Potential Solution to Job Balance?

[Shurrikhan]

I won't argue with that. though while I would have no issues with seeing that, given how they've removed Support abilities from DPS and Healer Jobs, I'm not going to hold my breath for this...

Those reductions, though, were primarily made because either

• the tuning (see: extreme Enmity buffs, nuked relative healing requirements, etc.) or forms of mechanics (say, a mob on which tanks must hold threats but could one-shot said mob to keep Shadewalker useful despite aforementioned Enmity changes) required to maintain their relevance was watered down past some critical threshold, or
• they were primarily just a pretense of complexity that made one job's ability to do anything (i.e., literally just to cast) --without what would be cripplingly poor play otherwise (using Cure I where possible instead of more expensive options, or even spending time idle for mana conservation) or terrible stat optimization-- dependent on other jobs, for whom those actions still had nothing much to optimize or the timings of which were forced due to other priorities anyways (e.g., halving enmity).

Some of them were outright poorly designed; the rest suffered specifically because of the same changes in context (e.g., encounter tuning and mechanics) that worsened how it feels to heal.

If that context is not addressed, I suspect being a healer will become/remain smothering regardless of whether you're holding your breath for such changes.

[ForsakenRoe]

Alright so how would you translate that to FFXIV?

a lot of these things, while specific to MOBA design, boil down to 'help allies' or 'hinder enemies' in some way. In order, the closest I'd imagine in FFXIV terms would be:

-apply buffs of some kind to the team to make it safer (probably mit)
-Debuff enemy to make them do less damage
-Set up burst windows with allied damage buffs (we already have this with chain strat/div, maybe lean more into buffing and less into 'spam glare')
-Warding is just to make stuff more safe so I guess it'd be like 'put up mit' again, maybe a healer designed around making 'warded zones' could be interesting
-Buff allies to make them stronger, perhaps a design for AST where you set up the burst window as you do your rotation, then 'activate' all the cards at once with Div to reduce APM issues during 2min windows
-Again, debuff enemies in some way so they can't do as much damage to you, perhaps even having a new 'dispel' action that healers have to use to remove enemy buffs?
-Just the usual 'supports support the team', forgot to mention Mekansm, an item that does in fact give an AOE heal to everyone, and Guardian Greaves which heal and restore mana. Maybe some kind of buffing system where healers directly influence job gauges? would be hell to balance though (oh the healer extended the DRG's Life window and now they get a 4th Nastrond)

The point wasn't so much 'look how much stuff happens in this game that FFXIV should copy', it was moreso 'this is what supports do in this game, why is FFXIV 'support' or 'healer' or whatever you want to call it, so barebones on responsibilities by comparison'. At the rate we're going, they'll remove Chain Strat from SCH because it requires targetting the enemy

Those reductions, though, were primarily made because either

I'm like 99% sure the reason they removed the stuff they did like Shadewalker, Smokescreen, mits from healers like Disable or Virus, was because people didnt bother to use them. Outside of Savage, where people wiped and were asked 'did you use Disable', I assume a lot of the casual base just didn't press it. Tanks in casual content would run tankstance 100% so Smokescreen/Shadewalker/Diversion were not needed. So when SHB design time came, the devs likely looked at the data and went 'well if people dont use this stuff, they wont miss it, lets make tankstance give insane threat gen, remove the damage penalty so they dont complain about being nerfed, then we dont need these aggro tools anymore. Also, we can retune the damage of raids around the nonexistence of these healer mits, they wont miss them, they'll be cheering about how cool the Lily System looks, now that it's actually functional!'

[Shurrikhan]

I'm like 99% sure the reason they removed the stuff they did like Shadewalker, Smokescreen, mits from healers like Disable or Virus, was because people didnt bother to use them. Outside of Savage, where people wiped and were asked 'did you use Disable', I assume a lot of the casual base just didn't press it. Tanks in casual content would run tankstance 100% so Smokescreen/Shadewalker/Diversion were not needed. So when SHB design time came, the devs likely looked at the data and went 'well if people dont use this stuff, they wont miss it, lets make tankstance give insane threat gen, remove the damage penalty so they dont complain about being nerfed, then we dont need these aggro tools anymore. Also, we can retune the damage of raids around the nonexistence of these healer mits, they wont miss them, they'll be cheering about how cool the Lily System looks, now that it's actually functional!'

Disuse was certainly a factor, but I think another large part has been a matter of "button bloat", and, more interestingly, how 'satisfying' a given button felt to press due to its contexts (encounter opportunities, and considerations it perhaps uniquely forces you to engage with, etc.).

Given how few add grabs were required that the tank couldn't just be prepared for, Shadewalker felt less like a unique tool (Enmity transfer) and more like just a +rDPS button for a given tank, due to needing less time in tank stance. Smokescreen was never of any real interest, as it was redundant with Diversion / Quelling Strikes and, unless you had a single melee carry who'd otherwise be forced to use ME/Purification, it wasn't enough to increase tank rDPS anyways.

Disable and Virus, as with Addle and Feint now, were too insignificant in most content to be of much interest, while any actual unique impact offered by either would cause our rather finnicky playerbase to cry imbalance (even if others could differently produce equal increased eHP by which to counter the given attack). I don't think that's necessarily a great reason to get rid of it, but I haven't much been sad it's gone or turned into a Role Action.

My big point of contention is simply "Okay, so... if Shadewalker became irrelevant and tank stances were bloat, etc., why then aren't there more sudden add spawns, and why aren't there more tools by which to deal with them? Why not simply revise Disable and Virus to be more interesting, potent, and satisfying to press?" I get why they did it, given the shift in context; I just don't get why they allowed the context to be so shallow.

/shrug

[Dzian]

I'm like 99% sure the reason they removed the stuff they did like Shadewalker, Smokescreen, mits from healers like Disable or Virus, was because people didnt bother to use them.

That's because in the vast majority of content they made zero difference and had zero impact. Same goes with many skills even today.

But for example when a raid wide hits you for 5k health and can effectively be healed with a single aoe tht will heal for like 6k health. in most cases a small mitigation does nothing. You take 4500 damage instead of 5k but when that single aoe heal is 6k. What did pressing that mitigation actually achieve? Zilch!.

It's why so many people don't bother with role skills because they're just bloat buttons that don't really do anything..

Interject for example. Is it the kitasa dungeon where you can silence the last boss casting bravery on himself. But if you don't silence it it really doesn't matter thus it carries no weight or impact..

[Shurrikhan]

Interject for example. Is it the kitasa dungeon where you can silence the last boss casting bravery on himself. But if you don't silence it it really doesn't matter thus it carries no weight or impact..

Interject really needs at least a DR-less 1.5s silence + pacify, instead of just an interrupt, so you can use it for managing mob positioning instead of solely for once-per-blue-moon spell casts.

[XiroGear]

that, and they should make it where these abilities actually matter in a fight.