A summary of healer issues

[ForsakenRoe]

Do you think it will be 7.0 or 8.0 when SE decides to remove the cast time and costs from GCD Heals because that honestly feels like a possibility now.

If that's the price to pay for 'actually interesting gameplay during downtime where there's nothing to heal' I'll absolutely make that trade. The issue is that SE would do the first half of the trade (instantcast, free heal GCDs) and not the second half in compensation (the additional gameplay). See Kaiten, and how some expected it to be replaced by something else that requires braincells. Instead it was replaced with... nothing. So the kenki got dumped onto Shinten instead, very fun.

And if the change did happen in such a way that eg Medica is now an OGCD with a 2 sec CD, what would the new rationalization from the 'healers should heal' squad be, it's not like the 'casuals' would be stressed if they could weave healing OGCD at literally any moment, akin to weaving tank mitigations

[Semirhage]

If that's the price to pay for 'actually interesting gameplay during downtime where there's nothing to heal' I'll absolutely make that trade. The issue is that SE would do the first half of the trade (instantcast, free heal GCDs) and not the second half in compensation (the additional gameplay). See Kaiten, and how some expected it to be replaced by something else that requires braincells. Instead it was replaced with... nothing. So the kenki got dumped onto Shinten instead, very fun.

And if the change did happen in such a way that eg Medica is now an OGCD with a 2 sec CD, what would the new rationalization from the 'healers should heal' squad be, it's not like the 'casuals' would be stressed if they could weave healing OGCD at literally any moment, akin to weaving tank mitigations

I for one eagerly await the new justification for HeALeRs ShOULd bE HeALiNG crowd once it becomes even easier than it is now. I've already had my mind broken with "Glare is fun and comfy", so screw it. Bring it on. Let the madness strip naked and jiggle around on the FFXIV healing stage, I'm already DPSing anyway.

[kcj]

As a new player (about a month in)...I'm finding my main headache is trying to heal while having to dodge the near continuous stream of AOE attacks by bosses. If I don't die at least once, then it's a good run.

[BRVV]

As a new player (about a month in)...I'm finding my main headache is trying to heal while having to dodge the near continuous stream of AOE attacks by bosses. If I don't die at least once, then it's a good run.

How do you do on dps?

[Osmond]

If it's any consolation (hehe), Whispering Dawn remains at 15y. Which is funny, because the analog on SGE, Physis 2, IS 30y. But Physis 1 isnt. Does SE really think that the 10% healing boost is why Physis 2 should have more range? That would almost imply it's the heal boost people hit Physis 2 for, and not the extremely potent HOT effect, which is silly to even think about

Actually, looking at it, the fairy skill ranges are now all over the place. WD and the Seraph version are 15y. Everything else is 30y. Oh wait, there's one exception! Fey Blessing is 20 for some reason. And whatever that reason IS, it's not to mirror Indom's range, cos that is 15 too!

Ehhh, I just place the fairy in the center, problem solved…

[Semirhage]

Just had an A12 queue with a White Mage whose rotation was Medica 2! Medica 2! Medica 2! Medica 2! Medica 2! Medica 2!

Best design ever. *chef's kiss*, dunno how they could possibly improve on this.

[ForsakenRoe]

Just had an A12 queue with a White Mage whose rotation was Medica 2! Medica 2! Medica 2! Medica 2! Medica 2! Medica 2!

Best design ever. *chef's kiss*, dunno how they could possibly improve on this.

Just had an A12 E11 queue with a White Mage party whose rotation was Medica 2! have 5/8 people fall off on every Fire-charged BurntStrike.

My Dosis percentage, despite the fight being an absolute cluster, was still well above 50%

Best design ever. *chef's kiss*, dunno how they could possibly improve on this. idk either i think they've peaked, this is the pinnacle of healer design /s

[Iedarus]

Just had an A12 E11 queue with a White Mage party whose rotation was Medica 2! have 5/8 people fall off on every Fire-charged BurntStrike.

My Dosis percentage, despite the fight being an absolute cluster, was still well above 50%

Best design ever. *chef's kiss*, dunno how they could possibly improve on this. idk either i think they've peaked, this is the pinnacle of healer design /s

Not like spamming healing would have done anything. I give Expedience and a crit spreadlo to my whole team on Rubi EX and they still get RKO'd by the in-out-in mechanic.

[Semirhage]

oh wait, they didn't do that, instead they just buffed Blackmage and told every other ranged to go pound sand.

Ah, a fellow connoisseur of the art of watching a Monk sit on the floor for ten seconds, eat a weakness debuff, and still take a massive dump on your damage output despite having similar party utility I see. Truly the job balance that knows no parallel.

[Semirhage]

I know we've heard a lot about body checks and their increasing prevalence, but I think the notion of a "soft" body check gets lost in the quibbling over what constitutes a "true" body check. Body checks, for the few people unfamiliar, are a functional-yet-obnoxious way to create difficulty. You design a mechanic in such a way that you kill the entire party if one person messes up or is dead. Towers in P10S is one; there are 8 towers. If ONE person is out of place or dead when the 8 slots open up, it explodes and basically kills everyone. There are no shields or mitigation that rescues it. You watch the empty spot, look at your healing and support kit and think, "well great. I can't do anything to stop this. We're all just going to die." Body check mechanics have been devaluing reactive play and caster raise utility all expansion.

What I'd call a "soft" body check is perhaps even more prevalent than "true" body checks. Sometime after Heavensward, I can't remember when, Square changed a piece of design philosophy, presumably to curb cheese strategies. E.g. if someone gets a stack marker and dies, the stack marker just moves to someone else. Light party stacks that target both healers: if one healer dies, well good luck. The other stack is going to hit a random person and you have zero way of telling or truly mitigating the effects from it. While the ubiquitous (and getting rather stale, come on Square) Healer Light Party Stack With Magic Vulnerability isn't exactly a body check, since you probably won't wipe to it, it's still yet another mechanic that the healer defensive kits can do sweet F-all about. Sure the party may or may not wipe...but some random Dragoon might get the party stack alone in the corner, with zero forewarning and a guaranteed instant death even if you unload what you can. Partner fire stacks in P9? If one person's dead, sucks to be you. Someone might take it alone and just die. It might move onto a random pair and just kill those two, no saving them other than the Raise afterward.

Difficult content should be difficult, sure, but Square's design philosophy hasn't done jack to alleviate the boring healer job design. As much as I harp on boring kit design (and BOY is it boring), the fight design is really hostile to player agency. Potential to rescue a flagging run is more often down to how fast you can raise people and heal them up, not how well you can keep the party actually consistently alive. That part is pre-planned. Mistakes are punished by death, followed by the unpreventable death of 1-7 more people because soft and hard body checks are waaaaaaay too rampant.