Thread: Consolidated White Mage 4.0 Feedback Thread

Originally Posted by Miles_Maelstrom

Are you for real? Since when? And holy is one of the spells I put up there as most visually appealing in the game.

I actually agree with Simmiii on this one. While Holy is very, very nice...its also from ARR. The only other spell WHM has that's in any way visually distinct is Aero III and even it uses the same cast animation as Holy and now Stone III. SB spells? Not one of the new ones is anything special visually. Most of it is recycled effects from our old kit.

After trying the new changes through Deltascape v1, 2, 3 and 4... I have to say, the changes appear to be going in a good direction.

I personally thought, due to the weak impact of lillies, that Cure 1 ought to generate 1 lily, and Cure 2 ought to get 3 lillies.

Now, Cure 1 procs Lillies on every cast. This is meeting me halfway, and I find this works pretty well.


I also like, in concept, the change made to Plenary Indulgence. Having it trigger confession stacks with 100% chance on any AoE ability (Medica 1, Medica 2, Cure 3) makes it - in a way - the lillies of AoE healing spells. That in itself is excellent and I was very cheered by this. However, it feels to me like the skill was weighted down too heavily in an effort to not be 'overpowered', and my that I mean the duration of the confession stacks (10 seconds rather than the previous 30), the 60 second recast time for Plenary Indulgence on top of the potency reduction.

I find that it makes it hard to actually get something satisfying out of the skill. The potency is notably weak on the first stack, and it's not always easy to throw out another AoE heal while dealing with everything else that's going on... nor is the second stack of confession actually relevant after you've thrown two AoE heals back to back. The short duration of the Confession stacks makes it hard to accumulate said stacks in instances where you do more staggered AoE healing in response to the encounter you're in when you're not being pushed to the limit.

So, more often than not, the Confession stacks end up being use right away to complement a group healing spell with a tiny extra group heal... that you can't employ for the next minute despite still generating stacks afterwards that you can't do anything about. Or, you save it, but don't end up needing it and waste the Confession stacks as a result. Both situations end up with a rather 'meh' outcome.

Suggestions for Plenary Indulgence functionality:
I think the way to empower the portrayal of this ability (boosts AoE healing) through the accumulation of Confession stacks (the more, the stronger the resulting heals) would be to increase the window of opportunity to accumulate Confession stacks.

1. My belief is that Confession stacks should go back to lasting 30 seconds. As a Healer, I'd appreciate being able to choose to hold off for a stronger heal, and not feel as rushed in using them.
2. I think the recast time is a little too long. I could have suggested that the ability to affected by lillies to gain a lower recast time like most of the other 60s oGCD abilities the White Mage has, but I'm concerned this would make the Lillies too contingented. So, instead, I'd recommend an equivalent change without requiring consumption of lillies, which would be to lower Plenary Indulgence's recast time from 60 to 45 seconds, a 15 second reduction (most of the time I was itching to use Plenary Indulgence and couldn't, there were about 20 seconds left on the cooldown).

I'm not a game designer, so, I can't claim my suggestion is balanced. I know it would make me happy. I hope it's at least met halfway; as I really do think Plenary Indulgence needs a little help with the confession stack duration.

Suggestions for Plenary Indulgence in regards to UI:
I find that it's true that the confession stacks adding themselves to the limited room there is to display buffs/debuffs on the Party UI is suboptimal.

So, let's face it:

• Plenary Indulgence is usually a whole party heal, for anyone in range of the ability cast, with the caveat that they need to be in range of the initial AoE heal.
• Most of the time, whatever is in the PI's skill range will be in range of the previously cast AoE heal.
• So, these stacks don't really need to affect other people anymore. Now, they're just supposed to define how powerful the use of the skill is depending on if the White Mage did an AoE heal once, twice or thrice within a certain timeframe.

So,

just grab those bits on the right of the WHM's new job UI, and make them glimmer once the WHM casts these AoE heals. Put the stacks on the WHM rather than others. It's still essentially going to work the same. You could put a numerical counter under them to imply duration... but is that really needed? Lillies don't expire, and I don't think there's much harm in Plenary Indulgence stacks not expiring either.

Originally Posted by simiii

Benediction, fluid,sleep are 100% garbage

*benediction might as well kill the person for me it sure as hell won't save them
*asylum was a meh skill at best but with new pi it's not going do anything
*fluid....ya moving on
*sleep skill (forgot what's its called)don't even have it on my hot bar

Not to mention visually whm is so god damn dull

Holy,aero,stone all have same animation

Benediction... is garbage? I can't... What? Not only is it not garbage, but it's a fairly functional part of a WHM's kit... But I'll get back to this.

Fluid Aura has lost a lot (read: most) of its usability since it's damage was removed but it has some uses. Like pushing a caster mob into the group or what have you. It also has some usability while soloing.

Repose is purely a soloing tool now. I wouldn't waste time on using it in dungeons.

Holy, Aero, and Stone (I'm assuming Aero III and Stone IV?) all have the same animation? Are you talking about charge/chant animation? Because, okay, yeah they so. The WHM floats.. but the actual casting animation and spell effect are all different... not really a worth while complaint.


Back to Benediction.

Are you actually serious? The recent CD reduction has caused Bene to really shine. It is the BEST spell to help push DPS in a WHM's kit (besides maybe Regen).

If you still can't figure out how to properly use it after so long (I see you joined over 2 years ago) then the issue is obviously with you, not the ability. If the tank keeps dying then use it earlier... the delay on the spell is easy to ignore if you know how to use the ability properly. Don't use it as a "omg tank has 1 HP!" heal, Tetra is much better for this since there is no delay, but use it as a planned heal during Dpsing. Bene has always been strong (people may disagree but I've always liked it) and it's even stronger in SB. You just need to know how to use it.