#FFXIVHEALERSTRIKE

[TheDustyOne]

None of us can answer why it was changed before- maybe it shouldn't have been. I can't say. But people are demanding change now, and so I'm asking what justifies the very non-trivial development cost of the changes being demanded when those changes are very likely to piss a lot of people off and may only excite a comparatively smaller group of players.

The same is again true in reverse; anecdotally I can only say that queue times got "better" for healers when ShB launched, which indicated that less people were playing healers compared to when I started in SB.

People like dealing damage, they like seeing big funny numbers, there's already plenty of memes around WHM screaming "BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD LILY!" people were excited at the concept of SGE being the "deal damage to heal" healer, so the inclusion of extra damage options would be exciting for people. And those that don't care for extra damage because "healers should be for healing" can just do what they do now and ignore them, even if they should know better.

[Moonjava]

The same is again true in reverse; anecdotally I can only say that queue times got "better" for healers when ShB launched, which indicated that less people were playing healers compared to when I started in SB.

People like dealing damage, they like seeing big funny numbers, there's already plenty of memes around WHM screaming "BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD LILY!" people were excited at the concept of SGE being the "deal damage to heal" healer, so the inclusion of extra damage options would be exciting for people. And those that don't care for extra damage because "healers should be for healing" can just do what they do now and ignore them, even if they should know better.

The situation doesn't truly go both ways, though, not from SE's perspective. Leaving things as-is is free; doing huge reworks of four jobs is very expensive, both in money and time. Reworking four jobs as immediately as most folks in this thread seem to be demanding will mean other content has to get postponed or cut- SE is not going to suddenly give CBU3 a budget increase to go hire a bunch more devs to work on job reworks just because one forum thread gained some traction (not that that would be logistically feasible anyway). And to your anecdote, ShB introduced one tank and one DPS job, so there would've been more people queuing as those roles, hence shorter queue times for healers. I'd be willing to bet that played a much bigger role in short healer queues than general satisfaction with playing healer, but there's no way of actually knowing.

Some people like dealing damage, some people like big funny number (me among them), but I've encountered plenty of healers who seem wholly uninterested in doing DPS and who could easily feel overwhelmed by more complex DPS rotations. Giving feedback is fine, but there are a lot of people in this thread demanding that SE capitulate to their preferences without justifying that demand or giving any reason why the benefits of doing so would outweigh the risks.

[TheDustyOne]

The situation doesn't truly go both ways, though, not from SE's perspective. Leaving things as-is is free; doing huge reworks of four jobs is very expensive, both in money and time. Reworking four jobs as immediately as most folks in this thread seem to be demanding will mean other content has to get postponed or cut- SE is not going to suddenly give CBU3 a budget increase to go hire a bunch more devs to work on job reworks just because one forum thread gained some traction (not that that would be logistically feasible anyway). And to your anecdote, ShB introduced one tank and one DPS job, so there would've been more people queuing as those roles, hence shorter queue times for healers. I'd be willing to bet that played a much bigger role in short healer queues than general satisfaction with playing healer, but there's no way of actually knowing.

Then they shouldn't have done the ShB reworks to begin with, all it did was design them into a hole that needs another redesign.

The inclusion of SGE also didn't fix the healer queue times, it was still mostly instant. So that argument doesn't work for me either.

Some people like dealing damage, some people like big funny number (me among them), but I've encountered plenty of healers who seem wholly uninterested in doing DPS and who could easily feel overwhelmed by more complex DPS rotations. Giving feedback is fine, but there are a lot of people in this thread demanding that SE capitulate to their preferences without justifying that demand or giving any reason why the benefits of doing so would outweigh the risks.

Then they can just ignore those buttons, it hardly matters in casual content since the only actual requirements for healers should be to meet the healing requirements. Damage is just a bonus in casual content.

In Ex/Savage they don't have a choice, and they should be dealing damage regardless of how they feel about it.

[Moonjava]

Then they shouldn't have done the ShB reworks to begin with, all it did was design them into a hole that needs another redesign.

