#FFXIVHEALERSTRIKE

[Xurtan]

I've been thinking more about the concept of role identity for healers in FFXIV compared to other MMOs I've played over the last 20 or so years and I think I've come up with some points that haven't really been thoroughly discussed here yet. I've spoken before on the problems with healers and what healers should be in this thread, but there's a gap between "What's wrong with healers/what should healers be?" and "What are scenarios in FFXIV that illustrate how healers in this game differ from healers in basically every other MMO?" So, here's some illustrative questions.

Healers:

1. Do you regularly spend more time healing your party than DPSing?
2. Have you ever died to a mechanic because you were desperately trying to heal someone?
3. Do you frequently feel like you need to make a conscious choice on whether or not to cast a healing spell, knowing there would be repercussions if you chose poorly?
4. Do you frequently feel you need to carefully manage your resources (MP, class points, etc.) to prevent your party from dying?
5. Have you ever failed an encounter because your party lacked enough healing output despite your party not failing critical encounter mechanics (e.g., a "healer gear check")?
6. Do you commonly have a non-healer in your party sacrifice DPS in order to prioritize your safety?
7. Are you ever concerned that your healing may accidentally draw threat/aggro, leading to your death and/or a party wipe?
8. Do you feel like a vital member to the overall encounter effort instead of just someone to "clean up others' mistakes"?

Every one of these things is extremely common for healing roles in other MMOs, but I'm guessing they're not for most of you (they certainly aren't for me).

That's a big problem IMO.

Oh this is a fun one.

1. Nope.
2. Nope (I guess unless you count server tic not having a tank's invuln actually activate despite going on CD, and having Bene land on their cooling corpse?).
3. No, all damage is scripted and the vast majority of healing is oGCD.
4. Not in several years. Mana hasn't been a factor since... early Omega, maybe? Maybe earlier?
5. No. Mechanics are either 'survive and heal through fine' or 'insta-gib regardless of healing'.
6. No, because the non-healer classes that have shields and the like are oGCD.
7. Not since early Stormblood or thereabouts?
8. Eh? I mean, yes kinda, because average Savage is hard to do without any healers at all. But I mostly spend the time Glaring, so it doesn't actually FEEL vital.

[BunnyQueen]

Oh this is a fun one.

1. Nope.
2. Nope (I guess unless you count server tic not having a tank's invuln actually activate despite going on CD, and having Bene land on their cooling corpse?).
3. No, all damage is scripted and the vast majority of healing is oGCD.
4. Not in several years. Mana hasn't been a factor since... early Omega, maybe? Maybe earlier?
5. No. Mechanics are either 'survive and heal through fine' or 'insta-gib regardless of healing'.
6. No, because the non-healer classes that have shields and the like are oGCD.
7. Not since early Stormblood or thereabouts?
8. Eh? I mean, yes kinda, because average Savage is hard to do without any healers at all. But I mostly spend the time Glaring, so it doesn't actually FEEL vital.

That's a lot of no's where there should be a yes if a game does healing right. Meaning healing is done wrong in FFXIV.