What makes WHM special? Nothing anymore.

Not a special privilege but let you ask you something.

Would you listen to someone who actually studied open heart surgery and has experience in it ? Or would you listen to someone who just has a feeling of what to do but has no experience in it ?

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Originally Posted by Jerichai

I would be curious to understand what gives you special privilege to define what kinds of discussion people are allowed to start. To be honest, I have my own opinions on this topic, but it doesn't sit right with me when someone basically says 'you're not allowed to talk cause I said so'. If you see no value in this discussion, exercise free will and try some other threads.

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Maybe I haven't articulated myself correctly or been too forceful. The classes play very differently and in this point of time they are unique enough to appeal to a range of play styles.

Maybe the way in which AST/WHM combos work will introduce a new play style where WHMs are expected to assist in DPS and have double hots rolling? It's only been 2 days since the introduction of the changes! How can anyone have a decent discussion when people have only been trialling it in this short period?

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Originally Posted by Blood-Aki

It's been said many times, but No matter what they do, someone will be unhappy with something. all the complaning to buff AST now they do, now its time for WHMs to start complaning that they have no "indentity" and yet they are still a highly desired if not borderline mandatory healing class.

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They HAVE an identity!

Henceforth, WHM stands for "Whine Mage".

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Originally Posted by Belhi

Yoshi P back in the 3 hour live letter when they first revealed new HW skills said himself that WHM was designed as the output healer or words to that effect. AST was supposed to be all about its cards. I classes identity is defined by its design. That's why I'm saying its a design issue.

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Well, the best laid plans of mice and men, right?

They probably realized that they couldn't make a healer that had RNG buffs and expect it to be anything but garbage when push came to shove. :\

The buffs don't make up for crappy healing, not unless they rework the card system entirely to put healing into the cards themselves...

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Originally Posted by Belhi

Snip...

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I read the thread, WHM has not lost its identity. It is one job where you are THE healer, the ABSOLUTE healer in the game, with good DPS output and good MP management. AST cannot, will not, and never ever going to match that. But you also need to read about what AST is, a job with dual sects, who can provide a similar ability of white mage or scholar, it gives player a choice which sect they want to enact to complement the other healer in your party. And AST has a nice set of cards to make up for their lack of benefits in other areas compared to the other two healers.

As much as AST can simulate the other two healers, AST IS NOT WHM and IS NOT SCH. They do not have the full capabilities of either job, just a few abilities to closely provide the benefits of the other two jobs. AST selling point is the cards, which now, are pretty good, not in OP way, but at least decent and can be great if the RNG favors the good cards.

I think you are fairly intelligent to see that SCH and WHM, each has their own unique selling points that AST cannot match, maybe closely simulate, but not excel in any of them by a great deal. If I want to be THE healer, I simply come as WHM, a job that has the best healing output in the game bar none, sorry AST, good try. If I want to be the DPS/Shield healer hybrid, then SCH is my defacto job. And if I want to come as hybrid healer who can bring decent buffs to the party, AST is the job. If people here are too blind to see the distinction, then dunno what else to say.

At the end of the day, AST is A HEALER first who has some decent cards that can buffs the party. AST IS NOT A BUFFER job who can heal here and there. The same can be said to SCH, they can DPS yes, but they will not outDPS a Summoner.... So now, we have THREE different healers in the game. Be happy, be grateful, be thankful, less bickering, and less finger pointing. Stop playing negative nancy, bitter betty, and doomsday daisy lol.

The more I read this thread, the more I'm reminded of people who complain about immigrants taking all their jobs.
Can't we all just get along and heal stuff?

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Originally Posted by RichardButte

They HAVE an identity!

Henceforth, WHM stands for "Whine Mage".

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Now your just being rude and frankly hypocritical.

Having a healing Job who's design philosophy is built around pure healing output is flawed. Its better that this gets considered and discussed now rather than left till it actually potentially becomes an issue, particularly if they add more healing classes in the future.

