Latest Official Developer Statements About Healer DPS?

[Melichoir]

But now the argument goes back to "What is the primary function of a healer?" which is "To heal/Res/Support team". So why have a DPS rotation in that case? And if youre trying to increase healer DPS output, that comes with a bit of drawback to it as well, both on actual design, and how people will operate that class. Yeah in theory people should be focusing on the support aspect over dps as a healer cause, you know, its hte role. But there will inevitably be people who ignore that because "I have a DPS kit now,s o I wanna do that thing. Your death was your problem, git gud." In the current setup, that position does not fly. In an environment where there is a 'functional' dps rotation for Healers, well that viewpoint now as legs. Its not exactly ideal from a dev standpoint and has to be considered, whether we as players like it or not.

[Supersnow845]

Once again we need a FAQ for the general opinions of the healer forums because again nobody wants healers to do more damage, we want to do the damage we are currently doing in a more interesting way

[ty_taurus]

Once again we need a FAQ for the general opinions of the healer forums because again nobody wants healers to do more damage, we want to do the damage we are currently doing in a more interesting way

Here, I brought a trampoline:


Since the running theme of healer discussions is people jumping to conclusions, I figured I'd set the mood.

[Aravell]

But now the argument goes back to "What is the primary function of a healer?" which is "To heal/Res/Support team". So why have a DPS rotation in that case? And if youre trying to increase healer DPS output, that comes with a bit of drawback to it as well, both on actual design, and how people will operate that class. Yeah in theory people should be focusing on the support aspect over dps as a healer cause, you know, its hte role. But there will inevitably be people who ignore that because "I have a DPS kit now,s o I wanna do that thing. Your death was your problem, git gud." In the current setup, that position does not fly. In an environment where there is a 'functional' dps rotation for Healers, well that viewpoint now as legs. Its not exactly ideal from a dev standpoint and has to be considered, whether we as players like it or not.

You have to explain to me how anyone not doing their primary duty that they signed up for has any leg to stand on at all.

If a tank doesn't do a tankswap properly and says "I'm not provoking, I have no weave slots during burst, it's the other tanks fault for not dropping stance and shirking.", would you accept that and say they have a leg to stand on?

[ForsakenRoe]

Reduce focus on Healers healing - This would mean raid damage would either have to decrease, or increase self sustain by everyone else, so that healers woul essentially have time to commit to a dps rotation

This is a misunderstanding that crops up quite often. Let's take an example, arguably one of the 'most complex' healers to DPS on, HW SCH. Back then, we had Bio at 18s (dealing a total of 240p), Miasma at 24s (dealing a total of 300p), Bio 2 at 30s (dealing a total of 350p), and Shadowflare at 30s (dealing a total of 250p). By contrast, the 'filler' at the time, Broil 1, was 170 (later 190 iirc). Now, we have Broil 4 at 295p, and one DOT at 30s, for a total of 700p. Notice how all those old DOTs deal only a fraction of a Broil more than an actual Broil (with Miasma being about 180% of a Broil), compared to now, where our single DOT does over 200% of a Broil. 'Misplay' with the old systems, eg dropping a DOT for a tick or two, was a lot less punishing than the current systems, where missing a tick of the current DOT is equal to losing about a quarter of a Broil cast

But the key thing about 'not enough time to commit to a DPS rotation' is this: When we have multiple DOTs, we refresh them on time ideally. If we cannot, because of a hard healing requirement (cough Harrowing Hell), either we delay the refresh by a GCD (as many times as is needed until you are safe to), or you refresh early. But regardless of which of these options you take, you're doing the same thing: removing one Broil cast from your fight timeline. If you are intending to go Broil, Bio, Miasma, Bio2, Broil, and you have to Succor to shield the team part way in there, you don't just drop a DOT entirely, you shift it back one GCD to make Broil, Bio, Succor, Miasma, Bio2, Broil, and the last Broil is pushed backwards by a GCD. Playing around the fact that this GCD is pushed back, and striving to make sure it's your least valuable GCD (in this case, Broil since it is the lowest potency compared to the DOTs), is the optional depth that we have lost from the class and seek to have back

If we have an extra button on WHM that has a 15s CD (like old Fluid Aura, but GCD), healing isn't going to suddenly be impossible to handle because of it. We hit the button when we can, and if healing gets in the way, we do the healing stuff first, then hit the button when it's next safe to.

