#FFXIVHEALERSTRIKE

[Kohashi]

That's how it ideally should be.

Over the years however this has become increasingly sparse. We see it more and more in both mechanics and job design that the devs do not want player agency, they see it as a failure when we don't play the game the "intended" way.
Damage downs on any hit that you were supposed to dodge, body check instant wipes, completely rigid rotations and execution of mechanics, things like the ice phase tether in the current extreme are by far the minority.

and it is. Join a blind pro group and find your own way to solve the same mechanic.

Just because people adopt Hector, Rinon, Kobe, or whatever other guide maker says, SE is not removing the player's agency. The only intended way SE wants you is to solve the mechanic and not stand in bad, the rest is up to you. It's absolutely normal for you to be penalized if you fail to resolve a mechanic.

In addition, every single game that I have played had this "rigid" (optimal) rotation that offered the biggest and most consistent damage or ways to solve mechanics. TERA, WOW, Dragon NEST, Blade and Soul, Guild Wars 2 (just to name only a few), hell even League of Legends which is a MOBA also has a very rigid way of handling lanes and farming as well as skirmish encounters.

I am not even sure what exactly people want at this point apart from complaining.

[AmiableApkallu]

A spell with cast time of 0 seconds is still is still a spell, right-?

In a game that almost never cares about damage types, an offensive spell with no cast time is functionally the same as a ranged weaponskill.

A non-zero cast time is just about the only readily-available avenue left to meaningfully differentiate "mage" and "spell" from all the weapon-wielding jobs and actions.

(Unless you think buffs that make a distinction between healing spells and healing actions to be meaningful and not clunk.)

[ForsakenRoe]

In a game that almost never cares about damage types, an offensive spell with no cast time is functionally the same as a ranged weaponskill.

A non-zero cast time is just about the only readily-available avenue left to meaningfully differentiate "mage" and "spell" from all the weapon-wielding jobs and actions.

(Unless you think buffs that make a distinction between healing spells and healing actions to be meaningful and not clunk.)

The distinction between 'zero-cast-time spell' and 'ranged weaponskill' effectively boils down to 'does it break through the Physical Stoneskin or the Magical Stoneskin of Cloud of Darkness in WOD' ever since they removed things like 'Brotherhood affects Physical damage only' or 'Contagion affects Magical damage only', or my personal favourite, 'Embolden affects Physical damage only, except for the RDM who used it, in which case it affects their Magic damage only (even though they have Physical damage actions in their kit)'

The difference between an action that buffs 'healing magic' and one that buffs 'healing actions' is an annoying quirk of how the tooltips are worded, but I wouldn't call it clunk per se, I think it's fine to keep but it could definitely do with a better tutorial/explanation about the difference between 'healing magic' and 'healing actions'

[Mortex]

But how is that SE's fault? It's a solution the players found. What exactly do you want them to do? Apply a dot like p5s or p8s so you cannot simply take the same hit again. It is an EX fight only.
Every mechanic has several ways of being solved. It's absolutely normal for the players to find and use the brain-dead strategies that offer the most consistent results. You can solve every mechanic in the "intended way" and how you see fit if you wish.

Like how they wanted in uwu for Garuda to be awoken in the bubble phase and people just taking 2 stack on a caster for the tether from the adds to do it almost at the end of the phase completely ignoring the “new mechanics”.

[Hyperia]

I think we are at the point where the devs need to start having lots of live letter Q&A sessions with the players in each job to better set things up so 8.0 isn’t a total disaster. I’m not talking about short 15 min per job sessions, more like 2 hours per job.

Giving a roadmap and telling players their ideas and let us offer feedback will not be spoilers for the next expansion. We know they are looking at the jobs, they need to have more two way communication. In the end, offer voting for players when they say we can only do X or Y or Z.

[Kohashi]

Like how they wanted in uwu for Garuda to be awoken in the bubble phase and people just taking 2 stack on a caster for the tether from the adds to do it almost at the end of the phase completely ignoring the “new mechanics”.

I have only seen Garuda's In/out mechanic a handful of times, I very rarely see Ifrit's dashes to the point I have no clue how to solve it now (lol). Ultima probably has less skip since it actually leaves the arena for a while.

[Kes13a]

I think we are at the point where the devs need to start having lots of live letter Q&A sessions with the players in each job to better set things up so 8.0 isn’t a total disaster. I’m not talking about short 15 min per job sessions, more like 2 hours per job.

Giving a roadmap and telling players their ideas and let us offer feedback will not be spoilers for the next expansion. We know they are looking at the jobs, they need to have more two way communication. In the end, offer voting for players when they say we can only do X or Y or Z.

no. they have IMPLIED they will look at jobs. in reality we know a grand total of absolutely nothing. nor, in all honesty, is their intention even remotely clear in if they are keeping healers, the trinity or... anything.

all we have for certain is PR speak telling us to "please wait for it"

[mallleable]

I want them to do a mid expansion of a job or two, and just go wild to give a us a taste of what's to come.

[GartredZW]

I want them to do a mid expansion of a job or two, and just go wild to give a us a taste of what's to come.

I'm hoping and praying for Scholar and Dark Knight.
But I'm worrying for Black Mage and Machinist.

[Supersnow845]

I'm hoping and praying for Scholar and Dark Knight.
But I'm worrying for Black Mage and Machinist.

Please don’t do SCH, it’s the only healer that has any degree of skill left and I don’t want to risk that for another SGE