[Job Adjustmentｓ Manifesto] WHM

While SE has not made any more posts about what's incoming for White Mage, I'll mention what I think the job could benefit from, and what I strongly disagree on.

First thing, White Mage will never, ever, get Auto-Regain, anyone could tell that's the case. We're not designed to be a melee job, although we can have fun with our clubs sometimes - I'm all too familiar >.>, fact is, White Mage is the strongest "mage" (this isn't factoring BLU though) melee when we want to melee things that justify it, solely due to Hexa Strike. We aren't getting a trait that'd go to a melee no questions asked if it went to one. TL;DR: I have yet to see them consider an Auto-Regain trait for any job, let alone a mage that only benefits from it front-lining that's designed to be in the back-line.

Second, updates that are given to White Mage through the Manifesto are *not* likely going to include the front-line melee role (Honestly, I view Auspice as a Subtle Blow spell, with the Enlight for the WHM under Misery as an added bonus). You can tell they didn't even bring it up - it's like on some other mages who have certain people saying they should be meleeing - Red Mage, Summoner, etc... not one mention. SE's vision of these jobs involves back-lining, and I'm perfectly content with that.

White Mage is flat out not going to be meleeing anything in serious events. We're healers in serious events, and we're not exactly meant to DD, end of story. Sure, anything that was serious at 75, knock yourself out, you should have no problem, but once 99 end-game content comes out, we know what we're going to be doing: Healing, and that's what people are going to want White Mages for. If I want to play a DD in these endgame events, I have Dark Knight for that. When it comes to offensive magic, I wouldn't mind seeing newer Banish spells and Holy II.

AoE damage can indeed be extremely dangerous for mages, White Mages are no exception. I do walk into AoE range kinda frequently, but it's for our barspells most of the time. I do think we should see the other 2 elements as barspells, though I suppose we do get an extra challenge without them. Any other case, in most scenarios, we're better off out of mob's range if possible, while still being able to cure people. When the AoE damage is somewhat worth justifying being in range, you could benefit from Misery, and use the Cura line of spells. They don't restore a ton of HP, but they can be pretty MP efficient.

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Regen casting time is waaaaay too long. It shouldn't take longer to cast then cure, and even if it was a snap cast like stun it would still see limited use.

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A lot of people do prefer to cure the HP immediately as compared to an over-time effect. Even with Fast Cast gear, and /SCH (I would say /RDM, but a /SCH can cast faster with Celerity; nevermind the fact I never sub RDM), cures will always go off faster than Regen spells due to cure cast time gear and cure cast time merits. Take Regen IV for example, wiki has it listed as taking 5 seconds to cast, vs. Cure VI being 2.5. People simply prefer to heal the HP faster, and cures will always do that compared to Regen.

At the same time, the Regen line is designed to gradually cure people over time, while saving MP doing so. When the mob doesn't damage the person much, tossing a Regen will take care of their HP, saving the MP one'd use casting a cure instead. Outside of Abyssea, MP conservation is more important (and we all better get used to it!), so we will see more use of it. Inside of Abyssea, it's nearly meaningless to try to conserve MP - I have infinite MP most of the time due to atma, as do most, and I can spam Cure V/VI fairly easily without worry of even coming close to low MP, unless I'm curing a MNK/WAR that lost Counterstance or something and they're still tanking with zero PDT- gear.

With regards to Cure VI, sure, one can heal for ~1500 or more with that spell, but outside of abyssea, that truly is a last-resort spell, as it's not exactly easy on the MP. It's nearly 100 more MP than Cure V, and at most, cures for 300-400 HP more. Though with job abilities like Penury and gear like Orison Pantaloons +2, it's less of a hassle. A lot think Red Mage, Scholar, and to an extent Paladin should have access to Cure V, and if end-game stayed in Abyssea, I would've agreed. White Mage should be the superior healer, and as is, it is that way. Sure, Dancer has Curing Waltz V, but they have an extremely unforgiving recast timer, and I know every DNC could vouch for that (it can outperform Cure V when it comes to HP cured with ideal waltz gear however, even compared to a WHM with ideal curing gear - I've seen it do almost 1300).

The merits could definitely use a revision. Honestly, defense is so meaningless in FFXI that if they made a Protectra VI spell, I'd only use it just to learn the spell, because I like having every spell. Doesn't mean it'd be useful. We all know how useful Protectra V is compared to Protectra IV... it's only a few more points of defense. Really? It won't make any difference at all. What I'd like to see, is something along the lines of the following: The entire "Protect" spell series being adjusted to become Physical Damage Taken-, just like the entire "Shell" series does for magic damage taken. During the process, since seeing tier VI buffs isn't too unlikely, they should adjust the group 2 merits for Protectra V and Shellra V to just increase efficiency of the entire series of the spells (such as -2% for level 1, up to -10% at level 5; as just an example).

As for Cursna, like I said in an earlier post, I'm inclined to think it's designed to have a low yet set chance at removing doom, not dependent on Healing Magic Skill. I'm fine with that - I like having a challenge at removing Doom. Sure, I can craft Holy/Hallowed Waters to help the cause further, but even WITH Hallowed Waters, I've still had tanks die against some mobs that inflict doom (Bukhis, I'm looking at you) even despite Hallowed Water + Cursna spam. I definitely liked the idea of mobs having Auras, as well, though I do wish some people knew more about them.

I also don't see a need for an Enmity Douse-like effect for WHM. WHM has access to massive enmity- gear, as well as an Enmity- JOB TRAIT for Healing Magic: Tranquil Heart (although yeah, RDM and SCH also have this). If a WHM's getting hate, something's wrong, or there's a hate reset factor being involved.

Overall though, I am quite happy with the White Mage job as it currently is. We have the spells that make us the preferred healer, and we can help manage our MP on our own fairly well with /SCH (Yes, I'm a /SCH fanboy - I am NOT a fan of /RDM, but hey, it's personal preference, and that will never change).

