For those who main/semi-main a DPS (e.g. DNC, RDM) but like Healers...

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

I love how Ren keeps making these super min-max arguments despite the fact he seemingly doesn’t do savage

To be fair, they did mentioned in the past about clearing first floor of tiers since EW for some friend's group as a replacement & would like to have the savage ilv 2nd ring in addition to augmented tomes' (paraphrase).

Then again... it's the still the first floor which rarely requires that sort of min-maxing even at day 1, so... lol.

[ForsakenRoe]

As always, my solution accommodates the most people. Your idea of "fun" isn't. Your idea of "better" isn't. YOU are literally writing off 75% of the community (by your example numbers) and telling them to screw off and go play another GAME while my idea means that both they and you can play this one. That makes your model worse in every way.

Question. Imagine there's a special panel at Fanfest. They are showing the direction for healers, as a way to publicly reassure players that they acknowledge the Abyssos situation was not a good time, and they're working on fixing the damage it caused. So, imagine that said panel opened with a mini-Job Actions trailer for the four healers, and as an example, WHM throws out some damage skills, a new one that looks suspiciously similar to Lost Banish, spends 50 of a new gauge on a massive cool heal, and then tears the target apart with Quake, Flood and Tornado. Do you think the average crowd reaction is going to be booing because there's new complexity added to the job, or cheering because we finally have Water spells in the kit? Because I imagine it'd be the latter, and big. Like, as big a cheer (if not more) as when SHB revealed PLD was getting a gapcloser

Correct. Upgrades, new effects added to abilities, etc, would all still exist.

You'll have to forgive some of us for not sharing your excitement for Glare 4 and it's +10 potency.

I'm with you on the 4-Healer Model.
Some nuance can exist within the Jobs - as it already does. I think this is the major sticking point. I recognize the Jobs already have complexity/depth while others reject the notion outright and hyperbolize that Healers are 1 button Jobs that don't do anything else.
I also agree with you that the concepts of easy and hard are subjective. I've long found GNB easier to play than old PLD, DRK, or WAR, though I'm not sure why.

The issue is that healing is binary. You either have enough and you live, or you don't and you wipe. Optimization on other roles has a different hard limit, that of the job's depth. A BLM can get more and more 'optimized', and find different techs, to push ever so slightly more damage up til the point where every tech has been found and used, and it's reached the 'perfect' gameplay. But said perfect gameplay is different from fight to fight, so they would have to do the process multiple times to 'master' the job in relation to each fight. Melee have similar, 'do your rotation correctly', 'shift buff timings to better match the fight timeline', 'minimize downtime to get one more autoattack', 'shift true north timings so you can get every positional', etc

Healers, on the other hand, have their 'mastery' mostly tied up in 'reduce at-cost healing to zero'. Once you get your damage-losing heals to zero, that's kind of it, any further 'mastery of the job' is almost autopilot, being 'keep DOT up, spam filler'. We just want to have a bit more to do (optionally) after the standard 'reduce atcost heals to zero'

Some of the people on your side have literally said before that people should not be able to play as they do currently and clear Savages OR even Extremes. Yes, that is gatekeeping. The idea of it being accessible "in MSQ 4 mans" is not actual accessibility.

Is that me you're referring to? Cos I'd happily say I'm wrong, and change my stance if it'd get changes into the game. I would prefer it if people actually had a grasp of how to play their class in hard content yes, but that can be changed. After all, the gap between 'standard' and 'full opti' in my designs is quite low. Thinking on it more, yeh why not. I'll amend my stance:

If the condition to get my WHM design added is 'ok but the current gameplay of 'refresh Dia every 30s and spam Glare thereafter' must still be able to clear every content in the game, including week 1 Savage and Ultimates', then I can go back to the design and tweak Dia's duration/damage such that it's less punishing to drop it for 18s at a time. I'd prefer to keep the duration at 12s. Maybe I could swap it and Banish (so it's 15s and B is 12s) and tweak potencies/gauge gain accordingly

...do you GENUINELY not realize that some people find Healers enjoyable to play right now? That "crappy loop" is your SUBJECTIVE take and not one universally shared?

Yes, and some people 'genuinely enjoy' Runecrafting in OSRS, despite the vast majority of that game's playerbase finding it absolutely horrid to train. This doesn't mean we shouldn't add new ways to train the skill that are more fun, more engaging.
Ironically, the OSRS community seems to have an iron rule: 'Any training method added cannot be any higher XP/h than the current best method'. Or in more relevant terms, 'any damage rotation for healer cannot be any higher DPS than current rotation'
That attitude gatekeeps good ideas from getting into the game and it annoys me to no end

I'm not "sacrificing" one. I'm SACRIFICING THREE. I'm SAVING one from you! What you want is the sacrifice. What you want is the suck. What you want is the crappy loop. What YOU want is the shit gameplay that I'd hate to be subjected to. I'm not "sacrificing" one healer to save three. I'm SACRIFICING three TO SAVE ONE. And YOU get all three. AND THAT'S NOT ENOUGH FOR YOU.

