Beginner healer class?

[Tridus]

In most mmos that i've played I've tanked and dps, but never healed. And I want to give healing a try. What would be a good healer class for a beginner? A few more things I'd like to know from experienced healers out there:

Welcome!

White Mage (or Conjuror when you get it) is the simplest one in terms of how it works, because it doesn't have extra mechanics like cards to think about. It's got heals, and damage. Usually that's the easiest one to start with. It's also the only one that starts at level 1 (Astrologan starts at 30, and Scholar requires getting Arcanist to 30).

1. What's my main stat?

Mind. Below 50 most caster gear will have it, and at 51+ all healer gear will have it.

2.What are the do's and don'ts of my role?

Do keep people alive.

Early on it's about getting a feeling for how much damage people are taking and how often you have to heal to deal with that. If Cure can heal for 200 points, you probably don't want to heal someone who is only down 50 with it, since most of it will be wasted on overheal. While that's not the end of the world, it's something you can learn to reduce later which frees up more time to do something else.

The role skills you'll want are Swiftcast (for instant raise if someone dies in a fight), Lucid Dreaming (the primary MP restore for every healer), Esuna (removes debuffs that have a white line on top of them, others can't be removed), and Protect (party buff). More experienced healers often swap Esuna out if they know it won't be needed in a given dungeon, but early on I recommend keeping it all the time because you may not know when you need it and when you don't.

3.besides healing what other things will the group expect from me? That's all I could think of at the moment. Any other advice would be appreciated.

If you find yourself standing around waiting for damage to heal, use your DPS spells. Every healer has at least one DoT and a nuke. You don't want to run yourself out of MP doing that, but every little bit helps speed things up and it's a good skill to practice. That said, if you are finding healing is keeping you busy, forget about damage and focus purely on healing.

If you're finding a tank hard to keep alive because they're pulling too much stuff, say something. Polite communication goes a long way, and honestly most folks in levelling dungeons are pretty nice.

I recommend frequent dungeon running, both due to your fast queue and for the healing experience. PotD also works, but it's not quite the same experience as healing the dungeons are.

Lastly, if you're not sure how something works, ask. We're friendly.