Cure V, Raise II Where?

[rog]

Solace, esuna, etc guarentee that whm will never be too far behind rdm, and will always have some situations where they are better than rdm.

Blu already has a cure 5, and you don't see them taking over whm's roll. I wonder why that is.

Sch hasn't made blm useless.

More than half of the jobs are dd jobs. Why isn't this a problem?

Why does whm get to monopolize healing, when every single other roll has a minimum of 3 options?

[Valkrist]

Solace, esuna, etc guarentee that whm will never be too far behind rdm, and will always have some situations where they are better than rdm.

Using Afflatus Solace and Sacrifice, proceeded by Afflatus Misery to Esuna is not a game breaking set of tools though. Using Esuna means one of two things. One, the WHM needs to be at melee range to get the status ailments to be cured. Two, used Sacrifice to steal the status ailment and is planning on running into melee to cast Esuna.

From WHM experience, yes Esuna's a godsend, but is it necessary? No. It's a very nice tool that saves the WHM both time and MP while generating a lot of enmity in the process. Yes, using it frequently can quite easily get WHM to the top of the hate list. Also if you're talking about fights where spamming Cure V is necessary, a WHM being at melee is generally frowned upon.

Blu already has a cure 5, and you don't see them taking over whm's roll. I wonder why that is.

BLU having their own version of Cure V does seem unfair, but do you ask BLUs to be main-healer often when you know that they're generally spike damage dealers? BLUs also don't have the same kind of MP conservation that a RDM or SCH have to make them not as ideal.

Why does whm get to monopolize healing, when every single other roll has a minimum of 3 options?

I think you just answered your own question. The other "rolls" have a minimum of three other options, like you said. What other roles do WHMs have aside from being nothing but a healer? You certainly don't look at a WHM for debuffs, nukes or to melee. The only time one of those other rolls gets filled slightly is if you have a WHM that understands to Banish III undead to drop their special defense by 75% for up to 45 seconds.

[rog]

I think you just answered your own question. The other "rolls" have a minimum of three other options, like you said. What other roles do WHMs have aside from being nothing but a healer? You certainly don't look at a WHM for debuffs, nukes or to melee. The only time one of those other rolls gets filled slightly is if you have a WHM that understands to Banish III undead to drop their special defense by 75% for up to 45 seconds.

You missed my point. I said every roll has at least 3 options. I did not say that every 3 has 3 rolls. Melee dd include 17~ jobs. Buffing includes brd, cor, sch, rdm, whm. Nuking has rdm, blm, sch, blu. Ranged dd has rng, cor, sam (yeah, i know that's a stretch, but the option is there). Crowd control has blm, brd, rdm, blu, etc. Enfeebling has rdm, brd, blu, blm, whm.

Then there's healing. That has whm, and blu. And if you asked a blu to heal, they'd laugh, think you're crazy, and disband.

Why is this?

Using Afflatus Solace and Sacrifice, proceeded by Afflatus Misery to Esuna is not a game breaking set of tools though. Using Esuna means one of two things. One, the WHM needs to be at melee range to get the status ailments to be cured. Two, used Sacrifice to steal the status ailment and is planning on running into melee to cast Esuna.

I love how you ignored the real benefit of solace.

[Silvers]

RDM and SCH will still be the go to job for healing because they are still by far better at longevity of MP, especially now at level 90. Outside of Abyssea, the need to cure 900~ HP instantly has never been an issue to RDMs and SCHs before.

WHM has the ability for more longevity than you give credit for:
-RDM sub for Refresh and Convert
-Orison Pantaloons +1 Converts 2% of "Cure" amount to MP
-Orison Pantaloons +2 Converts 5% of "Cure" amount to MP
-Serpentes set
-Refesh body armor: Nobles, AF2, AF3, ect.

