How to easily have healers dps engaged ( yet another thread)

[Renathras]

I like how someone says "Stop the walls of text", but then...

I also wouldn't have to post lengthy posts if there weren't like 5 people replying, so..

Did find the hb tag, so hope that helps a smidege.

Remember, as a White Mage, your soul stone derives from A-Towa-Cant;

While this IS true, it doesn't mean you ARE A-Towa-Cant, nor does it mean his purpose was going through the world and purging things everywhere. A-Towa-Cant's thing was somewhat more exploring the world and interacting with its people, spreading SUCCOR not DESTRUCTION far and wide.

As for Final Fantasy history - historically, WHM's get VERY few damage spells. In fact, the Water/Aero/Earth spells are a somewhat new to White Mage thing. Traditional FF games, WHM has the Holy spell, which is powerful but late-game, occasionally a light damage spell like Dia (which is generally a low-to-mid tier in damage amount), and that's it. The rest of their spells in most FF games are the Cure line, Raise line, Regen line, status effect cleansing line (from the specific statuses like Poisona to the mid-game cure-all of Esuna), defensive utility spells Protect and Shell(which we SHOULD HAVE imo, if nothing else they could be short term defensive tools like Temperance), often Haste and Reflect if Time Mage isn't in the game, more rarely offensive debuffs that aren't overly detrimental (Sleep) and general utility spells like Float, Teleport, or Warp.

White Mages have used hammers and bows, but I'd wager you aren't asking for FFXIV WHMs to be auto-attacking beasts? Though I wouldn't at all be opposed to cure spells working on undead to harm them! I'd love Cure 2 to be offensively useful in some fights, but FFXIV doesn't do stuff like that outside of BLU content and spells aren't coded to have offensive or defensive use like that (you have stuff like Assize which is offensive AND defensive, but it is against all creature types)

I do think your last question is instructive. I'd say we already have a good picture of that: Look at FFXI's versions of the Jobs that FFXIV has: https://finalfantasy.fandom.com/wiki...nal_Fantasy_XI)

Considering FFXI is an old school MMO and is menu based, WHM in an old school FF console game in MMO form would likely be basically what FFXI's WHM is, because...that's what FFXI is.

You don't have to nitpick every other sentence, just summarize it all up in a paragraph.

I have a general philosophy when replying to people: People are important. What they are saying is important. Therefore - I would so be an Ent if I lived in Middle-Earth - if it was worth the time for them to say it, it's worth taking time to respond to it, at least all the major points. You may think it funny, but it's how I show respect to people. I actually reply to all the points they make instead of trying to dumb it down, oversimplify, straw man, or hyperbole their arguments, which is what I consider to be insulting the person and disrespecting them. IF, however, that's what you WANT, I'll try doing that instead.

Yes, I did use hyperbole. It gets the point across. No one is complaining when you use pickle anagrams or whatever to simplify the argument.[/QUOTE]

The problem is when hyperbole falls into the slippery slope fallacy, as it no longer gets the point across. If WAR was made into a single button rotation that had Storm's Path and literally no other spell, that would be pretty bad. But I'm not arguing WHM have Glare AND ONLY GLARE, am I? So you're arguing against a strawman, which is a fallacy. It does not "get the point across", it vastly overstates your argument while not addressing what you're actually arguing against. That makes it a strawman fallacy.

IR = PoM makes more sense as crit weaponskills are automatic baked in and don't require an additional button press. Infuriate compares directly to Lucid Dreaming since both are generating a resource. It's not a perfect comparison (MP is more like TP, but TP no longer exists) and something like Rhizomata is a more exact comparison, but WHM doesn't have a Lily generating ability. Though if you want, we could pretend WHM had a Rhizomata/Aetherflow button and Infuriate was that? Either way, it shows your position is fault and a strawman fallacy, and that doesn't change, no matter what specifics we apply here.

Healer state:

Content: Extremes, Savages, Ultimates, yes, but ALSO some dungeons with enrages Gimlit that ends with the two sisters powering up their attack, the first boss in Troia, as well as a number of normal mode trials with add phases; I distinctly remember doing normal Titania when it was brand new first time in ShB and people were wiping to the add phase, and you get the unusual stuff like Baldession Arsenal and Delubrium but their damage rotations include some off the wall stuff.

I don’t want someone who doesn’t want to put in effort to clear hard content.

They're putting in effort, that's the problem. They're putting in effort to things other than DPS rotations. This is a consistent problem I have with your argument. It assumes that the only form of effort in this game is "herp derp I push button make boss go ouchie!" and literally nothing else is effort. Doing mechanics is not effort. Pressing healing buttons is not effort. What if we did this in reverse and pretended that pressing DPS buttons was not effort, only using tank mitigation was? Then we'd have to say all DPSers are not "putting in effort to clear hard content", wouldn't we?

“Just play ultimate.”

You put this in quotes, yet I didn't say it, did I?

Gear progression does not matter in this game at all for anything other than doing even harder content.

Did you not see where I preemptively answered this question already? You can't just ignore that I already "pre-rebutted" it. You can clear P8S in tome gear. You don't need Savage gear for it, either. You lose this one.

We’re not Padjali though,

We aren't. But you didn't ask that. You said WHM lore, and I'm pointing out that you're wrong on WHM lore, which is much more to the healers and much less to the damagers.

