A question about healing!

Hello =D I was wanting to try healing, but I was told that I needed to be able to dps and heal at the same time, which kind of makes me nervous, especially in higher dungeons. I was also wondering when I should use Cure 2 over Cure on my White Mage (I don't have the healer I want yet, Astrologian)

The expectation to DPS is that you should cast a damage spell if you don’t need to heal. Rather than wait around doing nothing until someone needs healing.

As for which spell to use, that often depends on the amount of incoming damage. A DPS at half health might be fine with a Cure. A tank who’s getting hit hard repeatedly might need a bunch of Cure 2s.

As you gain levels, you will have access to abilities that replace those spells. So don’t sweat it.

Generally on a white mage you can just bin cure 1 out of incredibly niche scenarios, both cure 1 and 2 cost a gcd, and the mana difference is inconsequential (especially because whm has essentially infinite mana unless they need to chain res). Also in the case of damage, all the healers have powerful aoe attacks (especially whm) so contributing to the party damage essentially means you nee to heal far less and everything goes a lot smoother at basically no cost.

basically, when you dont need to heal keep your dot up, if you dont need your dot to be refreshed, you need to use stone/glare, ruin/broil, malefic or your aoe if its a dungeon with 3 or more mobs alive

use cure 1 until you get cure 2, once you get cure 2, you can forget about cure 1 after about level 40 as its not worth diddly squat with whm's infinite mp and cure's poor potency

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Originally Posted by Aikeiko

Hello =D I was wanting to try healing, but I was told that I needed to be able to dps and heal at the same time, which kind of makes me nervous, especially in higher dungeons. I was also wondering when I should use Cure 2 over Cure on my White Mage (I don't have the healer I want yet, Astrologian)

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I would suggest that you don't try to "force" DPS.

You'll notice, if you only heal, you'll end up sitting there for periods of time doing nothing. This is a good time to pop some Holy's (Or Gravities, when you get Astro). If you don't have the AoE yet, then just stone is fine.

Now at higher levels of play, you can use your abilities to squeeze DPS out of situations that at first don't seem possible. And that's cool, but my advice is to get walking down before you run. When you have nothing to do, fill in with DPS, for now. As you get more confidence in this, then try pushing your limits.

Good luck!

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edit: There's one thing I kind of want to set straight. People seem to be thinking that how WHM plays at low level is now somehow the same as how it plays at max level.

It isn't. Your MP is not effectively infinite or even close at lower levels.

You can still probably use cure 2 over cure 1 most of the time. But if your MP gauge does start getting a bit low - and a medica 2 into a few cure 2s can do that - then you might wish to revert to cure 1 until Lucid Dreaming is available again.

The reasons some people are saying this is because WHM has a number of tools that give it good (but still not effectively infinite...) MP at max level, but you won't have these yet unless you're close.

It is not necessary unless you are doing content like savage or whatever else high end. It is merely recommended but some people will overreact if you don't. My best advice is to ease your way into it when you are comfortable enough. A dot here and there and so on. In terms of cure and cure 2..that really depends on the incoming damage.

As mentioned, it's not that you always have to heal and dps at the same time. It's more that it's expected you weave in dps spells when there is no healing needed. Avoiding unnecessary overheal makes your dps more efficient. However if your group is taking high damage and you're spamming heals and can't fit in any dps, that's fine. Do what you must to keep the group alive first.

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Originally Posted by Risvertasashi

It isn't. Your MP is not effectively infinite or even close at lower levels.

You can still probably use cure 2 over cure 1 most of the time. But if your MP gauge does start getting a bit low - and a medica 2 into a few cure 2s can do that - then you might wish to revert to cure 1 until Lucid Dreaming is available again.

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People advise dropping Cure once you get Regen because healing tends to fall into one of two scenarios.

-Light damage. In this case you aren't going to empty on MP and Cure II is more GCD efficient.
-Heavy dangerous damage. In this case Cure spam won't save your tank and you need beefy Cure II's to keep up, regardless of mana cost.

1- I think that it's very important to say that healing at low levels isn't the same as at end levels, with all of the skills that you will get, no matter which healer you pick. So it's fair to say- don't stress at the very beginning with too much DPS, just throw out a dot (if you're very nervous)

2- saying that DPS is "not necessary except for savage content" while being technically true, would also end end up being incredibly boring, and potentially cause a wipe. That is because, dear friends, it has happened that you (a healer) can potentially do more DPS than the occasional DPS. Many strange and wonderful things can happen in DF.
3 - By the time that you get to higher dungeons, the more you can personally contribute, the less stress you can actually have. Tank CDs only last so long. If combine prep pre-pull then do damage during the pull then you can deal with larger pulls. Otherwise, if you weren't to add your damage large pulls can be hell.

