that lack of dps by their whole team overgearing the fight by like 10 item levels. The game itself expects competence, enforced by an enrage timer. So I don't see why me expecting the same level of competence the game asks for, is an issue. It seems the issue you're picking up, is that you won't be able to use the current rotation to clear Savage anymore. In which case, you have options: wait till you overgear the fight, or practice until the new rotation is muscle memory. If you're good enough to clear early, undergeared Savage, picking up a new rotation is a 'practice on a dummy for a couple hours' job. If you're not good enough to clear undergeared Savage, instead clearing it when you have full tomestone gear, then the changes will have less effect on you. I can, now that I have BIS, entirely ignore my DOT. I'd still do enough damage without it to clear P8S. But in week 1, the game doesn't just expect me to use my DOT, it demands it. The same would be true under the system I'm proposing. Week 1 you'd have to maximize your gameplay (as is expected for any class of all three roles right now), week 7-10 whatever you'd have lenience to make a couple of mistakes, or purposely ignore parts of your kit (i guess?).

If you're trying to say 'well we should be able to clear week 1 Savage with the same gameplay as now' then yes, I disagree with that. I expect that if someone's in content that is as challenging as 'P8S, also you have no guides to work with, work out the mechanics yourself', they should also have the capacity to learn a new rotation for a class, even if that class's role is healer. And I don't think it's a controversial take to say 'I expect players to adapt and improve in terms of skill' when specifically referring to that high end content, where the GAME ITSELF is saying 'I expect players to adapt and improve in terms of skill'. I explained my position on three levels of difficulty, drew a chart to further illustrate the nuance in my opinion, and then you took the orange bars and only made analysis about them, and ignored/misunderstood, whether accidentally or deliberately, what I was trying to say about the difference in expectations that I/the game have of the player, based on the content they are tackling. If you want to stop talking about meat and sauce, that's fine by me. I understand what I'm talking about well enough, it sounds like you want to stop using the metaphor because it's not working for you anymore.

I don't understand what you mean by the last part with the WoW classes. Like, at this point it just sounds to me like you're throwing out random words hoping that you'll trip me up. Which I guess you have done. But based on my interpretation of what you're trying to get at, my point is to have Demon Hunter, which you 'want to play' in terms of gameplay, having several different kinds of gameplay. It works like this already, you can play regular mode where you just build fury and spend it on Eye Beam and Blade dance, or you can play the Momentum build where you have to purposely use Vengeful Retreat and Fel Rush to maintain selfbuffs. Momentum is a much more difficult playstyle compared to regular, as you need to be aware of your surroundings, know when is safe to Fel Rush, etc. Sometimes, Momentum is the better build of the two, doing more damage, and lets assume that it is 5% better than the regular build. The game would expect you to play Momentum for doing Mythic raids, or high Mythic+, but you could clear up to a +15, or a Heroic raid, playing the normal build.

Put another way, you asking 'why am I not allowed to play the way I currently do in Savage in your proposal, i'll do less damage if I do' is akin to me asking 'why can't I play SAM the way I did in Stormblood?' It's because the class changed, and the rotation changed with it. I can still play 'Stormblood SAM' in a EX roulette, burning all the sen on Hagakure and spending kenki on shinten, but that's not the optimal gameplay anymore. Probably clear an EX trial that way too tbh. But Savage asks more of the player, and I think that's fair of the game to ask. If we imagine every class was similar in rotational complexity to healers, then prog would be boring as shit, because we'd not need to focus at all on 'doing damage', the only difficulty would be solving the mechanics of the fight. It's already bad enough when we have fights like P7S, where we find a 'braindead' strat and remove the majority of the complexity of the fight.

Furthermore, in WOW, there is some highend content you'd be able to clear by doing nothing except spamming Flash of Light. Heck, that was THE strat back in vanilla. I think there's also a build that allows you to play 'ranged paladin'. Sort of. But Paladins aren't relegated to FOL spam anymore, they have an active DPS rotation to build resources and spend on instantcast healing tools. FOL is there as the 'I have to heal right now and everything is going horribly wrong' button, with some interplay where you can get a proc to empower it and make hardcasting it mid-rotation worth it.