Also, what happens to Sylphie when she only uses healing spells?

Do the quest again. You don't remember it. Let me quote from the Journal for you:

"Brother E-Sumi explains that Sylphie's powers of healing draw not upon the boundless energies of nature, but upon her own limited life force. Should she continue to practice her magic, the young conjurer is in danger of sharing her mother's tragic fate. Deeply concerned, the Padjal pledges for a way to save the girl, and hopes you will aid him should a solution be found. Returning to the subject of your education, the guildmaster expresses his satisfaction with your mastery of conjury's fundamental principles, and bids you strive to attune yourself ever more closely to the elements."

You anti-Sylphie's have used her as a punching bag so long, you don't remember what her "crime" was. She was trying to be a Red Mage. This goes a bit into the weeds, but if you do all the THM/BLM, CNJ, and RDM quests and know their lore, you know that the difference between THM and BLM is that THM's rely on their own internal stores of Aether to cast spells, which is why their magics are ultimately limited. Shantotto discovered one could channel the ambient Aether AROUND them to cast spells, making them far more powerful and unlimited. The White Mages of Amdapor discovered a similar method of using magic (interestingly, it's not stated, but the SCH's of Nym likely did NOT do that, and so didn't contribute to the 5th Calamity). The 5th Calamity was the result of their war and depleting and destabilizing the land's Aether as a whole. After it, it was why Black Magic and White Magic were banned and persecuted. RDMs specifically use their PERSONAL Aether, with techniques that amplify and efficiently reclaim it so the practitioner doesn't drain themselves dry and kill themselves in the process, which requires a great deal of physical conditioning, precise motions in casting, and is both mentally and physically taxing, so RDM's in lore have to be in fantastic physical and mental shape.

Conjurers, though, had a different path. The Elementals decided TO let them channel ambient Aether, but only a trickle, so they would not repeat Amdapor's mistake. Curative magics are more taxing, apparently, and will kill the user trying them at high levels with their personal Aether, as a THM does to cast their basic Fire and Ice spells. Sylphie's mother was a healer that did so, and died. Sylphie was following her mother's path, which would have killed her had she expended too much of her own personal Aether/life force.

Sylphie's crime was never "she cast only healing spells and no attack magic". It was she was drawing on her own life force to cast spells (in general) rather than on the Elemntals.

WHMs follow after the CNJ example, but, because they are entrusted by the Elementals to do so and are relatively few in number, do not have the cap/limit on how much they can channel, and so are capable of using far more powerful spells without, in theory, destabilizing the balance of the natural world.

THAT is WHM's lore and mechanics in FFXIV.

You’re using hyperbole here

Fair enough. My point was, it doesn't mention attack spells or offensive magics AT ALL. Going just by the lore blurb on the class, one would be forgiven for thinking WHM's WERE pure healers. My overall point that you aren't correctly representing WHM lore stands.

Caster design:
Honestly I don’t understand your point here. Do you also admit that SMN does not do casting well either? What does that have to do with Glarespam?

The point is you're citing an appeal to authority that does not exist. You're saying "Casters are X, Y, and Z" when they clearly are not, and you're ignoring the one outright example that proves you're wrong. Casters, in FFXIV, are clearly not limited to needing to stand still and turret. And, my point still stands: Healers are not Casters. They are classified distinctly, just as Tanks (and MCH) are not Melee.

No. I’m attacking flawed game design.

I didn't say you weren't?

I commented on who the arguments were coming from.

Moreover, Glarespam clearly DOES fit the game design. You can argue it makes for a BORING game design, but it was designed by the Devs to fit it. You may not like the fit, but it fits just fine. Glarespam very clearly allows WHM's to participate in and clear content, thus it's more than adequate at it.

Seriously? Since my forum profile says Scholar, that means I don’t have WHM at level 90 and I’m never interested in its aesthetic?

Now who's imagining being attacked? I didn't say you couldn't be interested in other Jobs - I play SCH about as much as I play WHM. But I'm willing to give one up to make other people happy as long as one remains in a state I enjoy it. It's selfish of you to not be willing to do the same, especially since you're the one benefiting from the change.

You also don't understand the options you have here. The option is NOT "you get all 4 healers to your liking OR you get 3 healers to your liking". The option IS "you get 3 healers to your liking OR you get NO healers to your liking and everything stays the same as ShB/EW". You're arguing as if from a point of already having everything you want and being asked to give something up, when the actual situation is you have nothing that you want and are wanting to get everything that you want. You're arguing from a position of weakness but acting like you're arguing from a position of strength.

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The issue is that without the current ogcd healing kit and being more reliant on gcd heals, a majority of in effect halfway interesting healing abilities would be lost and the role itself would become extremely slow to play.

I'm going to try to read this carefully, because there's some good density to this. Have you looked at the APM across Jobs, by chance?

It's oddly not a super accessible number (as far as I can tell on the abacus, you have to look at individuals the Casts and you can't do it by an aggregate across all records of a given Job), but a quick look at the current top of the pile has AST around 42.4 (this doesn't include targeting, btw), which is comparable with MNK (also about 42.7 with a bit higher of a decimal). The SCH on their team was 35.6. The first team down that list with a WHM has 33.7, their SCH co-healer 35.7, and for some more reference points, the first NIN on the list is 47.7 vs first BLM with 33.4 and the first MCH is 46.4. For Tanks, the top team (double DRK) each were 41.5, first GNB is 44.8, first WAR is 34.6, and first PLD is 36.6. Oh, and the first SGE is 35.0.

