Fixing Every Healer Job

[Conchoidal]

But at that point, what's the point of even having relevant DPS heals when they become so weak that they serve literally 0 purpose? It's not going to save you in a pinch in solo fights, nor will they be any more useful if they're nerfed outside of high-end party coordination. At that point, the skills are just there to take up hotbar space. Individual DPS jobs would just lose their own identities and self-survivability in the process, benefitting no one.

The problem isn't the healing from other jobs. Their healing is already weak enough and spaced apart as is, but jobs have been able to do content without healers. That implies it's a problem with how much total unavoidable damage there is. What needs to change is either raising the unavoidable damage players take more frequently or making the healer GCD more interesting instead of the same button over and over again.

If they won't raise damage requirements (as they said they won't do), then all that can really change is giving healers a decent GCD rotation.

That means both reducing the number of healing abilities to encourage more GCD healing and increasing the number of GCD DPS spells to change up the GCD playstyle. That way, healers aren't forced to spam only Glare or Cure II.

I don't really think the developers really understand how healing can work considering they continue to completely simplify every mechanic that requires consideration (i.e. enmity, MP). The only solution is as you say, to expand healer DPS kits through GCDs, and if they had a skill-floor/ceiling between WHM and DRK there would be far fewer complaints from casuals and high-end raiders alike.

[ThorneDynasty]

It'd also help make the healing more interesting if instead of a stupid amount of interchangeable oGCD heals, using your GCD heals was actually required and had some interaction. It's kind of pathetic that kits that are entirely stuffed with healing abilities either have no thought process outside of flat heal buffs or utilizing the few combo-like effects is basically unnecessary 99% of the time. AST's horoscope is basically the peak design there, which is pretty sad.

[Katoar]

That means both reducing the number of healing abilities to encourage more GCD healing and increasing the number of GCD DPS spells to change up the GCD playstyle. That way, healers aren't forced to spam only Glare or Cure II.

Anything nerf related to healing oGCDs and spells will be counter-productive.

[SirShady]

Can you give an illustrated rotation incorporating the changes implemented? I wrote an example of a rotation but after the 60s I am still not reaching a loop in any particular part of the rotation except Glare-Smite and DoT refresh.

Glare (2,5s) - Smite(5s) - Dia(7,5s) - Refulgence/Aero3(10s) - Glare(12,5s) - Shine(15s) - Glare(17,5s) - Smite(20s) - Glare(22,5s) - Shine(25s) - Bloom(27,5s) - Afflatus Lily(30s) - Glare(32,5s) - Smite(35s) - Dia(37,5s) - Refulgence(40s) - Glare(42,5s) - Shine(45s) - Glare(47,5s) - Smite(50s) - Glare(52,5s) - Shine(55s) - Afflatus Lily(57,5s) - Afflatus Lily(60s) - Misery(62,5) - and still not looping

Also, Bloom can be cast twice per minute, are we supposed to use it despite not having misery ready? What's the intended optimal playstyle?

I hadn't really thought much about rotation windows honestly (same with potencies), but the numbers can be adjusted to make it more fluid. It isn't supposed to be too strict of a rotation as the timings on lilies usage and shines would change depending on the fight. And yes, Bloom is meant to be used twice in between each cast of Misery if possible as it buffs your upcoming Misery up to two times. Honestly, written out that way it is a bit clunky. I'll go ahead and make Smite's buff last 30 seconds so you're not recasting as much.

Glare 2.5 - Smite 5 - Dia 7.5 - Refulgence 10 - Glare 12.5 - Shine 15 - Glare 17.5 - Shine 20 - Bloom 22.5 - Lily? 25 - Glare 27.5 - Shine 30 - Glare 32.5 - Smite 35 - Dia 37.5 - Refulgence 40 - Glare 42.5 - Shine 45 - Lily? 47.5 - Lily? 50 - Bloom 52.5 - Misery 55 - Glare 57.5 - Shine 60 - Glare 62.5 - Smite 65 - Dia 67.5 - Refulgence 70...

This leaves more flexibility for getting heals and shines in since those are pretty interchangeable (assuming lilies don't break your combo). If this is still too much to juggle, an easy change would be to limit the amount of times you need to cast Shine to one. That frees up 10 seconds from the one-minute rotation for any adjustments. That would make it much easier to stack your blooms, open up more time for GCD heals which white mage uses more than any other healer job, and let you use your refulgence procs more without throwing off your rhythm.

