What makes WHM special? Nothing anymore.

[J-Dax]

Astrologian doesn't have a comparable version to benediction, but essential dignity is.. essentially tetragrammaton. The main difference is that the potency is variable while tetra has a fixed 700.

And is therefore different.

Not everyone will stay on progression stages forever, nobody wants to hear a "now change classes because we're farming now". I think most tanks heard that, mainly paladin mains who were forced to go DRK/WAR due static preference for savage.

You may not stay progression forever but people are always going to enter an instance not knowing mechanics, they will always make mistakes. There will always be that one DPS standing in the red circle, always one tank who forgot what a tanking stance was. As long as these things exist, WHM will always be needed. When the s!!! hits the fan WHM healing power is always going to be welcome. Even when farming.

The issue isn't the amount of skills, it's which skills are mostly used, and every single skill they copied are pretty much most of the most used which turn both jobs way to similar.

The point is WHM still has significant differences in capabilities beyond what it has similar to other classes when taken as a whole. You can't curse about AST being able to pop a cure two and then dismiss using a benediction as unimportant. How many times have you used one of these unique spells outside of progression? How many times have you single handedly saved a party from wiping with them in DF? This is part of the discussion, part of the issue, and is important to WHM identity.

[AsakuraVN]

> Accuracy on gear which is indispensable for a WHM as every single dps skill requires it
>> DPS was buffed to the best of all 3 healers, but nothing was done to allow us to dps because "Healers don't need to dps, mr yoshi-p says"

Yoshi said current contents don't need accuracy on healer's gears, and they will add it back again when content get harder.

> Most powerful single target healing spells since benefic and benefic II are exact copies of Cure I and Cure II
>> Said copies cost LESS MP than the original skills at the exact same potency

Freecure? Overcure?

Cure III
Mind you, i love this skill. I'd marry it if i could. (i'd probably marry holy faster though) However like i said before the usefulness of cure III is negatively proportional to overgear and this game has history of throwing unnecessary gear levels to people to the point FCOB was being solo healed a month after it's release. We'll eventually get again to the point where a single medica II does the job and currently astrologian can do that with negligible losses. To add up they even gave scholars the ability to burst aoe heal with indomitability.

Solo heal isn't a bad thing, let your healer partner focus on full dps, WHM is still the best solo-healer out of the 3.

Synastry vs Divine seal
Divine seal straight up buffs every single healing spell power by 30% (except a few chosen), that's as straightfoward as it is. So a cure II that has 650 potency gets turned into 845.
Synastry is hard to calculate the potency since not everyone will get second hand heals for that long but benefic II gets turned into a 780 and then the 2nd target receives half of that, that's 20 seconds of 1170 heal potency right there. The main concern about synastry is it's higher cooldown (reduceable with the spear) and that that once the secondary target is fully healed, the second hand healing is completely wasted. Either way i wouldn't call the skills equal, but they're on equal ground.

That & Essential Dignity are the only 2 oh$h1t buttons on AST, you can count lightspeed if you want to heal while running & jumping all over the place. But WHM obviously can handle (and prevent the group from going into) emergencies much better with their steadily high HPS. AST/SCH is better at handling burst dmg skills from bosses.

Medica II range
Honestly, nobody cares. Everyone should be near the boss, no exceptions. Positionals are a mechanic everyone has in a way or another.

What about raids similar to A1? It's not really a big deal but I do often miss out 1 or 2 people with AST's AoE. Although I like to let it stays as is, since it's pretty balanced, but please don't treat it like both classes are equal.

Once again overgear is a huge concern of mine as nobody cares about healing numbers as long healing is done and in a few months nobody will care if white mage heals for more than everyone else because that heal bonus will only result on overheal. All people will care will be "can the healer dps while it doesn't need to heal?"

WHM get 1st slot in new raids & progression groups, AST/SCH combo only works better in farming groups which come far later, now that future Savage will most likely be much harder than Coil, since it already has story mode for casual ones. But then again, you can practice on solo-healing, no one gonna complaint about healer's dps when they have 5 dps in their groups.

[mp-please]

snip

Accuracy

Same happened with scob implementation, same old.

