Brakner Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 (edited) Taken from QA http://www.swtor.com/node/313694 Georg Zoeller: Our stance is that all full healer specs should be viable for all type of content, which is the case, even for 16 man Operations. Our own players have no issues clearing any of the content in the game, on all difficulty levels, with any healer spec. Data from the Live game shows Operations, at all sizes, being successfully run with Commando and Scoundrel healers. It is expected for certain Operations bosses to create challenges for different healer archetypes (e.g. due to mobility requirements), but overall, every healer archetype is capable of successfully healing through any Operations and Flashpoint content in the game (currently and in the future). With regards to your question about Commando/Scoundrel Area of Effect healing not scaling to group size, please understand that no heal, on any class, scales with group size. The most powerful Area of Effect heals in the game (Salvation/Revivification) affects up to 8 players, but does not scale with group size. These abilities are very costly, have an activation time requirement and require the targets to stand in a localized area for ten seconds to receive the full benefit. We plan on improving the overall Area of Effect healing performance of the Mercenary/Commando in the next major Game Update (1.2) by increasing the number of targets affected by Kolto Missile/Kolto Bomb. As for Scoundrels having no tools for short burst healing, we don’t agree with that assessment. A scoundrel, for example, is capable of producing rather significant burst healing output by using Upper Hand gained from Underworld Medicine or Kolto Injection to trigger an instant Emergency Medpack or Surgical probe when needed. That said, we certainly think there’s room for improvements (and our upcoming Game Update 1.2 has a sizeable chunk of such improvements). For example, we are shifting the healing created by the Kolto Cloud ability to be front loaded in 1.2 to allow it to act as an emergency Area of Effect healing tool. Finally, the perception of a specific class being not desirable can also be affected by the desirability of other classes. For example, Sage/Inquisitor healers are currently able to exceed our intended healing performance at times by affecting multiple heals with the same Conveyance/Force Bending buff. Game Update 1.2 will remove the ability to do so. Edited February 17, 2012 by Brakner Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Achraya Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 That is not a nerf, it's a 'fix', at best. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xaearth Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 I'm still dazed/confused/shocked/tripping on cold medicine over the part where he basically says Surgical Probe is burst healing... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doki Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Where's the Op buff? All I read in that giant pile of fail is "Ops and Mercs are fine". Absolutely no understanding of the core healing issues currently. None. Well, guess I don;t have to wait until 1.2 to cancel now. Heading over now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aluscia Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 (edited) The tone he uses is pretty maddening. I'm actually in shock that he feels an extra 1.6-3.5K heal THAT COSTS A GCD AND A UH/TA STACK somehow counts for burst healing? I thought it was just us ekeing it out... Guess this means Scoundrel/Ops healers are doomed to become obsolete. Edited February 17, 2012 by Aluscia Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobudo Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 (edited) At least we got an answer! I agree, I hate Georg's tone in just about every post he makes, but that's fine, because I'm pretty sure that most people don't like my tone. Plus, at least he's competent (I make no such claims about myself). I wish he'd publish those numbers that are telling him everything is fine, but that might just be PR speak. I consider it a coup that he said "room for improvements", as that's PR speak for "Yup, it's currently ****ed". It's not enough to make me resub, but I'm glad I'll be around to see the first round of fixes, hopefully they'll fix things enough that I can start playing again. Edited February 17, 2012 by bobudo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ariesen Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 you're focusing on the wrong parts. He also said "That said, we certainly think there’s room for improvements (and our upcoming Game Update 1.2 has a sizeable chunk of such improvements)." We don't know what those improvements are, and won't know until 1.2 hits the PTR. And as far as that being a Sorc nerf....don't cry nerf until we know what the new "Force Bending" is going to be. As it is a talent, they will have to be careful about how they change it, or everyone can/will drop it. It IS kinda overpowered when you can keep it rolling just by wasting some Force to renew it, when you don't need to. For all we know, they will simply add a lockout timer to it. Which will NOT change the intended and/or regular use of it. Only those who abuse it will be affected with a lockout timer. I'm kinda excited about what he said, and I see it all as positive. He basically said that Sorcs are fine, and a good baseline for healers. He said improvements to both Commando/Mercenary and Operative/Scoundrel are in the works for 1.2. I'm putting this down as a WIN for healers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobudo Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 And as far as that being a Sorc nerf....don't cry nerf until we know what the new "Force Bending" is going to be. As it is a talent, they will have to be careful about how they change it, or everyone can/will drop it. It IS kinda overpowered when you can keep it rolling just by wasting some Force to renew it, when you don't need to. For all we know, they will simply add a lockout timer to it. Which will NOT change the intended and/or regular use of it. Only those who abuse it will be affected with a lockout timer. The "nerf" is just fixing a current exploit whereby 1 proc of Force Bending/Clairvoyance can be used twice by lagless casting. Try spamming your Dark Infusion button to get 2 1.5s casts; this is being used (from my understanding) to cast short DI and then extra crit Innervate with only one proc of Force Bending. