My proposition for a Seer "fix."

[ColdxArmyxKid]

Intro:

Hello all! First and foremost allow me to introduce myself; I am Kegajoumae from the Shien server. I've wanted to play a force-user since 2008 and the consular since they leaked the class =P I started playing right from launch however after two months I had to unsub due to financial reasons. At the time of unsubbing I was a dedicated healer in both PvE and PvP.

Recently I've resubbed and my class has changed extraordinarily!

 

Background on the issue:

First off, in order to propose a solution I must first convince you that there is a problem. While there are plenty of people who are already aware--and let's face it, some who QQ because this is an MMO and it isn't an MMO without complaining--I would like to shed some light for anyone who doesn't know what I'm addressing.

 

Pre-1.2 healing was, admittedly, easy-mode. I could heal up to 8 allies for 4k-5k each (40k healing over a few seconds, saywhat?), use rejuv>conveyance>healing trance/deliverance on the tank WHILE racking up the prior 40k healing, and then insta-cast shield everyone... While getting FREE force back from healing trance crits, a combo which is spammable thanks to set bonuses and high innate chance to crit.

 

The problem:

BioWare's response to the above issue was to nerf our ability to single-target heal into the ground. Sure, the option is there if we ever get desperate, but if we need to heal a party intensively and they can't all be standing in my salvation, it's over. Salvation is our saving grace and it takes more coordination on part of the rest of the group as opposed to skill and tactics employed by the healer.

The current state of things is as follows: Conveyance no longer reduces cast time on deliverance, making in obsolete in terms of healing per unit time. Benevolence is inefficient because it costs so much in terms of healing per force. The benevolence issue wouldn't BE such an issue except they also nerfed our sustainability; even with resplendence, noble sacrifice now chunks our health.

 

This is a problem. To even stand a chance to heal with anything other than Salvation, we must commit ritualistic suicide as we deplete our force, followed by our health bar. (Again, the resplendence nerf isn't noticeable in a situation where everyone is together and you are standing in your salvation while using noble sacrifice).

 

The Solution:

I have a proposed fix.

Benevolence: Leave it.

Deliverance: Leave it.

Resplendence/Noble Sacrifice: Leave it.

Healing Trance: Leave it.

Salvation: Greatly limit the number of targets. Make the base targets hit three, or perhaps four while nerfing the amount healed.

Conveyance: The buffs should be as follows: Benevolence costs less force. Deliverance takes less time to cast. Healing Trance increases chance to crit. Salvation increases the number of targets that can be hit (Back up to 8, presumably). Noble Sacrifice does not consume health.

 

What would this kind of change do?

As discussed earlier, sages were OP because we could heal everyone whilst countering burst on any one target (Ourselves in PvP, tanks in PvE) and STILL manage to sustain ourselves with force.

Making the above changes gives us options but still requiring us to make a choice. Want to AoE heal like a bawss? Rejuv>conveyance>Salvation. Did that salvation cost too much (as it would now always cost large amounts of force)? Rejuv>conveyance>noble sacrifice. Is the tank low after restoring your force? Rejuv>conveyance>deliverance.

 

Conclusion:

As you can see, my proposition still allows for sages to do their job without allowing them to do EVERYTHING, as was the cause for the 1.2 nerf.

Have input? Let me know!

[madtycoon]

I agree with most of what you said. For me the sage healing class is too easy right now, just because of lack of options and little reward for being fast with reactionary healing. I just did both EC story (16 man) and HM (8 man) the last couple nights and parsed. Pretty much 55-75% of my healing comes from salvation. Its really dumb that all you have to do is drop that circle and then your job is over basically till it comes off cooldown. If you're having force issues just drop more salvations with conveyance of course. The healing it does is stupid.

 

Benevolence and Deliverance make up like 5% (on a good pull) to 20% (on a bad pull) of my overall healing. Rejuventate averaged like 15% and healing trance the rest. Healing trance is good where its at, but rejuvenate i pretty much used on cooldown and doesn't do much healing at all.