And yet somehow I'm the one who got accused of having an ego /s

I'm going to ignore "failing to offer a good reason" as I've done so dozens of times, you just don't want to accept it. Moving on from THAT to mutually exclusive:
The problem is, it is.
Unless the complex and simple forms HAVE THE SAME OUTPUT, it's mutually exclusive because there will be some content that the latter cannot clear otherwise. Therein lies the problem.

You gave reasons, the point is that none of them were 'good' in the eyes of others I guess

If we tune the potencies such that you CAN clear the content (even Ultimate/Week 1 Savage) by playing EXACTLY as you do now (ie on SCH, Bio DOT every 30s, Broil spam, ignore EVERY other new button that's added), does that remove the opposition to the idea? I assume not, because it's not about whether you can clear with suboptimal rotations, or you'd have learned from the many posts, from many people, showing how suboptimal you can be and clear that you can be alarmingly suboptimal and clear, even week 1 Savage. As an example, here is my first clear of P11S, on week 1:

31 Succors, 21 Ruin2's, 4 Energy Drains, one Dissipation. Those 'optimizations' sure don't look too 'required' to me. And before you say 'oh the coheal made up for it probably' they also had 6 Med2's and 2 Cure3's, so it's not like they were perfect either.
Stop assuming that 'any change to complexity = immediately locks someone out of content', it might be what some people would want to see, but things can be tuned such that it doesn't. And idk about others, but if I have to choose, I'll take 'people can play really badly and still clear' if it means getting changes to the healers. And yes I mean all 4

Taking this part out of tags because I think it could lead to a potential understanding of one another's positions

Hell, you've seen MY WHM and SGE proposals, have you not?
In both cases I made the DPS rotation more engaging, and I did it without even adding another DPS button (or button at all) for WHM, and actually DECREASING the total number of abilities on SCH!

Yes, I remember your WHM proposal, and agreeing that it'd be pretty acceptable. I remember it being more rigid than mine but equal if not higher complexity to execute. Which brings me to the final points: I think you aren't as against the idea of 'extra complexity' as you might think you are. It just has to be the 'correct kind' of complexity, a kind that you understand well, and vibe with, such that it doesn't feel 'clunky' to you. And with your hatred of staggered DOT timers (understandable) and previously mentioned 'I get GNB much better than any other tank somehow', I think I see why your WHM design was the way it was: You prefer static looping rotations, or rotations built from understandable/predictable 'blocks'. Ie, 'Glare x 3, Banish' is a simple 10s 'block' that builds the foundation, '3 Solace/Rapture > Misery' is a 10s block, but doesn't require the parts to be in sequence, etc. Current healers have a 30s block of 'apply DOT, press filler 11 times', when you think about it in that sense. I guess it explains your Arcane Mage days. And your defense of current SMN, being as it's got 4 'blocks' too now (3 summons and a demi). It's funny, I'd have made new PLD be very similar in style to what you seem to want from jobs, built from 10s 'blocks' (I'd even have made Shield Bash part of the rotation, SE hire me).

(you'll have to forgive me if I'm wrong in that assessment, but everything seems to line up)
(also forgive if you've already said as much, i don't remember reading it anywhere)

Question is: you're presumably not opposed to WHM getting that design, else you'd never have pitched it. So, if all three nonWHM healers got... whatever extra stuff to add complexity, and WHM got 'your design, exactly as you want it', like, you're creative director for the job's design and get to decide everything, VFX, potencies, interlinking of skills, everything, would you be opposed to that? Or is that design 'what Ren would be ok with WHM having, if it had to be one of the three offered to the wolves, and it was eg SGE that was being kept 'as is''? Cos I'm under the assumption that it's the latter, but if it were the former, then a lot of opposition to your essays would likely die off. I imagine a fair few people would accept your WHM, where it doesn't get any new actions, but instead gets new interactions between skills as you had listed

[Shurrikhan]

The issue is that healing is binary. You either have enough and you live, or you don't and you wipe.

Sorry for the tangent, but, I feel like this isn't functionally the whole story... as long as healing checks are high and frequent enough AND there's the occasional disproportionately valuable downtime skill to make room for.

In those situations, you can have enough to live through A, but not yet through B or C (which will hit shortly thereafter)" such that you have...

• enough to make B and C salvageable without using emergency resources,
• B and C meetable without having to use greater expense (tapping significantly into MP),
• B and C meetable without losing disproportionate offensive opportunity (delaying a CD, rather than just losing a filler),
• or B and C meetable without losing ANY damage,
• B meetable without losing any damage, but C only meetable thereafter only if you then spend emergency resource, more MP than is sustainable (if this were done often), or offensive opportunities,
• etc., etc.

