Upcoming Healing Question

Leveling in Alpha 1 felt extremely limited for healers and heavily relied on having a damage counterpart. While I understand alpha 1 was not for balancing. How do you plan to balance the capabilities of a healer leveling vs the damage leveling? Are you going to require that dps needs a healer just as much as a healer needs a dps? It seems like the requirement for dependency on healers is missing in the leveling process which allows dps/tank players to bypass the goal of working as a "group" when min maxing.

Welcoming anyone's thoughts/opinions on this topic and how I can change my question or just to spark conversation about healing. Feel like its not talked about enough!

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Iskiab

Where did you guys get the impression that classes shouldn’t be able to solo well? Sure there group content, but most of the game won’t be group content.

Ludullu

Iskiab wrote: »

Where did you guys get the impression that classes shouldn’t be able to solo well? Sure there group content, but most of the game won’t be group content.

I expect most of the game to be group content. And Steven is literally moving the design there more and more with each update on the dev process. Freeholds is just the latest example.

BlackBrony

Iskiab wrote: »

Where did you guys get the impression that classes shouldn’t be able to solo well? Sure there group content, but most of the game won’t be group content.

I hope is this way. We need group content, no solo.

Spif

To the OP's point, in older games I've played (DAoC, launch WoW, etc) healers were usually better off solo than most classes. But with the high healing rate of all classes out-of-combat, I dunno. Healers will probably get a DoT-and-snare multiple mobs method of mob grinding.

But I'd really like to see high leveling efficiency in the 3-5 player group range. Not that those groups should be faster than an 8-man (although they will be faster to form), just close when grinding.

7--8 person groups should only be *necessary* for some large story quests, class progression quests, zone event quests, dungeon end-boss kills, etc

Dygz

Ashes is primarily designed for an 8-person group with one of each Primary Archetype.
There's content for solo players, too.

Azherae

Iskiab wrote: »

Where did you guys get the impression that classes shouldn’t be able to solo well? Sure there group content, but most of the game won’t be group content.

At the moment our 'problem' is that since Ashes made most of its original design inferences long ago, it's possible to come to a lot of different impressions.

I come from a main game that was 90-95% group content at launch. Soloing was tedious, pretty unrewarding, and while soloing, two of the main interesting parts of the game's combat system were basically impossible to do.

But based on the descriptions of the game at the time from the makers (there weren't many of these) you wouldn't have known it was going to be like that. Basically, there are 'hints' in Ashes that a lot of it is going to be group content. For some people, sailing became group content a while back, and Freeholds became group content recently. Dungeons were probably group content all along, and with no global auction house, most economics may be group content. Depending on your area, it may be far more reasonable to consider gathering to be group content.

The OP is addressing 'is just basic leveling also group content'. But they didn't say 'I couldn't level', they said it was 'extremely limited', which implies that they tried it and either:

1) Could only level on a few mobs that their Cleric could consistently kill due to their type or level
2) Could only gain smaller amounts of exp compared to being in basically any group at all
3) Would be at so much risk that they could literally die and lose more exp than they gained

There is a design paradigm from the 2000s where classes are explicitly not able to solo well, so maybe it's just those people's expectations combined with Steven's 'attitude' in a lot of his old content.

Therefore I ask the counter-question. Why should I believe that most of the game won't be group content?

Gizban

mcnasty wrote: »

BlackBrony wrote: »

You should maybe be able to solo easily mobs X levels lower than you. If they're your level it should require high skills. We can't allow solo players to play without engaging with the community

I totally disagree with this take. Your comments would mean that even simple exploration would require a group, because encountering even 1 mob at your level means you're probably going to die.

Gathering/exploring should absolutely not require grouping to survive the environment.

I enjoy group content, and feel an MMO should absolutely require player cooperation. I want both solo and group content to be difficult. I want every encounter to require me to be on my game, or die.