Again, healers "need" a redesign according to you. A lot of people don't feel that way. Why is your opinion on the matter the "correct" one?

The inclusion of SGE also didn't fix the healer queue times, it was still mostly instant. So that argument doesn't work for me either.

There are countless reasons why healer queue times could have changed over time. I could come up with plenty of other possibilities, but our own pet theories can never be proven and are not evidence for anything.

Then they can just ignore those buttons, it hardly matters in casual content since the only actual requirements for healers should be to meet the healing requirements. Damage is just a bonus in casual content. In Ex/Savage they don't have a choice, and they should be dealing damage regardless of how they feel about it.

People generally don't find someone ignoring the bulk of their DPS rotation to be acceptable play in any level of content- they would inevitably get called out for it in some roulette or another. Introducing a more complex DPS rotation inherently raises the skill floor, even if the old rotation were technically still possible, and that would lead to some number of players, however small, quitting the game and would narrow the potential playerbase. I've still yet to see a compelling argument as to why SE should do that besides "I personally liked the old way better."

[TheDustyOne]

Again, healers "need" a redesign according to you. A lot of people don't feel that way. Why is your opinion on the matter the "correct" one?

Given the sheer amount of response this thread has had in a very short amount of time, that should be an indication that a lot of people are very, very unhappy with the status quo.

There are countless reasons why healer queue times could have changed over time. I could come up with plenty of other possibilities, but our own pet theories can never be proven and are not evidence for anything.

Hence why I referred to it as an anecdote, it's a thing I noticed but not full evidence. It's something to add to suggest that maybe people don't like how the healers play compared to before.

People generally don't find someone ignoring the bulk of their DPS rotation to be acceptable play in any level of content- they would inevitably get called out for it in some roulette or another. Introducing a more complex DPS rotation inherently raises the skill floor, even if the old rotation were technically still possible, and that would lead to some number of players, however small, quitting the game and would narrow the potential playerbase.

It only raises the ceiling on healers, not the floor. This has been discussed ad nauseum on the healer sub forum for years now. Only in Ex/Savage would it raise the floor, which is where people should be comfortable with their jobs anyway.

I've still yet to see a compelling argument as to why SE should do that besides "I personally liked the old way better."

And there's no compelling argument for the current paradigm, all you're doing is going in circles and intentionally being antagonistic over "well, I'm sure SOME like it".

[Moonjava]

Given the sheer amount of response this thread has had in a very short amount of time, that should be an indication that a lot of people are very, very unhappy with the status quo.

Relative to the size of the entire playerbase, this is not very significant.

It only raises the ceiling on healers, not the floor. This has been discussed ad nauseum on the healer sub forum for years now. Only in Ex/Savage would it raise the floor, which is where people should be comfortable with their jobs anyway.

It sounds to me like you consider the skill floor in normal content to be basically non-existent, that a healer can AFK at a dungeon entrance and as long as the rest of the group clears the dungeon, that's acceptable. From a purely objective-oriented perspective, that may be true, but in the social context of the game, players expect a certain amount of participation and effort from other players. If I ran a level 90 dungeon on SMN and only clicked Outburst and Ruin III, that would be considered griefing- if healer rotations were put on par with tanks/DPS, only clicking Glare and Holy would similarly be considered griefing, and a lot of players wouldn't take kindly to that. Players who wanted to stick to the old rotation would face social backlash for doing so.

And there's no compelling argument for the current paradigm, all you're doing is going in circles and intentionally being antagonistic over "well, I'm sure SOME like it".

The argument for the current paradigm is that it costs SE nothing to leave it as-is. That is my point. Nobody has given a compelling reason why SE should invest resources into this rework beyond their own personal preference.

[TheDustyOne]

Relative to the size of the entire playerbase, this is not very significant.

The argument for the current paradigm is that it costs SE nothing to leave it as-is. That is my point. Nobody has given a compelling reason why SE should invest resources into this rework beyond their own personal preference.

