Macrocosmos completely invalidating the P3S heal check is stupid

[ty_taurus]

What makes this particular situation with Death's Toll so odd is specifically the healing received down debuff everyone receives after. Macrocosmos allows us to ignore that because even if you reduce half of 999999 damage, that's still topping people off, but what was the intent of the mechanic in the first place? Were we intended to use healer LB3 to meet that check? Healing through it is rough no matter what healers you have, and I can only imagine it was more brutal at launch. If the goal is that they wanted to force us to LB3, then just make the debuff reduce healing received to 1 outside of tools that deliberately max heal (i.e. LB3 and Benediction). If they intended for it to be healed through, then perhaps the damage formula of each AoE should be changed to deal your current max HP as damage, meaning the first hit would hit your for exactly whatever your HP is, then each other hit would just amount to 1. In that instance, Macrocosmos would now only restore 50% of your max HP.

[AnotherPerson]

So...why does Benediction, which is a far, far weaker, jankier ability than Macrocosmos, have the same cooldown? Why does Astrologian get AOE Benediction plus damage on the same cooldown as Benediction? Could it be because healer balance is in the spot it's been for literal years, i.e. Astro has a whole flying boatload of free healing, infinite MP, higher total damage output than a "selfish" job, buffs, mobility, and a partridge in a pear tree?

Awful design decisions aside, the balance within the healer role has always been pretty bad ever since Astro was introduced to the game. You don't have jobs complementing one another with different strengths in different places. You have one or two jobs that can do everything extremely well with zero weaknesses, and one or two jobs that are strictly inferior in almost every single category except maybe one or two. That's not balance.

Because the general level of healers can't use macrocosmos as a benediction button to save their life in majority of the content because they have to start being aware. Delayed heals? I still see ASTs using Benefic II without touching their oGCD heals because they start panicking when everyone suddenly loses a chunk of HP immediately. Sad but true.

I'm still of the mind that AST doesn't need to get its heals nerfed. If they do, they might as well reduce button bloat instead first before nerfing a unique skill like this one. I'd rather they bring WHM to the same level as AST for the "Pure Healers" to be competitive, because as it is now, WHM needs a decent amount of healing redesign to be competitive.

Heck, all healer toolkits need a big re-examining. I'm fine with tanks getting more self-heals and party heals, but it leaves healers with only one or two offensive skills in a weird place still.

[elioaiko]

What, the party has to sit through this whole 20s song and dance just to set up a mechanic that is handled with one button? That's just dumb.

That mechanic is really no one's problem besides the healers and I'm not counting moving to your positions because everyone has to do that, healers included on top of healing through it.

I get what you're saying, but at the same time you don't think having AOE Benediction is a tad disgustingly overpowered, especially on a job that's already in an incredibly comfortable spot even without it? None of the other jobs have a potential infinite potency AOE heal without burning a third level limit break. That'd be like Reaper getting a 5000 potency attack on a 3 minute cooldown. That's busted.

I think perhaps should be tuned to heal your HP bar at 50% as way for it to be worth the 3 min CD, that way it's not OP. But I personally love the idea of Macro from a design stance–being rewarded for using it on a healer-demanding mechanic.

And fair point on the RPR thing but RPR isn't OP anymore and they didn't have to nerf them, they brought SAM, BLM, MNK up to par. Now people aren't saying that it's OP like at launch.

Of course it should be tuned but I'd rather they buff WHM to have unused Lilybell stacks saved up or be able to burst all the stacks into one strong AoE at a very high potency. Regardless, WHM needs more control over Lilybell because if was intended to be the equivalent of Macrocosmos (they even share the same CD) then they should be able to detonated like AST can with Earthly Star and Macro. This way WHM has a strong AoE heal for Death's Toll with a PI Rapture to top everyone up.

Simply wanting AST to have to work as hard as WHM during that mechanic only showcases the purpose of why WHM struggles during that part.

WHM struggles because they have to top everyone off very quickly and a chance of failure if you start too late or someone's latency didn't register that last heal.

And quite frankly, I'm not a fan of mechanics forcing you to heal within seconds of each mechanic. It's this mechanic vomit that they string together that shows WHM's weaknesses. WHM is not built to handle sustained healing if they want to be optimal. I thought that P2S's Flood and Sewer Deluge timings were great because it spaces the mechanics out enough to where you have to think about where you're gonna use a heal without having to AoE heal constantly while everyone is spread (P4S) while dealing with your own mechanic.

But anyway, I don't disagree that Macrocosmos is too OP but it's only super OP in that mechanic specifically and should only be tuned to where the heal isn't more than your HP bar on detonation.

[Recon1o6]

tbh its just a really dumb mechanic.

Macrocosmos shouldn't be nerfed. What astro needs is the rest of its healing kit nerfed. Plus its an element of time magic given to Astro when it had all of it stripped away in shb.

Whm absolutely should get something though and some serious buffs. Its at its lowest point since stormblood. Liturgy is awful, its mp is awful, its still got nothing that other healers can't do better. Misery is still a loss

[Cheremia]

Imagine a healer ability actually worthy of its 3 minute cooldown.

