Paired Threads: What would it take to make Heaker kits "complex/interesting"?

[Renathras]

WHM,

SCH,

AST,

SGE;

What would it take to make them hard/complex/punishing/challenging? (For those who find them not those things right now.)

[EDIT: Sister thread of https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...traightforward ]

EDIT2: Going to just stick this here to save space and have parity with the other one.

My take:

WHM would need significant changes to get it up to speed. It would basically need a total top to bottom rework. For starters, introduce an ability called Cleric Stance. This stance doesn't work like ARR/HW Cleric, though. It turns all your heals into damage spells. So under Cleric Stance, Cure is now Stone, Medica is now Holy, and all your HoTs are DoTs. So Regen becomes Aero, Regen 2 (a second HoT with a 2 sec base cast time like old Aero 2) becomes Aero 2, Medica 2 becomes Aero 3, Cure 3 becomes Holy, Cure 2 becomes Water (we'll get to that), and Asylum becomes a damage field like DoTon or Shadow Flare. The only spells not affected are Assize (which already does damage and healing), Raise (which works normally no matter what), and Benediction (which will always be a 100% full heal to a single person), and Solace/Rapture would be unaffected (but are also now oGCDs, so like how SCH would use Lustrate under Cleric in ARR and HW). The stance has a 10 second CD so using it at the wrong time would be punishing since Healers should be aware of boss fights and know better than to use it right before large healing mechanics. It should actually lock you out of all healing other than Assize and Benediction (since your heals turned into damage spells) until you turn it off. Some more button bloat, though Cleric Stance should actually mitigate this, and more variable gameplay for this to work, as well as more things to track.

This consists of at least one more timed CD self-buff (probably with a 90 sec duration to make it not play nice with other buffs and not be easy to remember or track when it's coming off CD, think like how NIN has Mug every 2 mins and Trick Attack every 1 min), at least one more DoT, probably two, and with none of them having durations divisible by 30 seconds, so one 15, one 18, and one 24, increasing the GCDs per minute spent on non-Glares for optimal damage output. A GCD damage spell with a CD of 21 seconds to further mix things up, Water element spell line (so Water, Water II, Water III, Water IV, Banish, etc), with a proc based chance of DoT ticks reducing its CD, and where using it has a chance of making a Thundercloud proc for one of your DoTs (or their DoT ticks can do this themselves, either one would work here; either Water is doubling up with Sharpcast or DoTs are doubling up being Mage Ballad and Thundercloud procing, both are good options). This would further cut into Glare's monopoly on the GCD and do so in a way that interacts with the rest of the kit and has other parts of the kit interact with it. Also an AOE DoT or DoT spread mechanic, and probably some kind of 1-2 rotation where the -2 is only generated by procs (like old MCH Heated Shots), where you only use it when it procs as it would be a DPS loss to use the unbuffed version, and rotates through Quake, Flood, and Tornado each time it's used, with each applying a different debuff and being AOE; Quake would be root, Flood would be Droopsy DoT, and Tornado would be vulnerability up. These effects last for 8 seconds when triggered. The -2 can be proced by both Glare and Holy, and act as a Combo requiring a Glare or Holy to be cast again before casting them to achieve their added status effect (just casing them directly only does the damage), and the cast time is base 3 seconds, longer than the GCD so a bit more like BLM big spells or SMN's Ifrit/Garuda cast time spells. Also removing Lily heals from the GCD and making them oGCDs instead, and giving Misery a chance to proc from...something, maybe Glares, which is your filler cast when Water/Banish is on CD and all your DoTs are already applied and ticking, sort of like Heavy Shot for BRD.

SCH basically give it back its SB toolkit with the addition of Bio as a separate spell line from Biolysis so it has 3 total single target DoTs and Shadow Flare from ARR/HW (can't use at the same time as Sacred Soil and no CD so you can GCD cast it whenever you want for uptime, 15 or 20 sec duration field damage effect like Doton). The DoTs all have different CDs, 15, 24, and 18 seconds, and three spell line to carry us forward keeping it up into future expansions, Bio which is instant cast with the short duration, Miasma with the long duration but being a full GCD cast time spell (2.5 sec), and Biolysis being a quicker 1.5 sec base cast time to upkeep as well. Also give it Fester, the Old SMN version where its damage is based on how many DoTs are on the target, and this will include Miasma 2 and Shadow Flare as separate DoTs for the purposes of its calculation, so up to 500 Potency of spike damage. Also make Selene and Eos their SB forms again. Remove Expedient, because it makes encounters too easy. Add "Martial Stance" that works like ARR/HW Cleric Stance, swapping your Mind and Int stats and reducing the potency of non-Faerie heals by 20%. Make Aetherpact a toggle with no Gauge Cost (remove Faerie Gauge completely) to replicate ARR/HW/SB SCH Embrace macros (alternatively, instead of a toggle, it could be just a command to use Embrace on a given target; both ideas work fine).