I'm not saying 'if you don't like the complex gameplay style, don't play the class', I'm saying 'if you don't like the complex gameplay style, don't do the content that demands you use everything in your kit'. If the issue is 'I want to do [content that demands interfacing with complexity] but don't want to [interface with complexity]' then there's just a mismatch of what the player wants from the game, and the game wants from the player. One which has nothing to do with me. In a sense, I'm just the messenger, bringing the game's decree that 'either learn your class, or go back to SSS until you do'. But I don't see why healer is the role exempt from 'learn your bloody rotation'. Pressing a healing button is just as hard as pressing a mitigation button as tank, you just do them at different times relative to the raidwide.

[Renathras]

You are purposely construing...

I'm not "construing" anything.

Someone playing WHM with a 2,1,1,1,1,1,1,1 rotation can currently clear Savage. That is the gameplay of the game now, and the model thee game is using. This is a fact. Whether you want to share your content with them or not, they're able to play it and they're able to clear it, and a player still has to know and execute fights to get through them. Further, if they could not, there would be a MASSIVE Healer shortage in Savage. Look at how many Savage Healers parse less than 50. For the sake of argument (since there's not much optimizing in Healer damage kits as it is), let's assume anyone parsing less than 75 wouldn't be able to clear under your model. That would destroy raiding in this game, to the point Yoshi P might seriously consider stopping Savage content because no one's playing it. All those supposed Healers that don't play Healer right now because they're bored with it and maybe playing DPS - even if all of them started playing Healers again, there would not be enough.

"a certain skill level"?

And what is that? What is that skill level? Can you describe it in objective, quantifiable terms? Do you think Healers clearing P8-2 right now do not have "a certain skill level" because they aren't having to play with "challenging" rotations? Why is "skill level" to you, synonymous with "conducting a mechanically complex rotation"? Why is muscle memory (and possibly use of add-ons like timers and HUT/UI altering add-ons to make things like DoTs easier to track...) considered "skill" to you, exactly?

But have you not said before that you don't want anyone not being able to clear content they do now? When I said that Healers with easy rotations should do the same damage, in the past, I believe you replied with something like "Yeah, I'm not one of the people demanding more damage, I just want to be more engaged, so I don't care if they're able to clear the same content and do the same damage, it's not about that"?

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I dunno, I just don't think it's going to happen the way you want because of all the fallout.

I don't understand what you mean by the last part with the WoW classes. Like, at this point it just sounds to me like you're throwing out random words hoping that you'll trip me up.

What...? o.O

No, I just can't fathom you not understanding this, because it's an extremely simple concept.

You're saying that an idea that gives you 2 options that you may not like is more limiting than an idea that gives you 0 options at all. I'm trying to figure out how to explain to you that 0 is less than 2. I would love to know how you think that 0 is more than 2 and am genuinely confused how to explain basic number theory to you since I thought everyone knew 0 was less than 2.

I'm not trying to be a dick about it, but every time I try to explain it, you rebuff or even attack me and act like there's some kind of hidden message. The concept is so simple, a part of me wonders if you get it and are just refusing to admit it because of how obvious it is and that it would harm your argument to admit that...but I genuinely think you don't get it. I just don't get HOW you don't get it:

If you are offered 2 options out of 30, that is limiting.
But if you are offered 0 options out of 30, that is MORE limiting.

I have no idea how to explain this because it's such an obvious, simplistic concept, I would think everyone would naturally get it...

I'm not trying to be snarky or a dick about it, I just am genuinely confused how you think 0 is more than 2, and how to explain to you that 0 is, in fact, less than 2. Even if you dislike the 2, 2 is still more than 0. I even made the point in FFXIV terms using myself and AST.

If the only Jobs I could enjoy in this game were AST, DRK, and RPR, I'd still play the game even though I dislike those kinds of edgy/dark things. I'd just liberally use Glam. Which...I do

I'm saying 'if you don't like the complex gameplay style, don't do the content that demands you use everything in your kit'.