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Originally Posted by Aikeiko

Hello =D I was wanting to try healing, but I was told that I needed to be able to dps and heal at the same time, which kind of makes me nervous, especially in higher dungeons. I was also wondering when I should use Cure 2 over Cure on my White Mage (I don't have the healer I want yet, Astrologian)

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Hello!

The healing & DPS thing I'd say take it at your own pace, it's not a huge deal if you don't feel confident mixing the two to begin with, it's good practice for later and can make runs go quicker, but is not real requirement until much later, meaning you can learn at your own pace. The priority is that everybody is alive and if you have space where you're doing nothing throw in some DPS spells. The good news is, especially for a lot of lower dungeons the healing requirement is low and your variety of abilities is low so you have less to think about whilst you get the hang of it. My usual advice is to start small and build on it rather than try to learn everything at once. The main reason people pick up on healers that don't DPS is because there's often big gaps where you don't need to heal and people prefer their healers to be not sit back and do nothing during that periods. So I wouldn't worry to much about if you struggle with the balance as long as you keep healing your number 1 priority. With time you'll get better and more confident with it.

When the healer & DPS balance becomes most important isn't until you're in high level content, by which point I'd expect you'll have got the hang of it by the time you're trying to heal there.

With regards to Cure/Cure II, Cure II is your big heal. Cure I will gradually become more and more redundant as you level. The main downside to Cure II is that it uses more MP, but WHM is generally good for MP management. So at a lower level you might want to use Cure I before Cure II in the chance you trigger a free Cure, but the moment Cure I feels laborious to get people's health up start using Cure 2 more.

Eventually you'll probably remove Cure I from your kit entirely.

Something else to consider is that your journey learning to play a healer might be a little odd, because of how healing jobs have evolved. To begin with you're going to learn you core spells that make up your bread and butter. Cure, Cure II, Medica, Medica II, Regen. Then you'll find you'll get nifty abilities that make up your filling like Assize, Asylum you Afflatus spells, Divine Benison and so on - all your oGCD's.

You will start to find that your core spells become secondary to your oGCD's, you might see this this 60-80 but mostly in 70-80. oGCD's give mobility and can be weaved between abilities, which will likely be between DPS moves. That's something for later to think about, but main thing. Learn your core abilities and build from there.

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Originally Posted by IDontPetLalas

1- I think that it's very important to say that healing at low levels isn't the same as at end levels, with all of the skills that you will get, no matter which healer you pick. So it's fair to say- don't stress at the very beginning with too much DPS, just throw out a dot (if you're very nervous)

2- saying that DPS is "not necessary except for savage content" while being technically true, would also end end up being incredibly boring, and potentially cause a wipe. That is because, dear friends, it has happened that you (a healer) can potentially do more DPS than the occasional DPS. Many strange and wonderful things can happen in DF.
3 - By the time that you get to higher dungeons, the more you can personally contribute, the less stress you can actually have. Tank CDs only last so long. If combine prep pre-pull then do damage during the pull then you can deal with larger pulls. Otherwise, if you weren't to add your damage large pulls can be hell.

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It may be boring, but at the same time. They are playing at their own pace..and a healer not DPSing in a dungeon won't result in a wipe..at least so far I haven't seen in my entire time of playing this game. But who knows..I can not speak for everyone. But anyways, I say it's not necessary because it truly isn't. I also said they can ease their way into it when they are comfortable. It is better to tell someone that than to say it is expected all the time. I use to be a healer that was extremely nervous to DPS. Until someone told me the exact same thing. Now, I DPS all the time. It doesn't hurt to be truthful to someone that is new than to give them this impression that it's DPS or be severely punished for it. Which sadly..I have seen far too many times on this forum.

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Originally Posted by Seoulstar

It may be boring, but at the same time. They are playing at their own pace..and a healer not DPSing in a dungeon won't result in a wipe..at least so far I haven't seen in my entire time of playing this game. But who knows..I can not speak for everyone. But anyways, I say it's not necessary because it truly isn't. I also said they can ease their way into it when they are comfortable. It is better to tell someone that than to say it is expected all the time. I use to be a healer that was extremely nervous to DPS. Until someone told me the exact same thing. Now, I DPS all the time. It doesn't hurt to be truthful to someone that is new than to give them this impression that it's DPS or be severely punished for it. Which sadly..I have seen far too many times on this forum.

