Should Cleric Stance be disabled in party instances?

[Neophyte]

...So, why can you not pop out of cs, heal, and then go back to dpsing with a 20 second cool down to exit cs? I have no idea what you're even complaining about. There is no stance in the entirety of the game that has a cool down associated with entering it, only exiting it. Do we even play the same game? Seriously. I'm saying potato, and you're arguing onion. You're arguing a problem that doesn't even exist! Enter cleric stance, 20 sec CD during which you cannot exit it, at all. Exit cleric stance, can enter it again as soon as you desire.

Then almost the same 'problems' occur.

Even with a 5s CD you have to learn when it's save to switch and when it's not. Same with a 20s CD. You do the Content, learn when it's save to switch and then do that.

Sooo.. let's assume there is tankbuster (where you help with a single target shield/heal) and 15s after there is a big AoE cast twice, where you use an indom or succor.

1. With 5s CD: Switch CS off, Adloquium/Lustrate the tank, CS on, 15s DPS, CS off, Succor/Idom the AoE damage, CS on, continue dps
2. With 20s CD: Switch CS off, Adloquium/Lustrate the tank, do nothing for 15s except unnecessary heals (since 15s<20s no stance switch allowed), Succor/Idom the AoE damage, CS on, continue DPS

How is the 2nd one in any way more difficult or challenging? Because using CS accidently leads to trouble more easyily? Wow, awesome.
That applies only to the learning phase or people with really fat fingers..

For every capable healer it's just one stance dance less... that doesn't make anything more challenging, only more boring (because of the 15s only-healing-phase an experienced healer would encounter every single time).

[Bourne_Endeavor]

...So, why can you not pop out of cs, heal, and then go back to dpsing with a 20 second cool down to exit cs? I have no idea what you're even complaining about. There is no stance in the entirety of the game that has a cool down associated with entering it, only exiting it. Do we even play the same game? Seriously. I'm saying potato, and you're arguing onion. You're arguing a problem that doesn't even exist! Enter cleric stance, 20 sec CD during which you cannot exit it, at all. Exit cleric stance, can enter it again as soon as you desire.

For someone chastising others for reading comprehension. You ought to take your own advance. My example explicitly outlined exiting Cleric Stance to assist with heals and how being unable to re-enter it for 20-30 seconds effectively makes that player useless for the duration based on your suggestion. Their DPS is severely reduced and heals aren't required after the big raid wide AoE. So like Neophyte said above, what exactly is the point of this except to force less healer DPS for arbitrary reasons?

And that last sentence makes it sounds like you're now suggesting Cleric Stance would lock you into it for 20 seconds. That will go over well...

[Cynfael]

And that last sentence makes it sounds like you're now suggesting Cleric Stance would lock you into it for 20 seconds. That will go over well...

From what I've been reading, that's exactly what Thunda has been suggesting; that CS would work as it does now except with a much longer CD, locking you in for 20 seconds instead of 5.

But yes, however you slice it, it makes no sense and probably doesn't even merit further (serious) discussion.

[Mimilu]

...So, why can you not pop out of cs, heal, and then go back to dpsing with a 20 second cool down to exit cs? I have no idea what you're even complaining about. There is no stance in the entirety of the game that has a cool down associated with entering it, only exiting it. Do we even play the same game? Seriously. I'm saying potato, and you're arguing onion. You're arguing a problem that doesn't even exist! Enter cleric stance, 20 sec CD during which you cannot exit it, at all. Exit cleric stance, can enter it again as soon as you desire.

Try DPSing as a main-healer in a savage raid, then talk about a "stance in the entirety of the game that has a cool down associated with entering it, only exiting it". >w>
Heal > CS >Place DoTs> CS > Heal, maybe throw some bursts, if you can.

[Shurrikhan]

Try DPSing as a main-healer in a savage raid, then talk about a "[there is no] stance in the entirety of the game that has a cool down associated with entering it, only exiting it". >w>
Heal > CS >Place DoTs> CS > Heal, maybe throw some bursts, if you can.

She is correct in that regard though. All stance cooldowns in this game lock you into the stance, never out of it. Which is what somehow took people 2 pages to get?