TL;DR for things I think they should do that they didn't mention as example adjustments:
- Keep WHM as the only job that can cast Cure V at will. (When I say "at will", I exclude the Puppetmaster's automaton.) Reality is, if Scholar and Red Mage gained Cure V, I feel WHMs would be less desired because we don't have as much HP outside of Abyssea to justify Cure VI use and they could get the job done similarly. (I think both SCH and RDM should get things that make them more desirable when it comes to supporting the group, enfeebles, unique buffs, etc, etc, etc). If I wanted any job to get Cure V, it'd be Paladin, but without the set VE/CE values that it currently possesses. There's a certain PLD I know who tells me all the time how he feels Cure IV is... a bit on the lacking side. It's not as effective anymore for hate gain, and it's almost solely to help keep HP up. The more HP you cure, the more hate you get, but even then, cures don't generate as much hate at higher level.
- Re-look into the effectiveness of the "Protect" line of spells, and redesign the group 2 merits should we see a sixth tier of these buffs.
- Barlightra/Bardarkra, please. At the same time, give RDM the single-target versions.
- Shorten Regen cast time. Could always introduce gear that'd lower "Regen cast time", similar to cures and healing magic. Though yeah, enhancing magic cast time- gear would work just as well, such as the sash that comes from Ogopogo.

I agree that Protect should be percentage based similarly to Shell so that it'd be more effective, because an increase of 60 to defense is really minimal.

However, I can't really agree that White Mage wouldn't make good use of an ability similar to Enmity Douse. We did get Tranquil Heart, but its effect is insignificant in longer fights. If you're healing a party of six or a full alliance of people, your cumulative enmity will be capped quickly. There are few options to quickly reduce your enmity so that tanks can retain the enemy's attention, and casting in full Enmity- gear is not really likely due to Cure Potency gear and such. Unless your Thief is on top of using Collaborator or Accomplice, that's not really a great option either.

We're mostly on the same page, except for this bit:

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Originally Posted by Fredjan

- Keep WHM as the only job that can cast Cure V at will. (When I say "at will", I exclude the Puppetmaster's automaton.) Reality is, if Scholar and Red Mage gained Cure V, I feel WHMs would be less desired because we don't have as much HP outside of Abyssea to justify Cure VI use and they could get the job done similarly. (I think both SCH and RDM should get things that make them more desirable when it comes to supporting the group, enfeebles, unique buffs, etc, etc, etc). If I wanted any job to get Cure V, it'd be Paladin, but without the set VE/CE values that it currently possesses. There's a certain PLD I know who tells me all the time how he feels Cure IV is... a bit on the lacking side. It's not as effective anymore for hate gain, and it's almost solely to help keep HP up. The more HP you cure, the more hate you get, but even then, cures don't generate as much hate at higher level.

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I think white mage being the only job that has cure V has caused a balance problem in FFXI. There's something seriously wrong when every party has to have one specific job to function, and that's currently what's happening with white mage. While part of the problem is abyssea and the huge hp pools and monster damage output, even in non-abyssea fights (such as voidwatch) most parties are constructed around white mages, and only white mages. It would be nice if at least one other job could fill the main healer role, and barring a major spell addition to another job I don't see another solution other then giving another job access to cure V.

If I could give it to one other job it would be scholar, but I would put the restriction that they could only use it under Addendum: White. That would make another job a passable healer if they specifically focused on doing it, but white mage would still be easily superior because of merits, job specific gear, and job traits.

And to put the situation in perspective, red mages and scholars are only marginally better healers then any melee/whm with a lot of +mp gear and refresh support. That doesn't seem right to me, but then again I do play white mage and scholar so maybe I'm biased.

The problem Ahrana is that sch and rdm are so much better at MP efficiency and usage that if you gave Cure V to them, they would become instantly more popular than whm for anything outside of Aby, which is how it was @75, with whms being all but obsolete due to our horrible mp problems at that time...I'm not saying we'd encounter the exact same issues, but I just think we should keep cure V and VI a whm only thing, and help SE to continue workin' to find alternative ways that SCH could be more competant as a healer, so that they bring something unique to the table, not just the same crap whm has.

My only problem with SCH getting cure V is the amount of potency they can end up with.... 38% in gear, then +60% with AF3+2 head.

I would agree that giving a non-cure V alternative to red mage and/or scholars would be preferable, but the fact is that SE has done a terrible job of adding unique job specific spells to red mage and scholar. Additionally, because of the way NM's work I don't think anything other than a large, direct heal will do the job. I know that over on the scholar forums the idea has been kicked around for a helix type healing spell, but with SE's current track record of job specific unique spells they would be underwhelming at best, and likely completely unworkable. For reference, how often do people use the hate up, down, and regain spells scholars possess?

SE has been driving to make white mage and black mage the best at what they do, and they've succeeded. The problem is that they've become so overwhelmingly good at their roles that they aren't replaceable anymore, which marginalizes the jobs that are in between them. Add on top of that SE has made many NM's immune to enfeebles, what is supposed to be the domain of red mages, and it's making the mage support role two dimensional: white and black. I don't see this as a good thing, even though I primarily play white mage as my main, and scholar as my "fun job."

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And to put the situation in perspective, red mages and scholars are only marginally better healers then any melee/whm with a lot of +mp gear and refresh support. That doesn't seem right to me, but then again I do play white mage and scholar so maybe I'm biased.

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I play White Mage, Red Mage, and Scholar, so I know what you mean. I do understand that point of view. However, cure potency gear and whatnot is what'd make the difference compared to a melee/whm - I can reach close to 600 Cure IVs on RDM and SCH. Plus Scholar has Rapture, allowing a Cure IV to exceed 800+ with ease. If a SCH /WHM'ed for some reason (such as Haste), Divine Seal would stack on top of that if the situation called for its use. Most RDM/WHM only use Divine Seal with Convert.

