Thread: WHM wishlist for 5.0

Some commonalities I am seeing here are a lily rework, water based spells, exclusive protect/shell, top DPS amongst healers (especially if still lacking utility), more utility, and the return of once exclusive skills that were put in the role category.

I have to agree with all of those. Based on that here is what I am thinking:

WHM currently does not have a on-the-run offensive gcd other than Aero, but it's a DoT. So mechanics that force heavy movement puts WHM in a bad place and having to choose the lesser of two evils. There is a vacancy for a water based spell that is instant with a 2.5 second recast that's basically Ruin 2 for WHM. Its potency needs to be lower than base Stone but higher than Ruin 2, and will give WHM back the Fluid Aura finisher on trash we had in 3.0, minus the knockback. I would put its potency around 120-130. I would like for this skill to replace Repose.

To add to WHM water spells, I wouldn't mind having another DoT to keep up, and for it to be WHM's highest potency per GCD. So a water spell that also inflicts Dropsy and heavy 40%. I'm gonna go big here: 150 base potency, Dropsy duration: 24 seconds potency 30.

Exclusive protect/shell. Only issue I have here is WHM is not really a DMG mitigator. This doesn't mean they shouldn't have any. SCH is not a HoT healer but still has access through whispering dawn and fey union. We have Divine Benison, and on a short enough CD to be weaved after every other Aero cast. Since most damage is focused on the tank, and the majority of unavoidable AoE is magical, I believe and AoE shell would be perfect for WHM and give them additional utility that isn't OP, which should allow them to ascend to the top of healer DPS charts.

The lily mechanic I would prefer for it to remain passive, but how we acquire lilies and what they affect would definitely change. The lilies simply buff the WHM similar to greased lightning for MNK. They make the WHM stronger, and they make the WHM faster. They could also possibly increase the range on their AoEs including Cure 3. I would go ahead and tie the consumption of these lilies to Assize. It is our bread and butter ability as we cannot pass up 400 potency with no % reduction based on number of mobs, 400 potency cure to all party members in range, and 10% MP restore. Potency and range for Assize would be 300/350/400 and 15/20/25 yalms respectively.

Last would be SoTL2. What I would do here is add the range buff to the lilies I spoke of above. Prior to 68 you just get the potency buffs. A tier ability should improve upon the previous. Not throw in another useless mechanic. Jeebus man what were they thinking here???

As WHM is my go-to healer, I'll pop in my 2 gil:

Water based attack spell. Possibly another DoT.

Tornado. Direct damage spell dealing Wind Damage and consumes Aero's you have on the target to deal bonus damage (Also, grants Lilies)

Lily mechanic reworked (So it's not needlessly limited in how to generate Lilies...) - Something like allowing Stone, Regen and/or Aero to proc them. Possibly baseline having Cure/Cure II have its current 100% generation on a damaged target and Stone having a chance on hit or a 100% generation on crit. With Secrets II being extending it to Regen and Aero crits too.
Possibly also adjust the benefit from Lilies too. So instead of just being CDR on oGCD skills, it also passively gives a bit of crit chance to all skills (Like maybe 1, 3, 5%). With bonus crit chance on the oGCD skill that consumes them (Maybe 10, 30, 50%) as well as a temporary boost to crit chance (10% chance for like 5, 10, 15 seconds)

Team utility of some description *Cough*Bravery*Cough*Faith*Cough*

Maybe a shiny new skill that consumes 3 Lilies to deal a powerful effect *Cough*Ultima*Cough*

Also, not directly related to WHM: Remove Protect. Kill it, burn it. Re-tune around it not being around. Maybe turn it into a temporary buff skill for WHM or PLD, idc just get rid of this current implementation that adds nothing to the game outside of "You guys remember casting Protect in previous games right!?"

Plenary Indulgence was always useful if you aren't one of those healers that feel the need to 100% everyone immediately after every raid-wide.

WHM is a job that is designed around two things: regens and and burst heals over short periods.

Plenary Indulgence (as well as Cure III and Thin Air) are designed around this play style. Where other healers work by either preventing damage or healing it up immediately via pre-set stars, WHM is about ignoring damage until right before it needs to be healed. This compiles your heals from the previous raid-wide and the incoming raid-wide together into one heal session, all of which can be covered by Thin Air, and all of which contributes to Confession stacks.

Example:

After the first Tidal Wave on O9S, do not heal. Instead, wait a couple seconds, use Thin Air, and stack on the stack point. As Chaos begins to cast Umbral Slash, cast Cure III twice to 100% everyone leading into Umbral. You now have two PI stacks. You can then cast a third Cure III or Medica II as Umbral's damage lands, netting you three PI stacks within Confession's 10s duration, allowing you to follow with a 3-stack PI to heal the rest of the damage.

Because of this, the 30s Confession was never needed. Now that they have caved and extended it, however, more windows open up where you can use Plenary Indulgence at 2 or 3 stacks without compiling heals, or where compiling heals isn't an option.

Originally Posted by NocturniaUzuki

WHM is a job that is designed around two things: regens and and burst heals over short periods.

In the current state of the game, for me it does not make sense at all. It's either two big damages back to back that any combination of two healers can work on (and by doing so, avoiding to rely on only one healer- which is the poitn of having two healers), or big damage and downtime, where a Medica II / Aspected Helios / Eos regen's name I forgot will be enough.

