Divine Magic rework? It's about that time.

[Raka]

Are there any plans to increase the usefulness of Banish and Holy spells at all?
Also looking to see if Banish III makes the cut for PLD spell list at the same time, and I'm sure WHMs would be interested in Banishga III and Banish IV.

[Economizer]

I'm all for a rework in line with the one they did for elemental magic, including reducing the cast times of the current spells, but I'd suggest keeping the recast timers a bit higher than the elemental counterparts to further set the Banish line apart.

Banish IV.

To be honest, short of a rework making them significantly more deadly, I don't see why we don't have Banish V as one of the Gift spells at the least.

Hear me out - White Mage has less access to nuking gear and traits, and would be contending with less recast timers since the Banish series is just one vs. the six elemental magic spells. During any serious content will be doing healing and would be hard pressed to spare the extra MP. Additionally, White Mage and Paladin don't gain TP from casting these spells unless a rework includes a sort of "Divine Acumen" trait, so it should have even less issues.

If Scholar can pop some job abilities to be a good healer or a good nuker, and Red Mage is decent at both with great buffs, shouldn't White Mage have some options too? Additionally, this could help in raising the gear/skill floor for White Mages a bit.

Paladins would benefit from reduced casting times so they have more opportunities to grab enmity.

Let's look at some spell progression as well:

• Banish - WHM 5 / PLD 7
• Banish II - WHM 30 / PLD 34
• Banish III - WHM 65
  
  
• Water - BLM 5 / DRK 11 / SCH 8
• Water II - BLM 30 / DRK 48 / SCH 34
• Water III - BLM 55 / DRK 80 / SCH Lv.57
• Water IV - BLM 70 / SCH 71*
• Water V - BLM 80 / SCH 83*
• Water VI - BLM 99*
  
  
• Banishga - WHM 15
• Banishga II - WHM 40
  
  
• Stonega - BLM 15
• Stonega II - BLM 40
• Stonga III - BLM 63
• Stoneja - BLM 81

Now, obviously, Paladin is a lot harder to match up, as it would find an analog much closer in Dark Knight, but has a much different spell progression than it does. Additionally Paladin has Holy and Holy II, which skew this further.

[Raka]

You put quite a bit of work into that post there, lol.
I honestly tried to just keep it really simple since whenever I try going into detail, I get completely ignored by SquareEnix.

This goes towards many different topics, but hey...they are pretty busy with RoV right now. Though I am hoping that things like this
do not get left unfinished or not even noticed. It's long past due and the Divine Magic needs some work to bring it up to where the game currently stands/will progress(hopefully)
towards with the minor adjustments they may make in the future.

But yeah, when it comes down to it. I don't think I can even remember a time I even needed to use my Banish spells, ever...may it be on Paladin or White Mage.
Why have the spells if they serve no purpose I guess. I mean, granted I use Divine Emblem and Holy II a lot, that's still 10min if I even use it more than that. lol

[Economizer]

But yeah, when it comes down to it. I don't think I can even remember a time I even needed to use my Banish spells, ever...may it be on Paladin or White Mage.
Why have the spells if they serve no purpose I guess. I mean, granted I use Divine Emblem and Holy II a lot, that's still 10min if I even use it more than that. lol

If you're in a party with a piercing based job, fighting a skeleton or other piercing resistant (and usually blunt weak) mob, casting your highest tier of Banish every so often is a good way to increase the damage of your party's Thieves and Dragoons.

I mostly favor Holy II myself, as it works out for magic bursts much better given the cast time. That said, it would be nice if Afflatus Misery was better for solo/lowman. Currently you might as well Afflatus Solace and take advantage of the cureskin; Cura's cap is too low, Banish doesn't benefit enough, and Auspice's duration is WAY, WAY, WAY too short (plus I don't think it affects WHM Trusts, which would be a nice bonus).

[Raka]

Yeah, lol. Personally haven't had any form of party against skeletons though or really any form of undead honestly in ages. :/
A lot of things have been overlooked for some time.

[saevel]

Yes White Mage should get Banish IV, Banish V and Banishga III. Their damage, MP and recast needs to be reworked to be in line with the other elemental nukes, approximately the strength of Aero. Paladin can just be treated the same as Dark Knight and elemental magic.

On a side note, I would also support the creation of a line of dark nukes that use dark skill and are accessed by Black Mage and Dark Knight.

[Economizer]

On a side note, I would also support the creation of a line of dark nukes that use dark skill and are accessed by Black Mage and Dark Knight.

Divine Magic and Dark Magic aren't complete analogs of each other.

That said, if this was to be the case, rescaling Drain spells to have more tiers including an AOE variant would easily be the easiest way to do this in my opinion.