These are all 99 players except the AST, who is 100, and this is Proto-Carbie, as I figured it'd have the most smoothed numbers (higher fights having more forced movement and downtime and such). We can examine some other fight, but I wager the general story will be similar.

What do we see here?

Overall, we see that healers have a similar APM profile to Tanks, and though I didn't break down all DPS Jobs, the ceiling is likely NIN or MCH around 48 and the floor BLM around 33. And again, note that these are all 99s with a 100 thrown in there, so this represents high end players and optimization and all that.

Is this "extremely slow" to play?

Well, if it is, so are BLM and WAR, and no one is demanding they be loaded with more abilities. And I agree, it's okay for one healer. Which is literally all that I'm asking for/stating as necessary.

No, WHM doesn't need an "elemental rotation". Especially if they actually bite the bullet and add GEO to the game already. Krile needs a new Job for 7.0.

I do agree, though, that I'd like to see more GCD variation. I believe I stated that, too.

You express constant smugness over healers who care about their dps,

No I absolutely do not. You, on the other hand, are constantly talking down your nose to me.

I do agree that I'd like to see healer skill expression - IN HEALING - as more prevalent in the game.

And to be honest, I think your talking about elitism and WoWs supposed toxicity all the time, it kinda feels like you can't get over the trauma of being called out once in your time there.

To be honest, I was never "called out" in WoW. I defended other people who were attacked by meter worshiping crapbaskets, though.

My position is not one of elitism but of basic competency.

I don't think it is. If that was all it was, we wouldn't be having this discussion. You note yourself that basic competency is merely being able to heal the content (your "floor" doesn't include any damage at all, I'll note). Yet you're not talking about/asking after that. You're talking about adding DPS rotations to exclude people from various forms of content. "basic competency" that is not.

I literally picked up healer during Endwalker fresh after not playing it for years and was immediately capable of playing with pretty high dps uptime and barely having to cast heals,

Yes? This is because of how powerful and frequently available oGCDs are. Have I not said over and over that's a problem? And have you not over and over defended those systems and demanded they remain in place, even in this very post, insisting that healers would be "extremely slow to play" without them?

You can't argue for something and then complain about the result of that thing existing at the same time.

If oGCD heals were less prevalent, it would require more GCD heals. But my contention - correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems this way to me reading your posts - is that you don't want to have to press healing GCDs. You want healing to be exclusive oGCD so you can use all your GCDs on damage spells. Is this not so?

With which you then get bored, because there aren't very many of them to press. In effect, your philosophy of healer design creates a problem, then you complain about the problem to achieve an objective of shifting healers ever closer to dpsers.

Healer DPSing being a thing is pretty much the most unique and stand out thing in this game,

To you, perhaps. Many people would say it's the story and characters.

because it was already an established norm and common courtesy when I started the game, arround the end of heavensward.

It really wasn't. There was, in fact, a big fight/discussion over it at the time within the community. So much so the Devs removed Cleric Stance because of the toxicity it fostered.

And to be honest, I feel like story content being so easy that it is impossible to fail is kind of immersion breaking. It would be okay if the WoL would be defined by being just there and special, but they are supposed to be a legendary combatant but the story itself has no casual skill checks for the player to test and proof that.

I feel like this is one of those "depends on your point of view" things. To me, the WoL being able to do all of this without me MECHANICALLY AS A PLAYER having to do crazy stuff is the proof of their legendary prowess. Among the most hated (by many players) parts of EW was the segment where you control the Garlean (basically Gladiator skillset) who is super weak. While we can destroy magitek armor with ease, it's a certain death if you do so during that segment. You have to be extremely careful and cautious as you work your way through the city and use limited resources to struggle to make it.

And most players seemed to HATE it.

I thought it was fantastic because it showed how powerful the WoL IS and why the rank and file Garleans look at you the way they do. It was using game mechanics to explain a point, but was a one-time thing.

If that was happening all the time, if every fight was a struggle at that level, THAT would be immersion breaking.

[Tiramu]

I agree with the wall of text thing, I found it really hard to follow. Sometimes shorter posts, or if long posts are needed then splitting into mutliple posts replying to different things is better.

Anyway, I wouldnt want to change the basic healing tools WHM has (cant speak for other healers).

[AmiableApkallu]

As for Final Fantasy history - historically, WHM's get VERY few damage spells.

That is true, but a lot of Final Fantasy history is single player RPGs where you, as the player, are (1) controlling an entire party, in a combat system that features (2) plenty of randomized outgoing damage and (3) plenty of status effects and elemental affinities.

Point (1) means that you, as the player, don't notice the repetitiveness of any one job as much. Points (2) and (3) mesh well with kits heavy on addressing HP and status effects.

None of those points are true in FFXIV. The actual mechanics of "white mage", and of "healer" in general, need to fit the combat model as it actually exists. (I'd love for the combat model to change, but my gut says that's less likely to happen than changes to job design.)

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WHM is my preferred healer, but after playing FFXIV for a year, it's too simple. Temperance on a 2min cooldown effectively means my only solution to a healing problem is "hope no one dies and fix HP bars after the damage hits." The lily heals and Tetragrammaton are much too close to the bread-and-butter Cure/Medica spells. The DPS kit, maybe also the healing kit, could lean more heavily into CNJ's elemental roots.

