Raid DPS Contribution is IMPORTANT

[DotsNnots]

Setting aside the emphasis on healing for a moment, what (ridiculously) wasn't touched on, was raid DPS contribution.

They're re-thinking dps' synergies with each other and removing type specific damage,
They're re-rethinking healing and emphasizing pure healers,
They're trying to shift away from certain jobs being "locked" in party compositions,

But can we talk about how Scholar and Astrologian still bring significant contributions to the whole party's DPS with both chain and cards (which are both still there) and White Mage still has no party damage utility?!

And while yes, it's possible it just hasn't be revealed yet, I can't see how they can talk about the importance of ALL of the above points, and not this one. This one is crucial in why White Mage is excluded from parties. And no amount of increasing the healing that needs to be done is going to change this. No amount of personal WHM DPS contribution "in exchange" for raid DPS utility is going to change this. No amount of "adjustments" to chain or cards is going to change this, either.


Unless there's a giant reveal still missing, White Mage is still likely to be in the same spot it was for the past two expansions.


"Please trust me."
https://clips.twitch.tv/AbnegateFairWombatDuDudu

[manamoppet]

We'll have to wait and see what people at E3 June 10 have to say I guess... They said at the end of talking about the job changes that people would get to try ShB changes and fight Titania then.

[FusionSamurai]

WHM dead on arrival once again. Please look forward to it.

(big levi fan btw)

[Risvertasashi]

that might be what they meant by pure healing emphasis. Compared to raid buffs.

All the same, it was incredibly vague. So we don't really know. But... I'm worried. I hope I'm wrong, but I fear white mage will be the red-headed stepchild healer once more.

[Dyvid]

WHM dead on arrival once again. Please look forward to it.

(big levi fan btw)

Hate to say it but if WHM doesn't get some kind of DPS buff ability this is going to happen.

Haste - speeds up a party member actions
Reflect - returns a % of damage back to the attacker
Berserk - Increase damage of a party member

These are White Magic spells from the series that buffed the parties damage.

that might be what they meant by pure healing emphasis. Compared to raid buffs.

All the same, it was incredibly vague. So we don't really know. But... I'm worried. I hope I'm wrong, but I fear white mage will be the red-headed stepchild healer once more.

From what is sounds like, Pure Healing simply means that SCH and AST barriers are going to be less effective. If this is the case it just pushes the problem no solves it because SCH and AST will be able to pure heal and buff, while WHM will be able to pure heal and......?

[LarcSekaya]

If they increase WHM oGCD heals that can open up more GCDs for DPS abilities. If they increase the potency of WHM heals, they can heal less frequently and do more damage. They can increase the potency of WHM attacks to offset the rDPS buffs the others provide.

Plus, it looks like AST is losing AoE cards, so the rDPS contribution may not be as much.

[Hustensaft]

Plus, it looks like AST is losing AoE cards, so the rDPS contribution may not be as much.

Here is the sad part people don't see: AST cards and Stratagem aren't all that huge in rDPS gains, they're 2 or 1% rDPS gains. If you look back in WoW history when unique buffs still existed, you had values in a range of about 5% rDPS gain per buff (e.g. 5% crit at 100% critdamage).

In the current setting, the new black lily damage ability, if available every 30 sec, would need to be about 300 potency to equal whatever raid dps gain Chain Stratagem provides. It's fairly hard to argue for "WHM needs dps utility", when such a simple yet seemingly weak DPS button can provide an equal rDPS gain.

It looks more like all healers are reduced down to a single target dps spell, and one dot, and one AoE ability - which can easily balanced against each other.
Then you have further homogenization in healing toolkits (e.g more instants for WHM), so the usage of DPS spells is overall more equal across healer setups.
At that point you have to balance cards vs. stratagem vs. black lily for raid DPS contribution.

In general, they seem to have gone for full homogenization in heal and DPS toolkit to balance healers, instead of actually fixing the underlying issues.

[Gemina]

Hate to say it but if WHM doesn't get some kind of DPS buff ability this is going to happen.

They would need that, or a way to improve the abilities from SCH and AST such as extending timers, or applying haste on everyone so everyone gets more attacks off during Balance/Chain windows.

I'm afraid I will no longer be able to defend the devs in regards to healing if WHM doesn't get something that's desired by raids and their co-healers. It would be a strong indicator that they either have a vision of WHM they are trying to force feed us, or absolutely no one over there mains a WHM who is letting them know what our issues are.

What's troubling is looking at the job actions for SCH and AST, many of us were impressed with what we saw even though we are left to speculate on quite a few skills. Fact remains we liked what we saw, while WHM was just kind of... meh. I'd lean towards most thoughts hovering around, "Well, they can still heal." So many players are left with excitement based off what they saw for their favorite jobs: NIN, MCH, DRK just to name a few. Hell, MCH was so good players are already talking about changing their main to MCH. I feel like that is how us WHMs should be feeling right now, and we're just not.

Sounds like a broken record now, but I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

[Metsonm]

Here is the sad part: AST cards and Stratagem aren't all that massive in gain, they're 2 or 1% rDPS gains. If you look back in WoW history when unique buffs still existed, they were in a numerical range of about 5% (e.g. 5% crit at 100% critdamage).

The new black lily damage ability, if available every 30 sec, would need to be about 300 potency to equal whatever raid dps gain Chain Stratagem provides. There's absolutely no reason to cry for raid DPS utility with the Black Lily ability.

We don't even know the full extent of the kits or their potencies for any of the classes yet. We can't begin to work out how much personal or raid DPS any class brings, let alone how much disparity there is in balance. For all we know SCH also gets a new DPS toy to match.

[Veis_Alveare]

Just because Chain and Cards exist doesn't mean they're going to be contributing the same amount of damage.

With the lack of emphasis on synergy I can't imagine you'll be able to get as much out of chain specifically.

I understand the pessimism that comes with how let down WHM mains have been in the past but let's not lose our minds until we see what the cards and chain do