The Healers should be reworked? New player perspective.

[Renathras]

I could take a look at the Dissidia FF Opera Omnia Cellphone game for some possible inspiration too. In most cases, they choose the most notable abilities that the characters used.

For the more recent games, yes, but less so for the Job based ones. Not to mention cell phone games with 3-6 abilities are a bit of a different animal.

The closest comparison to an MMO would be looking at WHM and SCH from FFXI:

https://ffxiclopedia.fandom.com/wiki...age#Spell_List

...remembering the original level cap was 50 or so and some spells have been shuffled about. WHM in FFXI, the other FF MMO, had Banish (15 sec CD Holy element attack, so think like Holy Priest's Holy Fire or Afflatus/Lily abilities), Dia (spamable, but a DoT, so think like Shadow Word: Pain or Dia), and Holy at level 50 (big Holy element damage attack on a single target, but with a 60 sec CD, so maybe THIS is more like Misery). That was the entirety of WHM's damage kit.The rest of its spells were all defensive, healing, or status effect curing/buffing abilities. Even with the expansions, it tended not to get more damage abilities. It got Holy 2 at some point and yet more cures, buffs, and debuffs cleanses, but that was it.

Now, you CAN argue that you could cross-class into SubJobs. And while that's very true...in practice, WHM's in FFXI did this primarily to...heal more. Generally they would cross-class to access even more healing, make their healing more efficient, or add to their list of buffs. SubJob of RDM would grant you some mid level BLM spells, but in large group content, that wasn't your job. You were using the RDM SubJob to access its other enhancement and buffing abilities. Likewise, SCH would grant you some mid level Black Magic and a stance to boost it, but the main use was for the healing enhancements. (Note that SCHs in FFXI were a bit more able to dabble in the attack side of things than WHMs were). The other common SubJob was SMN, I think, for...you guessed it, more healing and efficient healing, and I think the largest MP pool? Something like that, anyway.

By the looks of it, we should be saying that AST is the one that shouldn't be DPS focused?

Maybe, I have considered that.

The problem is that AST is too busy due to the way its oGCDs work, and as everyone knows, is NOT a simple Job to play, relatively speaking. It's arguably the most complex of the Healers now as it is. Though I do agree that AST should be more buffing focused.

And it doesn't start at level 1.

The overall change I'd push for would be:

1) WHM simple damage rotation, strong and hyper efficient heals, focused more on GCD actions in general.
2) AST buff focused, slightly weaker and more indirect healing (probably more HoTs and stuff).
3) SCH damage/support hybrid, focused more on various debuffs/DoT uptime and oGCD healing.
4) SGE damage focus, heals by executing a DPS rotation.

That covers all the bases there.

*Maybe if AST was available at level 1, or branched from WHM at level 30. You know, like I suggested in that other thread. THAT would make this more doable, especially if WHM's changes were chiefly after level 30 (that is, if CNJ was left more or less as it is now), since ASTs would just level it to 30, pick up the AST quest from Y-Suni at level 30 CNJ, go to South Shroud, unlock AST, and swing into the Job from there. THAT would make this feasible...if we also seriously cut down on AST's complexity. So way less/more direct oGCDs like WHM has now and removing the high APM burst element of the Job in some way.

...needless to say, that would anger existing AST players, while leaving WHM as it is (something existing WHM players enjoy or at least tolerate) would not carry that consequence.

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Though, you're more likely to annoy the AST mains with that than you would to annoy the WHM mains by leaving WHM as is.

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Actually, that's not entirely true...

Ty, that cuts both ways. You can't say "neutral people don't care and wouldn't oppose new actions" without also mentioning "neutral people wouldn't oppose no new actions". Further, many of the long form answers - as I noted - clarified even some people asking for "more" attacking actions meant "lower level availability of higher level attacking actions earlier", not new abilities. Many also complain about button bloat, and many complain about the one button spam, which can be solved with NO new attack actions by merely shaking up the rotations. Dia procing an empowered Holy OR a all at once Dia damage boost (like Thundrecloud actually works for BLM) would both mix up WHM's rotation, for example, away from a one button spam (depending on proc rate), which would satisfy many of the people who supposedly want "more attacking actions", with some people even suggesting things like that in their long form answers.

So no, my number is what it is.