AST give it all of its HW and SB and ShB card effects. Return Seals to affecting Divination so people actually have to do that crazy ShB opener if they want the full +6% party buff. And give them a second DoT with a cast time like Old SCH Miasma or WHM Aero 2. Also give them the old Sleeve Draw, Royal Road, and Spread (stock a card to use later) abilities, as well as Time Dilation, Celestial Opposition (when it was AOE Time Dilation), and return Nocturnal and Diurnal Sects to the Job.

SGE give it BLM's rotation. Like, straight port BLM's rotation to SGE but with Greek names for Fire, Thunder, and Blizzard. Kardia is now how they heal party members. All the big BLM spells ( IV versions, Xenoglossy equivalent) generate AOE Kardia pulses, AOE spells like Fire II generate AOE Kardia pulses. SGE doesn't pay attention to health bars, it focuses totally on its DPS rotation. If it does it correctly, the party has sufficient healing to live. If it does not, people KO and must be raised. It only has a very few token healing tools like Durochole that are limited by Addersgall generation rate and are for emergencies only. Give it an Energy Drain Addersgall spender to use Addersgall on (SGE does this wrong, SCH does this right), so when you're doing your rotation optimally, you aren't needing to use Addersgall to heal, you're using it for additional chip damage - if its doing its DPS rotation correctly, it won't need to use them on heals anyway. Very high skill ceiling. Some animations would be reused, but some would obviously need to be added to have the desired effect. Eukrasia could be used as a stance toggle kind of thing for one or the other (the Umbral Ice or the Astral Fire type spells) to save some hotbar spaces and to keep it from being a carbon copy of BLM too much. Basically, the goal here is to make SGE do for Healers what GNB did for Tanks - give DPS minded players (though in this case Casters instead of Melee) a sort of island/oasis Job within another role (for GNB, Tanking; for SGE, Healing) that they could swap to and play. I suppose we could do something more like RDM or even Old MCH (SB days), but BLM would probably be the most directly transferable to a Healer role since it shares the cast time turret general functioning that Healers do. And if doing the damage rotation resulted in party healing with just a few suboptimal to use backup heals with Addersgall, then you have new and complex SGE.

.

That's how I would make Healers as needlessly complex and difficult as possible.

Added WHM Cleric Stance and SCH Martial Stance effects.

[Semirhage]

[Renathras]

It's not my fault you guys can't read basic notices to posts and want to believe the worst things possible so I have to REALLY break things down to try and get you focused on the actual thing I'm talking about at a given time - and you can't even do that, either. (I suspect less because you CAN'T and more because you don't WANT to if it might risk you reevaluating your positions... <_< ...but that's whatever.)

.

Besides, read that WHM and you know you'd probably enjoy it. I would hate it, but it'd be right up your alley.

It has Water magic, it has Quake/Flood/Tornado WITH different effects, it has lots of DoTs to juggle, it has interaction between the different parts of the kit, it has a risk/reward damage/healing aspect going, rewards fight knowledge like BLM and gives you tons of damage options to use during healing downtime. Lily heals being oGCDs means you'd have a WHM that heals like SCH used to, primarily with oGCDs alone, and your GCDs would be devoted instead to damage most of the time via Cleric Stance, with you being able to drop out for emergency healing before going back into Cleric. You'd spend most of your fights in Cleric. The Job would also have a low skill floor for casual content (casual Healers would simply never go into Cleric stance and be Cure spamming Sylphies), with a high skill ceiling for high end players, with lots to juggle and manage between DoTs, GCD CD abilities, more self-buffs, and procs all over the place. It would also be very punishing for "Sylphie" or casual players attempting to do hard content, as they'd literally be doing no damage if they didn't spend at least some time in Cleric. Soloing content would also give you a far more complex and interesting rotation with a lot more to watch and maintain.

Isn't that literally what you want out of WHM?

