The Problem with Healer Feedback, and requested changes

[Shurrikhan]

I disagree with some people going nuclear in here though, suggesting 'quit the game'. It's not the solution. However, if someone wants to experience the story and casual content by just pressing Glare, that's fine, they added Easy and Very Easy modes to help people through the story. They're adding Duty Support to help players through dungeons.

Here's the thing... I'm not telling anyone to quit the game or to gatekeep the game when I say things like "if you want WoW healing, then play WoW." (Or if it's more applicable, perhaps Ragnarok or another MMO that better supports triage-focused healing)

But, we've had more triage-based healing. Not for a long while now and not terribly often, but... there wasn't anything exclusive between having more of a rush and sense of gamble from the healing itself AND having far more damage skills. We did have both. The devs gave up caring about it in the face of "just give them more skills(' bloat) as an expansion selling point" before they'd come anywhere close to leveraging it terribly well, but it was there.

if you're frustrated with... how healing has been moved toward OGCD weaving between DPS spells mostly with very little requirement to use GCD heals, then FFXIV is not satisfying you or providing the experience you're looking for.

Okay, but, who all actually thinks the near-entirety of our healing coming from fixed-timer oGCDs or mechanics devolving into "See A, slap button A," is... an improvement over what we had prior?

On the rest, mostly agreed, but... wanting more of our dopamine to come from the healing itself, wanting to feel like we're making more vital decisions in our healing, etc., isn't a preference that leads to "Well just go play WoW" anymore than just "Well, just go play (older) FFXIV." It's not so much that XIV isn't for that sort of player as... not for that sort of player anymore.

And given that I'm pretty sure those wanting more from healers, or even just the kind of "more" that we already had, outnumber those happy with their current state, that should mark a problem, not just a difference in preferences.

[ty_taurus]

But, we've had more triage-based healing. Not for a long while now and not terribly often, but... there wasn't anything exclusive between having more of a rush and sense of gamble from the healing itself AND having far more damage skills. We did have both. The devs gave up caring about it in the face of "just give them more skills(' bloat) as an expansion selling point" before they'd come anywhere close to leveraging it terribly well, but it was there.


Okay, but, who all actually thinks the near-entirety of our healing coming from fixed-timer oGCDs or mechanics devolving into "See A, slap button A," is... an improvement over what we had prior?

On the rest, mostly agreed, but... wanting more of our dopamine to come from the healing itself, wanting to feel like we're making more vital decisions in our healing, etc., isn't a preference that leads to "Well just go play WoW" anymore than just "Well, just go play (older) FFXIV." It's not so much that XIV isn't for that sort of player as... not for that sort of player anymore.

And given that I'm pretty sure those wanting more from healers, or even just the kind of "more" that we already had, outnumber those happy with their current state, that should mark a problem, not just a difference in preferences.

There are two examples I can think of where heavy healing mechanics were required:

1. Turn 2 cheese strat: The coils were wonky, and in Coil 2, you were pitted against a small labyrinth of rooms with minibosses. You'd have to make your way through at least 3, but there were more, and which ones you took down would disable certain effects from the final boss, but that final boss had a nasty mechanic known as Allagan Rot where you'd basically be playing hot potato with your team for the whole fight and holding it too long or giving it back to someone who had it recently would explode and kill everyone. The strat? Wait until there were I think it was 10 minutes remaining on the raid timer, where the boss would "enrage" by just spamming high damage AoEs. You'd completely bypass all of the boss's mechanics and just burn it down while the healers spammed Medica/Medica II/Succor. This was not the intended strat.

2. Mini-burn phases like in Brute Justice: At the end of the fight with Brute Justice in A8N and A8S, he spins around and just does constant raidwide damage for the last small chunk of his HP, with the raidwides growing in intensity. These mechanics are exceedingly rare--rarer than Esuna mechanics--and only make up a small fraction of the total fight.

