Help... brand new to game and I'm failing hard

First let me start of with saying I am fresh to the game with less than 1 month of game play.

I am currently a lvl 33 WHM(17 ARN) and just finished Brayflox by sheer luck and amazing Duty finder mates(hat tips to them)

I think the biggest issue I'm having is mana management, I seem to OOM very quickly and as a result toward the tail end of the fight, I'm literally going from Cure I cast and praying for a free Cure II. I had a very difficult time managing dispells and again by the end of the fight I was OOM.

Does anyone have an good lowbie guides for WHM starting off? Is this maybe just a gear issue and I need to go back to Hakkue and get some more gear? Any screen configurations for healing? I'm afraid I might be tunnel visioning on health bars and missing things.

Any tips, hints, guides, youtube videos that anyone finds helpful would be great. I did google but everything seems to be for max level, I'd rather not fail through the next 17 levels, causing grief

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Originally Posted by Raeli

First let me start of with saying I am fresh to the game with less than 1 month of game play.

I am currently a lvl 33 WHM(17 ARN) and just finished Brayflox by sheer luck and amazing Duty finder mates(hat tips to them)

I think the biggest issue I'm having is mana management, I seem to OOM very quickly and as a result toward the tail end of the fight, I'm literally going from Cure I cast and praying for a free Cure II. I had a very difficult time managing dispells and again by the end of the fight I was OOM.

Does anyone have an good lowbie guides for WHM starting off? Is this maybe just a gear issue and I need to go back to Hakkue and get some more gear? Any screen configurations for healing? I'm afraid I might be tunnel visioning on health bars and missing things.

Any tips, hints, guides, youtube videos that anyone finds helpful would be great. I did google but everything seems to be for max level, I'd rather not fail through the next 17 levels, causing grief

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For Brayflox, there is an entire set of level 32 green gear (ilevel 34) that can be won from it. I kept all the gear I won the first time through on WHM and reused it for SCH. You should probably have level 29 right-hand-side gear as well (those you get from Haukke)

Though you don't necessarily need all of that if you were able to get to the final boss. The problem with the final boss is the tank not pulling the boss out of the poison fast enough.

Now, just for reference, the difference between doing this on WHM and doing it on SCH mainly comes down to WHM "Use Esuna", SCH "Heal through poison stacks", if you get paired with Melee's, the latter only lets you heal the tank, so the Melees need to avoid stepping in the poison completely. If you get paired with ranged DPS, then there is no reason for them to take any damage (though they inevitably will, you may be able to ignore some of it.)

So it sounds to me that maybe the overall party was just barely meeting the DPS requirements. You should have put your bonus points into Mind and nothing else, but if you put it into PIE, then you should have still not run out of MP.

Generally you can, and are supposed to play harder content without collecting the entire set of gear from a dungeon because you aren't guaranteed the drop you need. That's when you make up for weak gear by buying it off the market.

As for strategy... You are a healer. You should be using Cure I unless a large amount of HP needs to be cured at once. It's sometimes more effective to use Cure I 4 times than it is to use Medica (but it will depend how spread out the party is.) You won't have Regen until level 35, and generally you don't want to "proactively" use Regen or Medica II due to the enmity costs. Don't feel pressured to DPS, that's the first mistake everyone makes, the amount of damage the healer contributes will likely never be more than 8%, so it's not enough to justify taking attention away from healing. You get Shroud of saints at level 38 and Divine seal at Level 40, which let you temporarily change the dynamics of the healing. Shroud of Saints has an effect called "Refresh" which recovers MP for 15 seconds. When you initially get it, you probably won't notice it (and I don't believe anything in the game actually says "recovers MP" but it's nowhere near as handy as how MP is generated on THM/BLM and ACN/SMN/SCH.) Divine Seal boosts your healing by 30%, so when you're "near low", like the bottom third of your MP you can hit both and economize Cure I's. My preference however is to use Divine Seal before Medica II to boost the power of the regen effect.

