Consolidated White Mage 4.0 Feedback Thread

[Metsonm]

Ok, had some playtime at 70 now. Here's my updated take on things:

Skills

Ok, of the new job skills we got I won't sneeze at Thin Air. That's great. As is Stone IV, even if I preferred the hit animation of III and the spiky death ball. The problems come later:

Divine Benison is alright now I've had hands on play with it. I hadn't taken into account the fact that resurrection doesn't cut health anymore so Stoneskin isn't needed to buffer ultimates any more. And the ability to treat it as a combo from Cure II makes it easier to slot in than SS. I still miss the ability to precast before pulls, but the ease of use can counterbalance that. The only problem is that it's tied to lilies, which I'll get into in a bit.

Secret of the Lily II (because here works) is ok. It's so passive I've never noticed it, but it's not hurting. Do I wish we had space for a different trait that wasn't dependent on RNG upon RNG for a cooldown reduction? Yes, but the effects are way better than the lily system as is because it reduced already used cooldowns so you're not saving things stupidly.

Plenary Indulgence is trash. Just going to say it outright. The ONLY time I've gotten a confession stack is through fishing for it. Then there's the thing about it just being an AoE tank heal because the chances of having it on multiple useful people is extremely low. This really needs sorted, either the confessional system or the skill itself, just something.

Lilies

I still don't like the lily system. Are there many tankbusters that come in the frequency where Tetra being between 48 and 60 seconds is beneficial? If I want to shield the tank it doesn't matter anyway. It boosts too many things, and too few of them I'd want to use lilies on. I mostly just found myself using single lilies on the shield because saving up 3 to make Assize reduction worthwhile is a waste of time. I'd rather if it gave us a spellspeed buff or something rather than a cooldown reduction. They're infrequent enough that it wouldn't be crazy powerful, unless you're spamming Cure II in which case the extra HPS might be useful anyway.

DPS

Dealing damage is just empty now. Some people thought it was clunky, but I honestly miss the feeling of going "Ok, people are good, tank has regen, no damage coming in, time to go nuts with Cleric Stance." With the possibility I screwed up. I also miss the weaving of Fluid Aura with Aero. It somehow made WHM DPS even simpler and that's a line I wasn't ready to cross.

Overall I'm a bit disappointed, but it's not the trash fire I expected. I can safely say WHM exists and that's about it. I hope they take this feedback and have a good long look at the lilies and confessions. I've written the DPS changes off as a lost cause, but those others could be fixed.

My final thoughts: probably going to swap to Red Mage now.

[Aillith]

Got to 70. So utterly disappointed. Will be quitting healing. Everyone in this thread has pointed out the reasons why.

Clearly they did not think this through, and if they honestly want to say they thought long and hard and put a lot of effort into it - then I have to question their intellect.

The forums saw on paper what they proposed - pointed out the issues - we were asked to give it a try - lo and behold, the community was spot on.

[Sandkat]

PI (and confessions) in its current form, may as well not exist.

Confession needs 1 of 2 things to happen. It needs to be a 30% chance, at a minimum, and proc off c1/2/3, medica1/2 (just the heal, not the hots), and Tetra. Or PI just needs to work off Lilies and be given a cooldown.

Divine Benison needs a duration and potency increase per lily to make it even worth using past 1, since its 1 lily or never currently.

[Keridwyn]

Alright I made 70. Here are my quick thoughts on WHM.

The Good: Thin Air is even better than I expected and my near limitless mana pool and excellent mana recovery have allowed amazing comebacks.

The Bad: Lilies are a pain at best, I hate having to fight for them and seeing so little benefit from them. Plenary Indulgence is a giant joke. Confessions are a headache especially with another WHM around and the whole thing is dissatisfying.

The Ugly: Poor Divine Benison, I might love you more if I hadnt known Stoneskin. As it is you try hard but are ultimately lacking.

Suggestions: For the love of god do something to make lilies satisfying and rewarding. As it is I know too many WHM that have hidden their class gauge and ignore them.

Make Plenary use lilies not confessions. Barring that maybe make Assize and Asylum always grant Confession stacks. Or, if neither of those are okay, remove/double the timer on confessions. Even spamming Cures I have NEVER seen 3 stacks.

Allow Benison to grow stronger per lily, be cast once PER lily, or remove the need for Lilies.