But, to actually feel like any of those things matter... you really want some somewhat frequent rewarded offensive GCDs to make room for (ideal), flexible emergency tools (non-rigid CDs), MP to be an actual mechanic, and for healer maximum damage to be, well, significant. I.e., it needs a better context than we have right now to really give that its full due.

If the condition to get my WHM design added is 'ok but the current gameplay of 'refresh Dia every 30s and spam Glare thereafter' must still be able to clear every content in the game, including week 1 Savage and Ultimates', then I can go back to the design and tweak Dia's duration/damage such that it's less punishing to drop it for 18s at a time. I'd prefer to keep the duration at 12s.

To be fair, unless you've specifically nerfed WHM's existing offensive tools, nerfed WHM's free healing to below excessive levels without compensation, AND/OR your WHM suggestions somehow also successfully demanded buffs to all content (making it harder) from the devs... your additions cannot make meeting the rDPS requirements of content any harder than they are now -- literally only easier. /shrug

Healers are currently the most frequently disposable of any role, so, if there were any role to ever have an excuse to just inadvertently get pure buffs in the pursuit of making them less boring, it'd be healers.

[ForsakenRoe]

I.e., it needs a better context than we have right now to really give that its full due.

While I say 'healing is binary', and it's true in any content, it is also correct to note that 'you have enough healing' is currently a very easy threshold to reach, and that adjusting that threshold, while not suddenly proving the 'healing is binary' assertion false, would change how we're forced to look at damage-losing GCDs, and we'd likely have to shift from 'get to zero' to 'get as low as possible, with zero being unattainable due to fight requirements'. That at least opens up an avenue of 'I express my skill because where everyone else has had to use 6 at-cost GCDs, I only needed 5', but it does also open up an avenue of 'I could not keep up with the healing required, so we died' for at least one player of the game

To be fair, unless you've specifically nerfed WHM's existing offensive tools, nerfed WHM's free healing to below excessive levels without compensation, AND/OR your WHM suggestions somehow also successfully demanded buffs to all content (making it harder) from the devs... your additions cannot make meeting the rDPS requirements of content any harder than they are now -- literally only easier. /shrug

Healers are currently the most frequently disposable of any role, so, if there were any role to ever have an excuse to just inadvertently get pure buffs in the pursuit of making them less boring, it'd be healers.

Not nerfed, but 'redistributed', I think would be the best way to go about it. As example:

I decided to try and do the maths on potencies and see how close I could get to the current potency per minute (PPM). As a baseline, not including any buffs like Presence of Mind, external buffs, prepping Misery's, anything, just me VS the dummy in a Glarefest. Currently 1min of combat looks to be 2 Dia's and 22 Glares, totaling 8140 potency. With the addition of Banish and the change to Dia's duration/potency, we'd theoretically get 5 Dia applications, totaling 2150, 4 Banish's at 1400, and the rest is 15 Glare's at 4650, with a grand total of 8200

By changing how often the 'low on-cast potency' of Dia is being forced into the rotation, it siphons potency out of the Glare it's replacing (it's 150p for the 'cast' of Dia, versus the 310 of the Glare it replaced), keeping the overall potency per minute relatively similar while moving the potency focus away from the filler. Currently, our potency is 1430 from Dia, and the rest is our filler (6820 from Glare, ouch). As you can see above, Dia gets to be about 700 more potency of 'focus' in the rotation, along with the instantcast Banish replacing 4 casts per minute, which doesn't really affect our overall output by that much, but doing these two changes takes Glare from 6820p, down to 4650, meaning that 'you missed a Glare because required healing/movement/etc' is less of a punishment, proportional to the total. One of the biggest obstacles for a casual player to doing damage as a healer is movement, and so shifting more power out of the hardcast Glare and into instantcasts like Dia and Banish would also help them keep their damage going even when they're running to dodge Breathstroke in Aetherfont, for example

Also this math was done back when Dia was 60+60, now that it's 65+65, our per-min total currently is 8250, making this design a potency loss of 50 per minute. Thanks SE. Let's pretend I listed Dia at 160 on cast instead of 150, at 5 casts a minute, that gives us the 50p difference, and now the two designs (this and 'current') are perfectly balanced against each other. Then the potency difference between the two designs would be entirely down to micro-optimizations like 'put Misery in raidbuffs'. Well, unless you consider 'not knowing the base rotation' as a factor. As mentioned before though, we could make Banish equal potency to Glare, and redistribute the lost 40p per cast elsewhere. 160p per minute isn't difficult to wedge in somewhere else, like stick another 10 on Dia's cast and the rest on Assize or something

[Shurrikhan]

Not nerfed, but 'redistributed', I think would be the best way to go about it.

Sorry; I hadn't remembered the potencies or whether ppm had increased by result of these new elements. In that case, then there could be some concerns, even after you adjust to level it out to match the buffs to WHM since then, since doing only the same as now could actually make clearing Ultimate slightly harder.

My main point was simply that I don't feel like we need to be compelled to wholly avoid buffing healers when/by adding new elements.