They had been able to do the job perfectly well while buffing the party with hastes and refreshes, all-the-while landing potent enfeebs at level 75. Now we're talking about having RDMs with Refresh II and higher Fast Cast and SCHs with more charges and a Sublimation that can convert up to 12 HP>MP per tick doing everything that a level 75 RDM/SCH did and then with Cure V and other new spells mixed in.

What does that leave WHM outside of Abyssea? RDMs and SCHs cast faster than a WHM while getting access to tools that allow them to be more than just a healer. WHMs will still have the greatest cures per cast without a doubt in both actual and potential cured(Afflatus Solace Stoneskin) with a Cure V. Will a 1100~ Cure 5 and a 275 Stoneskin be necessary? Generally not. Will a Cure VI be necessary with its even bigger numbers? Absolutely not. Will WHMs be able to get back as much MP as a RDM or SCH with /RDM or SCH? Again absolutely not, though is it necessary for a WHM to have as much MP as them? Maybe or maybe not. Only time will tell for that one.

So what exactly is WHM's role outside of Abyssea when RDM and SCH both out perform it? The same role that it has had even before Abyssea. The need to have a dedicated healer with a big "oh shit" button. But when you give RDM and SCH Cure V, the need for a WHM greatly diminishes.

There's no legitimate reason for Rdm to have Cure V or higher at this time, given the level of versatility the job already possesses. Why aren't you guys asking for Tier V nukes? Or Ancient Magic? Or Banish III/Holy?

You have options. You're just choosing not to use them.

Option A: use a job that CAN cure, cure faster, (arguably more frequently) that can also Enfeeble(Cripple really), Nuke, etc lowering the need for more cures/larger cures.

or:

Option B: use a job that can cure for greater amounts, but does not possess any real ability to impede the mob in any meaningful way or do damage to the mob either.

The ability to cure faster is arguable. Speed deals with how much you cure for, how fast you can cast, and your recast. I think the edge in speed is still favors WHM/RDM for curing with the amount of -cure spell casting time gear whm has available (merits, Cure Clogs, Aceso's Choker, Orison Pantaloons +1/+2). I do agree about how enfeebling is overlooked at times at how it can make things easier.

If things outside of Abyssea stay about the same with content outside of Abyssea, then you two would be right. With levels rising and expecting new future content to be challenging (be it Abyssea or not), I'd think Cure 5 is and will be needed for more than just WHM. RDM are asking for a bit more, some would like to see their melee abilities boosted. There was point made in the SCH forum about divine magic skill that applies to RDM stating,

There is no reason for having skills without spells to go with them. It's like having a native weapon skill rating on a job, and your job can not equip any weapon associated with your skill.

Even though RDM has an E rating for divine magic, is it too much to ask for SE to give use at least 1 divine spell again?

So like I said above, "I feel that with the current Cure V spell, RDM and SCH should not have it." People in other job folders here have discussed alternatives or possible changes that make sense and may be viable without ruining the current game structure.

-Raising the caps on all Cure spells. As well has making Healing Magic skill more important to the Cure formulas.
-Give WHM a Job Trait that lowers enmity of Cure spells. Change the enmity that Cure V and VI generates. (Though personally I like the idea and the direction it's going, I don't see it balancing the jobs enough.)
-Give access to Cure V through the use of atmas. (Again I like the idea, but don't see the balance unless the atma decides to give a penalty as well.)

With all said, I don't see a problem with PLD getting Cure 5 in its current incarnation.

Giving PLD Cure V as it is now ..... They would actually want the enmity. To give Cure V as is would mess with how PLD is played. Curing is a hate tool for them ... and now I sense you was joking.

[Quetzacoatl]

Personal opinion, if RDM got Cure V, I wouldn't invite a WHM. You would have someone that more or less does the same thing as WHM and then they're capable of Refresh II and stacking heavy debuffs on the target. The only time WHM would become useful is if magic damage taken was involved. You're certainly not inviting a WHM for their Cure VI, or slightly bigger Cure Vs.

