Healing

Siam

Hello boys and girls. I created this thread for a discussion on the current incarnation of Healing and to get a pulse of the general feel towards it, i.e. do we want to move away from its current incarnation, what tweaks do you feel are needed, do we want to give healing to bards and monks, etc. Healing is currently a prime choice for PKers who want greater sustainability as opposed to Hexes, Tarot and Astrology. While Healing sacrifices offense(well, 98% of it, as there are two offensive skills), Hexes, which stands at the opposite end of the spectrum, forgoes all defense completely. The premise of choosing either skill is to give up offense or defense for an entire plethora of shiny skills. Tarot and Astrology are a mix of offense and defense. Tarot, being a solid choice for PK and Astrology is at the mercy of RNG and the current alignments, although that is not to say that it doesn't have its moments.

Discuss.

Aerotan

I've always liked healing, especially for how nigh-unkillable it makes you. Essentially a good healer can only be reliably killed with either mana or ego-reliant kills, can't really be locked down, and can therefore find a way to just waltz right out of mana or ego set ups. That said, I would rather never have to deal with a bard with Bedevil, thanks. or, Hell, not even Bedevil, just a bard with access to shifting senses auras onto his victims to periodically strip truedeaf? <<No, thanks>>

Eritheyl

Healing is balanced (relatively speaking) around the kits it's currently an option for, so if for some reason it ever came up in serious discussion...no, no one that currently can't take Healing should ever be able to, imo. It's a great tert, and though I haven't touched it since the Overhaul business began, it was just fine then.

Malayn

Healing was balanced for the guilds that were out when it was made.

Institute have too much offense while having healing.  Shadowtwist also works with healing far more reliably than shadowdancers otherwise would (because the offense is self contained). I am working on some thoughts for healing at present based on some feedback from Kalliste, though I can poke others if they are interested!  The idea was to make it not game breaking walls, while also giving more offense (these changes are aimed at PvP, and PvE should stay the same really).

Open to thoughts, RP, ideas, etc. I will factor in fun things.

(Disclaimer: This is me writing a thing, I am not an envoy, and I do not have a go ahead to create a report. Think of it like a draft idea with possible acceptance.)

Aerotan

Thing is, the 'unbreakable wall' aspect is sort of what the Healing skill is about. Unless you want to, like, make curing self require (but not consume) equilibrium as a stopgap. Even that has its flaws though, since the healer can raise certain key auras and still be nigh-unkillable. Which is, again, the point. Though with the overhaul this might become less of an issue, since one possibility I can see working is to allow healing skills to reduce levels of afflictions rather than outright curing them.

Synkarin

Pretty sure healing requires balance and eq to cure yourself, but doesn't consume it already....

Saesh

My only comment at this point is that I don't oppose any changes to healing, but it's important to not cross the streams. If you have issues with Researchers or Shadowdancers, that issue needs to be addressed appropriately with the Researchers and Shadowdancers. I'm not a fan of another "Fearaura is too strong, let's envoy wolf totem," debate. 

Arcanis

I wouldnt mind if Healing became more a skill themed at nurturing and healing the land and so forth.

Enyalida

That wouldn't make sense for three quarters of the orgs who get it.

Elanorwen

Arcanis said:

I wouldnt mind if Healing became more a skill themed at nurturing and healing the land and so forth.

Being that you're not in an organization or guild that has access to healing, I don't see how you minding or not minding it changes the situation in any way.

Enyalida

True. That's basically why no one is yelling about sap yet: There are so few druids, and most of the time you're going to be sapped, you're going to immediately be point-cleansed off anyways.

Saesh

Play nice. You don't need to be in a guild to have an opinion about a guild. All respectful perspectives are welcome.

Arcanis

Enyalida said:

That wouldn't make sense for three quarters of the orgs who get it.

Technically it would. The concept of forests attempting to cleanse the land was taken up by cities, with the mages initially connecting to the plane of water to cleanse the crystal sea. This was further expanded, with the very 'goal' of the once celest empire to cleanse the lands completely, and was the core purpose of project cosmic hope. Since I cant see healing remaining as a 'cure each aff' skill, what with the reduction of affs and the conversion of them to 4 cures, it would need something else to fill in the gapes.

