White Mage Attraction

[AnotherPerson]

Now this is a debate I've been having for years too. What exactly could WHM have that gives it attractibility that doesn't take away from other classes' functions? WHM is painted into a corner where it's not allowed buffs, not allowed debuffs, not allowed utility, not allowed highly available mitigation, because all of that is the "identity" of the other healers. But the rub here is, that (damage buffs especially) is what FFXIV's combat system tests you on. That was the crux of my arguments that Scholar and Astrologian were overpowered in Heavensward and Stormblood. It's a venn diagram of situations that don't spell disaster on their own, but in their overlap it means you're stuck. It's the question that needs an answer: when you have other classes in the rest of the role whose "identities" are "being good at everything the combat system wants a healer to be good at" i.e. high personal damage, high party damage buff contribution, great free healing tools, mobility, and mitigation, and you have a healer that needs brain surgery because it's only okay at one or two of those things, then how can you improve it in a way that isn't either worthless bloat that the combat system doesn't care about or isn't "stepping on the other healers' toes"?.

Easy. The real main problem is how healers in general have terrible flexibility in DPS options and utility options to be honest. They have little to no variability other than healing -- which is why WHM is currently stuck. Having ways to branch out of that will fix WHM's issues. If THAT problem gets solved, then WHM will get a niche.

Have more shield-type skills that can immediately become a DPS skill following after - becoming DPS neutral or even possibly DPS positive under boss-downtime.

Ex: Stoneskin returns as a GCD AoE Shield skill, but has a longer cast time than recast time (3 to 4 seconds). Under the effect of Asylum, Stoneskin can be instantly cast once, but still on the GCD. After using stoneskin, the skill will turn it into the second GCD skill on the same hotbar - Earth Rupture -> AoE damage on target.
This way, the skill acts like Reaper's Soulsow -> Harvest Moon and gives WHM a way to place barriers. However, the barrier is inefficient due to the longer GCD cast time, but doesn't take away the identity of the barrier healers. At the same time, it doubles down on WHM's identity of a Conjurer and manipulates the elements while simultaneously shoring up its lack of shielding and having a more varied GCD gameplay depending on how Asylum and Stoneskin is used for optimization.

The main problem for healers is that there isn't any complex decision making. Because we have SO MUCH healing power, a lot of the skills can never be used at their full potential unless it's content in Savage or Ultimate. You can just go through content while rarely using the skills. In that case, what really needs to happen is for healers to manually have to make decisions on trading healing or having options for more DPS or more buffs -- but not in the straightforward manner.

Healers needs more depth in decision making, whether for DPS or healing. Healers also need a way to fallback in case the plan doesn't work out by being able to change to a more defensive / recoverable gameplay if DPS is not an option and recovery is the priority. This is what the healing kit should contain.

The problem is that we have ways to fallback. Too many of them in fact, that there is no depth in decision making. So that just makes defensive and recoverable gameplay completely dependent on the player's comfort level themselves rather than being part of the toolkit. In this regard, SCH has a semblance of good gameplay through Energy Drain (albeit it's still lacking depth).

Edit: Before someone calls this similar to Lily system before the DPS-neutral lily update, NO, that's not similar at all. You're literally comparing a core job mechanic to individual skills. THAT is bad game design - being decentivized to use your constantly-charging heal skills. Having decisions outside of your core healing is GOOD game design. This example is a more niche esoteric example, but to set this up, we must have a GOOD and functional game design. Otherwise, you would be left with expecting RPR to spam Soulsow -> Harvest Moon as its core gameplay loop and ignoring their Enshroud gauge .

We still lack more core gameplay decisions - while DoTs are good, SCH should get a more DoT oriented gameplay imo. Other jobs like WHM should get a more spreadout variety of DPS skills that can charge healing skills to create their own version of a rotation.

Ex: PvP Seraph Strike on a 60 sec cd, but retrofitted into PvE WHM. Using Seraph Strike grants 1 charge of instant Cure III (Holding up to a maximum of 3 indefinitely). To incentivize Cure III and not become a DPS loss, using these Free Cure III charges will act similarly to charging the Blood lily. However, because your core job gauge already does that (Lily gauge healing), it's not a loss to hold and use Free Cure III for healing. Throwing away excess healing is also an option for Afflatus Misery, but the gains are not worth it since you already can do that with your regular Lily charges on a 20 second cooldown.


And if you really want to get crazy, for utility sake -- we can have a Wind-themed skill like 'Fetter's road' or something -- become an AoE line Totem skill. Any allies who run on the 'Fetter's Road' Totem gains increased {Movement Speed} while any enemies in the path will gain a {Slow / Windburn / Heavy} debuff. This is in direct contrast to SCH's Expedient - which is not bound by location and range and applies a mitigation buff as well.

Fluid Aura can be a self-buff status effect skill that enables WHM to have certain situational skills gain an additional effect for more versatility {Thin Air lasts for a set duration of time, Stoneskin becomes instant cast, Presence of Mind reduces the cast time of healing spells by another 25%, etc.}

If you really want to play into the WHM utility gameplay, give it a Beacon skill.
After placing a Beacon, party members who attack the Beacon will be marked with a status buff. When the WHM uses the skill again, the Beacon will automatically activate and pull all allies toward them. You can think of it like a specialized version of Rescue.