I feel that this argument is really nothing more than RDMs and SCHs wanting to main-heal against high damage doing NMs, which again has always been the role of a WHM even at level 75 cap.

The entitlement argument really doesn't have any sound ground which I hear a lot of. It's like players saying that since they've played FFXI from day one deserve 10 million gil for every year that they've been playing. Sure it'd make those players extremely happy and the other players jealous, but I can not see the entitlement argument being there for anything but to cuddle one group of people.

Again, I'm a level 90 WHM, RDM and SCH. I enjoy playing those jobs and would love to see improvement to all three, but I would hate to see an improvement to a job that doesn't provide a sound reason to why it needs said improvement when it significantly impacts another job in a potentially negative way.

I'm not discounting that RDM and SCH shouldn't get a bigger Cure than Cure IV, but asking for Cure V most definitely effects WHM in a very negative way. I'm sure people are going to make fun of that statement and say something along the lines of, "so you want us to have a cure 4.5 then?" In a sense, yes. Cure 4.5 would most definitely be a new spell that fits into the groove between Cure IV and V. Would the spell really be called Cure 4.5, probably not... I don't think SE would be silly enough to name a spell like that.

Finally, someone who sees it from my point of view.

[Valkrist]

You missed my point. I said every roll has at least 3 options. I did not say that every 3 has 3 rolls. Melee dd include 17~ jobs. Buffing includes brd, cor, sch, rdm, whm. Nuking has rdm, blm, sch, blu. Ranged dd has rng, cor, sam (yeah, i know that's a stretch, but the option is there). Crowd control has blm, brd, rdm, blu, etc. Enfeebling has rdm, brd, blu, blm, whm.

Then there's healing. That has whm, and blu. And if you asked a blu to heal, they'd laugh, think you're crazy, and disband.

Why is this?

I love how you ignored the real benefit of solace.

Ah I misunderstood your rolls. I took it as that each job (RDM, SCH, and BLU) have the luxury of having three rolls that they can play as.

I see your point that WHM and BLU have a niche for being "uber" healers because they have Cure V. But are you then saying that RDMs and SCHs can not be good healers without Cure V? If that is the case, why is it that they were always called out as main-healer in the past? WHM had Cure 5 back then and RDMs didn't, but no one seemed to mind. And then WHM had Afflatus Solace going for a bonus Stoneskin to potentially reduce further damage. Was WHM called upon even then? Not particularly.

RDM was used for its versatility back then while being fully capable of being main-healer. The level 90 RDM is even more capable today than it was at level 75. If you took a level 85 RDM and a party of 5 level 85 DDs out to Vunkerl Inlet (S) and exped on the IT crabs there, would the party instantly or even come close to dying because RDM doesn't have Cure V? Probably not unless the RDM wasn't a good healer to begin with. So if a RDM can do the job just fine here, why would you want a WHM there instead? You absolutely wouldn't because RDM gains back significantly more MP compared to a WHM, and then you have the RDM that can be placing significant debuffs on the monsters. That is if you don't have a lazy RDM there. Again, the argument becomes against NMs only where large cures are necessary.

WHM has the ability for more longevity than you give credit for:

It's true that the WHM today definitely has better MP management skills today, but you're comparing a job that at best gets 3 MP/tick from Sublimation, or 3 MP/tick from Refresh I. Then you stack on Serpentes set, AF3+2 body, Refresh hairpin and subligar, coupled with Owleyes. That nets you at best 9 MP/tick at best. RDM gets 11 MP/tick at best. SCH at 15 MP/tick at best. So in terms of pure Refresh, WHM is at the bottom.

It's true that WHM can go /RDM for Convert, but most WHMs will unanimously agree that /RDM is a subjob you only use if you're worried about MP management. Otherwise /SCH is superb in all departments. So generally WHMs MP pool will be about half of RDMs and SCHs.

Giving PLD Cure V as it is now ..... They would actually want the enmity. To give Cure V as is would mess with how PLD is played. Curing is a hate tool for them ... and now I sense you was joking.

