Latest Official Developer Statements About Healer DPS?

[Melichoir]

In 2017, Yoshi-P went on record stating the developers do not expect Healers to contribute to DPS.* Like so many things, some people liked this and some people disliked this, but regardless it provided some valuable insight into the way the devs approach the design of content and roles.

My question is: a lot of time has passed since 2017, so I'm wondering if since then Yoshi-P has ever gone on record as having either altered or reinforced this stance. If so, I'd be grateful if someone could provide the source for whatever he said about it.

I'm just curious to know what the devs have officially said about this sort of thing. Thanks for the help on that!

*Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5la_nyC5BO0&t=282s

Devs are caught between a rock and hardplace. Essentially they got two options right now with Healers:

Focus Healers on just healing - This would mean that raid damage must increase substantially so that Healers are spending MORE time doing heals and sustainting/protecting the group, so they would have less of a need for DPS skills

Reduce focus on Healers healing - This would mean raid damage would either have to decrease, or increase self sustain by everyone else, so that healers woul essentially have time to commit to a dps rotation

Neither answer is actually all that good. Casual players seem to lean towards the former, while more higher end players tend to lean into the latter. From my perspective though, it feels like theyre testing the waters currently with the former, as a lot of 'higher end' content feels a lot more damage heavy, requiring more healing from support. And if they wanted healers to be more damage focused, I figure theyd have to give more sustain to everyone else to compensate for lack of healing while adjusting healing to be more OGCD based and adding in offense abilities (think how tanks operates, where most of the skills are offense with some oGCDS for defense buffs))

[ty_taurus]

Devs are caught between a rock and hardplace. Essentially they got two options right now with Healers:

Focus Healers on just healing - This would mean that raid damage must increase substantially so that Healers are spending MORE time doing heals and sustainting/protecting the group, so they would have less of a need for DPS skills

Reduce focus on Healers healing - This would mean raid damage would either have to decrease, or increase self sustain by everyone else, so that healers woul essentially have time to commit to a dps rotation

Um, healers focus on healing so little already that even in Savage, healers can maintain 100% DPS uptime (excluding AST). How is the swollen DPS uptime windows healers already have access to is not enough to justify more than 1 filler attack, 1 30 second DOT, and 1 40/60 second cooldown bonus button?

[ForsakenRoe]

Reduce focus on Healers healing - This would mean raid damage would either have to decrease, or increase self sustain by everyone else, so that healers woul essentially have time to commit to a dps rotation

This is a misunderstanding that crops up quite often. Let's take an example, arguably one of the 'most complex' healers to DPS on, HW SCH. Back then, we had Bio at 18s (dealing a total of 240p), Miasma at 24s (dealing a total of 300p), Bio 2 at 30s (dealing a total of 350p), and Shadowflare at 30s (dealing a total of 250p). By contrast, the 'filler' at the time, Broil 1, was 170 (later 190 iirc). Now, we have Broil 4 at 295p, and one DOT at 30s, for a total of 700p. Notice how all those old DOTs deal only a fraction of a Broil more than an actual Broil (with Miasma being about 180% of a Broil), compared to now, where our single DOT does over 200% of a Broil. 'Misplay' with the old systems, eg dropping a DOT for a tick or two, was a lot less punishing than the current systems, where missing a tick of the current DOT is equal to losing about a quarter of a Broil cast

But the key thing about 'not enough time to commit to a DPS rotation' is this: When we have multiple DOTs, we refresh them on time ideally. If we cannot, because of a hard healing requirement (cough Harrowing Hell), either we delay the refresh by a GCD (as many times as is needed until you are safe to), or you refresh early. But regardless of which of these options you take, you're doing the same thing: removing one Broil cast from your fight timeline. If you are intending to go Broil, Bio, Miasma, Bio2, Broil, and you have to Succor to shield the team part way in there, you don't just drop a DOT entirely, you shift it back one GCD to make Broil, Bio, Succor, Miasma, Bio2, Broil, and the last Broil is pushed backwards by a GCD. Playing around the fact that this GCD is pushed back, and striving to make sure it's your least valuable GCD (in this case, Broil since it is the lowest potency compared to the DOTs), is the optional depth that we have lost from the class and seek to have back

If we have an extra button on WHM that has a 15s CD (like old Fluid Aura, but GCD), healing isn't going to suddenly be impossible to handle because of it. We hit the button when we can, and if healing gets in the way, we do the healing stuff first, then hit the button when it's next safe to.

