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

[ASkellington]

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.

If they actually read feedback like they SAY they do they would know what we want.

Quite literally all they need to do is get a translator and read the entirety of Recon's post that has been nicely updated for EW. That is the most upvoted part of the healer forums, is a quality post and details what's wrong with healers, what to do to fix it and what each healer wants.

They don't even have to do all of it, but it would give them ideas if they would get their act together and just READ.

I stand by my statement they don't. Give me a good reason why Living Dead was an issue since HW and only got fixed in this expansion's post patch? Give me a good reason why MCH got a "we didn't know about this ping issue" when it was one mentioned all through out Shb COULD have been fixed in a point patch (as evidenced again this expansion).

My signature quote frankly sums up everything.

[Renathras]

...

Maybe.

I suspect they have other ways they gain feedback from players. We know these forums LIKELY don't represent the average player. It's possible whatever larger scale player sample they're looking at IS telling them something different. And/or the Japanese forums (that they actually pay attention to) are only talking about wanting more healing, not more damage...but I find that doubtful.

I also think people are too quick to say "what each healer wants". For example, I don't want a high (damage rotation) skill ceiling. I honestly like more easygoing, direct, and straightforward Jobs with lower skill ceilings. I just don't think EVERY Job should be that. When I played WoW, I remember people saying that Warlock was "the hard one", Mage "the easy one", and Hunter "the braindead" (they used a word mixing Hunter with a derogatory word for "slow of mental development", if you take my meaning; the R-word) one. And people generally felt it was good for the game for all three to exist within it and for each to also have specs to give them more or less engagement. Granted, FFXIV doesn't have specs, but the basic gist of classes with varied difficulties is true. Many people just want to play with their friends and get the most out of their Jobs that way. They can be called lazy, but that doesn't change the fact they still exist, and that diversity of this kind in the Job design is heterogeneity, which is a good thing.

I also am neutral about point 9 (the glams being "too feminine"), and think that's a bit more subject to taste (not sure what the date on this was, but for example, the Cryptlurker healer gear wasn't feminine, and the SCH Job gear generally isn't, though the WHM and AST geara does tend to be... not saying it's not at all a problem, but I'm not sure that's a "what every healer wants", even if I HAVE noted before that Tank Jobs are almost always portrayed as male and Healers female, which I'm not big on Social Justice Warrior stuff, but that just seems odd to me considering doctors and field medics have been male and there are female police officers and firefighters [what I'd call irl tanks] as well; maybe it's just a Japan/non-Western thing), but I don't think that's a major problem, or at least not the most major of things.

I don't like WHM as an "elementalist" and think having it spring from CNJ is kind of stupid and only a legacy of 1.0 (where Jobs didn't exist and they wanted a game of only "classes" and not "Jobs"), and don't want an "elementalist" WHM. I wouldn't mind GEO being added to split off CNJ like how SCH/SMN do off ACN, but I can't imagine the Devs ever doing that.

I also (as I've said) oppose making the Lilies "automatic" since there are times I want to save them UNLESS the base spells (Cure 2/Medica) became instant cast at all times to make up for this change.

I have no issue leveling Healers, and have done it with all of them, do my MSQ as Healer, and even been running some FATEs (since Sebazy asked me) as Healer and have fun with it. I also do S Rank (Hunt) spawn attempts (you know, the kill 100 of 3 types of things on the moon one? Stuff like that) on Healer, as well as my solo play in Deep Dungeons as Healer. No issue, no boredom.

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I guess what my point is, is that just skimming down Recon's list, there are a lot of things I disagree with.

I suspect the Devs are trying to take a wide range of views into account, and between just me, use, and Recon, you've already found one that disagrees on multiple of Recon's points. If you extrapolate us to the entire community, even if it's JUST that ratio, that's 1/3rd of players not agreeing. And that's assuming that ratio holds and that you 100% agree.

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As for LD, I'd wager it's either they were trying to resist homogenization OR they in EW they're doing the "next 10 years" thing and trying to trim around the edges to resolve longstanding issues (it's probably NOT a coincidence we're getting SEVERAL major Job reworks - SMN, PLD, incoming AST and DRG) during this same time frame. That or they genuinely didn't think it was an issue.

I dunno, maybe they are actively ignoring people, but I doubt it. I think it's more they're looking at all the feedback - here and not here - and seeing the divided opinions.

EDIT2:

Now, granted, there ARE some things I agree on.

