How does SE plan to restore White Mage's identity as a healer?

[Docteur_Fluttershy]

ok, i didnt get that you were only thinking of spell and abilities that deal direct heals.

About exiled, i agree with what you say, back before 3.0, and at the beginning of 3.0, WHM had the upper hand in healing capabilities (with sch very close for some reason, but sch is OP, yoshida said it, everyone knows it, so let's take that out of the equation.)

The boost to AST were clearly made to make it very very strong for the end of the extension so more people would play it, to counter the lack of player of AST from the lame AST of the 3.0 start and make the community forget this happened.

The problem is now, AST heals, WHM heals and SCH heals are pretty much of the same caliber (you can prove me wrong if you think so, i'm open minded if you have good arguments about that), but SCH got the fairy, and AST got the cards, where WHM got... stoneskin, serenity and aquatic aura.Let's also add that protect, priest stance and wind are WHM skills used in both other healer's cross skills slot, where they are a full skill for WHM, and both other healers get their full potencial, where WHM get lame E4E and virus.

EDIT: The topic isnt that the WHM is bad. stop with that. The topic is SCH and AST are better, so why bother taking WHM? equity doesnt instantly mean something is bad, it just mean everything isnt equal if two are really powerfull and the other is decent, and then there is a problem.

[Exiled_Tonberry]

Again with that "WHM is a reactionary healer" stuff.

EVERY HEALER IS REACTIONARY. It's how healing in general works in this MMO! PLEASE STOP SPREADING THIS MINDSET THAT IT'S UNIQUE TO WHM.

Here's the truth. WHM was indeed fine in 3.0. It was a strong healer and that's what defined it.
Come 3.2, AST Healing power creeped up to the levels of a WHM and it started to hurt WHM from there.

All WHM has is healing. So obviously if another healer heals just as well WHM is going to lose relevance.

[Watachy]

Tje funny thing is: were they as many AST threads back in 3.0 asking for buffs than WHM threads 3.4 crying ? No.

We got the point "omagad AST got buffed im useless to the party". The only thing you should whining about is the AST gameplay (made to replace WHM or SCH instead of proposing a third way to heal people)

Im done with this topic, always the same unvaluable arguments saying WHM is underpowered... god damnit you're as strong as you've always been since 3.0 stop crying !

[Docteur_Fluttershy]

were you actualy there at 3.0? there was a huge lot of topic about AST being underpowered Oo

EDIT: At 3.0, SCH was the best of 3, WHM was decent because the AST (the other possible healer duo) was really lame.
Now, we have SCH and AST both at a ridiculous level, and YES, we are still at the same state than in 3.0, so there is a problem.

[Watachy]

were you actualy there at 3.0? there was a huge lot of topic about AST being underpowered Oo

Well yeah, but AST was really underpowered thing the actual WHM isn't.
And we're around the same number of topics with WHM crying.
Waiting for a WHM nerf, that would be a good reason to complain since the job still great

[Ghishlain]

The boost to AST were clearly made to make it very very strong for the end of the extension so more people would play it, to counter the lack of player of AST from the lame AST of the 3.0 start and make the community forget this happened.

I agree with this comment fully. The recent changes to AST feel like an attempt from S-E to remove any previous stigma regarding AST's power to give them a fairer representation in 4.0. It seems to be working fairly well if you look at healer clear rates in A12S on fflogs too though the WHM/SCH comp is certainly more represented than AST/SCH and WHM/AST.

With that being said, I do hope they give the AST an identity facelift in 4.0.

[Docteur_Fluttershy]

Well yeah, but AST was really underpowered thing the actual WHM isn't.
And we're around the same number of topics with WHM crying.
Waiting for a WHM nerf, that would be a good reason to complain since the job still great

seems like you dont remember WHM having*enhanced* Stoneskin and Proshell removed at 3.0?

(and i'll just add this here, at 3.0, 2-3 weeks before the release,when the skills were revealed, tetragration was supposed to heal for 50% of health, but was changed at the last minute because yoshida wanted to kill heals with percentage.
Lustrate was 25% back then. now? lustrate 600 potency, tetra 700, but that's just another thing that went by mostly un-noticed)

[Leigaon]

I'd like them to continue with the HoT aspect of the job, along with the burst heals. Spreading them around. This won't be enough though. Adding various additions so that cures critical and regens can be stacked / reapplied in various ways. So that AST can still have the single or aoe heal that regens, but whm has a few more in their toolkits.

I feel we're seriously lacking in mitigation. I'd love to see something like NulMagi that increases the parties defense to magical damage for 15s. En-light / en-brave to add to the party for either increased damage / tp regen etc. It's hard though, looking back at white mage I see them as those that really cure, remove poisons. Problem is curing is a staple but there's not much needed in terms of Esuna, things like stacks of poisons can make a party for a bad time but also some situations they can just leave it.

In terms of something in the end-game land. I can see how AST are loved since they can toss a balance at a proper time. I want to see how they re-do the skills in 4.0. Like repose, don't need that and when you do it's resisted. Fluid aura, no need for that knock back with the exception of early dungeons. I haven't done PVP in a while but it was fun to use there! Maybe keep the KB a PvP trait.

Hard to think about ways to make it sustain the party since most of the instances the way a party stays alive is by knowing the dance or damage dealing the living crap out of it.

I think in the end the healing aspect will be very little in terms of difference between the 3 jobs. We may get more ways to add regens, critical heal while SCH can have the fairy do some outside healing + a few things like a regen while the SCH casts barriers. AST will be able to toggle to one or the other and keep up but will have a few toolkits to make sure they don't fall behind. What will most likely determine their identity is what support they can give. That..to me, is difficult. But this is why I play games instead of making them.

[Exiled_Tonberry]

I agree with this comment fully. The recent changes to AST feel like an attempt from S-E to remove any previous stigma regarding AST's power to give them a fairer representation in 4.0. It seems to be working fairly well if you look at healer clear rates in A12S on fflogs too though the WHM/SCH comp is certainly more represented than AST/SCH and WHM/AST.

With that being said, I do hope they give the AST an identity facelift in 4.0.

I just hope they did this and have some way to help WHM later on. WHM can't stay like this.

[Docteur_Fluttershy]

SE could do some good regen spells that would be for WHM while being really helped by SCH and AST toolkit, with for example:

A regen that would either heal if the target isnt full life, or add a stack of 1% damage reduction if the target is full health when the regen ticks. put the Regen potency at 40, make it go for 60s.

If in this 60s, the target was full for 5 ticks on the 20 there are, he will have 5% reduction for the remaining time, up to 20% at the end (which would last for 3s).

May feel really powerfull, but i dont think anyone can manage to have a tank full life in a raid for 60s straight on every tick of 3s, unless the sch/ast spam shield on it.

(i'm not saying WHM need that, i'm just sayin there are a lot of possible aspect that arent exploited, this ability may be really overpowered, or totally useless depending on who use it.)