 

I understand wanting to revert the healing changes on conveyance and even nerfing salvation. Your change would be a good nerf to salvation, which I think is needed. There needs to be a balance between our healing options. I don't like rejuvenate healing as a hot. I think it should be all direct like holy shock (in wow). Let's face it, hots in this game are pretty crappy. I would also like to see benevolence cost a lot less through talents high up in the seer tree.

 

I don't want deliverance to return to a fast cast off conveyance. This is mainly because of PvP. I think sages would be too strong and that if you had both benevolence and deliverance in pvp and if they reduce damage which they are planning on doing, last i heard, you have a problem. Also I don't want sages getting interrupted on deliverance and still having benevolence to cast in pvp.

 

Sages are poorly designed right now.

[ekimmak]

I'm not sure about this. My healing specced sorceror isn't high enough to have the group heal, but I doubt this is a good idea.

 

I always saw Dark Consumption and Noble Sacrifice as a reason to bring in an excellent single target healer instead (Sawbones Scoundrel), so that while a Sage focuses on keeping everyone alive, the Scoundrel makes sure they don't kill themselves in the process.

[ColdxArmyxKid]

First off, yeah I never run out of force until I get into certain flashpoints (Like lost island) where everyone is FORCED to split up and I can't tag them with salvation. I'm not posting this because I'm having trouble playing as much as I'm having trouble enjoying what I'm playing.

Now I agree that rejuv should probably be a direct heal, however I don't find it to be a game breaker for me. While I empathize that dliverance having a cast reduction was pretty broken for PvP, you should note the big change I'd make from how it used to be. With Salvation having no means to reduce its price AND having to use conveyance with it to increase number of targets, a sage using conveyance with deliverance to keep him or herself alive will do nothing but stall the opponent(s) attacking them and the sage would quickly run out of force and not be able to heal other targets NEARLY as efficiently (to the point where it's game breaking, like pre-1.2)

[ColdxArmyxKid]

I'm not sure about this. My healing specced sorceror isn't high enough to have the group heal, but I doubt this is a good idea.

 

I always saw Dark Consumption and Noble Sacrifice as a reason to bring in an excellent single target healer instead (Sawbones Scoundrel), so that while a Sage focuses on keeping everyone alive, the Scoundrel makes sure they don't kill themselves in the process.

 

So you bring two healers to any mission? While I'm inclined to act aghast at your suggest, I'll simply reason with you in saying this isn't possible at level 50... Mainly because bosses have timers within which the DPS must finish them off. Any group would be better off just bringing the smuggler or commando and leaving the Seer. (While that statement is absurd since Sages aren't completely broken, the point is that the "fix" to our issue isn't bringing more healers.)

[Aurojiin]

To be honest, I don't find your changes that appealing, simply on the basis that if the class' mechanics were to be changed, I'd like to see it move away from Conveyance being so paramount. I don't want my entire decision-making process to be a variant of "what do I do with this Conveyance proc?".

[injury]

I think I would like to see respledence tweaked (wouldn't mind reverted to 1.0 but not holding my breath). Perhaps while Resplendence was up force regenerates X times faser than normal, basicly of the opposite of the debuff you'd get it you used noble sacrifice without Resp up. Something like that may make force management a bit less hectic than it is now.

 

I also would like to see perhaps a different calculation of alacrity on deliverance and maaaaybe salvation to speed them up somewhat. Mainly for PvP reasons to make them more usable again when not playing people that are brain dead. Barring that some kind of buff like some classes have that can stack to make an ability uninterruptable.

 

I don't expect benevolance would be ever changed to be efficient, but on the pvp front that's pretty much all you get off reliably once the enemies see you. The amount it heals for and the low force costs means you are lucky to maintain someones health at the level you start healing, never mind gaining any ground.

Edited May 8, 2012 by injury

[madtycoon]

First off, yeah I never run out of force until I get into certain flashpoints (Like lost island) where everyone is FORCED to split up and I can't tag them with salvation. I'm not posting this because I'm having trouble playing as much as I'm having trouble enjoying what I'm playing.

