T/H/D/D vs T/3DPS - By the numbers

[Renathras]

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1 - I agree with 1 (by your writing, you seem to be saying you know I do, so we're good there). I think the solution is less big spikes of damage and more gradual, consistent but smaller, damage, and possibly pruning/weakening oGCDs. It seems from survey answers, this is what a lot of other people agree with as well. While many want more DPS actions, many more say they want to heal, they just need encounters to actually use their healing ability. While it is oft said here that the Devs won't increase healing requirements in any way (even by making them lower intensity...which seems an odd thing to insist would be harder...), Yoshi P is already on record (quote produced by AmiableApkallu above) saying they, the Devs, believe that adding to the damage kits will be what drives novice Healers off and creates animosity in the community towards those who use less DPS buttons in their kit (something we know historically happened with Cleric and it is reasonable to assume would happen again).

It's why I find it difficult to believe they'll do the opposite of those things.

2 - I think it's fair that some heals DON'T have interactions. Many games have direct healing abilities that don't have gimmicks or tricks. Many MMOs and RPGs have entire classes based around this concept. I believe the problem comes when all the healing classes work that same way, and do agree there should be more going on. The thing is, we have to ask what an interaction is. For example, you list Energy Drain as a good example and I'll point out (in yet another thread) the second most complaint about SCH in all the surveys we've done (after "give us more DoTs") is that people hate Energy Drain because they feel like they can't use their Aetherflow on any of the AF heals without being bad, and how awful that feels because they LIKE abilities like Soil and Excog and feel penalized if they use them. SGE has been consistently praised by these same people as not having that trade-off.

...on the other hand, I'd point out that Recitation, Emergency Tactics, and Deployment Tactics (and Pepsis and Zoe) are "modifier" abilities that work with other abilities. But because they're (a) oGCDs and require (b) GCD heals (damage losses), they get overlooked while the far inferior and LESS interactive Energy Drain (the only way it interacts with your kit is by locking you out of things) is touted as good, when the people responding to our questions seem to think it's pretty bad.

Perhaps we mean different things by interaction, though...?

3 - As I've said, I don't think this is inherently a problem as long as it's not the exact same thing. I don't like BLM's rotation. If I want to play a Caster, I have two other options that play nothing like BLM. But say I don't like WHM's rotation. There are no other options. They're all the same. I think this is the problem - there's no GETTING AWAY from the Nuke + DoT. In the long form survey, I think there were either 2 or 3 people saying they would like Dia removed and JUST be a 1 spamming WHM because they want their focus on healing. While in the minority, and I won't say they aren't, a LOT of the other responses were along the lines of "I just want more to heal", with a few taking the "healing right now is a conflict of two designs, do damage or heal, and I don't care WHICH ONE, but SE needs to pick ONE and run with it". In short, not everyone is at odds with the Nuke + DoT issue itself, the problems are more that it's the same for all the healer Jobs so no one can escape it, and that the healing requirements are low enough for it to even be an issue thanks to too many and too powerful oGCDs.

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I do agree we have bloated kits. Worse, the kits often have a TON of overlap. WHM/AST is the most egregious case, but if you ignore all the oGCDs and ONLY look at the GCDs, the difference is...what, WHM has Cure 3 and Solace/Rapture (though they're just Cure 2/Medica) and Misery while AST has, what, Macrocosmos?

They both have Cure 1. They both have Cure 2 (WHM has 3 versions of it, basically), they both have Medica, they both have Medica 2, they both have Regen, they both have Dia, and they both have Glare. Taking away the oGCDs (which people often don't "feel", so to speak), the only distinction is WHM has Cure 3 (rarely used) and the Lily abilities in its rotation, and AST has Macrocosmos (which is used as a big CD in a healing plan). It's ridiculous how identical they are.

...then we can add SGE to the mix and see it has Cure 1/Physic and Medica (and Adlo and Succor), Dia, and Glare, which obviously is the same as SCH which is only different in that they DON'T have Medica but have Ruin 2 instead. And Summon, I guess?

Top to bottom, they're the same. Top to bottom, a lot of people felt left out because there's no healing Job that is what they like.

And as you note, it's not limited to Healers, as Tanks likewise have bloated kits.

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As to the last...maybe. I'm not sure people are doing it to explicitly send a message any more than Sebazy tanking Titan on WHM was meant to. It probably started more as people just seeing if they could do it. That's definitely the 1 healer Ultimate motivation.

And, to be fair, there'd probably be a lot of 1/0 Tank runs on things, too, if it wasn't that Tanks are just invincible, partly due to their Tank Mastery ability and otherwise due to their fairly ridiculous self-sustain. Maybe I'm remembering wrong, but I don't remember WAR and PLD having that much immunity to damage and "No, it's fine, I'll heal myself" in ARR or HW. I didn't play DRK and only dabbled in WAR, but I didn't remember any Tank having a chunky heal as part of their 1-2-3 back then...

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I think the Devs recognize there's an issue - Yoshi P's "We're trying to give you what you want, is this not it? WHAT DO YOU WANT?!?" after P5-8S were released indicates the exasperation going on in the Dev team - they just are super kid gloves about solutions because they remember Cleric stance and the massive healer shortage and toxic behavior of yesteryear and don't want a repeat of it.