Glare 2.5 - Smite 5 - Dia 7.5 - Refulgence 10 - Glare 12.5 - Shine 15 - Bloom 17.5 - Glare 20 - Shine 22.5 - FREE 25 - FREE 27.5 - FREE 30 - Glare 32.5 - Smite 35 - Dia 37.5 - Refulgence 40 - FREE 42.5 - FREE 45 - Bloom 47.5 - Misery 50 - FREE* 52.5 - FREE* 55 - Glare 57.5 - Shine 60 - Glare 62.5 - Smite 65 - Dia 67.5 - Refulgence 70...

Any of the "FREE" spaces before Misery could be used for Lilies, GCD heals, Refulgence procs or more Glare/Shine combos.

[CSX]

I only play for 1-2hrs tops not endgame by no means, not even close, this was my day off to play more but maintenance on holiday. I feel as though they can fix healers by giving them skills that engage party members with something other than heals and shields. My favorite healer, AST was the ONLY one that did this and it looks like they're about to do away with it. They should be giving every healer a specialty buff that we can apply and rotate on individual members consistently with a short enough CD instead of removing them. Like, WHM gives Haste, SCH gives Crit, AST gives ATK, SGE gives DH where different buffs stack or all of them give unstackable ATK buff instead to prevent favoritism and just assign 3 people per healer to rotate and manage in 8 man content. Like any RPG, healers should be strengthening their party members and contributing through not only heals and shields but buffs as well, not actually contributing with raw DPS. . .but it seems and feels as though thanks to the parsing mentality for brag rights everyone opts to pressing 1 for 30minutes then these SAME people complain about healing being too easy.

[SirShady]

Added some changes to Sage! Gave Eukrasia versions of Duodosis and Dykrasia. Eukasia Duodosis works to empower your next attack's Kardia effect, giving it combo potential with Eukrasia Tridosis and the new Physis. While Eukrasia Dykrasia sets up your Toxikons to deal much more AoE damage, since I didn't add anything to spice up the AoE rotation of the job. Combine this with your new ways of getting Addersting stacks and you'll be putting out a great amount of AoE damage as well as some nice spot healing.

[SargeTheSeagull]

I love basically all your ideas. Especially your take on sage. I was actually about to make a post on here about what I'd change about sage and overall you and I had nearly identical ideas. My idea for sage was largely the same: Your main way of healing is via kardia and it has what amounts to a combo. However, I played with the similarity with sage and red mage in previous FF games where the jobs were very similar insofar as they used black and white magic. That wouldn't make a whole lot of sense given 14 sage's identity of sci-fi effects and whatnot so instead my idea had sage's rotation rely on procs like red mage.
Dosis has a high chance to proc duodosis which has a chance to proc tridosis. Both of these would increase your damage or grant sings. Alternatively, if you use eukrasia they turn into spells that increase healing and grant a gall respectively. I also had the idea of removing ixochole. In its place would be phlegma which would have the unique effect of healing for 100% of its damage dealt. It would also have a cooldown that guarantees its combo will proc on two charges with a 45/60 sec or so cooldown. Also, i'd remove panhaima and instead make pneuma work as it does in PvP where it applies panhaima instead. Haima/panhaima can be dispelled by pepsis.

[SirShady]

Feedback.

Hey! I'm glad you enjoyed the changes so much! Honestly I was majorly disappointed to learn that Sage didn't do anything new with the class fantasy. I'd take either of our changes over the current iteration.

[Mortex]

Hey! I'm glad you enjoyed the changes so much! Honestly I was majorly disappointed to learn that Sage didn't do anything new with the class fantasy. I'd take either of our changes over the current iteration.

I must say the changes are good and way better they are in game atm (sadly for the game not that hard) but for white mage I would actually love more of a element specific gameplay, the job is based on the life giving elements( or astral elements) water earth and wind. I would have too have a system we’re you boils these up as a gauge and could combine then for group buff effects or enemy debuff effect. So you have 3 different combinations options for all situations.

[SirShady]

I must say the changes are good and way better they are in game atm (sadly for the game not that hard) but for white mage I would actually love more of a element specific gameplay, the job is based on the life giving elements( or astral elements) water earth and wind. I would have too have a system we’re you boils these up as a gauge and could combine then for group buff effects or enemy debuff effect. So you have 3 different combinations options for all situations.

Well thank you kindly! Honestly, the only reason why I left out the elements for White Mage is because I think they've been leaning them more toward holy/light-mage to make room for Geomancer having the water/aero/earth spell lines. If they AREN'T however, I'd love to see White Mage get its flavor back.