Dawntrail Wishlist top 3 desired healer additions

[ty_taurus]

So I've had this thread up over in genera discussion regarding a survey I've put out about (which is also over on Reddit), and while it's still a little early, there's a decent amount of healer feedback. The main part of the survey is a 'check all that apply' list of what changes a player wants to see followed by a follow-up that asks that player to select which of those is the one they care about the most. Here's where each healer stands currently as of 9/30:

White Mage
1. New Attacks (64.2%)
2. New Group Mitigation (11.3%)
3. New Lily Actions (9.4%)

Scholar
1. New Attacks (61.1%)
2. Faerie Gauge Changes (13%)
3. New Faerie Gauge Actions (9.3%)

Astrologian
1. New Attacks (27.9%)
2. New Draw/Play Actions (23.3%)
3. Arcana Gauge Changes (20.9%)

Sage
1. New Attacks (72%)
2. New Addersting Actions (10%)
3. Tie [Upgrades to Existing Actions/Addersgall Gauge Changes/Unsure] (4% each)

It's still a fairly small amount of responses so far, but I think it's interesting information so far.

[Renathras]

Is that the top three "want to see" or the top three "care most about"?

EDIT:

Oh, for anyone who hasn't seen it, the survey is here: https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...ishlist-Survey

[ty_taurus]

Is that the top three "want to see" or the top three "care most about"?

EDIT:

Oh, for anyone who hasn't seen it, the survey is here: https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...ishlist-Survey

"Of the choices you selected, which is one the thing you are most interested in seeing from [JOB] in the next expansion?" is the exact phrasing in the question. Personally, I interpret "want to see" and "care most about" as synonymous. For example, for that specific question, I didn't choose New Attacks for Astrologian because I care more about seeing a good card rework. I do want to see more attacks, but if I could only have one thing, a revamped, engaging card system is something I care more about and thus would want to see the most from the changes.

[Renathras]

Okay, to put it a different way - I'm not trying to be antagonistic - is this an answer to the first question that allows multiple choices or the second that wants you to pick just one?

As a survey taker instead of the maker, I read them as "Which things would you like to see" and "OF THOSE THINGS, which do you want the most to happen?", which are different questions. For example, maybe a lot of people (probably a majority) want to see ability upgrades, but that isn't the thing they most want to happen.

I was just asking if this was an answer to the first of those questions or the second.

I take it by your answer (which was...well...never mind) the second of those questions. Anyway, let's see...

What new actions or changes are you hoping to see:

WHM
New attacks 48(85.7%)
New Lily Actions 34(60.7%)
New Blood Lily Actions 28(50%) / Other forms of Utility 27(48.2%)

SCH
New Attacks 48(84.2%)
Faerie Gauge Changes 46(80.7%)
New Faerie Gauge Actions 37(64.9%)
[Next nearest is Aetherflow Gauge Changes at 31(54.4%)

AST
Arcana Gauge Changes 33(73.3%)
New Attacks 30(66.7%)
New Draw/Play Actions 29(64.4%)
[New Minor Arcana Actions 25(55.6%), New DPS Buffs and New Star Sign Actions both got 23(51.1%) and all other options got less than 50%, though Other forms of Utility close at 21(46.7%)]

SGE
New Attacks 45(882.%)
New Addersting Actions 36(70.6%)
New Eukrasian Gauge Actions 24(47.1%)
[New Addersting Actions was right behind at 23(45.1%)]

which is one the thing you are most interested:

WHM
New Attacks 37(66.1%)
New Group Mitigation 6(10.7%)
New Lily Actions 5(8.9%)
[Upgrades to Existing Actions and New Blood Lily actions both got 2(3.6%), everything else just 1]

SCH
New Attacks 35(61.4%)
Faerie Gauge Changes 7(12.3%)
New Faerie Gauge Actions 5(8.8%)
[Aetherflow Gauge Changes 4(7%) and New Healing/Barrier OGCD Abilities 2(3.5%), everything else just 1]

AST
New Attacks 13(28.9%)
New Draw/Play Actions 10(22.2%)
Arcana Gauge Changes 9(20%)
[New DPS Buffs at 5(11.1%) was the only other thing with more than 10%]

SGE
New Attacks 37(72.5%)
New Addersting Actions 5(9.8%)
[Upgrades to Existing Actions, Addersgall Change, and Unsure all got 2(3.9%), everything else just 1]

.

Given "New Attacks" was the lead for the second question for everyone (though in different percentages from AST's low of 28.9% to SGE's high of 72.5%, the first question shows a big of a more complex picture in terms of just things that people want more generally. I'm also curious how people interpreted "New Attacks" vs "New Blood Lily/Addersting Actions" (the latter of which would clearly be new attacks/DPS buttons, most likely, and yet...)

I agree with you on AST needing a card rework. I figured that was what "New Draw/Play Actions" was supposed to mean, though wasn't entirely sure, and I suppose Minor Arcana as a second question splits that a bit. New Minor Arcana ITSELF got over 50% in the first question.

