There's been many threads here and around the internet with legitimate criticism of the way Healers have been destroyed this expansion. It is clear that the dev philosophy isn't working. The many healer complaints however get mixed in with general SHB complaints and mixed between the roles.
So I thought I'd summarise them.
1.Lack of things to do when no healing is required and during solo duties
Healers are extremely boring. We spam 1 button constantly with a second button every 30 seconds. I had more things to press during downtime back as a level 16 conjurer in 2.0 when I first fell into Sastacha and this is not an exaggeration.
2. Outgoing damage in most content is too low, infrequent and scripted
Very few fights in the game need two healers even at minimum Ilvl. One dev recently admitted in a reddit interview that the 70% hp hit at the start of e1s was to make healers were paying attention. OGCD healing is strong and frequent enough some fights don't need a single GCD heal.
3. The majority of the streamlined healer gameplay changes feel like a complete failure of job design
The three healers have been homegenised to the point that its made things worse not better. Changes to old skills to bring healers together have utterly destroyed the gameplay styles of all 3 healers. WHM no longer has procs (though this goes back to stormblood changes), SCH no longer has ogcds/dots focus and fairy, Ast no longer has any time magic and the card changes have been one of the most unpopular design decisions the devs have made to the point it was the cited reason for the majority of Ast's ditching globes.
Healing has been dumbed down far too much. It feels like the devs are focusing on balance and accessibility so obseeively its sucked all the fun away.
4. New skills are passive upgrades, clunky, ogcd clones of other spells or older removed skills readded under a different name. None of this is fooling anybody
With the exception of Afflatus Misery, the general reaction to new healer skills is mediocre at best. The capstones are all proof of this:
Seraph has ghosting problems and doesn't work with previous scholar capstones.
Temperance is Divine Seal but with a damage reduction upgrade. Many WHM's were angry when it was removed for largesse and again when that was removed.
Neutral Sect is again, Divine Seal/Largesse...but this time it has the effects of both sects which is just Celestial Intersection with a boost to 20 seconds. Nevermind lorebreaking.
New skills should ENHANCE the gameplay styles, not replace things that should not have been removed in the first place.
5. The decision making inolved in healers no longer exists in any meaningful capacity.
Healers used to have a nice juggling act between using their healing, and using their supportive tools to great effect.
Whm was slow but powerful with a good chunk of thought coming from what tools you had on cross class, regen vs pure heal and mp.
Sch was all about choosing correct gcds and weaving tools
Astrologian required you to think carefully about how you used your drawn card, whether you buffed it or not and who you gave it to or whether to save it for later. Now you just toss it to someone based on its colour.
6. Healer lore has been trampled to bits, levelling them is terrible with missing rewards and lack of sills that correspond to them
Whm never had water magic to begin with, yet we have Y'shtola with us throwing out tornado, Stone/quake and water 4. Stone and Aero got scrapped to be replaced by generic light magic which is more paladin's thing. Having infinite mp while useful, is completely anathema to the fact that white mages draw magic from the land and themselves in order to cast things.
Scholars have 2 fairy designs: eos to succor defensively and selene to support offensively. It is decoupled too far from its tactical arcanist roots and nymian combat medic lore of planning and weakening the enemy.
Astrologians have a goldmine of time related magic, future reading and adapting fate to suit their whims. Yet all our cards have been replaced with one rather than 6 effects. The time magic is gone, and the neutral sect abilities actually negate the piece of lore that states they must choose the correct path ahead of time IE the correct sect. The entirety of the 30-50 skills give you a new skill and explainations for what it does and why you are learning it. All gone.
7. The effects, sounds and looks of healer abilities are lacking, inconsistent and do not mesh well with the themes of the healers
With the homogenisation even extending to the debuff removal, mana renewal and basic restorative effects it is quite difficult to see at times the difference in healers from the healed perspective which person is targeting you.
White mage's magic is all pure light based and has moved away from its stone/wind/water effects that were lacking to begin with. Many liked the conjury roots and to see them gone makes shadowbringers strange with how rampant light magic is. Quite a few of its indiviual healing/restorates have lackluster sounds now. Blood lily is a dull thud that's barely audible.
Scholar has got a very inconsistent theme, with hexagons on fae stuff, but later on its turning into generic white lights with the occasional computer/tech style abilities in biolysis and broil 3. Art of war just looks silly.
Astrologian has some ridiculously over the top effects now (divination and neutral sect come to mind) yet the sounds effects are lacking compared to older skills.
8. Healer feedback is continuously ignored
Healer's have lots of ideas and suggestions on how to improve their job(s) and how to spice up the battle. Healers have the most stressful primary role, especially when things go wrong, but they also spend a large amount of their time, around 70% in trials/raids, 80% and up for dungeons and alliance on their downtime.
As a result of this a large portion of healer feedback will be about healer downtime unless the devs overhaul the entire combat system
But whenever we make suggestions, or legitimate complaints about the state of affairs (energy drain, ghosting fairy, boring cards, terrible meter in sb) we are met with silence. Live letters NEVER answer healer questions no matter how desperate or important they are.
The one time we did regarding astrologian cards, we were basically told to get used to it. So we did:
The 50 page healer quit thread and the constant healer in need is our response.
9. Healer glamour compared to other roles is double standards
Other roles have various amounts of cloth and armour options of multiple amounts from full tunics and plate to cloth, to hardly anything at all
Healers are continuously stuck with robes, shawls or a couple of wraps. Ignoring the fact that male healers are a thing, why can't we have some proper armour sets instead of cloth for once? Imagine a scholar in plate alongside his warrior allies like the lore, or a white mage in a gambison and chain mail wandering the land to bring succor.
