Yoshi-P: "If you want more engaging content, go play Ultimate"

[Allegor]

For what it's worth, she did try asking about how they were addressing some of the criticism that healers were receiving, and the response was to try Sage. That's also the interview where Sage was described as being designed with healer feedback in mind. Which is why, regardless of how content the majority of players are with healers, Sage is still a failure, because it failed to satisfy the people it was targeting.

They promoted it as a "dps healer" and the only thing it has related to dps is a Regen with extra steps...it's literally just a SCH with lilies instead of aetherflow otherwise.

[currentlemon]

Even just making the few attacks we do have used more frequently would be a breath of fresh air. Drop DOTs from 30 seconds to 15 seconds. Drop Phlegma from a 40 second cooldown to a 20 second cooldown. Add some quality to each AOE spell that gives it functionality in single target, whether that be something like a mobility button (like Dyskrasia is both your AOE and a DPS neutral mobility spell with a higher MP cost) or adding buff upkeep to a job earned through your AOE attack, or give the AOE attack usable utility against all types of enemies, like adding a mitigation effect to Gravity even if under specific circumstances.

There's truth to this. Think of SCH's Ruin II and SGE's Toxicon II. These abilities are hardly used by players for various reasons. Sometimes even discouraged. There's simply no reason to use these spells when playing either job. For Ruin II, I think after they buffed the GCD cooldown to 1.5secs on offensive spells made it obsolete. And obtaining Addersting wasn't something worth getting.

For those jobs, I think if they gave us more reasons to use those spells, along with shorter DoT times and somehow making our AoE abilities worth using for dungeon boss / raid fights would be great.

Same with WHM and AST, but I still think WHM needs at least one more DPS spell though. Not sure how AST can play into this.

[ty_taurus]

There's truth to this. Think of SCH's Ruin II and SGE's Toxicon II. These abilities are hardly used by players for various reasons. Sometimes even discouraged. There's simply no reason to use these spells when playing either job. For Ruin II, I think after they buffed the GCD cooldown to 1.5secs on offensive spells made it obsolete. And obtaining Addersting wasn't something worth getting.

For those jobs, I think if they gave us more reasons to use those spells, along with shorter DoT times and somehow making our AoE abilities worth using for dungeon boss / raid fights would be great.

Same with WHM and AST, but I still think WHM needs at least one more DPS spell though. Not sure how AST can play into this.

What sucks about Ruin II and Toxikon II was that SE got it right the first time. In ARR, Scholar had Ruin and Ruin II. Both had a potency of 80; Ruin had a 2.5 second cast time while Ruin II was instant, but cost twice as much MP (and inflicted Blind). What made that work so well was giving agency to the player. You had access to as much mobility and weave windows as you wanted without your DPS being punished or any cooldowns. Your only restriction was your MP, which was important, but you could very well afford to cast several Ruin IIs as needed. This was the perfect mobility tool. There was no need to try and "fix" it. The only flaw was not updating Ruin II in Heavensward when Ruin was replaced with Broil.

[currentlemon]

What sucks about Ruin II and Toxikon II was that SE got it right the first time. In ARR, Scholar had Ruin and Ruin II. Both had a potency of 80; Ruin had a 2.5 second cast time while Ruin II was instant, but cost twice as much MP (and inflicted Blind). What made that work so well was giving agency to the player. You had access to as much mobility and weave windows as you wanted without your DPS being punished or any cooldowns. Your only restriction was your MP, which was important, but you could very well afford to cast several Ruin IIs as needed. This was the perfect mobility tool. There was no need to try and "fix" it. The only flaw was not updating Ruin II in Heavensward when Ruin was replaced with Broil.

Wow. That’s just depressing to hear.