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Originally Posted by Noira

Not a special privilege but let you ask you something.

Would you listen to someone who actually studied open heart surgery and has experience in it ? Or would you listen to someone who just has a feeling of what to do but has no experience in it ?

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That's a bit of a jump, since you're literally trying to compare a game to a potential life and death situation. Yes, with higher risk there tends to be a higher priority of verifying sources.

But I think you're neglecting the potential impact of uninformed opinions. Let's stick to the medical theme to start. Currently, we're in a bit of a crisis with vaccinations and the control of certain disease. Some people got it in their head a few years ago that vaccines can cause side effects like autism. Now, you have a movement that's sprouted up that's promoting the idea that these vaccines are bad and are not immunizing their children. Because of bad information, people developed an uninformed opinion on vaccines, and as a result we're seeing some terrible consequences, like certain diseases making a resurgence and those who rely on herd immunity being at greater risk to contracting these diseases at no fault of their own.

Now, let's jump back to the gaming side. Remember back to a few weeks ago before the AST buffs. We started seeing threads pop up from people saying they we're being barred from content like the extreme primals. In many respects, a portion of the community was excluding the AST job likely because of general perceptions of "weakness" and the fact that AST had a known, limited presence in savage content. However, the fact is AST was more than capable of handling the content prior to, and arguably through, savage mode. The community at large was acting on an uninformed opinion about AST's capabilities and people we're experiencing diminished play experiences as a result. Alternatively, remember when that video of the AST solo healing Ravana extreme appeared? A lot of people took that as a sign that AST needed no adjustments, even though that case made no attempt to demonstrate how the other healing classes would also perform in that situation. That uninformed opinion led to a lot of frustrated back and forth on this subforum.

To take it back to your point, you have to consider the penalties/risk of bad information in these situations. Where one's health is concerned, people on average tend to seek out the advice of experts, but as the vaccine example shows, even there uninformed opinions can create problems. When you look at it in a game since, bad information posses little to no risk. So it's far easier for bad information to persist and people to act on it. In my opinion, I'd rather all opinions, informed or otherwise, come to the surface so they can be faced and discussed/disproved rationally (though that's the part forums tend to fail at).

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Originally Posted by Belhi

Having a healing Job who's design philosophy is built around pure healing output is flawed.

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Not really, I want one healer job that is THE Healer, the absolute healer and the BEST raw healing output in the game. I like how playing WHM makes me feel I am the healer, and let's be honest, is the easiest of the three since you know you can top player's HP in seconds. I don't want to worry about stance dancing, thinking about cards, and all those other BS, I just want to heal, end of story period. WHM gives me that. As much as I love SCH, the stance dancing can get tiresome. AST is fun, but trying to DPS and healing, AND also worry about cards, NOT FUN! considering I don't have my trusty fairy to heal me when shit hits the fan.

WHM is great to play for people who are more healer oriented, SCH is great for people who enjoy a challenge of stance dancing, pet management, and DPSing. AST is a breathe of fresh air for players who have done either WHM or SCH (or Bard), and now they can try another healer job with similar capabilities, but slightly different, and focusing more on buffing.

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Originally Posted by Jerichai

Alternatively, remember when that video of the AST solo healing Ravana extreme appeared? A lot of people took that as a sign that AST needed no adjustments, even though that case made no attempt to demonstrate how the other healing classes would also perform in that situation. That uninformed opinion led to a lot of frustrated back and forth on this subforum.

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On the contrary, those solo heal videos and the A1s savage video thread on these forums highlighted the weaknesses of AST even more, and little to no people used these to support the fact that ASTs had the ability to heal. In the A1s video people actually were extremely rude and made generalized statements regarding how the SCH carried the raid (which were extreme and unfair).