"Burst heal" is the problem for me. It's highly situational, and yet again, a well timed Earthly Star / Indom + Helios or Medica will do it perfectly, negating the use of two Cure III for instance.

Originally Posted by Sebazy

My biggest wish is that SE will hire a job designer that is specifically experienced with playing all 3 healers at both mainstream content and the highest levels of play aka early savage and ultimate progression. Without this, I'm not especially optimistic. I'm still pretty salty about just how much of a step back 4.0 was for healers in general. The state of the media preview was somewhere between unforgivable and plain embarrassing for a game that's 4 years old.

Savage Sebazy, I like it. Though I guess swimming in the kiddie pool that is this game's healer design for 5-and-a-half years is enough to wear anyone down.

Tbh I think if they're going to stick with this healing-lite gameplay that focuses more on DPSing and rDPS buffs the devs should integrate it better. Let your DoTs buff magic damage on the boss so casters are less of a meme. Let your filler nukes enhance your next healing spell or something. Something that just FEELS a lot better than, "I'm casting this damage spell because I have nothing else to do".

Also, give AST and WHM stuff like Disable/Enhanced Virus back so stacking that makes SCHs less mandatory for raid content. Then the devs can delete the monstrosity that is AST Sects and focus on giving them some new functional healing style.

AOE Divine Benison for WHM would also be legit, and tie into this goal. Giving Asylum the 10% damage reduction that CU has would also help.

I posted this in another thread, but this seems like a better place for it.

Give Whm Misery and Solice Stances.

With Solice active whm non regen cures (basically just Not regen and Medica 2) now grant a shield for 25% of the health healed, Esuna becomes AOE And Whm passively gets 5% damage taken reduction.

With Misery active heals grant a buff for 10 seconds that boosts Crit and Direct hit rates by 1, 2, 3% each (Based on tiers). Holy Imposes a 2% increased damage taken on the target for 10 seconds and stone 4 has a 50% chance of a guaranteed Crit and instant cast when an Aero DOT crits.

Both passively Boost healing potancy by 5%

I don't honestly think any of that is too powerful. And it fits into the Hardcore healer or DPS stances that Cleric's Stance user to provide. And would make whm stand out a bit from the other healers.

Originally Posted by Rosa_Frandlia

Stone skin and stoneskin II back. I don't know how many times in lower level dungeons I've had tanks wait for a shield before pulling bosses when I don't have one. Perhaps change Divine Bension even to Stoneskin III and keep it as is.

Why was stoneskin spells removed?
It's not like you could even use stoneskin II while in combat.
They were nothing game breaking but were nice to have.
Divine Bension is not a proper replacement.

Originally Posted by Mansion

In the current state of the game, for me it does not make sense at all. It's either two big damages back to back that any combination of two healers can work on (and by doing so, avoiding to rely on only one healer- which is the poitn of having two healers), or big damage and downtime, where a Medica II / Aspected Helios / Eos regen's name I forgot will be enough.

"Burst heal" is the problem for me. It's highly situational, and yet again, a well timed Earthly Star / Indom + Helios or Medica will do it perfectly, negating the use of two Cure III for instance.

Two healers is always overkill though. If you're taking two high-skill healers into a raid in the first place, the usefulness of every GCD spell in the game is negated. Two excellent healers who are genuinely working together to build a duo rotation can basically remove all GCD heals from their rotation just by working together to build an oGCD rotation between the two of them to cover all incoming damage. This is where those extremely high DPS healer runs come from. The healers literally waste no time on GCDs, and instead do nothing but cast offensive spells while working together to cover all the healing solely with oGCDs.

Every healer can also solo heal, though, which is really where actually having to use an entire healer kit comes into play. MP sustain also actually comes into play, which is another benefit of the burst heal approach, since compiling heals into Thin Air time (and using a 3-stack PI instead of an extra Cure III) massively reduces MP strain. There are a lot of windows to use compiled healing. Any raid-wide damage that occurs in quick succession, or is heavy enough that the entire Medica II regen duration doesn't top the party off, is viable for compiled healing. You can also stretch out the compilation. This happens a lot on O11S. For example, after the second big fists, I will Medica II, but won't top the party up entirely. Then, heading into the next Flamethrower combo, I will wait until just before Flamethrower goes out to top up the party with Medica (1 confession), then reapply Medica II and use 2-stack PI instead of 1. With the new 30s confession duration, I could actually net all 3 stacks, so it's a nice enough change. But it was never necessary to make PI useful.

Originally Posted by NocturniaUzuki

Meow.

Yeah, I follow you there. But, there is a gap between healing in O11S or the book phase in O3S and in O10S or O6S for instance.

Of course, Plenary is useful. But the 10s duration on Confession made it very niche for those few situations you metion (I guess Heartless Angel into Ultima from Kefka would allow it too) and hard to use outside of those situations, while the 30s duration makes it more manageable. You can almost keep it up for 1min30, and get a powerful free heal at the end of this duration (I guess Seiryu is perfect for that with his 5th element nicely spaced out). This is more in line with how 80% of the raid damage works than those isolated healing checks we are discussing.