That at least opens up an avenue of 'I express my skill because where everyone else has had to use 6 at-cost GCDs, I only needed 5', but it does also open up an avenue of 'I could not keep up with the healing required, so we died' for at least one player of the game

True, which is why I've tended to think about increased GCD healing requirements as being (necessarily) supported by a degree of more bankable and/or at-cost oGCD heals as well, as to have more room for recovery, even if that obviously still comes at cost to rDPS (or, really... primary output -- whatever output directly wins the fight, which is then damage in all fights thus far).

If we healing overall without giving any prior obvious incentive to treat oGCDs differently, then that means that there's less slack, which can create as many more wipes as it did does fights where healers are more enjoyably engaged with that healing. Give that slack in a different way that doesn't so badly (compared to the current situation) stratify the healer kit and make much of it counterintuitive, and you've got the opportunity to increase healing requirements without increasing difficulty in ways likely to cause more wipes.

[ForsakenRoe]

Give that slack in a different way that doesn't so badly (compared to the current situation) stratify the healer kit and make much of it counterintuitive, and you've got the opportunity to increase healing requirements without increasing difficulty in ways likely to cause more wipes.

I think one of the ways to address the 'counterintuitive'-ness of healing is to make the 'flow' better. Maybe this is not 100% what you're referring to, but I see a problem with current GCD heals, and it's not just 'it costs me a Glare': They have a cast time. Weaving in a Cure3/Medica2 feels bad, because if you have just started a cast of something else, you'd have to either interrupt that cast, or complete it and delay the healing coming out by an extra 2.5s, which could be considered an aspect of 'optimization' I suppose. But then when we look at 'why do people like SGE', a fair amount of the remarks about it I've seen is the fluidity of it's gameplay, that you can instantly Ixochole damage, or weave in any of Holos/Pankardia/Kerachole when you see the damage coming, or Icarus to last-second dodge an incoming AOE. And for the things that would fall under 'it feels bad' as above, Pneuma and E.Prog, E.Prog's 'cast time' enforced by Eukrasia is 1 second rather than the 2 of something like Medica2, and Pneuma's, while 1.5s cast time, justifies itself by being both a very powerful heal (900 with Zoe) and that it's a 2min CD so you don't use it too often. That was SCH's whole selling point originally, that 'the fairy helps cover the healing, so you have more room to get damage out'. And of course, AST has all the OGCDs it has which don't interrupt the GCD.

Contrast how 'good' it feels to have to interrupt your damage to press Medica 2, and by comparison, how 'good' it feels to weave in a Rapture. The instantcast nature of Rapture makes it feel better, I think, partially because it doesn't force you to stand still for a longer cast, and partially because it opens up doubleweave slots, and that's why I wanted the gauge-spender heal (instant, 500p) in the design I posted. Doing damage (or GCD healing but you don't want to) builds gauge, spending gauge refunds itself by doing damage, spending that refund also builds the same gauge as the regular filler. A little self-contained 'cycle' as it were. I'd imagine with a tool like that, during prog you'd likely save at least 50 gauge (or even just leave it capped till you need it), ready to use it to react to sudden unexpected damage. But after prog, in reclears, you'd be able to shift the timing of when you use it vs Rapture, so that you can try and get both the refund from the gauge heal AND Misery into raidbuffs. Even if you didn't, it's one Glare of damage being refunded so like... Not gonna cause an enrage if you don't, just like how I don't cause enrages when I forget to put Misery into raidbuffs now

The current kit for GCD healing feels like it's... two separate halves of a kit, rather than one cohesive, interplaying full kit. OGCDs get around this because you weave them. Lily heals get around this by being on the same cadence as the damage GCDs (because they're GCD too), and shifting the damage you 'lost' to a later point in time. So where WHM currently has 'damage tool fed by healing', I'd like to see 'healing tool fed by damage'. Ren previously noted that it'd feel bad for people to be forced to do damage to get access to the cool new shiny, which is kinda the point, but it did make me consider that you're not really going to have time to deal damage to charge it during Harrowing Hell, for example, so it also builds from GCD healing too now

[AmiableApkallu]

Contrast how 'good' it feels to have to interrupt your damage to press Medica 2, and by comparison, how 'good' it feels to weave in a Rapture. The instantcast nature of Rapture makes it feel better, I think, partially because it doesn't force you to stand still for a longer cast, and partially because it opens up doubleweave slots…

For me, Rapture feels intellectually satisfying but emotionally dead, and this sentiment generalizes to healing oGCDs. They're insta-casts that queue nicely if you push the button while in the middle of a GCD cast. They're fire-and-forget abilities, emphasis on "forget." Medica 2's cast time is precisely what gives me that feeling of "healer that's actually healing" instead of being "that button I push to make HP bars go up while I see how many rocks I can throw at the boss."

