Post by tarbomb on Feb 6, 2013 19:31:57 GMT -5
This post got me thinking.
Bringing healing to all classes is one solution to the problem. Here's another take on the idea of healing:
Not many people use healing classes right now. Why? There's really no appeal to it. You've got weaker shields and wimpier weapons than most other classes, you can't heal yourself, and even if you were selfless enough to play a class for the benefit of others, the heal is both too slow and ineffective, since by the time your shields collapse ou're mostly dead anyway. Healing in a battle is a pretty risky proposition in any sense, since your shields are probably going to collapse before the shields of the people you're playing with. Admittedly this isn't quite bad as being the low-DPS fragile player in RotMG, since damage doesn't correspond to loot here, but you do take on quite a bit of risk to play a healer due to the wimpy shields, while giving yourself and your team not much benefit in return.
So if you want to make healing classes playable, you have to make them somewhat competitive with heavier classes, especially in survivability. Make healers tanks people want to use, but not by simply slapping a heal gun or two on normal classes. Instead, put them on classes that have defensive playstyles that would be best used on a healer. Here are two ideas:
- Long-range sniper: an unshielded or extremely weakly shielded tank with sufficient range to outrange most enemies. The range would be balanced by extremely the extremely low power of the tank's weapons, making it unsuitable for solo combat unless you were extremely patient. Its range would allow it to loiter safely at the edge of the battlefield, healing friendlies after they've been forced to retreat.
- Battle healer: extremely powerful shields and therefore highly survivable, with a high-efficiency heal that would actually be fast enough to be effective in battle (think 2-3x the current heal rate) and extremely powerful but extremely short-ranged weapons (imagine a hurricane-like gun with double the power and infinite targeting, but 1/3 the range). Its tough shields and short range would encourage it to jump into the fray, where its healing would be the most useful to tanks that are actively fighting.
Thoughts?
When I designed the priest's AoE heal I assumed that priests (and everyone, really) would be selfish and only heal when they themselves needed it, but that others could benefit and thus be happy to hang around priests. But it seems that many people believe priests should heal on command. If we have AoE-healing triggers, will we see the same thing in Grid 12? Maybe all healing should be gun-based (and yes, I agree 360 is probably the way to go), so if you want a heal, you go stand by the healer instead of issuing a command that you expect to be followed?
Also I was thinking that maybe we should have healing abilities on many or all classes, not just a few. This won't avoid the "idiot, why didn't you heal me?" problem, but it might spread it around instead of concentrating it on just a few classes.
Also I was thinking that maybe we should have healing abilities on many or all classes, not just a few. This won't avoid the "idiot, why didn't you heal me?" problem, but it might spread it around instead of concentrating it on just a few classes.
Bringing healing to all classes is one solution to the problem. Here's another take on the idea of healing:
Not many people use healing classes right now. Why? There's really no appeal to it. You've got weaker shields and wimpier weapons than most other classes, you can't heal yourself, and even if you were selfless enough to play a class for the benefit of others, the heal is both too slow and ineffective, since by the time your shields collapse ou're mostly dead anyway. Healing in a battle is a pretty risky proposition in any sense, since your shields are probably going to collapse before the shields of the people you're playing with. Admittedly this isn't quite bad as being the low-DPS fragile player in RotMG, since damage doesn't correspond to loot here, but you do take on quite a bit of risk to play a healer due to the wimpy shields, while giving yourself and your team not much benefit in return.
So if you want to make healing classes playable, you have to make them somewhat competitive with heavier classes, especially in survivability. Make healers tanks people want to use, but not by simply slapping a heal gun or two on normal classes. Instead, put them on classes that have defensive playstyles that would be best used on a healer. Here are two ideas:
- Long-range sniper: an unshielded or extremely weakly shielded tank with sufficient range to outrange most enemies. The range would be balanced by extremely the extremely low power of the tank's weapons, making it unsuitable for solo combat unless you were extremely patient. Its range would allow it to loiter safely at the edge of the battlefield, healing friendlies after they've been forced to retreat.
- Battle healer: extremely powerful shields and therefore highly survivable, with a high-efficiency heal that would actually be fast enough to be effective in battle (think 2-3x the current heal rate) and extremely powerful but extremely short-ranged weapons (imagine a hurricane-like gun with double the power and infinite targeting, but 1/3 the range). Its tough shields and short range would encourage it to jump into the fray, where its healing would be the most useful to tanks that are actively fighting.
Thoughts?
