The Big-Medium-Small Issue

#0 - April 14, 2010, 7:30 p.m.

The comments from Blizzard on shammies, pallies, and priests has all made at least some reference to the concept of three different types of core healing spells. In each of those cases, one is a fast but expensive heal for when you need to get something to your target now; the next is a bit slower, but fairly efficient; and the third is slow, but packs such a punch that it will be worthwhile when you really need a big heal. Whether you're talking about [Lesser/Greater] Healing Wave, [Flash/Greater] Heal, or [Flash of/Holy] Light [+undisclosed bigger heal], the concept is the same.

In my opinion, this is a flawed structure. While there may be varying degrees in the sizes or efficiencies of each of these heals, structuring it in that way still provides a relatively homogenous core. That means two things:

(1) The core activity of those healers feels relatively similar.
(2) Each healer will be differentiated based on the secondary spells and utility they provide.

This is a potential problem in a number of ways. First, it does tend further toward homogenization, which isn't fun for most. Second, it requires reliance on other healing spells to define each class; if those spells are not useful a high percentage of the time, or if one class has relatively few of such spells, things get still more boring for the healer.

How do you get away from that? Three ways that I can see, really. The first is to adopt an approach like that taken with druids. Druids have three direct single-target healing spells as well; and technically, one is small, one is medium, and one is large. What makes druids well-structured in this respect is that each heal is unique not just in size, efficiency, and cast time, but also in terms of mechanics--Nourish requires setup and planning for maximum throughput/efficiency, Regrowth reflects a druid's proactive nature and is only maximized when used on targets who will be taking more than that single spike, Healing Touch is a big one-off that a druid otherwise lacks. The other healers currently lack this kind of differentiation between spells, so far as I can tell.

The second is to emphasize synergy between core abilities. Druid heals, again, have a degree of this synergy - Regrowth boosts Nourish and can fuel SM - but even that doesn't go too far. Shammies and Pallies have some synergy between healing spells, but only by stepping outside the bounds of those core spells (HS and RT) and/or adding an extra spell to the mix (SS+FoL). What if Beacon interacted differently with FoL versus HL--say, FoL was copied, but HL cast directly on the Beacon target either made it into a small AOE (like the current glyph) or put a shield/additional buff on the target? What if Flash Heal on a target with PW:S increased the amount absorbed by PW:S instead of actually healing the target? What if Healing Wave put a stacking buff on the target that, when it hit 10, proc'd a CH originating from the target? It's pretty easy to get creative here.

The third is to not stick with the strict "small-and-inefficient, medium-efficient, big-and-slow" model for every class. What if one class had a small, efficient, quick heal, like pallies have had in BC and WotLK? Lately, we haven't used it much because the throughput is low; but if we had more time to get more heals in before the target was to drop, we'd use it more often. What if one class had a big heal that was also very fast, but which was even more expensive than the big heals of the other classes? If mana is an issue in Cata, that's a self-regulating issue--that'd become the best class for getting the huge emergency heal through, but they'd be able to turn to it even less frequently than others. Departing from the standard structure of speed+size+cost for different classes isn't necessarily a bad thing at all.

It is entirely possible that, as someone who primarily plays as a pally healer and is used to having those "core" heals as its only tools, I may be biased. I also may be biased because, as things stand, we have the fewest tools outside of that core set. But I know that I, for one, would be a great deal more excited for Cata if there were synergy between core heals or other interesting secondary effects. I'd also be more excited as a raid leader if there were a distinguishable difference between the core healing styles of each of my healers, even as to their most similar spells. As it is, even knowing that we've only gotten a taste of the changes to come, I'm nervous about being reduced to a healer who has the same types of efficiency-speed-potency heal categories as every other healer, but fewer additional healing tools to supplement it.

Just my preliminary big picture thoughts.

#70 - April 16, 2010, 12:08 a.m.

Q u o t e:
I mean, in the end, isn't what they are doing essentially the same as downranking - lower cost mana spell that heals for less?

Yes. Actual downranking had two problems though. One, it was a pretty obtuse concept for new players. If you're super elite you might dismiss that concern, but it was something players had to figure out (typically be reading forums or something) and worked nothing else like anything in the game.

Even more of a concern, a lot of players downranked not only to conserve mana when they didn't need to heal much but because at some point in gear the coefficient starts to matter a lot more than the base points. They could essentially get a fairly powerful heal off at a lower cost.

We think the decision of when to use a big heal and when to use a small heal is a fun one -- it was fun for players for vanilla and BC. Healing might be too bland if you literally only had those spells, but nobody will.

Q u o t e:
The argument would be that a very weak but very efficient heal would result in that class always healing. I don't think that's a problem, or even counter to Blizz's intent. In fact, Blizzard has said that they do not want to go back to the model where healers spend half their time sitting there so that they can regen mana. Rather, they want us to be casting a lot; but they want the decision of what we cast and when we cast it to be more than "mash X button 50 million times".

We talked a lot about keeping the paladin model inverted, where the small heal is super efficient. There is probably a way it could still work. In the end we were just concerned that it would end up biting us in the rear. Somewhere along the way we'd have to make special rules to handle the paladin, who would risk being too mana efficient or too incapable of healing when forced to heal outside of their mana-efficient comfort zone. Could we have designed it? Probably. But frankly I'd rather spend our time on more interesting mechanics and spells. I'd rather the new AE heal really make paladins feel like they can AE heal rather than really making sure FoL felt small, cheap and fast. I agree it erodes a little bit of distinction among the classes, but only a little bit. There are far more interesting ways to make healers feel unique than in the relative mana efficiency of their small spell.