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Originally Posted by Luvbunny

Not really, I want one healer job that is THE Healer, the absolute healer and the BEST raw healing output in the game. I like how playing WHM makes me feel I am the healer, and let's be honest, is the easiest of the three since you know you can top player's HP in seconds. I don't want to worry about stance dancing, thinking about cards, and all those other BS, I just want to heal, end of story period. WHM gives me that. As much as I love SCH, the stance dancing can get tiresome. AST is fun, but trying to DPS and healing, AND also worry about cards, NOT FUN! considering I don't have my trusty fairy to heal me when shit hits the fan.

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If there's one class that is THE class that heals, that class isn't replaceable and content has to be built around the amount of healing it can put out. This is the problem with one class being the best healin' class instead of it being based around different types of healing and different things brought to the table.

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Originally Posted by Rewind

On the contrary, those solo heal videos and the A1s savage video thread on these forums highlighted the weaknesses of AST even more, and little to no people used these to support the fact that ASTs had the ability to heal.

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Some did, but if you go back to those posts you will see other uses it as a basis for saying AST was fine and didn't need adjustments. This isn't an all or nothing thing, let's not make it that way, shall we?

Not to mention I'm not sure what this has to do with countering my original point...?

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Originally Posted by Verdan

If there's one class that is THE class that heals, that class isn't replaceable and content has to be built around the amount of healing it can put out. This is the problem with one class being the best healin' class instead of it being based around different types of healing and different things brought to the table.

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Well you now have THREE flavors of types of healing you want to bring to the table. The best raw heal numbers, which is your WHM (granted WHM has tons of other abilities as well). Your shield/dps/buffs hybrid of SCH. And finally your healer/buffs of AST. AST needed this adjustment, so it can at least be equal to the other two when it comes to healing capabilities. There is only so many ways they can come up with different ways of healing, not sure if we need another healer for 4.0. FFXI only have two healers WHM and SCH (three if you count Red Mage, and almost four if you must add Summoner, though SMN in FFXI will rain pitchforks on you).

What this game is seriously lacking is pet based jobs, bring on the Puppetmaster and Beastmaster!! As well as pure buffer jobs, but this is like opening a big can of worms, because very very very very few players want to sit on sideline running around playing songs like FFXI's Bard. And support job is never popular in FFXI either, glad this team learned that lesson well. And just like in this game, FFXI's WHM is THE HEALER, but the bad side of this, no party in their right mind in that game, will do any end game content without a WHM, period. And most players there HATE coming as WHM or BARD, SCH can do some healing, but it is used mainly as, SURPRISE!! a DPS job (StunSCH yes please!!).

FFXI WHM at one point was threatened by RDM and SCH healer taking their precious spot, but SE did some adjustment and made WHM the HEALER, resulting to WHM becoming the absolute ONE healer that you have to have in your party for every content. Just be happy that this game is able to provide three distinct flavor of healing style and you have some variety in the jobs area. Healing is a lot more fun here as well.

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Originally Posted by Jerichai

Some did, but if you go back to those posts you will see other uses it as a basis for saying AST was fine and didn't need adjustments. This isn't an all or nothing thing, let's not make it that way, shall we?

Not to mention I'm not sure what this has to do with countering my original point...?

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Not meant to be countering anything, just stating that the overwhelming opinion on this forum that AST was not fine.

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Originally Posted by Luvbunny

At the end of the day, AST is A HEALER first who has some decent cards that can buffs the party. AST IS NOT A BUFFER job who can heal here and there. The same can be said to SCH, they can DPS yes, but they will not outDPS a Summoner.... So now, we have THREE different healers in the game. Be happy, be grateful, be thankful, less bickering, and less finger pointing. Stop playing negative nancy, bitter betty, and doomsday daisy lol.

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You completely misunderstood Belhi's posts.

He is not being a negative nancy at all lol infact he's one of the few posters with helpful and contributing posts to this thread. He's just stating the facts in terms of design flaw when it comes to feeling unique on healer roles.