Seriously, actually read it and think about it; would you NOT find that an enjoyable iteration of WHM?

When you mentioned Galadrial in that other thread, it got me thinking of basically Y'Shtola's Sorceress class, and WHM as something like it. Which is actually what inspired this thread, btw - you.

.

As much as these are all changes I would PERSONALLY absolutely HATE: You have to admit you'd like some of them. (And while I wouldn't LIKE them, the WHM version of Cleric Stance I actually kind of like the concept of, even if I'd rather not play it personally.)

[ty_taurus]

I do not understand what it is you're trying to accomplish with all of these threads. Your initial post here is heavily coated with your visceral hatred of the idea of the healers (specifically WHM) having anything added to what it has right now, so it doesn't seem like you're even willing to hear out or acknowledge anything anyone would say anyway, so what's the point? You're just going to shoot down and rip apart any suggestions that anyone could make.

If this were a conversation you actually want to have and respect the ideas other people could propose, it would behoove you to approach the topic with an unbiased perspective and engage with others with an open mind. But if your opening post includes statements like "That's how I would make Healers as needlessly complex and difficult as possible." or "What would it take to make them hard/complex/punishing/challenging?" or "As much as these are all changes I would PERSONALLY absolutely HATE: You have to admit you'd like some of them." that's not exactly an open minded standpoint to go into a conversation with, and quite frankly feels like you aren't listening to what others are saying when you have discussions about the same topics over and over again because you are not reflecting what others are saying in these posts.

You've set everyone else up to utterly fail to meet your expectations.

[ty_taurus]

It's really you that needs to seriously reevaluate your posts, not me. I'm not the one who has a meltdown and tries to play the Uno reverse card every time someone criticizes your approach to communication and calls you out on bad faith.

I constantly respond as professionally as I can while offering you the benefit of the doubt. You really don't understand the difference between criticism and toxicity. But if you'd like to prove me wrong, then why don't you share with me how you'd approach criticizing your own post if you saw bad faith behavior in it in a way that isn't a visceral lashing out of anger. Teach me how someone who is respectful and professional calls out negative attitudes.

[ForsakenRoe]

I guess if you make enough threads eventually you'll find at least one other player that agrees with you that WHM should have zero skill ceiling, and then you can lord over all of us unenlightened 'dirty elitists' that you were right all along

You know, you could be using the time you're spending on these constant forum posts that boil down to 'I want to keep the maximum skill expression of the class as low as it is, so really good player don't make me look worse by comparison' to, idk, practice more

It's not my fault you guys can't read basic notices to posts

How is this not 'bad faith'? Assuming that Sem didn't read your post before posting theirs? It's entirely possible (and I'd assume did occur) that they DID read your whole drivel, and that gif was the summary of their opinion about what you wrote. Because it's not worth a whole typed response.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

You know, you could be using the time you're spending on these constant forum posts that boil down to 'I want to keep the maximum skill expression of the class as low as it is, so really good player don't make me look worse by comparison' to, idk, practice more.

Maybe because making forum posts *le gasp!* more fun than 1 button spam after all!

[IDontPetLalas]

I just want to add that while there may be the odd note of sarcasm, which may be due to impatience, or a poor sense or humour- I really don't recall ever seeing a single instance of a personal attack, or what looked like responses that were in bad faith Renathras. There is no "clique", we aren't the Illuminati either by the way.

What I do see is an incredible amount of patience in comparison to other forums , where indeed other people - or possibly mods - would either have been more abrasive, or the threads might have been locked.

[ForsakenRoe]

Maybe because making forum posts *le gasp!* more fun than 1 button spam after all!

When you think about it, writing words on a forum post is a 'rotation' of sorts in itself isn't it? We have certain 'phases' of the rotation, which is 'words', building into a 60s loop we call a 'paragraph'. And it definitely takes more than the button count healers currently have to make a semi coherent post than to clear most of the content in the game, even savage probably uses less unique buttons than the average post (maybe even this one)

Weird to think about it that way

[ty_taurus]

When you think about it, writing words on a forum post is a 'rotation' of sorts in itself isn't it? We have certain 'phases' of the rotation, which is 'words', building into a 60s loop we call a 'paragraph'. And it definitely takes more than the button count healers currently have to make a semi coherent post than to clear most of the content in the game, even savage probably uses less unique buttons than the average post (maybe even this one)

Weird to think about it that way

Are you sure about that?