I'm looking at you Benediction, Liturgy of the Bell, Dissipation...

Best part to that is, that people... said Macrocosmos is bad.

Same with the speed/defense buff of SCH (cant remember name right now).
Before Endwalker came out, that is.

Lilly was the "good" one, even tho i immediately knew it was bad once it was released that you need to get hit for it to work.
And yet... "its a big heal so its good" ...

How the turns have tabled and turns out that Heals with extra effects are always better than pure heals.

Macrocosmos is stupid and worth using. Its literally one of the only sklls worth the 3 minutes timer, i agree.

[eagledorf]

Best part to that is, that people... said Macrocosmos is bad.

Same with the speed/defense buff of SCH (cant remember name right now).
Before Endwalker came out, that is.

Lilly was the "good" one, even tho i immediately knew it was bad once it was released that you need to get hit for it to work.
And yet... "its a big heal so its good" ...

How the turns have tabled and turns out that Heals with extra effects are always better than pure heals.

Macrocosmos is stupid and worth using. Its literally one of the only sklls worth the 3 minutes timer, i agree.

You're thinking of Expedient. I don't think anybody thought or was bad, just that it's lame that it's just another damage mitigation plus sprint. The last thing scholars needed was another mitigation skill to bloat the hotbar. Just give two charges of Fey Illumination and add the movement speed in there, it's not really a new skill that needs to exist

[Cheremia]

You're thinking of Expedient. I don't think anybody thought or was bad, just that it's lame that it's just another damage mitigation plus sprint. The last thing scholars needed was another mitigation skill to bloat the hotbar. Just give two charges of Fey Illumination and add the movement speed in there, it's not really a new skill that needs to exist

More mitigation means less healing.
Sch is "protect others from damage to begin with" healer, so it fits perfectly fine with what SCH is. Barrier healer, as you might name it.

I would trade Expedient for Lillybell all day.
The less damage people get, the less i need to use on heals.

Especially, at a point where you know fights in and out, using mitigation to begin with is always better than healing through more damage than needed because you're a silly whm that only has wings and they are on a mega cooldown.

Also the sprint is super nice.

I'm sick of "more healing" anyways, was for a while, so i guess i will not agree that more mitigation tools are the bad thing compared to the extremely strong heals every healer gets.

Macrocosmos...

[Semirhage]

I'm still of the mind that AST doesn't need to get its heals nerfed. If they do, they might as well reduce button bloat instead first before nerfing a unique skill like this one. I'd rather they bring WHM to the same level as AST for the "Pure Healers" to be competitive, because as it is now, WHM needs a decent amount of healing redesign to be competitive.

Late Heavenward/early Stormblood begins to flash before my eyes, reminding me the healer role is trapped in Groundhog Day.

Thank heavens I'm playing DPS instead of huffing WHM copium this time around though. I've heard "just bring WHM up to match the others" so many times it gives me a nostalgia chuckle.

Outside one or two patches with egregious design flubs on the other healers that got potency buffed to compensate, WHM has been the weakest healer for about six years now. I foresee no future where Square actually stops treating this job like all its mains are masochists.

By this point WHM's identity has been "boring with garbage cooldowns" longer than it hasn't.

[Risvertasashi]

Late Heavenward/early Stormblood begins to flash before my eyes, reminding me the healer role is trapped in Groundhog Day.

Thank heavens I'm playing DPS instead of huffing WHM copium this time around though. I've heard "just bring WHM up to match the others" so many times it gives me a nostalgia chuckle.

While WHM is in a pretty terrible place, Macrocosmos goes further - people are locking slots to AST, meaning they don't event want SGE + SCH - a very performant healer combo - in no small part because macrocosmos is just that strong. So, yeah, not even an issue of bringing WHM up for this fight.

Now more to the personal side of your comment. Me too. Exact same boat here - I've played WHM for many years and been through the seasons of it being locked out of parties before.

Now I'm maining DPS and I feel like I've dodged such a bullet. Groundhog day indeed. Still makes me sad to see healers like this, though...

[Liam_Harper]

I don't think Death's Toll should necessarily be taken out. I think Astro having AOE Benediction is complete BS and the ability should be fixed so it doesn't generate a fifty gajillion potency heal in response to mechanics that overkill the party and then healblock them for flavor reasons.

And then what? The Devs continue to ignore WHM and the Sylphies go "hey, WHM is ok in p3s now!" and it continues being the most popular class on all fights, solidifying its position as being "fine".

I actually disagree on this one, because as ridiculously good as Macrocosmos is, it is a 90 capstone ability and at least one healer is getting some nice toys. I don't think asking the devs to take away toys from other healers is a good way to get attention for fixing WHM. It's sort of like when some people here became fixated on nerfing tank heals, despite the fact it'd solve none of our own issues or the fact bosses hit like wet noodles.

Death's Toll and the fact it made WHM the least popular healer on a fight for once is actually a tiny spark of hope in that here's a mechanic that requires some heavy healing and the toolkit of the supposed "healing powerhouse" is falling flat. Rather than ask the devs to nerf AST and call it a day, I'd rather draw attention to the actual proof of WHM falling flat on heavy healing.