Healing Buff Question

I'm just wondering since this came up while I was learning how to play scholar better:

Why do Largesse, Fey Illumination, Mantra, and Convalescence only affect what Square calls "Healing Spells"? Especially when you have healers like Scholar where 66% of its major healing kit are abilities, and when fights are more healing intensive, I don't see why this still exists.

I'm not asking for it to be changed, but I'm asking why. I don't get why it doesn't affect abilities like Lustrate, Indom, or other things like that. It's also not healthy for new players. I've had new players not understand that things like convo only affect Cure/Cure 2 and not Tetra. I don't get the logic behind it. I want it to be explained to me so I can stop complaining about it, since it's not healthy.

Thanks to any who can maybe explain why this is like this.

Spells and Abilities have different purposes. Spells are always ready to be used while an Ability can only be used once every so often. In exchange Healing Abilities are typically very powerful and Healing Spells somewhat weak in comparison. Abilities don't need to be buffed because they are already designed to save you in a tough spot. Healing Spells are used to handle normal damage and you buff these Spells when the damage to the party is slightly heavier than normal. Your last resort is a Special Healing Ability. Learning the difference and proper usage of all these techniques is what makes being a healer fun and gives you room to grow in skill and mastery as you progress.

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Originally Posted by NobleWinter

Spells and Abilities have different purposes. Spells are always ready to be used while an Ability can only be used once every so often. In exchange Healing Abilities are typically very powerful and Healing Spells somewhat weak in comparison. Abilities don't need to be buffed because they are already designed to save you in a tough spot. Healing Spells are used to handle normal damage and you buff these Spells when the damage to the party is slightly heavier than normal. Your last resort is a Special Healing Ability. Learning the difference and proper usage of all these techniques is what makes being a healer fun and gives you room to grow in skill and mastery as you progress.

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This is what I thought it was and wanted to make sure of it by asking here. Thanks! I'm always learning and asking people around and learning "why" rather than claiming "this should be" is how I learn to be a better player, as cliche as that sounds.

To add, healing abilities have no cast time. While the potency of healing spells can be buffed, they still have to be casted. This means optimal use of healing buffs requires being proactive. When this is done correctly, it is very rewarding.

Try to think about your healing abilities as already being pre-buffed, and that is why they cannot be buffed further. These abilities really help out when you have to be reactive, and if you were around during the cleric stance days, you would know how annoying it was to have the check out of cleric before using abilities like tetra and lustrate. Choosing to, or having to buff an ability would share a similar annoyance and kind of defeat the purpose of these strong heals.

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Originally Posted by NobleWinter

Healing Spells are used to handle normal damage and you buff these Spells when the damage to the party is slightly heavier than normal. Your last resort is a Special Healing Ability.

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I would just throw in the caveat that abilities shouldn't truly be considered "last resort" options by default. I don't think you were trying to say exactly that, but some players take this view so literally that their oGCDs are largely wasted while they wait for emergencies that either don't happen or could have been prevented by using abilities in a timely and appropriate fashion.

To add what was said above about the differences between spells and abilities, not being effected by healing up buffs has a slight pro to it...it also means healing down debuffs will not effect the healing abilities, they'll always be at their full potential.

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

To add what was said above about the differences between spells and abilities, not being effected by healing up buffs has a slight pro to it...it also means healing down debuffs will not effect the healing abilities, they'll always be at their full potential.

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I don't know about that. I pretty sure in the rare instance they would use a healing down debuff on the healer (and not the normal healing received down debuff, which does get our abilities) they have some way to word it that it does. I need and instance of a debuff like this in the game to see if this is true, because I don't believe it.

Ya, Infirmity(the status that reduces healing magic) doesn't affect. I remember numerous instances in A3s where sometimes we failed to get the healer thing off before digititus went off and while the gcds were affected, assize, asylum and tetra were not. Again the wording is key. If it says healing magic, that means that your gcds are affected by not your ogcds.

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Originally Posted by Maltothoris

Ya, Infirmity(the status that reduces healing magic) doesn't affect. I remember numerous instances in A3s where sometimes we failed to get the healer thing off before digititus went off and while the gcds were affected, assize, asylum and tetra were not. Again the wording is key. If it says healing magic, that means that your gcds are affected by not your ogcds.

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No see that's wrong. Infirmity is the one that reduces healing received, not healing spell potency. So yes all your healing abilities / spells are affected by it.

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Originally Posted by Miles_Maelstrom

No see that's wrong. Infirmity is the one that reduces healing received, not healing spell potency. So yes all your healing abilities / spells are affected by it.

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Infirmity actually only does affect spells. You can test that by picking up six lightning orbs (3 stacks of overcharged) in Ramuh and see that your Tetra, Lustrates, Indomintability, Aetherpact, etc. still work at full power but any healing tool that's tagged as "spell" won't.

IIRC this also affects Warriors in Defiance. IMO it's pretty confusing that it works this way, since it's not particularly clear that some spells are more affected than others (and also makes Defiance weaker than Shield Oath).

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Originally Posted by Tridus

IIRC this also affects Warriors in Defiance. IMO it's pretty confusing that it works this way, since it's not particularly clear that some spells are more affected than others (and also makes Defiance weaker than Shield Oath).

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Yes, this is something important for healers to keep in mind when healing a WAR since they have an increased HP pool versus passive mitigation that PLD and DRK have in their tank stances. This means the diverse oGCD toolkit that SCH and WHM have at their arsenal actually loses some effectiveness. I'm hoping S-E does make a change to Defiance so it's affected by both spells and abilities though I'm not sure if S-E feels WARs overall self healing and on demand mitigation via Inner Beast would offset that detriment.

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Originally Posted by Miles_Maelstrom

I need and instance of a debuff like this in the game to see if this is true, because I don't believe it.

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Pretty sure the coerl from hullbreaker applies that status, the one summoned during the first "boss". As a sch during HW I never had to actually do any healing during that fight so I can't give you anything concrete, however.

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Originally Posted by Mirateski

Pretty sure the coerl from hullbreaker applies that status, the one summoned during the first "boss". As a sch during HW I never had to actually do any healing during that fight so I can't give you anything concrete, however.

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You're right I remember that his Tether move did indeed lower out going healing. You're right though, I too was a SCH and especially that fight I never actually healed anything. Not like the Coerl tethered Selene like he should have. I normally attacked the coerl when he came out.