The Healers should be reworked? New player perspective.

[Shurrikhan]

No big deal. Auto-Battle is a better term as well. And I agree with point 1. As I mentioned in response to Ren's desire for the opposite, there's nuance that you likely can't get around.

I also don't feel it's necessary per say, but rather, my argument is using that as a bargaining chip. If we *must* have a childproof way of allowing anyone to reach passable levels of DPS output, then having more elegant DPS tools and general gameplay that also features an auto-battle type tool that pushes you through most--if not all of your GCD DPS "rotation" so that those who cannot handle or do not like going through the job's manual gameplay, then that I think is a compromise where group A does not step on the toes of group B and vice versa.

Sounds good to me, yeah. Again, sorry for having blended topics earlier.

On the topic of your Dia example, you can still set regular Dia to your hotbar and use it manually as a movement tool if you want to. Nothing stops you from setting any of those actions to your hotbar as manual actions.

True, that's a very good point. For whatever reason I still I had my head stuck in/on the existing models, official and third-party, but if we were making something new and better then there are obviously no such constraints.

Whether or not this can be done with plugin's though is irrelevant to me because that's not officially supported, nor can every player utilize this. Having a more optimized, official button to manage this can be the proxy needed to allow jobs to move away from this crusade in the name of simplicity.

Make sense.

One other piece of food for thought, though: If we just lifted the knee-capping order on macros and allowed them instead at least the functionality of WoW's only half-restricted ones... that's an official means of consolidation already.

Now, replace all the random codes and syntax one would need to memorize with a more intuitive and accessible GUI for making those macros --or maybe now call them, idk, Gamuts or whatever it was in XII-- and... there you have it. And the game could provide/recommend premade damn good Gamuts that cover whatever skills one's acquired and maybe even allow for the importing of Gamuts and even... Layouts, etc.

[Renathras]

Why does that matter to you?

It matters enough to you that you would oppose it...so that means it's important to me, too.

I don't think that's a valid assumption.

I suspect it's more valid than you think. You mention ARR/HW Cleric, but as we've talked about before, Cleric wasn't used by large portions of the community, and as people here are fond of saying, "We were all bad back then" and the game's nuances hadn't been fully probed and mathed out.

...and about when those things changed into what the modern playerbase is, Cleric was removed. Specifically for that reason - that it was dividing the community and that there was a big disparity between Healer damage outcomes which gave the Devs headaches to try to balance around. It didn't stop Healers from being plentiful UNTIL people got good enough/the game got solved enough that people started cussing out others in casual content for not using it. And what happened? ENOUGH Healers were quitting healing that the Devs took note and removed Cleric (as a toggle). In other words, this very thing happened before with the more modern playerbase.

And the game's only become EVEN MORE casual since then.

Disagree with the last bit. While everything IS personal preference, history has shown us that the hardcore players were not in the casual pool, and certainly not enough to make up for an exodus of casuals. We saw this with Tanks in mid-to-late SB.

Again: Do you really doubt the Devs will react if they start to see DPS que times creep up? We both know that's something they actually DO care about. And history has two examples to us of this happening, meaning it's not at all unreasonable to assume it would again. You can argue the magnitude, but not that it won't happen.

For one, I'd quit healing. Absolutely. I might outright quit the game, but I'd definitely quit healing. I've said before, if I want a DPS rotation, I'll play a DPS Job. If I don't outright quit the game, I'd just swap to maining SMN and being part of the DPS que - which, incidentally, would make the ques worse.

As a casual healer, I have to say: I'm deeply insulted by how little you think I'm capable of.

Where did I state what you or anyone is "capable of"?

[ty_taurus]

It matters enough to you that you would oppose it...so that means it's important to me, too.

How petty of you.

[fulminating]

Maybe they should do this for an expansion. The mass exodus of Healers that follows, the dungeon runs taking 2x as long because the casual Healers don't know what they're doing and Healer DPS tanks, everyone complaining about how regular Healers have stopped DPSing in dungeons, 24 mans, and so on. All the casual Healers quit the role and start doing something else like playing DPS or just quitting the game entirely. People who are "If I wanted a dps rotation, I'd play a DPS Job" going extra heels in the sand and just not hitting ANY DPS buttons at all. Ques taking ages because all the "high end players" tend to run dailies/roulettes with their friends and all the casual Healers quit quing - what the hardcores said would happen in ShB and EW would actually happen.

What a load of fearmongering nonsense. We already have healers who refuse to press either damage or healing buttons. No one can convince me that the opinion of cure 1 mages is even worth considering in any expansions content.

[Renathras]

How petty of you.

Aw, another insult. /yawn

It's not petty - you're saying it's important enough that you need to fight me over it, while also insisting that it's not/shouldn't be important to me.

This isn't new with you, but I've started calling out people telling me to just accept something they want because it shouldn't be important to me, noting that if it wasn't important, they wouldn't be fighting me over it. You can't insist something isn't important or shouldn't be important to people when it IS important enough to you to fight over it. It being important to you would be sufficient for me to determine it's something I should find important to me as well. If it wasn't something worthy of importance, then you wouldn't be fighting me over it.

