Is it fun?

[Semirhage]

I think the bigger problem here is that SE wants a pure healer... the playerbase hasn't played any of the healing classes as a pure healer since like ARR (even then, Green DPS was a thing if you were good at juggling Cleric Stance). Probably the best way forward is to follow the example set forth by Assize (except drop the mana regen from the other DPS skills) and attach either an AoE flat heal AoE HoT to them all so the healers are healing while they DPS which will lessen the need for their pure healing skills. That way SE can create a more interesting DPS rotation as the healers don't stop healing while focusing on DPS.

The playerbase has basically said healers are green DPS, it'd be nice if SE had the class design follow what the playerbase wants.

I wouldn't even say Green DPS necessarily what the playerbase wants (though I'm in that camp. I think it's way more interesting than straight heal spamming). It's what their game design encourages. They can wax on and on about "pure healing" as much as they want. The low healing requirements, the huge gaps of time between unavoidable damage, the nonexistence of any other options to focus on when everyone's at full HP, the tight enrages, the fact that higher party damage output is a good thing 99.99% of the time...it all dances around healers doing damage as the clear answer to those facts. Someone on the design team really got attrition healing into their craw and thinks XIV's healers need to be designed with that model in mind, but it ain't gonna happen. The GCD is too long for consistent crazy clutch healing. There's no concept of MP management within the GCD healing kits; you need to be able to choose your heals based on efficiency for that, and the functionally equivalent GCD heals in this game are differentiated largely by time and AOE size efficiency, not mana. Which is a knock-on effect from the fact that the GCD is so long: time becomes the most important deciding factor in a lot of cases. They want the game to be widely accessible, but to do that you need to minimize the unfortunate consequences of getting a bad healer, which is almost the polar opposite of what you want to make skilled attrition healing a thing.

It's as if they really want a job that's good at applying Water Resistance Down to enemies. And we keep telling them that's completely worthless in the game they've designed, but Water Resist Down is just the best idea ever guys, really.