As ironic as it sounds, I'm sure there would be PLDs out there that would love to be able to heal themselves for more than Cure IV when their dedicated healer can not, regardless of whether or not Cure V generates less enmity. Would Cure V be the spell they normally cast? Absolutely not. You're right that they'll be focusing on casting Cure IV either as a form of enmity generation, or to just heal themselves as much as possible. But if PLD had Cure V, I guarantee that all of them will be using it once they're in critical HP. If this breaks PLD, then Cure I-IV already broke PLDs against all other tanks since the closest comparable tank with a self-heal is MNK.

[Valkrist]

Double post, sorry.

I love how you ignored the real benefit of solace.

Actually I'm not. If you're relying on the Afflatus Solace Stoneskin to keep people alive, you're gravely mistaken. The 25% HP converted into Stoneskin mitigation (35% if you're using AF3+2 body) is not HP cured no matter how you look at it. It's HP potentially mitigated. You never look at a WHM and go, "I hope the SS from their cures keeps me alive!" It's not something to be relied on. So the argument goes back to only against the NMs where you have to spam large Cures back-to-back.

If you take a look at SCH, they're currently second best healer since I'm not really counting BLU (sorry BLUs.) They're getting 450~ Cure IVs and then Rapturing those into 675 HP Cures. Yes they too do ask for Cure V, but no where close to as loudly as the RDMs because they have something that's comparable to a "Cure 4.5."

[Daniel]

Personal opinion, if RDM got Cure V, I wouldn't invite a WHM.

Right now almost everything in relevant end game can be killed by a whm and a mnk. You make it sound like suddenly whm won't be able to do that anymore if rdm has cure V.

In terms of spell cast, as stated many times there is more than enough cure speed equipment to meet cap with /rdm.

MP issues? Sub rdm, convert, refresh, then there are also the pants which assuming you aren't wasting cures should give you almost 40% of your mp cost back instantly.

As far as useful enfeebles, whm has slow and para already, not to mention higher native mind and more access to +mnd gear.

Finally there is nukes... ask any RDM there nukes don't do shit when it matters, I know I have some pretty good nuking gear and capped skill + merits, and yet on most t2 my nukes are nothing more than a chance for the tank to die.

[Mojo]

I think that, again, it would do everyone good to actually compare the two jobs in a completely factual way to assess how different WHM and RDM are instead of making hasty generalizations. I'm actually quite surprised to see so many people thinking that RDM would even have an advantage over WHM in regards to healing if RDM had Cure V. I guess I'll break it down for people again.

To begin with, between Solace and better gear options, WHM Cure spells are going to be around 50% more efficient than RDM Cure spells. That's a tremendous difference, probably enough to make up for the difference in refresh by itself (which I'll address later.) WHM also has large Curaga spells which, if needed, are extremely useful and even without the benefit of Solace still eclipse the Curaga MP and enmity efficiency of RDM Curaga (Cure V doesn't work with Accession, btw, and I wouldn't even say that Accession Cure IV is a viable option due to enmity issues.)

Next up is damage mitigation. WHMs have a more potent Shell and can add up to 20 MDB. While the precise results of those do vary with how much other MDT+/- and MDB+ the tanks/melee already have, the result on a vanilla tank (no MDT or MDB) is a reduction any magic type damage that they would have incurred to 72.6% of what they would have taken with just a RDM's Shell V.

Now for something that I'm surprised hasn't received more attention - Auspice. A WHM with Orison's Duckbills can grant a +20 Subtle Blow buff to everyone in their party (both melee and mages.) Subtle Blow is perhaps one of the most overlooked traits in the game. I do a lot of tanking and I can tell you that it's a very valuable trait and +20 alone puts you at 40% of the Subtle Blow cap. It opens up a lot of interesting possibilities, like a WAR tank with capped Subtle Blow who doesn't have to give up a 6 hit build or even capped Haste. I could really could write paragraphs about why Subtle Blow is so great but I don't want to veer off course too much.