Don't overheal. Use Regen when you get it. I use it all the time, after the tank has pulled the enemies so that they don't go running all to myself though.

If you're still learning don't feel bad if you just sit there for the duration of the fight, only healing. I had to do that the first time I healed dungeons. Soon you'll be able to learn when to DPS and when to heal but for now, don't feel bad just watching and throwing out heals when someone gets low.

Use Cure unless heavy damage was taken, then it's time for Cure II. Don't bother with Cure II on the DPS unless they've got some serious hurts.

Also due to Brayflox and its love of poison on the last boss you are gonna have a hard time with mana. When you get Shroud of Saints it's your saving grace. So nice. So just keep spamming that Cure , and remember it's okay if the tank isn't at full HP. Usually unless I'm preparing for big damage I keep the tank at around eighty percent.

The last boss in Brayflox is a mixed bag as a healer. If the tank keeps getting the Dragon out of the poison in time, then it's a pretty quick fight. But if the tank does not, then the Dragon heals himself while standing in the poison. That will make it a long drawn out fight, and you don't have the mana to sustain healing such a fight.

I've failed the first time I've tried it. Trying to keep everyone up.

Now I'm basically only healing the tank, and DPS only when they blunder into a pool of poison. Use your Esuna whenever you can, especially on the tank. It cleanses the poison off the recipient. And that's damage you don't have to heal. Do use Esuna on a melee DPS like a Rogue, Lancer or a Pugilist though. They have to be close to the boss to deal damage, so they will take poison damage. And throw them a Cure if necessary. But your main priority is to keep the tank up.

On my Scholar mana is not a problem. Plenty of tricks to get mana back. But Conjurer/Whitemage doesn't have that luxury in Brayflox. Shroud of Saints is level 38, but is not usable in dungeons below that level because of level sync. So you will never have it in Brayflox, same as with Regen.

Oh and if all else fails, you can always use your limit break if it's available. That is if a DPS isn't using it.

Don't cleanse the dot off the tank until he/she has several stacks. It's usually more mana efficient to heal through the tick damage than to esuna the poison. You'll need to judge when it's more efficient to cleanse or heal through damage.

Just play as normal and see where u stand as a player in that dungeon after a few duty finder parties.
Parties differ from one another.
But if u r going oom in every party u r in then refer to the posts above.
But if you seem fine in most parties except for some here and there than its probably not on you and more so on the ppl draining ur mp.

There's supposedly a learning curve involved when doing the dungeons. Sadly you can complete said dungeons perfectly fine without learning anything or even realising the curve is there. Dungeons from level 15 til 30 don't really teach you anything bar some extremely minor mechanics and may not even involve you as a healer. This dungeon is supposed to teach you (as a White Mage) to use Esuna. Although it somewhat fails in that department. Esuna is rather costly compared to Cure and unless the poison ticks for more damage than you can handle throughout the party, it's not worth removing the poison. If I remember correctly, it's perfectly fine to let someone build up 3 stacks before removing the poison.

The only real tip I can give you would be planning. Planning is everything when it comes to healing, as it involves mechanic handling and MP management. Take Cure and Cure II, for example. Cure II costs twice as much compared to Cure, but does not heal twice as much: 400 potency vs 650 potency. Cure also has a trait that may give you a free Cure II, whereas Cure II has no similar trait. Unless a lot of healing is required within a short time window, it's good practice to cast Cure over Cure II. This may change for endgame, however. It will depend on how aggressive you'd like to play later.

The following are included with planning:
Identifying mechanics
MP management
Movement mapping
party positioning
Spell tailoring*

Additionally, if you haven't done so yet, read all the tool tips concerning your spells, abilities and traits. This seems to be something that's occasionally being neglected.

* using a specific spell for specific situations/mechanics

Brayflox is the first real test of any player in this game and thus players will be required to step up and face the challenge. One of the important skills a WHM should learn is the ability to manage their MP and understanding the dynamics of a fight so they know when to heal and it shows in this dungeon.

