A summary of healer issues

[Kolaina]

Precisely.

When we still have Timmy the Medica II Mage running around letting people die (unintentionally, unfortunately) because they do not know how to utilize 30% - 100% of their entire healing kits from bottom casual to EX/Savage+ contents as of today, what makes people think raising incoming damage would magically 'fix' the issue, if it fixes any at all in the future?

Lmao, really.

This is more than half of whms. Glad I’m not the only one to notice the mediocre medica 2 healers.

[Smollett]

What I'm trying to see is what a more general audience thinks of it. The place it was posted is a bit of an echo chamber and I'm curious what people not part of that echo chamber feel related to it.

I started as healer in FF14 because I loved to heal in other mmos. So here I am - a fresh CNJ.

Now in Endwalker after leveling all jobs I can say... I don't want to heal anymore. It's boring as hell, and it's not even the main point. Healers outdated as a role, we aren't needed in almost any group content. In 4-man duty we just exist. Normal and alliance raids allow some healing, but lets be honest - any SMN or DNC or WAR or PLD can fill this niche. My key "1" is almost broken. And no, savage and ultimate shouldn't be the only engaging content for healers.

It's all my opinion. You have all rights to disagree. But that's how I feel.

[fulminating]

Lol the high end healers I know mostly quit because healing got mind-numbingly boring. Since ShB. Not because there's pressure.

It's amazing really. They're too boring for competent players and the slightest bit of challenge makes them too difficult for the lower end. You couldn't design a system like this intentionally.

[AnotherPerson]

Ahem, not to put too fine a point on it but...have you looked at your profile lately on Lodestone? It seems unsearchable on the forbidden site, but I don't see Savage clear mounts or Extreme mounts under that Mount tab. Easy to cast stones when you make it where others can't verify how you stack up to your own standard... <_<

You... uh.. you might not realize this, but while he's a troll on the forums and have multiple alts, he actually is one of the more accomplished high-end raiders who also happens to parse like a monster (better than most players too). It isn't all the time he drops pretense when trolling, but when he does have a serious conversation, you realize he is also aware to the issues that plague FFXIV gameplay.

I visited the healer forums once. It was an echo chamber of salt. And when I dared speak my own opinion about how I liked healer as it is now, they got extremely vitriolic. So why would I pay attention to anything other than general discussion, which has arguably less vitriol.

Unsurprisingly, really. Can you imagine if Samurais lost more than Kaiten, their entire rotation just became 3 buttons instead of 7 for single target as well as removing Kaiten? And while most people are still upset at the changes, then someone goes into the DPS forum like "Yeah, I Love the current Samurai!" It has only been... what? Less than 1 expansion since Samurais lost only Kaiten and the forums were in chaos for a while. And yet this isn't even for the entire DPS role, it was just 1 job where plenty of Samurai threads popped up. Healers had their issues start from Stormblood (2 expansions ago) with a large portion of their toolkit just deleted from existence, so it's no surprise the vitriol only accumulated after lots of healers tried the gameplay out, did not like it, and had their feedback ignored to change it.

Don't get me wrong, I can see the potential beauty of 1 button DPS in ShB. It gives a lot of room to pay attention to boss mechanics and to keep track of HP bars for healers who aren't great at multi-tasking. However, any potential that playstyle had shattered for me in Endwalker's implementation. When HP bars don't move significantly or frequently enough for a long period of time, I absolutely abhor the 1 button DPS gameplay because I don't feel engaged or feel like a healer. It's not feasible to also just increase damage for healers to heal because there are healers who won't be able to keep up, yet they aren't willing to give healers that ability other than mashing the same DPS button for the entire fight when healers can handle pretty much all healing with just using their instant abilities. It's just a lose-lose for healer gameplay at every turn lately.
So here we are, some players are still struggling to heal effectively in casual content by relying mainly on their weakest/outdated skills instead of using the shiny new ones, causing players demanding healers to be easier, but you also have a WAR that can just heal themselves and the party while the healer remains dead on the floor ... It's almost inconceivable at what the state of healers have been reduced to with how little their main role contributes when players are wholly competent, and how little they can do anything else when it happens.
Keep healers accessible on the healing side since that's their main role sure, but don't take away their toolkit and leave nothing else in return once they get accustomed to healing and realize there's nothing else for them to do when the party also have ways to keep themselves alive.

