Nantes Gamewatch interview summary

[LineageRazor]

If healers are not supposed to DPS, then why do they have Aero(II), Stone(II), Fluid Aura, and Holy?

For solo play? SE apparently intended these abilities to be used solo-only, if they designed their instances WITHOUT healer DPS in mind.

Obviously, players should take every advantage they can get - but judging by SE's announcement of including healer DPS in their future raid calculations, it means they WEREN'T expecting it to be used in their past raids. So, yeah, I'd guess SE really did think these abilities were mainly going to be used solo.

[Velox]

So, yeah, I'd guess SE really did think these abilities were mainly going to be used solo.

Well it's not that they were blind to the idea of healer's assisting with DPS in fights, but fights are balanced around not having healers DPS (it's purely a bonus that helps cover for some DPS slack or to push a phase faster).

Remember that, for the sake of balance and fairness in party makeup, all fights in this game are balanced in a way that a party with the least optimal DPS set-up can still pass a DPS-check assuming all 8 people have mastered their jobs. This is because of the random nature of DF parties. What does this mean though? This means that a party of 2 PLD, 2 WHM, and 4 BRD (the lowest realistic DPS-setup) can pass every DPS-check with a little strategy and elbow-grease. Now it's not ideal to assume every player has complete mastery of his/her job, and said party configuration would have to work 3x harder to achieve the same goal. This is why different DPS jobs have different strengths, and why healers sometimes help out as well. This creates the overall balance scenario within a particular party make-up. Fights themselves are balanced around the bare minimum though, assuming the "perfect-play" scenario I mentioned.