Aesthetics of healer

[fulminating]

The combination of squiggly arcanima glyphs and techno chain stratagem things works pretty well. Not to mention that none of the other healers have the sheer style scholar does when casting ruin 2.

Astrologian is a close second in terms of aesthetics, the celestial animations are very visually appealing in isolation.

I can’t make head nor tail of sage’s theme. It’s a jigsaw’s fifth corner piece.

White mage I think felt more cohesive prior to glare/dia. Hopefully they’ll miraculously turn into quake, tornado and deluge variants in the next expansion, but I can’t see that happening.

[Renathras]

I hate CNJ (not a fan of the nature, Druid stuff - I don't DISLIKE Druids, but I want them to be DRUIDS, not White Mages), but I love WHM.

WHM has - and nails - the typical White Mage aesthetic of a holy, faith based Healer, with strong heals and few attack spells, but ones empowered with holy light. It's such an iconic class fantasy existing across genres and is the iconic White Mage from all of Final Fantasy history. Though it's bereft of the typical buffing sub-role of normal White Mages, it has powerful, light based spells (highest personal DPS of the Healers), powerful heals, and a direct kit with no guile or tricks; it's a holy traveling priest, not a Druid or Shaman. It nails the class fantasy pretty close to perfectly and feels like the experience you'd get with a White Mage playing one across MOST games of the series. No silly elemental magics here (once it finally grows out of them in Shadowbringers), this is a HOLY Healer. I also love the "floaty" animations on Glare and Holy, and WISH there was a heal that had them as well. I'm not sure why, I just think they're cool. It's also kinda funny chain casting Glare if in an area with water on the ground since you're the only Job able to almost totally levitate above the water while everyone else is getting their feet wet.

CNJ sets up players for failure, because they are expecting a Druid/Shaman class and then get the rug puled from them when they actually become White Mages instead. It should honestly be a different Job itself. I liked WoW Resto Druids, so I might like CNJ if it was actually its own Job - elemental spells, GCD healing kit, a bit of HoTs (well, at least in ARR Medica 2 was a CNJ spell...it's now WHM exclusive if you remove the WHM Job stone) - it could be a fun Job on its own if it was actually a JOB on its own.

I also love SCH. It has one of the most solid and consistent aesthetics in the game of a military officer and academic, right down to the tools it uses. It has battlefield commands, both through its adjunct subordinate (Eos) and party support commands (Emergency Tactics, Deployment Tactics, Expedient). The Job quests also make clear that SCH is a support and protection magic based Healer. In lore, the Scholars of Nym were able to hold off the superior forces of Mhach not by having powerful spells, but by having tactical mastery of their weaker magics, working with their Faerie partners (this is why I HATE the spell Dissipation...), and with the MRDs of the Royal Marines, commanding and protecting them with strong defensive magics. Adloquium, Succor, and Sacred Soil are probably the most iconic and visually consistent and powerful healing spells in the game, as they all directly represent the party being shielded by the SCH. As Alka Zolka said after the level 60 quest, never had he felt so protected while waging battle than he did while under the aegis of your powerful defensive spells. Casting Adlo on someone makes me think of Aqua using her Protect spell on Terra in that KH:Birth By Sleep trailer. Even if it ultimately was only a momentary reprieve, the idea of just completely blunting an attack is extremely appealing to me (which is the one thing I love about AST: CU). And I still love its Broil IV animation. Makes me think of the red plasma turrets from Halo, and that's cool to me for some reason.

Kingdom Hearts 2 Final Mix Secret Ending [HD 1080p] https://youtu.be/r8RCNgZWAeQ?t=92 (just after this timestamp)

AST is the Job I honestly dislike the most, to the point of ALMOST hating it. While I tend to like Time-Space Magic, AST isn't it. No Haste, no Slow, no Stop, no Reflect, no Teleport, no Demi, Gravity is kind of a throw away spell, and no Meteor. Moreover, it has something else that I dislike, Tarot cards and occultist divination, which I've never put stock in, paired with astrology, a perversion of astronomy (something I actually love). And while I like buffing my allies, AST does it in the worst ways possible, a Quantum Mechanic's like buff system (unreliable, RNG based buffs that you have little control over) OR boring, samey buffs that don't do anything that feels impactful or noticeable. And I really don't care for its...I'm not even sure what "Wavkin" is supposed to be, but the dresses just don't do it for me. WHM at least sticks with robes, but a lot of AST armors are just dresses with a lot of random bits that make me think of dime store fortune teller conmen/women. The sad thing is, AST has a lot of things I COULD like, but...then a lot I don't. It's also the only Healer that doesn't have a projectile attack. WHM, SCH, and SGE all actually shoot stuff at the bad guys. It's just aesthetics, but since we're talking aesthetics, that makes it relevant. When I'm on Hunt trains doing the Marks in Ultima Thul, WHM, SCH, and SGE all have shots you can track from your character to the boss. You can even identify other nearby Healers by seeing their projectile animations. But not AST. Malific just kind of appears around the boss. Even Malific 1 (with its Ruin/Ruin 2 copied animation) is better than Fell Malific... The one thing I really DO love about AST, though, as mentioned above, is Collective Unconscious. UNFORTUNATELY, the "proper" way to use it is just flash it and move on, not throw it up and hold it, actively channeling defensive magics to shield your party.