General things to know about healing

• How much you can heal for - This allows you to gauge approximately how much collateral healing you'll need to do on non-tank targets to keep them alive through the next barrage of attacks. While it would be great to keep everyone at full HP, sometimes it's not possible and your priority should be the tank and keeping the non-tank roles alive just enough for them to survive a random hit (This also becomes infinitely easier once you have Regen)
• How a fight pans out - This can only be achieve with experience. XIV is a heavily scripted so after you do a fight enough, you can generally predict when these attacks are going to occur and thus be able to heal accordingly.

Aiatar has three primary attacks of concern for a healer:

• A frontal line attack that adds a stack of poison and does heavy damage if the tank gets clipped (this is unfortunately something out of your control and will need to respond appropriately if the tank DOES get clipped)
• A toxic spit that gives the target and anyone else hit a poison stack and deals damage - leaves an environmental hazard on the ground that no one should stand on (including Aiatar, as he regenerates HP while in these pools)
• A normal attack that gives the target (should be the tank) an additional stack of poison

As a WHM for the fight, your goals should be as follows:

• Remove Poison stacks via Esuna at the earliest and safest moments of the fight (a time where the tank is sufficiently healed so they may not die to the next attack)
• Removing Poison stacks from DPS hit by the toxic spit and giving them enough healing to survive the next toxic spit if they are targeted
• Positioning far enough away from Aiatar (and if possible, towards a wall) so you can heal effectively and reducing the amount of coverage a pool may have on the arena

This is what a healer can do to minimize the risks of a fight from a healer's perspective. Unfortunately, there, you may need to carry more or less depending on the competency of your tank and how many melee DPS you have, as more melee DPS means more Aiatar repositioning due to Poison spit. Base your decisions on party competency and composition and you'll be able to get through it.

One general word of advice for gearing - I noticed through your Lodestone that you have a Danburite Earring equipped. Intelligence does nothing for your heals, so if you can replace that with a Mind earring as soon as possible, it would give you a small boost to your heals. If you have any friendly FC crafters, I'd ask them to see if they can make you a free set of HQ Malachite Accessories to help out.

Otherwise, your gear looks to be in relatively good shape. I would recommend running Brayflox a few more times to (1) get a better feel for healing as you'll really be put to the test once you hit Stone Vigil and (2) the Battlemage set is good enough to last until you can get to the first set of AF gear at level 45, so I recommend getting a full Battlemage set if possible.

Happy healing!

Thank you all! This has been very helpful, this was the first dungeon I really struggled. The tank and I are friends so we were leveling together. They did do a very good job of moving out of the frontal attack and getting out of the AOE but both DPS were melee so the poison was close on the ground. It could have just been a tougher makeup of the group then.

I'll go and look for my mind earrings :) Thank you everyone for the advice, I'm going to re-run it today and put all this advice to work and hopefully things will come out better!

Like Ghishlain said, Brayflox is the first real dungeon (imo) that tests both healers, tanks and a few dps depending on class. Cure II is really just Cure I but with a faster cool-down time and at later levels you'll see that Cure II was has same mp cost as two Cure I's so I'd suggest using Cure I unless you know that it won't fill the tank to fill, then I'd use Cure II. Also at level 35 you unlock regen a HoT (heal over time) and a god send (imo) of a move that really helps with healing, but be careful not to use it when the tanks pulling the mobs, because it does generate aggro.

Once you get the hang of Brayflox and don't get a crappy group it's really simple to do. MP potion can help i used to like popping one after i drop 10-15% MP so i know it will be off CD if the fight drags on and i need a late MP boost. The rest just hope for good freecure procs. If it's not getting too out of control you can let a couple of poison stacks hit the Tank before removing it the poison alone won't kill them remember SCH does this without being able to clense and you have really good single target heals plus a proc for a Cure II that costs no MP. If you are constantly spamming esuna for every poison it can be a pointless drain.

