A summary of healer issues

[Shurrikhan]

You were in different circles then. I know several players of varying skill levels who despised the old card system because it essentially boiled down to "Balance fishing". This opinion is especially prevalent in the speed kill community as Balance was king. A lot of people also disliked how certain cards were worthless. Bole, for example, was never worth using as you were never going to rely on inconsistent mitigation. It's no different than current Lady, which every Astro hates drawing.

...So we replaced those actual gamble elements with "Which melee|ranged each has the greatest burst dps during their 2min, their 60s mid-burst, and their shifted 30s between-bursts? DPad up to 3 times to target them and deliver a ST damage buff unnoticeable without a parser. If your top 2 DPS are of the same type at each of those windows, well, sucks for you and your rDPS, I guess?"

The Seals aren't, in themselves, a bad system, and we should be thinking about what would be better than either, but more than a little difficult to look at the current state and honestly think, without substantial inebriation, "Yeah, this is better than it was in Shadowbringers."

The old system's main problems were simply that...

• Royal Road was preemptive and therefore forced rather than retroactive and therefore optional (cast Card, then optionally buff it),
• there were zero relative balancing passes ever attempted on the cards themselves (at least old Spear had some unique value over Balance available to it via a hastened reset for tank immunities, whereas new Spear was just a 5% damage buff trying to compete with Arrow's ~8% and Balance's 10%),
• there were zero relative balancing passes ever attempted on the Royal Road effects (Expand had twice the value of Extend, which had twice the value of Empower),
• that there was no need to split Ewer and Spire into separately TP and MP (same is true for StB Refresh and Tactician, ofc),
• and that Bole could only reasonably be used on an MT since it offered no flat eHP boost.

That it was still more entertaining and capable of nuance despite all those issues says something in itself about the current iteration of "Find the melee/ranged, and maybe do your seals if you really want to."

With all that said, I do think they could have done a better job adjusting the system than scraping it entirely. I, personally, liked old Astro a lot more than every other iteration.

Yup. Agreed.

[ForteNightshade]

...So we replaced those actual gamble elements with "Which melee|ranged each has the greatest burst dps during their 2min, their 60s mid-burst, and their shifted 30s between-bursts? DPad up to 3 times to target them and deliver a ST damage buff unnoticeable without a parser. If your top 2 DPS are of the same type at each of those windows, well, sucks for you and your rDPS, I guess?"

Oh, don't get me wrong. I never said it was a good decision. The whole shift from Astro has clearly been one failed iteration after another considering we'll soon be on the fourth rework. I do recall Yoshida outright saying players only cared about Balance, which is why they made the changes they did. Although, that was always a problem of their own making for precisely the reasons you outlined. They still seemingly operate with the idea players will sacrifice damage for utility despite them never making said utility worthwhile. If there's one positive I can give on the Endwalker job design, they have gotten better about not doing that. Even if Lady shows they remain a bit too stubborn.

I've long thought the logical step for Royal Road would have been to split the cards into two slots: Offensive and Defensive. This immediately makes resource or utility cards have actual value as they're no longer competing with damage. It also allows them to balance a smaller number of cards against each other. I also much prefer how cards like new Spear made you have to be aware of which jobs benefited from it. Of course, that's before they gutted a good amount of unique gameplay aspects like Bard interacting with Crit. All in all, I suspect the Astro changes were more about simplicity in balancing than listening to player feedback.

[Renathras]

Oh yeah, I'm not saying it's the only reason, but also a contributor. I know these forums don't like if you say that. lol You're supposed to only go against the devs who clearly don't understand their own game. I'd say the truth lies somewhere in-between.

I certainly remember number-minded players saying that if you don't fish for balance you're doing it wrong. Or that if you use the 'wrong' fairy you're trolling or whatever. Full disclosure, I'm raiding myself, so that's essentially my crowd. lol And guess what? Cards were all turned into balance and both fairies are the same now. It doesn't take rocket science to see where this idea came from. But, just to reiterate, I do agree with a lot of what's being said here. Like healers being the ones who are there so others can have fun (in low level content. As an AST main I enjoy savage).

For what it's worth I was pleasantly surprised by the healing requirements for Barbs ex. So there is that.

Largely this.

