Why do so many statics seem to be missing healers? What can be done to solve this?

[Ogulbuk]

Now? What do we see?
Talk of just good or bad tanks/healers.

This is the difference I see, the loss of the teaching and helping approach to help someone learn through repeat runs.
It mirrors the modern expectation to have everything 'there and ready', rather than an older mmo approach where it was a gradual and common learning experience - players accepting the norm, that raid groups where a 'family', with support and help freely given.

This is a big issue. I remember it took me a bit longer to get to 70 than most hardcore raiders, that seemed to all hit 70 on week one. By the time I was fully 310 geared and ready for "the next step" everyone was already demanding I knew every encounter if I wanted to join the raiding game. Learning groups were mostly composed of rejects without patience that would quit after a 2 failures.

In my case, I said to hell with it all, I just now logging in to get my weekly cap tomes, my detlascape normal rewards of the week, and then spend the rest of the week playing other games. It is not the game to blame, it's the community.

[QT_Melon]

I think part of the problem are people not wanting to take the initiative themselves. If statics don't want to get people up to speed, because they want them ready for content now, that is a problem. However, it's ALSO a problem if healers don't want to create their own and try to pug it so that they can learn the fight as well. If you're going around only wanting 2 chests, form your own static and recruit. If you want to learn and clear content, don't be hesitant to create a group in PF to learn and pug it.

[Reviell]

I don't run into big raid game and don't bother with static. But want to add a bit to the topic.

One of problems is healers are pressured by game already: simple example as o1s - if healer died once you will most likely wipe (tank could be lost or dps will start to drop one after another, so it's hard to get back to smooth going). At the same time if dps dies once you won't even bother about it - he raised and yes, you lost a bit of dmg, but it can be fixed. Basically, game doesn't allow healer the same mistakes as it allows dps or even tanks. And then there is community... one failure to the mechanic and #blamethehealer, but dps needs to die like 5 times a run or before specific mechanics he needed to be alive to (but they are only from o2s+) to make someone point it out. Pressure from knowledge you're forced by game to not die and from community which expects not only 'not die' but top heal and dps from you isn't the most pleasant experience.

And for solution... atm community doesn't have a ledder for players to get better. You're either newbie in 'practice, no rage quits' or you are in 'clear, no mistakes or kick' be it PF party or static. Hell, last week I lost partience with 'clear' parties for o1s where you can wait 30mins to get everyone and lose half of the party after one wipe with 'this party doesn't know strat, I'll go try my chances with another' and decided to calm my nerves in 'practice'. Turned out at least half of my 'practice' party did the same saying "just tired of guys who doesn't want to learn if they fail".

tl;dr: To help the raid scene we need to fill that gap between 'i know mechanic and can succeed in it' to 'i mastered all mechanics and can fail them only by chance or because i got sleepy on how easy it is' with opportunities not to learn, but to master. And with patience while other players be it healers or not do so.

[Ogulbuk]

tl;dr: To help the raid scene we need to fill that gap between 'i know mechanic and can succeed in it' to 'i mastered all mechanics and can fail them only by chance or because i got sleepy on how easy it is' with opportunities not to learn, but to master. And with patience while other players be it healers or not do so.

This will be a tangent but I think that is not possible. To do this, is to disappoint the people in the later group. They want unforgiving fights that will demonically punish them for their mistakes.

What we need is more things for the former group to do and somehow progress without taking away from the progress of the later group. Usually, that hole is filled with anima/relic weapon grinding, but we don't have that yet. There was also rumor of anima armor for this expansion.

Give these players things to do, and you will likely keep only the uber gamers that make no mistakes actually pushing to do Savage.

[Sebazy]

It is not the game to blame, it's the community.

I disagree, it's the nasty side effect of comparatively small scale raid teams where each individual carries much greater responsibility to the point where a weak link can prevent an otherwise solid team from progressing. Progression with even 1 or 2 new people can take a good amount of time even if it's nothing like as harsh as it was in Gordias/Midas and sadly some groups aren't willing to go through that again.

To say that 'everyone' demands that level of experience is patently false though. That's just not true, sorry. Look beyond PF, search around for proper statics that are appropriate to your own skill level and play style (can't stress this point enough) and you'll do fine.

To say I was 'unlucky' with progression pushes in Heavensward would be understating things to say the least Despite some pretty awful circumstances I managed to bounce back and get my raid game back via some good old fashioned hard work and a solid and proven reputation.

[Tridus]

This will be a tangent but I think that is not possible. To do this, is to disappoint the people in the later group. They want unforgiving fights that will demonically punish them for their mistakes.