I figure theyd have to give more sustain to everyone else to compensate for lack of healing while adjusting healing to be more OGCD based and adding in offense abilities (think how tanks operates, where most of the skills are offense with some oGCDS for defense buffs))

Healing IS OGCD based as it stands. The issue that the devs need to realise is that where they gave the tanks offense skills like Confiteor and Primal Rend, they have given the healers an overabundance of these OGCDs and not enough offense skills to keep the 'between healing' gameplay interesting. Effectively, the tank equivalent situation would be to have WAR have it's Eye and Path combos, and nothing else for it's damage. Then, in place of Upheaval, Onslaught, Infuriate, Inner Release, Primal Rend, that AOE punch thing, Decimate or Fell Cleave, SE gives them another 7-8 cooldowns to mitigate damage with. And not interesting ones, just 'reduces damage taken by X%', literal reskins of Rampart. At a certain point, you have enough mitigation to survive the hit, you don't need more. Same with healing, we have enough to heal through the content. So why do we keep being given more, when the content stays roughly as 'hard to heal' as previous incarnations of the same difficulty level? Nothing about the raid tiers this expansion felt 'harder to heal' than SHB, and the devs have been on record at some point iirc saying that E12S was 'probably the hardest they can make healing before it becomes unreasonable'. So if they can't go further than that, but 'that' wasn't enough, then we have to change tact somewhere, because it means 'more healing needed from player' isn't going to be a viable solution to the issue

Once again we need a FAQ for the general opinions of the healer forums because again nobody wants healers to do more damage, we want to do the damage we are currently doing in a more interesting way

IDK about anyone else, but I'd happily take a 25% whack to my output (going from 8k to 6k with current BIS gear for example) if it meant we had four healers each with unique and fun rotations to deal that 6k with. WHM can be 'bursty', SCH can be 'DOT city', AST can be 'supporty' by having cards to play way more often, and SGE can be 'actually a DPS-Healer' by making Kardia into something more than it currently is.

I do not want to do 'more damage' as a healer, I would be perfectly fine with doing LESS damage as a healer. I want the method by which we deal that damage to be more engaging than 'this could be done with a RuneScape autoclicker'

Since the running theme of healer discussions is people jumping to conclusions, I figured I'd set the mood.

Ironically, the brand name of that trampoline is the exact antonym of current healer design

[ty_taurus]

Ironically, the brand name of that trampoline is the exact antonym of current healer design

I stand by what I said a week ago: I'd rather let a tarantula lay eggs in my ear canal than play PVE healer in EW.

[Melichoir]

This is a misunderstanding that ....next safe to.

I do remember given the time period mentioned that dots had issues back then with lining up nicely among other things, and that being partially the reason devs moved away from dots. That said, what you are mentioning here is more meta complexity, that can probably be achieved with smaller fixes than whole reworks. It's not really a 'rotation' in the sense of other classes, like that of Monk, Sam, BLM, and etc. Granted I think stuff that has meta complexity is definitely more feasible for the devs to accomplish, and I personally like complexity in this regard because its interesting.

Healing IS OGCD based as it stands. ....to be a viable solution to the issue

I agree mostly with how healing currently is but there is a bit of a caveat to this? You could technically heal a fight with just oGCDs if coordination is superb (so both healers work well, as long as proper mitigation and no one taking excessive damage). In organized statics I can see that happening, but in PF....

That might be why things are as they are now, because it requires more coordination you need more robust healing options that are semi redundant because you have to factor in other players and the mistakes they may make much more than any other role[/QUOTE]

You have to explain to me how anyone not doing their.... say they have a leg to stand on?

The role of healer is a bit more unique in that, unlike other jobs where their rotation is pretty much their own business, healers business is that of other players. So if you had a rotation as a healer, how well that rotation goes will become some what more dependant on your party members doing their stuff to a T and not getting killed or taking excessive damage. So imagine player feelings when people cant do their healer dps rotation cause DPS eat pancakes or make mistakes.

