I really don’t know anymore….

[Renathras]

I just don't understand why we have 4 healers and they all function very similarly. We have the space to make 1/2 of healers more complicated and still keep 1/2 simple.

Straight up, I've been making this argument for close to 2 years now. "4 Healers Model" you can find all over this subforum, with everyone beating on me every time I mention it, but it's that very concept. We have enough healers to make 2 complex and 2 not, or even 3/1. We don't have to change everything. One of my hopes for SGE (before it went live, obviously) was that it would play like RDM (or like SMN now does), as kind of a DPS Job but where your damage spells translated to healing. A WoW Discipline Priest. Not even for me, since I don't like that, but to make happy the people who would.

I was pretty disappointed when they didn't do that, even though I personally like SGE okay, because I thought it was a missed design space/opportunity.

People complain when I say it, but the 4 Healers Model really is the best idea: Make the Healers not all have the same exact (or close enough to make no difference) damage and (frankly) healing kits. Then players can gravitate to the one they like best.

Isn't a support by definition a buffer though?

Not exactly.

Support is generally something that offers utility aside from DPS. RDM is a support because of Vercure, Verraise, and Magick Barrier as these are all things above the baseline. Even if you ignore the latter of those, Vercure and Verraise would make it a support-DPS. It is, in fact, and has been since SB, the Job that people who outright say they want a Support role enjoy playing the most since it's closest to that. BRD used to be that way before ShB, back when it could do things like some healing, cleansing, and the songs were more situational and responsive to situations.

Support CAN be buffing, but it can also be debuffing, healing (on a non-healing role class), raising, etc.

FFXIV, ALMOST every class has a "buffs party damage", so that isn't really support since it's basically baseline, and Feint/Addle are also baseline (as is Tactician/etc of the Ranged role, since they all have one and they're all identical).

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As for the how: It's that or homogenized morass. WoW figured it out 15-20 years ago. FFXIV figured it out in ARR. I know you like to go on about how super late in the expansion some people figured SCH/SCH could be a gain, but pretty much no one did that or cared to because the difference wasn't great enough (or the demand there) to make it worth doing.

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As for the last: The only time I've seen it is PF Extremes. I don't think I've seen a WHM that cast literally nothing but Glare other than that. It wasn't "the role was so boring the person fell asleep". It was a willful decision since they started out the fight/pulls that way.