I'm not completely against the Cure V thing being given to other jobs, but I do want White Mage to shine as the healer, similarly to BLM as the main nuker. Even if they had Cure V, WHM would have the (current) capped cure potency advantage + Afflatus Solace boost from AF3+2 body, but I doubt people would think of that. People didn't want WHMs at 75 because even with Cure V, having more MP is what people preferred, and that's one thing I strongly disliked when the level cap was 75. I didn't even enjoy main healing on RDM or SCH - maybe I just feel like those jobs lacked when it came to a main healer role, even at 75. But there's one thing they didn't lack on: MP efficiency (SCH, RDM has Convert+Refresh II only on a /whm use, but I tend to /SCH even on RDM unless I have to have a spell /WHM gives me when it comes to healing). In this day and age, all 3 jobs have plenty of self-support when it comes to efficiency, so it's a matter of what can do the best job healing.

I think the ideal situation is to give them more healing magic support, but not exactly Cure V just yet. After all, they have said that currently they don't have plans to do something like Cure V - but that doesn't mean they won't down the line.

Another case-in point: Summoner, like White Mage, can hit the cure potency cap (because of Facio Bliaut), so they'd cast Cure IVs (as /WHM of course, for now) even stronger than RDM and SCH (outside of Rapture). Nevermind the fact I hate healing on Summoner, it's just showing that RDM and SCH don't just lack cure potency gear to reach the cap; a job that doesn't even have a cure spell on its own without subbing a mage can reach it.

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I would agree that giving a non-cure V alternative to red mage and/or scholars would be preferable, but the fact is that SE has done a terrible job of adding unique job specific spells to red mage and scholar. Additionally, because of the way NM's work I don't think anything other than a large, direct heal will do the job. I know that over on the scholar forums the idea has been kicked around for a helix type healing spell, but with SE's current track record of job specific unique spells they would be underwhelming at best, and likely completely unworkable. For reference, how often do people use the hate up, down, and regain spells scholars possess?

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I try to use the regain spell when I'm with melees. Enmity spells was an interesting thought, but I don't use those often either.

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SE has been driving to make white mage and black mage the best at what they do, and they've succeeded. The problem is that they've become so overwhelmingly good at their roles that they aren't replaceable anymore, which marginalizes the jobs that are in between them. Add on top of that SE has made many NM's immune to enfeebles, what is supposed to be the domain of red mages, and it's making the mage support role two dimensional: white and black. I don't see this as a good thing, even though I primarily play white mage as my main, and scholar as my "fun job."

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They have indeed. I do recall them saying they plan to adjust Enfeebling Magic, which would definitely help RDM. As-is, a lot of things resist most enfeebles, so that needs a fix.

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Originally Posted by Fredjan

Way I look at Doom... That's simply something you never blame a healer on. Dealing with Doom requires ideal preparation.

That said, Holy Waters are just as effective as Cursna when it comes to removing doom, they are just faster than relying on Cursna, especially when you have a lower number of Cursna sources. When it comes to them actually working, it's all luck. I haven't once been a believer in healing magic skill playing a factor. If it was, then why would a /whm be able to remove it just as luckily as I can? It simply doesn't affect it. I realize that wasn't a discussion already, but even despite that, it's better to find an Alchemist that can craft Hallowed Waters. Sure, it may cost slightly more, needing Fire/Ice/Light Anima, BUT they are FAR, FAR, FAR more effective than both Holy Water and Cursna, but not 100% effective. I can directly attest to this. Not many alchemists would bother getting 1 key item for 1 synth in the entire game, but I've made my fair share of hallowed waters for tanks I know.

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I agree that healing doesnt really seem to effect cursna on doom, but I'd really have to disagree on the hallowed water. I bought 3 stacks to try on bukhis, sadly I went through a whole stack per doom cast. It all seems based on luck, Ive been lucky with holy water and cursna on first trys. Sadly, the cost of making hallowed is far to high for the very slight increase if at all.

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Originally Posted by Ahrana

I would agree that giving a non-cure V alternative to red mage and/or scholars would be preferable, but the fact is that SE has done a terrible job of adding unique job specific spells to red mage and scholar. Additionally, because of the way NM's work I don't think anything other than a large, direct heal will do the job. I know that over on the scholar forums the idea has been kicked around for a helix type healing spell, but with SE's current track record of job specific unique spells they would be underwhelming at best, and likely completely unworkable. For reference, how often do people use the hate up, down, and regain spells scholars possess?

SE has been driving to make white mage and black mage the best at what they do, and they've succeeded. The problem is that they've become so overwhelmingly good at their roles that they aren't replaceable anymore, which marginalizes the jobs that are in between them. Add on top of that SE has made many NM's immune to enfeebles, what is supposed to be the domain of red mages, and it's making the mage support role two dimensional: white and black. I don't see this as a good thing, even though I primarily play white mage as my main, and scholar as my "fun job."

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This is exactly the way I look at it. I play WHM and SCH exclusively in groups anymore, mostly WHM for obvious reasons, but SCH is my favorite. I love the concept of SCH having a unique way to ensure survival as well as WHM, but am very doubtful that SE can pull this off given the last year of lemons the jobs has been stuck with. I'd rather spend the next year with boring Cure V actually using SCH than test out their healing helix and watch it suck.

I also agree with Cure V being available only through Addendum White. I don't want to keep up with WHM and BLM at the same time, I just want to fill either role adequately.

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Originally Posted by Zigfreid

I agree that healing doesnt really seem to effect cursna on doom, but I'd really have to disagree on the hallowed water. I bought 3 stacks to try on bukhis, sadly I went through a whole stack per doom cast. It all seems based on luck, Ive been lucky with holy water and cursna on first trys. Sadly, the cost of making hallowed is far to high for the very slight increase if at all.