In terms of D&D (mind you, the last time I played was a million years ago), I'd have insta-casts and oGCDs be more inline with cantrips, and in that theme, I could even imagine an ability that was a GCD cast at Lv.50 becoming insta-cast by Lv.90 by virtue of sheer familiarity, practice, etc. I mean, in what world does it make sense that a 400 potency AoE heal takes 1.5s to cast (Helios), but you can instantly queue up the heavens to rewind time (Macrocosmos)?

[Raikai]

...what do you like about those Jobs?

Sure sure, "more damage buttons/rotation", but is that it, or is there something more that could be incorporated into Healers? Mobility? Utility? Buffs? Melee attacks?

What are the things you like about your main(ish) DPS Job aside from rotation?

If it's nothing other than DPS rotation, what is it you really like about that? (More than 2 buttons isn't really constructive, so what I mean is more depth, like maybe you like BRD or DNC's procs that always make the rotation different encounter to encounter, like AST cards do; maybe you like RDM's mix of melee and cast style, or the extensive burst [6 GCDs long], etc)

As a DNC, I honestly enjoy the niche of supportive classes in any game, that my overall dps is actually part of other dpser's buffed performances.

I also like the idea of supporting the supporters like offhealing, helping tanks survive (RIP Palisade), without fully commiting to their roles.

I don't know if that is a good answer for the OP, but an observation is that I wish the game would be nicer to the supporting role, but I suppose that would require a huge overhaul of the combat system for it to ever be relevant.

[ASkellington]

I'm breaking this up.

Argument below:

No.

Your solution is unacceptable.

First of all, what you seem to keep missing, is your argument and compromise hold no water. We aren't discussing leaving one healer behind. We're discussing fixing all 4. You may not like that, but that has always been the intent since Shb. You're late to the party. The addition of SGE doesn't change anything. We've been in talks about healer changes when we had 3. WHM was included. You don't get to come in here and say "now that we have SGE we'll fix 3/4. Its always been all. My argument has always been all.

Your argument and compromise do not work because you aren't thinking about all 4 receiving changes. That was my point. Period. It has always been my point. As said before unless you're willing to compromise on what those changes are for all four whether it comes to high or low complexity we have nothing to discuss.

Your model is not an improvement. Its gatekeeping. IN the traditional sense. You're literally gatekeeping all four healer's designs to suck, and you're gatekeeping healers who enjoy current healing. You are literally telling them "great, you can play MSQ and you aren't allowed to do anything else because we want the jobs to be convoluted and clunky and DPS because we like DPSing better. You want to play a healer, go play another GAME because no healer Job in FFXIV will be allowed to be fun." You just don't want to admit it or just can't see it that way.

Pick whichever is more accurate.

(Btw, this isn't me trying to be snarky. This is me showing you what you sound like.)

I've already tried to be nice to you. A LONG time ago. I can still be civil. But this is me being blunt. Like it or not "leaving WHM alone" is gatekeeping. You are literally stunting the growth of a class for no good reason. And yes, just because people like the way that it is now is not a good reason to hold a class back from improvements. Doubly so if you can take what WHM is currently and add to it while still keeping true to what it was originally. That is what I'm asking for and apparently you agree.

As always, my solution accommodates the most people. Your idea of "fun" isn't. Your idea of "better" isn't. YOU are literally writing off 75% of the community (by your example numbers) and telling them to screw off and go play another GAME while my idea means that both they and you can play this one. That makes your model worse in every way.

No, that's by your bias. In my example, which by the way isn't even a good one because we don't have actual numbers. 50% wanted change to 4 healers. The 50% are divided by dps+healing and healing alone. 25% are indifferent, they don't care. 50% would want a change to WHM in my example. The 25% may not mind if they also get additional dpsing. Some do, but that isn't the focus of the group hence why I broke it that way. You have 0 idea same as I if they're that abhorrant or not as a whole. I lumped them together.

The point you missed all together was: 50% wanted a change to all four healers. 25% would not mind changes. But because the 25% don't want any change at all, you're willing to say "no one gets what they want" all four healers changed "everyone has to suffer with only 3".

Correct. Upgrades, new effects added to abilities, etc, would all still exist.

This isn't even accounted for in "changes" upgrades and effects are going to happen regardless. We're talking about removing and/or adding abilities to make things more clear.

Some nuance can exist within the Jobs - as it already does. I think this is the major sticking point. I recognize the Jobs already have complexity/depth while others reject the notion outright and hyperbolize that Healers are 1 button Jobs that don't do anything else.

I also agree with you that the concepts of easy and hard are subjective. I've long found GNB easier to play than old PLD, DRK, or WAR, though I'm not sure why.



False.

I get it, you don't.

Maybe you should stop telling people what people who aren't you are thinking?

Mmm no. Because the entire time I've been talking with you its always been "keep WHM the same". "The same" implies "no changes at all" meaning nothing new that SE isn't already going to give ie. - extra healing abilities we don't need. You've NEVER clarified what that means even when I straight up asked you in another post. You've always kept saying "the same, the same, the same" "I like WHM as it is, I don't want any changes".