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Originally Posted by Belhi

Simply put, if AST are going to match WHM as backbone healers, WHM identity shouldn't be focused on being a backbone healer otherwise they will feel inferior to the more versatile and utility rich AST. This doesn't mean AST should be weaker. As I said, this is a class design issue. It means WHM needs to have its identity not bound up in what has become a prerequisite of healer classes in the role they fill.

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Very well said and this is what I've been thinking all this time. The way they designed WHM and SCH and also the fight mechanics or just the core gameplay doesn't leave much room for uniqueness in future jobs. They gave a lot of diverse tools to WHM (single regen, direct aoe heal, regen, an ability to cast faster for a few seconds: PoM, aoe regen) and SCH (mitigation shields, pet with buffs, etc) so any job that comes up with something similar but absolutely needed to be competitive in end game (balance) will get looked down the same way people are looking down at Astrologian when it's not even the job's fault to begin with. I bet if the cards instead had been AoE heal or AoE regen with the same potency as WHM people would've complained anyways because HoTs and AoE heals are supposed to be WHM exclusive according to them. But the way the fights are designed, regen and aoe heals are definetely needed. WHM shouldn't be unique for its core base as all healers, which is.. to heal, but then again they did remove protect and stoneskin traits for the sake of balance and you know what? Being a WHM main I didn't even complain nor cared, in fact I was pleased because that meant more power to my co-healer to help me out in raids and I guess I hated being the only one to cast all buffs lol. Maybe the limitation due to the way the game/jobs were designed was the reason I felt WHM was bland to me (no hate on the job, I've mained WHM since 2.0 and I like it a lot, it's just not exactly fun or interesting for me personally. The only fun I could have was when Holy'ing and then even that got nerfed for the second time so I needed something that kept me awake when playing healer for raids), lacking that something I was looking for in a healer. Astrologian was the answer and I've genuinly had so much fun with it and it saddens me how some people just wanna burn it to the ground because they want to keep feeling special and aren't looking at the bigger picture. It's not the job they should be mad at but at SE devs.

@OP I understand your concerns but don't hate on the job nor the people who play it. It's not our fault how the job was designed. We did ask for the cards to synergize with the heals, but SE designed the job this way and not us. They weren't going to have time to redesign the job from the ground so this is what they came up with and I think they did a good job in terms of balancing the job with others.

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Originally Posted by Rewind

Not meant to be countering anything, just stating that the overwhelming opinion on this forum that AST was not fine.

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I never said it was at the time? I was saying that some people chose to use bad data to develop the opinion that AST was fine. Obviously the buffs SE provided (rightfully) proved that the developers thought otherwise. Regardless, that uninformed opinion did exist and have ramifications on these sub forums when the topic of AST and class balance came up, even if the majority understood buffs were needed.

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Originally Posted by Tyla_Esmeraude

He is not being a negative nancy at all lol infact he's one of the few posters with helpful and contributing posts to this thread. He's just stating the facts in terms of design flaw when it comes to feeling unique on healer roles.

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Sorry, was not trying to say he is negative nancy or debbie downer, lol. Though, if you want to make a comparison, AST is somewhat similar to FFXI's SCH. FFXI's SCH has two sects, they can be a healer with emphasize on HoT, or they can be pure magical DPS similar to BLM. It was a bit rough when they introduce this because how powerful SCH come across. At one point, it was killing WHM and BLM spot in a party, since FFXI's SCH can switch stance at will, and have close to the destruction power of BLM and then some unique abilities as well. SE finally made adjustment to WHMs and turned it into the powerhouse healer that eclipse all other healer type in that game.