Beyond this, sure sometimes there are small windows where burst healing is needed, but these are few and far between, and once that phase ends, you've got another 30-60 seconds where no one is taking damage but the tank, and generally the tank has no issues managing that themselves.

Those burst moments can be fun and feel great, but the gaping holes inbetween those phases should be fun too, especially since that gaping hole is sometimes the size of the entire fight in most of this game's content. This contrasts against some other MMO examples where raidwide damage occurs every few seconds. FFXIV has never designed a fight to function this way. The closest you get are examples of damage spam mechanics as with Brute Justice.

[Shurrikhan]

There are two examples I can think of where heavy healing mechanics were required:

I didn't say anything about "heavy" healing. Nor did you previously do so. You said "triage."

In triage, healing revolves around an element of leveraged bets, so to speak. You're guessing that there will soon be incoming damage enough to kill X, but not Y, and so you heal X first, or you're guessing, without certainty, you'll have time enough to perform a riskier but more efficient action. In triage healing elsewhere, some degree of emergency cooldowns usually needs to be saved, rather than simply used on cooldown, because spam heals won't be enough to salvage a mis-guess (no prior sustain buff, nor sufficiently topping off the upcoming victim --probably because they were chosen at random-- by which to make spam heals enough to keep them alive). That requires a degree of combat tuning and slightly more hectic encounter design.

We had already approached that a couple times in this game, only to then let it be swamped out by just having so damn much free healing and little worth saving it for that isn't so painfully obvious as to devolve into nearly pre-synced "un-mechanic" buttons. The scheduled rigid dance overtook it, but not necessarily for the better.

Those burst moments can be fun and feel great, but the gaping holes inbetween those phases should be fun too, especially since that gaping hole is sometimes the size of the entire fight in most of this game's content.

Again, you can have both. Having a satisfying set of downtime skills do not require the healing itself to be dry as dust. Yes, the downtime should be our first target because it's so much more easily improved, but it's not as if we have to choose between the one or the other. The contextual value downtime skills add depend also on the state of the healing kit relative to encounter design, so that area should come up eventually, too.

[ty_taurus]

I didn't say anything about "heavy" healing. Nor did you previously do so. You said "triage."

In triage, healing revolves around an element of leveraged bets, so to speak. You're guessing that there will soon be incoming damage enough to kill X, but not Y, and so you heal X first, or you're guessing, without certainty, you'll have time enough to perform a riskier but more efficient action. In triage healing elsewhere, some degree of emergency cooldowns usually needs to be saved, rather than simply used on cooldown, because spam heals won't be enough to salvage a mis-guess (no prior sustain buff, nor sufficiently topping off the upcoming victim --probably because they were chosen at random-- by which to make spam heals enough to keep them alive). That requires a degree of combat tuning and slightly more hectic encounter design.

We had already approached that a couple times in this game, only to then let it be swamped out by just having so damn much free healing and little worth saving it for that isn't so painfully obvious as to devolve into nearly pre-synced "un-mechanic" buttons. The scheduled rigid dance overtook it, but not necessarily for the better.


Again, you can have both. Having a satisfying set of downtime skills do not require the healing itself to be dry as dust. Yes, the downtime should be our first target because it's so much more easily improved, but it's not as if we have to choose between the one or the other. The contextual value downtime skills add depend also on the state of the healing kit relative to encounter design, so that area should come up eventually, too.

I was trying to think of a simplified way of describing "spam healing buttons because damage goes out every few seconds" but perhaps that was the wrong word choice, lol.

And yeah, I want the healing side of things to feel fun and thoughtful too.

[Shurrikhan]

I was trying to think of a simplified way of describing "spam healing buttons because damage goes out every few seconds" but perhaps that was the wrong word choice, lol.

Oh, shoot, we had totally different definitions of the word then. Does what I described sound more attractive, at least?

[Renathras]

So, you've got 4 starving people...

And this is where you're wrong. We don't.