If I had to pick a specific play style to aim for, I'd model WHM as a healer after what BLM is as a DPS.

[Renathras]

That is true, but a lot of Final Fantasy history is single player RPGs where you, as the player, are (1) controlling an entire party, in a combat system that features (2) plenty of randomized outgoing damage and (3) plenty of status effects and elemental affinities.

I agree well enough with that. That's why I look at FFXI as the "This is what WHM adapted to an MMO should probably be". If you do a deep dive - I've never played FFXI other than a free trial, but we can look over the webpages like the one I linked above - you can see that it's a similar story to FFXIV's WHM in terms of damage tools. Basically Glare, Dia, Holy with both single target and AOE versions of the spells.

Granted, FFXI is a pretty different game, but as you look through the spell list, note there's no Water, Earth, or Aero spells in the White Mage toolkit. Like...at all. Instead, WHM has access to the Bar- line of spells (which are basically Protect/Shell for specific elements), single target (Cure line) and AOE (Curaga line) heals, and a far more complicated debuff cleanse system than Esuna, as well as having utility spells like Teleport, stat buffs for main stats like Vit and such, and even Sneak. That's what I think a WHM in an MMO has that's fitting to it.

Honestly, I personally feel like the Class -> Job system is just going to go at some point, because there's a lot of wonkiness in it. It's probably only still in the game because changing it would be trouble on the coding side, even though every Job introduced from HW on didn't engage with the system, especially once Cross-Class was removed. WHM coming off of CNJ was a disjointed mistake that causes a lot of confusion with some players liking the Druid-like nature of CNJ and being upset when they put on the White and gradually progress into being what a traditional White Mage is instead. Most game lore doesn't go Druid -> Holy Priest, so people that like the Druid are upset that the end up with Holy Priest.

I am a bit curious, though. Why is WHM your preferred healer? Aesthetics?

I don't ask to pry, just curious. You note it feels too simple to you, but all three of the other healers (even SGE) is more complex in their own ways. So I can't think of any reason other than Aesthetics OR that WHM is easy/straightforward that someone would prefer it, but if said person thinks it is too simple (near synonym for too easy?), then I can't quite square that circle.

How would you make a more simplified BLM rotation for a healer? Isn't that arguably what RDM is? Their Mana system makes their caster rotation arguably a simplified BLM rotation. And, as I noted above, WHM has a (slightly higher, but still) similar APM to BLM. In effect, WHM right now is arguably the Healer version of what BLM is to DPS - and what WAR is to Tanks.

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The just play ultimate argument is kinda the most toxic and gaslighting one in this discussion

And literally WHO is asking for it?

And come now, it's hardly "the most toxic" OR the most "gaslighting" thing in THIS discussion. You can't say a thing is happening (and the most toxic thing) in a discussion when it isn't even IN this discussion. It wasn't even mentioned in this discussion, I don't believe, until Flowerfairy said it.

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To follow-up ...
"I can't speak for White Mages, but I can say that healing at endgame as a Scholar is a blast. With DoTs, off-global cooldown abilities, dodging, and pet management to deal with I am rarely ever bored. I am literally always doing something in dungeons, and that feels amazing.

I think this is what's lost (from you guys' side) in this discussion. Note the first 6 words there. I put them in italics.

Contrast that by looking at the part you bolded. Other than DoTs and dodging, those were things SCH had that WHM did not. WHM had 3 oGCDs, Presence of Mind (which was used for healing not damage), Divine Seal (which was used for healing not damage), and Benediction (which was used for emergencies at that point in the game's history, not as a routine use tool). WHM had no pet management, and no DoT interaction, nor as many DoTs as SCH had since it could Cross-Class WHM's Aero, had Shadow Flare's field effect, and for a BIT anyway, could Cross-Class BLM's Thunder (though that was removed fairly early on)

WHM didn't play that way, SCH did. A LOT OF PEOPLE happened to like that. A LOT OF PEOPLE also happened not to, and played WHM. Keep in mind at the time WHM was primarily a GCD healer that healed through use of Medica 2, Medica 1, Cure 2 AND Cure 1 (because MP was an issue back then), and occasionally dipped into Cleric to apply DoTs if the fight was braindead snore easy, which no hard content was.

But how about we actually look at ARR history?

I think it might be instructive for us all to look back to the time we're talking about here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fsPp9IQXuc

This is MTQCapture's "The Binding Coil of Bahamut - Turn 5 Raid Guide" (man this brings back memories!) I want you to watch this and look at the enemy health bars (bottom center of her screen). Specifically, I want you to look for how many times you see Aero spells on it. Secondarily, I want you to watch the healer cast bars and watch what they're casting.

...given it a few minutes yet?

While SCH's damage spells - Bio, Miasma - appear frequently, notice how Aero does not? And what spells is that WHM casting? Surely Stone II right?

...well, they are casting something with stone in the NAME: Stoneskin. Quite a bit of Stoneskin, actually. Cure 1 seems to be the most frequently cast spell, followed by Stoneskin, with Cure 2 and Medica 2 being frequent, and WHM standing still regenerating MP being...also frequent.

Now, you might argue "This was a bad WHM", but this was what progression raiding looked like AT THE TIME in 2.1. Notice how little it looks like how you remember it?

