#FFXIVHEALERSTRIKE

[RhodesToRome]

1) Healing should be fun for everyone, not just the high-end. Jobs should still feel relevant in "easy" content. Dungeons were easy in HW. But healers felt critical back then. The mechanics in damage output in HW dungeons aren't higher than EW dungeons. In fact they are actually often much lower. But healing was way more important back then. Healerless HW dungeon runs can't be pulled off by random midcore players.

3) I agree that encounter design should be reworked as well, but job design is still the principal problem because we have very simple points of comparison: HW dungeons required far more healing during that era, while EW dungeons do not. Both were not mechanically complex at all. The job kits on healers back in HW also meant that there were many things you can do to optimize your job even if all the mechanics were simple, which added to the fun.

Truthfully, I'm struggling a bit to follow your train of thought here. You say that dungeons in HW were easy, but healers still felt critical. You say that mechanic damage output in HW was similar to EW, but HW required far more healing. That HW dungeons weren't complex, but a midcore group could not pull off a healerless dungeon run.

These statements are honestly just reaffirming my point that the main culprit is the battle content. As all of the jobs have gotten stronger, a lot of the content has not kept pace. Healers have so many tools, but nothing to use them on. Instead of trying to go back to "the good old days", I'd prefer to move forward with the current philosophy surrounding job design and see how else players can be engaged.

Interviews from the recent Media Tour have said that they are planning to focus more on job identity starting next expansion (and possibly during the patches leading up to it), so maybe you'll get your wish with added complexity to the Healer jobs. I just hope to god they don't start heading back to where the game was in HW/ARR. I personally didn't raid during those times, but from everything I've heard and read, the best words I can use to describe it are "obtuse" and "inconsistent". Some jobs didn't even function properly and were not even allowed in a group.

2) You didn't seem to have done high-end content before ShB. You probably don't have first-hand experience with how much more optimization there was in HW/SB healing, and how much more skill you required back then.

If you want to look up my logs feel free to pop into the Discord and I'll prove to you my rank 4 AST in SB.

As an aside, I did raid during StB (starting playing in HW casually) on a different character. But that's not really important and I'd rather not get into a measuring contest.