Healers Exist for DPS fun only?

[Allegor]

Taking avoidable damage is part of no one's role, which is the specific scenario you painted out.

Dealing with unavoidable damage is the healer's purpose. That is why they exist. They do not exist to deal damage - They do varying amounts of it from system to system, but that isn't why they are there. They are there to deal with the damage you cannot avoid. They do not exist to focus the damage output of a superior enemy on to themselves and minimize it with superior defenses.

Contrary to what you are saying, the only reason the healer archetype exists is so that enemies can deal damage greater than your party's total health and not have it end in defeat.

Either we're just not seeing eye to eye, or you're advocating that the current state of healers is good, if not ideal [might as well remove our one dps spell then?]. Either way I don't have the communication skills nor mood to keep a conversation that's apparently going nowhere, so let's just agree to disagree.

[Kabooa]

Since you are having trouble, I will make the effort to simplify this for you.

Inexperienced players are in every role. Anyone taking extra damage requires additional attention (AKA being "Babied") and it is not limited to the DPS.

"Tanks" absolutely do not take avoidable damage as part of their role, beyond fight specific uptime optimizations. Neither do "Healers", and especially not the "DPS".

Healing, as a role in FF14, is not about being a 'safety net'. It is literally about countering the damage the enemy puts out that other roles cannot recover from. That isn't a safety net. A safety net would be a system in which ALL damage is avoidable, ALL characters have a means of restoring their own health despite their load outs, and thus someone SPECIFICALLY loading up to HEAL other allies is a safety net.

Examples of this include but are not limited to Monster Hunter, Diablo, most of the Action oriented RPGs, and even baseline singleplayer Final Fantasy, because Potions are useful.

In order for Healing to be a safety net in FF14, all characters would need a baseline ability to restore their health such that no enemy could kill them with unavoidable damage. This only exists in very niche and well coordinated set ups in the content that the game is actually tuned around.

Effectively everything below Savage, nothing is required. You don't need healers, you don't need tanks, you don't need DPS. Take 8 of basically anything and you will win. (Except All Melee or all PRanged.)

Consider the following as a thought exercise.

If all damage were avoidable, would you play a healer at any point in FF14's history?

[ItMe]

Healing, as a role in FF14, is not about being a 'safety net'. It is literally about countering the damage the enemy puts out that other roles cannot recover from. That isn't a safety net.

You're right, that's not a safety net, but... I also don't think think the most accurate term for what I think they're thinking.

You're right. Healing is about countering the damage the enemy puts out.
But... (and correct me if I'm wrong Allegor, though I see you're trying to gracefully withdraw) it sounds like the frustration stems from that being basically all healers do in FF14. They have broil, a dot, and then a boat load of "You're not dead yet" buttons. And if hitting those buttons isn't satisfying I can understand how one would feel like they're just there for the sake of other players.

[Kabooa]

You're right, that's not a safety net, but... I also don't think think the most accurate term for what I think they're thinking.

You're right. Healing is about countering the damage the enemy puts out.
But... (and correct me if I'm wrong Allegor, though I see you're trying to gracefully withdraw) it sounds like the frustration stems from that being basically all healers do in FF14. They have broil, a dot, and then a boat load of "You're not dead yet" buttons. And if hitting those buttons isn't satisfying I can understand how one would feel like they're just there for the sake of other players.

I have at no point said "The current state with healing is good", but if one's complaint with being a healer is that the healer's existence is dependent on other players, quite simply, they should play another role.

That doesn't mean we cannot improve the experience (But frankly, I do not care to get into this, especially not in this thread), but picking a role that by definition focuses its attention on other players and singling that out as a negative has got to be one of the most inane assertions about class design I've seen yet.

And if you haven't seen the Tank/DPS forums being cluttered by certain topics, I will tell you that the bar for that was set exceedingly high.

[FoxCh40s]

I have at no point said "The current state with healing is good", but if one's complaint with being a healer is that the healer's existence is dependent on other players, quite simply, they should play another role.

That doesn't mean we cannot improve the experience (But frankly, I do not care to get into this, especially not in this thread), but picking a role that by definition focuses its attention on other players and singling that out as a negative has got to be one of the most inane assertions about class design I've seen yet.

