I'm bored when I heal because I need more complex DPS rotations

[Aravell]

The reason AoE feels pointless now is that, going into EW, they decided that AoE should only be used on 3+ targets when they got rid of any minor 2-target optimisation gains from the game. There's basically no reason to press your AoE in 2-target boss fights/phases now unless you're a SCH or a SGE, and even then SGE only gains 10 potency.

[Mithron]

Uh... You rarely press PLD buttons ?

Most of mine are always used. The exception being "passe d'arme" (the skill where you have wings behind your back, to protect your party).

Yeah, buttons like Passage of Arms, Shield Bash, Clemency, Cover and even Bulwark since it was just re-added recently and Holy Shelton uptime is pretty substantial. Then when you're OT and tank swaps aren't needed, you use even fewer buttons. So your core rotation buttons are pretty minimal, all in all. That's not even mentioning all the hyper situational buttons like Low Blow and Interject.

[Supersnow845]

If they actually leaned into the shield regen split properly SCH could potentially lose blessing, indom, ET, protraction and maybe union without losing too much, it was always debatable if giving SCH indom (especially when they made it critable with recitation) was a good idea since good AOE healing was always WHM’s niche in ARR, I’d also be in favour of nerfing the regen on sacred soil

SCH is too bloated with actions because its trying to do everything at once (which was its problem in HW)

[Grizzlpaw]

I feel like most classes suffer more from “APM bloat” or “redundant actions” bloat than they do true button bloat

Classes like DRK, NIN and AST suffer from APM bloat where they have messy overfull burst windows full of actions you only press during the burst window and then they are relatively boring outside of that (this is actually the one pro I give modern SMN, it never has a part of its rotation that actively feels weak like doing your 123 on NIN does)

PLD especially more so suffers from redundant actions bloat (but I could also point out the bension/aquaveil problem) where it just has alot of actions that while doing kinda different things all lead to the same result (not dying), clemency, intervention, cover, passage, shield lob they are all just kinda there

I’d say the only class right now suffering from true button bloat is SCH because SCH equals AST and PLD for most actions but all of SCH’s actions are actually unique and useful and it doesn’t have a bursty burst window you have to press 85 buttons in. Even if you deleted what most consider SCH’s 2 most useless actions (blessing and protraction) it still has close to the most actions of any class and beyond those two it becomes harder and harder to justify which action to delete

This is actually my biggest problem with most jobs. The bursts are cool and flashy, but then there's a minute or more of downtime where you have nothing to do. I wouldn't mind if bursts were less busy and filler phases had more for you to do.

For healers, we really don't need a fancy burst phase, some more interesting filler would be enough. I will continue to point to PvP sage as a perfect example of healer DPS done right.

[Lyth]

Most jobs seem to float at around 25 hotbar action slots + 5-7 role actions. The trend for new actions is to either upgrade a previously existing action (i.e. the perennial classic, Stone 16 becomes Stone 17), or to have them share the same hotbar slot with a previously existing action. This is either a one button combo or context-specific action (i.e. this action cannot be applied to a hotbar). Removing existing actions to make more space is an option as well, but generally doesn't seem to go down very well.

If you're looking for a combo system to model a casting rotation off of, the job to look at for inspiration is probably RDM.

Under the above principles, you would likely need to give up two to three other actions to do so at minimum for a combo alone, likely from your healing/defensive/support list. You are unlikely to get a net dps advantage despite such a sacrifice after role balancing is factored in, but I presume the end goal is just to make combat more satisfying.

Jobs with more intensive burst followed by extended downtime (i.e. jobs like NIN or DRK) tend to be that way because their hotbar space contains a high number of oGCDs. They have a similar trade-off to make as well, in that if you want a more interesting base rotation, you have to trade-off some of those oGCDs for GCDs. It really just comes down to what you're willing to part with to make it work.

[Tigore]

Some of us have been giving feedback towards freeing up those 2 - 3 slots that you say would need to be given up. The FF14 devs have tech to merge buttons together too so that the button changes to a better version or one that is catered to the situation. cough SMN cough. WHM has quite a selection of buttons that could arguably be merged together like Afflatus Solace with Cure 2 and Afflatus Rapture with Medica. 3 of the healers have a Cure version that can be merged with a Cure 2 equivalent. SCH would be Physick vs. Adloquium and AST would be Benefic vs. Benefic 2. One could say we could just drop Cure, but what if the Levelling roulette gives us Satasha? At least allow the Cure 2 to drop down to Cure for that dungeon. All of this so far frees up 3 slots for WHM and 1 for SCH and AST.