About the rest, solo healing is a viable solution, however the issue lies on party setup.
WHM+SCH, WHM can easily solo heal with SCH simply supporting with adlos and fairy if needed.
SCH+AST seems to be the perfect combo right now, sch dps while ast deals with most of the healing. Even with solo heal ast doesn't need to turn cleric on once to deal some "damage" by buffing the party.
AST+WHM seems to be the problematic combo, both are literally the same but ast wasn't built to dps outside of card buffing and their combust dots due to mp issues, meanwhile whm was but lacks the accuracy to dps efficiently.

[winsock]

WHM still has powerful single target healing spells that where not given to AST.
Benediction and Tetragrammation.

Balance of insta-heal cds:
Lustrate > benediction
Lustrate > tetra
ED > benediction
ED > tetra.

Insta-heals are more heavily weighed on accessibility than potency.

[tjw]

Balance of insta-heal cds:
Lustrate > benediction
Lustrate > tetra
ED > benediction
ED > tetra.

Insta-heals are more heavily weighed on accessibility than potency.

I typically weigh them on situational usage, in which case, yes, I weigh them on potency because I generally know how to manage cooldowns. If you're needing to use ED that often, then there's something else wrong with your healing that's not just the accessibility of oGCD heals.

But sure, lets also forget Assize. A net gain in almost all aspects of HPS, DPS and MP.

Or Asylums superior placement advantage over CU and lower risk of overhealling.

Or Presence of Mind's superior HPS/DPS output over Lightspeed.

Or Divine Seal's greater potency and lower CD than Synastry, with higher flexibility and less overhealing potential.

[winsock]

I typically weigh them on situational usage, in which case, yes, I weigh them on potency because I generally know how to manage cooldowns.

If you're going to use the management argument to say potency is what they should be weighed by. ED is still better than tetra in potency, throughput, and as a save.

The only potency argument you can take is that benediction's potency is better than ED, and even then that is conditionally dependent on the target's max HP, the buffs they have, and whether or not ED crits. And of course benediction's 5min cd is no comparison to ED's 40sec cooldown.

If you're needing to use ED that often, then there's something else wrong with your healing that's not just the accessibility of oGCD heals.

Player skill and skill balance are two seperate things. AST's were healing savage before the buff. I guess that means AST was fine right and the buffs should be reverted? No? Then ED being superior is a valid point.

But sure, lets also forget Assize. A net gain in almost all aspects of HPS, DPS and MP.

HPS or DPS, cleric stance makes sure one of them is terrible.
DPS:
are you really saying Assize is awesome because of a potential 300 potency AoE dmg every 90 seconds?
HPS:
300 potency at 15y... where have i heard of a skill like that before?
MP:
you cant look look at the MP gain and call this skill superior. MP management is a separate system altogether that is spread across several traits and abilities. The fact that the MP boost is attached to the skill is a disadvantage as far as MP management is concerned. If used too early, you risk loosing potential benefit of the potency, if used to late the mp return is less efficient.

Or Asylums superior placement advantage over CU and lower risk of overhealling.

... you get 10% dmg reduction + a HoT that isnt prepositionally restrictive after applied..

Presence of Mind
...
DS

^ these skill are what make a WHM. A 2:30 cd and a 60sec cd.

[Cynfael]

If you're going to use the management argument to say potency is what they should be weighed by. ED is still better than tetra in potency, throughput, and as a save.

ED is only superior if your target is fairly close to death already. Tetra packs a punch regardless and is potent as both a save and as an "it's up, so let's save MP" option.

HPS or DPS, cleric stance makes sure one of them is terrible.
DPS:
are you really saying Assize is awesome because of a potential 300 potency AoE dmg every 90 seconds?
HPS:
300 potency at 15y... where have i heard of a skill like that before?
MP:
you cant look look at the MP gain and call this skill superior. MP management is a separate system altogether that is spread across several traits and abilities. The fact that the MP boost is attached to the skill is a disadvantage as far as MP management is concerned. If used too early, you risk loosing potential benefit of the potency, if used to late the mp return is less efficient.

