I'm bored when I heal because I need more complex DPS rotations

[Zeastria]

Does it really though?

A big part of the problem with AST is that the buffs individually are all super weak now. The way you get actual benefit out of them is to dogpile everything into the 2 minute burst window. That leaves you with 1 or 2 free cards between those windows. That's less activity than even Lilies. If you're spreading your cards out on cooldown, sorry but you're doing it wrong. Playing sub par to get a 'better' experience isn't really a road that's acceptable to go down in my book.

I can only speak from my own experience, having played both WHM and AST.
AST obviously had something which WHM didnt.. since i didnt went back playing WHM.

[Renathras]

Again, it depends on how you consider it and how much you want to work on a solution.

SCH's got a lot of "combination abilities". Recitation with Adlo, Indom, or Excog, Fey Illumination with several things, Dissipation with Adlo (and Succor) and AF abilities, Seraph with Consolation which can be layered with Galvanize but takes a few seconds more to get out. Deploy Adlo, possibly led into with Fey Illumination and/or Recitation and/or Protraction and/or Disipation, depending on how much you want to boost it. Several of those require around 5 sec of lead time, which isn't a lot but is significant, and which you use depends on what else you're expecting in the encounter and what you have and don't have on CD, or might be saving for upcoming mechanics.

WHM really doesn't. Temperance DOES boost healing, but you're generally going to use it for the mitigation. Plenary boosts AOE healing and can be weaved just before an AOE spell. Asylum can boost healing but is often used for the HoT more than the healing boost itself, sorta like Temperance. Unless you count Presence of Mind for healing (and don't use it on CD but rather hold it for healing needs) or Swiftcast (and don't use that for DPS or hold for Raise and are going to use it on Cure 2 or Medica for.....god only knows what reason) or Thin Air (which obviously you can also weave in before said cast, after Plenary since Plenary has a duration and won't be consumed by, say, PI -> Glare -> TA -> Medica 2; and TA doesn't boost healing, so it's kind of a different argument). That's really it, though. While other abilities can be used together, they don't modify or affect the others, they just exist.

Divine Se- er, Temperance (again, more often used for mitigation with the boosted healing just being a happy side effect), Asylum (again, mostly used for the HoT), Presence of Mind (mostly used for DPS and used on CD rather than held for healing), and Plenary Indulgence are really the only "modifier on heals" abilities that WHM has, and only one of those, PI, is really used in that way.

And the only "setup in advance" that WHM really has is Lilybell.

Similar argument to SCH with AST, which has some modifier type abilities like Nocturnal Sect and Synastry, as well as "setup in advance" stuff like Earthly Star and Macrocosmos.

.

I do agree with Roe - and have said dozens of times - that WHM needs a 60 sec CD mit ability, possibly folded into PI as Protect or Wall (that would have the Pro-Shell effect).

[Silver-Strider]

WHM needs a 60 sec CD mit ability, possibly folded into PI as Protect or Wall (that would have the Pro-Shell effect).

Dear god, Hell has frozen over because we actually agree on something.

[ForsakenRoe]

It's not hard to find common ground when the topic of said ground is 'WHM has been consistently bent over the table and screwed by SE design for several years, and here's one example (where is my 60s mit) where it's direct competition wipes the floor with it designwise'

[ty_taurus]

Personally, I feel like “increasing max HP” is the primary answer to mitigation needs that should be White Mage’s wheelhouse. It’s not reducing incoming damage, but it increases how much damage the party can take while also being refillable for its duration, letting tools like regen/medica II or liturgy offer more value for certain mechanics. It’s basically a refillable barrier.

What would be interesting is seeing each healer approach mitigation needs differently as their primary response to big damage.

WHM: increases max HP
SCH: flat mitigation
AST: stagger damage taken
SGE: staggered barriers

That doesn’t need to be their only mitigation strategy, but could be their main 30 second cooldown or something similar.

[Katish]

Personally, I feel like “increasing max HP” is the primary answer to mitigation needs that should be White Mage’s wheelhouse. It’s not reducing incoming damage, but it increases how much damage the party can take while also being refillable for its duration, letting tools like regen/medica II or liturgy offer more value for certain mechanics. It’s basically a refillable barrier.

What would be interesting is seeing each healer approach mitigation needs differently as their primary response to big damage.

WHM: increases max HP
SCH: flat mitigation
AST: stagger damage taken
SGE: staggered barriers

That doesn’t need to be their only mitigation strategy, but could be their main 30 second cooldown or something similar.

I would add on that I would rather one option being what vengeance does on warrior (reflect x damage on top of mitigation) but as an aoe mit to help differentiate the healers, with the idea that the others get something that starts making them unique as well. But I am with you with different answers to the same problem.

I would argue that vengeance AoE would be suited for SCH given it has some tact with warrior lore wise.

[Renathras]

Dear god, Hell has frozen over because we actually agree on something.

If you read back a bit, you'd see I've been saying this for months, possibly over a year.

