So 4+ years on since the pairing first Dominated the raiding scene.

[Semirhage]

I care what's "meta" as long as my favorite class is literally always weakest-in-role, expansion after expansion, never bringing anything unique to the table, always clunkier than its competition, never allowed to grow or change or gain anything interesting to manage because "LEL it's supposed to be SIMPUL" and therefore always has the stupidest design.

[Vencio]

I care what's "meta" as long as my favorite class is literally always weakest-in-role, expansion after expansion, never bringing anything unique to the table, always clunkier than its competition, never allowed to grow or change or gain anything interesting to manage because "LEL it's supposed to be SIMPUL" and therefore always has the stupidest design.

And you’re a slave to this META asset/ absurdity of it,

Every expansion always brings changes, embrace that or remain stagnant & complaint like how many others did about SAM (which I actually support its changes).

You be you at the end of the day, but all classes can tip in regardless; only few select deems whats META & what’s not useful (which again is utterly BS)

[ty_taurus]

And you’re a slave to this META asset/ absurdity of it,

Every expansion always brings changes, embrace that or remain stagnant & complaint like how many others did about SAM (which I actually support its changes).

You be you at the end of the day, but all classes can tip in regardless; only few select deems whats META & what’s not useful (which again is utterly BS)

Saying "I would like it if my favorite healer wasn't just a watered down version of another healer who objectively has 0 redeeming qualities and offers literally nothing all of the other healers cannot do both in performance and in gameplay for the 6th year running" is in no way, shape, or form being a "Meta Slave."

[Semirhage]

And you’re a slave to this META asset/ absurdity of it,

Every expansion always brings changes, embrace that or remain stagnant & complaint like how many others did about SAM (which I actually support its changes).

You be you at the end of the day, but all classes can tip in regardless; only few select deems whats META & what’s not useful (which again is utterly BS)

I'm currently playing Red Mage because White Mage just blows that hard. It's a horrendously designed job. Just like the rest of the healers. But White Mage is the only healer that people regularly argue, for god knows what reason, *should* be designed this horribly, because asking for more means you're a "mean raider", or a "meta chaser", or whatever other nonsensical justification for keeping it designed like steaming garbage is in vogue this week.

[ty_taurus]

I'm currently playing Red Mage because White Mage just blows that hard. It's a horrendously designed job. Just like the rest of the healers. But White Mage is the only healer that people regularly argue, for god knows what reason, *should* be designed this horribly, because asking for more means you're a "mean raider", or a "meta chaser", or whatever other nonsensical justification for keeping it designed like steaming garbage is in vogue this week.

They say the 5 stages of grief are:

Denial
Anger
Bargaining
Depression
Acceptance

I think many healers are in the bargaining stage where WHM is easy to throw under the bus. Just make Sage good and see how successful it is. You’re right though that it’s stupid to want a brain dead job. If you want to play something that’s brain dead, then play something else. It’s not like you even need to be optimal to clear content anyway so I don’t know why people care. Just be a mediocre healer. No one’s really going to care.

[JanVanding]

Saying "I would like it if my favorite healer wasn't just a watered down version of another healer who objectively has 0 redeeming qualities and offers literally nothing all of the other healers cannot do both in performance and in gameplay for the 6th year running" is in no way, shape, or form being a "Meta Slave."

Thank you for putting it better than I ever could.

As for the "Meta" and why it's important and I actually got in a pretty heated debate with a few friends of mine about this.

People take notice of jobs that are always at the top, they don't always understand why, they may not even grasp the fundamental reasons, but it creates a disparity which really only those at the very highest end of the game truly understand but average joe goes "oh you're not X Job, do you have it and can you maybe play that?"

They don't understand the reason why, they just know that "X job is meta"

Now I will say WHM and SGE are far from weak, but they are very much missing utility flexibility outside of some very specific situations and content I.E, nobody can mitigate damage quite like a SGE, nobody can burst heal in a pinch quite like a WHM

But what they have in specialisation, they lack in flexibility of which SCH and AST both have in spades.

Now specialisation itself can be a good thing.

Take P3S as the example, SGE can outright trivalize a certain mechanic with their layered shields and party wide mitigation

But it brings the question, is it necessary? Do you need it? Can it be done easy enough without?

And the answer unfortunately is it's not necessary, you don't need it and it can still be done easily without.

Anything a WHM and SGE can do, the AST/SCH combo has a tool for it and that's not at all a problem with AST/SCH

That's a problem with WHM/SGE being too focused down one route.

They're very good at those routes, but they do not have flexibility and that's why AST/SCH continues to track up world firsts and be the "go to" pairing of many a raid group

[JanVanding]

[QUOTE=Risvertasashi;5937863]Except it's not.

-snip]

I have to raise a contention point on this.

Dps is not what makes the healer meta, it's just a singular metric that forms a single part of the portrait.

What does make it is the following all combined:

RDPS
ADPS
HP/PS (Health restored per second)
E/HP (how much effective HP a healer can account for via shields/healing/mit)
Utility

And most importantly skill floor and ceiling.

WHM is widely regarded as the healer with the lowest skill floor, easy to pick up and play, easy to become competent with which is great for what is the entry to healing job.