Also:

How am I the petty one for finding it important and not you being the petty one for proposing a solution that lets people be decent only but not match you? This is yet another insult you level at me that more accurately describes you.

Why are you so petty, Ty?

What a load of...

Someone proposed a scorched earth idea that would give people demanding it their just deserts, I merely went along with it.

As I said to Sebezy, we know this would happen, because we have historic examples of it.

And I have yet to find anyone who can prove "Cure 1 mages" exist. Maybe it's out there, but I've never seen any video evidence that this actually exists.

You know very well if Healers were changed, the average DPS would go down - it's what you're counting on as otherwise, the change would be meaningless.

[ty_taurus]

Aw, another insult. /yawn

It wasn't an insult. It was an observation of your behavior.

[Renathras]

It wasn't an insult. It was an observation of your behavior.

No, it wasn't, because you were the one being petty, not me.

When you insult people, at least have the courage of your convictions not to cower from it when called out.

I didn't say "because you care, I care" (which wouldn't be petty, per se - "because you care about charity for children with cancer, I care" wouldn't be petty in most any context). I'm saying if it's important enough that you feel it's important, then it seems to me reasonable to believe it's important as well.

Which means if finding it important is petty: You are petty.

Call it "an observation of your behavior", if you like.

.

EDIT: Or, you know, just stop insulting or "observing" people in insulting ways. You never "observe" any positive things about me, so let's be real, it was an insult, and we both know it. You aren't stupid, Ty, and neither am I. Your deflections and defenses these last few days have been pretty lacking...so actually, I feel I should ask:

Is everything going okay with you/in your life? You doing okay irl, buddy? (That, btw, is genuine.)

[AnotherPerson]

No, it wasn't, because you were the one being petty, not me.

When you insult people, at least have the courage of your convictions not to cower from it when called out.

I didn't say "because you care, I care" (which wouldn't be petty, per se - "because you care about charity for children with cancer, I care" wouldn't be petty in most any context). I'm saying if it's important enough that you feel it's important, then it seems to me reasonable to believe it's important as well.

Which means if finding it important is petty: You are petty.

Call it "an observation of your behavior", if you like.

No, it really IS petty when you say it like that. If you say "because you care about charity for children with cancer, I care" then I only expect that you only care because he cares about this issue and you wouldn't give a second thought if he didn't care about cancer....
You're basically saying you're only paying attention because someone else is paying attention. The logic you are using is pretty much incongruous and shows you wouldn't give a damn about something like this had it not been for someone else.

[Sebazy]

...and about when those things changed into what the modern playerbase is, Cleric was removed. Specifically for that reason - that it was dividing the community and that there was a big disparity between Healer damage outcomes which gave the Devs headaches to try to balance around. It didn't stop Healers from being plentiful UNTIL people got good enough/the game got solved enough that people started cussing out others in casual content for not using it. And what happened? ENOUGH Healers were quitting healing that the Devs took note and removed Cleric (as a toggle). In other words, this very thing happened before with the more modern playerbase.

By the end of HW I clearly remember wildly overblown threads loudly proclaiming 'HEALERS MUST DPS' or 'HEALERS MUSTN'T DPS' all over here and reddit.

I also clearly remember WHM somewhat frequently getting excluded in PF for Extreme and Savage content. This peaked around the skip soar or disband Zurvan meme days around 3.5?.

I don't remember seeing an exodus of healers though and I highly doubt that cleric was removed specifically for that reason. By all means cite your sources that confirms otherwise but IMHO that's a Stretch Armstrong tier reach.

I don't think you're far off though, just cut out everything after the bit where people were cussing each other out over the thing. My suspicion is that it got removed because it was so divisive and it was directly at odds with the casual centric direction Yoshida wanted to head in.

Regardless, done with this one. If you're going to tell me how I played both now and years ago then there's little point continuing this conversation.

[Shurrikhan]

By the end of HW I clearly remember wildly overblown threads loudly proclaiming 'HEALERS MUST DPS' or 'HEALERS MUSTN'T DPS' all over here and reddit.

I also clearly remember WHM somewhat frequently getting excluded in PF for Extreme and Savage content. This peaked around the skip soar or disband Zurvan meme days around 3.5?.

I don't remember seeing an exodus of healers though and I highly doubt that cleric was removed specifically for that reason. By all means cite your sources that confirms otherwise but IMHO that's a Stretch Armstrong tier reach.

The consensus back then was pretty consistent: Cleric Stance was an easy but stupidly annoying mechanic, in no small part because it badly punished Spell Speed (since it'd effectively increases the cooldown past 2 GCDs' time) and the un-stance didn't queue properly. It added virtually nothing despite a high cost to QoL.

Was it causing healers to quit healing, though? No. After all, that was what they were used to from level 2 onward.