SE knows how to make a great hybrid job, FFXI's Red Mage, Scholar, Blue Mage, Corsair and after long tweaks, Summoner and Puppetmaster. I am sure given time, a year from now, SE would probably do more tweaks and redefine some of the characteristic of WHM, SCH and AST. And if they bring another healer type in 4.0, they probably have to make a big distinction to the existing three. There are only so many ways you can heal in this game :)

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Originally Posted by Luvbunny

Sorry, was not trying to say he is negative nancy or debbie downer, lol. Though, if you want to make a comparison, AST is somewhat similar to FFXI's SCH. FFXI's SCH has two sects, they can be a healer with emphasize on HoT, or they can be pure magical DPS similar to BLM. It was a bit rough when they introduce this because how powerful SCH come across. At one point, it was killing WHM and BLM spot in a party, since FFXI's SCH can switch stance at will, and have close to the destruction power of BLM and then some unique abilities as well. SE finally made adjustment to WHMs and turned it into the powerhouse healer that eclipse all other healer type in that game. SE knows how to make a great hybrid job, FFXI's Red Mage, Scholar, Blue Mage, Corsair and after long tweaks, Summoner and Puppetmaster.

I am sure given time, a year from now, SE would probably do more tweaks and redefine some of the characteristic of WHM, SCH and AST. And if they bring another healer type in 4.0, they probably have to make a big distinction to the existing three. There are only so many ways you can heal in this game :)

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I can't comment on the balance in FFXI but for FF14 I see this as a problem. With the way content is built they can't simply buff WHM healing output without it undermining the difficulty of encounters. This seems to be something you see a lot in comparisons between FFXI and FF14.

Perhaps its possible to build there healing dynamics in group content but honestly AST's design seems specifically done to allow them to fit into the old roles within the established group healing dynamic. This design choice clashes with the concept you suggest which is for more variety in healing dynamics. Because of this design choice it means the AST is designed to fill the WHM role which means it has to be able to match WHM performance in that role. This in turn clashes with the design intent of the WHM which is bound up in filling the role within the establish healing dynamic.

Basically it means any AST and for that matter any healer that in the future is added, has to be able to match a WHM's performance in the role it holds in the dynamic. If a WHM's design and identity is tied to their performance in that mechanic we see either balance issues or WHM's identity as a role in healing undermined by other classes that potentially offer utility and versatility that WHM don't have.

Simply put, because of how healing works in groups, which SE has intentionally reinforced with AST's design, an AST that is filling the role traditionally held by a WHM in a group must be able to perform at or close to on par with a WHM. Because WHM's identity is designed by the developers to be tied up in filling this role, having another Job being able to match it in that role AND bring extra things to the table undermines the value of the WHM design. Thus having WHM design focused entirely on the role within the established healing dynamic is flawed as it is something that can't remain unique or special to the Job.

That was a rather complicated way of saying it all but I hope its understandable.

From someone who plays both classes my AST can not out heal my WHM...AST is much more diverse but WHM is pure unadulterated healing and managing my MP on WHM is much easier....so they both still have separate roles

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Originally Posted by Jerichai

That's a bit of a jump, since you're literally trying to compare a game to a potential life and death situation. Yes, with higher risk there tends to be a higher priority of verifying sources.

ussed/disproved rationally (though that's the part forums tend to fail at).

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Tldr: don't take people's word for it level the class for yourself and make your own opinion. Which is contrary to what he's been saying that you don't need to have a job leveled to have an opinion.

I can agree with the fact that AST is more WHM in nature than SCH. At least in how the class works. I am not talking about healing power!
So yes I see where people are coming from and personally I too would have liked for AST being more of its own thing than anything. Since SE on multiple accounts said they didn't want to buffer/support class makes the AST design all the more strange.
When AST was released they thought the Buffs available can close the gap given its weaker healing power, that wasn't really the case as we have all (maybe not vlady) noticed.
Now being "scared" of making the buffs of AST too amazing for the simple reason it would change the way SE has to design encounters. Which clearly is too much effort because how to you balance dps checks if the AST and its buffs could enable them to blaze past them before the intended timeframe and in the same breath do healing checks the AST can't possibly meet?
So they took the easy way out and increased potencies and made the class more WHM because the abilties were already pretty similiar and SE doesn't have enough time to really overhaul the ability kit.

