Guild Wars 2

When I was playing GW1 I remember seeing the trailer for GW2 and how there was no healer class. I thought to myself wow. ArenaNet is going to make another monumental change in MMO’s. However, after a year of playing I’ve noticed something. There’s trait lines I’ve never been able to spec into because I need survivability. That’s something I didn’t need to necessarily worry about in GW1, because you had a healer. So, I think by going away from a healer class all together we’ve lost build creativity. I think if a monk class was introduced into the game and current healing skills were at least halved. Then, we wouldn’t see people running all the same builds.

Dedicated healers are boring and don’t add up to interesting fights. It’s the risk reward of building your class, “do I build beefy, or go zerker?”. In other mmo’s it was,“you, there! Bring your dps class and I’ll heal ya”. They just gata fix the zerker/assassin problem so dps isn’t the primary objective in fights.

With the mechanics put in place in GW2, a dedicated healing class just doesn’t make sense. I’m fairly self-sufficient on mose of the professions, and I certainly don’t feel like I need any full-on heals even when I’m not. Mostly, if I die, it’s because I was doing something stupid like not doging or not healing myself – or perhaps taking on far too many mobs over my level, lol. I think the better option would be to open up a little more utility so that each profession has access to at least two AoE heals. Maybe you can only have one active at a time, but give everyone the option and I think it’d be a great middle-ground.

I actually don’t see a problem with the current system. I feel some traits need tweaking but other than that, nothing.

There is a bunch of builds designed to heal and provide a lot of support. The problem is that people don’t want to use them because they tend to be very specific in either the situation or in terms of skills\traits.

in a way, fewer skills is good, meaning there is less chance of overpowered combos – using a gw1 example, shadow form, it basically means that now it doesnt really matter which skill combo you use so long as it works, in gw1, if you had ‘the wrong build’ or were missing one skill, it was very hard to find a party

Use skill #6 and the traits, then have you your healing class

Wanted – People constantly posting asking for things anet not only won’t do but are against to go away.

Better yet start a guild with the rest of them so you can complain about not having mounts, gear treadmill, holy trinity etc.

alexjolly.1463:

Wanted – People constantly posting asking for things anet not only won’t do but are against.

Better yet start a guild with the rest of them so you can complain about not having mounts, gear treadmill, holy trinity etc.

I’ll be honest, there are a few times I’ve wanted a mount. However, on the whole I think it’s better that we don’t have all that.

Won’t let me +1. SO +1

LordMadman.5812:

So, I think by going away from a healer class all together we’ve lost build creativity.

And you know what? You thought wrong. Completely wrong.

Everyone is running the same build is because AI is terrible and exploitable. It is designed so that control and support are completely useless. Everything is balanced around dodges.

You don’t need to bring immobilization, or cripple. You don’t need to bring interrupts.

The game isn’t set up to reward support. If you spend your time in a fight buffing others then you won’t get loot, karma or exp. The whole game would need to be reworked in order to have support roles that are rewarded by the game. This means your request is unlikely at best to ever be put in the game.

runeblade.7514:

LordMadman.5812:

So, I think by going away from a healer class all together we’ve lost build creativity.

And you know what? You thought wrong. Completely wrong.

Everyone is running the same build is because AI is terrible and exploitable. It is designed so that control and support are completely useless. Everything is balanced around dodges.

You don’t need to bring immobilization, or cripple. You don’t need to bring interrupts.

Agreed, utility AI is what we need. I like the idea of losing the MMO Holy Trinity, but I feel like they went about it a little weakly here. All-in-all a great game, and this one thing won’t cause me to stop playing, but it could have been done better. EverQuest Next is using a couple of AI companies known for very intense programming and coding; AI that changes tactics as you do and based on your group makeup. Hopefully we’ll see it there and then it’ll become the industry standard.

No need at all for healing class, not wanted at all.

My alt Guardian is specced to heal others. He’s mostly for major fights. Even if Anet wants to get rid of the Holy Trinity, I still have 1 that is helpful.

They aren’t getting rid of the Holy Trinity, at least that’s not how I understand the desire of current devs. From what I read into it, they want to make it so you aren’t stuck if you don’t have the Holy Trinity. Something WoW had achieved on accident and then did away with when they changed the way their class mechanics and talent systems worked (I used to have a Rogue that could tank at-level heroics and off tank at-level raid bosses thanks to an awkward build I made). I think having things like Guardians and the handful of Necro abilities that do some AoE heals, we have what will suffice as a happy medium for the time being. Later down the road other games will impliment better and more complex AI systems that allow for more variants, but it all boils down to a more realistic style of gameplay and tactics – or at least the attempt therein.