What you're missing is it doesn't demand our kit right now. You're trying to institute a change that takes something away from people, and you don't seem to be willing to admit that's what you're advocating for, possibly because even you realize that would be a bad thing.

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The argument ultimately comes down to this:

Right now, Healer is accessible. We still have shortages, but a lot of people have it and enjoy it.

What you're asking for is to make content more exclusive - more elite - and deny people access to it that have access now. This would be a terrible thing to do. Firstly, you're going to alienate all the people you've decided to tell to "git good" - and no, telling them "It's okay, honey. /pat You can do the content in a few months once everyone's done with and you have the baby catch-up gear. /pat" is not going to fly well. But secondly, and what is actually more damning for the game, is it would cause a ridiculously massive Healer shortage that I don't think you see coming. P5-8S had a minor Healer shortage because healing actually required GCDs. That's NOTHING compared to the shortage that would come if every Healer had a NIN or honestly even a RDM damage rotation they had to do while healing if they wanted to clear current content.

It really boggles my mind that you not only don't see this, you don't even count it as in the realm of "vaguely possible that should be considered".

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And this isn't exclusive to Healers:

But I don't see why healer is the role exempt from 'learn your bloody rotation'.

How much you wanna bet a WAR could 1-2-3 + Upheaval and/or Fell Cleave (and obviously still using its oGCD mitigations just like Healers use their oGCD heals) and still clear Savage encounters? Like, never use Storm's Path, never use Inner Release even, etc. If they're in Tank stance, no one's going to rip threat off of them.

Healers are hardly the only ones "exempt". But the other thing you're missing:

Healers are not DPS

It's the entire reason many people play them - because they do not like DPS rotations. I don't understand what's hard to understand about that, conceptually. They like optimizing healing, they like being a support to their party - I know you don't, but many players do. Do you at least understand that, even if you think they have no place in your game?

I'm not saying "Healers don't do damage", I'm saying "Healers aren't designed to have a damage rotation". Healers in MMOs are almost always designed to be either reactionary or priority system based gameplay models. In NORMAL MMOs, at least some of the DPS are as well. Sadly, FFXIV's combat model has forced almost all of them into a rotation. RDM and I think BRD are still technically priority systems and not rotations - RDM doesn't have a set rotation, as your optimal "next ability to press" is based on what procs you have and the state of your Mana, contrasting something like BLM or DRG that have rigid rotations. As much as people insist they're the same, New PLD's rotation is priority based vs GNB's which is highly rigid, as was Old PLDs. So that was a step in the right direction. WAR's is also something of a priority system, not a rotation. But those can be more mapped out for entire fights where RDM and BRD can't be because of the proc systems they use.

don't do the content that demands you use everything in your kit'.

This should only be true for Ultimates.

[ForsakenRoe]

I don't get how YOU aren't getting it. I am offering WHM in four flavours of 'complexity', EX roulette braindead mode, 'OK I guess I'll use my DOT a few times' EX trial mode, 'Alright I'm gonna lean forward in my chair and tryhard for this one' Savage, and 'I am an unstoppable god' Ultimate mode. Then, I am offering SCH in similar vein, four levels of 'complexity'. It is up to the player which level of complexity they want to go with. If they want to just be 'braindead EX roulette mode' they can, but they are not going to clear Savage with it. That is not my design, that is how the game itself is designed, by the existence of enrage timers. Now, this requires that we assume there's no scale, no 'in between' for these complexity levels. In truth, there are much more minute differences to be applied, like, pressing your DOT twice instead of once doesn't jump you up an entire complexity level. Even so, with that assumption in mind, I'm giving sixteen options. Your ages ago suggestion of 'WHM - No spice, SGE - Mild, SCH - Med, DiAST - Hot, NoctAST - Very Hot' is five. And I shouldn't need to tell you this, but five is less than sixteen, by quite a lot.