At least this is my take away from this at least in terms of design of the class. If we're talking about healing power obviously WHM and SCH are still stronger.

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Originally Posted by Aomine1992

From someone who plays both classes my AST can not out heal my WHM...AST is much more diverse but WHM is pure unadulterated healing and managing my MP on WHM is much easier....so they both still have separate roles

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I'm noticing a common theme here.

It seems like everyone with both ast and whm at 60 are saying this isn't a problem and that whm still has its "identity". While people with just whm are the ones crying foul. Same with sch's in other threads too. Something tells me in a week or two this will all blow over when people realize they're seeing a problem that doesn't exist.

Most of the people that seem to be comparing/having an opinion on these healing jobs don't even have all 3 healers levelled to 60 or do savage raid content. Alex normal is easy, running dungeons? Who cares which healer comes along as long as they aren't garbage. As someone who does raid and have all 3 healers levelled, I can tell you that all this talk about WHM being replaced or undesirable is absurd. And even if you do bring an AST in place of WHM you won't have the mind party bonus which for progression is kind of a big deal.

What would be wrong with having a ~100 potency buff on all healing skills (Hello 1k potency Tetragrammaton <3)? It would certainly resolidify WHM's identity, which I've expressed before is kind of lacking. ^_^

i knew these threads will start coming up. thats where SE messed up - making a healer mimmicing 2 other healers, if they made a third unique healer without copying abilities, these threads wouldnt be coming. AST is fine now, but people will start now complaining because it can mimmic decently one or another healer instead of being a failure like it was

I think it's pretty simple, SE did a good job balancing all 3 healers because:

1- Heavy AOE damage with heavy single targeting damage: SCH/WHM Comp
2- Heavy AOE damage with moderate single targeting damage: AST/WHM Comp
3- Moderate-to-heavy AOE damage with moderate-to-heavy single targeting damage: SCH/AST Comp

sounds good to me, ofc all are still viable but not completely optimized.

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Originally Posted by Akyio

i knew these threads will start coming up. thats where SE messed up - making a healer mimmicing 2 other healers, if they made a third unique healer without copying abilities, these threads wouldnt be coming. AST is fine now, but people will start now complaining because it can mimmic decently one or another healer instead of being a failure like it was

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You forget that no thread in the history of FFXIV Forums inside a role discussion section for a DoW/DoM has ever been looked at by a red, and they will continue to be neglected because

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The purpose of this forum is for players to hold discussions on Healer roles and its tactics with other players.

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and not suggest balance changes.

So no actual help will come from making these kinds of threads in here. We're all doomed to stagnate and wait in suspense to see if the devs have similar concerns. But at least we can feel better while doing so by complaining about it.

An astro still can't do even close to the amount of HPS a white mage can. I think you're fine.

Synastry is Mega sexalicious though. ._. xD My hubby was messing around and crit healed 15k from one Benific II on my war(Defiance). 25% + 20%+40% add up for that burst heal. Its comforting to see when that is up my AST partner will have the healing power of a Divine Sealed WHM at keeping the tank up at least.

To OP:
I have both healers at 60 and so far I can say this:
Considering normal situation, where both healers will just use spells, which conserve mana and avoid overhealing, WHM healing output is almost identical, with medica 2 being slightly stronger.
This is where WHM is better in my opinion:
- Divine seal still feels stronger than Synastry, because it provides 10% higher bonus and has shorter cd, Synastry might look better on paper because of longer duration, but in reality when extra healing is needed it usually doesn't last longer than those 15s, so in most situations Divine seal is better, also by providing 10% more it further increases gap between medica 2 and AH, which also favors WHM in terms of mana management because AST might be forced to cast one more helios to compensate for this gap
- As others have pointed out that range on medica 2 is important in situations where raid is spread
- Why is everyone ignoring Cure 3? I know its situational and mana ineffective, but still its strongest AoE heal in the game, what can AST do if AH hot + CU hot + helios spam is not enough?
- As others have pointed out lightspeed doesn't decrease GCD so it only conserves some mana if used in burst healing, or allows you to heal on the run.
- I feel like my contribution to raid dps is not so random as in case of AST, on Tuesday I did dungeon where I draw only Ewer / Spire, and AST normal dps is not so good
- Assize provides better burst healing than helios with lightspeed and also gives me option to choose between burst raid heal and aoe dps
- AST doesnt have simply nothing close to Benediction, Benediction ignores any kind of healing debuff on you or your target, works with cleric stance as well
- WHM has some awesome traits, which conserve lot of mana (free cure, medica mp reduction, cure 3 mp reduction), AST has nothing like this, instead you have to pray, you get correct card ...

