A summary of healer issues

[AmiableApkallu]

I'm not being rude at all. Your original point was that two actions that do the same thing or similar things are bothersome, but then later argued that doesn't apply if your name doesn't start with H and end with -ealer. I'm just trying to understand where your logic is coming from. You said because they have to pay attention to the party, but so do the DPS. How is that rude?

First of all, all of your examples have thus far been, "it'd be nice if a DPS was looking at the party list and did <action>, but it's not required for any content where those situations actually arise."

Putting that aside, a DPS's first and primary responsibility is to deal damage. As such, there's no real decision making to be had. "What do I do for this GCD? Damage. What do I do for the next GCD? Damage." That is, obviously, beyond boring if all they have is one button. Thus, you give the jobs multiple buttons for dealing damage. The "meaning" of the job, if there's any to be found, is in finding the order in which to push those buttons to deal maximum damage, and then to actually do all that button pushing while under the stress of mechanics.

On the other hand, one might expect that a healer should, well, focus on healing. Reducing their damage kits down to one button is not opposed to that goal, nor does it, a priori, make their jobs utterly boring. After all, a complete and total clown fiesta isn't boring with current kits; "what do I do for this GCD?" is far from pre-determined. As a result, one might then assign blame to the game's combat model, where in high-end content, no one's allowed to fail mechanics, and there's no real randomness in outgoing damage, thus eliminating everything that might actually make playing a healer interesting.

[ty_taurus]

First of all, all of your examples have thus far been, "it'd be nice if a DPS was looking at the party list and did <action>, but it's not required for any content where those situations actually arise."

Putting that aside, a DPS's first and primary responsibility is to deal damage. As such, there's no real decision making to be had. "What do I do for this GCD? Damage. What do I do for the next GCD? Damage." That is, obviously, beyond boring if all they have is one button. Thus, you give the jobs multiple buttons for dealing damage. The "meaning" of the job, if there's any to be found, is in finding the order in which to push those buttons to deal maximum damage, and then to actually do all that button pushing while under the stress of mechanics.

On the other hand, one might expect that a healer should, well, focus on healing. Reducing their damage kits down to one button is not opposed to that goal, nor does it, a priori, make their jobs utterly boring. After all, a complete and total clown fiesta isn't boring with current kits; "what do I do for this GCD?" is far from pre-determined. As a result, one might then assign blame to the game's combat model, where in high-end content, no one's allowed to fail mechanics, and there's no real randomness in outgoing damage, thus eliminating everything that might actually make playing a healer interesting.

I quite literally have wiped due to not having enough mitigation in the first tier of this savage when I was running PF as a SGE because of DPS not using Feint/Addle. Savage content is a group effort, so I don't really care if you're a tank, DPS, healer, crafter, gatherer, blue mage, whatever... you should be paying attention to your team. Perhaps I could've blown all of my cooldowns/barriers, but then I wouldn't have had them for later mechanics.

Finding the order in which to push your buttons while under the stress of mechanics is the definition of cooldown-based MMO gameplay. Any job that denies the player that functionality is designed antithetically to the genre that it's in. One of the luxuries of FFXIV is how forgiving 95% of all of its content is. Although there is a "right" order in which to use your skills, you can quite literally disregard that and press buttons at random and still clear almost everything available in this game. That is not hyperbolic. If you don't believe me, try. Run into your expert roulette, your alliance roulette, into an EX farm party even. Just take off any movement skills on your hotbar and press buttons as randomly as possible. As long as you're still moving to the correct locations, you'll clear the content.

This is why the argument of "it's too much pressure for the healer" dissolves into nothingness like wet cotton candy. Even savage will not ask you to min-max your healer DPS actions on launch week. It is expected that you will approach healing cautiously as you get a feel for the fight's mechanics and overspend on GCD healing. "But what if things turn into a clown fiesta?" Ok, then stop attacking and heal. I don't see the big deal.