I figure theyd have to give more sustain to everyone else to compensate for lack of healing while adjusting healing to be more OGCD based and adding in offense abilities (think how tanks operates, where most of the skills are offense with some oGCDS for defense buffs))

Healing IS OGCD based as it stands. The issue that the devs need to realise is that where they gave the tanks offense skills like Confiteor and Primal Rend, they have given the healers an overabundance of these OGCDs and not enough offense skills to keep the 'between healing' gameplay interesting. Effectively, the tank equivalent situation would be to have WAR have it's Eye and Path combos, and nothing else for it's damage. Then, in place of Upheaval, Onslaught, Infuriate, Inner Release, Primal Rend, that AOE punch thing, Decimate or Fell Cleave, SE gives them another 7-8 cooldowns to mitigate damage with. And not interesting ones, just 'reduces damage taken by X%', literal reskins of Rampart. At a certain point, you have enough mitigation to survive the hit, you don't need more. Same with healing, we have enough to heal through the content. So why do we keep being given more, when the content stays roughly as 'hard to heal' as previous incarnations of the same difficulty level? Nothing about the raid tiers this expansion felt 'harder to heal' than SHB, and the devs have been on record at some point iirc saying that E12S was 'probably the hardest they can make healing before it becomes unreasonable'. So if they can't go further than that, but 'that' wasn't enough, then we have to change tact somewhere, because it means 'more healing needed from player' isn't going to be a viable solution to the issue

Once again we need a FAQ for the general opinions of the healer forums because again nobody wants healers to do more damage, we want to do the damage we are currently doing in a more interesting way

IDK about anyone else, but I'd happily take a 25% whack to my output (going from 8k to 6k with current BIS gear for example) if it meant we had four healers each with unique and fun rotations to deal that 6k with. WHM can be 'bursty', SCH can be 'DOT city', AST can be 'supporty' by having cards to play way more often, and SGE can be 'actually a DPS-Healer' by making Kardia into something more than it currently is.

I do not want to do 'more damage' as a healer, I would be perfectly fine with doing LESS damage as a healer. I want the method by which we deal that damage to be more engaging than 'this could be done with a RuneScape autoclicker'

Since the running theme of healer discussions is people jumping to conclusions, I figured I'd set the mood.

Ironically, the brand name of that trampoline is the exact antonym of current healer design

[ty_taurus]

Ironically, the brand name of that trampoline is the exact antonym of current healer design

I stand by what I said a week ago: I'd rather let a tarantula lay eggs in my ear canal than play PVE healer in EW.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

But now the argument goes back to "What is the primary function of a healer?" which is "To heal/Res/Support team". So why have a DPS rotation in that case? And if youre trying to increase healer DPS output, that comes with a bit of drawback to it as well, both on actual design, and how people will operate that class.

First, drop that "if you're trying to increase healer DPS output..." and take a look of these (Yes ty_taurus, I'm nabbing your pics):

VERSUS

Can they do more/less? Possibly. But the point was never "I want to increase DPS output".

[...]But there will inevitably be people who ignore that because "I have a DPS kit now,s o I wanna do that thing. Your death was your problem, git gud." In the current setup, that position does not fly.

Second:

• We already have DRK/GNB/AST refusing to weave in their cooldowns because their overbloated reopener.
• We already have PLDs who refuse to not use Circle of Scorn+Explacion after Goring Blade because apparently it's what the 'opener taught them to' despite knowing that those two buttons can be placed anywhere within burst window and the change would be very minimal so long it snapshots the buff.
• We already have healers who refuses to hard raise despite there being plenty of window to hardcast it safely because "My Swift is not up".