I want some areas that are too much for me to handle solo. I want difficult content, overall. But I also want to be able to level, quest, gather, etc solo for a few nights a week when I don't have the time or desire to group up.

I personally want 80% of quests to be solo/soloable, with 20% extremely hard to solo and require multi-player cooperation. There will be more than enough group content with world bosses, guild, raids, pvp caravans and sieges, etc.

80% solo?!?!
Holy smokes.

A pillar of this game is the importance of community and having a reputation... And the nexus of that is group play.

Gizban

I plan to main Holy Priest and generally expect solo to be hard thanks to WoW.
There was no solo leveling a healer in DAoC.

I would rather have a challenge in a group than a challenge solo.

Electronn

pyreal wrote: »

mcnasty wrote: »

BlackBrony wrote: »

You should maybe be able to solo easily mobs X levels lower than you. If they're your level it should require high skills. We can't allow solo players to play without engaging with the community

I totally disagree with this take. Your comments would mean that even simple exploration would require a group, because encountering even 1 mob at your level means you're probably going to die.

Gathering/exploring should absolutely not require grouping to survive the environment.

I enjoy group content, and feel an MMO should absolutely require player cooperation. I want both solo and group content to be difficult. I want every encounter to require me to be on my game, or die.

I want some areas that are too much for me to handle solo. I want difficult content, overall. But I also want to be able to level, quest, gather, etc solo for a few nights a week when I don't have the time or desire to group up.

I personally want 80% of quests to be solo/soloable, with 20% extremely hard to solo and require multi-player cooperation. There will be more than enough group content with world bosses, guild, raids, pvp caravans and sieges, etc.

80% solo?!?!
Holy smokes.

A pillar of this game is the importance of community and having a reputation... And the nexus of that is group play.

What percent of the game, the entire game, would you estimate that quests represent?

Spif

pyreal wrote: »

I plan to main Holy Priest and generally expect solo to be hard thanks to WoW.
There was no solo leveling a healer in DAoC.

I played a Druid on launch, and they were one of 2 solo-capable classes for Hibernia (Enchanter was the other). The first 50 in Hib was a Druid, he also leveled mostly solo. I recall Aug Healer was supposed to be pretty good at it, but did not level one.

Things changed a lot by the time fins were added/discovered, along with PBAE

Ebonborn

Hey, appreciate all of the feedback on the question posed! I think we as the Healing Community need to be more active in these forums. I hope if you guys can take anything away from this post it's that we need to be in these forums discussing what we want from the Healer class. If we aren't in these forums discussing a contentious question like this, how are they ever supposed to hear our opinions? They're going to create a healer with no feedback from the community and our desires. Then, when launch comes, we are going to have an idea in our head that doesn't fit the game.

HumblePuffin

EngimaGamer wrote: »

Hey, appreciate all of the feedback on the question posed! I think we as the Healing Community need to be more active in these forums. I hope if you guys can take anything away from this post it's that we need to be in these forums discussing what we want from the Healer class. If we aren't in these forums discussing a contentious question like this, how are they ever supposed to hear our opinions? They're going to create a healer with no feedback from the community and our desires. Then, when launch comes, we are going to have an idea in our head that doesn't fit the game.

I would personally love way more archetype/class conversations in general on these forums. Theory crafting is my fav. Hopefully once a2 is rolling and people have their hands on the updated kits there can be much more interesting class decisions to be had!

Aion had one of my favorite clerics of any game I’ve played. Big heals, good damage, with just enough CC to let you make space to heal yourself up mid fight. It was a fun time. Disc priest from WoW was pretty fun too.

I do think in general it’s safe to assume a pure healing class by themselves will take a bit longer to level.

The bard might get the worst of it to be honest. Super excited for the last 2 class showcases!

Abarat

"Fantmx wrote: »

Templar in EQ2 was the most fun in a group. Would love to see a blend.

I loved the Templar in eq2. reactives are the bomb in pvp too.

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