We have millions of people (probably around 1-1.25 million playing healers), with the vast majority of them well fed and happy with what they've eaten. You have a small percentage who are not and want more. That's the actual situation.

Healers are not "starving" right now.

...but you alone specifically asking...

It might shock you to know this, but if you leave the official forums and read other discussions of FFXIV healers, like in YouTube comments and content creator videos, your position is actually the minority one. Most seem to be entirely satisfied with healing in FFXIV right now, and don't consider it truncated or starving at all.

.

That all said:

But, we've had more triage-based healing. Not for a long while now and not terribly often, but... there wasn't anything exclusive between having more of a rush and sense of gamble from the healing itself AND having far more damage skills. We did have both. The devs gave up caring about it in the face of "just give them more skills(' bloat) as an expansion selling point" before they'd come anywhere close to leveraging it terribly well, but it was there.


Okay, but, who all actually thinks the near-entirety of our healing coming from fixed-timer oGCDs or mechanics devolving into "See A, slap button A," is... an improvement over what we had prior?

On the rest, mostly agreed, but... wanting more of our dopamine to come from the healing itself, wanting to feel like we're making more vital decisions in our healing, etc., isn't a preference that leads to "Well just go play WoW" anymore than just "Well, just go play (older) FFXIV." It's not so much that XIV isn't for that sort of player as... not for that sort of player anymore.

And given that I'm pretty sure those wanting more from healers, or even just the kind of "more" that we already had, outnumber those happy with their current state, that should mark a problem, not just a difference in preferences.

...I basically agree with this entire post.

[Shurrikhan]

It might shock you to know this, but if you leave the official forums and read other discussions of FFXIV healers, like in YouTube comments and content creator videos, your position is actually the minority one. Most seem to be entirely satisfied with healing in FFXIV right now.

So your position is that the forums comprise too small a user base... so let's instead look to only the dozen or so big, consistent XIV streamers --whose revenue is better met by skipping gameplay criticisms in favor of upbeat play-- and who make up a group a thousandth or so the size of the already small forum community???

But, okay, by all means, let's go ahead and test that.

If I type in "FFXIV healing" into YouTube, my first several videos are...

• A Crap Guide to Healing in FFXIV - which basically notes that the only ones who'd like healing in XIV are those who like the ego-trip of being able to let others die.
  
  
• The Ultimate Beginner Guide to Healing - gives no comments either way as to whether XIV healing is fun or well designed, but simply how best to think about it.
  
  
• Healer Guide | Introduction to Healing in FFXIV | Tips for Becoming a Better Healer - neutral (<picture of fight spreadsheet> "healing in XIV... means researching a fight or making mental notes of outgoing damage as it happens and planning your toolkit around it with little to no variance") - makes no attempt to say it's fun or that people should try it, only what it is.
  
  
• Comparing All Healers in FFXIV Endwalker - Neutral - Notes that there is a preferred healer duo, "Mechanics in FFXIV's raids are very predictable and easy to play around. Healers at that level generally don't struggle to keep up with heals once the fight is known, and overall healing output becomes less important than the damage dealt."
  
  
• Healing in FFXIV is Not Fun - (It wasn't sarcastic -- about that, at least.)
  
  
• 5 Jobs for People Who Lack Brains - [I](Warrior + Healers give or take an AST and a RPR.)
  
  
• Healing in FFXIV Has Big Problems - (Zepla's response video to "Healing in FFXIV is not fun") - she notes that likewise healing, especially, on AST, has got more boring / made it lose that spark for her.

If I more specifically put in "FFXIV healing bad," "FFXIV healing problem," it narrows further towards the negative, but if I put in "FFXIV healing fun," "FFXIV healing good," or "try FFXIV healing," or "FFXIV healing for you..." I get no increase in positive posts. There's just the one positive video, which opens already with the very words "Healer is not well designed."

:: Heck, there are entire series of videos specifically on ideas for healer improvements or in hashing out what the crux of the problems are...