That said, being locked into a dps-only stance for 20 seconds at a time would likely mean you could not afford to ever enter it unless you have a co-healer capable of solo-healing anything and everything that comes up over that period. While you could frontload shields or HoTs enough in casual content, I can't see a progression raider as safely being able to ride out 20 full seconds of never direct healing. And I have no idea why she'd want this. I had assumed it was an example for effect at first, until I looked back further...

[Thunda_Cat_SMASH]

I had assumed it was an example for effect at first, until I looked back further...

Pretty much~ My opinion on cs is that it should be something that can be used to full effect through skill and communication, since right now it feels more arbitrary than skillful to use.

[Shurrikhan]

Pretty much~ My opinion on cs is that it should be something that can be used to full effect through skill and communication, since right now it feels more arbitrary than skillful to use.

But at the heart of it, increasing the lock-in duration is a nerf. Much like purposely going into a dungeon with minimum ilvl, it reduces what you're capable of. While this may improve intensity to a degree (albeit a rigid, restricting one) when you would be overgeared, it can outright prevent otherwise skillful play when you would only be appropriately geared by forcing you to play the safe ground because death would otherwise absolutely occur during the interim (even if only at one small point therein). The smaller the cooldown, the greater the level of precision available. While a ~2-GCD span may seem overly precise now, consider content that would actually make use of it in order to have perfect DoT uptime between both healers despite covering frequent and intensive healing needs. Would you rather have a painfully restrictive mechanic let you pretend your content is difficult, or use the more precise one for more legitimately intense content? Once you overshoot, you're going to have a lot more downtime and a lot less skill involved, just as is the case when the mechanic is seemly *too* available, AND you're not maximizing its full potential.

[Cleftobismal]

I always wondered what would happen if the two second CD happened after the toggle is turned off.

[Chocolys]

In my opinion:

Cleric Stance is fine. The "problem" is players queueing for randomly matched group and expecting to end up in a team matching their personal expectations about how other members should play.

But what you end-up potentially and obviously:

- Different level of equipment
- Different level of player skill
- Different style of gameplay.
- Different level of commitment regardless of the class. Lazyness is not just about healers.

The only practical expectation should be to have a smooth enough duty, not the fastest, not the slowest and to not get mad because someone is not playing as best as he could. While of course a healer dpsing while healing properly is better, it's not a requirement for a smooth run.

In a random-matched group, the only time a player should argue in the group about another player's combat style is if someone is endangering the group or preventing progression in the Duty. Else if someone has other minimum requirements about how other players should do in the team, he shoud use a premade group.

[RiisWolf]

The problem is that there's raiders and others trying to force even new players who don't have a clue them to feel they absolutely MUST DPS when A) it was never required, B) Cleric stance was only intended to make solo content NOT A TOTAL SLOG, C) the problem only festered and perpetuated thanks what happened with Gordias Savage since week 1 AND the gear inflating, and D) the devs even said Healer DPS was never a factor in designing what was needed for party content, the fact they removed all of the accuracy from the gear shows it, even though they made the mistake of adding on to the list of damaging spells, which they should NOT have ever done. . . .or adding on so many ways to make it harder on the DPS themselves which added on the healer DPS problem.

Sure I'll miss melting things in a dungeon with Holy (or taking advantage of them heals who ABSOLUTELY NEED ACCURACY materia Vs), but enough's enough, I'd rather have Cleric stance be gone than put up with this garbage. Maybe then it'll teach them raiding DPS to get better and more importantly GET GEARED. Not "hey we don't need any of those things as long as we CAN cheese the whole system".

The other solution is to force healers to do more healing by increasing enemy DPS, making the enemy use long casting AoEs less than they excessively do, and fling in more mechanics only the healer can fix, like healer jail in A7, the bot the healer has to distract in A12S, passable damage down debuffs in A3S, more intense raid wide DoTs like in Odin, more AoEs that are straight up unavoidable, not give DPS a hard time by excessively forcing them to stop attacking every 5 seconds or giving them excessively obnoxious/disjointing controls that gets in the way of doing their best just for some illusion of a challenge.