I think damage should be more consistent and smaller, I think the oGCDs we have are too many and too powerful (and should be weakened or removed), I do think there are redundant abilities that could be pruned down or reworked IF DONE RIGHT (for example, my proposal that Cure 2 and Medica become instant cast and having a Lily simply makes them MP free for a cast and nourishes the Blood Lily, having Cure 1 upgrade into Cure 2 but with Cure 2 having the 1.5 sec cast time and 500 MP cost - don't care if it's "too efficient", we're not chain casting Cure 2 often anyway or doing any MP management other than Lucid on CD at this point, so it's irrelevant), and probably pruning or combining similar abilities like that. I just disagree with doing that for the sake of expanding its DPS kit instead, even if I have some ideas on how that could be done and not be a pain in the butt (now that I mentioned it a few posts back...I kinda like the idea of Presence of Mind leading to a three hit combo of Quake, Tornado, Flood...though if PLD and RDM are a guess, it would just make it where you hit the Glare button 3 more times and it just gives neater effects; and I'm also liking the 4 Glares = 1 +100% Holy now that I mentioned it...)

...but that doesn't mean I agree with all of them, or the exact proposed solutions.

[ASkellington]

I also think people are too quick to say "what each healer wants".

You're being too literal. It's in general of what WHM's want out of their job, what SCH's want, what AST's want and what SGE wants.

And as I've said, SE doesn't even need to do all of them, they need to read the post, get a general idea of what's wanted and then take the ideas and form their own solutions if they don't agree with the perposed ones out right.

For example: ASTs want their cards to be unique buffs instead of the shite that they are now.

If SE doesn't want to give back HW-SB cards, then they need to come up with unique buffs on their own.

[Renathras]

I think they've done this, they just have decided that their current path IS the solution (or lesser evil) to the overall problem.

I also don't think that OP is what healers in general all want, either. There are a lot of points that I haven't seen much support for in the surveys and some issues people haven't even brought up.

But I don't claim to know what they're thinking, either.

[Deceptus]

Give me a good reason why Living Dead was an issue since HW and only got fixed in this expansion's post patch?

Bit off topic but it was "fixed" because it has been an issue since it was released (years) and it was honestly an extremely simple fix: don't require healed to completely heal to full or tank death, put an increase healing modifier after using the ability, or as they chose give them massive life leech. Shouldn't have taken many dev resources to do it. And quite frankly it should have been fixed 2 expansions ago.

Healer fixes aren't so simple because they've been going on longer and their issues are core role mechanic issues.

[ForsakenRoe]

Healer fixes aren't so simple because they've been going on longer and their issues are core role mechanic issues.

Yeh, and unlike LD, the more they double down on the healer design they currently have (adding more and more redundant healing actions every expansion like Aquaveil or Lilybell), the harder it will be to 'undo' it to get it all sorted out. We already get hit with 'oh we cant have more damage skills because it'd be too much button bloat'. Well, we wouldn't have button bloat if we didn't have 17 healing skills when 10-12 well-designed skills would be enough to handle everything. Like, AST has 3 skills that are 'heal for 600-720p of healing witha 1min CD', slightly different in how they do it (CO, CU, Star) but they're all the same end result really, do we actually need all three? If we deleted the stupid bubble, and gave Star a second charge instead, does that actually affect AST's healing at all? Outside of 'AST loses it's 10% mit' (which just puts it on parity with WHM), I doubt it will make AST 'literally unplayable cant heal for shit'. Or merging lower level GCD heals, that should have happened in SB along with them merging Stone 1/2/3/4 as one upgrading button

[ASkellington]

Bit off topic but it was "fixed" because it has been an issue since it was released (years) and it was honestly an extremely simple fix.

Which is my point. MCH was also complained about and a simple fix yet some how they were blindsided by the fact it needed one. I'm not saying that healer issues are as simple of a fix. I AM saying that they don't read feedback like they say they do otherwise they'd have known about these issues they seem to be "blindsided" by. To me it seems more of willful ignorance than a general "we didn't know" at this point.

Doubly so as AST and DRG were planned for post expansion updates. Why they decided to hold off makes sense. And I'm not upset that PLD got theirs necessarily. I'm more upset there are things they CAN do between expansions (LD, MCH) and for w/e reason DECIDE NOT TO. MCH should have been done in one of Shb's point patches. Period. There's no excuse there when they did it in Endwalkers.

Same as LD.

[Deceptus]

Doubly so as AST and DRG were planned for post expansion updates. Why they decided to hold off makes sense. And I'm not upset that PLD got theirs necessarily. I'm more upset there are things they CAN do between expansions (LD, MCH) and for w/e reason DECIDE NOT TO. MCH should have been done in one of Shb's point patches. Period. There's no excuse there when they did it in Endwalkers.

Same as LD.