The overall AST aesthetic is just all over the place and it isn't self consistent. Is it a Time-Mage? A Space-Mage? A Diviner? A Barrier protector/healer? A support/buffer? It has no consistency outside of its Job specific armor...which is the weakest of all the Healers and the one I dislike the most. (At least it's floaty when casting Gravity, I guess...?) I'm completely glad it's there, for people that like it, but it's very much not for me. Though I like it's PvP version, I guess...? Still don't care for the aesthetics, though.

SGE again nails the class fantasy. It's kind of funny because it's not the SAGE class fantasy, but I can overlook this since it works so well. The Sage class fantasy is of a learned scholarly wizard...but SCH does that. And in lore, SGEs use magiced focusing stones to channel their spells. But in gameplay, SGEs have little mini-drones like a Gundam or Eve Online space ships, sending them to and fro and pew pewing with them like awesome laser guns. It's not Chemist (FFT arguably healer which uses elemental hand cannons), but it's close enough. It has a really tech theme with the animations and designs of its attacks and forcefields, and even Icarus' using the Nouliths as a short burst jetpack. And it just feels good to play, with a lot of interesting and divers abilities that have a consistent visual theme distinct from the other Healers (more purple/blue than the others' green). Kardia is also a neat ability when doing solo stuff like PotD and HoH as you can largely police your health without needing to constantly recast Regen or the like, while you also have good oGCD heals like Durochole and Taurochole and Kerachole (regen and mitigation) if you need them. And the laser spam of Dosis is just...I dunno, FUN. It's so cool to see and looks kinda like the energy swirling proton packs from Ghostbusters. Toxicon looks like a strong damage attack, Pneuma laser looks neat (even if it doesn't do as much damage as it seems like it should for a giant laser), and all the shields look good other than Eukrasia Prognosis not really having a shield animation like Succor's individual shells around individual party members does. I also kinda wish you got to see the Diagnosis/Prognosis cast more often (the animation in my signature pic) because it's kind of a cool animation and you never even see it unless you deliberately stop cast them. But those are minor complaints for a Job I feel is almost perfect overall.

Again, I'm not sure it's the right aesthetic for a Sage class fantasy, but as a Gundam techno mage, it nails it. And since that's a fun class fantasy, I'm not complaining.

.

I think the one I like the aesthetic of the most would have to be SCH, then SGE. SCH > SGE >> WHM >>> CNJ >>>>>> AST

[Semirhage]

Tarot cards and occultist divination, which I've never put stock in, paired with astrology, a perversion of astronomy (something I actually love).

Tangent: that's too bad. Tarot cards have a fascinating history behind their usage and their eventual evolution into modern playing cards. The metaphorical journey represented in each suit and through the major arcana are also really cool. The art has awesome symbolism in it too.

I've found the trick is to think of it this way (and this will seem like a wholly unrelated thing at first): You know how sometimes you aren't sure what you want for dinner, so you flip a coin? Heads is Chinese, tails is Greek, that sort of thing? And when it lands on tails, you have that moment where you go "aw, I was hoping for heads". Well there you go. Now you know what you wanted. The coin wasn't magic; it didn't tell you what to pick or impart anything you didn't already know. It tricked your brain into a scenario where it revealed the preference that was there to begin with. Treating tarot cards like that makes them much more useful.

[Semirhage]

Tangent: that's too bad. Tarot cards have a fascinating history behind their usage and their eventual evolution into modern playing cards. The metaphorical journey represented in each suit and through the major arcana are also really cool. The art has awesome symbolism in it too.

A basic rundown on tarot history, symbolism, etc.

In the 1400s, Tarot was a card game played in Italy. It had nothing to do with divination at all. It's gone through many revisions since then, especially as the cards spread to Germany and France, mainly changes to the names of the suits (coins/pentacles/discs/bells, cups/flowers, rods/sticks/wands, swords/pikes) and to the content of the trump cards (huge differences between regional versions). Modern tarot has settled on four suits of 14 cards (Ace-10 + four face cards, Knave, Knight, Queen, and King) and 22 trump cards (labeled 0-21), for a total of 78. Modern playing cards are based on this setup: diamonds (coins = money!), clubs (wands and sticks, hitting instruments), spades (swords. Something about a corruption of pikes and spears that looked like shovels to somebody), and hearts (cups and flowers. Love themes.) with the trump panoply being compressed into the number zero card, the Fool, as joker(s).

