WHM toolkit suggestions and changes (PI and Lily)

[Exiled_Tonberry]

Can you elaborate more on why Chain Stratagem is such a terrible idea?

It creates a problem where 2 jobs in a role have utility and one doesn't, similar to how WAR/PLD has aoe mitigation and DRK doesn't, which hurts them.
It singles out the only one that doesn't have access to such utility, except in WHMs case, it has nothing else to make up for this lack of utility now that AST is stronger than a WHM in personal DPS as well.

I know people love to say WHM has high heals as it's utility, but I can't stress enough that the fight design in this game makes this fact redundant. Every fight can be healed with any composition. SE specifically designed fights to meet this standard. So when you say WHM has better healing, you have to wonder how useful that actually is when it was already possible to heal everything without a WHM.

[NobleWinter]

I think we over estimate the "healing" ability of AST and SCH because we know that it's "possible" for them to clear every fight. I don't do much high end raiding and therefore my parties consist of mostly less skilled people. The effectiveness of "extra" healing really shines in the 99% of this game that isn't the top 1%. I think we all need to admit that WHM is actually tuned to benefit more players than SCH or AST even if it's DPS contribution is smaller. Cards and Speed buffs and Crit buffs don't really matter if a party is struggling to survive and learn mechanics for the first time. To me the Healer balance isn't centered on DPS but the required skill level to successfully heal encounters. In terms of difficulty WHM is easier and supports the large groups of new players learning with a plethora of strong healing skills as a fail safe. Medica 2 can heal through a DPS standing in fiery hell for a reason. Ast is slightly more difficult with less healing options and a card mechanic that can be ignored if you're desperate. SCH is the most difficult with a fairy to command in addition to Aetherflow Stacks to regulate. If you look at the reward of DPS as a tribute to class difficulty for succeeding as a healer then the balance from SE makes sense.

[Saraphin]

snip

No, the thing with WHM is that it is supposed to have the superior DPS numbers because it has no utility, unfortunately, they've upped the numbers so that both SCH and AST have the same numbers, AST can outshine in healing and both SCH and AST have Raid Utility. The heal checks in any content (Savage, 24 man, 8 man ex, 8 man trials, etc) is no longer high enough to need the WHMs numbers, and even then, with changes and other things, AST heals just as efficiently as the WHM (Please see other threads, there are plenty of them that has this math). WHM should not be "Babbie's First Healer" just like PLD shouldn't be "Babbie's First Tank".

Being able to raise an entire party in 6 GDCs is not Raid Utility because...Red Mage can actually do it faster now, because of Dual Cast.

There is nothing that WHM can bring to the table that another class cannot.

WHMs are sick of being there only because DPS don't want to move, or Tanks don't want to use Cooldowns for tankbusters. Generalized statement, yes, but I've done plenty of runs where people've stood in AOEs and when i call them out it's "you're a WHM you can heal me through it". WHM should not be the healer for groups that only care about their DPS Parse or who don't want to do mechanics.

[NobleWinter]

There is almost universal agreement that SCH has the best healer trait at end game but it requires a great amount of skill and foresight to function. Saving Aetherflow stacks for an emergency means the trait is useless if you wait until Aetherflow refreshes itself. The class is literally tuned to a higher skill ceiling in every way but no one understands why SE seems to promote giving it an advantage over WHM and AST. With great risk should come great reward and there just is no risk as WHM healing an encounter like there is using incorrect abilities on a SCH. If Indom is used too early everyone dies. Sacred Soil wasted a necessary stack that should have gone to Excog. Tank down. These scenarios happen frequently and the reward is that if you manage everything perfectly you perform better than the easier Healing Classes. I don't think it would be fair to let WHM be on equal footing in DPS with AST or SCH from a risk versus reward perspective. Maybe the Healer balance SE wants is just a different kind of balance from what everyone expects. If WHM could compete in rDPS and pDPS then why risk playing a harder class at all? I think many players wouldn't bother attempting the steep learning curve of AST or SCH because of this. This isn't to say that WHM couldn't or shouldn't get adjustments but maybe we should consider that more is involved in "balancing" the healers than our dissatisfaction with WHM performance in the smallest percentile of the game.