Now, SCH does. Those SCH buffs have high uptime and are there clear as day. While I don't see any Ruin 1 casts, if you watch close you can see a lot of Ruin 2 going out. But you don't see that from the WHM.

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Now, in the interest of fairness, let's have a look at end end of Second Coil:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_lnPoQNu7w

It still kills me the PLD casting Stoneskin on herself here.

Here, you can see Aero MORE often...but not anywhere NEAR 100% uptime. There's also a second Bio 1 on the boss a lot, but that may be coming from the BLM (which could Cross-Class ACN abilities)

Again you'll see the WHM consistently using Stoneskin and hardcasts of Cure 1 and Cure 2 frequently. I also see the SCH pretty often in Cleric Stance...but the Cleric Stance buff doesn't seem to be used much by the WHM (still watching the video all the way as I type this, but I haven't seen the WHM activate Cleric since I've been watching the party list, but you can see it from the SCH somewhat often). Also amusingly, at 3:48, you can see this amazing thing - beautiful, terrifying, or hilarious depending on your perspective: The BLM casting Physic!

No, legit go to that timestamp and see for yourself.

Even when the WHM is tanking - and yes, you read that right, "White Mage tank" is legitimately a phrase from that video/strat - the WHM is not in Cleric Stance. In fact, skimming through the video (she got video from several runs based on the party makeup changing), I can't see any point of WHM in Cleric Stance, can you? And I may have missed one somewhere, but I don't see Stone casts.

But overall, we see a similar situation:

The SCH is basically a de-facto Support fourth party role, throwing out damage while also contributing off-healing, while the WHM is a acting almost as a Pure Healer, using GCD hardcasts of heals and seemingly not casting many damage spells other than an occasional instant cast Aero and doesn't seem to be using Cleric Stance - for all the talk about how healers were this high paced dance of in and out of Cleric Stance...that seems to be ABSOLUTELY TRUE of SCH...but not true of WHM.

Now, I'm sure there are other videos out there, and we can make various arguments and analyses - here's Mr Happy's: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H75f6SgM6Sg - from the era. But here again we see little Aero, no heart-pounding Cleric Stance dancing, and filler GCDs were Cure 1s with Cure 2 and Medica 2 as needed, no Stonespam.

In other words: Far more like WHM as I remember it than what you guys are saying ARR WHM was like.

Being fair, what you're saying ARR healing was like WAS like that...for SCH.

...but I've spent this whole time advocating for that, so...

And AGAIN in the interest of fairness - the thought DID occur to me maybe this was true in the "wild west" days, so we should look at later raids once the raiding community was more developed and see if they had changed to what you guys remember - let's look at the FINAL turn of the FINAL Coil:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fbmd4eRNwnE

Again - little Cleric use (even by the SCH), low uptime on Aero (higher on SCH's DoTs, again some may be from the BLM/SMN). And notice how high and crazy the damage is here, and healers were dealing with it WITHOUT the use of their current generation oGCD kits. WHMs had to use "hardcore/skill expression" HEALING buffs. It wasn't "press this oGCD to top off the party from 10% health". It was "Press this button. Now use your GCD heals intelligently on the party with boosted potency to get through this tight spot."

So again, where is this WHM you guys are remembering? I'm not seeing it from these bleeding edge ARR raiders.

I _AM_ seeing something akin to it on these bleeding edge ARR raiders' SCHOLARS, but not their White Mages.

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It is interesting seeing JUST HOW MUCH Stoneskin was used, which makes me even more upset that they removed it. I remember using it myself a lot back then, and being upset when it was removed, but I had forgotten how much it was used and how useful it was (and because it was based on the target's HP, Stoneskin was also not nerfed by Cleric Stance, much like how Benediction (100%) and Lustrate (25%) were also based on HP instead of Potency/Mind.

(I should note here, I was not a raider and didn't have a static then, either, but I did get a Twintania clear during ARR, probably around 2.4, though I only started playing in late 2.2 and didn't know anything about gearing, so I was wearing a mix of Crystal Tower pieces when I did so - truly, it was the wild west. Didn't even know about tomestone gear and normal gearing up until SB, as in HW and half of SB, I was using Dungeon gear until I joined an FC where some players did 8 man normals and blew my mind when we did the first two Omega tiers to get my unlocks [and some other new members] and weapons and stuff.)

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In short: I think this MIGHT be part of the problem.

A lot of healers now that played SCH in ARR forget WHM didn't play that way. A lot of people that came to WHM later, or even played it then but it's just been 8-9 years, have kinda forgotten that, with their memory blurring with either later expansions or with SCH. As someone who has played WHM all this time, and apparently (given the period footage in those videos) played it as per norms of the time, I am remembering it correctly. And my assessment of EW WHM as being an improvement over SB WHM likely still stands. It shifted WHM from the ARR model to the SB/ShB/EW era healing requirements while keeping their GCD healing somewhat in-tact.

It's also funny the opinion piece calls out Physic when you actually can see that SCH casting it. (And the BLMs in some cases, but let's not mention that, haha!)

And this clearly isn't asking for the game to be redesigned, since this was the ORIGINAL (2.X) design of the very same game we play. So I'm not the one asking for the game to be changed from what it always was...

The amazing irony here is:

...and neither are you guys. Well, more or less.

For SCH, you are correct.

For WHM, I am correct.