lets see, what is really unique to WHM now, something no other heal class has anything similar to...
- benediction (100% heal)
- cure 3 (strong small aoe heal)
- repose (sleep)
- fluid aura push (which everybody loves when we do...)
- medica 2 is the largest aoe heal skill
- assize instant high aoe-dmg with huge range (in CS)
- cure 2 / 3 mp-reduction proccs
- medica mp-reduction proccs

and some things WHM can do easier (and instant with swiftcast) but not really unique
- stoneskin 2 (stoneskin the whole group)
- aero 3 (aoe dot)

so yeah, benediction on its 5 min cd is the only thing really special to WHM now, together with the very situational cure 3 and sleep. other than that its just stuff for convenience
the assize dmg aoe can make some add phases an instant kill though, for example on the first boss in neverreap, which is really really nice :3

but compared to what SCH unique skills are (plus the fairy), and the new upgraded AST card buffs this is kind of a letdown. not because WHM could be too weak, but because the class just offers not much unique to it anymore

to be honest, i would love to at least see some cooldowns reduced. if SE wants WHM to keep beeing the raw healing class, why not reduce cd of assize to 60 sec and tetragrammaton to 40 sec? also i would love to have graniteskin back, but i dont think this will happen >_>

ps: yeah WHM is also the only one with MND group bonus. thats 3% bonus MND. nice to have but not mandatory

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Originally Posted by deos

so yeah, benediction on its 5 min cd is the only thing really special to WHM now

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You're conveniently ignoring that that is all on top of skills similar to the other classes. That's the point of whm. It's the entire healer package, and is a pure healer that can heal circles around the other two.

I think everyone would have prefered ast to be designed as a completely unique class from the ground up. But it wasn't, and it's way too late to do anything about that now. We knew this since HW launch and we knew the direction ast would have to go in order for it to perform in this game.

This is a big reason I think these threads are really dumb (beside the fact most are filled to the brim with misinformation from players who having even experienced what they are complaining about). It's far, far too late to redesign the class, making these threads completely pointless. Best case scenario, next expansion both classes get 5 skills that pull the two away from each other.

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Originally Posted by Coltvoyance

Breakdown:

Single Heals: Equal
AoE Heals: Equal
Power Heals: Equal/Comparable
Fast Heals: Comparable
Instant Heals: WHM
Party Buffs: AST
DPS Contribution: AST
MP Management: AST

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• Single Heals - Arguably AST due to the way Synastry works, also Time Dilation on HoTs effectively adds 1.5 the potency to Aspected Benefic.
  1030 Potency 18s, +(140*5=700) = 1730. Do the same with all the HoTs.
• AoE Heals: WHM
• Power Heals: WHM
• Fast Heals: Equal (Not PoM vs LS!)
• Instant Heals: WHM
• Party Buffs: AST
• DPS cont.: AST
• MP Manage: WHM

OP's post is stupid and wrong.
I hope he edits.
Doesn't include

• Mitigation
• Raw DPS/Dungeon&AoE DPS
• Accuracy of DPS (Yes this is important)
• Ease of use

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Originally Posted by deos

to be honest, i would love to at least see some cooldowns reduced. if SE wants WHM to keep beeing the raw healing class, why not reduce cd of assize to 60 sec and tetragrammaton to 40 sec? also i would love to have graniteskin back, but i dont think this will happen >_>

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Originally Posted by Gist

3 minute Benediction wouldn't be terrible...!