I could see Healing taking on a very defensive sort of role. Perhaps ability to nullify magicks in the room (Ilusions, temporary meld effects), shield others, maybe even resurrection capability.

Shuyin

Come on guys, there are better arguments to use other than lack of access to a skill to refute suggestions.

That's pretty stupid logic. Else no one but demis++ can nerf destruction.

Re: healing - if you want to buff offense, self healing and sac need downgrades. Give to get.

Riluna

I think it's important to keep in mind that Healing is, if not the single most popular tert for newbies/non-coms, it's at least very close to it. It's always been great for utility, and an awesome way to teach people about afflictions, too.

While often beneath the notice of most combatants, non-coms remain an important part of this game. Please consider how it affects them, too, not just combatants, when considering any significant change to this skillset.

Enyalida

Really? The majority of PvE interactions don't involve any afflictions, or only involve a really limited subset of afflictions. I would have thought that total non-comms/newbies would get very little use out of the skillset, as it has almost nothing I would call 'utility', especially when compared to an offering like Tarot, that has oodles of utility - movement skills, healing, interesting buffs, and escapes.

Riluna

Enyalida said:

Really? The majority of PvE interactions don't involve any afflictions, or only involve a really limited subset of afflictions. I would have thought that total non-comms/newbies would get very little use out of the skillset, as it has almost nothing I would call 'utility', especially when compared to an offering like Tarot, that has oodles of utility - movement skills, healing, interesting buffs, and escapes.

Yes, really. It's extremely common. Even if there aren't nearly as many afflictions to hit them, it does wonders to help people just stay alive when they're not as used to those afflictions as you are. Even if there are less afflictions hitting them overall, it's still more afflictions than they're used to. For some, that takes time to adjust, even in PvE. General survivability = less frustration = they usually stay longer than my non-Healing students.

There's also the fact that once you have the skill, it's very rare that you even need the equivalent potion/herb anymore (though obviously they still should). This type of thing matters a lot for those to whom gold is not trivial yet.

Third, it's always been a fantastic, low-risk way for people to feel like they're actually helping their orgmates in combat situations, and gy et used to the speed and nature of afflictions in combat, without being completely crippled themselves. Or setting up general healing chains, just to try to help (it's rare that a non-com/newbie doesn't want to help, just that they don't know how/are overwhelmed when thrown to the wolves). I can't count how many times I've sat on the sidelines explaining things to my Healer students as they're happening.

Tarkenton

Consider the fact that two of the guilds who can access healing don't really have a better utility choice. Astro is lol, and hexes is strictly a PvP tertiary. Healing is at least useful in PvP and can be somewhat useful in PvE since with proper auras up, you generally aren't ever really hindered enough to not be able to attack. And it can passively cure bleeding if I remember correctly.

Giving the forestals a utility tertiary would be great. But then the thought of a tarot SD makes me cringe.

Siam

Well, I'm greedy and I could always use Tarot for Shadowdancers. Well, if Healing gets changed to make room for more offense, a few defensive things have to go. With the number of cures, reduced to 4, I'm still tinkering with a few ideas on possible tweak suggestions to Healing for the envoys and the admin. I'll post them when they're ready.

Arcanis

Siam said:

Well, I'm greedy and I could always use Tarot for Shadowdancers. Well, if Healing gets changed to make room for more offense, a few defensive things have to go. With the number of cures, reduced to 4, I'm still tinkering with a few ideas on possible tweak suggestions to Healing for the envoys and the admin. I'll post them when they're ready.

I most definitely believe that Healing would need a remake after overhaul, since its basic design is around the old cure system, and the concept simply doesnt work for the new system, as it would be seen as a severally lacking skill.

Aerotan

By the by, can you aurashift healing auras onto people you've got Bedevil on?

Siam

Should be able to, iirc.

Saesh

Healing would function exactly as it does now. I'm not sure where the "simply doesn't work," comment comes from. Healing, save for a handful of skills, just breaks up afflictions in to groups. Fairly easy to convert that to the new system. The other skills, sacrifice/heal/auras/etc would stay more or less identical to what they are now. The value of healing has never been measured by the volume of skills within the skill set.

Riluna

By the by, can you aurashift healing auras onto people you've got Bedevil on?

As I recall (though it's been a while since I was a Healer, myself), no. You can only aurashift one aura onto any one target, even if you can maintain more than that. And bedevil is an aura itself.