And if you cannot even understand FFlogs and how percentiles work, I suggest you stop trying to make ideas for 'how healers should work at endgame'. Even a grey parse can clear, it HAS to have cleared to be logged. You're forgetting so many details of what I'm suggesting, it'd honestly be shorter to write the parts you got right. No, I'm not suggesting a 'currently 75% player' is the baseline for who could clear Savage. Week 1 and Week 'whenever you cleared the tier (if at all)' are two different beasts. My first clear of Hegemone was an 80. It's now a 52, compared to what people can do with extra gear. So no, my suggestion would be that you'd have to be 'week 1 1% or higher' to clear week 1, as is the case now. One of my clears of P8S phase 1 is a 4, but it still got us into phase 2. It sounds to me more like you take issue with the idea that you might actually have to put effort into getting an early clear of Savage, before you completely outgear it and the challenge factor is reduced. That, or you're scared that your current playstyle that gets you.. whatever parse it gets, will not get you as good a parse in the future, that the insignificant, pointless number on a third party website will be smaller. But you don't care about that number, so why would you care if it got smaller?

If someone can clear Savage now, with the current rotation, good for them. If they cannot learn a theoretical new rotation that has one extra GCD for WHM, to the point where it is stopping them from clearing Savage, they can either learn the rotation until it's not a problem anymore, or clear Savage at a later time, when gear allows them to overcome that differential. The position of 'well they can clear it now, so they should be able to clear it always, and any changes have to allow for their skill level (or lack thereof) to remain at this level' is indefensible imo. It doesn't matter, in terms of when you get the mount or when you get the gear for your BIS, WHEN you clear the tier, just that you do. So the speed you clear at is nothing more than a yardstick to see how well you can cope with being undergeared. To test your skill. And if you don't meet the height check, you cannot ride the ride. The Phase1 doorbosses ARE this height check, they test you to see if you have enough DPS to clear Phase2, the 'real fight'. Over time though, they've become more and more towards 'being a fight of their own'. The original, Exdeath, was only like 4min long, instead of this 8-9min pain we have to deal with now. Before that though, we had a different 'doorboss'. Faust. We need Fausts back on each tier, to test the playerbase and make sure that, if they can't down the Faust, they can't even zone into the first fight of the tier.

I expect that if a player is going into 'challenge level content' then they're going to push their skills. That doesn't just mean 'how well they can heal predictable damage', but also 'recovery from mistakes', 'adjusting to cover mechanical failures (eg swapping which stack you're in if needed)', 'MP economy (would like to see this come back)', 'positioning', and yes, 'knowledge of DPS rotation'. We're quickly running out of those though. Recovery is impossible when every mechanic is 'everyone must be alive or you wipe'. Adjusting in some mechanics is not possible, EG High Concept, if one person's in the wrong place you cannot adjust to salvage it. MP economy doesn't exist anymore because all healers can clear with base piety, making that a dead stat too. Positioning is 'stand where the mechanic tells you to, unless theres no mechanic, in which case stand whereever tf you want as long as you're in range to get raidbuffs'. And lastly, 'knowledge of DPS rotation' requires there to BE a DPS rotation in the first place.

So we have this hypothetical player, who is 'participating in difficult content like Savage, and learning complicated mechanics like High Concept or Natural Alignment, but is unable to process the idea of pressing a different button as part of the downtime where the boss isn't hitting the party for 45 straight seconds'. If this player (who I refuse to believe even exists) cannot learn a slightly more complex rotation, or should I say, refuse to learn it, then they do not belong in Savage. Their abject refusal to adjust to the new rotation would imply they'd have an abject refusal to any suggestions of how to change up the strat for solving a mechanic, and no raider I've partied with would want to deal with that kind of obtuse attitude. If you want to be able to 11111111111 your way through Savage, more power to you. Under my rules, you'd be able to do that. But you'd just have to wait till the odd patch, and get the tome upgrade items from the 24man, get to full augmented tome gear, and have your DPS do similar, to make up for the damage you're not putting forward. You want that reward sooner, you'd better put some practice in and earn it sooner.