Now, if we take a list of content creators typically considered "big" around FFXIV and don't solely cover lore or music, we might end up with something like...

• Desperius - "even [dealing self-damage] would address the problem of how boring dealing damage can be [as healer], since then you'd have to heal yourself up after..."
• Zepla - 'healer changes since Stormblood have, on the whole, made them less interesting.'
• LucyPyre - {Essentially calls it a shitshow, but fine for brain-dead-ing.}
• MisshappenChair - {Essentially calls it a shitshow, but fine for brain-dead-ing.}
• Drak - <doesn't heal>
• Larryzaur - notes that their distinctions are almost solely in their visuals
• Merri - frequent critiques
• Shenpai - <no comments>
• Meoni - fights are overly one-and-done
• MrHappy - modest critiques, usually more on the Twitch side
• Xeno - has critiqued, despite likely having been bred/evolved, and subjected to many surgeries, to make him better fit a two-minute burst mold.
• Grael - <just does fight guides>
• Misteq - <just does fight guides>

So where's this grand majority consensus, then, that XIV healing are "entirely satisfied with healing in XIV right now"?

[Shurrikhan]

Triage healing works in other places because the game engine can actually keep up with the quick-reaction demand that 'triage' is at it's core. If you see the tank get clapped by a TB down to 20%, and a melee DPS happened to get clonked by it, and both are bleeding out to the attached DOT, FFXIV wouldn't allow for the quick decision making of 'I'll let the DPS suffer for the one GCD of cast time I'll use to keep the tank up, then Tetra them' or 'I'll Tetra the DPS now, and then cast time Cure2 the tank, and hope the tank has enough sustain/mit left to keep themselves up till my cast finishes', because every action in this game's crusty engine doesn't actually register on time, 'Bene lag' is the prime example.

I think you'd be surprised by how much more could work if simply removed of certain arbitrary obstacles.

Take the "Bene lag" for instance. It actually was unique in how long it took to take effect, specifically because it didn't actually apply the heal until after its animation had completed, whereas others may apply it at the start of the animation. But, shit like that doesn't require a change in netcode to fix. They just need to not purposely delay, for thematic "grand heal" purposes, an emergency action's activation to... well after/longer than the cases it'd otherwise best be used for.

That said, I do agree that a HUGE number of opportunities could be opened up for healers through broader (or, more underlying) improvements and little quirks to better leverage them. Pre-healing, for instance, is kind of absurdly fun to me -- to hit an ally with the very end of a precisely timed preemptive cast and instantly follow it up with another banked instant cast to bounce their health back up the moment a TB had reduced them to critical (rather than just... oGCDing it). And, we were able to support that already -- we just had it covered up too much to matter. These days, I'd also love to see manipulable (diminishing-per-bounce) chain-heals, stored or time-locked heals, life-linking, and other fun little mechanics becomes available to our healing roster. Yeah, our netcode may get in the way of some of those somewhat, but I don't think it'd cripple them.

It'd be cool to have actual 'triage' situations, but the reason it works better in, say, WOW, is that AOE healing is not plentiful. It's either kinda weak but spammable, or has some internal CD like WildGrowth, Circle of Healing, Dream Breath, Spiritbloom, PowerWord:Radiance, etc. In order to have a similar environment here, Medica and it's equivalents would need to have a 10s CD at minimum.

Maybe they could do it with a hacky workaround though, some kind of debuff that means 'only single target healing affects this player for X seconds', then have it applied to, idk, 2 DPS while they get clapped by adds.

I don't think we need anything particularly wonky to do that. We just need to stop making AoEs so damn OP.

Heck, the most fundamental difference between XIV AoE heals and WoW's isn't that WoW's are tuned more weakly, but rather that AoEs don't have to be simultaneously useful for a half-sized party and a full-sized party.

You can make up for that light party / full party wonkiness quite easily, though, just by having a portion of the AoE's potency be split among all receivers. The AoEs' total potency would still increase with party count, but not so steeply as to make all else irrelevant.