[Nizzi]

Teehee xP I happen to LOVE healers the way they are x3
Don't you guys like um, actually play the game??? Didn't you know that healers... erm... HEAL??? Those silly dumb DPS mains are like, CONSTANTLY taking damage in my normal mode easy content! Why don't you wannabe DPS mains just go play DPS and let us, the REAL HEALERS do our job? D:<

I happen to love my 1 button rotation so much I'm going to post it here so everyone can smile and feel warm inside and giggle too as they think about how much fun this is!

Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Bio Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil Broil

woohoo teehee that was almost as fun as it is in game and stuff, haha i love this game best game EVARRRR

[Leifei]

Personally I find playing healer is pretty fun, focus targeting a DPS, hitting Nascent flash and being able to get both their and my own HP to max in a few attacks feels pretty good.
I don't get why people don't like playing healer, Its pretty satisfying.

Glad you're enjoying it. Outside looking in, I have a few healer friends that raid and I've seen the conversations from strangers. Seems like their main criticism is that the dps rotation is only 2 buttons, and one is a DoT. I completely understand their gripe as that sounds less fun than having a more complex kit. Something that was present in the past for healers.

[Kickwars]

It's amazing really. They're too boring for competent players and the slightest bit of challenge makes them too difficult for the lower end. You couldn't design a system like this intentionally.

Honestly they should just cater to the top-end while minimizing the damage gap between the skill floor and the skill ceiling. Technically you can just win everything below Ultimate by using only Cure II, Regen, and Medica II (in Savage, once you get +20 ilvl gear). Back in HW if you were a newbie healer you just choose to NOT use Cleric Stance. Sure people gave you crap for it but most people didn't begrudge a sprout healer not using Cleric Stance. Same goes for tanking. You can just stay in tank stance the entire fight even in Savage. Elitists will give you crap but most people don't care. Everything was clearable with perma tank stance more or less.

There are ALWAYS options for very simple gameplay on a complex class. Don't like caster bard? Literally just don't toggle Minuet. Don't like positionals? Just... don't hit them? They literally don't matter in 99% of content? Don't like HW/SB astro cards? Just use Spire and Ewer on yourself and use the other cards randomly. Don't like Summoner pet micros and DoTs? Just only ever use Tri-disaster, don't bother with manual DoTs and use Garuda for everything and let it auto-use abilities. The pressure certainly isn't coming from the game. I honestly think it comes from two sources: one from elitists who scold people for not playing optimally. But just ignore them, they'll scold you for not standing behind the Reaper so that the buffs cascade to the Reaper first before you these days which probably makes like a 1 rDPS difference, so who cares? The other from people wanting to hit top damage but not wanting to put in the effort. I mean, I don't know why we want to cater to the latter type in any way.

The solution that SE implemented though, is to homogenize and simplify everything. An actual competent solution would be to minimize the damage gap so that people who don't want to engage with the extra optimization would be at most 5% DPS behind or something, as long as they're rolling their GCDs. That's basically what EW BLM was in 6.0/6.1 (not sure about now). There was the meme Paradox rotation that was less than 5% dps behind the standard rotation. People who want to play BLM casually should literally just use that instead of complaining about transpose lines and whatnot.

I know the real casual players certainly don't complain about stuff like TK+Riddle of Wind or positionals or tank/damage stance. At least I've never encountered any. They probably don't even know it exists. So why are these removed? I can only conclude that it's to appease the wannabe raiders who want to be part of the """elite""" without putting in the work. Majority of people on JP actually does Savage, but are not quite at the top level. It's probably these guys that are the real culprit than WoWfugees or casuals or elitists honestly (I know, I know about that other shitpost). SE doesn't listen to NA. These same JP players were on perma-WHM brain rot in SB so much that SE overbuffed AST, and WHM was basically never really a hard class. In retrospect we should've all seen it coming, when JP just can't get rid of its WHM addiction year after year; of course the developers will just turn everything into a WHM.

