Advice needed on healer role skills

So i found this macro on the page posted below that allows you to switch a skill out for protect cast it and switch back in 4 seconds. Before this i had protect as one of my 5, now that's not needed and i am having trouble selecting a fifth.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...66#post4199666

Got currently
Esuna - i consider essential for cleansing as whm
Lucid Dreaming - threat reduce and mp regen, nuff said
Swiftcast - Great for instant rez, instant medica 2s or Tetragrammaton + switftcasted cure2 combo.
Largesse - Great for tankbusters or high aoe heal situations, especially when combined with Presence of mind and/or thin air.
Protect - Got it on the switch macro so can use it but does not take up a perm spot.

Considering (need to pick one but can't decide)
Cleric Stance - Dps buff not the best for healers, good if you can guarantee dpsing for 15s but since you may only get a cast or two before going back to healing can see a lot of wasted buff time.
Break - The slow can have some uses, no mana use damage is a big plus in situations where you don't want to waste mana. But is weak damage level
Eye for Eye - 20% chance of damage reduction pretty nice, but 3min cooldown is a bit long.
Surecast - Fringe use, but needing a non interrupt on a cast isn't common.
Rescue - Deffinatly usefull, great for shifting people that don't understand that standing in aoe's is a bad thing, but 2.5min means u can't do it often.

Pick Eye for an Eye. It's not super effective but it's nice to have for some potential extra mitigation in mass pulls. When Esuna isn't needed, I also use Cleric Stance on WHM and try to pair it with Presence of Mind as much as possible.

If you are comfortable with the WHM kit I'd recommend dropping Largesse for something else (CS or E4E). Since a large majority of the WHM healing kit is ability based, your mileage for Largesse may be pretty low compared to CS or E4E.

I generally default Swiftcast, Esuna, Lucid Dreaming, Cleric Stance, and Eye for an Eye when I'm fairly certain I won't need to reapply Protect.

Also Surecast fringe uses include preventing knock backs so there's some applications for that too. Just be sure to understand how exactly it works before trying it xD

OP, I think Cleric Stance is always a good option if you are comfortable with damage-dealing. If you are doing content that you know for sure does not require Esuna, you can drop that skill.

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Originally Posted by Ghishlain

If you are comfortable with the WHM kit I'd recommend dropping Largesse for something else (CS or E4E). Since a large majority of the WHM healing kit is ability based, your mileage for Largesse may be pretty low compared to CS or E4E.

I generally default Swiftcast, Esuna, Lucid Dreaming, Cleric Stance, and Eye for an Eye when I'm fairly certain I won't need to reapply Protect.

Also Surecast fringe uses include preventing knock backs so there's some applications for that too. Just be sure to understand how exactly it works before trying it xD

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Having weaker Regen and Medica II just seems bad to me. Largesse just seems to be too good to pass up.

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Originally Posted by lulunami

Having weaker Regen and Medica II just seems bad to me.

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It's a preference thing to be honest. I haven't used Largesse at all since SB has come out and I'm currently progressing through O4S with no issue. I am finding I have no other cross skills to use in O4S thus far though so I think I'll just slot Largesse at that point just to fill things in since I effectively have an empty 5th slot ATM, lol.

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Originally Posted by Stirix

Esuna - i consider essential for cleansing as whm

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It's essential for any healer. Most of the time the cost of cleansing is far less than healing through a debuff. Personally I would only drop Esuna if there is nothing to cleanse or if I coordinate with another healer who agrees to take on cleansing solo. I would never drop it with the intention of just healing through debuffs.

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Originally Posted by Stirix

Eye for Eye - 20% chance of damage reduction pretty nice, but 3min cooldown is a bit long.

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The cd is far too long in my opinion but it is still worth taking. Especially now that sprint no longer uses tp tanks chain pull far more than before, which increases the strain on healing.

You're meant to change them on a fight to fight basis.

I recommend taking esuna off (or making a macro that does so) for 90% of level 70 content, because currently the only fight that requires it is omega 4 normal (and even that can be ignored if you have a Selene-using scholar).

I leave Esuna on all the time, because inevitably I forget to put it back on a fight where you want it, and a bad time ensues. It's not like anything else you can put there is critically important anyway.

I've had Rescue in that Protect swap slot since SB came out, but I find it pretty marginal. In the right situation it can help, but it has a slow activation and pull speed. I've had someone coming to me only for them to get yanked into an effect anyway because they just didn't travel fast enough. So its kinda meh. But Surecast is also kinda meh, Eye for an Eye has a really long cooldown for what it does, I don't care about Break at all, and Cleric Stance isn't that interesting to me (it's a small effect for a short period of time).

Honestly, if they killed the Protect swap macro... I'd probably just leave Protect there.

I usually keep Eye for an Eye (I'm a dungeon hero, not raider) as it mitigates during mass pulls. The CD on it does suck really bad though.

Got a protect macro that swaps protect for Esuna. It helps neither has a CD so both are good candidates for the macro.

Also, if the encounter has a knockback, surecast up will mitigate the knockback.

i personally have cleric stance instead of largesse. i rarely cast heals because i like to use my healing ogcds as much as possible to save mp and maximize dps and largesse is... rarely ever actually needed

To me, largesse and regen allows more uptime with using DPS, I never use cleric stance because 5% every 1 min and 30 sec for 7 spells max is a joke and with the slight fluctuations in damage, you never notice 5% damage doing anything. I am shocked people are not making threads to buff cleric stance.

I am not using something so marginally small at the risk of entering something of the like of a4N and forgetting you need put esuna on. I have enough trouble thinking I got a sect on but don't.

I use 4/5 what used to be base, Largesse, Lucid Dreaming, Esuna, Protect and for the 5th goes to swiftcast. I also do not understand why at least protect and Esuna is NOT base, what is the point in taking that away? Maybe they should remove the concept of class roles entirely since to me, they do not know what to do with it, and trying to use it to manage a "button bloat" problem.