First, drop that [I]"if you're trying to increase healer DPS output....... standard is sickening.

That example is not exactly great. All it does is essentially assume that "If something is more complex, it is more interesting and fulfilling." But that is an assumption, and is ultimately missing the 'reward' aspect that isnt subjective.

If you wanted a better example, it should be more like this:

50 + 50 = 100

50+x(2y/(x+45))^2 = 10,000

The complexity added is rewarded with increased output. This is an objective meaningful increase to complexity that people will naturally find more fair (if, the effort to get the increase is 'reasonable'). This is kind of important because, being frank, the example you showed is actually a nerf, because to achieve the same results, you now must do way more work. People will not generally find that change justified. You and a few others may on a personal level like the change cause its harder, but most players wont see it that way. They will complain and ask for reversion.

But even then, just consider the added complexity is a reward in of itself and people do accept that. That added complexity still comes at a cost to the game design, no matter how you slice it. It can be things like button bloat problems, balance issues, changes in the player mindset when playing the job, and so forth. Those are things devs have to consider before making changes. It is exactly why they havent settled on one design direction or another, and its not an easy problem to solve.

Lastly roles not doing their intended jobs is actually a problem that is worth pointing out. Tanks refusing to mitigate cause "gotta get my deeps", or healers not ressing cause "no swift cast" actually illustrates problems with player mentality when it comes to their roles, where the focus of their play becomes to much about DPS. Yeah, tanks need to be mitigating, and healers need to be ressing, even if it means a DPS loss because their roll is supposed to do those things. Why, then, would it be a good idea to encourage more of problematic behavior just because other roles have that issue? That really doesn't make sense to me.

Not a healer......as a response to this point.

THe problem with the proposed solution is that it ultimately is no different than pressing 1 button. Consider it mechanically: What is the difference between 1,1,1,1,1,1, and 1,2,3,1,2,3? You arent really adding complexity, partially because the problem with the proposed solution is there is no 'punishment' for breaking rotation. Youre just delaying it technically so you can do role specific actions that you are there for. There has to be something that gives a reason why spamming 1,2,3 (as an example) is more interesting an option other than you have more buttons to push that accomplish the exact same thing as pressing 1 button. And that complexity has to be meaningful, meaning it should come with 'punishments' for not doing it optimally.

[ty_taurus]

If you wanted a better example, it should be more like this:

50 + 50 = 100

50+x(2y/(x+45))^2 = 10,000

The complexity added is rewarded with increased output. This is an objective meaningful increase to complexity that people will naturally find more fair (if, the effort to get the increase is 'reasonable'). This is kind of important because, being frank, the example you showed is actually a nerf, because to achieve the same results, you now must do way more work. People will not generally find that change justified. You and a few others may on a personal level like the change cause its harder, but most players wont see it that way. They will complain and ask for reversion.

Um... The current tank balance would say otherwise:

[Supersnow845]

Um... The current tank balance would say otherwise:

The tanks are so hilariously balanced you almost get punished for picking a more complex class or one that has a worse invuln

But WAR isn’t allowed to be bad at anything

[ty_taurus]

The tanks are so hilariously balanced you almost get punished for picking a more complex class or one that has a worse invuln

But WAR isn’t allowed to be bad at anything

Certainly not perfect, but also not a disaster either. Which is why I find the 100 vs 10000 comparison to be highly uncharitable.

In general, balancing around the difficulty of a class/character in a game is not only common, but fairly standard practice, so the sentiment does make sense, but we're ignoring a lot of nuance to that concept. First and foremost is we need to consider how difficult is the job actually and what is the general performance expectation that we have of the average player in different settings? (Like if Sage is our complex DPS healer, how does the average dungeon player perform? How does the average alliance raider perform? How does the average savage raider perform? etc.) What you end up with, when balanced well, is a job that can outperform an easier class/character to some extent (i.e. without invalidating the alternatives), but also can underperform when played incorrectly. In other words, we have a higher maximum threshold, but a wider swing in terms of performance levels, and that's perfectly okay, as we see with Black Mage for example. Black Mage has the widest swing of all jobs in the game by a mile, and yet, its balance is rarely an issue (with caster DPS the issue is more on SE's insistence on massively overtuned utility tax on Summoner and Red Mage. Things like utility tax or mobility tax are fine for balance, but SE does not seem capable of comprehending how to hold back when it comes to DPS taxes).

tl;dr: Our hypothetical "complex" healer (and I use the term "complex" loosely) may have a higher maximum DPS output, but would also have a lower minimum--a wider swing.

