WHM Desperately Needs An Overhaul

[HyperiusUltima]

1. Many players like that WHM is a slower-paced healer, whether it's because they're not as skilled enough to play the other healers, or sometimes because they physically have a hard time with higher APM jobs like AST due to conditions like arthritis. While WHM is hilariously bad in almost every way compared to the other healers, being a low APM job actually is a unique aspect of the job and could be utilized to great effect to make it a job that's slower but more methodological.

2. Currently, if you're reapplying your DoTs on time every time, that equates to 3 GCDs every 90 seconds leaving you with potentially 33 Glare III casts. You may be forced to heal instead for a few of those, but emphasis on the word "forced." Ideally, you will not have to use your GCD heals, and thus are aiming for 33 Glare IIIs every 90 seconds. If Misery is made DPS neutral, then lily heals are no longer a deterrent and can be used interchangeably with Glare III at no potency loss (Potentially for a gain if you time your Miseries with buff windows). This means theoretically 4 less Glare III casts per 90 second window if you're not over capping on lilies. Casting less Glare III is something everyone wants.
3. It makes lilies competitive with OGCD healing on other healers in the same way that Pneuma is. It's not OGCD, but because Pneuma is DPS neutral, it can therefore be used interchangeably with OGCDs. The same would be true for Lilies if Misery were buffed, resolving your concern.

This I can understand, given I saw a post on Reddit the other day where someone literally had arthritis from playing DRG at a high level. I've been rethinking a bit about how jobs are designed in regards to GCDs since then, and I'll agree that maybe WHM does feel good on the low APM side; however, we still have to address the issues we have with Lilies. Taking what Shurrikhan said, it literally can go either way with oGCD or GCD Lilies since I made it a secondary option in the OP for this reason. If we're to design around a high level WHM that runs on GCDs alone, then we need to consider the Raw Potency as outlined in the original design of WHM in XIV. Adding raw potency to Misery to make it neutral would be a large gain to WHM instead of just Glare spam.

[aiqa]

This I can understand, given I saw a post on Reddit the other day where someone literally had arthritis from playing DRG at a high level. I've been rethinking a bit about how jobs are designed in regards to GCDs since then, and I'll agree that maybe WHM does feel good on the low APM side; however, we still have to address the issues we have with Lilies. Taking what Shurrikhan said, it literally can go either way with oGCD or GCD Lilies since I made it a secondary option in the OP for this reason. If we're to design around a high level WHM that runs on GCDs alone, then we need to consider the Raw Potency as outlined in the original design of WHM in XIV. Adding raw potency to Misery to make it neutral would be a large gain to WHM instead of just Glare spam.

Low APM is fine as far as I'm concerned, but existing spells aren't utilized well even if Misery potency gets increased. I don't really see why a role with the least damage spells should also have one of the highest "cooldowns" on one of those damage spells. Using misery every 90 seconds at most doesn't add that much to WHM rotation over Glare spam. I'd much prefer Misery every 30 seconds even if that means lowering its potency a bit. And the long Dia duration seems nice at first, but in effect that just means using Glare even more compared to the old Aero/Stone.

[HyperiusUltima]

Low APM is fine as far as I'm concerned, but existing spells aren't utilized well even if Misery potency gets increased. I don't really see why a role with the least damage spells should also have one of the highest "cooldowns" on one of those damage spells. Using misery every 90 seconds at most doesn't add that much to WHM rotation over Glare spam. I'd much prefer Misery every 30 seconds even if that means lowering its potency a bit. And the long Dia duration seems nice at first, but in effect that just means using Glare even more compared to the old Aero/Stone.

Generally it might be better to get other DoTs like Aero III back as Tornado or smth since WHM doesn’t have much otherwise; they could even decide to prune some unneeded skills from WHM’s kit that aren’t even used anymore for better buttons. Staying low APM however means we need to have it fully focused on decision making, “what are you doing with your GCDs, are you healing? Is there downtime? Do you need mitigation?” The questions we should be asking. Downtime being high means there needs to be more divergence at the offensive side.

