White Mage vs Scholar - Why is White Mage lacking?

[melflomil]

I'm in T11now and there is no way of getting by the add phase without a whm. I just don't see it happening.

[Cynfael]

There's nothing wrong with the White Mage class or it's skill set. But there's something terribly wrong with the mental image the playerbase has of White Mage and the current mainstream play style meta

Very much this.

*DS; Medica II spam, Cure II spam, Regen on everyone*
"Whee, healing is so eas--- wait, where's my MP? Why are all the mobs beating on me? WTB Aetherflow, Lustrate, and a gd Tinkerbell up in here!!"

Not saying that this is the OP's experience, but it's the attitude and behavior I observe in game.

[Lyrica_Ashtine]

Here's some more about the average duty-finder-hero White Mage or never-raided-but-a-soldiery-hero White Mage. Such as followed:

Levelled up WHM just to diversify a bit as I had both tanks and DRG at 50. I definitely thought, while leveling up, that WHM is way too easy to play.

Dead wrong lol.

Thing about White Mage is is that you do not learn a thing about healing while leveling from 1-50. Even less if you're one of those FATE-farmers who has never set foot in a dungeon. The average pattern in dungeons is like this:
hur dur idle till someone takes a bit of damage
press button to cure
hur dur idle some more

This is significantly more notable at low level dungeons. From Brayflox on you technically are taught to use Esuna more, but it's still doable without Esuna and still a HP-bar-filling-game and in Cutter's Cry/Sunken Temple you learn how to deal with mechanics as a healer. But this has nothing to do with healing itself in general. In Stone Vigil the mobs hit significantly harder, but that only reduces your idle time and still only involves filling HP bars without any other worries.

Once you hit dungeons such as Darkhold and Aurum Vale, the inability of healers become more transparent. Previous dungeons hasn't taught them anything about MP management and smart-casting (name pending). In lower level dungeons MP was never an issue and even if you heal a full minute late, it won't cause a wipe or anything. Taking previous 44 levels for granted, it leads to a very common thought pattern: "Not my fault". After all, for 44 levels worth everything went fine and you didn't do anything different at all, so it has to be the others, right? This is simply wrong and majority don't even acknowledge their own failure. I would like to dub this The LoL-effect.

The moment you reach level 50, you're being tossed into a lion's pit without being taught anything but filling HP bars. The learning curve for white mage turned from a flat beach to a Normandy invasion scenario. Healing simply became too hard as a white mage because you're always three steps behind and too dull because they're still doing it like they've done from level 1-49.

This would lead to a very common pattern (for white mages):
Divine Seal is never used
Eye for an Eye is never used
Presence of Mind is never used
Shroud of Saints isn't used till very low on MP
Regen/Medica II are up for no reason (no enmity mechanic awareness)
Virus is never used
Fluid Aura is either overused or never used*

With this, almost everything a white mage has to offer with it's skill set is being denied. No wonder it's dull if 80% of their skill set isn't even used properly!

* Fluid Aura is a 150 potency ability for free! Use it wisely as it can cause annoyances on targets that can be knocked away

[Slib]

Very much this.

*DS; Medica II spam, Cure II spam, Regen on everyone*
"Whee, healing is so eas--- wait, where's my MP? Why are all the mobs beating on me? WTB Aetherflow, Lustrate, and a gd Tinkerbell up in here!!"

Not saying that this is the OP's experience, but it's the attitude and behavior I observe in game.

Heh, actually for me on T11 phase 1, the tanks got hit so hard that I was like, Regen, cure 1 on MT a few times, OH **** OT is dying and I cant even keep up with the main tanks health loss! Cure 2... ok nerve gas dodge time, regen both tanks, swap to cleric stance, fluid aero 2 > aero > fluid aura, swap out. etc.

This right here causes mp loss. The pressure the tanks take is pretty insane and I wouldn't want to know what Phase 3 would be like assuming tanks accidentally got a stack of vulnerability debuff ><

When I switched back to scholar, it was much easier to get through it.

[NorthernLadMSP]

Shroud of Saint has a potency, which means that the mp you regen using it depends only on your weapon damage. Upgrade to a better weapon and you get more MP. 'It feels like a flat amount' because you dont change your weapon very often.

Sorry, this is completely wrong. Shroud recovers a flat amount, no matter what weapon or piety score you have.

[DarkmoonVael]

snip

You are being so selective it is not even funny now. If you honestly think the entire of final coil (and it seems turn 9 as well) doesnt require a white mage, please ask your group to drop their white mage and that you, as a scholar will solo heal everything.

