Getting to Know You (Healer Gaming Styles)

[ToodlesElNoodles]

There’s something I’m curious about the healer community. One, I would like to get to know more about you guys.

So, if you’d be willing, 5 things I’d like all of you to share:

1) How long have you been playing?

2) Do you use controller or mouse/keyboard?

3) Do you find healing too boring, too hectic, or just right?

4) Based off question 3, which content are you referring to.

5) How many healers have you maxed and which is your preferred to play? Which is your least preferred?

Mine: Been playing for a few months. I use controller. Currently, I feel healing is fine. Prefer casual raiding, dungeon running, PvP, slowly moving into endgame trials/raids - my motivation is fun. I have all healers maxed. Most preferred SCH, least preferred WHM.

Thank you! And looking forward to know more about y’all!

[ty_taurus]

1. I've been playing since the open beta of A Realm Reborn on and off.

2. I play with a controller on PS4 (PS5 if I could ever get my hands on one).

3. I find the current iteration of healing too boring most of the time.

4. Healing can be a lot more fun when you're progging content, or in some cases playing through more unique content like Eureka and Bozja; however, I feel that healing flat out is not designed with solo content (the MSQ), Dungeons, Treasure Maps, Hunts, Roulettes (usually), Farming shared FATEs, Deep Dungeon farming, farming old Trials, or farming certain current Trials (some are better than others) in mind.

5. Currently, I have every job maxed at level 80. My main job is Dancer and I almost never heal these days (though I love playing healers and support and am cautiously optimistic for the SGE and AST changes). WHM is probably the least offensive for me right now despite its weaving issues, but SCH upsets me because I LOVED 2.0 and 3.0 SCH, and even 4.0 SCH was pretty good after Energy Drain and Miasma II were restored to their kit. Like it genuinely breaks my heart to see how SCH has fallen. I loved AST too before, but the Shadowbringers card changes were a disaster, and I'm not even talking about the effects. The atrocity that was 5.0 Sleeve Draw was a crime, and in general it's just been a clunky mess this expansion. They've sterilized it for now, but yeesh! It was basically an attempt to see how clunky they could possibly make the system. I don't love the current card effects, but I don't think going back to the old cards is a good idea either. I'd argue the new cards are worse from a fun factor, and that's more important to me than the balancing factor, but I think it needs a full rework again. I'm hoping this new seal system might make it feel a lot better, but we'll have to wait and see.

[Novak_04]

1. I've been playing for about 5 years -- since Heavensward.

2. Mouse/Keyboard.

3. I enjoy healing.

4. Trials, Raids, and Dungeons.

5. I have every job at 80.

Sage will be my new bae come mid-November!

[Misutoraru]

1) How long have you been playing?
Since 1.0 but having a lot of break in between

2) Do you use controller or mouse/keyboard?
PC, Keyboard and Mouse

3) Do you find healing too boring, too hectic, or just right?
Too boring/just right

4) Based off question 3, which content are you referring to.
too boring for
Dungeon/Story mode raid and Alliance raid espeically when we overgear
Mainly is our healing potency too strong/damage received too low
Would prefer 70-80% GCD healing uptime, or more buff/debuff mechanics

It is just right if we are new to the dungeon/extreme/raid that everyone have little knowledge about mechanic

5) How many healers have you maxed and which is your preferred to play? Which is your least preferred?
All 3 max, favoured AST and least SCH

[fumofu]

1) playing since 2.4

2) pc - keyboard&mouse

3)I find healing gameplay to be just right and prefer it to be easier rather than more difficult

4)Mostly doing regular dungeons

5)Have maxed out all healers and prefer to play SCH because it's simple, fun and been my favorite since 2.4. Least prefered one would be AST because I don't like cards mechanics, which makes it too complex.

[FoxCh40s]

Playing since Early Access 2.0

Controller

I used to enjoy healing, I really do not anymore. Too boring/far too easy.

Yes.

Also yes; have everything maxed out. I gravitate towards White Mage because it's what I started on, can't stand what they've done to Scholar, and honestly got tired of Astro.

[Sebazy]

1) Since 1.0's Beta, although I did take a hiatus a few months after 1.0's release until the ARR beta.

2) Mouse and Keyboard, I've never really been comfy with gamepads

3) That really depends, healing new unknown content is exciting because of how fast people can get flattened and which inturn asks for quick reactions to try to save people during prog. Unfortunately the majority of damage incoming is so absolutely predictable that to a point, it's really not that hard to predict the likelihood of other people making mistakes.

4) Extremes and up. Outside of a few specific points in levelling dungeons, healing in casual content is barely worthy of the word.

