My thoughts on Healing in FFXIV as a new player

[Saefinn]

I think the DPS priority perception exists because 1) your rDPS measures your performance in this game and 2) good healers will DPS more than they heal because they game doesn't challenge their healing enough for it to be a big chunk of their uptime.

To add, a healer's contribution to DPS isn't only affected by their personal DPS (or their DPS buffs) but their ability to keep people alive, a dead person is not contributing to DPS. So technically speaking, keeping people alive, even if you're a DPS obsessed healer, is still your biggest priority. A dead DPS is a big cut to overall DPS and you as a healer aren't going to be pulling that dead guy's weight.

So healing remains a greater priority over DPS even if you are obsessed over DPS.

Content and how your healing spells are equipped for it, that's what determines how heal or DPS focused something is. Unless your healer opts for standing around doing nothing in between heals.

[Adeacia]

"Given the opportunity, players will optimize the fun out of a game." - Soren Johnson (2011), source: https://www.designer-notes.com/?p=369

This right here. Something I've certainly noticed a long time ago. Most complaints about the game only exist because people try to optimize the heck out of everything. If they would stop doing that, their issues would immediately stop being issues.

I don't try to optimize anything since I don't care. I'm here to play Final Fantasy 14, not Spreadsheet Simulator 2020.

Do I dps every chance I get when I'm healing? Of course I do because I enjoy doing it. I do not and will not try to squeeze out every possible bit of damage however as that isn't fun.

Have I done savage content in the past? Yes I have. Got clears? Yep. The obsession with optimization is what drove me out of it.

FF14 isn't a job, it's a game and that's how I'm going to treat it.

[Saefinn]

This right here. Something I've certainly noticed a long time ago. Most complaints about the game only exist because people try to optimize the heck out of everything. If they would stop doing that, their issues would immediately stop being issues.

I don't try to optimize anything since I don't care. I'm here to play Final Fantasy 14, not Spreadsheet Simulator 2020.

Do I dps every chance I get when I'm healing? Of course I do because I enjoy doing it. I do not and will not try to squeeze out every possible bit of damage however as that isn't fun.

Have I done savage content in the past? Yes I have. Got clears? Yep. The obsession with optimization is what drove me out of it.

FF14 isn't a job, it's a game and that's how I'm going to treat it.

This I also agree with. It's how the word "balance" has become a dirty word for me. Balance IMO should only go as far as "can this job be used to do this content competently?"

I don't care if it means one job it's harder to do the content competently, if anything that gives options for players who want more challenge....this to me has always been the advantage of multiple jobs fulfilling the same role, some can be more beginner friendly, whereas others can be more complex. Thus how enjoyable a job is should take importance.

[Limonia]

It's just that healers often either stand around idle when no healing is required, or heal in super inefficient ways, and need to be told that they can do more than just keep people upright to nudge them into improving. Better still, these changes often make for better healing as well (staying active means a better reaction time, and knowing how to use your kit effectively means when emergencies DO happen they can turn what would have been an opening for DPS into more healing.)

I couldn't agree more. I don't know how often I've been in duties with (not new) heal-only healers who were completely overwhelmed with healing when people messed up mechanics and they had to do more than just randomly cast a Cure or Medica. Those healers often don't use their toolkit at all. Like when they are WHM they use 2 Afflatus heals at max and one Tetragrammaton, and the rest of their casts are Cure I, and for AoE either Medica II followed by Medica or even another Medica II. So if people now mess up and two players need healing very fast before the next raid-wide AoE goes out, they just cast Medica somewhere in the back, unable to save them. I've seen situations like this SO OFTEN. Because in normal situations it's enough to spam Cure I on the tank and randomly cast Medica II, they don't even know their other spells and abilities.

So it's not only that they don't know how to heal efficiently though, a lot of them don't know how to properly heal at all.

And I just don't understand why. After all this time I know that there are healers who refuse to dps for various reasons. But why do they also ignore like 90% of their healing actions, only to be unable to keep up when needed? Is it really because they aren't needed if everything goes right in easy content?