Don't be discouraged. I actually recently posted about the same thing after i was told how bad i was on this dungeon. I got some great advice from the lovely people here, and went back to it. It's a great dungeon to get practice in, and it really helps to prepare you for what's ahead. I've now done all the dungeons up to aurum vale (lv 47) and though I've been met with some criticism I've also had my share of praise. The more you do the dungeons the more comfortable you will get with how to use all of your abilities.

Allocate your bonus point between Mind & Piety.

I am main WHM, and I didn't dump all my points on Mind. Due to latency (Getting invisible damage) I added also some Vitality (and Still have them).

I'd say 50%-50% for Mind & Piety for now, and don't worry about the allocation. GC sells a Hymn that will reset the point so you can adjust them if you bought one.

At Lv.37 you'll get the real deal healers' Accessories, Try to get PINK Accs (Green gems accs add Piety , Blue gems accs add Mind).

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Originally Posted by Kuwaitum

Allocate your bonus point between Mind & Piety.

I am main WHM, and I didn't dump all my points on Mind. Due to latency (Getting invisible damage) I added also some Vitality (and Still have them).

I'd say 50%-50% for Mind & Piety for now, and don't worry about the allocation.

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This approach, while it certainly won't kill you or cause major issues, is generally suboptimal, so don't take it if you are inclined to min/max.

PIE is found in abundance on healer gear, and the only content in the game for which players purposely aim for a specific minimum VIT is Final Coil. That being said, if like Kuwaitum you find that a certain stat combo appeals to you or works for you, go for it; just be aware of your options.

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Originally Posted by Kuwaitum

Allocate your bonus point between Mind & Piety.

I am main WHM, and I didn't dump all my points on Mind. Due to latency (Getting invisible damage) I added also some Vitality (and Still have them).

I'd say 50%-50% for Mind & Piety for now, and don't worry about the allocation. GC sells a Hymn that will reset the point so you can adjust them if you bought one.

At Lv.37 you'll get the real deal healers' Accessories, Try to get PINK Accs (Green gems accs add Piety , Blue gems accs add Mind).

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Vitality is really pointless for a Healer you shouldn't be getting hit by anything that isn't full party damage and your gear will give you more than enough to cope same with Piety if you can't manage at lvl 50 when you have 5k MP then you are seriously wasting it. I've yet to see a good reason to add a bonus to any stat but Mind you want to increase your heals it's what you do. Cleric stance swaps your Mind stat for Intelligence so it increases your base damage too and your main job in most parties as a WHM is using Holy.

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Originally Posted by MXMoondoggie

Vitality is really pointless for a Healer you shouldn't be getting hit by anything that isn't full party damage and your gear will give you more than enough to cope same with Piety if you can't manage at lvl 50 when you have 5k MP then you are seriously wasting it. I've yet to see a good reason to add a bonus to any stat but Mind you want to increase your heals it's what you do. Cleric stance swaps your Mind stat for Intelligence so it increases your base damage too and your main job in most parties as a WHM is using Holy.

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If you as the healer die, the whole party is screwed. Vit helps keep that from happening. If you know the fights and everyone does what they are supposed to, you won't need extra vitality, but that does not always happen. I have a full set of melded accessories that gives me a lot of extra vitality and it has saved plenty of runs. That said, I currently have all 30 points in Mind. My jewelry gives me plenty of extra Vit. I agree Int is a waste and PIE is not the best use for your points. At low levels, Vit and PIE do make a bigger difference than they do in endgame.

I dont think its necessarily bad to put some vit in at lower levels. However at ilvl100+ i'd switch to full mind as you get lots of vit from gear (even without any vit based acc. I have 5k hp). At higher levels u need greater potency heals and you would become a bit more adept with mechanics so u wont need such high hp. There is little reason to put points into piety u

Get lots of piety from gear anyway.

I dont think its necessarily bad to put some vit in at lower levels. However at ilvl100+ i'd switch to full mind as you get lots of vit from gear (even without any vit based acc. I have 5k hp). At higher levels u need greater potency heals and you would become a bit more adept with mechanics so u wont need such high hp.

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Originally Posted by Raeli

OP

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Place your attribute points in piety for now (assuming you haven't.) If you need to reset the points, buy the item at your grand company vendor.