There was a thing in Legion, called the Mage Tower. Tough solo encounter, tested you on how good you were at your class, rewarded a special artifact weapon appearance if you cleared it. First released in 7.2, if you saw someone in that patch, you knew they were beastmode. But, as time went on, 7.3 comes out, new Netherlight Crucible system comes out, more Artifact traits are added, player power goes up higher, the Mage Tower didn't sync the player to a stat template, so you could overgear it. People could still get the 'cool reward', for less effort, or less 'knowledge of their class', by just waiting. This would be the same. You want to get the Savage reward mount? Just wait, get more gear, do the fight when you don't have to bleed and sweat for every precious GCD. I got my clears of UCOB and UWU during SHB, and I could feel the effect of the SHB potency changes, despite never even going into the fights while they were current. I did TEA while it was 'more current' (ok it was in 5.5, same expansion technically) and the difference in how hard it was, was like night and day. I'd actually argue that current UWU is easier to learn than how it felt to teach some friends E8S, week 8-ish.

I got a purple pugging UCOB as DRG, and as NIN. I cannot play either for the life of me in EW content. I don't demand that my scuffed playstyle I used in UCOB matches the DPS output of actual competent DRG/NIN players, that'd be ridiculous. The addition of Wyrmwind Thrust made doing good damage as DRG more difficult for me, I don't understand when to use it in my rotation. I would if I practiced. But by saying 'current players should be able to use their current playstyle and not lose damage', I'd say is the same as me trying to say 'I should be able to play DRG without bothering with optimizing Wyrmwind, I should be able to just throw it the moment it's ready and do the same damage as the good DRGs'. Which is pretty daft a position to hold. Which is why I don't hold it and I don't play DRG or NIN in EW's endgame content.

And that last line, I'd say it's true for both week 1 Savage and Ultimates. Because Ultimates lock your ILVL so you cannot outgear the fight, just as, during week 1, you're 'locked' at a certain item level. The only time you can outgear the savage fight is once 'week 1' has passed. So no, I'd say there should be an expectation that the player is good at their class if they are aiming for a week 1 clear of Savage. If they're not good at their class, they practice. If the class rotation suddenly changes on them, they practice that new rotation until they know it. We all had to relearn the cards when they changed them to flat damage. I don't look at the job gauge to know my cards, I look at the '+ The Balance' thingy. So I had to learn which card goes to melee, which goes to ranged, which gives what seal, and that meant UNlearning stuff. Ewer and Spire were a pair, of 'turns next card into AOE' with Royal road. Now it's Arrow and Ewer that are paired. Same with Spire and Spear, it used to be that Arrow and Spear were 'doubles next card duration'. But because it changed, I unlearned what I knew, and relearned the class to know what I now know. And if the classes were to get more DPS actions, I'd relearn them again, that's how playing MMOs works mostly

[Renathras]

I don't get how YOU aren't getting it. I am offering WHM in four flavours of 'complexity',

...where ONLY ZERO OF THEM are valid in any content that matters.

EDIT: I'm going to read the rest of this, but this is where the breakdown is. You think if you offer something that works in content that literally no one considers relevant because a Job that is literally juggling potatoes would be viable, that that's somehow you making a big offer. It isn't. It's specifically why I keep pointing it out to you. Over and over again.

If your offer is "You can keep playing THE GAME but not THE CONTENT YOU DO RIGHT NOW", then you aren't offering things. You're taking things away. You're offering ZERO. Zero is less than 2.

That is, it is not "up to the player which level of complexity they want to go with" unless ALL LEVELS OF COMPLEXITY are capable in ALL LEVELS OF CONTENT, which you've specifically said they would not be. Consider ShB. You could play RDM, BLM, or SMN depending on what level of complexity you wanted, and all of them could clear Savage and Ultimate content.

THAT was complexity being truly optional. That was the player being able to choose what level of complexity they wanted in their Job. They might have to change Jobs if they wanted it - if you wanted simple you'd have to play RDM and if you wanted hyper complex you had to play SMN - but the option was there for all players to gravitate to the one they wanted. This is, btw, literally my longstanding argument for the "Four Healers" model.