Lets take your stance on white mages protect, which lasts 30 mins. You seem to think a couple of buffs that can be use every few minutes on a scholar somehow makes this obsolete. Now a good healer here would say every little bit of mitigation helps. I run scholar in my raid group, and am glad thta there is a white mage with us to mitigate that little bit more damage, especially since the amount of damage that protect mitigates over the course of the raid adds up.
Turn 11, you use the example of a white mage stoneskinning the entire party in combat. There are very few places that this is done, you are comparing something that is not usually expected of a white mage, with something that is the schoalrs bread and butter in a fight; in-combat shielding!!!!!! Tell me, does your white mage do any healing in this fight at all, it sounds as though you think they sit their twiddling their tumbs for this fight.
Turn 10: your example is "right guys, what the scholar does here is use their unique healing spells the way they should, and shield the tank for a hit and then use lustrate to top them off". Uh huh. So your fellow healer here, that nice white mage, is he/she perchance sat there twiddling their thumbs yet again for another raid? (I am guessing no to this question)

GUYS GUYS GUYS, scholars are really lacking compared to whm, here is why:
Their AoE healing is not nearly as fast as a whm, leaving people vulnerable with mass aoe damage (look at shiva ex wind move, or most primals for that example). Scholars have to blow a lot of cooldowns just to get any where near as profficient in their AoE healing as a whm.
They are unable to shield a party member any higher than 1100 usually (unless crit adlo), i mean this just sucks compared to white mages 18% traited stoneskin.
They have no cure 3, i mean how bad would it be to have a healer that couldnt heal everyone by approx 2k health with one spell.
Shroud of saints is insane on whm, regens mp AND dumps aggro, i mean wow! Why cant scholar have such an awesome spell like this that help tanks out with aggro management whilst gaining mana back.
They have to choose between fairies, meaning they dont get full access to their spells, unlike whm who have full access to their spells at all times, making them more proficient in their healing.
They get no single target regen spell, which is really really powerful when used properly. You can stick this on a tank and it helps heal the damage it takes from single target boss moves.
Whm mage gets awesome procs, scholars procs suck. Free cure 2 anyone? Half price cure 3 anyone?

Both healing classes in this game are absolutely exceptional at what they do, they both have a very different role within the party for healing. What you seem to be doing here is very selectivly compared the 2 classes, with a heck of a lot of biased to the scholar, biased that seems to be founded soley on the premis "scholar is really good at what its designed to do and how it fits in with a raid party, why cant the whm do EXACTLY whay the scholar can do". Neither healer can do what the other does, both bring a lot to a raid. I hope your healing parnter hasnt read this threat, it seems that you think they do nothing in your raid group.

[Blitzace]

I've seen whm hit over 5k heals with crits, How do they need a buff on single target heals if i may ask ?

[Slib]

You are being so selective ...

I'm trying to point out how Scholar can do things that a White Mage generally can not. Scholar brings MORE to the fight than a White Mage. Sure, the extra mitigation is nice. Is it necessary? No, as long as people stay alive. I do love having our White Mage there, but would would be even better was if he could put out as much DPS as I can in a raid fight while maintaining effective healing. For a White Mage, that is VERY risky and also will run you dry of MP fast in a long term fight.

What I am trying to get at is perfect play. I agree that having a white mage is nice, but it could be better and more on par with Scholar. Having a pet heal while you are dpsing and having Lustrates be your Guardian Angel is far better than tossing a Regen on the tank, swapping into Cleric Stance, then someone messes up and you have to Bene them because they got hit by Lunar Dynamo and they are about to get meteor striked. 5 Minute cooldown used when it could have been 2 of 3 charges that have a 1 minute cooldown.

You also don't always need magic defense in raids. Most of the painful magic AoE happens during a phase transition, like T9 and T11. That's where fey covenant takes over as being a staple in the Scholar utility, along with sacred soil and succor + 10% stoneskin (if needed)

Stop thinking that I think White Mage is completely USELESS. It just has a lot less Utility/Versatility than Scholar.

[Lyrica_Ashtine]

You're seriously looking down on White Mages by making posts like these, though. This is passive-aggressive white mage hate right there.

[IceSpear]

You're seriously looking down on White Mages by making posts like these, though. This is passive-aggressive white mage hate right there.

It seems like your extremely butt hurt about this kind of topic yet when the game first came out I remember everybody was hating on Scholar and White Mage was best for all content now it's the other way around in some peoples eyes.