Your number isn't even "the people who are ADAMANTLY AGAINST more attacking actions". Your number is people who want LESS attacking actions, not the people who are neutral + adamant. My number is the people who are against more attack actions/and or neutral to the change and/or want the same amount as now, which again is something like 1/6th to 1/5th of the players who responded to the survey, which is already a pool of players biased towards more attacking actions. Meaning it is reasonable to assume, of the community as a whole, 20-25% likely would oppose more attack abilities on Healers if they were to take part in the survey.

For example, _I_ didn't even say "less" attacking actions, but as you're aware, I'm adamantly against MORE attacking actions for at least one Job.

You can't use "want LESS attack actions" as = "want less + want the same amount + are neutral". You'd need an option of "want the same attacking actions as now going forward" to draw the conclusion you're trying to draw. While it is true that people who want less attack actions ARE very likely to oppose more being added, those who want the same amount as now are as well, and at least some of the people who don't say either way are likely to oppose new attacking actions. That's going to be far closer to my number than yours.

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I'm trying to think of a good comparison that isn't TOO charged politically, but it's like you having a poll on taxes where the options were "raise taxes, don't answer, and lower taxes" but where the people's feelings are "raise taxes, keep taxes the same, lower taxes, don't care either way", and you're trying to say the "don't care" and "keep taxes the same" people are in the same camp as "raise taxes" people are. You can't do that. If you wanted to draw that conclusion, you'd need to have offered those other answer options.

It's logical to assume people who want MORE attack actions answered that - plenty of people did! Because it WAS an option presented - and that people who did NOT say more attacking actions either want the same or a reduced number. You can look at the second question specifically to see how many wanted a REDUCTION, but that doesn't tell you anything about the rest.

That is, because there IS an "add more attack actions" option, we should assume people that WANT more attack actions picked that. We can't assume there's additional hidden support for it because the option was there.

On the other hand, because there IS NOT a "keep the same number of attack actions" option, there is an additional amount of people outside of "want less" who do not want more. That additional hidden opposition to adding more exists because you didn't give them an option to express themselves other than "Other" (and I should note, a few of the people who didn't answer "add more attack options" did use Other or their long form answer to clarify that they did not want more attack options; so we already know these people DO exist, even if your survey didn't capture them directly).

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To put it in numbers, of the 26 WHM who did not ask for more attacking actions, 4 of them want a reduction. That means 22 are EITHER "don't care" OR "keep the same number". The latter camp would oppose more attacking actions, and the former would probably split. But since you didn't have a question to determine how much is which, you cannot say with certainty how many of those 22 people don't care vs want to keep the same 5 DPS actions WHMs have now. Moreover, you can't assume all 22 would be fine with more damage actions added, as I am one of those 22 and do not want more damage actions added.

The only conclusion you can make from the question asking for less attacking actions is that 4 people want less attacking actions. This is a tautology, but it's also the only statistical claim you can make based on the questions as you worded them and the options you presented.

That tells you nothing of the people who want the same amount. Again, _I_ did not answer less attacking actions, but I very clearly want NO MORE. I'm an example that proves your assumption wrong.

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SUMMARY:

What we DO know is that ~84% of WHMs want more attacking actions, not that 2.6% do not. This means that 16% either want less, the same amount, or are ambivalent. For AST, this number is 33%, not 2.5%. (AST only has 4 to begin with, so it's kind of funny some people want even some of those removed!)

For overall, it's slightly greater than 20% who do not want more attacking actions. These are people who either want LESS damage actions, the same amount as today, or don't care. You cannot include those people in the camp that want more damage actions. Approximately (but slightly less than) 80% do want more attacking actions, from this survey sample.

Again, there WAS a question/answer for "want more damage actions". So the people who wanted more got to answer that question, and that gives us the 79%, or just under 4/5ths, who want more.

Since that option WAS THERE, we may safely assume those who did not choose it do not want more damage actions, either because they want less, want the same as now, or don't care (and thus don't mind a Job that doesn't get more). And once again: This is from a sample that is predisposed to want more damage actions, meaning the actual number from the community at large who do not is probably higher than this. But at a FLOOR, the amount who don't care for more dps actions is, at the very least, 1/5th of the community, and VERY likely higher.

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ASIDE: This also means Total 2 is actually higher than I initially estimated. If at least 7 SCH's want LESS attack actions, then that means that the lowest total 2 can be is 16.8%.