Guess they shouldn't have fixed issues people had with the benchmark, that was also only a small portion of the playerbase that complained and also cost resources.

A lot of people have issues, they want to see it fixed, resources be damned, that's what our sub should be paying for.

[Gemina]

Some people like dealing damage, some people like big funny number (me among them), but I've encountered plenty of healers who seem wholly uninterested in doing DPS and who could easily feel overwhelmed by more complex DPS rotations. Giving feedback is fine, but there are a lot of people in this thread demanding that SE capitulate to their preferences without justifying that demand or giving any reason why the benefits of doing so would outweigh the risks.

I've been seeing this direction of arguments not only from you, but from others as well. It aims to reignite the flames between the two factions of healers. While there are still green-DPS, and heals only healers cemented in their ways, the dev's direction has united them because now neither of them are enjoying the healer role. While one side would still like to see more damage options, and the other would like more punishing content, both of them are easily replaced in duties by a tank, and to a certain extent DPS jobs as well. Sorry, but this angle isn't going to work. Not under the current status quo, which is only going to get worse come DT.

The two factions of healers have shown that they are willing to compromise with each other and meet somewhere in the middle. Now is as opportune a time as ever for the dev team to make the proper changes to make this role fun for most of those who like to play it. It's time for them to give back some of the ground they've taken.

[Moonjava]

I've been seeing this direction of arguments not only from you, but from others as well. It aims to reignite the flames between the two factions of healers. While there are still green-DPS, and heals only healers cemented in their ways, the dev's direction has united them because now neither of them are enjoying the healer role. While one side would still like to see more damage options, and the other would like more punishing content, both of them are easily replaced in duties by a tank, and to a certain extent DPS jobs as well. Sorry, but this angle isn't going to work. Not under the current status quo, which is only going to get worse come DT.

The two factions of healers have shown that they are willing to compromise with each other and meet somewhere in the middle. Now is as opportune a time as ever for the dev team to make the proper changes to make this role fun for most of those who like to play it. It's time for them to give back some of the ground they've taken.

I really don't care what direction healers take- that's not my point. I'm looking at this from a cost/benefit perspective. Let's say currently, X players are upset with the state of healers and want them to change, and Y players really love the state of healers and would be upset by any change. SE cannot truly know the relative values of X and Y. The options are invest 0 resources and have X upset players, or invest a significant amount of resources and have Y upset players. Without significant evidence that X >>>> Y, I fail to see why SE should invest in a rework.

I understand the point of this "strike" is to try to give SE that evidence that X >>>> Y. But demands like this:

Now is as opportune a time as ever for the dev team to make the proper changes to make this role fun for most of those who like to play it. It's time for them to give back some of the ground they've taken.

...are unjustified until that evidence appears.

[Gemina]

I really don't care what direction healers take- that's not my point. I'm looking at this from a cost/benefit perspective. Let's say currently, X players are upset with the state of healers and want them to change, and Y players really love the state of healers and would be upset by any change. SE cannot truly know the relative values of X and Y. The options are invest 0 resources and have X upset players, or invest a significant amount of resources and have Y upset players. Without significant evidence that X >>>> Y, I fail to see why SE should invest in a rework.

I understand the point of this "strike" is to try to give SE that evidence that X >>>> Y. But demands like this:

That's not the case at all because even if you do enjoy healing in its current state, you are still replaceable in all all forms of content. That was my main point in Cole's video when he talked about being a ride or die SCH, and I wish I could personally tell him that his presence in any duty in this game neither makes or breaks it. The demand from striking healers for more damage options, and/or more punishing content are not their primary concerns. Both have been tolerable of these circumstances in ARR/HW and ShB respectively. It was EW where this ended, but they hoped DT would address the primary issue. It didn't, and now here we are. That is why I am telling you using this angle only dismisses that concern while trying to pit them against each other again. The 'No healer, no problem' is now a meme, and it is for a reason. Because it's true.