100% agreed. They had no issue making major changes to NIN and Tanks RIGHT before an Ultimate dropped (Yoshi's words: "Yes we understand we're doing these changes to job right before Ultimate is released but we're confident in players abilities to adjust.") yet for some reason healers are these magical puffs who can't adjust to changes.

Trust me. . . I know.

[Renathras]

Well, we wouldn't have button bloat if we didn't have 17 healing skills when 10-12 well-designed skills would be enough to handle everything.

Shockingly, I (mostly) agree with Roe.

There's a lot of redundancy in the kits. Every Healer has a Cure 1 spell. Why? For low level content I guess. Two have Cure 2 and two have Adlo. Three have Medica. Two have Succor. And there are a lot of neat abilities that are oGCDs instead, and this leads to a lot of overlap. WHM alone has 3 versions of Cure 2 between Cure 2 itself, Tetra, and Solace.

Hell, they could even use that as a basis for making the Healers different. Suppose they all had Cure 1, but it upgraded for each of them into their "signature" healing spell. For WHM, it became Cure 2, a strong single target heal. For AST, it could be Cure 1/Benefic 1, but with the Regen HoT attached with some kind of additional effect that it increases healing by 50% if used on a target that already has the HoT active (the Criterion Dungeon heal action works this way, I believe). For SCH, it upgrades into Adlo with a big shield. For SGE, it could upgrade into Haima, where it gives a smaller shield, but with stacks, and that the shields provide healing when the duration expires without consuming all the shields. (Granted, the potency of this Haima would be lower, but I mean the stacks of shields that convert to a heal thing)

Now, the base heals of each Healer are interesting and distinct, clearly leaning into niches. WHM has quick and powerful direct heals, AST has more careful but synergistic heals, SCH has strong barriers, and SGE has smaller individual barriers and is more focused on maintaining mitigation to get more use out of them.

The AOEs could also each do this with Medica upgrading to Cure 3 (basically make Medica 2 have Cure 3's healing with Medica 2's range and call that Medica 2 instead; Cure 3 could be a later upgrade or spell alongside Cure 2), AST's Holos gaining the HoT, SCH's Succor being itself, and SGE's Eukrasia Prognosis doing the Panhaima effect.

oGCDs should really be returned to their original form of emergency buttons. If they're the primary method of healing, not only do they make the DPSing boring (since it's uninterrupted), they make the GCD healing unused, which also explains them being boring and uninteresting as well. All the interesting heals - Sacred Soil, Excogitation, Lilybell, Divine Benison, Holos, Haima, Collective Unconscious, Synastry - are in the oGCDs, making the GCD healing even more redundant and lackluster. In "other big MMO", for example, the Holy Priest has (or had at one time) a heal that would heal their target and the Priest, or things like echo of light where healing a target with a GCD base heal then healing a second target gives that first target some splash healing for a short duration, encouraging (the equivalent of) GCD heal use.

Imagine, for example, if instead of Synastry as an oGCD for AST, when AST used Benefic or Benefic 2 on a target, it placed a buff on them for 8 sec or so where any time in that duration you cast Benific 1/2 on any target (other party members, say), it would also heal that one. This means you could use Benific 2 on the Tank then spot heal a couple people with Benific 1 and it would also be healing the Tank. It could be a passive ability rather than a massive 2 min CD that only heals for 40% and requires you to use these maligned GCD heals.

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I'm not sure what the answer is, but I agree we have too many and too redundant (different Jobs having identical healing abilities) in the toolkits. It's completely stupid to me that AST literally has WHM's identical potencies on all their base heals, they just get a cheaper MP cost for them. That's literally the only difference, and it's dumb. Either the heals should be different or WHM's should do more healing due to the higher MP cost.

And it's not like it's hard to come up with ways for them to be more different.

Granted, in my case, I don't think this should be "so we can add more damage buttons", I just think it should be done as a matter of good design. But I agree with the general concept of we have either too many or too redundant (or both) healing things. It's silly that we just need to "add a new ability" each Expansion, even if it's just "another flavor of existing ability".

(NOTE: I DO get that there are some different use cases - Tetra being an oGCD doesn't really replace Solace since Solace generates Misery, but being an oGCD makes it apply instantly and be more responsive - but the point is, why be SO identical?)

[fulminating]

Yeh, and unlike LD, the more they double down on the healer design they currently have

Imagine if the LD change required the whole party to be healed fully to successfully not die to it instead. Or give everyone a debuff tied to the drk’s walking dead to drain their go/kill them if the drk doesn’t make it. But they actually seem to have a grasp on and accepted the issues people had there, unlike this role.