I've said about homogenization many times in the past that the reason we have so much of it is that players asked for it, either indirectly or, in some cases, literally and directly.

With a lot of healing changes, it's because players asked for it either indirectly or directly as well. The reason we're where we are now isn't because the Devs hate the players, their own game, or Healing. It's because, over time, people have either asked for or demanded these changes. Yoshi P's exasperated "We thought this was what you wanted" after P5-8 dropped is kind of proof of that. They've done what they heard players asking for over and over - the 2 min meta, Tank homogenization, etc are also all results of this - and then gave it to them, only to be surprised when the old adage turned out to be true:

Players are REALLY good at identifying problems and REALLY bad at proposing solutions to them.

[ty_taurus]

Largely this.

I've said about homogenization many times in the past that the reason we have so much of it is that players asked for it, either indirectly or, in some cases, literally and directly.

With a lot of healing changes, it's because players asked for it either indirectly or directly as well. The reason we're where we are now isn't because the Devs hate the players, their own game, or Healing. It's because, over time, people have either asked for or demanded these changes. Yoshi P's exasperated "We thought this was what you wanted" after P5-8 dropped is kind of proof of that. They've done what they heard players asking for over and over - the 2 min meta, Tank homogenization, etc are also all results of this - and then gave it to them, only to be surprised when the old adage turned out to be true:

Players are REALLY good at identifying problems and REALLY bad at proposing solutions to them.

You know that actually reminded me of a comedy skit about Slytherin someone did several years back that had the quote "Look, you came to me, said you needed a break from studying... I got you petrified for 160 days out of the school year. I'm a good friend. What are you complaining about?"

Basically, yes, there are things that people have complained about over the years, but it is entirely on the design team that their solution to many problems is to just remove it. Astrologian's cards had really not be worked on very much. Outside of the experiment of making Balance a 20% DPS buff during HW and swapping Spear's cooldown reduction to a critical hit buff, nothing else had actually been done to address any concerns of balance. So why was the next step to turn every card into Balance? On the topic of Scholar, Selene had only really undergone a single major change as well when the spell speed/skill speed buffs were replaced with a flat attack speed and Fey Caress. Because Fey Wind was a damage increase, which was becoming increasingly more evident that Selene was effectively the "right" choice every time despite Caress and Silent Dusk being basically decorations on your hotbar, there did need to be some kind of change, but again, that change was to give Selene the French Revolution treatment.

It's giving pre-penicillin era "you scratched your leg? Time to amputate."

I don't understand why we can't actually sit down and try preserving things and experimenting with other approaches before we just chop off the limb. Or perhaps they do experiment and are unable to find a path that works, in which case it would actually be really nice to hear that and learn about what solutions they already tried.

[Renathras]

I don't understand why we can't actually sit down and try preserving things and experimenting with other approaches before we just chop off the limb. Or perhaps they do experiment and are unable to find a path that works, in which case it would actually be really nice to hear that and learn about what solutions they already tried.

My best guess is balance concerns. An example: Expedient. They gave us this new ability people were mocking vs SGE in the Job Actions trailer, but some smart people were noting at the time how it could be useful. Even some early EW guides were panning it. I remember Wesk Alber saying "You know what else gives people a few seconds of Sprint movement speed? Sprint.", implying that it was a silly action.

Then it turned out to be super powerful, not just for the damage reduction, but for the movement speed. To the point they nerfed its duration in half over fear of balance concerns.

And this isn't just an issue with Healers. The PLD rework was over balance concerns (not that they've got it right yet, but it's the impetus for it). Anything that is significantly different causes potential balance issues. Hell, look at this subforum here. How many times have I suggested the "4 Healers" model, which would allow each to be distinct, allow experimentation in different directions, and appeal to all types of players? And it is routinely derided.

The reason we're were we are now very much is because of what players asked for, complained about, and in some cases, demanded. Yeah, the Devs could have said "No. You may Balance fish until the heat death of the universe, we're not budging!" or "Nah, you White Mages get to keep lolLilies until the end of the game!", but they didn't.

If anything, the stuff that confuses me more at this point are the few things the Devs insist on not changing. SCH Faerie summon having a cast time after SMN's were made instant in ShB. How long they drug their feet on Living Dead. That all Healers must have a DoT even as they remove DoTs fro much of the rest of the game's Jobs. It's kinda strange what they do and don't decide must be kept.