[Silver-Strider]

Low APM is fine as far as I'm concerned, but existing spells aren't utilized well even if Misery potency gets increased. I don't really see why a role with the least damage spells should also have one of the highest "cooldowns" on one of those damage spells. Using misery every 90 seconds at most doesn't add that much to WHM rotation over Glare spam. I'd much prefer Misery every 30 seconds even if that means lowering its potency a bit. And the long Dia duration seems nice at first, but in effect that just means using Glare even more compared to the old Aero/Stone.

That could all be resolved by adding procs like the Diacloud suggestion. Something to break up the monotony and to give more purpose to our toolkit in ways that are simple but impactful and actually rewarding to utilize. If SE would just stop with cuddling healers to death, we could have actually engaging gameplay with just our 3 DPS spells but instead we just have an overbloated healing toolkit that is overkill for the majority of content and even in the content we can utilize it, they're so potent that we're still stuck spamming our 1 filler spell with nothing else to do except refresh our DoT occasionally.

[Shurrikhan]

That could all be resolved by adding procs like the Diacloud suggestion. Something to break up the monotony and to give more purpose to our toolkit in ways that are simple but impactful and actually rewarding to utilize.

That probably needs to at least have banking, though, even if that may reduce the urgency granted. Having a chance to waste a loaded proc with each server tick is rarely a good fit for healer and would constrain any later attempts towards a lower-percentage-downtime design philosophy for healers.

Moreover, I'm not sure how "break up all other possible procedures through immediate use of thing A upon proc-chime" would be particularly impactful or rewarding outside of a kit like that of BLM in which it should be held under state A and used mostly immediately under state B and both states are rotated between.

tl;dr: Procs can be of use, but only in the right contexts. They are not remotely sufficient in and of themselves.

[Semirhage]

tl;dr: Procs can be of use, but only in the right contexts. They are not remotely sufficient in and of themselves.

Agreed there. Is having a proc at all better than 11111111111? Sure, it's a start, but almost anything is less boring than 11111111. The important part comes with what the proc does and what it implies for the rest of the kit. If the proc pops up and skillful play dictates "just press it immediately whenever it lights up for a damage gain", then it's a scant improvement over just having no proc in the first place. If, for example, it's only a gain when you use it at say 9 seconds or fewer remaining on the dot, that's a bit better. Makes you think just a little. If it has greater implications and/or feeds another system like RDM's black and white mana do, which gives you even more pause to determine what among a set of 2-4 choices would be the best course of action in the next half second or so, that's excellent; much better than "press the button when it glows".

[HyperiusUltima]

Agreed there. Is having a proc at all better than 11111111111? Sure, it's a start, but almost anything is less boring than 11111111. The important part comes with what the proc does and what it implies for the rest of the kit. If the proc pops up and skillful play dictates "just press it immediately whenever it lights up for a damage gain", then it's a scant improvement over just having no proc in the first place. If, for example, it's only a gain when you use it at say 9 seconds or fewer remaining on the dot, that's a bit better. Makes you think just a little. If it has greater implications and/or feeds another system like RDM's black and white mana do, which gives you even more pause to determine what among a set of 2-4 choices would be the best course of action in the next half second or so, that's excellent; much better than "press the button when it glows".

That generally is what SMN’s DoTs were before it got wiped to a whole new job. It doesn’t really present any helpful function than just being another button to push, and would increase WHM’s APM if it were oGCD at that. You then have chances of proc overwrites which becomes a tick issue. Instead, why don’t we take something out of RDM’s book and have skills combo into stronger variations of itself that grant self-boons based on what is done since we’re focusing on low APM?

[Shurrikhan]

A quick question for you all: Is it worth having shared skills of any sort?

Lucid Dreaming is obvious bloat, and Cure/Physic/Benefic/Diagnosis aren't worth using in themselves, but let's take that one step further: Even if there were a "just heal" skill worth using, would it be worth including in the kit as such? Is it worth a button to specifically choose not to engage with our job-unique mechanics -- to 'generic heal' as opposed to 'job heal'?

Consider this alternative, by way of example -- What if there was no separate Regen and Cure II, but simply, say a combined skill and/or a job-wide trait:

Waters' Wake
Trait

Your healing in excess of your target's maximum HP is converted into Waters' Wake, which heals the affected ally over 3 to 15 seconds. This duration is based on the portion of healing in excess of the target's maximum HP.