5) All 3 at 80 and geared to BiS. WHM is my favourite by far, I'm not entirely sure why, I guess just because it's straight forward with a toolkit that wouldn't be out of place in Everquest or Vanilla WoW. I'm old and stuck in my ways Least favourite? AST I guess, I strongly disliked how the 4.0 changes played and 5.0 just ruined the job for me.

[Lauren]

1) How long have you been playing? Since Alpha

2) Do you use controller or mouse/keyboard? Controller

3) Do you find healing too boring, too hectic, or just right? I find the DPS rotations on healer really boring as they typically involve spamming one button and a dot. There's not enough to heal in majority of general content (not savage/ex) and I find dungeons pretty boring to run as a healer that I try go balls-to-the-wall on DPS. How healers do dungeon and not DPS is beyond me - they must be SO bored/lazy!

4) Based off question 3, which content are you referring to. General Dungeons, roulettes, 24-mans, some ex-primals, open work content

5) How many healers have you maxed and which is your preferred to play? Which is your least preferred? Every job 80. I think AST is my least preferred because I keep forgetting which cards are ranged and which are melee as I switch between WHM and SCH quite often. SCH is middle, I love the idea of SCH but the book is a boring looking weapon and there's nothing super snappy about SCH while WHM has so many oGCDs that I can just run around and spam buttons and it feel fun

[Saefinn]

1) How long have you been playing?

Since 2.0 BETA Phase 3.

2) Do you use controller or mouse/keyboard?

Controller, even though I'm PC. I also play with expanded crossbars, they're not enabled by default but I feel they are wonderful for extending your reach on a controller.

3) Do you find healing too boring, too hectic, or just right?

Too boring. I used to love healing. It can be summed up as: Too much downtime and too little to do in my downtime and not enough push to use my full healing toolkit.

I feel like playing healers in this game started out great and back in the day it was something I complemented about the game. I feel like healer/healing design has just kept going backwards since then.

4) Based off question 3, which content are you referring to.

Everything outside of Savage and EX progression. I'm a semi-casual player, so Savage and EX content is rarer for me, meaning my healing content is mostly:
Alliance Raid, Normal Raid, Bozja, events, MSQ, side quests, dailies and Duty Roulettes.

Then out of Bozja, Delubrum Reginae can sometimes turn me into a Rez Mage, because the doom mechanic means I'm better served rezzing people than actually healing.

FATE grinding in Bozja also means just Holy/Art of War/Gravity spamming. (and heck, FATE grinding is dull even at the best of times)
Critical Encounters are better for upping the healing requirement but don't occur frequently enough IMO. My net experience of Bozja as a healer is negative but had the potential to be positive, which is why I give it a mention. Sure I could swap DPS and healer between FATEs and Critical Engagements, but I was using Bozja to level my WHM and I feel like I should have been able to enjoy the experience.

5) How many healers have you maxed and which is your preferred to play? Which is your least preferred?

I have SCH and AST to 80 on my main and WHM to 80 on an alt and my WHM on my main is nearly 80.
But my main experience healing content has been on SCH and AST.

Pre ShB my prefferred was SCH. In ARR and HW SCH was my baby.
During ShB AST was my preferred. But I would sporadically try SCH to see if I can enjoy it on certain content.

In ShB SCH is my least preferred to play. But WHM is kinda next to it.

Note that out of the 3: AST is the only one that feels like it has something to do in its downtime, despite it being watered down, it still makes it more enjoyable to play than SCH and WHM.

[Recon1o6]

1. playing since ARR beta

2. controller on both pc and ps4

3. Far too boring. To the point I quit healing in 95% of content. I don't run out of mp, The cards are an insult and are so weak that the standard deviation of +/-% on every attack or heal makes them indistinguishable from a series of high rolls in that %, the lily gauge has no depth to it, all my time magic is gone, and the healers are clones of one another.

4. The one place it isn't a one button slog: bozja. Where i can load up with lost seraph strike and burst for some semblance of an aoe rotation. Everywhere else its a glare/malefic spamming snore fest where most of my healing actions are never pressed.
Dungeons? always have and will be a snorefest that get slightly more interesting when a tank doesn't use mitigation. Alliance raids? Glare/malefic spam with more raises. Extremes/savage? I might cast a heal once every 60 or 90 seconds depending on the fight.
Only truly fresh content is remotely interesting, since nobody knows mechanics so I do need to heal a little bit, but there's still the millstone of nothing interesting to do when i dont need to heal. Then after a few days its back to the same old snorefest

5. Ast and whm maxed, most other jobs maxed bar bard, blm and smn/sch. It appears my globe and stick are gonna stay in my saddlebag for another 2 years. If I'm still around after 6.0 that is. The devs admitting they don't care about healer, feedback, veterans enjoyment and any sort of skill ceiling.

I can always look the last bit I enjoy of the game, the story, up on youtube. I'll have a poke about at 7.0 to see if anything changes.