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I very much agree here. I think the concept can seem scary to somebody who has little to no confidence, but there's oodles of space to build it before it becomes an issue.

I think my only requirement is that people aren't being lazy. If there's less or no DPS from the healer because they're new and aren't confidence enough to manage the two, I say "no worries".

But I think when there's only a handful of healing abilities too and if you've got the core understanding of how to heal, it could be good practice to throw in DPS attacks before that kit expands too, rather than trying to learn it when you've got more to juggle.

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Originally Posted by Aikeiko

Hello =D I was wanting to try healing, but I was told that I needed to be able to dps and heal at the same time, which kind of makes me nervous, especially in higher dungeons. I was also wondering when I should use Cure 2 over Cure on my White Mage (I don't have the healer I want yet, Astrologian)

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To be technical, healers possess very few skills that heal and damage at the same time. What you are really being told is that your GCDs should be used for damage when healing is not required. While this does apply to healing in general, it more or less refers to optimization of your kit and is emphasized at endgame.

The leveling experience can be, and will be different. Early on, you won't have access to all of your skills, which means you will have to resort to using GCDs to heal much faster, but this concept never changes throughout your entire time as healer in FFXIV. Only the amount of threshold it takes for you to resort to GCD heals.

If you are just starting out, the expectation of you should only be to keep everyone alive as best as possible. Keeping everyone alive while also dealing out a lot of damage is an expectation of experienced healers who have been doing it for a while, and have cleared various forms of content from easy to difficult. By difficult, I am referring to content that pushes YOU. You don't have to be Savage raider to be an experienced healer, but also know that running any form of PvE over and over again will create this expectation of you.

As for your specific question. Cure 1 is basically used until you either get Cure 2, or you don't have sufficient mana to cast Cure 2 (in which case you're likely screwed anyway). The idea of MP efficiency in regards to which heal you should be using is an antiquated concept in FFXIV, and it exists in the form of Cure 1, and the procs tied to it. You still need to keep it on your hotbars though in the case you are synced to a level below Cure 2 availability.

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Originally Posted by Saefinn

I very much agree here. I think the concept can seem scary to somebody who has little to no confidence, but there's oodles of space to build it before it becomes an issue.

I think my only requirement is that people aren't being lazy. If there's less or no DPS from the healer because they're new and aren't confidence enough to manage the two, I say "no worries".

But I think when there's only a handful of healing abilities too and if you've got the core understanding of how to heal, it could be good practice to throw in DPS attacks before that kit expands too, rather than trying to learn it when you've got more to juggle.

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We all have our own personal experiences, but I have seen (albeit extremely rarely) where the only DPS left was yours truly (the healer) and the tank, and while I give full credit to said tank- he would not have been able to solo the boss with both DPS floor-tanking.

That being said - my response was not to say that someone new to healer should think about doing better DPS that the DPS in there party. In fact, I clearly am saying - if you are new- add DPS slowly as you learn to heal.

Your last line expresses it extremely well.

If someone says that people are severely punished for not DPSing on the forums? I'm sure we can find all kinds of opinions, but the majority of people that I've talked to would expect both DPS and healing from a healer who has some knowledge of a dungeon, and outside of specific content that most players don't ever touch they aren't very demanding at that. As long as the party is alive we just have 3 simple DPS buttons to hit and perhaps 1 buff or debuff. It really isn't onerous. I just have to look at my summoner in comparison (that DPS rotation is a nightmare imo).