EDIT:

Crap, forgot the averages: (prior results from https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...8Hk/edit#gid=0 in perenthesis) - Number of responses

WHM: 4.56 (4.67) - 55

SCH: 4.41 (5.18) - 56

AST: 3.36 (4.55) - 44

SGE: 4.66 (5.18) - 50

Where the prior results were SGE=SCH > WHM > AST (with the latter two being not far apart), now we see SGE > WHM > SCH >> AST, which has had the bottom fall out of it. WHM had the smallest change of -0.11, leading to it moving up to 2nd, AST the biggest, falling by -1.19, SGE by -0.52, SCH by -0.77 to 3rd.

This is still a small sample size, only 44 for AST and 56 on the high end for SCH, but it's still interesting.

[ty_taurus]

Okay, to put it a different way - I'm not trying to be antagonistic - is this an answer to the first question that allows multiple choices or the second that wants you to pick just one?

Oh, I just misunderstood what you asked the first time. As you deduced, it was the second question.

The thing about choosing what answers to offer was a little tricky sometimes. With "New Attacks" vs something like "New Blood Lily Actions"... let's say someone has in their mind some singular alternate Blood Lily action that they want to see. I would imagine they could check both those options, and then specify that "New Blood Lily Action" as their most wanted change because that's more specific than just New Attacks. As for the Astrologian specifications...

In my mind, I imagine "Arcana Gauge Changes" as changes to the tools that revolve around the gauge, such as the card effects, the star signs, and the minor arcana effects. Meanwhile "New Draw/Play Actions" along with the other options below are more about new tools to compliment the system in some way, like an alternative to Astrodyne for "New Star Sign Actions." I realize that's not super clear, and a part of that simply comes from trying to communicate specific details in a limited amount of words without creating too many choices to choose from. I really wanted to break down the different parts of each job's gauge since those are usually have a large impact on the gameplay of each job, but it was certainly harder to try and break down certain gauges into more digestible answers than others, which Astro is certainly a culprit of. But I think even if there is some ambiguity, Arcana Gauge Changes and New Draw/Play Actions together make up almost 50% of the most wanted answers, and they're highly voted in "want to see" question as well, so we can tell that there is a strong desire to see the cards reworked in some capacity with this upcoming rework. And there is of course the written answers which do help bring more clarity to what specifically people are looking for.

But yeah, it's still very early for this new survey so things may change. I posted this on these forums and reddit at the same time so it's unclear how many answers are from where. A lot of people on reddit wrote their desires in the comments in that thread, and I think many probably didn't fill out the form. The thread has been viewed 37.4k times according to my analytics, and yet the total responses are still pretty low, which is a little disheartening. And if people were actually looking at the answers, that would show in the response count for anyone that just filled out the pancakes and waffles question (which was the purpose of that by the way, an answer you can fill out if you just wanted to see the results if you didn't have input you wanted to share)

[ForsakenRoe]

While the response count may be a little low as it stands, it does seem to be following similar patterns to previous data points: people want more attacks on every healer, except AST is way lower, and has way more of it's % dedicated towards non-attack damage-related tools (ie, buffing allies). Which makes sense. Though SCH does not have the same, despite having Chain, I guess people overall believe that Chain is in a good spot and doesn't need to be any more or less than it currently is?

SGE
New Attacks 45(882.%)

I know it's a typo, but lol

[Aravell]

While the response count may be a little low as it stands, it does seem to be following similar patterns to previous data points: people want more attacks on every healer, except AST is way lower, and has way more of it's % dedicated towards non-attack damage-related tools (ie, buffing allies). Which makes sense. Though SCH does not have the same, despite having Chain, I guess people overall believe that Chain is in a good spot and doesn't need to be any more or less than it currently is?

I can't speak for everyone who answered but I'm one of the people who want SCH to have more utility focus, the fairy gauge is in far more dire straits than SCH's utility though. The fairy gauge is currently barely relevant, it really does need some reworking, so I'm not surprised at all that it's the 2nd highest voted option.

[Renathras]

I know it's a typo, but lol

lol!

Yeah, I'm leaving that.

I think it's a bit more complicated, and it should be interesting to see how the sample changes with time. Honestly, the biggest surprise to me is that people would rather see more damage buttons on WHM than...utility or party mitigation. I get some people want to be damage dealers, but that's an abject no brainer to me since it's WHM's biggest failing right now, especially compared to AST (which is a foot in barrier healer already) and how SCH/SGE parties are entirely viable since they have ample healing without even needing a WHM or AST.

The thing about choosing what answers to offer was a little tricky sometimes...
...
In my mind, I imagine "Arcana Gauge Changes" as changes to the tools that revolve around the gauge, such as...

Yeah, I get that. It really is hard.

One thing I would caution against, though, is assuming that people read and respond to the poll questions in the way you might have. For example, you thought of Arcana gauge as all those things, where I just thought of it as the gauge itself, and I thought Draw/Play being related to the card changes, and I thought of the star signs as being that other option about seals/New Star Sign Actions. So while you would read "Arcana Gauge Changes" and think it was all of those things, my mind segmented each into the option more directly related to those specific topics.

