A few ideas to improve the WHM from a SCH player

I'll start by saying that the differences between the classes are starting to be more apparent, and that after playing with a WHM partner following 2.1, I feel there need to be more improvements to WHM play that bring them back in line with how versatile and efficient scholars are.

Versatility
White mages struggle to keep up with scholars in terms of actions per minute. This is due to the scholar's advantage in simultaneous control of self and fairy (improved in 2.1, which I am pleased about!), which is even better with the addition of proper manual fairy AI options and mouse-over macros. These changes allow me as a scholar to target a player or monster for personal casting while also commanding the fairy to heal a separate target. Doing so does not require separate targeting selections. In order for a WHM to remain competitive in versatility, I would suggest making Regen into a free spell off of the normal spell GCD. The justification is to allow WHM to improve their actions per minute while also having comparable secondary healing output as a fairy for the same mana cost as fairy heals, while still retaining the "WHM-ness" of the function. This leads me to the next topic:

Efficiency
It's no secret that every class in the game is reasonably efficient with the exception of white mages. White mage mana is a liability. Ask your bards how often they play Mage's Ballad compared to how often they play Army's Paean. Consider the changes in 2.1 which move white mage play in the direction of Cure III as a response to high-stress AOE healing and away from reliance on Medica II for those purposes. One thing that these changes did not help with was improving the mana liability of the class. Arguably, things are now even less mana efficient. Consequently, I have a few suggestions to improve efficiency:

1: Free Regen
By having a free, off-GCD Regen, white mages can solve minor healing concerns (e.g., your monk stood in an AOE) with similar outcomes as scholar fairy use, using a free, low-potency solution that does not detract from your primary healing duties.

2: (Critical?) Regen ticks reduce the cooldown of Shroud of Saints by X seconds

By providing an intra-class synergy with a core class mechanic, it will be possible to encourage skillful use of Regen in order to gain quicker access to the WHM threat and mana relief option. The conditions by which access to SoS is improved may depend on the itemization that developers want white mages to aim for. For example, if spell speed is desired, have spell speed increase the rate of Regen ticks. If crit is desired, have critical ticks reduce the SoS cooldown even more, etc.

3: Streamline Medica II
Remove the front-end heal and reduce the mana cost proportionately. Now the spell is the intended background heal but better optimized for that role.

Hi, I see you're pretty new to the forums. Just a heads up, you can edit your first post to include everything you want to say, instead of making multiple posts.

This gets past the character limit and prevents you from reaching your post limit faster.

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Originally Posted by Nullie

Hi, I see you're pretty new to the forums. Just a heads up, you can edit your first post to include everything you want to say, instead of making multiple posts.

This gets past the character limit and prevents you from reaching your post limit faster.

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Thanks for the tip. I cleaned up somewhat. :)

I've been playing SCH since launch and right now have a lvl 48 WHM. So not Medica II for me yet. But too me, it seems like they have too many AoE heal options (with worse mana regn than SCH, Cure III seems like I should only use it when it's at half cost, which is never at the times its most useful), and nothing instant that's particularly useful (Regen is about what Embrace is, but over time, so it's not a life-saver in any way - and even tho Embrace has a cast time, it's basically instant cos SCH's can cast it while running - I don't have Benediction yet, but that seems a little overkill for what I'm looking for, with a long cooldown).

I think a lot could be helped if the Overcure timer was longer - maybe 30 seconds.

Otherwise, a lot of your suggestions would really make WHM a HoT healing class, reminds me of the Operatives in swtor. Which was my favorite class to heal as. But I haven't played and FF games before honestly, so I don't know if that steers it too far away from how WHM's are traditionally presented, or if they are possibly planning on introducing another HoT healing job later on that it would conflict with. If not, I support them :-)

I personally love hot healing and this could help a great deal but might need fine tuning in practice. At the very least something should be done about whm mana because it simply seems wrong the way it is now.

I don't agree with any points. Having regen off GCD and adding more mana regen just means that WHMs will keep regen up on 8 people. I don't want to become a regen machine. Part of the challenge of being whm is MP management... choosing when to use cure 1 vs 2, cure 3 vs medica, etc. WHMs who need constant ballad are just bad at their job.

Yeah, I rarely have issues with MP conservation on my WHM anymore, except maybe sometimes on the healing intensive fights like Ultima Weapon or Titan. Or fights like Behemoth where people are dying left and right due to bad comet placement, and multiple revives are required. Learning to utilize Freecure/Overcure along with well timed Shroud of Saints is key for keeping your MP up.

Here's my analysis of the current state of the 2 healing jobs.

