3.0 Adjustments to Existing Actions for WHM & SCH

[Blueyes]

So in addition to all the fancy new spells being added we also received this information from the preliminary patch notes:

[2.0] In accordance with the raise in level cap, the following job actions and parameters have been adjusted.

White Mage:

Stone
Protect
Proshell
Stone II
Presence of Mind
Stoneskin
Holy
Aero II
Stoneskin II

Scholar:

Lustrate
Fey Light
Fey Glow

I'm curious to hear thoughts and speculation on what some of these changes may entail.

Starting with Scholar, the adjustments to Fey Light and Fey Glow was something I expected with the way spell and skill speed buffs have been changed. I'm guessing a reduced potency from these buffs, but by how much is unsure. The change to Lustrate was less expected. Probably because it's been adjusted in a previous patch that saw it buffed from a 20% heal to 25%. I'm not sure if they consider it too good or not strong enough at this point. A possible nerf would be to put it on a short recast timer so it can't be spammed back to back or maybe the ability to do that doesn't bother them at all. It's hard to say.

Now White Mage has a much longer list of changes being made to its existing actions with one of which being a change to Proshell. It doesn't mention Proshell being replaced so it might just receive a different effect. Possibly a small increase to physical defense instead of magic or maybe it will just last longer. Or maybe it is getting replaced with something entirely different and the notes simply didn't explicitly state that.

I won't go over every spell being adjusted for White Mage, but one thing that seemed odd to me was that there was no mention of changing Shroud of Saints or the trait that enhances it. That seems very odd considering the way MP costs are going to scale at level 60. Will the changes to the damaging spells simply be a reduced MP cost? Or will Presence of Mind receive an added MP recovery effect?

Anyway, I'm curious to hear people's thoughts. Heavensward is just around the corner, but even after the expansion goes live I think people will still be interested in providing feedback in regard to how these changes have affected gameplay and whether or not they like said changes.

[pandabearcat]

Hoping its something like "Stone II/III" now no longer costs 100% of your mana to cast.

Presence of mind perhaps a lower CD, it was kinda long for the fairly lackluster benefit it gave.

Aero II maybe longer duration, less dps, or longer duration, higher mana cost.

Stoneskin mana cost may be lower to make it worthwhile casting in battle.

[Remilia_Nightfall]

To be fair I believe they are just getting changed to be "up to speed" due to the level cap. For example, Stone II will receive more potency since it is supposed to be used at level cap as well - keeping it at its current potency would make it useless.

I bet most of those skills (if not all) are being "adjusted" in this sense - we are not talking about nerfs of buffs, simply about making them viable at 60 as they were at 50. That's all.

I hardly believe they are either nerfing or buffing all those things, it is too long of a list.

[Amaret]

Presence of mind perhaps a lower CD, it was kinda long for the fairly lackluster benefit it gave.

Check the patchnotes about skill speed changes. Presence of mind would be too powerful with that changes. (Same goes for Selene)

Stoneskin mana cost may be lower to make it worthwhile casting in battle.

It is already worthwhile in battle. o.ô i think they nerf / buff the % it block since we get a huge amount of hp now. Same goes for Lustrate.

Also there is a new buff from AST, which reduces the Cast Time Delay. So maybe they change the buffs to this?

There will be changes to Miasma, Miasma II and Bane too btw. Just listed @ SMN

[Hustensaft]

Presence of mind perhaps a lower CD, it was kinda long for the fairly lackluster benefit it gave.

Presence of Mind, alongside Selene buffs, will most likely be nerfed instead of buffed. You should expect PoM to give significantly less Spellspeed.

[Selli]

For a couple of WHM's skills anyway, I wonder if they're planning on making them 100% hits, like SCH has for some of their skills. I could see them doing this to our DoTs at least (or just Aero II, anyway .-.).

I wonder if for Stone and Stone II they are adjusting the MP costs? They're both huge MP sinks considering they're WHM's spamable attacks (consider them kind of like Ruins, LOL?). If you have the time to DPS, popping Presence of Mind and spamming Stone II (for 15 seconds, mind you) is gonna cost you about 1,500-2,000 MP which is pretty significant for a WHM.

As for Holy... They're probably nerfing it. Again. D: Which makes me rather depressed because I love Holy so much, lol.

I dunno what they're doing to Presence of Mind but they better not be nerfing that. .-. I only use it for DPS or if I'm in a pinch and the tank/party needs lots of healing right now. It's a very important skill. D:

Stoneskin II... they better be giving that mofo to everyone. ._. Even before we had it, to Stoneskin and Protect 4-8 people took significantly less time than a poor SCH who has to Protect, Stoneskin 4-8 people (one at a time), Aldo the Tank(s), Succor the other 3-7 people. And hardly anyone waited for that. It was one of my main reasons why I don't like running SCH in dungeons, because no one waits for your freaken buffs. >:c

[t-a-l-a-n-m-e-r-c-e-r]

Don't nerf my Holy! :<

[KisaiTenshi]

As for Holy... They're probably nerfing it. Again. D: Which makes me rather depressed because I love Holy so much, lol.

Don't nerf my Holy! :<

I wonder if the skill speed changes to DoT/HoT's affect how long debuffs (stun/bind) last.

[Eisenhower]

Stone/Stone II/Holy/Aero II are all spells with direct damage components, and it might be that they'll be changed to allow WHMs to dps in high-end environments without having to stack accuracy. The odd thing is that Aero I isn't on the list. The tanks got the passive accuracy buff on their tank stances, probably to prevent tanking in their aggressive stance. So it's not wild to think that new bosses will have a jump in accuracy needed. Although DPS classes can compensate their itemization, I don't think us healers will get those stats so the spells change instead. Or perhaps it's to scale the output in lieu of the spellspeed and new Stone III and Aero III spells.

Stoneskin/Stoneskin II might get a % change or a mechanical overhaul. I'm leaning towards the former.

Protect/Proshell will be changed for parity between the healer classes, this we've heard from the live letter.

Presence of Mind is because of the spellspeed changes. Of that I'm certain. But I have no clue if it will be a pure buff or nerf.

[Verdan]

Keep in mind that PoM currently doubles our spellspeed. With spellspeed effecting Dots and Hots, I'd gird for a decrease in potency of PoM. It'll still be super awesome because we have 3 hots, 3 dots and can stack it with Divine Seal, but it's probably not gonna double it anymore.
Or maybe it's all just scaling stuff and we keep it. I hope that's what the rest is.