WHM has very potent healing capabilities. Divine Seal makes regen very powerful, allowing you to sit back and recover MP. DS also makes Cure 1 heal nearly as much as an unbuffed Cure 2, allowing you to save MP by not casting Cure 2. DS is also on a 60 second cooldown so do not hesitate on using it.

As you play more, you will learn the boss fights and be able to predict incoming damage, incoming spike damage and get better at MP management.

Don't take it all on yourself as well. Your MP management is also due to how well the other group member perform. If you're having to waste MP raising or healing unnecessary damage taken, that's not your fault. Being you're still in mid-level content, I would not be surprised if you're playing with new players also getting used to their jobs and boss fights.

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Originally Posted by MXMoondoggie

Vitality is really pointless for a Healer

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Tell that to people doing T13 with less than 6k HP. :D

On a more related note, it's generally about Regen and not overhealing (healing to full means you're usually healing a tiny bit too much). It's also the tank's (and, to a lesser degree, the DPS players) job to make your life easier by taking as little damage as possible. There was another thread on here recently about a healer having issues in Brayflox - his tank kept getting hit by the boss' beam attack time and time again and then he gave the healer a rough time for not keeping him alive. It's a little give and take. ;)

VIT is important and you'll get more as you level up, but points of VIT you allocate are insigificant. If you allocate 15 points of VIT at level 37, you will gain maybe 50 HP. It's certainly not as useful as MND.

There are a few tricks to stay safe, which are common sense, but I'll say it nonetheless, as I saw too many players not knowing or seeming to forget about it during the heat of fights. You are a Range player and your range of healing is huge and you should try to stay as far as you can when healing. If, unfortunately, you get some adds over you (it happens - even to the best healers), the thing NOT to do is to run farther away. The enemies will eventually catch you anyway, whether you sprint or not, or worse, you could be dragging more. Instead, run to the tank. That will make the enemy be in range for the tank's provoke/flash so he can take back on himself.

That said, Bray is one of the first real check-points in the game and it's normal you find it "heavy", responsibility and healing-wise. There has been a lot of threads about this dungeon alone in this "Healers" subforum, and you might want to have a look, the infos they contain are golden for whoever is a healer, at ALL levels.

Don't be disheartened by how some players react to your healing In-Game. They also share their loots of responsibility. When they see you are having a hard time, they should :
- NOT pull too many at once
- Dodge the avoidable damages/aoes more.
- Use their buffs with better timing.

And even more importantly, discuss. When you have a peaceful moment for that, tell them if you are having issues about anything (mana pool, not managing to switch your targets to be healed fast-enough, or one of the above). They will hopefuly understand your point and make sure it won't happen again/ dodge more/ slow down the the run a bit.

You'll often see remarks about "it's a healer's job to heal, if he doesn't then he's the one to blame" blabla. It's also the other player's job not to make your job more difficult than it should.

I'd say you weren't failing at all. If even the tail of the dragon is in the poison, they heal up. If the fight goes on to the extent where you run out of MP on any healer, but especially WHM, it's usually a case of the tank messing up, in the Brayflox dungeon. Also, f the tank doesn't sit right UNDER the belly of the dragon, a lot of times he's going to be hit with major poison stacks when the dragon uses its breath attack, so if the tank isn't doing this, it also could be an issue when it comes to healing.

So please, don't let this discourage you. Also, I go through Brayflox every so often on SCH, which doesn't can't cleanse at that level. I sometimes cast stoneskin on people to help combat the poison, but really, unless someone's stacks are really high, don't Esuna them, the MP cost isn't worth it, as others have said. Rely mostly on Cure 1 for this fight, Esuna when the poison stacks get to high, and you'll find you have less MP issues I suspect.

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Originally Posted by cgbspender

You'll often see remarks about "it's a healer's job to heal, if he doesn't then he's the one to blame" blabla. It's also the other player's job not to make your job more difficult than it should.