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Originally Posted by Aikeiko

Hello =D I was wanting to try healing, but I was told that I needed to be able to dps and heal at the same time, which kind of makes me nervous, especially in higher dungeons. I was also wondering when I should use Cure 2 over Cure on my White Mage (I don't have the healer I want yet, Astrologian)

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1. You are playing a 'Healer' role. Keeping everybody alive is your MAIN PRIORITY. Familiarize yourself with your healing kits & choose the right healing kit to heal. It's generally not needed to keep everbody at full health all the time, but if you have to start learning from there, it's much better than zero effort.
2. You got first step alright? Now the next step: resist the urge to top up everybody all the time and use that time to DPS until you need to heal again. Even if it means to leave them at 1 HP and still running around. (hyperbole) They don't die, so you're still doing your job.
3. Comfortable enough with 2nd step? Next, adjust accordingly. Encounters in FFXIV are generally scripted in a way you can plan out your heals efficiently to maximize DPSing. But players behavior are not, so be ready to react accordingly if mistakes happens. These are those times when you'll have a quick pop questions in your head such as "Can this DPS survive next unavoidable damage?" ; "How many GCDs left until next tankbuster?" ; "How much healing my random co-healer will pitch in after next major damage?" ; "Do I think this DPS is in danger of dying due to more mistakes?".

The only way to get these steps right is to play more and experience more. It won't always be perfect but don't worry, because we're not unicorns ;)

[Cure I] is your main healing spell for WHM until lv30 where you receive [Cure II] from its job quest. At that point, your usage of [Cure I] will diminish drastically, preferably zero usage beyond lv50+. Arguably not even worthy to provide a slot for it in your hotbar, because we have lv syncing. AST's equivalent of that is [Benefic I] & [Benefic II], same rule applies.

It's all about practice. Your first priority is keeping people alive, and not doing as much DPS is ok so long as you're aware that contributing to DPS is a goal you should reach. Start off keeping people alive, then move on to noticing what % of their HP your heals tend to recover and not healing until they drop below that (minimize overheals basically), and that will free up time you can use to toss out damage.

Thank you all for the tips and such =D I really appreciate it ^_^

As a side note
Benediction isn't a panick oh shit button, it's a tool like any other. If you spent the whole fight / dungeon not using it then it means you wasted an opportunity to full heal the tank with an ogcd. Same goes for asylum, it is not only for raid DMG (preferably tho)
For instance, if by using it on the first pack of monster it is up for the boss where there are a good opportunity to use it. Just throw it on the first pack to heal the tank, it is good free ogcd heal.

The core idea is to not let your ogcd go to waste. They are not panick button.

Also as a whm you have access to a lot of Regen, let it do it's job.

Many new whm pop a med2 then spam med1, leaving everyone with a Heal over time that will not heal anything because they're already full.

Also, your goal is to be sure people have enough hp to survive the next aoe.

If you know there is around 30s before the next aoe, no need to rush, just pop an asylum, assize or a medica2 and let the hot do its job. And no one needs to be full of the aoe isn't life threatening .

If everyone is at 80% and the ale barely does 40% of the party's health, you're fine, they'll survive

Finally, you'r not a baby sitter.
If someone dies from an attack they were suppose to dodge it's their fault.
Even if healing them prior to the attack could have saved them, it is their fault.
There is a big red aoe marker under their foot, if they can't move it's their issue.

The only thing the shouldn't die from are aoe they can't dodge.

You should deal damage whenever healing is unnecessary. Naturally, it's okay to start off skittish and unsure when healing is and is not necessary, and if you dedicate yourself to it I'm sure you'll be able to get used to when it is and isn't. Of course, try not to be so skittish that you never deal damage - the best way to get used to when you should and should not is by taking risks and trying it.

Worst case? You wipe, say "Sorry, pushing my limits a bit, I'll reel it back in there!" and move on.

As for when to use Cure I vs Cure II, you use Cure I when your MP is stretched so thin that you cannot afford to use Cure II, as its MP:Healing ratio is better and it has the chance to proc a free Cure II.

However, since Cure I's healing-per-cast is so much weaker, you generally want to avoid using it (Freecure is generally a trap) wherever you can, and instead use Cure II, Afflatus Solace (an equivalent to Cure II that costs a Lily instead of MP and has no cast time), Tetragrammaton (an equivalent to Cure II that has no cost but can be used only once every minute) and so on. This is because to heal the same as (technically slightly more than) a Cure II you need to cast Cure I twice, meaning if you instead cast Cure II you could have cast Holy, Stone, Aero, and so on as well, provided your MP can sustain this (it usually can).

As you level you will get more and more tools that both reduce the number of times you need to cast Cure II (sparing you from spending MP on it) and increase your MP efficiency (meaning spending MP on it is less draining on your overall reserves). This means that generally over time Cure I will see less and less use, unless you hop into super-hardcore Ultimate raiding or similar, where I hear the world-first players resorted to using Cure I to spare their MP... But if you're taking on the toughest content in the game, then you're probably experienced with and good enough at your class that you don't need my advice any more!