Multiple applications of Water's Wake may exist simultaneously, but the effectiveness of Waters' Wake decreases based on its total healing to be dealt relative to the target's maximum HP.
Healing per tick cannot exceed the equivalent of 500 potency and total healing to be dealt cannot exceed half the target's maximum HP.

* Essentially, the more healing-to-be-done already applied, the less further healing may be applied at that time. It's kept within reasonable limit as to prevent a Benediction from overhealing a tank before Infirmity in order to snapshot its healing, as a HoT, over 15 seconds for its full value, etc., etc. Obviously, this couldn't be used as is, for mechanical reasons; this is just an example of overheal -> HoT (of duration based on excess) as an integral mechanic. It will likely be trimmed to just those two hard limits, as that will probably already do what I need without having to apply anything like a logarithmic curve to be rechecked per value change (on tick or new application).

Flourish
Spell
Charged
600 MP

Instantly grants target 18 seconds of Regen.

Regen: Grants healing over time effect to target. New applications of Regen add to, rather than replace, existing durations, to a maximum of 18 seconds.
Cure Potency: 200

Thereafter, charges for up to 2.5 seconds, causing 3 seconds of Regen to be consumed instantly per [.5 seconds] spent charging, granting their healing immediately upon charge's end.

This would allow you to get off an instant Regen (1200 cp) or hold for a nukish pre-cast heal (1200 within 3 seconds, 1000 on the heal itself). It therefore offers same functionality and capacities as Regen and Cure II, both, but rather than a separate button each by which to "generic heal" or "WHM heal", you can choose via cast-length while also further optimizing heal-timing.

Extension: Do the same for Cure III, baking the smaller focus-AoE a bonus to Medica. Voila, by saving buttons you actually increase the "WHM-ness" of WHM.

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Similarly, what if Aetherpool and/or Galvanize were an actual integral mechanic for SCH, rather than Galvanize being just a bland extension of Succor and Adlo (basically a generic AoE and ST heal+barrier, respectively)?
What if AST could make use of an integral Singularity or Theoretical Sun (a la old Combust flavor-text) or Slingshot mechanic, or if the old Diurnal/Nocturnal distinction could instead be managed through spell-timing and a related Time Magic trait?
What if Sage could actually purpose its nouliths into different formations, with good reason and tactical mixing, rather than all that just being visual fluff on otherwise template skills?

Would it be so awful if they actually did their healing differently and had some degree of different playflows because of involved and permeating job-unique mechanics?

[Leonerdo]

A 0.03% DPS buff that doesn't effectively help in addressing its MP issue nor the DPS discrepancy between WHM and SGE, much less AST, and only mildly addresses the issue of being unable to use Assize for healing. Hard pass there.

1 improvement is not going to solve all of WHM's issues.

Buffing Misery has the largest impact on WHM since lilies at least save more MP than Assize grants, grants you weave windows+mobility and offers the same benefits as an extra charge of Assize (More DPS and Healing) but even that wouldn't be enough to magically fix WHM because it has more issues than 1 improvement can realistically cover so no, I will NOT focus on 1 improvement because it's not enough.

One assize extra assize in an 8 minute fight is about about a 0.5% DPS buff. (I checked one of my purple P2S logs, so it should be close to the average contribution. It's somewhat optimized, but not in speedrun territory.)

Regardless, if you think WHM needs more than that, that's a fine opinion I can't fault you for. Maybe one change isn't enough. I still think it would be better to focus on just 2 or 3 changes than the whole laundry list that's in the OP.

As for my opinion, I'm still on the fence about Misery buffs. To me, the current damage loss is an extra element of gameplay I get to think about. The cost isn't too high that it's prohibitive; lilies are still frequently worth using for healing or mobility. And I don't have mana issues unless I'm reviving multiple people without Thin Air (with about 200 piety from gear). So in my eyes, buffing Misery isn't really necessary, but I guess it would be more fun for others if they can use lilies more freely.