What we need is more things for the former group to do and somehow progress without taking away from the progress of the later group. Usually, that hole is filled with anima/relic weapon grinding, but we don't have that yet. There was also rumor of anima armor for this expansion.

Give these players things to do, and you will likely keep only the uber gamers that make no mistakes actually pushing to do Savage.

One of the issues is that the gap between normal and savage is a gaping chasm. Normal is *EXTREMELY* forgiving. Savage is... not. And as you say, there isn't relic weapons, deep dungeons, or other things to do right now. So you either decide you're content with the normals or you have to do savage to progress. That winds up going to just how hard should savage be, and how many players do they want doing that content? Then when you factor in that some jobs have it harder than others, what you get is something that isn't easy to get right.

Sometimes they try to address the healer end of it by making mechanics lethal, so DPS screwups aren't a healer responsibility (because there is nothing a healer can do about it), but IMO that takes away part of the fun of being a healer. My favorite moments in WoW raiding were the times when someone did something stupid and I pulled off a miraculous save. When everything is "dodge or die", that doesn't exist. But if you can save everything, then people dying becomes your fault even when it's not (see: people dying on Deltascape Normal).

I don't have a good answer, but I do admire the problem. If you're not going to try to train people up and expect them to already know what to do, you're competing with a LOT of other groups that all want the same thing. Expect that to be hard if your'e not top tier. (Angered posted recently looking for a healer, I don't expect they'll have a hard time.)

Anyway... I do tend to agree that when there's more alternate types of progression, some of this will level off. People will decide to go do that and that savage isn't for them, which is fine.

[Bourne_Endeavor]

One of the issues is that the gap between normal and savage is a gaping chasm. Normal is *EXTREMELY* forgiving. Savage is... not..

This my primary issue with how the devs have tuned content since Heavensward. Take the two recent primals. Honestly, both extremes should be normal mode. They are far too easy for players with even a remote grasp on how to play their job. Even casual groups posting their clears on youtube joke about they couldn't believe they one-shot either of them. Compare that to three three tiers of Titan and it's almost night and day. Titan Hard was a good blend of reasonably challenging but forgiving for players just looking to get their feet wet while Extreme smacked you around. Even the story mode could be a mild hurdle. I firmly believe this enormous gap contributes heavily to the skill differences and why players struggles attempting Savage. Unfortunately, the devs seemed convinced it was the UI and ability bloat hence the changes we saw in Stormblood.

[Okamimaru]

I've considered creating a dynamic raid linkshell that let's people who want to raid but don't have the schedules for static groups... that way you can just swap people in and out as needed... will there be wipes? Most definitely... but people will either work together to improve the group or move on... it would be a nice way to get people who want to try raiding but don't want to hassle of "be there at this time and you can never mess up"...

[Teraluna]

You simply cannot ignore the change in the community over recent years. Even a quick scan of the posts here will show you talk of bad healers being evicted - without one word mentioning any help or tutoring to work together.

It's the same story now over and over - don't want bad players, no good for us, got rid of them and now searching for a good one.....

Where is the mmorpg community approach? Where is the camaraderie, the willingness to take a little time out and run training raids to help people learn?

Is that all dead now, and I'm just an older player out of my time? It feels like it reading this topic.

Then people turn around and say 'we can't get a healer/tank!'
No wonder.
Your own approach has brought about your own problem.

Healers/Tanks are scared of signing up for these hyper critical no second chance, no helping hand groups. Naturally they turn to other things in the game - or other solo games where's there isn't a mob of players waiting to pounce if you slip up. One mistake and instantly labelled a bad player, out you go, ltp, go back to hello kitty.
Yes, I've seen these posts.
Then once again its: 'We can't find a good healer (or insert tank), where are you all?!

- oh there's a coincidence, there's someone saying it already in the title.

[Tridus]

This my primary issue with how the devs have tuned content since Heavensward. Take the two recent primals. Honestly, both extremes should be normal mode. They are far too easy for players with even a remote grasp on how to play their job. Even casual groups posting their clears on youtube joke about they couldn't believe they one-shot either of them. Compare that to three three tiers of Titan and it's almost night and day. Titan Hard was a good blend of reasonably challenging but forgiving for players just looking to get their feet wet while Extreme smacked you around.

Oddly, I didn't find Susano Ex easy at all. It took an extremely long time to do it, because even once I had it more or less figured out it was hard to find a group that could do it. Lotta wipes, lotta time. Then one day a group one shotted it and made it look effortless. The difference was so wide that I didn't know what to make of it.