For WHM, I tended to think of Blood Lily Gauge and Actions as the same thing, and was confused at first what the difference would be other than maybe ways to generate it...but yeah.

...god, polling is hard. <_<

I do think it's a task worth trying/doing, though.

I can't speak for everyone who answered but I'm one of the people who want SCH to have more utility focus, the fairy gauge is in far more dire straits than SCH's utility though. The fairy gauge is currently barely relevant, it really does need some reworking, so I'm not surprised at all that it's the 2nd highest voted option.

Agreed. I think it's the best candidate for "more DoTs" for people that like DoT gameplay, but I agree that the Faerie element of it is in the most dire straights. I think I also picked something related to Faerie Gauge.

[ty_taurus]

"Healing Gauge Changes" would be like growing a different lily, or changing how lilies are generated, or changing what lilies actually do (i.e. Shadowbringers). "New Lily Actions" would be a new Afflatus spell that consumes normal lilies. "New Blood Lily Actions" would be a new spell tp spend your Blood Lily on other than Afflatus Misery.

[ForsakenRoe]

Honestly, the biggest surprise to me is that people would rather see more damage buttons on WHM than...utility or party mitigation. I get some people want to be damage dealers, but that's an abject no brainer to me since it's WHM's biggest failing right now, especially compared to AST (which is a foot in barrier healer already) and how SCH/SGE parties are entirely viable since they have ample healing without even needing a WHM or AST.

Well, I can give my reason for prioritizing A over B: Because while both are very big issues WHM faces, it is still capable of clearing all content, even with the lower amount of mitigation. If we had one one of the two things added in DT, an extra mit tool would be like, 'ok cool I now have something to use as a 60s mit, this helps me keep the party alive', but after adding that addition into the list of 'what can we use on the spreadsheet to cover this raidwide' it falls off in 'wow factor' very quickly. Look at how fast people's interest in Aquaveil and Exaltation fell off. And it's effectiveness/how 'interesting' it is, is very reliant on the difficulty of the content. Turning a raidwide in EX roulette that does 20% of your max HP, into one that does 18%, not very interesting. It being the critical mit that pushes you from taking 110%, down to 99%, turning it from a oneshot to 'we barely lived', does make it feel good. This means that such a tool would be a 'fun addition' in a small fraction of the content

Changing the rotation with new damage buttons, something that helps stave off boredom (for players inclined towards enjoying such an addition) in ALL content, would have much more staying power as an addition. It does not matter to me personally, if I am in EX roulette or progging an Ultimate: I will notice the difference between current rotation, and one where I have a new damage button to press as part of the rotation. The incoming damage of the content has no bearing on whether the new button feels fun or not, as the two are not linked in the way that damage and mit are. In fact, the potential for 'big damage is happening, I don't have time to press my correct damage rotation, so I will have to adjust later' is a good thing imo. We dropped all of our damage during Harrowing Hell because we had to spam healing. If our DOT falls off during that phase, we ignore refreshing it because 'heal the 30-40k pulses of damage' takes priority

My concern with SE, and how they interpret data/feedback/etc, is that if they hear the calls for 'more damage buttons' and actually follow through on it, they go with something horrendously 2min-meta inspired. Like, 'you now have a new damage button on WHM: a 2min CD Afflatus Purgation, it does damage in a line and has zero interactivity with the kit, just press it in buffs'. Because that does technically fulfill 'more damage buttons' but it's probably the worst possible implementation, because it doesn't address the 'WHY' of 'we want more damage buttons': that pressing one button (Glare/Broil/Dosis/The other one) 11 times in a row does not really feel like good 'gameplay' to some players

In my mind, I imagine "Arcana Gauge Changes" as changes...

Yeh, the way I read it was that each change section was for it's specifically labelled thing (eg Draw/Play Actions covers a request for 'add Sleeve Draw again'), and Arcana Gauge changes is the more 'general' or 'overall' aspects of the job. Things like what buffs the cards give, how many different cards can be drawn, etc.

So the way I'd interpret the results is that 'people want varied card actions again, people want MA to be something more than a coinflip between a Malefic and a Helios, people want more interactions with the cards rather than just drawing and playing them (probably Royal Road requests), and people want something to use the Seals on other than Astrodyne (or for Seals to be removed)'.

And like above, I voted for both buffs and damage buttons, because I see both as a problem for AST. But if I had to have just one, I'd take buffs, because I think that uniquely to AST, having more damage buttons would help it feel better sure, but having a good feeling 'buff management' system would feel 'more better'. Like, take the SB AST. We had the funny cards, and we had two DOTs, Combust and Combust 2. So if we had the choice, between 'funny cards again' and 'you have a second DOT again', everyone's gonna take the cards, because the current card system is a much bigger issue for the job's gameplay than it's lack of damage buttons. In fact, the card system being how it was back then was the whole reason it had less damage buttons compared to the other jobs (and a 1.5s cast time), the card system justified that simple damage rotation. In fact, personally, I'd like a system for the cards that is so robust and 'depth enabling' that it justifies removing Combust entirely, making AST the 'no DOTs healer', I would prefer to see it be 'my hands are full' with card stuff instead