I did more thinking about this and even though the sPVP is team it’s small based that is forced to split. So, individual survivability is required. WVW is quite vast so again being bunkerish will give you some protection until you reach your group. I think what I wouldn’t mind seeing is some point target healing support spells. Particularly for ele’s. The guardian does have some but they are weak heals with long cool downs which doesnt make them attractive to bring over other skills. The ele’s water healing skills are really weak heals per second, so maybe increase the healing output slightly. If they ever get around to releasing GVG which is more team based you will see particularly more staff ele’s coupled with the usual guardians.

OP

Players like popular builds.. that is why you see everyone running the same thing. A monk profession or healer profession already exists.. its called a guardian. A full cleric guardian can negate and heal other players sufficient enough to be called healers.

A healer only makes everything boring.

Chewablesleeptablet.3185:

OP

Players like popular builds.. that is why you see everyone running the same thing. A monk profession or healer profession already exists.. its called a guardian. A full cleric guardian can negate and heal other players sufficient enough to be called healers.

A healer only makes everything boring.

Agreed, roll a Guardian and heal your friends while maintaining survivability and such . . . that is what we call win/win.

Any class can be a very decent healer if traited and geared good enough.

the best thing about cleric stats is that it provides good power.

Bismuth.3165:

Any class can be a very decent healer if traited and geared good enough.

Except thief … we still suck at support no matter what. Such a shame :/

I hope the October patch helps out thief support some, outside of venoms because that’s offensive support. We need more defensive options.

Play a guardian mace/focus and staff or an ele with staff both have decent heals.

A healing ‘class’ would actually bring something interesting to the game. I think the reasons for not having the ‘trinity’ in GW2 (apart from the sake of just being different) are not very clear. Personally, I feel that the game is too shallow and needs something more; allowing people to spec defensively in to a ‘healer’ would really make a lot of people happy.

I’m not saying that if someone picks a certain profession that they should ever be locked in to playing in a narrowed set of styles – but if they want to, they should at least be given a choice.

The lack of any sort of reliable healing in this game is disappointing – sigils of water have only a low proc chance on crit, and the cooldown is too long to be useful. Similarly, the regeneration boon restores only very little health, even with a very high healing power stat.

A healer would most certainly be welcome in all of the dungeons I have run thus far – when I think of dungeons, I just think of a lot of downed/dead players, as that is what I see the most when I am in them; and that really turns me off running them.

Basically – I feel that ArenaNet have something against healers and don’t have very good reasons for it.

Combat in this game is little more than D&D (DPS and Dodge).

The thing is I find is many people find they need more survivability and trait accordingly because they are just standing there and soaking damage.

A big part of this game is more about avoiding or negating damage vs out healing it. Consider shifting how you play If you want to play other trait lines.

you’d have to completely revamp the entire game to add an effective healer to the game, it’d completely change it away from what many of us bought the game for in the first place. AND you’d need to add tanks, because healers would trivialise any content that didn’t hit like a truck.

It wouldn’t be gw2 anymore, so NO thanks.

Also you only need survivability if you can’t dodge correctly. try speccing into the damage lines, it will force you to learn.

NO, No healing class thank you!

Teraphas.6210:

A big part of this game is more about avoiding or negating damage vs out healing it. Consider shifting how you play If you want to play other trait lines.

Yes! Thank you, this whole game is built around changing what we know to be true and “required” in a Fantasy MMO. This is a whole new game, play it as such, please.

emikochan.8504:

you’d have to completely revamp the entire game to add an effective healer to the game, it’d completely change it away from what many of us bought the game for in the first place. AND you’d need to add tanks, because healers would trivialise any content that didn’t hit like a truck.

It wouldn’t be gw2 anymore, so NO thanks.

Another finely-tuned mind that understands the need to leave this different. Guild Wars is trying to leave the need for the Holy Trinity behind. They left in the game professions with the potential to heal, but not with the expressed purpose. There is no dodge or evasion stat, it’s all about you playing the game and making the move yourself. It’s live gameplay, no dice-rolls, actively fighting and doging. If we are given Healers, we’ll need Tanks (as stated above); if we are given Tanks, they’ll need dodge- and parry-styled stats. Half the reason I’m playing GW2 is because it doesn’t have those things. Adding them back in will push away the players that understand it’s kittened to have a tank taking all the damage when that mob should realistically be attacking the glass cannons or the healers.

This game is a great step in the right direction, let’s not screw it up, please?