Healer Design Philosophy - Why we QQ

#0 - Dec. 1, 2008, 12:47 p.m.

I have thrown fits on CoH, Shaman mana regen, and Paladin AOE/HoT healing, among other things. Yes, they were stupid and unreasonable complaints. No, Priests aren't a useless class without CoH and Paladins won't be bumped from raids because they lack a HoT. But those weren't really the reasons any of us complained in the first place.

Let me explain....

Blizzard had some basic design goals for DPS and Tanking specs in Wrath:

- Homogenization (not ever "needing" one class over another)
- Threat: All tanks capable of generating significant amounts of AOE threat, and threat being far less of a factor for DPS.
- AOE: When it came to light that certain classes were more desired for AOE instancing, Blizzard's response was to buff traditionally single-target classes to give them better AOE just as they had buffed the other tanks to be able to compete with AOE tanks.
- Simplicity: As few unique buffs as possible, less focus on group makeup or synergy.
- Equality: Related to homogenization... any tank or DPS, regardless of class/spec, will be competitive. Paladins didn't have a taunt.. now they do. Some tanks had a hard time with AOE threat and didn't dish out as much damage.. now all 4 are essentially DPS tanks and can all very effectively solo grind (some can even PVP) with their tank specs. Some DPS had less damage in exchange for more utility.. now they all have competitive DPS, without any penalty for utility.

Let's look at the goals for healers:

- More difficulty: Make healers have to make more decisions about which spells to cast, which stats to stack, and watch their mana bars more closely. Accomplished, for example, through significant mana regen nerfs and the removal of down-ranking.
- Complexity: Discourage, or even directly prevent, healers from using a limited number of buttons. From adding cooldowns to making all new talents in a tree take a new direction from earlier ones, the goal is to keep healers from doing the same amount of healing as before without pressing more buttons.
- Inequality/Niches: Paladins heal tanks, Shaman heal the raid, Druids HoT everything in sight, Priests fill in wherever needed (or assist any of the other 3 as necessary). Each class is dramatically better at their own particular role.
- AOE: When certain classes are capable of AOE healing instances, the reaction is the polar opposite of what it was for DPS and Tanks. Instead of making all more capable in that area or changing encounters, the goal is to make it more difficult for healers to AOE heal.

You get the idea.

I agree that CoH IS too spammable. All 4 classes SHOULD NOT have the exact same abilities. There SHOULD be niches. Those aren't really our issues.

Our issue is that tanking and various DPS specs were significantly overhauled to make them more fun, while the primary goal for us was not fun.. but rather to make things HARDER. The experience is dramatically different. For example, every single instance for a healer looks the same: a Healbot/Grid window (in other words, every single instance is just health bars). Whereas other specs are playing with new abilities and complete overhauls, our major change is that we now look at blue mana bars in addition to green/red health bars and get to do more math.

Our issue is that we already had the hardest jobs in the raid and generally had to be the most skilled players. Yet we see our jobs end up requiring even MORE skill and have to effectively carry everyone else. A WotLK Rogue/Hunter/etc. in epics and high raid progression will NOT be equal in skill/effort to, say.. a Holy Paladin or Disc Priest in epics and high raid progression.

Our issue is that we can't level solo, which is acknowledged and explained as a limitation of our specs... yet significant efforts are made for specs that already leveled much easier than ours to level even easier!

Healers have by far the most responsibilities, the most abilities they need to use, the most things they need to keep track of, and the most blame when things go wrong (especially with aoe tanking/threat being such a joke now). So yes, we're going to be up in arms every single time there is the slightest nerf or change announced so long as the design philosophy for tanks and DPS = "How can we make things easier and more fun, while also introducing abilities that make them stronger?" While the overwhelming, undeniable priority and philosophy for healers = "How can we make it harder for them and make sure they are not as strong as they were before?"

continued....

#70 - Dec. 7, 2008, 5:53 p.m.

I actually will read manifestos when they are thought-out and relatively unwhiny. IMO the OP falls into this camp. Complex problems sometimes require complex solutions. Where I get a little impatient is in the "here's how to fix our class" threads that involve changing every single spell and talent in the game. They aren't all that broken, and most of the time, we're talking about simple problems that can be fixed with more simple solutions.

But I digress.

One of the design goals in LK was to make tanking more fun and I daresay a little easier because it could be very challenging. I have tanked and healed A LOT on various classes and I feel pretty confident saying that tanking can be much harder than healing on some fights (on others it is reversed). Challenging the dps classes is harder, but you often see it in the form of berserk timers -- if the dps can't maximize their output, then the raid is going to wipe at no fault of the healers. Repositioning fights often tax the dps characters, though to be fair, they often tax the healers too.

I'm pretty happy with the current state of tanking, modulo polishing up a few bits here and there. Healing is something we have committed to taking a good hard look at now, so threads like this are helpful. Unlike tanking, it is a harder problem to solve, in part because some healers like the way healing works now just fine thank you, and risk walking away from it if we make very dramatic changes. The kinds of dramatic changes that get suggested a lot are things like causing damage to heal, having to heal through the main game window and not the health bars, having combo points and that sort of thing. You may say "That sounds awesome!" but many other players say "Yech."

Others say just having better UI, having more diverse spells to rely on, not having to time things so tightly, or having something to do besides healing will make their game more fun.

We do think the game can handle more diversity in healing mechanics than it can in tanking mechanics. In other words, it's okay for healers to have niches moreso than the tanks. This is largely because raids require more healers than tanks.