A summary of healer issues

[ty_taurus]

It's been said before as well, but is worth reiterating...

There is still room to shake up future combat encounters to some degree. You can feel a difference between ARR and HW encounter design vs more modern encounter design, for example, and yet it still stays within a certain margin of rhythm. It's possible to shake up the general flow within a similar margin of difference. But it's unrealistic to change encounter design enough to actually shift action dominance away from DPS tools. As Semirhage said, there will always be a skill gap issue, and the primary issue we keep talking about over and over and over is how the better you get, the less rewarding healing becomes because your reward is a monotonous lack of gameplay. If you're objective is resolving that by making healing requirements so intense that those who master healing are meant to heal at a much higher rate than they attack, then the novice and intermediate healers will get absolutely destroyed. It would be catastrophic.

This is why the argument is having DPS gameplay on the same level as the tanks--the other support role whos primary responsibility is also not dealing damage and has even more things to focus on than healers do. It allows those that master the healing role to be rewarded with fun and engaging gameplay, and the optimization of that gameplay is in no way shape or form required for 95% of the rest of the game, so someone who is having a harder time healing will still be able to comfortably clear everything in the game that they can already clear right now. As I said earlier, the only difference is that you actually have to work harder to parse purple or higher--something that doesn't even matter for Savage because many teams will still be able to clear parsing grey or green.

[ForsakenRoe]

All this 'but the casuals' hyperbole is getting so repetitive and boring. Here's something to consider: we don't have tankbusters with no cast bar anymore for the most part. They're all clearly named and have a windup to them, even in Savage. Tyrant's Unholy Darkness, for example. But, against all odds, despite this design decision, casuals still somehow managed to muddle through Titan EX, where there were not castbars for Mountain Busters. It's almost like casuals CAN actually manage to do some tough content even with some hurdles to clear. So if they can manage that, why is it somehow the end of the world if they're given a couple extra damage buttons to press, which, and let me put this on a seperate line so it's obvious:

THESE EXTRA BUTTONS WOULD NOT MATTER FOR ANYTHING BELOW WEEK 5-6 SAVAGE, IF YOU ARE NOT DOING EARLY SAVAGE OR ULTIMATES YOU COULD PROBABLY IGNORE THEM AND STILL CLEAR

I don't get how many times we have to say it, or how many neon signs we have to have pointing to it before people get it, I could go clear P8S right now with full tome gear, Rubicante EX weapon (probably Barb weapon tbh), and use zero cards for the whole fight, and clear. If the cards, the defining feature for the gameplay of AST, is ignoreable because of extra gear, these extra buttons we keep hoping for would be too

[Aravell]

We actually have video evidence of the opposite: A relatively casually-seeming player somehow managing the impossible task of clearing a dungeon during Heavensward as a Scholar. They had far less healing resources to work with, yet also had to deal with the incredibly unforgiving and anti-beginner-friendly old Cleric Stance, and was able to do so while still remembering to do things like keep Shadowflare up, apply DoTs, and keep the party alive even if they idled quite often. All on controller too.

To add to this, I was a terrible healer back during HW too (Was tank main in ARR). Back when I was struggling to figure out how to heal, I never actually had anyone tell me to put on Cleric Stance and do damage or they'll kick me, not even in extremes. However, when I started learning and got comfortable with juggling both healing and doing damage, I got many people telling me to turn off Cleric Stance and just heal.

I really don't see any addition of extra downtime buttons making the life of weaker players any harder at all, if they struggle to keep up with healing already, then they'll still just heal and not even bother with the new buttons anyway. The main argument I've seen is "But then the casuals/weaker players will hit enrage more often", to which I say "What content do they even do where missing damage from one singular healer results in an enrage?"

[Semirhage]

I say "What content do they even do where missing damage from one singular healer results in an enrage?"

Oho, I'd be careful touching that sacred cow. That's calling the rest of the party's competence into question. We all know it's always the healer's fault. Even when there's no enrage, it's still the healer's fault.

(Though to be perfectly fair, in Savage+ it's debatable. The additional damage from a 0-DPS healer trying even a little will often be a much larger gain than a DPS squeezing a little more uptime. It's a case-by-case thing).

[Tint]

All this 'but the casuals' hyperbole is getting so repetitive and boring.

Other roles have so much healing and mitigation tools now, there really is no reason to not increase the difficulty. If the healer is not good enough then tanks and DDs can step up their game.

[ForsakenRoe]

Other roles have so much healing and mitigation tools now, there really is no reason to not increase the difficulty. If the healer is not good enough then tanks and DDs can step up their game.