[Smollett]

Glad you're enjoying it. Outside looking in, I have a few healer friends that raid and I've seen the conversations from strangers. Seems like their main criticism is that the dps rotation is only 2 buttons, and one is a DoT. I completely understand their gripe as that sounds less fun than having a more complex kit. Something that was present in the past for healers.

Uhm... You do understand it was a joke about WAR "healers", right?

[Avoidy]

Healing in this game is boring as hell. Even when it's intense, it's rarely fun; it just feels stressful because people are fucking up and now that's falling on you to deal with. In the game I used to play (tera), healers handled the group's resource management. So you replenished the team's mana, you boosted their attack speed/recast times, and you kept them topped off so they could cheese mechanics. People planned for this, and so a good healer was critical for actually being able to pull off your rotation properly. The difference in that game between a good healer and a bad healer was that with a bad healer you'd run out of mana during your burst, but with a good healer you wouldn't. Or with a good healer, you could straight up ignore certain mechanics, but with a bad healer you'd lose uptime dodging everything because you couldn't trust them. This game punishes you for getting hit with vulns and damage downs, so good luck playing with that for very long. You would also regularly debuff the boss in this other game, and optimal play meant keeping that debuff going for the entire fight so the rest of your group could do more damage that way as well. It felt good. It felt meaningful. People would literally say "I want to go for a personal best, and I need you healing for me to do it." In this game, 90% of the time I just spam a single button to contribute some speck of damage and that's pretty much it in the absolute best case scenario. Like, spamming 1 button is the optimal situation I'm striving for as a healer. The longer I can do that, the better. That's not enjoyable for me. Hell, I'd wager it's not enjoyable for anyone, which is why every time I queue up a daily as a healer it pops immediately. Nobody's lining up to be bored as hell. In a lot of the normal content, you don't even need a healer. People go out of their way to avoid recruiting one so they can finish faster.

Unfortunately fixing it means changing how the entire game works. XIV utilizes a system where everyone operates independently of one another (compared to other team based games, slapping a party buff every 2 minutes is nothing), so support jobs in general feel a bit empty. Hell, I used to love AST for having more stuff to deal with, but then they ripped the sigils out of divination and put them on a self buff that I frankly don't give a shit about, and other flavorful things like sects or the cards themselves were gutted to appeal to metawankers who won't be happy until they've minmaxed the fun out of the game. Frankly, I've given up on healing in XIV. I just play SCH when I don't have any other choice, or when I want a queue to pop. Watching yoshi say that lapis manalis would have something new for healers to grapple with, and finding out that he was talking about using esuna on doom, solidified my stance that nobody on the devteam actually heals in this game and it'll never get better.

And oh my god, watching them tell healers "if you want to be engaged, just bang your head against an ultimate" was such a slap. Tera was a free to play kMMO with an incompetent staff that ran it into the ground, but even they found a way to make healing feel engaging in all content difficulties. That game's dead now, but it has a private server, and guess what? When I went to play it, they had a healer surplus. As in, I queued for something as a healer, and it didn't pop for several minutes. But when I queued as a DPS, it filled immediately. It turns out when you make healing feel important and valuable and rewarding and engaging, people actually want to do it.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

[...]Watching yoshi say that lapis manalis would have something new for healers to grapple with, and finding out that he was talking about using esuna on doom, solidified my stance that nobody on the devteam actually heals in this game and it'll never get better.[...]

Lordy, did Yoshi-P specifically mentioned -that- in Lapis Manalis intro? M-maybe he meant we can Repose the griffin to pseudo stun the Griffin at the beginning!!

Lmao.