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aluscia Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Yeah, it seems to be the only silver-lining in the unresponsive UI this game totes haha... We knew it had to come to an end some day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doki Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 you're focusing on the wrong parts. He also said "That said, we certainly think there’s room for improvements (and our upcoming Game Update 1.2 has a sizeable chunk of such improvements)." We don't know what those improvements are, and won't know until 1.2 hits the PTR. And as far as that being a Sorc nerf....don't cry nerf until we know what the new "Force Bending" is going to be. As it is a talent, they will have to be careful about how they change it, or everyone can/will drop it. It IS kinda overpowered when you can keep it rolling just by wasting some Force to renew it, when you don't need to. For all we know, they will simply add a lockout timer to it. Which will NOT change the intended and/or regular use of it. Only those who abuse it will be affected with a lockout timer. I'm kinda excited about what he said, and I see it all as positive. He basically said that Sorcs are fine, and a good baseline for healers. He said improvements to both Commando/Mercenary and Operative/Scoundrel are in the works for 1.2. I'm putting this down as a WIN for healers. This isn't a win. No way. That, THAT, THAT was a giant blowoff of everything we've been saying the boards. Is summary, we've been showing time and time again that the Ops healing spec and the Merc healing spec PALE in comparison to the Sorc healing spec, that though we CAN do something with much effort, the Sorc can do it better, thereby making Ops essentially obeslete. His answer was essentially a "nu uh". Please Georg, tell me where taking an Ops healer is a better choice than taking a Sorc healer. Name one situation. ONE. Just one. Please show me where an Ops healer gets the job done better than the other two classes. Just one situation. JUST ONE. (Hint: not going to happen) And by the way, frontloading the RN healing won't fix anything. What a miserable pile of fail. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alanisUDL Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 The "nerf" is just fixing a current exploit whereby 1 proc of Force Bending/Clairvoyance can be used twice by lagless casting. Try spamming your Dark Infusion button to get 2 1.5s casts; this is being used (from my understanding) to cast short DI and then extra crit Innervate with only one proc of Force Bending. They actually mostly fixed this in a recent small patch, though it wasn't really documented. It happens very rarely now, whereas prior to that patch I could get it to happen at will. That being said, as an OP and Sorc healer, I am happy to read this news. Acknowledgement that there is a problem and improvements in 1.2, including one listed that appears helpful, is nice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aluscia Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 And by the way, frontloading the RN healing won't fix anything. What a miserable pile of fail. It'll make it more of a quick save so Sages/Sorcs have time to get their AE heal down. I'll take anything that this point to make us more AE-viable (seeing that current Raid design emphasizes raid-wide damage). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Endusima Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 I would be "kinda" fine with Surgical Probe/Emergency medpac being considered an emergency heal if not for the fact that UA/TA generation is random/unreliable. I don't do much PvE but I having atleast one UA/TA saved up is not that hard, what bothers me is PvP (Which I do alot) If I jump into an engagement and see a friendly player getting heavily focused and at 10% what do you do as a: Sorc/Sage=Throw Barrier to immediately stop him from dying then start frontloading big heals. Merc/Comm=Use Emergency Scan/Bacta Inf to immediately stop him fron dying then start frontloading big heals. Ops/Scound=Start casting Kolto Inject and hope he survives until cast is finished. The alternative is to waste 2 GCDs on Kolto Probe and hope for a TA proc (which is a bad idea because target is dead by then anyway) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xaearth Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Please Georg, tell me where taking an Ops healer is a better choice than taking a Sorc healer. Name one situation. ONE. Just one. Please show me where an Ops healer gets the job done better than the other two classes. Just one situation. JUST ONE. He would, but they don't currently have metrics on the legally dead attempting to heal HM operations as a Sorc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doki Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 It'll make it more of a quick save so Sages/Sorcs have time to get their AE heal down. I'll take anything that this point to make us more AE-viable (seeing that current Raid design emphasizes raid-wide damage). Does this fix make you desirable in a raid over a Sorc now? For any reason. Answer: Nope. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alanisUDL Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Does this fix make you desirable in a raid over a Sorc now? For any reason. Answer: Nope. You have absolutely no idea based on his vague discussion of changes for 1.2 what the result effect would be. They acknowledged there was a deficiency and are attempting to provide a cure in 1.2, and people are still ************... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caelrie Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 (edited) Just reroll as sage/sorc and save yourself the headache of fighting with Georg for the next several years. You'll thank yourself later. Anyone who's played one and one of the other healers can tell the Bioware testers have no idea what they're talking about. And if they can't even get something that simple right... well... Just play their pet class. Edited February 17, 2012 by Caelrie Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xaearth Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 You have absolutely no idea based on his vague discussion of changes for 1.2 what the result effect would be. They acknowledged there was a deficiency and are attempting to provide a cure in 1.2, and people are still ************... The fact that he referenced Surgical Probe as burst healing does not evoke thoughts of confidence, at least not as far as this Operative is concerned. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doki Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 You have absolutely no idea based on his vague discussion of changes for 1.2 what the result effect would be. They acknowledged there was a deficiency and are attempting to provide a cure in 1.2, and people are still ************... But they didn't. They spent 80% of that saying that Ops and Merc healing was fine, and that they can do all content (ie nightmare modes) just fine in all combinations. Then they gave a vague reference to changes in 1.2. Not improvemnts to Ops healing or Merc healing, just "changes". Then they said they'd fix a beneficial Sorc bug. I don't get where the positivity comes from. There was ZERO acknowledgement of issues in that post. NONE. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doki Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 The fact that he referenced Surgical Probe as burst healing does not evoke thoughts of confidence, at least not as far as this Operative is concerned. Yea, this was the most epic line of the whole post. The ignorance here is staggering. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darieltis Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 They acknowledged there was a deficiency and are attempting to provide a cure in 1.2, and people are still ************... They did no such thing... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alanisUDL Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 I don't get where the positivity comes from. There was ZERO acknowledgement of issues in that post. NONE. Quoted: That said, we certainly think there’s room for improvements (and our upcoming Game Update 1.2 has a sizeable chunk of such improvements). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ariesen Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 The "nerf" is just fixing a current exploit whereby 1 proc of Force Bending/Clairvoyance can be used twice by lagless casting. Try spamming your Dark Infusion button to get 2 1.5s casts; this is being used (from my understanding) to cast short DI and then extra crit Innervate with only one proc of Force Bending. yea that happens to me. I thought it was a bug though. Never exploited it on purpose, never thought to. Doki, fighting, and whining, and attacking your fellow healers isn't the way we work. Clear, concise, focused discussion got us the LONGEST response YET from the Dev Q&A. Improvements are on the way. UNTIL 1.2 hits the PTR, we don't know what they are. We don't know if they have taken all of this healing communities ideas and thrown them down the shaft, of if they are using them. We don't know what form the improvements are going to be in. We don't know if they are going to be huge, or small. BUT AT LEAST the Devs are willing to tell us they are going to improve BOTH Commando/Mercenary and Operative/Scoundrel. Like someone said, druids had to wait 6 content patches to get looked at. Still a win in my book. And If I had un-subbed (which I didn't) I would give TOR until 1.2 hit the PTR before I canceled for good. 1.2 on the PTR will show us very quickly how the Devs feel about the state of healing. If there are major changes, they are listening to us, and feeling our pain. If there are minor changes.... I've played through more nerfs than I can shake a stick at, and this is the first Dev response that I was glad to read. This is the first time I thought a Dev was listening to what a community had to say. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aluscia Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Our stance is that all full healer specs should be viable for all type of content, which is the case, even for 16 man Operations. Our own players have no issues clearing any of the content in the game, on all difficulty levels, with any healer spec. Data from the Live game shows Operations, at all sizes, being successfully run with Commando and Scoundrel healers. It is expected for certain Operations bosses to create challenges for different healer archetypes (e.g. due to mobility requirements), but overall, every healer archetype is capable of successfully healing through any Operations and Flashpoint content in the game (currently and in the future). This is the part that bothers me the most, because I don't think he realizes what he's saying. Could 2 Scoundrel healers heal Nightmare 8s? How about Commandos? I can guarantee you 2 Sage healers could (and that many guilds only run with Sage healers). I believe the answer to my first two questions is no and no - there's simply too much burst healing required on too many targets for double-Scoundrel to be viable. I'm not even sure double-Commando would work out any better. Scoundrel + Commando would be dicey too. Of course any Healer archetype can heal any Flashpoint/Operation on any difficulty (I've done them all as a Scoundrel). The issue is how difficult and stressful it is to do, and why anyone would want to play as a class with half a toolbox worth of tools. Touting the "mobility requirements" bs makes me laugh because Sages have us beat there too - Shield + HoT + Front-loaded Channel (break the channel to keep running if need be) puts out WAY more healing than stacking Slow-release medpac and hoping we get a UH stack to blow on an emerg medpac while running (or hoping we can eke out a 2s cast for Underworld Med). I'm hopeful that 1.2 comes with sufficient changes to render Scoundrels/Ops desirable healers. I'm cynical enough to believe that it won't, because if there's anything this Dev team has proven time and again, it's that they don't value the feedback Scoundrels/Ops are giving them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xaearth Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 I've played through more nerfs than I can shake a stick at, and this is the first Dev response that I was glad to read. This is the first time I thought a Dev was listening to what a community had to say. Except the first part of his reply essentially said "L2P scrubs". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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