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I have noticed the same thing. Sometimes it won't work at all, sometimes it works on the first water use, sometimes it works on the first cursna. It's hard to really come to a conclusion about it, given what it's based off of. I just go by what I'm told.

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Originally Posted by Zigfreid

I agree that healing doesnt really seem to effect cursna on doom

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I can't say I've ever noticed any sort of conclusive evidence to prove either way...

I'd normally Divine caress (+af3+2 mitts) the first cursna, then keep recasting it in full haste gear.

I'm with you Aleste...I haven't noticed a significant difference in doom-curing success based on healing skill....it would be nice if it did affect it though, as it would be logical for us to have fewer troubles curing it, us being you know...healers >_>

Adjusting Healing Magic skill to better affect spells such as Cursna would be a great improvement to what we have now, especially when dealing with Doom on multiple people. I definitely think they should adjust the Healing Magic skill to be more powerful for a few other spells as well. Perhaps allow Esuna to cleanse more status ailments the higher your skill so that instead of removing only two, it can remove up to four or five ailments with Afflatus Misery.

Another great addition would be a spell that can remove Amnesia. If they add such a spell, Amnesna for example, it could work similarly to Cursna in that it'd be more accurate the higher your Healing Magic skill is.

As for the Cure V debacle, I feel that Red Mage and Scholar should be able to learn it. It probably wouldn't be usable with Accession, and as White Mage seems to be getting Curaga V by Lv.95, it wouldn't be much of an issue. If they wanted to allow White Mage to maintain its status as the true healing job on XI, then they could always add a job trait that quickens Healing Magic casting similar in effect to Elemental Celerity. Or a job trait that has a chance to reduce the cost of your Healing Magic spells similarly to Conserve MP. Both would be nice, but I'd prefer the latter.

Can we whms get a little love from the devs on the manifesto info?

At the present time, if another job got Cure V, there would be no reason to play White Mage (as a main healer), except for maybe procs in Abyssea. Don't give me this Cure VI or cure potency crap, both RDM and SCH can cast, recast faster, and have better MP regeneration tools - without having to resort to gear.

On top of that, both jobs have several solid secondary roles they can choose to do in parties aside from just cure botting - enhancing/support, nuking, enfeebling, crowd control. White Mage performs barely decently compared to both when it comes to enhancing/support, where the only major factor White Mage contributes is better magic resistance. White Mage enfeebling is fairly rare. White Mage nukes, at best, outperform a Dark Knight, especially now that Paladin can pack a punch with the occasional Holy (Congrats on that to Paladin by the way). And White Mage's are lucky they even have Repose, but single target sleep isn't exactly crowd control.

Outside of that there is just one thing White Mage can compete at, which would be our melee side. We get all the weapon skills our two weapon (three if throwing counts) selection provides (the only other job in the game limited to two weapons is BLU). We perform competently with both, and are second only to Paladin in Club skill. We have a monopoly on the Club Magian Trials, and a monopoly on the best weapon in the game (which I hope to someday have).

Ignoring Blue Mage, we are the best mage-ish job at melee. And even then, this is slipping. Summoners may soon get access to all weapon skills without having to sport a more melee oriented job, and Red Mages want their melee buffed too. Perhaps some buffs will be in order for them, but please do not forget the powerful, gratuitous amounts of potential you gave to us, and please don't let it languish.

Unlike Black Mage's super comfortable job security in filling a role - any role - White Mage only maintains its position on a paper raft in Ifrit's Cauldron. We could be bumped off at any moment by the ravenous hordes of Scholars that won't rest until we are out of a job, or Red Mages hungering for the days where the could out cure a White Mage.

Twenty-five to thirty-five percent cureskin, and slightly better cure potency gear isn't going to cut it forever, and there are major arguments that other jobs need more curing power. I'm guessing that they'll get their cure power in some way. White Mage either needs to be supreme at what it does, or needs other roles to play.

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There are a few things that have been said here that have been amazingly insanely good suggestions. I've had a few thoughts too. Some organized thoughs on how to adjust White Mage going forward:

Barlight, and Bardark. For Red Mage too.

Regen cast time should be reduced. Gear and job traits/abilities should not be your answer to this request SE!

Healing Magic Skill should not be useless. This comes on two fronts. First off, Cursna should have better chances at removing Doom if my healing magic skill is higher. Second, the difference between zero skill and capped Healing Magic skill is 30 points of curing for Cure V. This is a major problem. I don't think a Summoner with /WHM should be able to Cure IV as well as a White Mage, and I don't think someone should be able to Abyssea burn a White Mage and cure as much as me without cure bombing undead for a few hours (or I suppose they could just sub Scholar for Light Arts).

A suppressant aura would be very nice with Afflatus Misery, to suppress monster aura effects, but somehow I doubt SE would consider this balanced. Not that having a debuff that cannot be removed on you should be considered balanced.

Afflatus Misery could use a boost.

Benediction is horrifically broken. I know that doing something like removing weakened might be an iffy movement considering that Ninja's 2hour is basically a glorified way to do this, but Amnesia? Mute? Doom? Zombie?

At this point Benediction is just an instant way to pop a Curaga IV and Esuna when you have no MP. Except Curaga IV can be free with the AF3+2 pants under the right circumstances. To be honest, I think all 2hours could use something extra at high levels like what Summoner got. For example, Benediction can actually do what it says, or if the dev team feels generous, even give some extra buff, like absurd amounts of cureskin, or Max MP boost.

White Mage should get Banish IV (maybe even V) and Holy2. These nukes will undoubtedly suck, and not actually help White Mage except for more recast timers for skillups. We know this, just give us them and be over with it.