Since all three were different levels of complex and all three were viable, in Savage content and otherwise, at those varying levels of complexity. You couldn't play SMN like you could RDM and still be viable. But you could play RDM like that and be viable. RDM was also one of the most played Jobs in the game. The point here is that all of them were viable, even in Savage content, while one was simple, one was complex, and one was somewhere in-between.

Likewise, ShB era Tanks offered four different layers of complexity. You could unga bunga WAR or you could big brain PLD or you could go with the two flavors in between; and all four were viable in Savage content being played those ways.

Your argument like saying ShB RDM needed a rotation as complex and difficult to play as BLM and SMN in order to play Savage, and people could be allowed to keep playing it simply, but they couldn't clear Savage if they did. That's a REMOVAL of option, since it's not an option the moment it becomes REQUIRED to clear the content.

It not being required for MSQ is irrelevant, since no one cares and everything can clear MSQ anyway. Likewise for Extremes, for the most part.

.

...okay, so, now that said...the rest of it:

That is not my design, that is how the game itself is designed,

No, it's not, because Healers are clearing this content with their simple rotations right now. It's how you want the game to be designed, and you have this odd notion that if the Devs change Healer rotations, they won't change anything else; an unlikely outcome.

but five is less than sixteen, by quite a lot.

Setting aside math theory (5 and 16 differ by << than one order of magnitude; roughly around half an order of magnitude, to be more precise), it's not 5 vs 16 if the 16 says that only 4 are viable in high end content. Then it's 4 vs 5, and 4 is less than 5. But it's not even 4 vs 5. It's 0 (number of simple play viable in Savage under your model) vs 1 (number of simple play viable in Savage under my model). And because 0 is null, 1 >>>>>>>> 0. 1 is considered infinitely larger than 0.

If you were saying ALL 16 were viable in Savage...then that would be different.

You aren't. You're explicitly saying that only 4 WOULD be viable, and none of the simple ones, meaning 0 of the simple ones would be viable in Savage under your model.

And if you cannot even understand...

I can understand it fine. That wasn't the point, and I'm tired of giving you forbearance for wanton inanity. THE POINT, since I must spell it out:

It's probably valid to assume only 1/4th of current Healers would be able to play your complex Healer rotations well. That means that only about 1/4th could clear Savage content if the changes you want were made. The number of people that don't play Healers that would only be attracted to the role if they were more complex is very likely less than 3/4ths of the current Healer population that would cease to be viable - either through lack of skill or lack of desire - and this would create a Healer shortage.

THE POINT was that your model would create a Healer shortage.

That was the point.

We know this because it DID create a Healer shortage in the past, which is why they changed it. In HW, Savage raiding was done by a tiny percent of the population. In SB, more people did it, and there was a Healer shortage. It was only in ShB and into EW that we haven't had a massive Healer shortage in Savage with it being played by a good chunk of the playerbase - enough to make it worth the money for the Devs to keep making Savage fights.

It sounds to me more like you...

And STOP with the stupid and rude ad hominem attacks. For one who has condemned my style in the past, yours here is far more insulting and rude.

...is indefensible imo

Well, as it turns out, iyo doesn't matter. The Devs have made this their goal. You not wanting it (and seemingly wanting to be an elitist who gets to exclude people from content) is not their goal. Their goal seems to be the exact opposite, in fact...

We need Fausts back...

Question for you: What percentage of the playerbase cleared Savage at level in HW?

So we have this hypothetical player, who is 'participating in difficult content like Savage, and learning complicated mechanics like High Concept or Natural Alignment, but is unable to...

Another thing you seem not to understand:

Which is harder, BRD or RDM or BLM or DRG?

You might think you have an answer...but you don't. Why do I say this?

Because each is hard IN A DIFFERENT WAY.