I feel like the current design requires at least some mitigation, and WHM is the one Healer Job I consistently find I'm reaching for a mitigation button and there's not one. I first noticed this with 6.0 with Ra-La's fight, where on SCH and SGE and even AST, I could reliably pop a mitigation of some kind timed to each of the raidwides he did, which were about 30 seconds or so apart (if they fight only goes 1:30-1:59, AST can still manage using Collective, Neutral, Collective). But with WHM, after Temperance for the first one, you've got nothing unless the fight goes on long enough for him to get around to doing a 4th or 5th one.

Sure, it's not NEEDED for that fight (though with some of the Tanks and DPSers I had...ahem <_<), but the point is, when fights have a simple cadence raidwide, all the other Healers have several tools, and the CDs are where they can answer MOST raidwides with some form of mitigation or shielding.

WHM is the only one that does not.

And BECAUSE of how simple that fight is, and BECAUSE of how apparent the cadence is, it becomes really apparent how utterly lacking WHM is in the department that it can't even mitigate TWO of them; just the ONE.

If AST didn't, either, that might be a different story - would still "feelsbad", but at least the Pure/Barrier dichotomy would hold - but the fact is AST has 3 per 2 minute period and WHM has as little party mitigation as BLM does is a problem. And ADDLE, of all things, even has a SHORTER cooldown of 90 seconds. So technically, BLM - and SAM with Feint - the selfish DPS, both bring more party mitigation to the table than WHM does! WHM would actually have MORE frequently available mitigation if it actually lost Temperance and was given Addle! (Note: This is NOT something I'm proposing, and the physical mitigation would be half of Temperance's, but it would be available 4/3 times as often.)

It's not hard to find common ground when the topic of said ground is 'WHM has been consistently bent over the table and screwed by SE design for several years, and here's one example (where is my 60s mit) where it's direct competition wipes the floor with it designwise'

There is a problem with "homogenization", but the thing is, WHM had some tools in the past between Proshell (granted, every party wanted it, but it meant an AST/SCH party only had the physical mitigation from it, not the magical) and WHM had spamable Stoneskin (unlike Divine Benison which only has two charges) (and SCH/AST Cross-Classing it only got the base version that was a shield for 12% or whatever HP of the target, not the Trait version WHM got that went up to 18%).

It's hard to worry about homogenization when WHM had the abilities first.

Additionally, homogenization is only a good argument when it's not "all but one have this". If it was JUST SCH or JUST AST that did, that'd be one thing. But the fact is, SCH, AST, and SGE all have this, meaning it's pretty close to a "required for the role" ability. Imagine if SGE didn't have Raise, for example, and people were saying "You can't give SGE a Raise, that'd be homogenization!". Obviously, that wouldn't be an argument (even WoW eventually gave Druids a spamable raise since their unique combat raise - which they got to keep for the flavor, btw - could only be used once per HOUR; not so great for wipe recovery in a 5 man if more than one person died). And mitigation, at this point, is "role essential".

Personally, I feel like “increasing max HP” is the primary answer to mitigation needs that should be White Mage’s wheelhouse. It’s not reducing incoming damage, but it increases how much damage the party can take while also being refillable for its duration, letting tools like regen/medica II or liturgy offer more value for certain mechanics. It’s basically a refillable barrier.

What would be interesting is seeing each healer approach mitigation needs differently as their primary response to big damage.

WHM: increases max HP
SCH: flat mitigation
AST: stagger damage taken
SGE: staggered barriers

That doesn’t need to be their only mitigation strategy, but could be their main 30 second cooldown or something similar.

I actually do agree that there's design space for "different roads; all roads lead to Rome". By my band-aid in the moment issue is that 1 out of 4 can't do a thing that 3 out of 4 currently can, and that's a problem.

[ty_taurus]

I actually do agree that there's design space for "different roads; all roads lead to Rome". By my band-aid in the moment issue is that 1 out of 4 can't do a thing that 3 out of 4 currently can, and that's a problem.

I didn't say otherwise. White Mage does have a glaring flaw in its ability to respond to the necessity of mitigation in harder content. Even Astrologian does, it's just not as bad as White Mage. All Astrologian has over White Mage is Collective Unconscious, which is a 60 second cooldown, but the mitigation only lasts 5 seconds unless you commit to the channel which is literally never the right answer if the boss is targetable, even in healing emergencies, actually casting heals is objectively superior.

Meanwhile, Scholar and Sage together can keep a 10% mitigation on the entire party indefinitely when paired together as long as they manage their resources properly, which isn't that challenging to do.

All I was saying is that, if we're looking at a new expansions worth of changes anyway, I would like to see how each healer responds to mitigation needs be a little different at least if it's going to stay being this massively important factor.

[Kikio_The_Blu]

You're asking for an extra spell for no reason other than having a second button to press. No interesting interactions, no skill expression, etc.

I mean having two buttons to press like a mch rotation to keep uptime is more engaging than 11111111111 forever. Even if it adds nothing of value it adds interest to the class, and I would rather have a class be interesting than feel like im falling asleep piloting it in savages.

[Avenheit]

when i play 1 button heroes, i play the song called "One - Pluffaduff".