Lastly, there are countless other abilities that others have brought up. Regen spells, Cura, Esuna. All of those spells and abilities are just icing on the cake to me though. They're pretty neat but not nearly as useful as what I've just outlined.

Now, RDM, on the other hand, has more potent debuffs (Paralyze II, Slow II, Dia III, Bio III and Addle namely), although I wouldn't say that the difference in potency between any of these spells and the WHM equivalents are anything to write home about, I'd pretty much lump them in along the lines of Cura, Esuna, and Regen spells. Saboteur, however, is pretty good. It's amazing in fact. It will allow you to more or less double the potency of one of your debuffs, which is almost always going to be Slow II. So if you're ever going to talk about RDM debuffs, you mostly should be talking about this.

Next up is Refresh II. Refresh II and Saboteur are more or less the only reasons anybody should ever be talking about RDM. If offers 6(7) MP/tick, which is 3(4) more than Refresh I which WHM obtains through their subjob.

Now, for a refresh comparison. Between Orison Bliaud +2, Wivre Hairpin, Serpente's Sabots/Cuffs, Stearc Subligar, Moonshade Earring & Owleyes WHM can get 7 MP/tick refresh through gear alone. RDM subjob opens up another 3 MP/tick as well as Convert. So you're left with 10 MP/tick refresh without any kind of atma and Convert every 600 seconds if you need it.

RDM, through Duelist's Chapeau (or Wivre's Hairpin), Estoqueur's Sayon +2, Serpent's Sabots/Cuffs, Stearc Subligar amd Moonshade Earring can achieve 6 MP/tick refresh. Adding onto this, with their AF3+2 legs of course, is a 7 MP/tick refresh spell. I suppose you can throw in some Convert merits for an end result of 13 MP/tick refresh and a convert every 510 seconds if you need it.

tl;dr

Hard to really summarize everything I just wrote succinctly, so I'm not even going to try, but if you did read everything I wrote and understood it all then there really shouldn't even be a question as to whether RDM would even pose a threat to WHM with the addition of Cure V. They get a little bit more refresh, but it's not nearly enough to topple the other tremendous benefits that WHM brings to the table. It's not even a close competition. The difference in vanilla refresh becomes even more marginal when atma and the presence of other jobs that can add even more refresh are added to the equation. Honestly, the preference of RDM over WHM in any circumstance ended immediately when WHM was given the option sub Convert and Refresh I.

Lastly, to all you dudes saying you used RDM as a healer on Abyssea NMs and were successful. Congrats. You fought a weak NM that a NIN/DNC might have been able to solo. You also came on the wrong job because a BLM can heal just as well as you and has more access to amber procs.

[Valkrist]

Mojo, everything you wrote is almost line for line the same thing as what I've been saying in what a WHM can do in comparison to a RDM. I'm not calling stealing of work, but agreeing with most of what you've said.

WHMs will absolutely not have a 50% Cure Potency bonus over RDMs. That's saying that the RDM won't even have a Light Staff. For a well geared RDM, they're looking at 35% Cure Potency bonus. So comparing well geared WHM to RDM (in terms of Cure Potency) you're only looking at 15% difference. Given next update the 15% difference will only decrease due to WHMs already capped and Surya's Staff +2 will more than likely get more potency.

Auspice using Afflatus Solace and AF3+2 feet argument is a damned good one. I have no comment on this since you're 100% right about it.

Atmas should never be put into the equation when you're comparing the jobs, that is unless you're arguing an Abyssea only scenario. This is assuming that all content since level 80 cap to level 99 will always involve insane buffs to your stats, WS, and spells. If all content will boost your tank's HP from 1.5k to 4k, then by all means give RDM Cure V. Give them Cure VI. If content after Abyssea doesn't have the insane buffs through atmas, abyssites and cruor, then RDM can live without Cure V.