This is one of those RARE cases where everyone is correct simultaneously. Which ALSO strongly lends to my 3 change, WHM remain the same perspective, does it not?

[ty_taurus]

Snip

Did you really take a single clause from a 2013 opinion piece meant to talk about SCH and use that to go into a diatribe about WHM?

Let's get a few things straight here. You keep trying to white knight the WHM, but let's remind the classroom that you don't speak for all WHM players either. In fact there's another player that drops by the forums on occasion who will quite literally go to war with you to fight for the right for WHM to have actual complexity and how it's infuriating that WHM is always forced to hold the baby raddle.

Secondly, MTQ Capture both then and now uses prog footage for her guides. Do you know how frequently her videos feature people blatantly failing mechanics, dying, or are already KOed? In ARR, damage meant using Cleric Stance, and also WHM had far more restrictive MP problems, so conserving MP and waiting to see what mechanics were coming up were common when learning a new fight as a healer--particularly as a WHM, because the consequences of being in Cleric Stance at the wrong time or running out of MP were significantly more severe. But also, ARR was an experimental time. Every job was trying to figure out how to play correctly, and WHM players were, across that 2 year period of time, learning how to manage their DPS more effectively, and that was one of its talking points going into HW. While SCHs were thinking about ways to make it easier to heal when you have 2 SCHs together, WHMs were looking for better MP management and an easier time utilizing their DPS tools. And what did HW give WHM? All OGCD healing, Assize which restored some MP, Stone 3, and Aero 3--more damage, more ways to heal while doing damage, better MP management, and a new DoT.

I will say it until I'm blue in the face. No job in FFXIV should ever have its gameplay reduced to largely 1 button spam. It is a disgrace to the entire combat system of FFXIV. It is bad game design. That is fact based on the systems of FFXIV, not an opinion. If you're happy with 1 button spam, go play a Mario Party minigame.

[Renathras]

Did you really take a single clause from a 2013 opinion piece meant to talk about SCH and use that to go into a diatribe about WHM?

Did I take a CLAIM about the state of the game in ARR, actually look AT THE GAME IN ARR, and demonstrate how the CLAIM about the state of the game was wrong?

Yes.

Yes I did.

That seems to be not what you said though. What did you say? "diatribe about WHM"?

No, I didn't do that, because I didn't go on a diatribe. I did an analysis of the state of the game using recorded data from that era of the game to disprove the argument that you seem to prefer.

Sorry that upset you.

Let's get a few things straight here.

Oh yes...LET'S...

This is going to be "let me correct you for being wrong, isn't it?". Like, seriously, you guys keep attacking me personally, while doing your absolute BEST to ignore the arguments I'm making. That's known as an ad hominem logical fallacy. It's also a dick move. If you don't like my arguments, attack my ARGUMENTS. If you can't do that, realize you MAY be incorrect. It's okay to be incorrect.

Indeed, I even pointed out that you guys are MODERATELY CORRECT if we specify SCHOLAR ONLY. Something you guys are loathe to do because IT PROVES MY POINT THIS WHOLE TIME.

let's remind the classroom that you don't speak for all WHM players either

Sure, if we also remind the classroom that literally no one here speaks for all WHM players OR all healers more generally, either.

Good thing I'm not speaking - nor claiming I speak for - all WHM players.

I swear, if you spent half the effort addressing my actual points as you spend addressing canards, things I didn't say and didn't claim, and positions I don't hold - that is, strawmanning and gaslighting - we MIGHT actually be able to reach agreements on things!

In fact there's another player that drops by the forums on occasion

Ah, yes, one person.

I'm sure there are more.

There are also more that hold my position or even moreso - do you even know what my position is at this point? To give you a summary since you don't, it's this:

Healers are not perfect right now, but they also aren't terribly broken or horrible, and I think the best solution is to change up healers since we have four of them to where they are distinct in their DPS kits and less homogenized in their healing kits, and to where there are four levels of complexity of their kits in the same way Tanks have an easy (WAR), moderate (depends on who you ask, but DRK and GNB), and complex (PLD) options, and then we can let the players choose which they like.

WHAT ABOUT THAT STATEMENT do you find so offensive?

There are some that go farther than this and would insist that healing is pristine and nothing should ever be changed. My position is actually the moderate position here.

who will quite literally go to war with you to fight for the right for WHM to have actual complexity and how it's infuriating that WHM is always forced to hold the baby raddle.

WHM has "actual complexity" now. It's not not DPS complexity. There's no "baby raddle" here.

Secondly, MTQ Capture both then and now uses prog footage for her guides.

Yup.

But look at her prog video captures now. You WILL see WHM's casting Glare, not casting Cure 1 (ever), using GCDs, and having high Dia uptime. Well, the ones where they run WHM (her team seems to be AST + SCH/SGE depending on fight)

Also note I posted Mr Happy's video from Coils, and also note the same pattern and same gameplay. That WAS the raid scene WHEN THE CONTENT WAS LIVE.

Indeed, AS YOU GUYS HAVE POINTED OUT, AND DO ALL THE TIME, healer uptime is now much higher, NEEDED much higher to beat Enrages, and each fight has over 100 Glare/Broil/etc casts. That was CLEARLY not happening in the ARR fights, and they were clearing the fights.

I know you don't want to admit it - because it kills your false appeal to authority fallacy - but WHM did not function the way you say it did in ARR in the raid environment.

