What makes WHM special? Nothing anymore.

[Eudyptes]

From someone who plays both classes my AST can not out heal my WHM...AST is much more diverse but WHM is pure unadulterated healing and managing my MP on WHM is much easier....so they both still have separate roles

I'm noticing a common theme here.

It seems like everyone with both ast and whm at 60 are saying this isn't a problem and that whm still has its "identity". While people with just whm are the ones crying foul. Same with sch's in other threads too. Something tells me in a week or two this will all blow over when people realize they're seeing a problem that doesn't exist.

[echoica]

Most of the people that seem to be comparing/having an opinion on these healing jobs don't even have all 3 healers levelled to 60 or do savage raid content. Alex normal is easy, running dungeons? Who cares which healer comes along as long as they aren't garbage. As someone who does raid and have all 3 healers levelled, I can tell you that all this talk about WHM being replaced or undesirable is absurd. And even if you do bring an AST in place of WHM you won't have the mind party bonus which for progression is kind of a big deal.

[Gist]

What would be wrong with having a ~100 potency buff on all healing skills (Hello 1k potency Tetragrammaton <3)? It would certainly resolidify WHM's identity, which I've expressed before is kind of lacking. ^_^

[Akyio]

i knew these threads will start coming up. thats where SE messed up - making a healer mimmicing 2 other healers, if they made a third unique healer without copying abilities, these threads wouldnt be coming. AST is fine now, but people will start now complaining because it can mimmic decently one or another healer instead of being a failure like it was

[Minorinz]

I think it's pretty simple, SE did a good job balancing all 3 healers because:

1- Heavy AOE damage with heavy single targeting damage: SCH/WHM Comp
2- Heavy AOE damage with moderate single targeting damage: AST/WHM Comp
3- Moderate-to-heavy AOE damage with moderate-to-heavy single targeting damage: SCH/AST Comp

sounds good to me, ofc all are still viable but not completely optimized.

[Gist]

i knew these threads will start coming up. thats where SE messed up - making a healer mimmicing 2 other healers, if they made a third unique healer without copying abilities, these threads wouldnt be coming. AST is fine now, but people will start now complaining because it can mimmic decently one or another healer instead of being a failure like it was

You forget that no thread in the history of FFXIV Forums inside a role discussion section for a DoW/DoM has ever been looked at by a red, and they will continue to be neglected because

The purpose of this forum is for players to hold discussions on Healer roles and its tactics with other players.

and not suggest balance changes.

So no actual help will come from making these kinds of threads in here. We're all doomed to stagnate and wait in suspense to see if the devs have similar concerns. But at least we can feel better while doing so by complaining about it.

[FoxyAreku]

An astro still can't do even close to the amount of HPS a white mage can. I think you're fine.

[Rawrz]

Synastry is Mega sexalicious though. ._. xD My hubby was messing around and crit healed 15k from one Benific II on my war(Defiance). 25% + 20%+40% add up for that burst heal. Its comforting to see when that is up my AST partner will have the healing power of a Divine Sealed WHM at keeping the tank up at least.

[Dynalon]

To OP:
I have both healers at 60 and so far I can say this:
Considering normal situation, where both healers will just use spells, which conserve mana and avoid overhealing, WHM healing output is almost identical, with medica 2 being slightly stronger.
This is where WHM is better in my opinion:
- Divine seal still feels stronger than Synastry, because it provides 10% higher bonus and has shorter cd, Synastry might look better on paper because of longer duration, but in reality when extra healing is needed it usually doesn't last longer than those 15s, so in most situations Divine seal is better, also by providing 10% more it further increases gap between medica 2 and AH, which also favors WHM in terms of mana management because AST might be forced to cast one more helios to compensate for this gap
- As others have pointed out that range on medica 2 is important in situations where raid is spread
- Why is everyone ignoring Cure 3? I know its situational and mana ineffective, but still its strongest AoE heal in the game, what can AST do if AH hot + CU hot + helios spam is not enough?
- As others have pointed out lightspeed doesn't decrease GCD so it only conserves some mana if used in burst healing, or allows you to heal on the run.
- I feel like my contribution to raid dps is not so random as in case of AST, on Tuesday I did dungeon where I draw only Ewer / Spire, and AST normal dps is not so good
- Assize provides better burst healing than helios with lightspeed and also gives me option to choose between burst raid heal and aoe dps
- AST doesnt have simply nothing close to Benediction, Benediction ignores any kind of healing debuff on you or your target, works with cleric stance as well
- WHM has some awesome traits, which conserve lot of mana (free cure, medica mp reduction, cure 3 mp reduction), AST has nothing like this, instead you have to pray, you get correct card ...

[deos]

lets see, what is really unique to WHM now, something no other heal class has anything similar to...
- benediction (100% heal)
- cure 3 (strong small aoe heal)
- repose (sleep)
- fluid aura push (which everybody loves when we do...)
- medica 2 is the largest aoe heal skill
- assize instant high aoe-dmg with huge range (in CS)
- cure 2 / 3 mp-reduction proccs
- medica mp-reduction proccs

and some things WHM can do easier (and instant with swiftcast) but not really unique
- stoneskin 2 (stoneskin the whole group)
- aero 3 (aoe dot)

so yeah, benediction on its 5 min cd is the only thing really special to WHM now, together with the very situational cure 3 and sleep. other than that its just stuff for convenience
the assize dmg aoe can make some add phases an instant kill though, for example on the first boss in neverreap, which is really really nice :3

but compared to what SCH unique skills are (plus the fairy), and the new upgraded AST card buffs this is kind of a letdown. not because WHM could be too weak, but because the class just offers not much unique to it anymore

to be honest, i would love to at least see some cooldowns reduced. if SE wants WHM to keep beeing the raw healing class, why not reduce cd of assize to 60 sec and tetragrammaton to 40 sec? also i would love to have graniteskin back, but i dont think this will happen >_>

ps: yeah WHM is also the only one with MND group bonus. thats 3% bonus MND. nice to have but not mandatory