Delete rescue from the game.

[Renathras]

No its not, proof:
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Those differences you mention aren't enough to make the jobs feel different,
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Even tanks as homgenized as they are are far more different than those 2, just look at any 2 tanks and you'll se how they aren't even close.

Okay, I know you guys hate me saying this, but it needs to be said:

This is subjective.

I don't mean the number of casts, that's objective. I mean the feel. Any time you use the word feel, you're speaking in subjective terms. I've read through the results of the long-form surveys on Reddit. While there are a lot of disappointed people (results of the satisfied/dissatisfied question here:

Note that the scaling is done from 1-9 instead of 1-10 since Ty's system is weird, so the net ratings are actually higher if you change the 9 to 10, but this is "looking at it in the worst way possible" - it's also not broken down into individual Jobs, and keep in mind the three notes listed... ), there are a lot of satisfied ones that talk about how DIFFERENT the Healer Jobs feel to them.

Conversely, hop over to the Tank forum. They've been complaining ever since the 6.3 PLD rework that PLD now feels just like GNB (or WAR, depending on who you ask), and that DRK feels just like WAR, and that all the Tanks are samey and feel alike because they just have the same 1-2-3 rotation, with some gimmick -4 or equivalent, and that their mitigation toolkits feel identical.

...I disagree with them, too, mind you, but the point is, you're speaking for yourself - AND for those that think like you - but not for everyone. There seem to be a lot of people who describe all the Healers as feeling very different to play. I would wager this is because some players put more emphasis on the healing side of things and others the DPSing side of things, with the former feeling different and the latter feeling they're the same.

It woudn't and honestly I feel that it should be obvious why its not but to summarize

You list a lot of things but don't really substantiate them.

You say you gain optimization (which SHOULD increase the skill ceiling...), but then handwave that away as just a small difference (but don't say what the difference is now to compare it to), then say "losing literally every kind of GCD and cooldown optimization whatsoever" but don't explain how or why you're losing these and what these optimizations are that you're losing. Like...what are you losing here? The only optimization you're losing is that of using downtime shields so Toxicon isn't damage neutral (which is clunk, not clever mechanics) and...what? If you're trying to stock the Toxicons for burst, it means you're trying to avoid them as a movement tool, not use them more for one (so you're gaining ceiling/optimization there, not losing it), you can use GCD heals for movement optimization in place of Toxicon, I guess? But since the Toxicons you gain are for burst and you're trying not to overcap them otherwise, that should still be a net increase in the skill ceiling. You say it will shrink the gap between ceiling and floor, but don't explain how it's supposedly doing so.

You are correct on increasing the RNG reliance, but it's more increasing the buff window reliance. If this is bad, then every DPS and Tank Job in the game right now are bad because they all do this.

You say it's disencouraging[sic] job knowledge...but don't explain how. Fully optimizing SGE's burst under this model would require MORE Job knowledge, not less! You'd want to stock Toxicons and Plegmas for burst windows, have the raid awareness to know when those start, and ensure you land all three Toxicons and your two Plegmas in the burst window. That already would be a higher skill ceiling than what SGE's damage rotation has going for it now, would it not? And you would still be rewarded (provided you haven't overcapped Addersting) for downtime shielding. You'd be rewarded for knowing when you NEED to shield so you could optimize around that to use those Toxicons for movement (knowing you'll have more than 3 by the burst window and so need to burn some) instead of Plegma, ensuring a good player is stocking the Plegmas (2) for the burst window while a less optimized player would be using Plegmas instead and have a lower burst output and thus lower overall output.

Everything I can think of has this rewarding Job and kit knowledge as well as encounter knowledge. You're going to have to explain to me how this isn't so, because I'm not seeing it here.

I think what you're trying to say is people can more freely shield (but that's a trap if they dry out their MP) and that if they use Toxicon outside of burst it's a DPS loss but gives them more movement or something? But that wouldn't be optimizing, and thus is an example of widening the skill ceiling from the floor, since the lower skilled player wouldn't be optimizing there while the higher skilled one would be.

I do agree on that but didn't want to talk about that cause Sch is its own can of worms and is honestly another topic that could fill pages easily

Fair enough, though I suspect we might agree more on THAT topic than this one.

but its undeniable that is dpsing side is the same as the existing healers had, its job mechanics are not unique and its main way of healing is a carbon copy of a pre existing job

It is, in fact, deniable, as it's DPSing side isn't identical to any other Job. The only case that's absolutely true of is SCH and AST (since SCH arguably doesn't use Ruin 2). The question is how distinct they are (not very), not if they're identical ("the same").

It's Job mechanics are unique, but they're pretty similar to SCH's. Their Addersgall is generated differently, they have Addersting instead of Energy Drain (which is also generated differently), their splash heal works differently (arguably better), and their oGCD kit aside from Aetherflow/Addersgall is distinct (and arguably better as well) than SCH's. The fact remains that in all three surveys (Ty's and my two long form ones), SGE is the most praised Healer Job while SCH (in the long form) is pretty derided (only AST is worse), and in Ty's, SCH gets lower marks than SGE. Clearly people are seeing some distinction, otherwise they'd be rating them the same (in Ty's) and talking about them the same (in mine) where people aren't.

One of the most common things said in the long form surveys is "I really like WHM and SGE, but I don't like SCH since it's like a worse SGE and I really don't like AST" or some variation on that theme.

EDIT2:

I'd see the meleeing aspect of a healer akin to WHM's Lilies, you're DPSing whilst also healing and pocketing further resources for down the line. As long as it's melee focus was a means to generate resources whilst functioning optimally I think it'd be fine. Times where it was forced out of range could be taken as moments to spend said resources in optimised play, not to mention that boss hitboxes are so huge these days that you can smack them from deepest Narnia anyway. I don't think it would be a problem now in the same way it would have been back in 2.x-4.x.

Watch some world prog team Savage PoVs on YouTube. It's kind of surprising how little time you need to spend out of cane slap range.

Yeah fair.

I guess I should say this more like "in older content", but as I've said to you guys, older content doesn't matter, so...

You know what? Sure. Bring on the melee Healer.

Hm...Onimaiju...or whatever the thing that [SPOILER] from the Ranged Physical EW Role quest is. I'm not sure what it was, but like the shrine priest thing. Could have a playstyle slapping sacred suchers(sp?) on things like Miroku from Inuyasha. Honestly, I'd be fine with a melee Healer then. I wouldn't play it, but could be the candidate for the WAR 1-2-3 -4 combo system.