So no you don't get it. Doubly so as I've repeatedly said I want to keep WHM easy to enter with a higher skill ceiling something I backed up with quotes and also something you seem to agree with. Yet you ignored my quotes saying so.

"Gatekeeping":

Some of the people on your side have literally said before that people should not be able to play as they do currently and clear Savages OR even Extremes. Yes, that is gatekeeping. The idea of it being accessible "in MSQ 4 mans" is not actual accessibility.

First and foremost, you clearly haven't been in MMORPGs for very long. That's fine, but you're mistaking "gatekeeping and gatekeepers" with competence and people expecting competence. I get it, I was in your position before believe it or not and despite knowing you'll not actually read what I have to say I'll tell you the difference.

Gatekeepers do in fact keep people away from highleveled content. They do this by seeing a person's skill level, noting it, saying nothing about how a person can improve, blacklist them and then go out of their way to tell everyone in the community that they know and usually do high content with to stay away from said people. According to the forums the JPN community does so with the ENG community. This is a sad fact of gaming. And its everywhere where there is a level of competition.

Your specific example of saying that "people should not be able to play as they do and clear Savage/Extremes" is a loaded statement. It really is. For the facts of:

• Yes, if you're doing higher end content you are expected to heal and dps.
• Yes, if you're doing higher end content you are expected to know your class.

And probably lumped into that as well is:

• EX/Savage are too undertuned for their intended audience.

There's nothing we can do about the last point because SE refuses to make hard content for people looking for it for garbage reasons we're going to get into that you're likely not going to agree with*, but the point I want you to get away from all this is: points 1+2 are to the best of your ability. No one expects someone who's done a fk tonze of dungeons and raids only, wanting to get into EX/Savage to be good. Maybe someone will get a surprise out of it, but yea, if you're progging they expect mistakes.

Are you still going to be gatekept regardless? Yeah. Because people are arses and I'm one of them (an arse not a gatekeeper). But are you going to have just as many people wanting to help you? Yeah. Pretty sure I could come to the forums, even now, and ask "hey I'm having trouble with X mechanic" or "cardinals" or probably the biggest thing I really struggle with "how tf do you people work with boss=north because it makes 0 sense and no one wants to explain in a way I understand" and I'll have plenty of people do so and hey maybe one should stick.

Does that mean we should make healers fool proof? No. Because that literally removes all the fun with the role.

Edited out but I'm just going to say, you need to take your own advice.

Healer Enjoyability:

...do you GENUINELY not realize that some people find Healers enjoyable to play right now? That "crappy loop" is your SUBJECTIVE take and not one universally shared?

I genuinely believe people find healers fun in GROUP content. There's no way in hell you can sit there and tell me that most people find doing Fates/MSQ/Deep Dungeons or any SOLO content beyond tedious on a healer for 0 reason. And if you're gonna sit there and tell me that healers are only able to find fun in group content, where the vast majority of their kit is somewhat worth a damn, then I'm going to bring up my list I want to shove in YoshiP's face, specifically:

Then why not start healers at the level cap since we can't enjoy doing something other than using mostly 2 buttons for combat because our kit is THAT lopsided in terms of healing?

As I've said before and will say until you and everyone else gets it through to them: if we have to suffer through to however many levels to get to the content that feels GOOD then you may as well add a few extra buttons to press. Or do YOU think that its fun to build up lilies as a WHM and spend them all just to get a blood lily to do extra dps to a target and kill it faster despite the fact you don't need the healing at all? Because I don't. And I sure AF find it beyond tedious to do any content as AST or even SCH and SGE.

NO!

GOOD GOD this is what's frustrating.

I'm not "sacrificing" one. I'm SACRIFICING THREE. I'm SAVING one from you! What you want is the sacrifice. What you want is the suck. What you want is the crappy loop. What YOU want is the shit gameplay that I'd hate to be subjected to. I'm not "sacrificing" one healer to save three. I'm SACRIFICING three TO SAVE ONE. And YOU get all three. AND THAT'S NOT ENOUGH FOR YOU.

That's again in YOUR bias. You don't want extra dps. Fine. But you don't want to give other WHMs extra dps like THEY may want just because YOU don't like it. Or any other healer for that matter. You don't even want us to compromise and make a loop that works for BOTH parties because every time someone tries to MENTION IT you throw a hissy fit. Like right now.

At the end of the day, if a healer doesn't want to engage in the extra dps buttons, they are free to. Its not going to stop them from doing MSQ. Its not going to stop them from doing AR. Its not even going to stop them from doing raids. Is it going to stop them from doing EX/Savage? Early on probably. Again, that's not gatekeeping. You are expected to use every tool of your class, even if not at a great level. Its a harsh reality that ALL roles have to deal with and trying to remove that from the game (or prevent it from coming in) is exactly what's wrong with quite a few classes in the game currently.

