Live letter expectations.

[Semirhage]

I can't speak up for anything before Stormblood, but i think it would have been a way better design choice to further improve both WHM and AST back then, in a way that both have qualifying features which the other Healers do not have, instead of just going full easy street and just nerf the most powerful one

I was on the forums back then. I recall a lot of vague "yeah, improve WHM" sentiment.

Alongside a lot of "wellllll...but not buffs because that's Astro's thing. Or damage because that's Scholar's thing."

I'm wondering exactly what future Scholar mains envisioned when their competition should have been improved, but not like *improved* improved in any way that group content cares about. I still maintain that Scholar (well, Arcanist really) suffocated job design. It's the DoTs class. No wait the pets class. No wait the smart book wizard class. No also the damage king. No wait also king of tactics. It legitimately hogged a wide variety of identities to itself. Scholar's identity, as far as I can tell, was "good at everything this game's combat system asks a job to do". That's not a sustainable identity. It precludes any other job being brought up to its level, because then you'd be treading on its toes after all.

Scholar was annihilating both the damage and heal numbers on the Site That Shall Not Be Named, and Scholar mains were still on these forums and Reddit whining and moaning that Embrace "felt so weak". Skipping mechanics with deployed critlo. Enabling shenanigans the other two healers couldn't dream of. Healer design needs to be brought up from where it is now, definitely. But oldschool meta-warping bonkers OP Scholar I'd rather see never return.

[GrimGale]

I was on the forums back then. I recall a lot of vague "yeah, improve WHM" sentiment.

Alongside a lot of "wellllll...but not buffs because that's Astro's thing. Or damage because that's Scholar's thing."

I'm wondering exactly what future Scholar mains envisioned when their competition should have been improved, but not like *improved* improved in any way that group content cares about. I still maintain that Scholar (well, Arcanist really) suffocated job design. It's the DoTs class. No wait the pets class. No wait the smart book wizard class. No also the damage king. No wait also king of tactics. It legitimately hogged a wide variety of identities to itself. Scholar's identity, as far as I can tell, was "good at everything this game's combat system asks a job to do". That's not a sustainable identity. It precludes any other job being brought up to its level, because then you'd be treading on its toes after all.

Scholar was annihilating both the damage and heal numbers on the Site That Shall Not Be Named, and Scholar mains were still on these forums and Reddit whining and moaning that Embrace "felt so weak". Skipping mechanics with deployed critlo. Enabling shenanigans the other two healers couldn't dream of. Healer design needs to be brought up from where it is now, definitely. But oldschool meta-warping bonkers OP Scholar I'd rather see never return.

It truly left you scarred. When someone mentions WHM and SCH I'm always wondering when is Sermihage going to barge into the conversation.

But, jokes aside, I agree. Having imbalanced classes is not good for the healing community as a whole. Still, I do think it is possible to have mechanics exclusive to one Healer Job and have every healer viable. There is enough design space for everyone granted numbers are tweaked for it.

Again, I am not saying WHM should be the "simple" and "boring" healer. I like playing all three healers and a Glare Mage with clipping issues isn't what I'd call engaging or fun. I would rather have WHM have a proper BLM style rotation with mantaining self buffs and proper weave-space.

That being said I would also keep the Buffer/Debuffer mechanics to Ast and Sch respectively.

[Deceptus]

I was on the forums back then. I recall a lot of vague "yeah, improve WHM" sentiment.

Alongside a lot of "wellllll...but not buffs because that's Astro's thing. Or damage because that's Scholar's thing."

I'm wondering exactly what future Scholar mains envisioned when their competition should have been improved, but not like *improved* improved in any way that group content cares about. I still maintain that Scholar (well, Arcanist really) suffocated job design. It's the DoTs class. No wait the pets class. No wait the smart book wizard class. No also the damage king. No wait also king of tactics. It legitimately hogged a wide variety of identities to itself. Scholar's identity, as far as I can tell, was "good at everything this game's combat system asks a job to do". That's not a sustainable identity. It precludes any other job being brought up to its level, because then you'd be treading on its toes after all.
.

Then you would also remember in ARR when SCH SUCKED at AoE healing, that was WHM's thing.

Problem is and always was that SCH was the job if you mastered it, you had a REALLY strong job, it could do everything. But if you didn't, it was a pretty bare bones healer. It was similar to Warrior. Insanely strong when mastered.

Whereas WHM was the healer for people who didn't want to optimize. The casual healer

[Jirah]

Lower than the coils

[Brandedblade]

I was on the forums back then. I recall a lot of vague "yeah, improve WHM" sentiment.

Alongside a lot of "wellllll...but not buffs because that's Astro's thing. Or damage because that's Scholar's thing."

I'm wondering exactly what future Scholar mains envisioned when their competition should have been improved, but not like *improved* improved in any way that group content cares about. I still maintain that Scholar (well, Arcanist really) suffocated job design. It's the DoTs class. No wait the pets class. No wait the smart book wizard class. No also the damage king. No wait also king of tactics. It legitimately hogged a wide variety of identities to itself. Scholar's identity, as far as I can tell, was "good at everything this game's combat system asks a job to do". That's not a sustainable identity. It precludes any other job being brought up to its level, because then you'd be treading on its toes after all.