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/tencharacters

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Originally Posted by UlricCraft

-snip-

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It's also important to keep in mind that the areas you listed that ast beats whm in are areas sch has always beaten whm in too. So it's not like ast is suddenly doing something unheard of.

Edit: And to the two suggesting whm get lowered CDs; No. Whm and sch are already borderline OP. SE needed to lift ast to their level because no one was taking ast to anything. If your solution is to make whm more even more powerful, we are just going to be back in the exact same spot we were in two days ago.

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Originally Posted by Eudyptes

words

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Agreed.
Though this topic seemed to be about AST replacing WHM's functionality and role.

Noct AST is still, in my opinion, behind the capabilities of the SCH and also loses the raw healing throughput of HoTs from Diurnal vs Eos.

This argument is a valid argument though... The balancing still isn't quite right.

SCH has a place and clearly outperforms AST at that designated role.
Mitigation.

Diurnal AST may well have 3% less potent healing than a WHM, but provides much more raid utility and DPS comparatively.

Compare this argument to the three tanks.

1. One tank gets slightly better offensive capabilities - Strong physical tanking
2. One tank has slightly stronger defensive capabilities - Strong AoE tanking
3. The 3rd is a hybrid between both and compliments them well - Strong magical tanking

The healers:

1. One gets more healing potency
2. One gets more offensive capability
3. One gets the same healing potency AND more offensive capability

High healing numbers, cute /cpose.

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Originally Posted by UlricCraft

• Single Heals - Arguably AST due to the way Synastry works, also Time Dilation on HoTs effectively adds 1.5 the potency to Aspected Benefic.
  1030 Potency 18s, +(140*5=700) = 1730. Do the same with all the HoTs.
• AoE Heals: WHM
• Power Heals: WHM
• Fast Heals: Equal (Not PoM vs LS!)
• Instant Heals: WHM
• Party Buffs: AST
• DPS cont.: AST
• MP Manage: WHM

OP's post is stupid and wrong.
I hope he edits.
Doesn't include

• Mitigation
• Raw DPS/Dungeon&AoE DPS
• Accuracy of DPS (Yes this is important)
• Ease of use

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THANK YOU
AND AGAIN
THANK YOU!

White Mages still have the best bounce back from wipe situations as their raw healing power is consistent and tied to their GCDs. It is important to note that in the event a White Mage does use a Cure III, it is on a shorter cast time thus making it the best upfront AoE heal in the game. Of course there will be situations where you wont be able to Cure III, but there currently isn't much content that requires it. I think T13 synced is the only content that favours WHM over all the other classes simply because no other healer has the speed of WHM in terms of up front healing. And since I mentioned T13, I do think it's relevant when comparing classes despite it being "outdated" content (emphasis on quotations). I don't think I would ever bring an Astrologian even if held gunpoint to T13 unsynced--even if the AST had access to all skills from 51 ~ 60.

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Originally Posted by ViDare

Tldr: don't take people's word for it level the class for yourself and make your own opinion. Which is contrary to what he's been saying that you don't need to have a job leveled to have an opinion.

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But, you can have an opinion on something, albeit an uninformed one, with having experience. The reality is, though, that even if we prefer those opinions don't exist, they can still have an impact on overall perception. Next time try not putting words in people's mouths.

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Originally Posted by Jerichai

But, you can have an opinion on something, albeit an uninformed one, with having experience. The reality is, though, that even if we prefer those opinions don't exist, they can still have an impact on overall perception. Next time try not putting words in people's mouths.

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That should be without having experience, but the mobile app for the forums doesn't seem to allow edits.