Arcanis

Saesh said:

Healing would function exactly as it does now. I'm not sure where the "simply doesn't work," comment comes from. Healing, save for a handful of skills, just breaks up afflictions in to groups. Fairly easy to convert that to the new system. The other skills, sacrifice/heal/auras/etc would stay more or less identical to what they are now. The value of healing has never been measured by the volume of skills within the skill set.

I meant that, as the affliction system will now function on 5 cures, the Healing skill will be reduced to only 5 cured abilities, rather than the many it currently has. The skill itself will be seen as lacking, which is why I suggested it would need a remake with little additions.

Saesh

That's not necessarily true. The existing skillet isn't divided strictly by cure type. Some are, some aren't.

Arcanis

Saesh said:

That's not necessarily true. The existing skillet isn't divided strictly by cure type. Some are, some aren't.

@Saesh Well if we were to consider the skillset itself, it is compromised of the following curing:

- Skin for liniment
- Temperature for frost
- Fractures for arnica
- Glandular for calamus
- Senses for myrtle/concussion
- Neurosis for smoke coltsfoot
- Breaks for mending
- Choleric for choleric
- Curses for horehound
- Muscles for marjoram/paralysis
- Sanguine for sanguine
- Blood for yarrow
- Melancholic for melancholic
- Phobias for wormwood
- Phlegmatic for phlegmatic
- Nervous for kombu
- Depression for galingale
- Mania for pennyroyal
- Regenerate for regeneration salve


That's basically 19 abilities, based upon the old (or soon to be old) aff and cure system. If changed, the skillset would be substituting 19 abilities for 5, leaving it quite empty. Healing was designed around the more complicated aff system we had, which offered cures for basically everything, but now that it is being simplified, it will leave much to be desired.

Saesh

Your list isn't entirely accurate. I haven't gone skill by skill, but off the top of my head I know temperature affects both ablaze and shivering which have different cures.  Muscles cures some marjoram afflictions but also slit throat and paralysis as you noted. It's a bit of a mixed bag, but they do often clump by cure but it's not a hard and fast rule. There's no obligation to make it a rule during the affliction conversation.

That being said, I go back to my previous comment that the number of skills the affliction curing is divided into is not the measure of Healing's value. Whether it's 19 or 4 skills, the value of healing is that it cures afflictions. The curing groups might have to be broken up in healing to keep auras from losing too much value (bigger pools of afflictions means it's less likely to cure the desired affliction under the new system) but even then, auras aren't the main draw to high tier combat. It's the ability to cure any and all afflictions instantly regardless of status (except for stunned/asleep). So long as we maintain that aspect, I think healing will be fine.

edit: To address an earlier concern, my perspective is that we balance around PK while during our best to keep non-pk implications in our periphery. Ultimately the primary function of skills is to use against other players, so that is where my focus is going to be. 

Lerad

The abilities in healing clump by cure mostly because the pre-overhaul cures were thematic, much like how our new cures are thematic, just condensed thematic.

The aspect of radiating healing auras will definitely be affected by the overhaul condensation. But the actual aspect of healing will actually get more potent, not less, because we're... condensing afflictions. Each affliction will command a greater amount of real-estate post overhaul as compared to previously. Simply because there will be less afflictions overall, a healer's impact on combat will become all the more significant. Curing off one affliction post-overhaul will mean more given that there are less afflictions in total. Mass spamming of afflictions to overload a target will likely become much less viable, and that also means the impact of a healer helping you may well be significantly higher.

That said, we also don't know how the admin will want to code healing for the new system. If they give even more control to them, allowing them to pick and choose which affliction to cure off, that will be another buff on its own, depending on how cure priorities will be implemented. When we come to that bridge, we'll cross it, I expect.

Aerotan

That might be an interesting way to approach healing. And a one-off idea I had without actually thinking about how it might impact things would be to give a healer the ability to essentially inoculate against an affliction instead of the current auras. Meaning he or she could, for instance, FORTIFY <target> SENSE to prevent, let's say, Blindness, Deafness, and blackout, but only the next instance of one of the afflictions, similar to the way quicksilver prevents Aeon or warm/cool prevent chilled/ablaze once.

Siam

I still prefer for a certain grouping of afflictions to exist within healing post-overhaul for the reasons Saesh mentioned.