Now I agree that rejuv should probably be a direct heal, however I don't find it to be a game breaker for me. While I empathize that dliverance having a cast reduction was pretty broken for PvP, you should note the big change I'd make from how it used to be. With Salvation having no means to reduce its price AND having to use conveyance with it to increase number of targets, a sage using conveyance with deliverance to keep him or herself alive will do nothing but stall the opponent(s) attacking them and the sage would quickly run out of force and not be able to heal other targets NEARLY as efficiently (to the point where it's game breaking, like pre-1.2)

 

I didn't mean you as in you. I meant it as a general rule i've found when raiding. Whenever I find myself with force problems and i'm looking at parsers, its because i didn't do the bulk of my healing with salvation. I run with a commando healer and mine ticks for almost 1k on crit tick w/adrenal + relic depending how much +healing they recieve from talents. Its way too strong. That's why I agree that salvation needs to be nerfed and the other heals need to be more viable with options.

 

I'm not opposed to your deliverance change, but I just see a problem in pvp where I don't like deliverance and benevolence both being useable if one gets locked out on interrupt, especially since we still have healing trance which is really good for direct healing.

[madtycoon]

I think I would like to see respledence tweaked (wouldn't mind reverted to 1.0 but not holding my breath). Perhaps while Resplendence was up force regenerates X times faser than normal, basicly of the opposite of the debuff you'd get it you used noble sacrifice without Resp up. Something like that may make force management a bit less hectic than it is now.

 

I also would like to see perhaps a different calculation of alacrity on deliverance and maaaaybe salvation to speed them up somewhat. Mainly for PvP reasons to make them more usable again when not playing people that are brain dead. Barring that some kind of buff like some classes have that can stack to make an ability uninterruptable.

 

I don't expect benevolance would be ever changed to be efficient, but on the pvp front that's pretty much all you get off reliably once the enemies see you. The amount it heals for and the low force costs means you are lucky to maintain someones health at the level you start healing, never mind gaining any ground.

 

Thinking about this more, you're right. I would rather see resplendence tweaked over making benevolence just more efficient. If benevolence had a lower force cost, noble sacrifice would be less needed and that would be bad.

[ColdxArmyxKid]

To be honest, I don't find your changes that appealing, simply on the basis that if the class' mechanics were to be changed, I'd like to see it move away from Conveyance being so paramount. I don't want my entire decision-making process to be a variant of "what do I do with this Conveyance proc?".

 

So you don't want to have to make any actual decisions? I'm sorry but I'm having a hard time following where you're going with this. It sounds to me like you just don't enjoy the style of play that the Seer embodies.

The whole paradigm that IS Seer healing is that you have basic ability which can then be empowered by a proc, allowing you to gear your function towards a specific need (AoE vs single target vs regening force, in this particular case).

If you don't want that style of healing I recommend playing another class. Don't say that all classes need to heal one way. I haven't played the other classes--because I am very happy with how the Seer operates in general--so I don't know which to recommend to you.

 

If I'm missing your point somehow, please enlighten me. XD

Edited May 14, 2012 by Sireene
rude

[SpacePiglet]

I don't understand why other healing classes' AOE heal is instant but sage's has a casting time. Scoundrel don't even have to stand still - such an easy life. And yet you want to ehmmm... lower the amount of what sage's AOE can heal?

...

 

You've got to be kidding me right?!

 

Because you haven't played other classes....You have no idea....

Edited May 14, 2012 by Sireene
rude

[Cleet_Xia]

So you bring two healers to any mission? While I'm inclined to act aghast at your suggest, I'll simply reason with you in saying this isn't possible at level 50... Mainly because bosses have timers within which the DPS must finish them off. Any group would be better off just bringing the smuggler or commando and leaving the Seer. (While that statement is absurd since Sages aren't completely broken, the point is that the "fix" to our issue isn't bringing more healers.)

 

Actually, 2 sages healers in a HM is stupid easy. I've done it several times, and not hit an enrage timer once. It's actually a lot of fun. It feels like leveling as a sage, as oposed to being a heal bot through every boss fight. If you havn't tried it yet, I'd highly reccomend doing so.

