Hmm, White Mage or Scholar?

[tinythinker]

My level 60 White Mage is very intuitive to play and has "oh crap" abilities when things go south for even low level runs, but my level 40 Scholar has a faerie that goes really well with the unicorn mount and is getting more and more fun abilities for higher level play.

Is it worth getting top gear (mainly weapons as other stuff would be the same) for both, or should I just pick one to focus on?

[Kaurie]

As an aside, I find your reasoning to play SCH entertaining.

I would say level all three healers up to 60 and then decide. Personally, I find SCH the most fun, by far, of the 3 healers. I enjoy WHM sometimes and dislike AST. That said, I know plenty of others with the exact opposite opinion.

[Lambdafish]

Playing both is fine, all healers share gear now, so your lore gear will mean their ilvls aren't so different. As for weapons, you can keep them relatively similar with the variety of content available. If you want to stick with WHM, its always worth getting a Sephy weapon for your SCH (or more relevantly an OOO weapon from 3.3).

Playing both at a high level will likely allow you to heal better as you will gain a better understanding of the purpose of the two jobs and what makes each unique, which will help when you encounter different healers, and give you the flexibility to be the healer than fits with a groups makeup, if that is ever relevant.

(To add an offtopic, I also find SCH really fun)

[loreleidiangelo]

Some more context in your OP might be helpful to allow me to make an informed reply, but the simplest answer is that most "main" healers I know have all 3 at 60, and keep all 3 reasonably geared. They may not play all 3 equally, but will try out their "healing alternates" in things like expert dungeons, or EX primals. Variety is the spice of life!

However, it's hard to tell you what is "optimal" or "worth it" when your OP doesn't give us much in the way of playstyle or priorities. Are you looking to raid? Looking for more challenge? Looking for the job with better glamours?

[Thunda_Cat_SMASH]

Scholar if you want to be a glorified DPS, white mage if you want to actually have some healing responsibility.

[Kaurie]

Scholar if you want to be a glorified DPS, white mage if you want to actually have some healing responsibility.

Don't listen to this guy.

[AnimaAnimus]

You need to think of the dps factor as well. A whm is not expected to dps as strongly as a sch is and when the two are in a pt together, many times the sch is on dps duty and the whm is the main heal. Sch can toggle between the two aspects which is quite nice.

If you are one of the "I'M A HEALER NOT A DPS, I PLAY HOW I WANT, RANT! QQ RANT! ELISTEST! RANT!" type healers I suggest you stay far from sch. If you are a reasonable healer then lvl sch and see how it feels. The perk to it is that in most leveling dungeons you can place your fairy near the tank and go full dps mode for the most part, making dungeons all that much faster.

Myself I prefer Astro because because I hate toggling my stats and since I main smn I would have to every time I wanted to play the opposing job. Thanks SE.

[Ghishlain]

If you don't intend to participate in any serious end game progression on your healer, the weapon doesn't matter too much. You can do well with the i210 esoteric weapons (or Seph EX weapons if you fancy that) on your healer and spend Prototype Midas pieces / Lore on healer armours and accessories since these pieces are shared among all healers.

If you do intend to do raids / high end progressions, it would be best to at least invest in a weapon for the job you consider your "main healer". I do recommend getting both to 60 and playing with both to see which you prefer for "raiding" with if you are planning to go this route (or even all three healers if you really want to raid as a healer).

As Lorelei mentioned, a bit more context to your desires would be nice too. Here's a thread on the healer forums about the benefits and disadvantages of each healer if you need some more input on healing styles, though you might not wish to tread too far past Page 2 since it kinda goes downhill from there, lol.

Also, as Kaurie advises, please don't listen to Thunda_Cat_SMASH. All the healers have a balance of healer and DPS responsibilities if you want to play the respective toolkits to the fullest.

[Averax]

Scholars and WHMs have their benefits and pitfalls.

With scholars:
-Proactive healing, you can be very creative with your shielding.
-You've got backup in case you are having a brain fart.
-MP is pretty much a non-issue

But:
-You often feel irrelevant in dungeons, because Eos can do pretty much all of the healing, so you just kind of sit there and dps.
-Your toolkit isn't as directly powerful as the other healers
-You have to micromanage your fairy in hardcore content

With WHM:
-You are a strong pure healer
-You have a wide set of tools to heal people with
-You have strong cooldowns to use in heavy damage situations

But:
-Managing your MP at lower levels and ilvls is tricky, if you heal too much you run out, if you heal too little, people die
-Your MP regen cooldowns aren't as strong as the other two healers
-You don't get very many big instant heals that you can use often. So if you're brain farting people will probably die. You get Benediction, which heals the target to full every 3 minutes. You get Tetragrammaton, which is like an instant Cure 2 with a little less power. And you get Assize, which you'll probably be using for MP management rather than heals.

[Lambdafish]

snip

AST:
- cosmic cards

But:
- not enough cosmic cards