Many options that other roles get but we healers are constantly getting the short stick from
Continue reading...
So I thought I'd summarise them.
1.Lack of things to do when no healing is required and during solo duties
Healers are extremely boring. We spam 1 button constantly with a second button every 30 seconds. I had more things to press during downtime back as a level 16 conjurer in 2.0 when I first fell into Sastacha and this is not an exaggeration.
2. Outgoing damage in most content is too low, infrequent and scripted
Very few fights in the game need two healers even at minimum Ilvl. One dev recently admitted in a reddit interview that the 70% hp hit at the start of e1s was to make healers were paying attention. OGCD healing is strong and frequent enough some fights don't need a single GCD heal.
3. The majority of the streamlined healer gameplay changes feel like a complete failure of job design
The three healers have been homegenised to the point that its made things worse not better. Changes to old skills to bring healers together have utterly destroyed the gameplay styles of all 3 healers. WHM no longer has procs (though this goes back to stormblood changes), SCH no longer has ogcds/dots focus and fairy, Ast no longer has any time magic and the card changes have been one of the most unpopular design decisions the devs have made to the point it was the cited reason for the majority of Ast's ditching globes.
Healing has been dumbed down far too much. It feels like the devs are focusing on balance and accessibility so obseeively its sucked all the fun away.
4. New skills are passive upgrades, clunky, ogcd clones of other spells or older removed skills readded under a different name. None of this is fooling anybody
With the exception of Afflatus Misery, the general reaction to new healer skills is mediocre at best. The capstones are all proof of this:
Seraph has ghosting problems and doesn't work with previous scholar capstones.
Temperance is Divine Seal but with a damage reduction upgrade. Many WHM's were angry when it was removed for largesse and again when that was removed.
Neutral Sect is again, Divine Seal/Largesse...but this time it has the effects of both sects which is just Celestial Intersection with a boost to 20 seconds. Nevermind lorebreaking.
New skills should ENHANCE the gameplay styles, not replace things that should not have been removed in the first place.
5. The decision making inolved in healers no longer exists in any meaningful capacity.
Healers used to have a nice juggling act between using their healing, and using their supportive tools to great effect.
Whm was slow but powerful with a good chunk of thought coming from what tools you had on cross class, regen vs pure heal and mp.
Sch was all about choosing correct gcds and weaving tools
Astrologian required you to think carefully about how you used your drawn card, whether you buffed it or not and who you gave it to or whether to save it for later. Now you just toss it to someone based on its colour.
6. Healer lore has been trampled to bits, levelling them is terrible with missing rewards and lack of sills that correspond to them
Whm never had water magic to begin with, yet we have Y'shtola with us throwing out tornado, Stone/quake and water 4. Stone and Aero got scrapped to be replaced by generic light magic which is more paladin's thing. Having infinite mp while useful, is completely anathema to the fact that white mages draw magic from the land and themselves in order to cast things.
Scholars have 2 fairy designs: eos to succor defensively and selene to support offensively. It is decoupled too far from its tactical arcanist roots and nymian combat medic lore of planning and weakening the enemy.
Astrologians have a goldmine of time related magic, future reading and adapting fate to suit their whims. Yet all our cards have been replaced with one rather than 6 effects. The time magic is gone, and the neutral sect abilities actually negate the piece of lore that states they must choose the correct path ahead of time IE the correct sect. The entirety of the 30-50 skills give you a new skill and explainations for what it does and why you are learning it. All gone.
7. The effects, sounds and looks of healer abilities are lacking, inconsistent and do not mesh well with the themes of the healers
With the homogenisation even extending to the debuff removal, mana renewal and basic restorative effects it is quite difficult to see at times the difference in healers from the healed perspective which person is targeting you.
White mage's magic is all pure light based and has moved away from its stone/wind/water effects that were lacking to begin with. Many liked the conjury roots and to see them gone makes shadowbringers strange with how rampant light magic is. Quite a few of its indiviual healing/restorates have lackluster sounds now. Blood lily is a dull thud that's barely audible.
Scholar has got a very inconsistent theme, with hexagons on fae stuff, but later on its turning into generic white lights with the occasional computer/tech style abilities in biolysis and broil 3. Art of war just looks silly.
Astrologian has some ridiculously over the top effects now (divination and neutral sect come to mind) yet the sounds effects are lacking compared to older skills.
8. Healer feedback is continuously ignored
Healer's have lots of ideas and suggestions on how to improve their job(s) and how to spice up the battle. Healers have the most stressful primary role, especially when things go wrong, but they also spend a large amount of their time, around 70% in trials/raids, 80% and up for dungeons and alliance on their downtime.
As a result of this a large portion of healer feedback will be about healer downtime unless the devs overhaul the entire combat system
But whenever we make suggestions, or legitimate complaints about the state of affairs (energy drain, ghosting fairy, boring cards, terrible meter in sb) we are met with silence. Live letters NEVER answer healer questions no matter how desperate or important they are.
The one time we did regarding astrologian cards, we were basically told to get used to it. So we did:
The 50 page healer quit thread and the constant healer in need is our response.
9. Healer glamour compared to other roles is double standards
Other roles have various amounts of cloth and armour options of multiple amounts from full tunics and plate to cloth, to hardly anything at all
Healers are continuously stuck with robes, shawls or a couple of wraps. Ignoring the fact that male healers are a thing, why can't we have some proper armour sets instead of cloth for once? Imagine a scholar in plate alongside his warrior allies like the lore, or a white mage in a gambison and chain mail wandering the land to bring succor.
Many options that other roles get but we healers are constantly getting the short stick from
Continue reading...