AND I EVEN GAVE YOU THE OUT by noting that SCHOLAR, in fact, DID function that way.

There's a perfect face-saving thing for you to do at this point:

"Oh, Renathras, you're right. We're thinking SCH, and as you point out, we're right about how SCH played in ARR. You're also right that WHM did not, and that healing in FFXIV accommodated both styles side by side back then and probably could today."

That's the correct, rational response to what I presented above.

The only thing it would require is you to let go of the notion you must be 100% right, anyone not agreeing with you must be 100% wrong, and unless you get 100% of what you want, the game is in a terrible and unsustainable place and that WHM is actually about what it should be.

Now, if we were arguing about SCHOLAR being kept as it is today, you'd have an argument...

...but we're NOT, since I've already said MY PREFERRED COURSE OF ACTION would be to revert SCH to its SB state, with the addition of Expedient and Faerie responsiveness that's been made better. Do you not AGREE with that position?

Do you know how frequently her videos feature people blatantly failing mechanics, dying, or are already KOed?

Yeah. As do Mr Happy's. As do current groups progging - and CLEARING - hard content. If anything, it just shows that the game was not tuned quite as tightly, was not as unforgiving, and was not as "all about damage" as it is today - which, btw, further proves my point.

In ARR, damage meant using Cleric Stance,

Which the SCHs were doing in ALL the videos I showed you but the WHMs were not. I also found this video of Turn 9 SAVAGE clear: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biZ9LyDyfAE

Here, you will note the WHM casting more Stone 2 and Aero 2 spells and having better Aero and Aero 2 uptime. But a few things about that - this was in full ilevel 130 waiting for HW to come out by people that even self-described as being bored, but watch the WHM (and even the SCH) buffs carefully. Do you see what you DON'T see?

The WHM isn't Cleric Stance dancing. Like at all.

You also see, again, a lot of Cure 1 casts.

Even once these players had optimized and overgeared the fights, they STILL weren't playing like you insist they were. I'm not sure how better to prove to you you're wrong then by showing you actual evidence of you being wrong. If you still refuse to admit it at this point, you're being ruled by bias and desire, not reason. Moreover, I'm even pointing this out in a way that you CAN STILL BE CONSIDERED PARTIALLY RIGHT, you're just rejecting being partially right because...why? Because you can't accept a world where you're somewhat correct but not totally correct?

nd also WHM had far more restrictive MP problems, so conserving MP and waiting to see what mechanics were coming up were common when learning a new fight as a healer--

Again, watch the video immediately above this.

ilevel 130, overgering the content, waiting for HW to come out, group knew how to clear and did so while doing more of the things you insist were common. Basically a late expansion farm party and they STILL weren't Cleric Stance dancing and weren't as balls to the wall on damage spells. Indeed, if you look towards the later part of the fight, the WHM is almost exclusively casting heals and NOT maintaining DoT uptime.

You can blame this on MP economy if you want, but it still proves YOUR POSITION ON WHM IN ARR is WRONG.

HOWEVER, I will say it again, your position ON SCHOLAR is correct.

Take the partial W.

But also, ARR was an experimental time.

And YET, you guys keep trying to appeal to ARR when you THINK it proves/supports your position.

I'm pointing out to you it clearly does not.

It doesn't matter if it was an "experimental time", we're talking about how Healers actively played the game at that time.

This whole argument is kind of wonky, but it's basically you guys trying to insist to me that I've been playing the wrong game all this time because FFXIV has always been this way, when it's clear THAT IS FALSE, and the game I want is actually what FFXIV was, at least regarding WHM.

I'm even reaching out to you half-way on SCH and you're slapping my hand offered in friendship and compromise away because I won't join you in lying about what ARR was like.

And what did HW give WHM?

Not that this is relevant - we are talking about what the game was from its "foundation", ARR, but to answer your question - an oGCD used for MP management, an upgrade to its spam nuke, a field effect so SCH wouldn't feel TOO special, and a single oGCD heal that was NOT an emergency panic button exclusive like Benediction was. Other than the Stone upgrade (which is just standard for every expansion - it replaced Stone 2 in practice in your rotation), the rest was largely based on AST being added and them trying to adapt to a world where every 8 man group was no longer expected to include WHM + SCH.

Don't forget what came right after THAT: SB where WHM was given a Lily system that actively required them to cast Cure 1 and Cure 2 to activate. So be careful how heavily you hang your hat on "but the next expansion...", and that's if we ignore that ShB and EW came after and reflect the Devs' CURRENT intentions for Healers.

I will say it until I'm blue in the face. No job in FFXIV should ever have its gameplay reduced to largely 1 button spam.

And I will ask it over and over again - who is asking for a Job that has only 1 damage button and nothing else that it presses and presses nothing else?

LITERALLY NO ONE.

Even WHM's current state isn't that.

And what I'm asking for (other than its kit to remain LARGELY the same) is for the healing model to shift to where we use more GCD heals, which is the exact OPPOSITE of asking for "largely 1 button spam"!

If you're happy with 1 button spam, go play a Mario Party minigame.

THIS is the only "go play ultimate" going on in this thread, btw.

And it's worse than "go play ultimate".

At least "go play ultimate" says you have a place in this game and this community.

This "quit FFXIV" is far more toxic.

.