WHM are, by far, the best class for AoE healing. SCH are, by far, the best class for ST healing. I think it's safe to assume this is what SE originally envisioned them as in order to compliment each other in an 8-man party. This is ok, as WHM/SCH is definitely a very efficient setup. But, if we boil down each job into pure mechanics, we really can see the disparities between them.

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SCH are also equipped for mitigation coupled with their healing ability, and have access to regular Stoneskin from CNJ.
WHM just have heals and enhanced Stoneskin.

SCH are equipped with various party-wide buffs from within the job and through the fairies, and have access to regular Protect from CNJ.
WHM have enhanced Protect.

SCH are equipped with various enemy debuffs inherited from the ACN base-class.
WHM have repose, but later have access to regular virus and eye for eye from ACN.

SCH are equipped with scaling MP recovery (applied at once) with a 60 second cooldown, coupled with Energy Drain (if they choose to use it to further boost MP recovery).
WHM are equipped with fixed MP recovery (applied over time) with 180 second cooldown and reduces current enmity.

SCH have a healing ability that scales based on target HP, and thus ignores healing debuffs. Can be used, at maximum, three times every minute.
WHM have a healing ability that restores a target's HP to full. Can be used once every five minutes.

SCH healing is split between the caster and the pet, thus enmity is split between the 2.
WHM take the full brunt of all enmity for each healing spell.
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As we can see, SCHs are much better equipped to handle any situation this game can throw at them, except extremely heavy AoE damage occurring at quick intervals. But even in heavy AoE damage environments, they have a lot of tools to minimize the impact.

SCHs also have tools available to cover for mistakes from the rest of the party, and are somewhat independent healers. They have decent MP recovery, so that makes them less reliant on a BRD. It also means they can spend more MP healing a DPS who accidentally took a plume to the face, or quick raising a tank who forgot to pop a CD and was OHKO'd. SCH are definitely very well off in either a long drawn-out fight, or a healing-intensive fight, not forever as they will eventually run OOM, but they can hold their own for quite some time.
WHM have very little tools to cover for party mistakes. They have limited MP recovery, and thus are more reliant on a BRD in drawn-out fights or high-healing situations. This also means they cannot cover for other player mistakes as easily. That DPS who took a plume to the face may not be able to get that emergency heal, or that tank who died. Those extra heals and raises are very MP costly, and for certain boss fights WHM just don't have the mana to spend. Thus, WHM are more party dependent than SCH. They require to be in a party with decent DPS who know how to dodge and tanks who know when to use CDs properly, and in the case of a high-healing fight, access to a BRD.

Both jobs have their obvious pros and cons, but I think when you look at just the core of each one, SCH just seems to have superior design. WHM almost looks lazy in what it's capable of, and what it adds to the party makeup. SCH are a team of players in 1 job...WHM are just heal machines.

Again, I will reiterate that WHM/SCH is still a more efficient combo that WHM/WHM or SCH/SCH (unless the fight doesn't require AoE healing, in which SCH/SCH would be as effective as WHM/SCH assuming both Eos and Selene are used).
However, because 99% of all heals being thrown out in this game are going towards a Tank coupled with the lack of high-damage AoE mobs that wouldn't allow for a SCH to heal up a party in between, SCH is currently the "better" healing job. In order for WHM to ascend to the same level, SE would either have to reconsider the job's mana usage or enmity generation, or redesign some of these fights to make WHM more valuable in parties (but not in a way that would diminish SCH's current value).

The thing is, for all the doom and gloom being preached over the 'state' of the white mage job, we are not 2.0 warriors, I've never once looked at my parser and felt like I was getting carried by the sch or simply holding the group back. If anything, I tend to win the parser war more times than not (And yes that's including doubling succor/adloq and no I'm not sitting there over healing like crazy).

We could do with PoM getting made useful but beyond that and I'll agree that the medica II change was annoying, but I appreciate why it got changed now, I really don't see what's so bad as things are.

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Originally Posted by Sebazy

The thing is, for all the doom and gloom being preached over the 'state' of the white mage job, we are not 2.0 warriors, I've never once looked at my parser and felt like I was getting carried by the sch or simply holding the group back. If anything, I tend to win the parser war more times than not (And yes that's including doubling succor/adloq and no I'm not sitting there over healing like crazy).

We could do with PoM getting made useful but beyond that and I'll agree that the medica II change was annoying, but I appreciate why it got changed now, I really don't see what's so bad as things are.

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Agreed. PoM is fairly pointless, but I don't understand what the doom and gloom is about WHM. We're extremely powerful already. The idea with Regen? That would be ridiculously OP - both in PvE and PvP.