Blaming the 2 minute meta on players is fair enough.

Glad we agree on that, at least.

Then you went weird. "Is he your uncle"? Whut? o.O This passes as an argument to you?

1) People who didn't like DoTs and were annoyed at how many there were and how they all had dissonant timers.

2) No idea on that one. I don't AST.

3) People endlessly complaining there was no need to have herr.

4) People who endlessly complained about SCH's clunk and wanted a non-clunk SCH (though this one I think was stupid considering SGE is completely primed to be a Chloromancer)

5) The people who said they were useless or never used anyway.

6) The people endlessly complaining how much more work SCH had to do in its rotation than WHM.

7) The people who kept complaining AST was too hard/complex.

8) No one as far as I can tell. 4.0 WHM was quite possibly the worst iteration of the Job in the entire game, and "every Job has a Job gauge of some kind now" was the reason for it, imo. I will die on that hill. WHM could have stayed HW minus Cleric Stance and been better off, but then it wouldn't be viable in the current game since it'd be too GCD heal reliant. Which is why the ShB and later EW changes were net positives for it.

9) Got me on that one. One point for Griffindor.

You got 2 out of 9. That's a ~22% success rate. You may be able to bring up endless things, but that doesn't mean they all support your position. Everything and the kitchen sink is not a very rational perspective, especially when used to avoid the obvious.

Healing is in the state it's in DUE TO TWO PIECES: ONE is the Devs, and you're right about that. THE OTHER is the players and their demands over the years. You can't ignore that second piece because you have a hate boner for the Devs. I mean, you CAN, but it just makes you wrong. I absolutely agree they should expand their team - FF14 is carrying Square's budget at this point, it could use more of it for itself - but that's no the sole reason for the current situation.

Healers are homogenized - IN PART - because we asked for it repeatedly over the last 8 years. It's shocking at this point WHM doesn't have an AOE shield since every other Healer does, but that's really the only point of major resistance to absolute homogenization the Devs have made when it comes to Healers. All the other things Healers have asked to be homogenized largely have been.

It goes once more to the adage:

Players are really good at finding problems, but extremely poor at proposing good solutions.

[fulminating]

It goes once more to the adage:

Players are really good at finding problems, but extremely poor at proposing good solutions.

"It was fun before and it's not fun now, can we go back?"

[Sebazy]

Cool

Now how many of these occurred in your head or aren't massive stretches because you know.... Renethras posts etc?

1) Show me a legit post that asked for Aero III to be removed here

2) Tried chat gpt yet? Maybe it'll give you some fresh material

3) So why didn't Eos get removed when people thought she was worthless for some ~2-3 years?

4) By all means link me to any post here that says 'yes, what I really want is a cut and paste SCH with lasers'.

5) Are you hallucinating? Maybe get some water and sit down, also please link your source material. Preferably something that isn't from Titanmen, bonus challenge, can you find it without having to use google keywords? I'm not convinced.

6) Again, cite your sources. You're either lying or just plain deluded.

7) As above, people complained about AST's HPS throughput early on, then they complained about balance fishing later. I don't remember ever seeing a complaint thread over abilities such as time dilation getting traction.

8) Ironically I'd argue 3.4 was the worst state WHM was ever in, but if google says 4.0 was worse then I guess that's what you're going to go with right? Remember 3.4 literally had to spend time standing there doing nothing and not casting at all to conserve mana. As worthless as Lilies were, Thin Air was an incredible ability and it at least allowed WHM to actually do stuff for the entire fight. Do you remember this? I'm not sure google does.

9) Might want to double check your numbers there sir.

Seriously though, I don't have a hate boner for the devs. I'll always merrily say that they did an incredible job with the design of 2.0. The issue is that Yoshida has allowed the game to outgrow his team by a significant margin. They haven't been able to keep up with the demands of the player base for years now and that's not really acceptable for a game of this size and stature.

[ForsakenRoe]

My best guess is balance concerns. An example: Expedient. They gave us this new ability people were mocking vs SGE in the Job Actions trailer, but some smart people were noting at the time how it could be useful. Even some early EW guides were panning it. I remember Wesk Alber saying "You know what else gives people a few seconds of Sprint movement speed? Sprint.", implying that it was a silly action.