BRD is highly reactionary. The "rotation" is understanding the song timing, and then largely dealing with procs. Iron Jaws once every 45 seconds is not a "rotation". Press Burst Shot if nothing has procced is not a "rotation". The only thing that's really a rotation is the songs, and the rest of its combat style is based on what is up and what is not. A priority system.

RDM is moderately reactionary. The "rotation" is balancing Mana, while using and trying to maximize procs you get (through Acceleration and proper Holy/Flare usage/going into your melee combo with the lower Mana being one you don't currently have a proc for). "Using a short cast then a long cast" isn't a rotation, that's two buttons. The melee combo is 3 buttons (now that they've technically split the Mana Gems off of it). The finisher combo is 2 buttons, one of them twice. None of these things are "rotations". The only actual solid pieces of the entire kit are when to use Embolden.

BLM, on the other hand, is proactive with a TOUCH of reaction. BLM's rotation is largely static. The only thing that changes is the random Firestarter or Thundercloud procs. The base rotation itself is the same every time. It's actually a pretty rigid rotation, but with minor variance based on procs, and the BLM's playstyle is more about learning the encounter and fitting their rotation to it.

DRG, on the final hand, is a highly rigid "railroad track" rotation. I kind of mentally think of it as a figure 8 based on the way Fang and Claw and Wheeling Thrust work. DRG's rotation doesn't have procs, and doesn't have a priority system per se (the next button in the proper rotation is the "priority" to hit). Everything is based on timers, either CD timers or the GCD between main rotation abilities. It's strict, punishing if you mess it up, but it's also the same, meaning if you spend hours at a training dummy to cram it into your muscle memory, you can play every fight the same with the only difference being where you buffs (Battle Litany and Dragon Sight).

So, which is harder?

...well, that depends on the player, since not every player is alike. A DRG lover may be the kind of player that likes things to be known, planned, and under control (SGE also kind of works this way with its healing system, btw, and GNB with its rotation), but may absolutely HATE BRD's proc lottery madness and feel overwhelmed by it, and may find RDM's lack of a true rotation to be frustrating. On the other hand, a BRD player may like how free-form it feels, and find DRG's strict rotation to be stifling, find themselves constantly mucking up the rotation, and just hate it. A RDM player may find BRD's proc system overstimulating, but BLM's planning and DRG's strictness too limiting, instead prefering RDM having a general pattern of abilities, but with some variance and a fair amount of flexibility. BLM players might also find BRD too overstimulating, but RDM too simple, while finding DRG too rigid, and more enjoy being able to optimize their otherwise somewhat strict rotation to fights, using their tools that allow them to push, defer, or accelerate their rotation.

Which is harder?

Each is easy to the person that gets it, not as easy to those that don't resonate well with it, and hard to those who come from the opposite school of skill.

.

In short, not everyone's skill is the same. Many people playing this game don't get Healers, so they don't play them. Many people think SGE is super hard to heal on, while others find it easier than SCH and AST. There's not an absolute scale there, but the message is this:

What is hard or skill for one person may be easy for another or impossible for another.

I often point out how I hate DoTs (especially ones that don't interact with anything) because my brain doesn't track timers on its own well. It's not a skill issue, it's a "I literally cannot tell you when 30 seconds has passed" issue. I can absolutely "press a button", that's not a matter of "skill". It's something else being measured.

It's like the statement "Scientists measuring IQ know that they're measuring something, but they're not exactly sure what it is that they're measuring."

Is memory "skill"?

Is timing "skill"?

Is rote repetition "skill"?

Is recognition of a priority "skill"?

Is response to a sudden event (proc) "skill"?

Which is hard?

Which is easy?

It depends on the player. Some people find a single spam button and upkeep DoT difficult - not kidding - while they'd find a 1-2-3 rotation easy. Others find the 1-2-3 rotation super complex and tricky but the DoT+nuke braindead. The thing is - neither's right, but neither's wrong.

That's why it's important to have both in the game.

The game needs RDM and the game needs BLM. If every Caster was like BLM, people would hate it. If every Caster was like RDM, people would hate it. The game arguably also needs New SMN, but ALSO needs Old SMN at the same time on the other end of BLM. That's the "hole" that Caster needs filled right now, too.