For SCH, freeing up more slots might involve consolidating some Aether cooldowns with the fairy cooldowns. It looks like the intentions were for Aether cooldowns to charge up the fairy gauge, but the fairy healing spell rewards feel quite paltry. This might feel like it will remove SCHs ability to stagger their heals if Indomidability is fused with Fey Blessing (example), but I tend to use both of them together anyhow in 4 man dungeons >.> From what the Savage healers comment on, the moments they actually need to heal tend to be in bursts that are predicted from boss cooldown timers. Bosses don't seem to do enough unavoidable AoE pulses to warrant wanting to separate and stagger the healing over multiple cooldowns. Even if we want to retain the staggered healing use, Fey Blessing could probably still be merged with Indomidability to be like an oGCD combo it flips to after using the first step.

[Colt47]

Some of us have been giving feedback towards freeing up those 2 - 3 slots that you say would need to be given up. The FF14 devs have tech to merge buttons together too so that the button changes to a better version or one that is catered to the situation. cough SMN cough. WHM has quite a selection of buttons that could arguably be merged together like Afflatus Solace with Cure 2 and Afflatus Rapture with Medica. 3 of the healers have a Cure version that can be merged with a Cure 2 equivalent. SCH would be Physick vs. Adloquium and AST would be Benefic vs. Benefic 2. One could say we could just drop Cure, but what if the Levelling roulette gives us Satasha? At least allow the Cure 2 to drop down to Cure for that dungeon. All of this so far frees up 3 slots for WHM and 1 for SCH and AST.

For SCH, freeing up more slots might involve consolidating some Aether cooldowns with the fairy cooldowns. It looks like the intentions were for Aether cooldowns to charge up the fairy gauge, but the fairy healing spell rewards feel quite paltry. This might feel like it will remove SCHs ability to stagger their heals if Indomidability is fused with Fey Blessing (example), but I tend to use both of them together anyhow in 4 man dungeons >.> From what the Savage healers comment on, the moments they actually need to heal tend to be in bursts that are predicted from boss cooldown timers. Bosses don't seem to do enough unavoidable AoE pulses to warrant wanting to separate and stagger the healing over multiple cooldowns. Even if we want to retain the staggered healing use, Fey Blessing could probably still be merged with Indomidability to be like an oGCD combo it flips to after using the first step.

Yeah, I've gone back to playing WHM over the weekend doing various content. I have no idea how they can make healers more proactive in fights. The entire design of the role in the trinity system is to react to the party taking damage or react to the threat of taking damage. Attacking is something that one does proactively and generally is something that is reacted to. So the main way to allow healers to be more proactive (DPS skill chains, etc), would be to have fewer points where the healers are forced to react (raise an ally, apply a heal OGCD or otherwise). The fights would need to have fewer points where it is "oh shit people are going to die" going from 100% to 10% HP from super attacks or unexpected loops of damage, such as when someone is learning savage, and move towards more gradual damage chains that are predictable but require attention. Another way to view it is instead of death being knife edge thrills it turns into gradual decay of ones health until they fall.

E.g. a boss does an aoe and hits the party. Everyone gets a debuff that if it stacks to 3 reduces everyones maximum HP by the damage dealt and can only be removed by using a healing spell or self heal skill. So instead of the fight being about healing people to max health after taking a huge hit, its about dpsing the boss and weaving in heals to remove the stacking debuffs and prevent permanent HP loss.

[ty_taurus]

Many of my suggestions for healer reworks have resulted in around 18-20 hotbar actions with less role actions as well. It’s very doable when given some thought and a little creativity

[Mithron]

Many of my suggestions for healer reworks have resulted in around 18-20 hotbar actions with less role actions as well. It’s very doable when given some thought and a little creativity

Neither thought nor creativity are allowed any more. We must pander to the immoral societal standards as per our corporate shareholders dictate. They don't want long term players anymore; only to be flashy for the current new generation, get their sub for a month, then move on.

So I wouldn't be surprised if all dots are removed in Dawn Trail, so healers only have 1 single target damage GCD, with the exception of SGE who will have 2, and Yoship will continue to say "if you want to DPS as healer, play SGE"

[ty_taurus]

So I wouldn't be surprised if all dots are removed in Dawn Trail, so healers only have 1 single target damage GCD, with the exception of SGE who will have 2, and Yoship will continue to say "if you want to DPS as healer, play SGE"

Meanwhile Sage has less DPS abilities than every other healer somehow:

WHM: Glare/Holy, Dia, Afflatus Misery, Assize, Presence of Mind
SCH: Broil/Art of War, Biolysis, Energy Drain, Chain Stratagem
AST: Malefic/Gravtiy, Combust, Earthly Star, Minor Arcana, Draw & Play, Divination, Astrodyne
SGE: Dosis/Dyskrasia, Eukrasian Dosis, Phlegma