The biggest favor you can do yourself is to tackle fights with an idea of just healing. But pay attention to the instances where you don't need to heal. These are the places where you can safely insert dps. You can start with something as simple as the Aero DoT and insert some Stones if it's single target and some Holy if it's multiples.

WHM has strong heal over time in Regen and Medica II, so this can tick away doing a lot of the healing for us and allowing us to slip in that dps. If you take this approach, you won't fall into the tunnel vision mindset some healers do and find yourself not able to react well if unexpected things occur. We don't mitigate damage. We react to it. And getting comfortable with the amount your heals do, how effective your HoTs are, and studying the flow of the fight will allow you to easily drop out of dps mode to drop a heal and slide right back in again with little trouble.

So use your HoTs, keep your party's health at a decent level, and slip in dps when you've got windows where nothing is happening and you'll get comfortable with flip flopping in no time.

As for Cure II, I is still a bit useful after you get Cure II if you're in a high healing situation. If you're able to use Cure II as the primary heal and not be out of MP, go ahead and switch. Otherwise use Cure I as you need to. You won't really need it at higher levels since if there isn't immediate incoming damage, you can drop a Regen to do your work for you.

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Originally Posted by TaleraRistain

Snip!

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Respectfully, I disagree with you on basically every point.

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Originally Posted by TaleraRistain

The biggest favor you can do yourself is to tackle fights with an idea of just healing.

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Approaching things with so skittish an attitude will surely lead you to miss opportunities to DPS, and in all likelihood build bad habits in healing (typically by overhealing or healing when it will be nullified soon after). Instead, I would advocate looking at every fight with a mindset of "Do I need to heal this, or can I let it be?"

The first time into something, assuming you're completely blind, assume the worst and act accordingly, but take note of what happens - did I need to top everyone up after that raid-wide, or can I leave it to tools like Asylum? If a heavy raid-wide comes up afterward that executes anybody left low, you need to heal quickly, but on the other hand there might be a mechanic that sets everyone's HP to 1, nullifying all the healing you just did. If there's nothing for a long time except dodging, can you trust your party to dodge properly? In Duty Finder I'd likely say 'no', but if I'm playing with my friends I'd just tell them not to stand in fire.

By keeping this mindset, your focus is set on quickly finding the most efficient way to heal an encounter. This most-efficient way will, by the nature of healing, have the most space for DPS, and so by focussing on healing well you are also indirectly optimising your damage output.

(Split into two posts due to the extremely-limited character count, apologies)

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Originally Posted by TaleraRistain

We don't mitigate damage. We react to it. And getting comfortable with the amount your heals do, how effective your HoTs are, and studying the flow of the fight will allow you to easily drop out of dps mode to drop a heal and slide right back in again with little trouble.

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Playing a Healer reactively is quite possibly the worst way to play a Healer. It leads to second-guessing, indecision, not planning your resource expenditure, and plenty more things that will make healing the fight harder, and to top it all off it will lower the damage you do as a knock-on effect of all of these.

While Scholar and Astrologian have more in the way of shields than White Mage, that is not to say that White Mage should not be being just as proactive.

Have you ever played The Chrysalis in i90 gear on White Mage? This was the trial that really hammered this home for me, back in early Heavensward when I first started playing. Double and Triple Spark were doing so much damage to the Tank that they would die almost immediately, and so I had to learn the spells' timing and cast Cure II such that it would hit the Tank after the first Spark, but before the second, and then later when Triple arrived I had to do this twice back-to-back.

Had I been reacting to the Tank taking damage, I would simply not have had enough time to cast before the second/third Spark hit and deleted them, and we would wipe. By quickly learning when in the spells' cast I could begin my own to hit during the delay, I learned to act proactively, allowing me to keep the Tank alive.

Additionally, I'd like to mention that with the removal of Cleric Stance, Healers no longer have a 'DPS mode' that they're locked into, any such phenomenon is entirely a player-sided problem, and one I suspect born from this kind of thinking. Abandon the concept of having two 'modes' and fuse them together. Any time you don't need to be casting a healing spell, cast a damaging one - you can always cancel out of it if you realise you actually need to be doing something else; three-and-a-half Stones and a Cure II is better than zero Stones and a Cure II, after all.

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Originally Posted by TaleraRistain

So use your HoTs, keep your party's health at a decent level, and slip in dps when you've got windows where nothing is happening and you'll get comfortable with flip flopping in no time.