On that note, Banish and Holy should at least do more damage to undead. Its not like White Mage is gonna suddenly replace Black Mage if we can nuke almost as good as a gimped Red Mage that somehow has no Magic Attack Bonus on one type of mob right?

On Divine Magic, please give White Mage Reposega. Getting ganked by undead sucks.

Charmna is nice and all, but how about removing Amnesia? And as stupid as the mechanic is, at the very least make Silence have a chance of removing Mute, if not outright.

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And on a final note, since I know SE loves answering questions that sound absurd, and I think this could have a big impact on White Mage regardless of what spells we get to have a monopoly over:

As an experienced healer, I can't help but notice at novice healers who lack skill perform comparably to me. While I appreciate having new faces who are able to keep my comrades alive, it makes me feel like I have failed at honing my skills. What can I do to make my Healing Magic Skill useful?

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Originally Posted by Ashay

Or a job trait that has a chance to reduce the cost of your Healing Magic spells similarly to Conserve MP.

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This would be SO awesome, I would take it over every other proposed adjustment.

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Originally Posted by Economizer

At the present time, if another job got Cure V, there would be no reason to play White Mage (as a main healer), except for maybe procs in Abyssea. Don't give me this Cure VI or cure potency crap, both RDM and SCH can cast, recast faster, and have better MP regeneration tools - without having to resort to gear.

On top of that, both jobs have several solid secondary roles they can choose to do in parties aside from just cure botting - enhancing/support, nuking, enfeebling, crowd control. White Mage performs barely decently compared to both when it comes to enhancing/support, where the only major factor White Mage contributes is better magic resistance. White Mage enfeebling is fairly rare. White Mage nukes, at best, outperform a Dark Knight, especially now that Paladin can pack a punch with the occasional Holy (Congrats on that to Paladin by the way). And White Mage's are lucky they even have Repose, but single target sleep isn't exactly crowd control.

Outside of that there is just one thing White Mage can compete at, which would be our melee side. We get all the weapon skills our two weapon (three if throwing counts) selection provides (the only other job in the game limited to two weapons is BLU). We perform competently with both, and are second only to Paladin in Club skill. We have a monopoly on the Club Magian Trials, and a monopoly on the best weapon in the game (which I hope to someday have).

Ignoring Blue Mage, we are the best mage-ish job at melee. And even then, this is slipping. Summoners may soon get access to all weapon skills without having to sport a more melee oriented job, and Red Mages want their melee buffed too. Perhaps some buffs will be in order for them, but please do not forget the powerful, gratuitous amounts of potential you gave to us, and please don't let it languish.

Unlike Black Mage's super comfortable job security in filling a role - any role - White Mage only maintains its position on a paper raft in Ifrit's Cauldron. We could be bumped off at any moment by the ravenous hordes of Scholars that won't rest until we are out of a job, or Red Mages hungering for the days where the could out cure a White Mage.

Twenty-five to thirty-five percent cureskin, and slightly better cure potency gear isn't going to cut it forever, and there are major arguments that other jobs need more curing power. I'm guessing that they'll get their cure power in some way. White Mage either needs to be supreme at what it does, or needs other roles to play.

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There are a few things that have been said here that have been amazingly insanely good suggestions. I've had a few thoughts too. Some organized thoughs on how to adjust White Mage going forward:

Barlight, and Bardark. For Red Mage too.

Regen cast time should be reduced. Gear and job traits/abilities should not be your answer to this request SE!

Healing Magic Skill should not be useless. This comes on two fronts. First off, Cursna should have better chances at removing Doom if my healing magic skill is higher. Second, the difference between zero skill and capped Healing Magic skill is 30 points of curing for Cure V. This is a major problem. I don't think a Summoner with /WHM should be able to Cure IV as well as a White Mage, and I don't think someone should be able to Abyssea burn a White Mage and cure as much as me without cure bombing undead for a few hours (or I suppose they could just sub Scholar for Light Arts).

A suppressant aura would be very nice with Afflatus Misery, to suppress monster aura effects, but somehow I doubt SE would consider this balanced. Not that having a debuff that cannot be removed on you should be considered balanced.

Afflatus Misery could use a boost.

Benediction is horrifically broken. I know that doing something like removing weakened might be an iffy movement considering that Ninja's 2hour is basically a glorified way to do this, but Amnesia? Mute? Doom? Zombie?

At this point Benediction is just an instant way to pop a Curaga IV and Esuna when you have no MP. Except Curaga IV can be free with the AF3+2 pants under the right circumstances. To be honest, I think all 2hours could use something extra at high levels like what Summoner got. For example, Benediction can actually do what it says, or if the dev team feels generous, even give some extra buff, like absurd amounts of cureskin, or Max MP boost.

White Mage should get Banish IV (maybe even V) and Holy2. These nukes will undoubtedly suck, and not actually help White Mage except for more recast timers for skillups. We know this, just give us them and be over with it.

On that note, Banish and Holy should at least do more damage to undead. Its not like White Mage is gonna suddenly replace Black Mage if we can nuke almost as good as a gimped Red Mage that somehow has no Magic Attack Bonus on one type of mob right?

On Divine Magic, please give White Mage Reposega. Getting ganked by undead sucks.

Charmna is nice and all, but how about removing Amnesia? And as stupid as the mechanic is, at the very least make Silence have a chance of removing Mute, if not outright.

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And on a final note, since I know SE loves answering questions that sound absurd, and I think this could have a big impact on White Mage regardless of what spells we get to have a monopoly over:

As an experienced healer, I can't help but notice at novice healers who lack skill perform comparably to me. While I appreciate having new faces who are able to keep my comrades alive, it makes me feel like I have failed at honing my skills. What can I do to make my Healing Magic Skill useful?

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Totally agree...I've fought with sch's an' rdm's before on this subject, and they don't seem to remember that not too long ago, whm was all but obsolete because we couldn't compete for MP restoration....we're getting a tiny bit of glory now and sch/rdm want it, yet then they turn around and claim to not want to be put in a healer's role....