I don't follow this argument about Assize being less than great. Even if it had no damage potential it would be valued as an oGCD Medica that was not only free, but restored MP. If you judge the healing to be unnecessary for the moment, you can instead inflict significant damage with it (300 potency with no consecutive target damage reduction...). It's a flexible tool that does something good for you regardless of how you choose to use it. As for the MP restoration, 10% is a modest enough return that it's pretty difficult to waste. It's also not a crime to hold off using it for a few seconds when you know to expect a particular mechanic to heal or an add spawn to nuke.

... you get 10% dmg reduction + a HoT that isnt prepositionally restrictive after applied..

10% damage reduction from this skill is a niche application in that A) no one cares about it except for very specific raid buster moves and B) unlike the reworked HoT buff, this bonus vanishes the moment the AST drops the field. CU is quite good now, but Asylum retains its own niche.

^ these skill are what make a WHM. A 2:30 cd and a 60sec cd.

This is still a grossly simplified take on WHM that doesn't take into account how its individual skills work with each other. Besides, I'm not sure what you would want WHM to be able to do that it can't already; the holes in its kit were filled in a way similar to how those of SCH were. WHM is the most complete healing class in the game, has solid DPS options, the best aggro management cooldown (a.k.a. healbomb and get out of deep shit free card), and an arguably unique playstyle that depends entirely on player choices, timing, and anticipation to provide appropriate HPS and DPS since their power is built completely into the character itself rather than into a supplementary system like pet management or card buffing.

This isn't to say that one system is superior to the other, but it's pretty difficult to suggest that WHM lacks its own identity.

[GideonHighmourn]

Winsock, in the context of what actually occurs in-game, Assize is hardly a "disadvantage" or "useless" as you've claimed and dismissed multiple times. WHM's MP management is far superior and more reliable than AST's because of Assize, period. And yes, even Assize's 300 potency damage is amazing in the 4-man context, and AST has nothing that compares to WHM's AoE DPS because of it and Aero III combined. Assize, when used properly, can replace the need for Medica and also restored 10% MP, which is quite a chunk of MP when combined. However, AST must forego group utility/DPS contribution by (hoping for) and burning an Ewer on themselves. You can't discount Assize as being a "disadvantage" while not acknowledging that AST using Ewer on themselves is also a "disadvantage" (in your comparison/analysis), since you forgo one component of the toolkit for another (just as you do with WHM's Assize).

You can argue on-paper semantics all day, but I will always prefer WHM's toolkit to AST's when I'm looking for healing potential or DPS; it's still superior, by a noticeable amount. ED is not a bad skill but I still prefer Tetra's flat-potency vs a sliding-scale potency, because there are times where, if you want to make better use of ED, you must let people take more damage, which can often mean death in savage. I wouldn't call ED superior to Tetra, but it's a break-even at best, and WHM still wins once you consider Benediction's healing potential if used on a tank. If a tank drops low, AST must burn Synastry+ED (and be completely out of healing CD options) where a WHM only has to burn Benedition (and is still left with a myriad of healing CDs available).

WHM has, on average, 6 instant (single-target) heals available over 5 minutes and AST has 7 if used on CD, so "availability" of oGCD heals is still nearly identical. If you want to include Assize (a tool that AST has no equal to), WHM has 9 instant heals available and AST still only has 7 over 5 minutes. At 8 minutes, WHM has 13 available while AST has 12, and at 10 minutes WHM has 18 and AST has 15. So your argument that AST has more instant-heals available than WHM is also incorrect.

[winsock]

WHM has, on average, 6 instant (single-target) heals available over 5 minutes and AST has 7 if used on CD, so "availability" of oGCD heals is still nearly identical. If you want to include Assize (a tool that AST has no equal to), WHM has 9 instant heals available and AST still only has 7 over 5 minutes. At 8 minutes, WHM has 13 available while AST has 12, and at 10 minutes WHM has 18 and AST has 15. So your argument that AST has more instant-heals available than WHM is also incorrect.

You forgot lightspeed and proc'd bene II

[GideonHighmourn]

You forgot lightspeed and proc'd bene II

Lightspeed and proc'd Bene II are not oGCD heals, which is what you were trying to compare. Try again, maybe?