[Irenia]

This right here. Something I've certainly noticed a long time ago. Most complaints about the game only exist because people try to optimize the heck out of everything. If they would stop doing that, their issues would immediately stop being issues.

I don't try to optimize anything since I don't care. I'm here to play Final Fantasy 14, not Spreadsheet Simulator 2020.

Do I dps every chance I get when I'm healing? Of course I do because I enjoy doing it. I do not and will not try to squeeze out every possible bit of damage however as that isn't fun.

Have I done savage content in the past? Yes I have. Got clears? Yep. The obsession with optimization is what drove me out of it.

FF14 isn't a job, it's a game and that's how I'm going to treat it.

Note that in context that quote does not blame the players for optimizing, rather this is something that the developers need to keep in mind when designing their games. Some players have fun optimizing, and you should never take that from them.

There was a GDC talk by one of the people who work on Magic the Gathering where he says that it is the dev's job to ensure that the most optimal, and the most fun options are the same. He likens it to the shot clock in basketball iirc (Before it was implemented, players would get the lead, and just kind of hold on to the ball. Boring, but optimal). Honestly, I'd imagine this train of thought was the reason why AST cards were changed, because many people had fun using all the cards, while it was optimal for sufficiently skilled groups to fish for the damage increases. So they brought the two inline to... mixed results.

[GrimGale]

Note that in context that quote does not blame the players for optimizing, rather this is something that the developers need to keep in mind when designing their games. Some players have fun optimizing, and you should never take that from them.

There was a GDC talk by one of the people who work on Magic the Gathering where he says that it is the dev's job to ensure that the most optimal, and the most fun options are the same. He likens it to the shot clock in basketball iirc (Before it was implemented, players would get the lead, and just kind of hold on to the ball. Boring, but optimal). Honestly, I'd imagine this train of thought was the reason why AST cards were changed, because many people had fun using all the cards, while it was optimal for sufficiently skilled groups to fish for the damage increases. So they brought the two inline to... mixed results.

Optimization and minmaxing will happen whether devs want it or not. There will always be a rotation that maximises damage for each class.

That being said, you can optimize around anything any rotation or gameplay, so why not just design classes with an engaging set of skills and forget about what players will optimize around.

1 button spell spam is not engaging.

[Irenia]

Optimization and minmaxing will happen whether devs want it or not. There will always be a rotation that maximises damage for each class.

That being said, you can optimize around anything any rotation or gameplay, so why not just design classes with an engaging set of skills and forget about what players will optimize around.

1 button spell spam is not engaging.

I agree, but while they may have been thinking of this concept when working on AST cards, I think the 1Dot/1Filler design comes from another desire entirely.

[Brandedblade]

I agree, but while they may have been thinking of this concept when working on AST cards, I think the 1Dot/1Filler design comes from another desire entirely.

They wanted to streamline the process of alternating between damage and healing. While the process is boring from an optimization standpoint. It was not a decision with the higher tier players in mind, but the lower tier players who are responsible for all the feedback about bad scholars who think their fairy can handle everything without actually using cooldowns to facilitate that. Yes good scholars look like they're just dpsing the whole time, but so do bad ones.

I'm aware that my example focuses on scholars but the sentiment does apply to whm and ast as well.

[GrimGale]

They wanted to streamline the process of alternating between damage and healing. While the process is boring from an optimization standpoint. It was not a decision with the higher tier players in mind, but the lower tier players who are responsible for all the feedback about bad scholars who think their fairy can handle everything without actually using cooldowns to facilitate that. Yes good scholars look like they're just dpsing the whole time, but so do bad ones.

I'm aware that my example focuses on scholars but the sentiment does apply to whm and ast as well.

A a healer that heals all the time would probably end up grossly overhealing/not using his kit to its full extent. That would also be an example of a bad healer.

The fact that most fights have long stretches of healing downtime doesn't help either.

[Seoulstar]

A a healer that heals all the time would probably end up grossly overhealing/not using his kit to its full extent. That would also be an example of a bad healer.

The fact that most fights have long stretches of healing downtime doesn't help either.

That isn't a bad healer..I still question where people got that idea.