Again, in summary, if you read nothing else of the above, my position you are ACTUALLY ARGUING AGAINST is this:

Healers are not perfect right now, but they also aren't terribly broken or horrible, and I think the best solution is to change up healers since we have four of them to where they are distinct in their DPS kits and less homogenized in their healing kits, and to where there are four levels of complexity of their kits in the same way Tanks have an easy (WAR), moderate (depends on who you ask, but DRK and GNB), and complex (PLD) options, and then we can let the players choose which they like.

WHAT ABOUT THAT STATEMENT do you find so offensive?

As I've said numerous times (and as you lot have IGNORED numerous times) my ideal course of action would ultimately be for SCH to be returned to its SB kit - AT THE VERY LEAST CAN YOU AGREE WITH ME ON THAT? - SGE should have a DPS kit more akin to RDM's Caster kit, or the Water/Earth kit that was presented here a few posts ago and deal damage leveraging Kardia instead of Aetherflow 2.0, AST should...actually I honestly have no idea what AST should do other than the Cards need some kind of major overhaul and, imo, should be the key part of its gameplay and rotation, not a side game, and finally, that WHM should shift to a more GCD healing model flexing the Lily system to allow it to deal damage with a simple damage rotation (basically what it has today) but where it's actually getting more varied GCDs in by casting things other than endless Glare as its filler.

I honestly LOVE the Lily system because it ENCOURAGES GCD USE ON HEALING and allows the Job to still perform just fine in the damage department. Instead of 4x Glare, you have 3x Solace/Rapture + Misery, which I find VASTLY more enjoyable. The thing I'd really like to see is for more varied Lily abilities and for Lilies to be generated at a rate that they comprise more healing and you can use Misery more often. I'd love it if, for example, Regen (or hell, all WHM heal spells) generated a stack of Blood Lily so that every three casts you could use Misery. It would make spells like Regen and Medica 2 not DPS losses that way, and I'd love that. Refund that healing with damage and give me a reason to cast all those GCD heals instead of do 100% of healing with oGCDs and fill in the gap with Glare for 100% of GCDs that aren't Dia refreshes.

...in other words, yet again, I'm arguing for THE EXACT OPPOSITE of what you think I'm arguing for.

SB SCH + benefits,
SGE that actually plays like a WoW Disc Priest or RIFT Cloromancer,
AST that actually uses Cards meaningfully,
WHM that is more like an ARR WHM but modernized with the Lily system.

THAT is my actual position.

THAT is what YOU are arguing against.

[Azuri]

This is a really fascinating thing that dawned on me. He simply can't get it. To him it's really not mostly pressing a single button because 30% of the time he presses none at all.

If you take an average healer run with 80% of all casts being Glare (yes, Renathras, this includes GCDs and oGCDs) and remove 30% of GCD uptime while adding some "safety Cure III spam" (the rest of us can read "pointless overhealing") you really do end with maybe less than half of your casts being Glare. And yeah, I can see how one might find it actually fine. Just because they don't know better.

There really is no point trying to explain that healer design is awful and no, "you can have three healers that work well and leave one in the trash for me" will never be an acceptable compromise. He just fundamentally lacks the understanding to get it.

[Renathras]

This is a really fascinating thing that dawned on me. He simply can't get it. To him it's really not mostly pressing a single button because 30% of the time he presses none at all.

If you take an average healer run with 80% of all casts being Glare (yes, Renathras, this includes GCDs and oGCDs) and remove 30% of GCD uptime while adding some "safety Cure III spam" (the rest of us can read "pointless overhealing") you really do end with maybe less than half of your casts being Glare. And yeah, I can see how one might find it actually fine. Just because they don't know better.

There really is no point trying to explain that healer design is awful and no, "you can have three healers that work well and leave one in the trash for me" will never be an acceptable compromise. He just fundamentally lacks the understanding to get it.

https://www.grammarly.com/blog/ad-hominem-fallacy/

"There’s nothing worse than when you’re debating someone who has no idea what they’re talking about, is obviously a fool, and to make it worse, smells like dirty socks.

Ugh. It’s just the worst. And they need to know just how uninformed they are (and that they smell like dirty socks).

Actually, they don’t. When your argument strays from the issue at hand to criticisms of the person you’re arguing with, you’re no longer communicating logically. Instead, you’re making an ad hominem attack."

[Acece]

I think most whms that wanted complexity gave up because we had to deal with sylphies that wanted to keep whm without it's knee caps lol.

[Videra]

Right, so, to steer the long-form debate into a wall, let's address the facts we know:

---------------------------------------------------

1) WHM is doomed to hold the baby rattle because the developers want it to be the simple healer anyone can pick up, while simultaneously reflecting this decision onto the entire healer role rendering it null and void.
2) Healers in general have been reduced to a large portion of their gameplay being nuke spam, upwards of 90% of your uptime in some extreme cases, but always the majority of your casts in others. They currently have a dot that takes up another chunk of your casts, and will likely be removed in 7.0.
3) The game has a whole two class designers, and in a Live Letter prior to Endwalker the creative director said in no uncertain terms that they're not making healers more complex.

---------------------------------------------------

What do we expect of healing in 7.0? Does anyone have hope that the dev team will go against the direct statement of 'No' to additional complexity made before Endwalker? What are your plans for if they hold true to that? Will you completely quit the role if you lose Dia and its derivatives and get reduced to truly one-button spam? And moreover, what do you specifically want?