I would fully support having multiple classes that can heal...IF each one of those classes brought something unique and worthwhile to the table that cannot be gotten any other way, not just cutting and pasting whm's stuff to other, more MP-efficient jobs...besides, it's been said before, but it definitely bears repeating...a hybrid mage (rdm or sch) should NOT be able to outclass a specialty mage...the benefit of being a specialty mage is that we have more power than a hybrid, in exchange for losing the hybrid's versatility!

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Originally Posted by Ashay

Or a job trait that has a chance to reduce the cost of your Healing Magic spells similarly to Conserve MP. Both would be nice, but I'd prefer the latter.

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I meant to mention this in my post but forgot. Except we sort of have a template for this to some extent - the AF3 pants. With the fully upgraded pants you can supposedly get back the entire cost of MP of what you put into a spell but not a point more, if you do a Curaga or Ascension a Cure IV, you can get free cures if people are wounded enough.

That said, I have doubts that SE would give us more of this as a job trait, although it would certainly be nice to get a small boost of this on top of the pants 2-5%. A 5% savings already translates to roughly a 25%-40% savings for Cure I-V, while a 10% savings would cheapen spells 60-80%, and a 15% savings would make the majority of cures free, meaning that even small numbers have great affect. As a White Mage, I would gladly give up exclusivity of Cure V for an extra 10% of this trait on top of what the AF3 pants already gives, but this would be completely broken.

And although I've posted many suggestions, I still have to be firm that Healing Magic Skill should affect debuff removal and cures more. Looking quickly at the JP forums using a machine translator, I see something similar, and I suspect that SE will answer us about this soon. Perhaps if we lay down the pressure (or alternatively, bribe Camate) we might not only get an answer, but a promise that SE will adjust this skill to play a bigger part into cures. After all, Summoners got a change to their skill that made it matter. Worst thing that could happen is that we get another undead slaying session with 99999 damage cures.

Cure potentcy merits please.

Cure Potency caps at 50%, so unless you mean a job trait that bypass the gear cap, this would be fairly pointless for White Mage, as it isn't too hard to cap Cure Potency.

As for whether or not they should be merits in the first place is also a point, every White Mage should get increased Cure Potency, because what would you merit over Cure Potency that ignores the current gear cap? Basically, it would be like our current category 1 merit category of "Bar Spell Effect". Who would merit something else? That said, I don't exactly expect SE to make White Mage have a hard choice of what to merit now or in the future.

It would be immensly useful ragardless of the cap.

Cure Potency merits would be awesome even if they counted toward the cap as they would free up gear slots for stuff like -Enmity and MND.

It would be nice to see Bene remove more than it does but honestly I think Zombie is an interesting game mechanic and I can't see them including that.

Healing magic effectiveness I agree on utterly. Mine's capped but seeing BRDs, subbing WHM removing Doom when I can't... sucks.

Barstunra, Barlumina and Barnocta would be great along with some way of removing Amnesia.

Benediction weakness away, it is a 2hr ability after all.

Cure Potency merits would be nice for better equipment options, but I'd only get them if it was a Group III merit. Cure Cast Time and Bar Spell Potency merits are too nice.

If they don't add Reviviscence for players, then they should buff Benediction to remove Doom, ST20, Amnesia and Weakness. How about Raise IV with no weakness?

how about raise IV = aoe raise?

I've seen two White Mages building a multihitter in my server in the last two days, while I was doing the same. At least one if not both of them were JP players too, with some gear better then me.

It always warms my heart to see a White Mage melee things down.

I really hope that in the next update SE won't forget about our melee side, especially if they give away even more of our abilities and spells to other classes. On that note, silly question format:

As a White Mage, I've noticed a distinct desire for my most potent spells and abilities by others, an alarming amount of anger towards White Mage for having these. Are there any ways I can augment my combat abilities to defend myself from these undesired advances?

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Originally Posted by Economizer

I've seen two White Mages building a multihitter in my server in the last two days, while I was doing the same. At least one if not both of them were JP players too, with some gear better then me.

It always warms my heart to see a White Mage melee things down.

I really hope that in the next update SE won't forget about our melee side, especially if they give away even more of our abilities and spells to other classes. On that note, silly question format:

As a White Mage, I've noticed a distinct desire for my most potent spells and abilities by others, an alarming amount of anger towards White Mage for having these. Are there any ways I can augment my combat abilities to defend myself from these undesired advances?

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lol Econ they are just mad that we whms are finally getting a little of the glory that they had at 75, and they don't know how to deal with not being choice #1 for healing in pt's anymore :)

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Originally Posted by Bubeeky

lol Econ they are just mad that we whms are finally getting a little of the glory that they had at 75, and they don't know how to deal with not being choice #1 for healing in pt's anymore :)

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It isn't just jobs that want more healing though. Summoners want to be able to use more Staff WS without /WHM so they can melee more, and Scholars want them because they aren't happy unless they've put Black Mage, Red Mage, and White Mage out of a job. And while, despite the fact that Summoners already have a solid way to deal damage without melee (something White Mage pretty much lacks) I can see maybe Summoner deserving some, what does this leave White Mage in terms of a class role? Does this mean Black Mage, Bard, and Dragoon will also get these natively? Where does it stop?

As a sub, White Mage won't be the only job with Haste available forever, and I have doubts that many jobs will be subbing White Mage for Repose at those higher levels. Either Red Mage for Haste, Enspells, Barspells, Ice Spikes, Phalanx, Sleep II, easier Sleep/Dispel, up to Cure IV, and MP longevity (and if your a SCH, Magic Attack Bonus), or Scholar for debuff removal, up to Cure III, MP longevity, Light Arts/Dark Arts (better Sleep/Aspir) and Sleep/Dispel.

