Should Divine Benison be improved?

[Erakir]

Correct me if I’m wrong here, but Benison is the only oGCD barrier in the game? It’s also pretty powerful on a tank, it’s also unique in being percentage based rather than reliant on actually healing (which makes it quite potent the moment infirmity style debuffs come into play).

So lilys aside, I think it’s actually pretty decent.

The only issue I have with it is it requiring lilys to actually use. There’s nothing more annoying than having to waste GCDs to have it ready for stuff like Tera slash or O4s in general, whilst there’s always that risk of firing off Assize on CD or a clutch Tetra only to shoot yourself in the foot and be left unable to Benison in time. Kind of limits how dependable it is =\

It's a travesty to me that as usable as Benison is, I hear people use it less and less in fights as they get better simply because lily generation plummets as you cast fewer cures. I *want* to use Benison - Casting cure 2 and following up with benison is like a guaranteed crit every 30s with the crit portion not overhealing. Something that you -should- feel efficient using, a free-mini-boost. And yet here we are - It feels bad to pass it over cause the GCD to generate the lily becomes less and less worth it (Not to mention, a risk if your cohealer tops off the person while you're casting and you get no lily at all). And like yourself, the times I've had to suddenly tetra and lose the shield I had planned on using in 3s just sucks.

During HW I was a big proponent of some sort of synergy with DPS, things like allowing stone casts to stack or proc MP reduction of stoneskins, helping offset the harsh MP costs and letting you stay in Cleric's longer to avoid triggering the 5s lockout again (And shields happen to play oh so nicely with HoTs if a person isn't topped off when the shield is applied, almost like we could regen a tank and buffer them with small shields or something to make tank health stable and less ping-pongy). Heaven forbid we got to make better use of that "lovely" 0.5s cast time reduction trait. One could do similar things with the aero line tied to regen, or any number of spells, but that basic point remains. It's important to not make it ~more~ healing than not DPSing, but more of a little bonus that you can weave back into healing related mechanics.

It should come as no surprise that I'm sad we can't generate lilies with DPS as well. If they put, say, that 20% chance back on stone casts, suddenly it's gonna start popping up more often. Heck, if you gained one every 5 casts of stone - would it be a real problem if a WHM was generating 3 lilies every 30-40s or so doing nothing but DPS, given the whoop-de-do nature of the CD reductions as it is? I'd say probably not.

Food for thought - as meh as CD reduction is for the other skills, I'd consider that benison *might* benefit the most from it, despite the reduction being so small. This is specifically because other abilities are often planned for mechanics, and while I've planned benison a fair bit, too, its lily requirement leads to it being phased out, making it more usable as a 'whenever feels decent' skill. However, it also means generating more lilies to constantly use, which decrease as fight experience goes on, so you probably won't really capitalize much on 24s Benison vs 30s. Tetra is the other ability I feel benefits the most from CDR for its reactionary nature.

As for the OP - Honestly if I had to address any of our abilities, Asylum would be the first one I look at before Benison. And that's after doing something with that garbage Secrets of the Lily II trait.

Also, Kabzy, I want to say Benison stacks with SCH/AST shields. The tooltips for the latter specifically state not stacking with Adlo (for AST) and Nocturnal stance (for SCH). I haven't tested it in a long time but I could have sworn I looked at it early into the expansion and saw they stacked. Stoneskin always stacked with AST/SCH shields too, which is why we'd spend 8 GCDs stoneskinning the raid for things like Nerve Cloud in T11 back in ARR, and why if you really felt like it you could take Stoneskin as SCH for extra tank HP on dungeon pulls on top of Adlo. Right now, it makes benison unique in being the only healer skill that can further increase a tank's EHP past Adlo/Benific 2. If this is incorrect someone please slap me, though.