Scholar was annihilating both the damage and heal numbers on the Site That Shall Not Be Named, and Scholar mains were still on these forums and Reddit whining and moaning that Embrace "felt so weak". Skipping mechanics with deployed critlo. Enabling shenanigans the other two healers couldn't dream of. Healer design needs to be brought up from where it is now, definitely. But oldschool meta-warping bonkers OP Scholar I'd rather see never return.

This is why I don't want to return to Heavensward era SCH despite the fact I did love playing it. I would rather see the FFXIV devs try to use this opportunity to flesh out a new identity for SCH instead of simply reverting it back to what everyone misses. They have the building blocks for identity now, the "resource management" and "pet" healer, they just need to add a drop more color to the dps rotation (I'm fine with them simply bringing back Miasma and Bane and keeping AoW as the AoE filler myself.) and make the heal mechanics more cohesive with one another.

[Semirhage]

It truly left you scarred. When someone mentions WHM and SCH I'm always wondering when is Sermihage going to barge into the conversation.

It definitely did. I've been on here since Heavensward, and have become -very- sick and jaded of Astro and Scholar mains vaguely waving in the direction of improving White Mage, while also demanding that it never actually gains anything useful or interesting (that's Scholar's identity!). I blame those players for the Shadowbringers design corner almost as much as I blame the job design team. How is one supposed to improve White Mage if it's barred from utility, damage, etc? Easy, you nerf everything down to that pit. Few things on these forums make me roll my eyes harder than Shadowbringers healer design complaints leading to "well why don't we just return to what we had before! That was working right? The healers weren't *that* unbalanced"

Haaaaaha. Ha. Yes. Yes they were. Shadowbringers was a (clumsy) attempt to fix how grossly imbalanced they were. Simply reverting these changes just brings back Scholar's overwhelming dominance again. The other two healers can't compete with Scholar in that design landscape without becoming busted OP too, and I'd bet money that many a Scholar main would riot if the other two healers became anywhere close to as bonkers as Scholar was in Heavensward. You were basically trolling your party if you didn't bring a Scholar into all content more difficult than dungeons.

Then you would also remember in ARR when SCH SUCKED at AoE healing, that was WHM's thing.

Then came Indomitability, and the final semblance of Scholar having weaknesses went straight out the window.

[FoxCh40s]

Then came Indomitability, and the final semblance of Scholar having weaknesses went straight out the window.

For the life of me, I never understood why they gave us it. It thematically and kit wise never made sense. It was something that never should have been given to Scholar; this is coming from an original 2.0 to 2.3 White Mage Main, to 2.3 to 5.2 Scholar Main.

I never understood why they kept nerfing Holy into the ground, why they removed Aero 3, and especially why they kept removing abilities from lower levels and giving them back at higher levels. I had always said that White Mage damage wise should have been the definitive king of big damage for healers. Afflatus Misery is a long time coming, and really should have been a Stormblood ability. Holy has long since needed an upgrade to 2, and Aero 3 should have been Diaga. Fluid Aura should have changed to an actual spell, and become Flood in Stormblood, being a 30 second cooldown that triggered faster cooldowns on Lily Procs, and should have been upgraded into Light Wave in Shadowbringers. The whole job should have revolved around Lily's, with each giving you a stack increase to damage and spell speed, synergizing with Presence of Mind. White Mage should have a channel damage spell like Astro's Dome either Wind based or Water based. It should have all tied into its conjurer roots with the only job having an AoE Esuna, but instead they keep removing abilities or just ignoring then outright.

I have LONG since been an advocate for White Mage even after I stopped playing it, but with the devs, it doesn't do much, because they really just don't care about the role.

[Teno]

For the life of me, I never understood why they gave us it. It thematically and kit wise never made sense. It was something that never should have been given to Scholar; this is coming from an original 2.0 to 2.3 White Mage Main, to 2.3 to 5.2 Scholar Main.

My thoughts also. I was very disappointed the first time I saw scholar's heavensward job actions, namely indomitability and the weird dissipate. I wish they'd kept focusing on our shields and buffs instead of streamlining our kit and stacking it with oGCDs. Deployment Tactics was very fun for example.

[Deceptus]

For the life of me, I never understood why they gave us it. It thematically and kit wise never made sense. It was something that never should have been given to Scholar; this is coming from an original 2.0 to 2.3 White Mage Main, to 2.3 to 5.2 Scholar Main.
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Because if you were in 8/24 man content it was possible to get 2 scholars and that made for a really bad time with AoE invovled.

WHM regens stack, Shields don't.

[FoxCh40s]

Because if you were in 8/24 man content it was possible to get 2 scholars and that made for a really bad time with AoE invovled.

WHM regens stack, Shields don't.

Oh, I'm totally aware of that fact, but that was initially what Emergency Tactics was for. To alleviate this issue and give Scholars more options.

However based on Scholars previous kit and design, the choice to give Indom made no sense, it was an ability that came completely out of left field, much like Dissipation.