I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure that's part of why the SAM community had a lot of backlash against SE's changes.

Tl;dr - You can't fix META. Not with job changes. Stop trying to.

The problem is, it is.

Unless the complex and simple forms HAVE THE SAME OUTPUT, it's mutually exclusive because there will be some content that the latter cannot clear otherwise. Therein lies the problem. That's why one should be spared being turned into a shitty worse DPS and allowed to remain NOT shitty like healers today are NOT shitty and are fun and enjoyable to play. And there's no way you guys would accept the same output. You think "more work should be more rewarding", and the "reward" isn't "more fun" it's "greater output in either damage, healing, utility or some combination". That's not equal, and thus is mutually exclusive. And, if someone points this out, they get accused of being lazy or "wanting a pink parse" - because we all know belittling and insulting people is the highest form or civilized discussion and disproves the opponent's position, right? Oh, wait, no it's not...

No the problem is, you're trying to fix something that really can't be fixed. You wanna know why AST is the way it is right now? This. Same with SCH. This is a COMMUNITY problem. NOT A CLASS ONE. The ENTIRE REASON healers are the way they are now is because SE thought WHM was far behind and instead of bumping it up and making it more distinct from AST and SCH, SCH lost everything they liked, AST got their cards removed, and SCH and WHM now have AST's crappy rotation. YOU may not like Aero III but plenty of people do.

You can't design around this and you SHOULDN'T design around this. I would be ok with AST being a shitty dpser (and can't heal as well as WHM!) if my buffs made up for it (they don't). Other people aren't ok with that. Alright, but that's the balance of the class don't like it? Play something else. You aren't supposed to give a 1:1. EVERYTHING is supposed to have some kind of draw back to justify something. Otherwise... well we get what crap we have now.

There's GOING to be a Meta. Always. And that's fine. As long as everything is viable, people really shouldn't care. Is there going to be more pressure on the "inferior class"? Probably. Buuuut it makes the people who main and choose to learn and master it all the more rare and applaudable.

SCH/WHM changes:

Hell, you've seen MY WHM and SGE proposals, have you not?

In both cases I made the DPS rotation more engaging, and I did it without even adding another DPS button (or button at all) for WHM, and actually DECREASING the total number of abilities on SCH!

WHM: https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...-Mage-eddition
Note that this would be a more complex DPS rotation but doesn't add a single new spell to the roster to do so.

SCH: https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...e-Proposal-SCH
This idea actually adds a lot of complexity, but pays for it by simplifying and merging abilities, reducing clunk, and streamlining systems to make it not punishing at the same time.

I've heard mixed things on both of these. I've mostly kept quiet because I don't know the ins and outs of these two classes like I do AST for good changes but I'll give a crack at it anyroad. I will say again: these are my uninformed non-main WHM + SCH contributions.

WHM... I honestly don't like the changes. Instead of doing anything with Holy, again, you can add a whole new button to take its place. (or make it proc Misery if you're that against a new button like jfc what is wrong with it?) Further, Holy being as it is, is likely because it has a stun. Coupling Glare and Holy in this way would likely cause the removal of the stun (because SE). You may as well just keep the Misery proc and/or add a Solace one.

Dia stacking, no. Its already a set and forget DoT. It doesn't need to be worse like SAM's. The alternative Thundercloud lite... I mean it doesn't need to proc an MPless Dia. It could proc something else. But because you refuse to add anything else to the table (other than Holy) it doesn't have the freedom to do anything. See why adding nothing is limiting?

Assize change... I don't get why everyone is obsessed with stacking it up to 2. I guess its because its different from CI and ED in that it also does damage... but I also don't understand why it needs to be a GCD either. (I guess to further play into WHM being a slower but more impactful healer?) I would rather Glare (if it doesn't proc Misery or maybe also) boost either the damage or healing of Assize (GCD or not)

None of it makes me want to pick up WHM again, even ignoring I don't like simplicity. I don't think it really fixes anything other than give Misery another proc other than "use lilies you don't need to use because no one is doing damage".

SCH also fixes... nothing for me either. I have nothing against Excog other than that its on arguably too short of a CD. (ie due to short recast we use it a lot more often than we arguably should in place of other tools because encounter design still sucks) I see no reason why it has to upgrade from Lustrate.

Bringing back Miasma is nice, but I'm curious as to why you didn't add Bane, doubly so as you added a HoT to it. You could literally have it or Deployment Tactics (if you focused on an enemy) to spread the DoTs and the HoT. Not sure why it also has to have a HoT attached to it, but I'll keep it and not change anything.

Broil IV change... again Bane/DT is fine. Or even AoW could spread them if you're that adverse to extra buttons. I get the intent this seems... needlessly extra to me.

Aetherpact change... why? As it stands right now if I want to use another faerie ability I would either stop the channel (cause I likely won't want to use it all anyway to keep a decently high gauge) or the faerie ability stops it automatically (which I think it does already) We have a spot heal. Lustrate.