 

As for "fixing" the seer, your suggestion is to essentially roll back the 1.2 changes without reintroducing the double dipping bug. I'd be cool with that. But I'm also cool with healing as a seer after 1.2. I really feel that the problem with the seer isn't actually healing, but it's the lack of a free cast ranged dps ability. Both the other healers have it, but the seer is the AC with the most to loose by trying to do some free dps between heals.

[AndyRWager]

Actually, 2 sages healers in a HM is stupid easy. I've done it several times, and not hit an enrage timer once. It's actually a lot of fun. It feels like leveling as a sage, as oposed to being a heal bot through every boss fight. If you havn't tried it yet, I'd highly reccomend doing so.

 

As for "fixing" the seer, your suggestion is to essentially roll back the 1.2 changes without reintroducing the double dipping bug. I'd be cool with that. But I'm also cool with healing as a seer after 1.2. I really feel that the problem with the seer isn't actually healing, but it's the lack of a free cast ranged dps ability. Both the other healers have it, but the seer is the AC with the most to loose by trying to do some free dps between heals.

 

Actually instead of a free range DPS, I would love to see a free heal.

Like the commando has hammershot, and the smug has diagnostic scan, that they can use when they need to to conserve power. But the sage has nothing of the sort, he must always use force to heal.

[Gnoblesse]

If it were up to me, I think moving Kinetic Collapse to the spot where Confound is in the Seer tree, would do a lot to improve full-specced healer viability in PvP without breaking PvE. Put Confound somewhere that it has more synergy with what the sage/sorc is actually casting most often, and move other DPS talents around to compensate. Thoughts?

[Cleet_Xia]

Actually instead of a free range DPS, I would love to see a free heal.

Like the commando has hammershot, and the smug has diagnostic scan, that they can use when they need to to conserve power. But the sage has nothing of the sort, he must always use force to heal.

 

It sounds like a good idea, it could be fun to have a free heal. The thing that bothers me about it is that it would make the 3 healing classes pretty much identical to play. But everyone would migrate to seer for the better AoE heal. I kind of feel like the lack of a free heal is what balances our having the best AoE heal & Rescue. But having a free ranged DPS would sort of have the same effect on our resource management. I've found that it's very easy to avoid going OOF, by just simply casting only heals & damage mitigating abilities ~or~ only casting dps abilities. It's casting both that puts you OOF. but if we had any sort of free cast to throw in somewhere, that would shut down most people's complaints about 1.2. Our only free cast at the moment is a melee ability. And for sages melee range is the last place we want to be, under any circumstance PvE or PvP. It's been a problem with the design of the advanced class since launch, that no one ever really brought up.

 

Alternatively they could buff that melee attack to be something like Tumult, but without the need for the target to be stunned. At least then, when you got roped in/ charged, you'd have the option to drop a solid hit before you bugged out.

 

If it were up to me, I think moving Kinetic Collapse to the spot where Confound is in the Seer tree, would do a lot to improve full-specced healer viability in PvP without breaking PvE. Put Confound somewhere that it has more synergy with what the sage/sorc is actually casting most often, and move other DPS talents around to compensate. Thoughts?

 

That would be AWESOME !! Probably OP- but AWESOME !!

 

For PvE I feel like confound is pretty much worthless. Bosses are immune to it's debuff. Our companions won't kite a mob. And Confound doesn't do anything to a ranged mob. It's a tough skill to actually make use of. You have to either turn off your companion's taunt, or run with a dps companion. That being said, it should be great in PvP against melee classes, but I have never had the chance to cast Weaken Mind when Confound would really help me escape from an attacker.

 

1. warrior leaps in, or agent attacks from stealth

2. cast weaken mind

3. stun breaker

4. speed away

 

Sounds great !! By the time leap comes off CD- you should be well out of range. But I never could get it to work out that way, so I respeced out of Confound. I wouldn't be upset to see confound be dropped, and for Kinetic Collapse to just be a talent to 2 different trees. I don't see that any changes would need to be made to the dps trees at all.

 

But I think if they wanted to make full spec healers more viable for PvP without breaking PvE all they'd have to do is reduce the broad PvP nerf to healing. Or change the maps a little bit, so that we could defend outselves from the melee classes a little better.