[ForsakenRoe]

I quite literally have wiped due to not having enough mitigation in the first tier of this savage when I was running PF as a SGE because of DPS not using Feint/Addle. Savage content is a group effort, so I don't really care if you're a tank, DPS, healer, crafter, gatherer, blue mage, whatever... you should be paying attention to your team. Perhaps I could've blown all of my cooldowns/barriers, but then I wouldn't have had them for later mechanics.

More than this, 'paying attention to your team' is just a nice thing to practice, for the times where you actually might need it. Sure you can go through the whole game, not giving one {flying sardine} about your team or looking at anyone's hp bars but your own as a BRD, but by practicing that attention and keeping yourself proficient at it, means that maybe you can save a wipe from happening with a timely Paean to cleanse a debuff, for example. To me, anyone who says 'I shouldn't have to pay attention to my team as a non-healer' is a detriment to their party, in any game. If you're playing Overwatch as a DPS and you give zero regard to your teammates, their positioning, their HP, only caring about yourself, you're going to get yourself and your team killed. It's selfish behavior, and in a teamplay-oriented game, it's counterproductive, it makes you more likely to 'fail' rather than 'succeed'.

Go play a MOBA or such as any non-support role, 'pay zero attention to your team', chances are you'll get rolled. Take that garbage attitude back to singleplayer games where the NPCs don't mind getting treated like servants to you, the 'real hero of the story'

(not directed at you Ty you're ok in my book)

[AmiableApkallu]

I quite literally have wiped due to not having enough mitigation in the first tier of this savage when I was running PF as a SGE because of DPS not using Feint/Addle. Savage content is a group effort, so I don't really care if you're a tank, DPS, healer, crafter, gatherer, blue mage, whatever... you should be paying attention to your team. Perhaps I could've blown all of my cooldowns/barriers, but then I wouldn't have had them for later mechanics.

Savage content (on launch) is quite literally not a "it'd be nice if…" situation.

Finding the order in which to push your buttons while under the stress of mechanics is the definition of cooldown-based MMO gameplay. Any job that denies the player that functionality is designed antithetically to the genre that it's in.

Jobs don't exist in isolation. They exist within a combat model. The two have to work together. You want jobs to change to fit the current combat model? Fair. I merely pointed out an alternate take, that the combat model should change to fit the current jobs. And really, that's a change that would benefit everyone, not just the healers, because if it is really about "the stress of mechanics", then let's see how everyone does when there's enough randomness that they can't plan out all the possibilities in advance.

I mean, the combat model, with all of its predictable scripting, is boring. Piling on more DPS buttons to push will certainly give healers an opportunity to expend more of their attention span and effort, but, my two cents, is unlikely to actually do anything about that boredom unless you introduce BLM-like failure states that are recognizable in all content (which is something that most all of the jobs lack).

[Semirhage]

Jobs don't exist in isolation. They exist within a combat model. The two have to work together. You want jobs to change to fit the current combat model? Fair. I merely pointed out an alternate take, that the combat model should change to fit the current jobs. And really, that's a change that would benefit everyone, not just the healers, because if it is really about "the stress of mechanics", then let's see how everyone does when there's enough randomness that they can't plan out all the possibilities in advance.

I mean, the combat model, with all of its predictable scripting, is boring. Piling on more DPS buttons to push will certainly give healers an opportunity to expend more of their attention span and effort, but, my two cents, is unlikely to actually do anything about that boredom unless you introduce BLM-like failure states that are recognizable in all content (which is something that most all of the jobs lack).

Which is a fair point!

However.

What are you going to do about skill gaps? There will always be one, and it'll always be larger than you estimate. One person will struggle bus their way through an Extreme. Another will breeze through it. Same with Savage. This is normal, because you can't tune an encounter to be played absolutely perfectly (or even close to it) and expect most people to even attempt it. What's the upper quartile of that list of people going to do when they've mastered their healing game? What's a new player practicing their skills going to look forward to? Spamming Glarebroileficosis. Spamming Glare isn't fun. It's not a suitable reward for mastering your class. Even if you shake up encounter design to make healing more dynamic and fun, the reward for being good at it still sucks donkey balls.