[Hariel]

Main WHM 70 opinions on new mechanics PART 1

1- Thin Air: essential and finally a great skill for the mp management problem.
2- Stone 4: great dps skill nothing to say here.
3- Divine Benison: finally a nice shield, essential for me!
4- Secret of the Lily 2: 20% chance to reduce of 5 sec Assize/Asylum on a CRIT CURE I/II ONLY; this is useless, just fix it to enhance the lilies uses as the name says.
5- PI: this seems good on paper but it's too random for a lvl 70 skill (20% chance on both cure/cure2) and completely not worth the time to build confession stacks.

Lilies Mechanic:
Ok this is nice and bad at the same time.
Nice because you can "spam" skills like divine benison; bad 'cause you literally can AVOID this mechanic in dungeons and trials since you don't get a significant bonus from lilies; Flowers should keep recasting times reduced cause it's totally not a game breaking mechanic but please add some nice bonus on it.

Part 2 with examples on next post!

[Hariel]

PART 2
Examples
1. 5% recast reduced +1% Shield (based on the next consuming lily skill potency/maximum hp) or Haste for 5 sec and not refreshable (please change that 4% number... it's gonna break my heart and eyes D: ),
2. 10% recast reduced +3% Shield or Haste for 10 sec
3. 15 or 20% recast reduced +5% Shield or Haste for 15 sec

Chances to get a lily:
Cure 50%
Cure 2 100%
Cure 3 100% <- no one is using this skill, try to give ppl a reason to love it
Medica/Medica2 20%

Secret of the Lily II: Add the Shield mentioned above or HASTE to lilies. NO MORE ASSIZE/ASYLUM TIME REDUCED.

Confession Stacks:
Actually i really don't know how to rework it, just change it completely or increase that 20% :/.

sry if my english it's not so good :3 cya in game!

[Kabzy]

Probably not going to be a popular contribution, but I actually find WHM to be super fun to play. I think it's fine, even with the current Lily system. People said it has zero interactivity but I find myself making choices all the time when it comes to Lilies, and PI is simply there to top up the tank to allow you to DPS a little bit more. Their toolkit is similar to 3.0, but made more fun imo. (Surprisingly with the RNG aspects of the job.) WHM by no means feels weak in either healing or DPS, and Thin Air is life! I also find myself using Divine Benison a lot more often than I ever did Stoneskin.

In terms of healer balance, I only think they need to tone down ASTs potencies ever so slightly to make it a little more fair. And well SCH needs a complete rework at this point. Obviously we still have to see if WHMs potencies can keep it viable in savage raiding, but as of now I really don't see any need to buff this job.

[VanilleFang]

snip

How are you "finding yourself making choices when it comes to Lilies"? The abilities that are effected by Lilies all have completely different uses, so there should be no time when you're having to choice between them. If you need to cast Tetra, cast Tetra. Assize is up? Use it.

You should not be revolving what you do around the Lilies. It hinders flexibility and proper reaction and planning.

PI is unreliable at best.

[Oncidium]

Healing
I'm not 70 yet so I can't give feedback on endgame content. However, I do feel like our healing is in a good place right now. Our kit seems cattywampus in that many healing abilities aren't really needed to keep the team up. I can keep an entire team healed with regen in a 50/60 dungeon; no problem, this give me plenty of time to chain stone.

Lilies
I just ran Great Gubal Library (Hard) and Hullbreaker Island (Hard) as a 62 WHM and didn't have a chance to generate a single lily. I suppose this was because the sheer healing power of Regen, Assize and that snap Tetra if needed outweighed any need for Cure 1/2. I'm not focusing on lily generation but keeping the team healed enough to DPS, if I were focusing on lilies I'd for sure be missing out on a lot of DPS time.

Feel of Class
Compared to HW the WHM is more one sided and simpler to play. Removing the cleric stance mechanic we no longer have to stance dance to show our true potential.

[Kabzy]

-Snip-

Well generally if a Lily procs I'll be using it on Benison to allow me to DPS more, so yes I am revolving part of the toolkit around the Lilies. Could the Lilies be a little more interesting? Yes. But I think WHMs are forgetting that at least they have something designed into this gauge. ASTs is basically just UI, and SCHs could literally have just been like a second AF icon up to 10. It's something, even if it isn't perfect.

And PI is unreliable, but imo that's exactly what it's meant to be. If it procs, it can open windows for you to DPS that slight bit more, if it doesn't, it doesn't. Not the best addition, but at least it adds something to the job. They've tried to make WHM a little less autopilot if you actually choose to see it that way.