The problem is, the WHM doesn't really "grow" and thus push to a higher skill ceiling so their growth becomes pretty sterile as they hit the low ceiling pretty quickly and if they want to grow beyond it, they have to change healing job. Very much unlike BRD, DRG, MNK, PLD, BLM, SCH and WAR that all grow and increase due to a higher skill ceiling (admittedly the WARs one isnt exactly a gulf but you get the point).

Now there's nothing wrong with being "entry level" but there needs to be that extra level, that thing to strive for and excel at and for WHM it's just not there.

With SGE they actually have a higher floor, they are not pick up and play friendly, their style takes adjusting to, learning their cooldowns, managing them effectively weaving all those OGCDs you have to truly be effective

But that's where it ends for them. Once they reach that plateau, theres no other level unlike AST which can continue to grow and improve beyond that culture shock.

And that's what we are really talking about.

The skill ceiling being a pair of handcuffs to two jobs when SCH/AST can continue to grow beyond becoming "adept" with their kit.

WHM never really grows
SGEs growth ends with becoming adept

And that's because of their specialist kits versus the flexible kits of AST/SCH.

I'm not asking for homogenized kits.

I'm asking for WHM and SGE to have room to continue to grow.

[ty_taurus]

I don't entirely agree that SGE's highest personal damage doesn't really compete with the utility of AST and SCH. SGE is a notable bump ahead of them, not unlike BLM is to SMN and RDM. It also has a lot of mitigation and sustained healing. Both AST and SCH have good tools to offer, but if you're comfortable with the fight, then SGE offers more bang for your buck. Also, I don't think WHM actually has burst healing at the same level as AST. Cure III has some value, but its very expensive for very mild gains over AST's GCD healing, but has has significantly better OGCD burst heals.

I also feel like this idea that WHM is the "easy mode" healer is kind of a lie. It's easy in the sense that being optimal isn't very hard and doesn't require much weaving, which makes it seem easier to play, but WHM can fall very behind very quickly if a fight isn't going well and is the first healer to exhaust their resources by a wide margin. For that reason, I think it's deceptively the hardest healer to play once push comes to shove, which if you're a casual player looking for a free ride is far more likely to occur than an experienced healer.

So I do feel that SGE contests nicely with the other healers whereas WHM doesn't really have any strength that warrants its largely shallow selection of powerful heals. Even SGE who's burst healing power is far more limited is largely going to have a much easier time. If you're looking for easy, you're better off just playing AST even if you're far worse at it. It'll be easier to heal through stuff as one even if you're botching your OGCDs and your card buffs.

[Azuri]

And you’re a slave to this META asset/ absurdity of it,

Every expansion always brings changes, embrace that or remain stagnant & complaint like how many others did about SAM (which I actually support its changes).

You be you at the end of the day, but all classes can tip in regardless; only few select deems whats META & what’s not useful (which again is utterly BS)

My lad, did you actually just try to lecture a WHM player on "embracing changes" and "not remaining stagnant between expansions"? Yikes.

[JanVanding]

I don't entirely agree that SGE's highest personal damage doesn't really compete with the utility of AST and SCH. SGE is a notable bump ahead of them, not unlike BLM is to SMN and RDM. It also has a lot of mitigation and sustained healing. Both AST and SCH have good tools to offer, but if you're comfortable with the fight, then SGE offers more bang for your buck. Also, I don't think WHM actually has burst healing at the same level as AST. Cure III has some value, but its very expensive for very mild gains over AST's GCD healing, but has has significantly better OGCD burst heals.

I also feel like this idea that WHM is the "easy mode" healer is kind of a lie. It's easy in the sense that being optimal isn't very hard and doesn't require much weaving, which makes it seem easier to play, but WHM can fall very behind very quickly if a fight isn't going well and is the first healer to exhaust their resources by a wide margin. For that reason, I think it's deceptively the hardest healer to play once push comes to shove, which if you're a casual player looking for a free ride is far more likely to occur than an experienced healer.

So I do feel that SGE contests nicely with the other healers whereas WHM doesn't really have any strength that warrants its largely shallow selection of powerful heals. Even SGE who's burst healing power is far more limited is largely going to have a much easier time. If you're looking for easy, you're better off just playing AST even if you're far worse at it. It'll be easier to heal through stuff as one even if you're botching your OGCDs and your card buffs.

Oh I 100% agree, SGE is not in a bad spot and that's more because they bring excellent ADPS and extra Mitigation which can and does put a lot of work in, WHM on the other hand what do they have that isn't easily covered for or even replicated?

The truth is, nothing really stands out in their kit at all. Yes they have Bene but AST have Aspected Bene. They have high ADPS but so does SGE with SCH not far behind.

I'd actually say WHM doesn't really have anything that is just theirs, something they can bring to the fight that nobody else can.

SGE has Mitigation and some burst healing with excellent self mobility
AST has a constant stream of Raid buffs and lots of burst healing
SCH has Raid buffs and Mitigation with group mobility
WHM has burst healing....and that's it.

Edit: And that in itself also answers the problem

AST and SCH covering everything that the other two do while bringing something the other two don't.

The symptom is called overloaded kit (however, I personally do not feel they should be nerfed/nor punished for it, that's on SE and I think they should look to other options for WHM especially so it's not a typical default to AST/SCH pretty much for everything)