Dissipation not eating the faerie is fine. I don't think we need extra healing buff applied. We seem to have more than enough healing to go around.

I don't see why Physick should trait upgrade to Aldo. I get the point, but it isn't in the same vein as Cure I and Benefic I to me. Its not a change I'm completely against the idea of, but I still use Physick more than I use the WHM and AST equivilant. Much like with Cure I if I were to make this change, I would either have it upgrade into something else (because around the time you would get Aldo/Cure II you still have minor uses for the ability) or as you've done fix the MP to is. I feel like spamming Aldo to heal when you don't have Lustrate however to be wrong. Dunno why, just feels wrong.

Energy Drain using Fey gauge is interesting. I don't like it being decoupled because at least to me Aetherpact isn't really worth much when I have other tools at my disposal to heal. Even with your changes. That said it does fix the issue of Fey Gauge being mostly worthless. I don't think it gives much more choice. Roughly about the same. Perhaps its more but I doubt I'll feel it in most content I run. Neutral over all.

Faerie is still useless outside of a handful abilities. I may be the minority but I for one would like to have more pet options. Doubly so cause I'd like to have Selene back and switch between them. Maybe Seraph as well.

Alright. That's my thesis for today. Pick and read at your pleasure.

[Shurrikhan]

Contrast how 'good' it feels to have to interrupt your damage to press Medica 2, and by comparison, how 'good' it feels to weave in a Rapture.

To me, a lot of the "good" I feel about either is like that of narrowly dodging something because 'the narrower the dodge, the less opportunity cost'.

I like Rapture when I've charted out its use for its mobility or its being able to basically combine with the prior GCD of healing (say, a Cure III) for a massive, timely burst. I like Medica II for knowing when I have room to cast it, how long in advance it must be cast in order to both meet the needs I have for it later and minimize overhealing. Etc., etc. Were Rapture always available, the tool would quickly seem dull to me, and that'd probably be largely true even if it was more than just a Medica in its effect (i.e., you could damn near just have any non-intentionally cancelled healing spell Medica auto-complete if a Lily is available and have all the effect of Solace and Rapture at no button-cost).



That said, I don't think we need strict cast times to do that. I truly wouldn't mind if you could still get 'something' out of a cast you don't have the full time for, especially if there's still a flat GCD cost atop it: imagine, for instance, if you could simply build 400 to 800 cure potency from Cure II by charging it for up to 2 seconds at the same MP and GCD cost, or 250 to 800 potency at varying MP cost (drains over cast) but the same GCD cost, etc.

In fact, one could --at least, with better netcode-- have Rapture, Medica, and Medica II all be one button, wherein you can instant-cast it at resource cost, release the normal cast at 2 seconds, or also add a HoT thereafter for up to 15 seconds based on further cast time (up to 3s), with the cast completing early automatically if you lack the MP to go on... and let Cura be instant-cast at resource cost, full-cast at 2s, or expanded to have up to 75% AoE falloff across up to 10 yards by 3s.

...Heck, you allow casts to be held there (e.g., if the button is actually held, rather than merely tapped -- Character-Configurable), still spending a mild amount of MP continuously, to make it easier to sync up those heals perfectly to incoming damage.



I feel like that added fluidity from it healing spells being less all-or-nothing could also go a long way towards helping more panicky players still feel like they could meet healing checks.

I'd still want to complement that with more flexible oGCDs that could offer a further layer of (at-cost) slack/borrowing/exchange/protection/call-it-what-you-will, but there's a lot to be said for deemphasizing certain stumbling points in the interest of allowing for greater healing requirements. Granted, I want those greater healing requirements precisely because that's where I think you could then draw out more of the interest of varied healing tools and their engagement among (and because of) each other -- where the "two separate halves of a kit" can better come together.

So where WHM currently has 'damage tool fed by healing', I'd like to see 'healing tool fed by damage'.

If the job would otherwise have more up-front / at-the-ready tools for dealing with healing requirements than most and especially if it has an offense slightly more able to take advantage of raid buffs, then I wouldn't be opposed to that.

In terms of D&D (mind you, the last time I played was a million years ago), I'd have insta-casts and oGCDs be more inline with cantrips, and in that theme, I could even imagine an ability that was a GCD cast at Lv.50 becoming insta-cast by Lv.90 by virtue of sheer familiarity, practice, etc. I mean, in what world does it make sense that a 400 potency AoE heal takes 1.5s to cast (Helios), but you can instantly queue up the heavens to rewind time (Macrocosmos)?

This part, though, doesn't really bug me, as we could just say that the action actually started sooner, and it's precisely because it was so strenuous (in being done in that short moment) that it won't be doable again for so long. I don't mind that we sacrifice a bit of the dramatic wind-up keyframes in favor of more precise time-ability. (If we actually had the occasional channel or alternate-length GCD, I'd disclaim that with "for the average player", but without any such control, that advantage applies even to min-maxers.)