Basically, the fact that White Mage is the only mage class (does PLD count?) that gets advanced Staff WS is a major part of the current game balance currently, and a major part of what the White Mage class offers as a sub. It isn't like it is unfair to have to make sacrifices when choosing a sub, that's the nature of the sub job system. But I guess we'll have to wait and see.

Sorry to be such a downer. It is just refreshing to see someone who isn't all angry about White Mage actually having some traits unique to it, but more importantly, being good at what it does. :p

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Originally Posted by Aleste

My only problem with SCH getting cure V is the amount of potency they can end up with.... 38% in gear, then +60% with AF3+2 head.

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38% non weather-related gear. Add 10% for Korin Obi + 5% for Twilight Cape. Most SCHs (including me) are asking for double weather effects as well, meaning 30% of weather-related cure potency we can full-time with Aurorastorm that is not subject to the 50% gear cap (I think). If we don't get double weather, we're still at 53% currently with Aurorastorm and no Rapture. As much as I love SCH, I think even my WHM would be jealous of 68% cure potency. My solution is to remove the gear cap! I think WHM can reach 70% with some Facio luck?

EDIT: TimeMage pointed out in the SCH thread that the weather bonus is actually multiplicative after the gear bonus is applied, which I had missed looking at the Wiki formula. So it actually looks like a max potency set on SCH now can go 59%, and with double weather would be able to reach 81%. Unless the Obi and Cape are added first , then it would only be 79% with double weather.

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Originally Posted by Merton9999

38% non weather-related gear. Add 10% for Korin Obi + 5% for Twilight Cape. Most SCHs (including me) are asking for double weather effects as well, meaning 30% of weather-related cure potency we can full-time with Aurorastorm that is not subject to the 50% gear cap (I think). If we don't get double weather, we're still at 53% currently with Aurorastorm and no Rapture. As much as I love SCH, I think even my WHM would be jealous of 68% cure potency. My solution is to remove the gear cap! I think WHM can reach 70% with some Facio luck?

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I think we need something other than just removing the cap....removing the cap on cure potency might be a temporary fix but in the long run, ppl will need some other kind of uniqueness from a whm's cures for us to be able to compete with the MP efficiency of a sch or rdm

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Originally Posted by Bubeeky

I think we need something other than just removing the cap....removing the cap on cure potency might be a temporary fix but in the long run, ppl will need some other kind of uniqueness from a whm's cures for us to be able to compete with the MP efficiency of a sch or rdm

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Overall I definitely agree for post-Abyssea content. My gear cap removal suggestion was specifically for addressing just the potency comparison issue.

Glad to see a place where Cure VI is wisely not considered in discussions when talking about giving other jobs Cure V. Removing the gear potency cap would make the AF3+2 body fairly useless outside of overheals and the extra MP/tic refresh.

Oh, that and White Mages would be able to get up to 80% Cure Potency in gear (83% with Dual Wield). This would be very expensive and hard to do, but here is a break down:

Surya's Staff +2 (22%) OR Tefnut Wand (15%) + Templar Mace (10%) (25% total)
Medicine Ring (Latent, 10%)
Roundel Earring (5%)
Orison Earring (2%)
Fylgja Torque +1 (3%)
Serpentes Armor Set (5%)
Orison Cap +2 (10%)
Tatsumaki Sitagoromo (Augment, 5%)
Facio Bliaut (Augment, 15%) (Admittedly, I've only ever seen it go up to 14%, but wiki says 15%)

Actually, if you want to go even further, White Mage could hit 20% more in Abyssea:
Atma of the Rescuer (10%)
Atma of Harmony (10%)

So inside Abyssea, White Mage could hit 100% (103% Dual Wield). But wait! There's more! If you get a Healing Feather, you can get 20 charges of a 3 minute boost of 15%, meaning White Mage could hit 115% (117% DW).

With this much cure potency, Cure IV essentially does what Cure V does without any potency. If you choose to never wear the ASA augmented pants in favor of the AF3+2 pants (for cheaper cures), and ignore the feather, you still get 95% inside Abyssea, 75% outside, you'll get roughly half cost cures, and you can pick up a free cure every two minutes with /SCH and Penury inside Abyssea.

That said, it is expensive enough to gear a White Mage without having to get a Roundel Earring and Fylgja Torque +1 to become more efficient, and the odds of getting a good Facio are terrible its almost not worth counting as gear WHM can get. So even if I could hit 83% with the best Facio possible, and the ASA pants instead of AF3, if Scholar got 79% from double weather effects and Cure V, I think I'd have to grab two Clubs and start teaching Scholar all about the only other thing White Mage is the best at.

I don't think that removing the cure potency cap for gear is a good solution. I also don't think that Scholar should get Cure V, especially under this new information that they could reach 58% cure potency (72% in Abyssea), at the least until new options are explored.

Also, I think that Scholars aren't going to get double weather effects unless SE wants them to be overpowered again in general. Unless SE plans on giving Black Mage tier VI nukes that don't suck or something, or some other major leap ahead it won't balance out on their side. And unless SE plans on making Cure IV require Addendum: White, giving White Mage A+ Club skill, native Parrying, Dual Wield I, and something that gives 5% of cure amount back as MP, or some other drastic changes, they won't balance out on the White Mage side either.

Also SE, that's the cost of Scholar or Red Mage getting Cure V. We get Club raised to A+, Parrying E or better, and Dual Wield I or better, and a native trait that gives us an effect like our AF3 pants, of at least 2% (much higher if Scholar also gets double weather effects).

Additionally, it wouldn't hurt you to give us new shields that do something beyond what Genbu's, the Muse Tariqah, or the Bloodbead Ecu do. We have higher skill then Red Mage, or Thief and they seemed to have gotten several past 75 while we just got tagged on the Ecu. A double attack shield would make everyone happy and you could slap the letters WHM on it in addition to the usual list of jobs.