Also, something to consider is DPS vs utility. Something I've said before is that every healer should have a unique advantage that gives them a different angle to approach more challenging content with. Scholar already has this in the form of Expedient, and Astrologian arguably has this in Macrocosmos being able to delete certain types of healing checks (if things like Reaper's Toll were more frequent, that could be Astrologian's niche). As long as White Mage can be allowed to have its own form of utility, like the example of float I've given elsewhere in the past or something else entirely, then Sage's niche could also just be an extra couple steps higher of DPS output, not unlike the concept of Black Mage.

[Melichoir]

Um... The current tank balance would say otherwise:

I wasnt initially discussing comparisons between classes cause that starts involving a whole slew of nuances that arent exactly relevant to what I was trying to say about the example and generally the overall approach to making a healer class more complex.

What I was saying was increasing complexity to achieve the exact same goal is not enough in of itself. That isnt meaningful in an objective sense. There has to be a tangible reward for the increase in complexity from a previous iteration. A tangible reward could be an increase in dps, but could be other things that give its complexity an edge over less complex iterations. So if a healer increases complexity with some rotation on top of keeping all other aspects intact only for it to achieve the exact same end result as its previous incarnation that spammed 1 all day long, the change isnt really justified as a positive. It is, in fact a defacto a nerf to the class. One many people will not outright accept, especially if the level of complexity is substantially increased.

If we were to talk about complexity between classes within a role, this just goes back to what I mentioned about the problem with making changes: Added complexity comes with cost. Balancing, as an example, becomes substantially more difficult to do if the goal is to keep the relative output of all classes within a role 'viable'. Its actually easier to dumb things down and homogenize than to add complexity to maintain balance. So even if they want to make healers have a rotation, they have to consider balance as a result. A way this plays out is actually pretty easy to see: If WHM, for example, had a pretty damn complex rotation that is significantly harder than all the other 3 healers to achieve the same result, it will likely see LESS play overall from the player base because people will optimize into a class that better bang for their buck.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

[...]

You see, I don't really disagree vehemently against many of your points. However the fact remains that neither the changes they've imparted into the green role nor their related past statements had made any sense.

Why say "healer DPS isn't expected" while also pruning the complexities away & creating fights like E8S that clearly expects healer's contribution? To add insult to the injury, have they ever given back anything in return after those pruning? (rhetoric)
Why say "we want healer to heal" but also keeps adding buttons that specifically to make healers heal less or sometimes none at all (aka button that literally created to solve a very specific mechanic)? Lilybell & Panhaima are the biggest offender in this category. Multi-hit instances are nice to have, but do you know why healing through Styx in Zodiark Normal was more fun as a WHM than SGE? Because I can make that in-combat decision to where to keep my 2-3 lilies so I don't need to hardcast Medica II/Cure III, drift Assize, and I don't have Lilybell at that level. What's wrong with SGE? Just Panhaima+Kerachole and Dosis away(??????).

Make it make sense, small indie company. They're clearly capable of making things better, they just refuse to for whatever reason.

[...]Why, then, would it be a good idea to encourage more of problematic behavior just because other roles have that issue? That really doesn't make sense to me.

This goes both ways. ARR - StB healer dps buttons would like to have a word with this particular sentence.

You (general you) give a 1 2 1 1 1 1 rotation to a healer, then suddenly newbie & scared healer are shocked that healer needs to contribute dps because just how easy it is to achieve about 60% of a full fledge DPS job's contribution. This is exactly what's happening after ShB pruning.
You give back old Cleric Stance to healers, then suddenly newbie or scared healer can remain within Cleric Stance to heal safely because everybody knows the risk just isn't worth it if they can't pull it off. This was a common occurrence in the olden days.