[Aravell]

What sucks about Ruin II and Toxikon II was that SE got it right the first time. In ARR, Scholar had Ruin and Ruin II. Both had a potency of 80; Ruin had a 2.5 second cast time while Ruin II was instant, but cost twice as much MP (and inflicted Blind). What made that work so well was giving agency to the player. You had access to as much mobility and weave windows as you wanted without your DPS being punished or any cooldowns. Your only restriction was your MP, which was important, but you could very well afford to cast several Ruin IIs as needed. This was the perfect mobility tool. There was no need to try and "fix" it. The only flaw was not updating Ruin II in Heavensward when Ruin was replaced with Broil.

They kind of brought back the MP and movement considerations with Miasma II in SB, but then they removed it for Art of War in ShB anyway.

[ty_taurus]

They kind of brought back the MP and movement considerations with Miasma II in SB, but then they removed it for Art of War in ShB anyway.

Well, I like the concept of merging the functions of your mobility tool and your AOE attack, but I'd still argue ARR Ruin II was better. It had the same element of agency: spend more MP to move and weave, which when combined with Energy Drain gives you the ability to deal more damage than with your standard spell. Miasma II by itself was still a DPS loss and staggered the damage through a DOT, which I do think is a weaker design.

So maybe if instead of Miasma II, Ruin II just dealt 50% of its damage to nearby enemies as well, then that would be a real step up from ARR Scholar. Not to say that ARR Scholar was the best. Selene was a lie and quite literally had no functionality. A silence that's too delayed to interrupt anything, and two buffs to skill/spell speed that didn't actually provide enough of an increase to actually affect your GCD. I don't think Fey Wind and Fey Caress were well balanced changes. The silence still was basically unusable, an AOE Esuna was really cool in like 3 specific fights and was otherwise completely useless, and an attack speed buff that everyone would hate nowerdays anyway that essentially meant it was the "right" choice for increasing the party's DPS by 1% whereas Eos didn't. Of course, sending Selene to the gallows was not the right answer, but alas, SE has a fetish for amputations. So here we are.

[rawker]

Ruin II was fine when it was useful, especially when Ruin used to have a 2-second cast time. Nowadays, it's just a loss... SCH's version of Scathe.

[Reinhardt_Azureheim]

They kind of brought back the MP and movement considerations with Miasma II in SB, but then they removed it for Art of War in ShB anyway.

The irony is that they could have kept both actions. For AOE purposes we'd at least alternate between Miasma II and 3-4x Art of War (II), depending on spell speed.

I yet have to see a meaningful reason why Bane had to go as well. Or in the other direction, why the Faerie gauge dropped the gauge cost for one of the skills (AOE heal). Or why DOTs "had to be" lengthed to 30s (45s in the case of BRD; lmao what). At best I can see the "we had to cut dots for technical reasons" if I am generous.

[Sebazy]

Just +1ing this thread. Battlefield controllers used to be my favorite class in MMOs in the 90s and early 00s, then those were taken away and I moved to healer. Now healers have been pretty much nerfed into braindead oblivion, and I'm unsure what to play instead. Prog is still kinda interesting, but after that? Ehh. Mana isn't really a concern, aggro absolutely isn't a concern, we have no damage rotation, healing stance doesn't exist anymore... what's left for them to take?

Everquest Enchanter's were truly something else =(

[Aravell]

Ruin II was fine when it was useful, especially when Ruin used to have a 2-second cast time. Nowadays, it's just a loss... SCH's version of Scathe.

I wouldn't put Ruin II at the level of Scathe tbh. Scathe is a redundant ability, like Undraw.

Ruin II at least has some applications remaining. As someone who pugs savages/ultimates, Ruin II is a tool I use frequently for when I want to cross a large distance without slidecasting, because slidecasting tends to make other people panic and adjust for you unnecessarily, which leads to a wipe. Ruin II at least recoups some of that damage loss from moving.

Ruin II is also useful during prog to test how many GCDs of movement a certain mechanic takes, so you can gauge whether you can slidecast or if you need to Swiftcast. Also you generally don't Swift for movement in prog because you want it for raise, so Ruin II is useful there along with Toxikon II.