[ForsakenRoe]

Man, just say you want to be carried through content while you are playing suboptimally, if that's what you want. It'd save us all the time and effort of trying to decipher whatever you meant when you were talking about your meat and sauces. I'm saying that if someone wants to clear a piece of content, that expects the player to be competent, then I also expect the player to be competent. I don't see why you're trying to argue, for example, a SAM should be able to FreestyleSAM their way though Savage. If they want to do that in story, or EX roulette, that's up to them, but in content where expectations are set by the game itself, then I have to hold those same expectations. If you want to look at it through your whatever-tinted glasses of 'oh evil Samantha is going to force all four healer classes to have more complexity if I want to get a week1-4 clear of Savage', yes I am, and so is the game.

If time went backwards, and we had Current PLD removed in 6.3 to make way for 'the Old PLD' (the spreadsheety one), some people would complain, sure. But a much bigger number of them would be like 'whatever i guess Goring is a DOT now' and get on with it. People who are competent enough to clear Savage early will learn the new rotation and get on with the job. Only this hypothetical playerbase (who either doesn't exist, or is comprised of just you), who is simultaneously bigbrained enough to solve High Concept 2's gimmick, but also so clumsy with learning new rotations that they cannot process an extra DOT on SCH or an extra GCD on WHM, would have issue. And if they DO exist, they are in such small number that it should not have any bearing on SE's design decision. The pros outweigh the cons by such a large magnitude, that only someone who is well and truly galvanized against any changes would argue against it. Which explains why we're here, doing this song and dance over and over.

Clear the tier, then we'll talk about week 1-4 Savage complexity/ease of play balance, ok

[Renathras]

Man, just say you want to be carried through content while you are playing suboptimally,

Holy rudeness, Batman!

EDIT:

Seriously, I go to great length to explain things to you, you refuse to get them - probably because you see they'd defeat your argument - and you DON'T want a middle-ground. You just want to pretend your position (which isn't), is, and then you're an arse to other people. And you say I'm the one with an attitude problem.

You don't have to "decipher" anything. My position has always been clear:

I want the game to have options for people who enjoy all different forms of play to where each has AT LEAST ONE Job they can play to their liking and enjoy the game and clear content. If some have more than one, that's fine, as long as all of them have AT LEAST ONE. Because I want to include people and people to have fun, I don't want to exclude people and cause massive Healer shortages or the like. And I don't want to take away anything from players who are willing and able to enjoy it NOW. I don't want to rob people of content they enjoy.

You can pretend this is somehow rocket surgery, but it's simple:

I want a game everyone can enjoy and no one's excluded from, you want to be an elitist that doesn't let people into "your" content; not realizing if few enough people do "your" content, Yoshi P is liable to stop making it.

If time went backwards, and we had Current PLD removed in 6.3 to make way for 'the Old PLD' (the spreadsheety one), some people would complain, sure. But a much bigger number of them would be like 'whatever i guess Goring is a DOT now' and get on with it.

And the people who don't like it would swap to WAR.

Your argument isn't "make one Healer more complex". Your argument is "make ALL Healers more complex". At least be consistent with your own position!

The parallel here would be if we made WAR, PLD, GNB, and DRK all have Goring-like DoTs.

And the first thing that would happen is people call all the Tanks homogenized and same-y. The second thing would be a massive Tank shortage as Tank players quit the game or swap to playing DPS.

where expectations are set by the game itself, then I have to hold those same expectations

I don't know how much clearer I can get than this:

The GAME ITSELF does not have these expectations. IF IT DID, then Healers playing as they are now WOULD NOT BE ABLE TO CLEAR ANY HIGH END CONTENT.

CLEARLY it is not THE GAME that has these expectations, regarding Healer rotational complexity. It's YOU.

You're literally talking about CHANGING THE GAME to where it holds those expectations. Which HAS TO MEAN it presently DOES NOT hold them.