And if you haven't seen the Tank/DPS forums being cluttered by certain topics, I will tell you that the bar for that was set exceedingly high.

That's the exact issue I take though, is that the healing itself in this game isn't even interesting. High level play of healing is actively avoiding heal as much as you possibly can.

So what do we have left? Dps'ing. It's why all the veteran Healers and myself included are so focused on it; because it's all we have left of the Role in reality. Healing is not interesting, they've removed every buff and debuff in the game that needs to be maintained beyond Astros cards, and now they've taken away DPS being interesting on Healer from us.

What do we have left to say if we merely exist to fuel DPS fun? That is EXACTLY what it feels like. We know the healing portion of the role isn't going to improve, it never has, and it never will.

[Sebazy]

@OP:

I'm about as jaded as it gets against the current design direction of the healer role in general at the moment. However no, I don't believe that healers are intentionally designed to babysit the DPS.

Rather I think it's a matter of priority with limited job design time being spent with a DPS role specific mindset coupled with a complete lack of understanding or interest in how healers actually play not only at the endgame, but even in mainstream and levelling content as well. This has been a fundamental problem with SE's job design long before Shadowbringers. Debuffs getting taken from healers and shovelled onto DPS roles is a prime example of this but there are plenty more. SCH launching in Stormblood with no spammable AE even at the level cap is another favourite example of mine.

The issue is one of either misguided effort, or just a complete lack of.

[FoxCh40s]

@OP:

I'm about as jaded as it gets against the current design direction of the healer role in general at the moment. However no, I don't believe that healers are intentionally designed to babysit the DPS.

Rather I think it's a matter of priority with limited job design time being spent with a DPS role specific mindset coupled with a complete lack of understanding or interest in how healers actually play not only at the endgame, but even in mainstream and levelling content as well. This has been a fundamental problem with SE's job design long before Shadowbringers. Debuffs getting taken from healers and shovelled onto DPS roles is a prime example of this but there are plenty more. SCH launching in Stormblood with no spammable AE even at the level cap is another favourite example of mine.

The issue is one of either misguided effort, or just a complete lack of.

Well said and agreed.

I would like to clarify that us existing to simply fuel their fun is certainly what it feels like, though I have no real tangible proof to back it up other than anecdotal evidence and personal insight.

[Kraniel]

Not only the DPS, but it does feel like healers are here just to make sure people can queue for content and that's it.

Honestly, even savage/extreme content has nothing to do with healing most of the time. If you avoid mechanics correctly, every room-wide AoE is countered by one AoE heal button press ... It's ridiculous.
Might as well go the GW2 way and put a couple healing spells on each class, then remove healers entirely from the game at this point.

There's always times when we do feel like we had a proper influence on the issue of the fight, but those are rare. Usually it's either "people know the mechanics and everything goes smoothly" or "people don't know the mechanics and we wipe".

There's always exceptions, but that's my general feeling.

[Liam_Harper]

Remember, the reason tanks and healers only do 40-50% of the damage a dps does instead of 75% with more engagement, is so even bad dps can feel useful. We can't even feel powerful or have more impact to a raid, despite being the most in-demand roles, because bad dps wouldn't feel as important.

It's just sad when making tank/heal appealing by making them powerful juggarnauts that you're glad to see on a team when played well is so unthinkable, that they had to resort to simplification, making us 1 button glarebots or watered down melee that press a cd 3 times in a 10 minute fight to try and convince people to play them instead for a free pass in endgame content.

[FoxCh40s]

Remember, the reason tanks and healers only do 40-50% of the damage a dps does instead of 75% with more engagement, is so even bad dps can feel useful. We can't even feel powerful or have more impact to a raid, despite being the most in-demand roles, because bad dps wouldn't feel as important.

It's just sad when making tank/heal appealing by making them powerful juggarnauts that you're glad to see on a team when played well is so unthinkable, that they had to resort to simplification, making us 1 button glarebots or watered down melee that press a cd 3 times in a 10 minute fight to try and convince people to play them instead for a free pass in endgame content.

*cries and rocks in corner*