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Just this. Wiped recently on Sastasha HM because the dps and tank weren't interrupting the first boss's attacks at all. Made it nearly impossible for me to heal easily. Came back, they planned out when to interrupt and who at what time, made the fight a breeze. Fortunately that was one case where they didn't blame me and put in a group effort to do better. Wish all groups did that. =D

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Originally Posted by YukariOro

Just this. Wiped recently on Sastasha HM because the dps and tank weren't interrupting the first boss's attacks at all. Made it nearly impossible for me to heal easily. Came back, they planned out when to interrupt and who at what time, made the fight a breeze. Fortunately that was one case where they didn't blame me and put in a group effort to do better. Wish all groups did that. =D

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Most groups, in my experience, will not even bother with attempting to interrupt the boss' Tail Screw since it's a non-lethal mechanic and not worth getting a DPS stunned to free up the tank.

If you begin the round of Esuna/Leeches as soon as the slimes drop, this mechanic is trivial (assuming that your party members are properly spread and not eating multiple stacks).

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Originally Posted by Cynfael

Most groups, in my experience, will not even bother with attempting to interrupt the boss' Tail Screw since it's a non-lethal mechanic and not worth getting a DPS stunned to free up the tank.

If you begin the round of Esuna/Leeches as soon as the slimes drop, this mechanic is trivial (assuming that your party members are properly spread and not eating multiple stacks).

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I've done it before, where they didn't interrupt at all, but it gets to be a struggle when the debuffs pile up for me, period. I'll keep your tip in mind tho, ty, for future runs and give it a try. =)

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Originally Posted by YukariOro

I've done it before, where they didn't interrupt at all, but it gets to be a struggle when the debuffs pile up for me, period. I'll keep your tip in mind tho, ty, for future runs and give it a try. =)

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The only time it gets to be dangerous is if players stack with each other, the slime can then hit both or more players, or at worst some players get 2 slimes.
Other than that there really shouldn't be a problem.

dont let yourself discouraged. MP-Management as a WHM is the one big limiting hurdle you have to master. Even later on. The WHM can be a insane healing- (and even AoE-Damage-)bomb. bit it's drains you out in no time.

therefore, as many people saidd before me. try and plan the fights. if you dont know them, keep your healing low - if you have any chance - remain on Cure I and wait for procs. if you have to spam Cure II - the fight have to be over quickly.

As i just reached lvl50, my gear was weak ofc, but many tanks thought they can pull like your are fully 100+ geared - is used to spam at the begining of every dungeon "Dear tank, my gera is still crap, please dont pull to much"

some listend to this request, others prefered to go into the bright light of death - their choice.

you should always try to analyze the capability of the tank you have and communicate how much he can take and force him to slow down. (it's even easier if it's your personal tank^^) DPS sghould always do what is possible to mitigate avoidable damage as much as possible - if the dont (remind them of the bright light of death from time to time)

I've always tried to practice good MP management when I first leveled my WHM main, and that just comes with experience and knowing what you can get away with. I will say that as an end-game healer this mindset helps a lot. Learning phases and when to pre-cast or when it's ok not be topped-off.

With Brayflox nm, it's not always worth it to cleanse the poison from an MP standpoint because it doesn't do that much damage. Even as SCH you have no choice so you just heal through it. This goes back to "what can I get away with but keep everyone alive?" mindset. There are more scenarios in the game like Odin trial where cleansing the party list isn't worth it and just AoE healing through the DoTs. All the way up to T13 where everything hits hard, and you practically work with almost the minimum amount of heals needed.

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Originally Posted by Spoekes

The only time it gets to be dangerous is if players stack with each other, the slime can then hit both or more players, or at worst some players get 2 slimes.
Other than that there really shouldn't be a problem.

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Yep, at that point you'll have to make a decision on the cleansing. Since you are going only to get up to 3 globals to clear them before the screw hits. If there are multiple doubles and the screw hits one of those doubled, so be it. Some ranged ran into me as SCH when they should have just have stood still, causing four stacks. Obviously I wasn't going to let myself die.