Weird isn't it, DPS get new selfdefensives like Arcane Crest? Sure, cool, skill expression tool to optimize (especially Third Eye). DPS gets healing like Bloodbath? Sure, helps them stay alive, makes healer's job easier!

Tank gets selfhealing out the ass? No problem, helps them stay alive in even the spiciest of wall-to-wall pulls! Tanks get more damage and burst like 1200p Double Down? Go nuts, helps them keep aggro (aggro does not exist anymore)

Healer gets a defensive like Aquaveil? Sure, helps them to do the 'good heal work' and keep their party alive!

Healer gets a new damage skill WHOA HOLD ON A SECOND we can't have that, the casuals! Only way you're getting that one past TSA is by attaching a heal to it and calling it 'damage neutral healing skill'!

It's only one specific role of the trinity, getting stuff that belongs to one specific OTHER role of the trinity, that is an issue. Anything else seems to be fair game.

My question, if 'casual healers won't be able to focus on keeping people alive if they have more damage skills', is 'why do tanks keep getting more damage skills then'. Not just because 'boo hoo the non-dps specs get treated differently we want equality', though that is part of it. No, what I mean is that while progressing P8S early (week 2 iirc), the DRK in one party straight up said 'im not f*** using mit during my 6min' (considering the DPS check prenerf, 100% justified take tbh), and was using Living Dead (and just Living Dead) for the tankbuster. Cue a 45k PER TICK DOT that he'd invariably die to, because not mitigating the TB = DOT is stronger. After dying despite me using Solace Spam on him, he eventually decided he'd use 'maybe a little bit of mit' or something, cos it went down to more manageable levels. But the fact he had to sac his own damage, to stay alive, means that surely tanks have hit the limit on 'how much more damage tools they can have without screwing themselves/their party over by choosing to do damage over mitigating'. And in that situation, of course 'use the mit then' is the solution, because you can't do your damage if you die to the TB. But the same logic tracks with the hypothetical casual healer: if you're not safe to do damage, then focus on healing.

So we're back to the original question: how is it that tanks are allowed to make the decision of 'ill prioritize mit over damage here', and they get to have more damage tools, despite being a doubleweave nightmare in their 2min windows, but the thought of adding another damage skill to healers has people up in arms over 'the poor casuals'? That the decision of 'ill prioritize healing and mit, over damage for this part' is too much for us poor petite princesses, and so the decision was made FOR us?

[ty_taurus]

4.X tanks: Can we get a tank that feels like a DPS and has a much busier rotation?

SE: Absolutely

5.X healers: Can we get a healer that feels like a DPS and has a much busier rotation?

SE: Absolutely not

[Aravell]

4.X tanks: Can we get a tank that feels like a DPS and has a much busier rotation?

SE: Absolutely

5.X healers: Can we get a healer that feels like a DPS and has a much busier rotation?

SE: Absolutely not

Technically, we already had a busy healer that felt like a DPS. We had 3.x SCH. But Yoshi P was under the impression that SCH is a healer that can only chad their cohealer to do maximum damage, so we got the sad state that we have right now. If only the dev team had a healer main that could've corrected their boss.

[Nizzi]

Healer gets a new damage skill WHOA HOLD ON A SECOND we can't have that, the casuals! Only way you're getting that one past TSA is by attaching a heal to it and calling it 'damage neutral healing skill'!

This made me think; when was the last time any healer got a no frills attached, only for damage, put in your rotation damage spell?

Things like Macrocosmos don't count as they're just damage neutral GCD heals, and things like Misery or Stormblood Lord /Lady don't count either as they have frills attached - there's healing associated with it, either through 'you must heal to do this spell' or 'there's RNG and it can be a heal or damage lmao' and isn't apart of your rotation.

So going on that, not a single healer has gotten a rotational damage spell since SCH in Stormblood with the reworked Miasma II, or arguably WHM in Heavensward with Aero III as that was an entirely new spell, which was 5 to 7 years ago, nearing 8 in a few months.

It's no wonder SE is so resistant to making things in line with how they once were; they fundamentally associate buttons that are solely for damage with the older design.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

Technically, we already had a busy healer that felt like a DPS. We had 3.x SCH. But Yoshi P was under the impression that SCH is a healer that can only chad their cohealer to do maximum damage, so we got the sad state that we have right now. If only the dev team had a healer main that could've corrected their boss.

Can't let that happen. They'll just get replaced the moment they set foot into EX+ lmfao.