[2021] The Healing problem

Let's start this with some warnings

1. My english is bad, I know it myself, if it's too unbearable, just DM me and I'll try to fix it
2. I've been feeling this for far too long, and I definitely know that it's a controversial topic in the community, and I totally expect it to be downvoted, If you are a Healer hater, just drop your dislike and go away, I want to talk about this, discuss what you guys think, why or why not it wouldn't work
3. I don't know what went wrong, but all my organization broke reddit.
4. Just wanted to adress that the changes on the brawling + healing mechanics in the beginning of the season didn't change Healing at all, after 500 power, there was no difference at all and actually made all healer's winrate go up a bit.

Healers are liked by a very vocal group, it's really difficult to go by for more than 6 months without at least one post asking for a healing balance for the sake of support variety, or quality of life issues and yet, Healers (mostly Aphro, but all healers, more or less placed around the spectrum) are hated by another very vocal group, being considered to be anti-fun, unfair and / or broken.

And we all know how unstable healers are in the current meta, do you all remember when Aphro and Hel were top winrates? because I do, and it was certainly not fun to play against.

+1 in the kit

Devs said that they want Healing to be a "plus 1", without being a definitive trace of a god, and while it's easy to see that in gods such as Hórus and Guan Yu, it gets really difficult tu follow this logic when seen through the eyes of a Terra main, when there are 2 skills that work as heals (being one of them the Ultimate) or even Hel (two skills are healings, and we can argue that you give up on a Ultimate and a decent escape for this heals). Basically, this logic is flawed, doesn't work for a lot of gods, and is actually hurting Smite as a game

The problem with Power scaling heals and overpowered gods

When gods scale healing with Power, you will expect a strong healer such as Aphrodite to deliver a massive damage AND heal a lot, because her 600 magic power is boosting her heal, and that is the problem, you can't really fight a good with massive damage and massive sustain. Basically, they are either good on doing a lot of things or terrible.

Healing itemization

Smite tried to increase the interaction between itens and healing, they are Lotus Crown, Asclepius Rod and Caduceu Shield.Healing itemization would seem like a good idea at first, but, in this situation, it would be more likely to see a 5 power item build, and 1 healing item. If you aren't aware, that's already the case, aphros around will build 4 Power itens, and add Asclepius + Lotus to buff heals.

The problem with A new Stat

Other mentioned solutions tend to be a new Stat, that would consider healing it's own characteristic in the god, and again, it sounds reasonable, until we try it out. When you have 3 stats to build around, it would actually nerf it outright, less damage, less defense, less heal. All in the same packpage.

Why healers should be supports

That's nothing new in the moba scenery, they are called enchanters, supports that peel by healing (and / or) cc instead of tankiness and cc, they are just as viable and fair. There are constant complains on Smite, just because we've been stuck with almost 10 years of Smite with supports that work only as front line.

There is a claim that implies enchanters wouldn't work like other mobas thanks to the different perspective and the gaming changers that come with the aiming/dodge mechanics making Tanks necessary.

But that's not true at all, it just takes a bit of adaptation.There is yet another complain, saying that it would be anti-fun, but, may I ask, would it? is it just as unfun as being trapped in a Kumbra CC chain? Or a full team Ares/Cerbs ult under the tower? You may say that beads is there for this kind of situation, but Ankha is there too, and the antiheals can stack as high as 125%, basically cancelling healing at all.

The lack of variety on supports is boring, it's already an underated and underpaind role, they are arguably one of the most important, yet one of the most flamed (among with junglers), the community is constantly asking more than giving. The point that I'm trying to make is:

It's a class that need something new and refreshing, every game feels the same, with hardly any change, even with a completely different pick.

My take on the solution

Why not, instead of doing an entire new stat, make it a mix of Defense (I think that it would look a lot with the support buff, every quantity of defense, you would get more healingbuffs) and it would be added to % of power

Theoretically, it would make glass canon builds not as strong as healers, and that's the idea. You don't want a god that can IK enemys AND heal his entire HP bar using one skill.

And it would make Bruiser builds the new ideal build, and surprise, it would fit quite well their arquetype. Most healers are trown to Solo instead of Mid, Aphro and Hel (and more often than not Chang'e) most picked lanes are on Solo, and most players recommend them there

But it would also turn Healers in great supports, they would be tanky enough to take the frontline, if they heal with frequency.

The real problem

I think that the biggest problem is the lack of communication, I can't speak for everyone, but as far as most healer mains that I know, there is not enough talking between the devs and community, the concern with healers maybe is written in big, bold, red markers on your board, with thousand tries of solutions, but without news nor actuall changes, it get really difficult to not feel abandoned as a player

External link →