Something else SE could do to differentiate healing power in general would be to make healing magic skill affect spells more, especially on skill past the B+ mark. There should be a major, not just minor difference between someone who has capped healing magic skill and someone who does not. There should also be a reason why White Mage has an A+ in the skill, and this should be something major too.

While I'm talking about White Mage in general, Afflatus Misery could use a boost. This could come from adjustments, like making damage add up like healing does for Solace, or come from traits, abilities, and spells White Mage gets, or gear. Or even a mix of the three. Ever since the combined blows of the Auspice nerf and the AF3 body's effect, it hasn't been the same.

I would love to see the cure formula adjusted to include healing magic skill more heavily...I think at this point, capped healing magic skill adds a grand total of like....50 hp to cures, and from other posts and personal experience, healing magic doesn't seem to affect a great deal of anything besides interruption rate...perhaps SE could look into changing that?

I don't know about you, but I never found it very expensive to get cure potency gear.

Surya's Staff +2, Orison Cap +2, Noble's Tunic, Orison Cape, and Serpentes armor set caps cure potency as it is now. Get a Facio with 10% and refresh instead of Noble's and every bit of that is free.

It isn't expensive to cap cure potency as a White Mage anymore because of the fact that it does cap. Imagine if you had to wear every piece of expensive gear (Roundel, Fylgja Torque +1) just to get a slight edge over classes that can also nuke almost as well as a Black Mage too.

I was a bit erroneous to say that it was, but I was also considering the possibility of when you want to cap cure potency without the body piece for the 5-10% cureskin boost the body provides. Well, that and I should have used the word "hard" instead of expensive. I may have a Surya's Staff +2, but many White Mages I see still cure in something you could have before level 70, so I can only assume it is hard for most players (well, the beast killer portion of it was hard for me).

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Originally Posted by Economizer

It isn't expensive to cap cure potency as a White Mage anymore because of the fact that it does cap. Imagine if you had to wear every piece of expensive gear (Roundel, Fylgja Torque +1) just to get a slight edge over classes that can also nuke almost as well as a Black Mage too.

I was a bit erroneous to say that it was, but I was also considering the possibility of when you want to cap cure potency without the body piece for the 5-10% cureskin boost the body provides. Well, that and I should have used the word "hard" instead of expensive. I may have a Surya's Staff +2, but many White Mages I see still cure in something you could have before level 70, so I can only assume it is hard for most players (well, the beast killer portion of it was hard for me).

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That's my problem with just simply removing the cap...one, it's hard/expensive to get all the items you mentioned, as not everyone has the resources to aquire the items, even if you are a dedicated whm...and two like you said, all those items together would give us a miniscule edge over other jobs that are effective nukers and efficient as mp use as well, not to mention the fact that if we really looked at it, how useful would that be? I mean outside of Abyssea, no one has the hp to justify cure V regularly, let alone cure VI, especially if you're curing for +50% cure potency...adding 30%+ to that cure potency won't change that, as such we need something more unique for our cures than just a cure pot cap removal.

PS, just throwing this out there as I'm honestly curious...if you guys use the medicine ring (the +10% cure pot ring) how do you constantly keep your hp low enough to get the bonus? the 10% would be wonderful, but I can't see how I'd get around a pretty potent regen JT...

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Originally Posted by Bubeeky

PS, just throwing this out there as I'm honestly curious...if you guys use the medicine ring (the +10% cure pot ring) how do you constantly keep your hp low enough to get the bonus? the 10% would be wonderful, but I can't see how I'd get around a pretty potent regen JT...

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Personally, I don't use the ring because I cap cure potency without it (although I'm considering getting one for when I'm engaging in a beatdown and not wearing my AF3 cap, who knows).

Macroing in gear that lowers your HP or converts HP->MP then switching out of it is one way, putting on gear that gives +HP is another. If you have the Zenith set, or a bifrost ring, or a serket ring, these make wonderful tools for this. If you are inside Abyssea, you can cancel your Max HP buff and it will come right back and put you into the yellow. If you decide you want to use this ring, beware undead, especially since SE doesn't let us oneshot them with cure anymore. D:

And of course, /SCH's Sublimation will counter your Regen while it is up, with an added bonus of making you immune to sleep effects and giving you MP.

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If you are having issues capping cure potency, the easiest gear to get to get to cap would probably by Noble's Tunic, Orison Cap +2, Surya's Staff +2, Augur's Gloves, Orison Earring, Orison Cape, which will put you at 51% to be sure you hit the 50% cap. If you have questions about the Staff, the wiki doesn't always explain the easiest way to do a trial adequately, although the light damage trial is pretty much "the" hard trial of the bunch. For the Augur's Gloves and the Orison Earring, either shout groups or begging off gear will work. You will probably need help getting the cape, preferably from a Monk friend who can cover any procs you miss - you will hate Marvin because he is often camped and rarely drops the cape even with a blue proc... at least compared to other gear. The hat +2 items can be difficult to get if you don't have some friends or the ability to solo a mob that drops on of the +2 items at a time.

Thanks for the info econ :) I'm actually pretty good on cure pot gear, I'm just sitting at like 43% or something right now, so it's a work in progress and I've always avoided the medicine ring because of the hp/regen issue, but if there's reliable ways around that, I'll invest in one so I can free up my other slots :)

I've been building my cure pot set for a while, and the biggest reason that it's not capped atm is because I'm trying to avoid having to go back to the noble's tunic or fascio's thing so I can use my af3+2...the addition to my cureskin and refresh really helps out too much to exchange it for some basic cure potency if I can swing it in other slots :)

If you can, get medals for WotG in Windurst and pray your server gets Plucking Wings access. I'm 1-2 days from the evaluation that will get me the medal, and my server has access this week. Sooo close.