*As for raw rDPS balance, WHM is behind by about 4% (more than the last time I checked, oof... I thought it was like 1.5%). But realistically WHM will always be ~1% behind, because it's got a lower skill floor and it's more popular than other healers. WHM stats will always be skewed down a little just because there are more newbs playing it. Regardless of any bias, WHM could certainly use a small damage buff. Buffing Glare/Dia would be fine for that, IMO. Buffing Misery a bit would be fine too. Like I said, it's not my priority.

I just don't want to use Assize on cooldown anymore, wasting the healing, and still feel bad about it because of the unavoidable clipping.

[ty_taurus]

One assize extra assize in an 8 minute fight is about about a 0.5% DPS buff. (I checked one of my purple P2S logs, so it should be close to the average contribution. It's somewhat optimized, but not in speedrun territory.)

Regardless, if you think WHM needs more than that, that's a fine opinion I can't fault you for. Maybe one change isn't enough. I still think it would be better to focus on just 2 or 3 changes than the whole laundry list that's in the OP.

As for my opinion, I'm still on the fence about Misery buffs. To me, the current damage loss is an extra element of gameplay I get to think about. The cost isn't too high that it's prohibitive; lilies are still frequently worth using for healing or mobility. And I don't have mana issues unless I'm reviving multiple people without Thin Air (with about 200 piety from gear). So in my eyes, buffing Misery isn't really necessary, but I guess it would be more fun for others if they can use lilies more freely.

*As for raw rDPS balance, WHM is behind by about 4% (more than the last time I checked, oof... I thought it was like 1.5%). But realistically WHM will always be ~1% behind, because it's got a lower skill floor and it's more popular than other healers. WHM stats will always be skewed down a little just because there are more newbs playing it. Regardless of any bias, WHM could certainly use a small damage buff. Buffing Glare/Dia would be fine for that, IMO. Buffing Misery a bit would be fine too. Like I said, it's not my priority.

I just don't want to use Assize on cooldown anymore, wasting the healing, and still feel bad about it because of the unavoidable clipping.

They did seem to namedrop certain abilities in need of improvement that people have been bringing up for literally years, like Living Dead, so I have a lightly positive outlook on what the WHM changes will end up being. I don't think it's going to be everything we asked for and more, but I do feel that there's more hope for some criticisms that have been discussed multiple times. At present, here are some things that I feel are plausible changes we could see--not necessarily all of these at once, but maybe some of them:

1. Make lilies restore MP on use - This is the most likely change in my mind because it matches up with how the other healers work in a sense--restoring MP when they use their main resource.
2. Buffing Misery - If we were to make Misery DPS neutral in line with the change listed above, that would immediately make WHM feel a lot smoother, however, I think we might likely see them simply streamline Misery's potency with Glare even if still at a loss (i.e. 870 potency at level 74 and upgrades to 930 potency at level 82). I think they just don't actually consider the cast of Misery as a part of the calculation and I don't trust that they've changed their mind on that.
3. Add a charge to Assize - This is one that's been talked about for a while now and might get acknowledged finally. It's really not a crazy change.
4. Lower MP costs for some GCD heals like Medica II or buff the potencies - The AST comparison has been brought up multiple times that their potencies are the same but WHM's is just higher. They've done this before where they corrected MP costs, but they might also consider making their GCD heals stronger to further their idea of WHM being the big numbers healer.
5. Doing something with Thin Air - Thin Air's nerf was pretty negatively received and is a fairly recent change, which they are sometimes responsive to. I'm not really sure what they would do to buff it though. There are many things they can do, but I don't really have an idea of what direction they would take.
6. Allowing Liturgy to be manually triggered - Another heavy topic is how bad Liturgy feels. It reminds me a lot of Plenary Indulgence also being miserably received, and they were quick to rework it. So I feel like they may respond to this promptly as well.

We'll ultimately see what happens next month, or perhaps get some hints during the next liveletter, but those are the general areas I'm thinking will be looked at. I think it would be nice if all of them were addressed, but I don't think they will. It is a lot of attention to MP across those points as well which they likely won't be going overboard on. I could also maybe see them taking the MP restore out of Assize if they did all of those things at once, to better balance WHM's MP economy. Keep in mind these are just the things that I think they might do, though it's definitely influenced by my understanding of WHM's problems and not theirs. So we'll see.