Many more to mention revolving around "[X] player refuses to use [Y] job's kit because [Z] reason" but suddenly when healer wants to do slightly more people tend to laser focus---why? The double standard is sickening.

[Jade_Tyrant]

Not a healer but responding to a specific comment:

Imagine how frustrating it would be to be in a group where you have to interrupt your dps rotation and skills to do resses and GCD healing?

As a Red Mage main, I've literally been in that position before (mostly in dungeons, though I have had to rez mid-combo in raids before as well). Maybe it might be considered a different scenario because I'm a DPS and therefore it's not a "regular" expectation, but I didn't find it particularly frustrating to break my burst combo to Vercure the tank, rez the healer, and keep Vercuring the tank until the healer was back up.

Would it be frustrating if it was a regular thing expected of me and it continued to break the combo the way it does? Yeah, for sure. But the post above the one I'm responding to by Supersnow said "...with designs in place that stopping the rotation to cast succor doesn’t break the combo...", and I can't imagine it being very frustrating in that case. You delay the damage to heal and/or rez, then go right back to the damage combo.

In terms of a situation where it just messes with the rotation in general, and not specifically burst, it's even less of an issue. I'd even say that I enjoy the occasions where I'm allowed to have fun "healer" moments as a Red Mage!

Obviously this is the perspective of someone playing a DPS job, and not the same as a situation where healing is my main role, but hopefully it's somewhat relevant as a response to this point.

[sindriiisgaming]

You say this, but the core of the game has not changed since ARR, we had so called "dps races" back then as well, yet we had 3 unique healers in HW/SB.

WHM was direct heals and direct damage.
SCH was preemptive shields and passive over time damage.
AST was delayed and extended heals and have unique buffs.

All the unique traits of the healers were taken away in ShB when they were mashed into the same mold. But sure, tell us how 4 unique healers wouldn't work within the core of this game (despite then working that way before).

im not advocating for 3.0 combat, but at least jobs did have more identity
perhaps then the issue is encounter deisgn. MHW can be a dps race and yet every fight feels different and its because of how the monsters react. kingdom hearts boss fights are similar like this too. maybe ff14s encounter design is just to rigid?

[ty_taurus]

Not a healer but responding to a specific comment:



As a Red Mage main, I've literally been in that position before (mostly in dungeons, though I have had to rez mid-combo in raids before as well). Maybe it might be considered a different scenario because I'm a DPS and therefore it's not a "regular" expectation, but I didn't find it particularly frustrating to break my burst combo to Vercure the tank, rez the healer, and keep Vercuring the tank until the healer was back up.

Would it be frustrating if it was a regular thing expected of me and it continued to break the combo the way it does? Yeah, for sure. But the post above the one I'm responding to by Supersnow said "...with designs in place that stopping the rotation to cast succor doesn’t break the combo...", and I can't imagine it being very frustrating in that case. You delay the damage to heal and/or rez, then go right back to the damage combo.

In terms of a situation where it just messes with the rotation in general, and not specifically burst, it's even less of an issue. I'd even say that I enjoy the occasions where I'm allowed to have fun "healer" moments as a Red Mage!

Obviously this is the perspective of someone playing a DPS job, and not the same as a situation where healing is my main role, but hopefully it's somewhat relevant as a response to this point.

If healers had an actually engaging, interactive gameplay loop when DPSing, anyone who finds having to pause that to heal is not the demographic we should be taking advice from when considering healer changes. I said this in one of the other threads, but the thing that made FFXIV's healing so fantastic in the beginning was that it was a dance between your offense and your healing. You weren't just an HP battery, but a combat medic that revolved around making decisions throughout the fight based on what best suited the situation.