The cast time on Stoneskin II

The issue with Stoneskin II, is that it has botha long cast time and cannot be used in battle. It shoukd be one or the other. Either SE reduces the cast time to the normal 2.5 seconds and makes it unable to be cast in battle or they maybe increase the time to that of a Raise and allow it to be cast in battle.

Never understood the point of making low level raise, Phoenix Downs, and SS2 out of combat only.

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Originally Posted by MagiusNecros

Never understood the point of making low level raise, Phoenix Downs, and SS2 out of combat only.

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Raise - so Paladin can cross-class it.
Phoenix Down - because they wanted to add the item to the game but didn't want it to break anything.
SS2 - because WHM's job is not to shield, it's to heal. Plus, SS2 is +1 skill over the amount that every other Job has access to.

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Originally Posted by Destous

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WHMs will blow Swiftcast for an instant application just to avoid it, despite that there's really nothing lost other than 5 seconds of time.

Casting Stoneskin II is demonstrably less valuable than 5 seconds of time.

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I disagree with this logic. IMO, the value of swiftcast is so low for the initial minute of the instance that it is worth saving 5 seconds.

Stoneskin 2 was added as a WHM courtesy, someone asked at the last NA Fanfest the time it took to stoneskin in full-party raids and Yoship decided it was a good idea. Its the same as a pet summon cast.

You can just swift it between pulls if the cast time bothers you that much, especially if you are one of those WHMs that just stands there and doesn't Swift+Holy in pulls anyway.

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Originally Posted by JackFross

Raise - so Paladin can cross-class it. Ultimately pointless and sees little to no use not to mention the Knight never had access to Raise but Cura/Cure 2.
Phoenix Down - because they wanted to add the item to the game but didn't want it to break anything. Being as pointless as PLD raise it'll never be used either so why bother? Especially in every other FF game it could be used in combat.
SS2 - because WHM's job is not to shield, it's to heal. Plus, SS2 is +1 skill over the amount that every other Job has access to.So they gimp it on utility and the only real thing they bring over the others is Cure 3/Bene/Assize/Tetra. May as well make Stoneskin 2 a cross class as well.

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Guess I just don't understand your reasoning for it. Besides I think a huge cast time like 6 seconds alongside making it out of combat only is pretty pointless.

For the combat restriction of Stoneskin II: back when this spell was requested and introduced WHM's stoneskins were really powerfull so having this spell to be able to use in combat would literally be a semi-spammable Deployment Tactics-like spell, by level 50. Same problem happens at lv60, if this spell is unlocked for combat you have yet another AoE shielding techinique that can even stack with the others we have today that we didn't on 50.

The biggest "issue" if we think about it making this a combat is the fact that this is a spell and its tied to global cooldown on top of the possibility to stack with Galvanize/Nocturnal Field AND Divine Veil at the same time. And if we transform into an ability with a proper cooldown, no one would use to preparate pulls anymore and it would become something really strong with the same stacking capabilities I mentioned before. This kind of mitigation combo would be too powerful for the game at the moment for how healing checks have been designed. And don't forget what JackFross and technole said, that SSII is a spell aded as a +1 action for WHM job as a courtesy.

What it seems that some of you are trying to do, is transform something that was a solution to one kind of problem back on 2.X into a new problem.

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Originally Posted by zuzu-bq

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I don't want it to be an in-combat spell. I want it to stay out of combat only, but be instant cast. There's no point to the cast time right now other than to eat time and ultimately stop players from using it in everything that isn't current endgame content.

It is swiftcast bait. o-o

Also, during load times it fits in pretty well to hit most players. Its kind of ironic that players are asking for a QoL on a QoL skill. xD

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Originally Posted by MagiusNecros

Guess I just don't understand your reasoning for it. Besides I think a huge cast time like 6 seconds alongside making it out of combat only is pretty pointless.

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I mean - it's not MY reasoning. It's my best guess at the reasoning of the makers of the game. However:
1. It's all well and dandy looking at FF1 and crying WHY but the first incarnation of the Paladin - in FF4 - has access to Raise. The idea is just to prevent multiple battle res abilities - the only one who would be an issue in that is PLD, since they cross-class CNJ and have access to Raise. This in itself is an issue imo, because it's a worthless cross class for PLD (Just like 90% of their other options), but that's not what's being discussed here.

2. Again - not the point of "how useful it would be" but the matter of "This is Final Fantasy, so Phoenix Down needs to exist" coupled with the idea that "This is Final Fantasy XIV, and having an item be so powerful as to resurrect someone when they die would be a bad thing."

3. I'm not defending the cast time - I just think it's a silly complaint to level when you will never - ever - be pulling a boss withing 30s of entering the duty. It generally ends up being a full minute between pulls. 5 seconds isn't as big of a deal as people make it out to be.


And before you bring up the "what about outside of a raid scenario" - Stoneskin is worthless/useless/not necessary outside of a raid scenario anyway. Even IN the raid scenario, its only purpose is to lessen the blow from the first raid damage in the fight to allow the healers to DPS more.