Then it turned out to be super powerful, not just for the damage reduction, but for the movement speed. To the point they nerfed its duration in half over fear of balance concerns.

Ooh curse those smart people with their rational takes and their logical conclusions, they should just submit to the anger and outrage of the hivemind!

(sorry couldn't resist)

Seriously though, I don't have a hate boner for the devs. I'll always merrily say that they did an incredible job with the design of 2.0. The issue is that Yoshida has allowed the game to outgrow his team by a significant margin. They haven't been able to keep up with the demands of the player base for years now and that's not really acceptable for a game of this size and stature.

Think the problem they mentioned in the past is that, unlike in the west where the criteria is 'knows how to program games', over there it's 'knows how to program games, and is able to speak japanese', which means way less total people to recruit from. Also the geography means that eg Blizzard could theoretically recruit from any part of America (if the person is willing to move to CA to work for them), which is a vastly larger population than Japan.

What SE needs to do is realize how much money THIS game pulls in, and devote more devs to it from other parts of the company. Hopefully the reason things are kinda 'ehh' moreso than ever is because so much of the company is focused on FF16, so once that's out, bring those devs into the fold to work on FF14

[Sebazy]

Largely this.

I've said about homogenization many times in the past that the reason we have so much of it is that players asked for it, either indirectly or, in some cases, literally and directly.

With a lot of healing changes, it's because players asked for it either indirectly or directly as well. The reason we're where we are now isn't because the Devs hate the players, their own game, or Healing. It's because, over time, people have either asked for or demanded these changes. Yoshi P's exasperated "We thought this was what you wanted" after P5-8 dropped is kind of proof of that. They've done what they heard players asking for over and over - the 2 min meta, Tank homogenization, etc are also all results of this - and then gave it to them, only to be surprised when the old adage turned out to be true:

Players are REALLY good at identifying problems and REALLY bad at proposing solutions to them.

Blaming the 2 minute meta on players is fair enough.

Blaming the Endwalker healer culling on players though? Do you actually believe the tripe you just typed there? Are you Titanmen? Are you trying to revise history? Is Yoshida only listening to a very specific person here? Is he in fact your Uncle?

Who asked for Aero III to be removed?

Who asked for AST cards to become unclickable and by extension, who asked for Undraw?

Who asked for Selene to literally be deleted?

Who asked for Sadge to be a thinly disguised copy pasta number on SCH?

Who asked for our debuff kits to get deleted and handed over to DPS?

Who asked for SCH to lose key abilities such as Bane?

Who asked for AST to lose all of it's time extension kit?

Who asked for 4.0 Lilies?

Who asked for 4.0 SCH to launch without a single spammable AoE in it's kit?

Want me to go on? The material is endless.

Healing is in the state it is because SE don't have the manpower or depth of talent to do better. They have close to the same small team they had at the release of ARR but twice the number of jobs and a far less forgiving and monumentally more clued up player base to deal with.

Healers aren't homogenised because we asked for it 6 years ago. They are homogenised because they literally don't have the man hours in which to truly make the healers unique with the team Yoshida or his finance department wants to stick by.

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...ealer-designer.

That link explains it in more depth, but the TLDR is that SE's job design team is one of the smallest in the industry.

[ty_taurus]

Oh yeah, I'm not saying it's the only reason, but also a contributor. I know these forums don't like if you say that. lol You're supposed to only go against the devs who clearly don't understand their own game. I'd say the truth lies somewhere in-between.

I certainly remember number-minded players saying that if you don't fish for balance you're doing it wrong. Or that if you use the 'wrong' fairy you're trolling or whatever. Full disclosure, I'm raiding myself, so that's essentially my crowd. lol And guess what? Cards were all turned into balance and both fairies are the same now. It doesn't take rocket science to see where this idea came from. But, just to reiterate, I do agree with a lot of what's being said here. Like healers being the ones who are there so others can have fun (in low level content. As an AST main I enjoy savage).

For what it's worth I was pleasantly surprised by the healing requirements for Barbs ex. So there is that.

Trying to police player behavior by stripping away job mechanics so that it’s impossible for anyone to complain about your performance will kill this game if it continues. It fails to address the reality that some gamers will always be gamers, and only serves to punish everyone else.