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Paladin Healing and its Challenges as well as positives
sharpstring
Member Posts: 6 Arc User
For starters my current main is a paladin tank and healer, but I used to main a cleric healer, and before that a rogue. I have been through most of the major changes with classes and the combat system. And for the most part what I have seen is a big focus on dps classes while alot of support classes either saw big hits or changes that caused alot of turmoil in the game and alot of friends to quit. For this post I want to focus mainly on how things stand now, no sense crying over spilt milk or whining about the glory days of cleric super heros or paladin immortals.
So with that being said the main things I want to focus on are the positives of pally healing in general, but the challenges to them being a really good healer when compared to other classes. So lets start with the positives, obviously the shielding is a huge plus in certain content and can add alot of benefit when trying to protect your allies from damage they are "about to take". In addition the divinity regen choices for paladin make them one of the easiest divinity management classes in the game and this has been that way for quite a while. These two things paired together make for honestly a really fun play style that lets you focus on what is going on in combat better than sometimes other classes. However this is where the challenge comes in with the current state of Paladin healing. Which breaks down into 3 main things, first is our inability to procc some of the best gear in the game consistently leading to lower stats overall when compared to others, second is the low magnitude of our healing, and finally the longer cast times of our heals. I have made a separate post in the bugs area to address the gear issue so if that is your focus please head over there and add that post {Healing and Gear Proccs [Pally Focus]}. I want to camp out instead on number 2 and 3 of the challenges and how a slight tweak to this could easily put paladins back on par with clerics for healing.
So the biggest challenge to me when running my paladin through content is mass party damage, the reason being is that between the low magnitude of the AoE healing and the long cast times of paladin skills which can be interrupted very easily, I struggle to put out enough recovery. The main concern I have is the long interruptible cast times, especially with things such as stun or knock back all but eliminating the ability to heal anyone. If this could be addressed then the paladin could then be back on par with the cleric for being able to burst heal during dangerous situations. However if cast times can not be addressed I would perceive a few other options mitigating this problem enough to make it through these situations. First potential solution would be to allow Shielding to "stack up" to a certain threshold, so you can really pad the shielding right before high damage. Second option would be to increase either the overall magnitude so that the large heal can span a greater time period of damage taken which in turn also bumps shielding to help. Or just give a flat boost to Shields so that more health is being protected. I hope this helps to explain the main challenge because typically I have the divinity to heal everyone but I dont have a good way to basically expend that divinity in a short time to mitigate all of the damage coming in.
Finally I wanted to cover one last thing associated with Paladin Healing and that is shielding, which can be broken down into two separate challenges. First is the challenge of your own shields overwriting larger shields, for example using the tab mechanic to give your tank a big shield then being forced to overwrite it as soon as a dps gets injured. Or even just getting a critical heal on a person then the next heal is not and drops the shield by over 50%. I am not sure what the intended way this is supposed to work is but simply not having a lower shield value eliminate a larger one would go a long way in helping paladins. The second challenge is the same as the first but it comes from a different source, other healers during trials. This could be a warlock, another pally, or even a ranger giving shields that are smaller than the ones the intended target already has. Where this causes the most problem again is during large incoming damage periods where every little bit of health protected means the world of difference for pally heals since our actual magnitudes are lower for health recovery. I would see three possible solutions, one is allowing shields to stack up to a maximum value, only replacing the shield if the new value is bigger, or three is give every heal class a separate health protection mechanic. Example: Paladin gives [Shielding] blue bar , Bards give [Temp Hit points] yellow bar, Warlock gives [Soul Protection] green bar.
With that I want to circle back again to the idea that on a whole I enjoy playing a paladin healer, I like how it operates, the skills available which are decently flexible, and the premise behind it being a preemptive healing class rather than as damage comes in. I am just hoping that with a few tweaks that it can really stay on par with other healing classes so that there are less instances where I just don't have the tools to counter existing game mechanics.
So with that being said the main things I want to focus on are the positives of pally healing in general, but the challenges to them being a really good healer when compared to other classes. So lets start with the positives, obviously the shielding is a huge plus in certain content and can add alot of benefit when trying to protect your allies from damage they are "about to take". In addition the divinity regen choices for paladin make them one of the easiest divinity management classes in the game and this has been that way for quite a while. These two things paired together make for honestly a really fun play style that lets you focus on what is going on in combat better than sometimes other classes. However this is where the challenge comes in with the current state of Paladin healing. Which breaks down into 3 main things, first is our inability to procc some of the best gear in the game consistently leading to lower stats overall when compared to others, second is the low magnitude of our healing, and finally the longer cast times of our heals. I have made a separate post in the bugs area to address the gear issue so if that is your focus please head over there and add that post {Healing and Gear Proccs [Pally Focus]}. I want to camp out instead on number 2 and 3 of the challenges and how a slight tweak to this could easily put paladins back on par with clerics for healing.
So the biggest challenge to me when running my paladin through content is mass party damage, the reason being is that between the low magnitude of the AoE healing and the long cast times of paladin skills which can be interrupted very easily, I struggle to put out enough recovery. The main concern I have is the long interruptible cast times, especially with things such as stun or knock back all but eliminating the ability to heal anyone. If this could be addressed then the paladin could then be back on par with the cleric for being able to burst heal during dangerous situations. However if cast times can not be addressed I would perceive a few other options mitigating this problem enough to make it through these situations. First potential solution would be to allow Shielding to "stack up" to a certain threshold, so you can really pad the shielding right before high damage. Second option would be to increase either the overall magnitude so that the large heal can span a greater time period of damage taken which in turn also bumps shielding to help. Or just give a flat boost to Shields so that more health is being protected. I hope this helps to explain the main challenge because typically I have the divinity to heal everyone but I dont have a good way to basically expend that divinity in a short time to mitigate all of the damage coming in.
Finally I wanted to cover one last thing associated with Paladin Healing and that is shielding, which can be broken down into two separate challenges. First is the challenge of your own shields overwriting larger shields, for example using the tab mechanic to give your tank a big shield then being forced to overwrite it as soon as a dps gets injured. Or even just getting a critical heal on a person then the next heal is not and drops the shield by over 50%. I am not sure what the intended way this is supposed to work is but simply not having a lower shield value eliminate a larger one would go a long way in helping paladins. The second challenge is the same as the first but it comes from a different source, other healers during trials. This could be a warlock, another pally, or even a ranger giving shields that are smaller than the ones the intended target already has. Where this causes the most problem again is during large incoming damage periods where every little bit of health protected means the world of difference for pally heals since our actual magnitudes are lower for health recovery. I would see three possible solutions, one is allowing shields to stack up to a maximum value, only replacing the shield if the new value is bigger, or three is give every heal class a separate health protection mechanic. Example: Paladin gives [Shielding] blue bar , Bards give [Temp Hit points] yellow bar, Warlock gives [Soul Protection] green bar.
With that I want to circle back again to the idea that on a whole I enjoy playing a paladin healer, I like how it operates, the skills available which are decently flexible, and the premise behind it being a preemptive healing class rather than as damage comes in. I am just hoping that with a few tweaks that it can really stay on par with other healing classes so that there are less instances where I just don't have the tools to counter existing game mechanics.
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