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As I touched on a little previously, don't think of it as a 'DPS phase' and a 'Healing phase', but rather think of it as 'Healer gameplay', all in one soup. If you wait for windows in which nothing is happening to deal damage, you will end the fight with no damage done. Find the points in the fight that you need to be healing or doing mechanics, and work backward from there - any point at which you're not healing and not doing mechanics is a point you should be dealing damage.

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Originally Posted by TaleraRistain

We don't mitigate damage. We react to it.

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We, absolutely, 200%, can and should mitigate. It's in our kits, so let's not sleep on it if it can save us a few GCDs we could've spent DPSing in the long run and therefore MP.
This also applies to DPS btw, thinking about DPS mitigating is even more outlandish than thinking about healers mitigating but addle, feint, troubadour and the likes to name some common ones should be used too.

ABC of healers and casters: Always Be Casting
If you have nothing to heal > PewPew
Use your MP regen on cooldown

Start small, ensure your dots are on boss 100% on the time
When you have access to Holy, give at least one on each pulls (Stunned mobs = no damages)
Avoid using Cure 1, prefer oGCD heals when you have them. Cast heals only when you have nothing else to heal with.

You will soon realize you dont need to heal as much as you think. People dont need to be topped off all the time
Plan when you use Benediction, the best single heal in the game (and free!). Let the tank lose damage, use it before it is too late.

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Originally Posted by Aikeiko

Hello =D I was wanting to try healing, but I was told that I needed to be able to dps and heal at the same time, which kind of makes me nervous, especially in higher dungeons. I was also wondering when I should use Cure 2 over Cure on my White Mage (I don't have the healer I want yet, Astrologian)

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I don't want to discourage you, but out of all the healers astro is the hardest to master. It's not impossible for everyone...astro just has A LOT going on. Cards, Heals, DPS. Like most of the posts in here I would say learn the basics before you learn the advanced. Here are some tips I have adopted from others over the years.

1. Learn how strong your tank is.
2. Diurnal or Noct? it doesn't matter. Some will say you need to run Noct for High end, but I have run diurnal in savage and extremes. Both work fine, but need a different playstyle. Noct can be an MP hog I find, but others have really mastered Noct.
3. Get very familiar with your cards, learn what each one does, and which party member benefits the most from each one. Read the tooltips and understand the job gauge. Learn the class icons and what DPS they represent (ranged,melee,caster)
4. Believe it or not but Cards are an Astros form of DPS also. If you aren't using your cards your not helping DPS. If you are sitting on draw off cooldown your not helping. Draw and Play as much as you can, plus it fills your MP.
5. Seals can be a pain especially if your fishing for a certain seal to complete your divination. Don't sweat it. That's just RNG for ya. Pulling the perfect seals get's much easier when you get sleave draw. And some astros forget they have minor arcana.
6. Macros! Find some macros that work for you. Focus target is a great way to macro your DPS buttons. Target through target is slick way to toss out a combust or malefic while not leaving the tank or party member.

Astro is insanely good at healing for some odd reason, and has some of the best heals to toss out when your in a tight spot. I would watch some guides on astro if that's going to be your main healer.

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Originally Posted by Tweets

Additionally, I'd like to mention that with the removal of Cleric Stance, Healers no longer have a 'DPS mode' that they're locked into, any such phenomenon is entirely a player-sided problem, and one I suspect born from this kind of thinking. Abandon the concept of having two 'modes' and fuse them together. Any time you don't need to be casting a healing spell, cast a damaging one - you can always cancel out of it if you realise you actually need to be doing something else; three-and-a-half Stones and a Cure II is better than zero Stones and a Cure II, after all.

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I think it's incredibly easy to DPS on astro. I thought it was a huge pain to switch stances and pop cleric on and off. Cleric stance being gone has allowed healers to really push out the DPS now, at least I find anyway.

It is infinitely easier for me to DPS now that I don't have to swap to a stance and back out. Weaving heals and DPS is also infinitely easier, as for astro it can get troublesome with cards to manage while DPSing and healing. It used to be way better with Heavensward/Stormblood cards (miss royal road), but those days are gone.

Astro DPS is split with cards and normal spells (malefic, gravity). Combust is a one off as it needs no cast time and should be no excuse for combust falling off...it's so easy to cast.

I personally get bored on WHM as I miss my cards :D