The cartomancy showed up in the 1800s, when French occultists claimed the cards had ancient ties to Egypt, I ching, Kabbalah, etc. Though there's evidence that the concept of playing cards arrived in Italy from China and the Mid East, modern tarot is so divorced from those origins that it's a major stretch. For looking into the divination symbolism I'd recommend the Rider-Waite card art; a lot of custom and ancient tarot sets have gorgeous art, but RW's art actually has the card's "meaning" symbolized in the image. All details below are therefore some combination of old card game fun folklore with a layer of 19th century French mysticism sprinkled on top. Plus I think knowing what the cards mean in a general sense makes references to them even more enjoyable; when you know that The Fool is supposed to represent beginnings, the Fool card in the Binding of Isaac teleporting you to the starter room...makes sense!

In the divination sense, the suit cards and trump cards are renamed the minor and major arcana. Without detailing individual cards, there are *themes* that go through the deck. Each suit represents a classical element and an aspect of life experience, which goes through a "journey" of ups and downs from Ace to 10. The face cards usually represent people connected to this; the page is an idealistic neophyte, knight is an overexcited crusader, queen is a wise and calm adept, king is a stern and commanding master.

Cups: water and emotions. You start at the ace with "new love! new thing that brings you passion and joy!", go through the honeymoon phase, a breakup of some kind, crying, moving on, and eventually coming out stronger for it.

Coins: Earth and materials. Ace starts as "New job. New house. New pile of money.", takes you through hard work to build things, not appreciating it and losing it all, then patiently rebuilding stronger than ever.

Swords: Air and thoughts. This is the suit people tend to hate because it has a lot of bad/sad cards. Starts you with new ideas, pretty quickly dives into disappointment and self-reflection, ends on existential crises and hitting rock bottom.

Wands: Fire and actions. Starts with taking charge and moving forward with a new (thing), includes exploring, learning new things, fighting battles (real or metaphorical), winning some, losing some, and sometimes carrying a bunch of baggage a long way.

The major arcana do something similar, but in a more generalized sense since they're not tied to a specific aspect of experience. You start fresh, thinking you're hot stuff. You end up good at some things. You fly too high a few times and get spanked back down. Learn something about caution and humility, discover that sometimes bad stuff just *happens*. Become wiser, pick yourself back up again, and eventually declare "yes, I think I've finally learned whatever lesson I was meant to here" in the final card.

Aside from that, I just love the symbolism and multiple meanings on a lot of the cards. The four of cups, for example:
Thanks for not working, image tags

it's the card that means "dissatisfaction, boredom, daydreaming". It depicts a man sitting by a tree, with a cloud next to him forming a hand holding out a golden cup that he's contemplating. But the card is the *four* of cups; there are three perfectly good cups sitting right in front of him. In the art you have both "He's bored and using his imagination to help alleviate it!" alongside "he's bored but you can see it's actually ingratitude".

Eight of swords is another good one.

Guess these don't work inside hide blocks.

It means "feeling trapped, limited, forced into your lot". It depicts a woman tied up in bandages, blindfolded, barefoot with swords in the ground around her. But the card also means "victim mentality and excuses"; the bandages are actually tied pretty loosely, and the swords haphazardly arranged in a way that doesn't actually cage her in. She could pretty easily shake the bonds off, take the blindfold off, and walk away. The elements of multiple interpretations are really neat there.

[Kele_Star]

A basic rundown on tarot history, symbolism, etc.

Its kind of a shame that popular culture in general tends to focus so much on the Face cards. I had no idea the numbered cards had so much meaning to them, and id bet not to many people even know the cups, wands, swords, and coin cards even exist. Thank you for the history lesson^_^!

[Renathras]

A basic rundown on tarot history, symbolism, etc.

Poking in to say - this is actually pretty interesting. Reading the first part had me thinking "Huh, wonder if regular playing cards derived from...oh look, they did!"

History and meaning behind things is always interesting to see and learn about.

I appreciate that post, Semirhage.

[Estecka]

I love AST, but I prefer the simplicity of the lower level weapons and spells (Gravity and Malefic).
Probably because to me, those feel more closely related to space than divination, I think mathematical elegance fits them better than fancy ornaments.

[elioaiko]

I think all of them have their own cool flair.

My favorite is AST because I love space themes and the astrology motifs are gorgeous. The job basically stays relevant because of the sfx when the devs butcher their kit. Celestial Intersection has a beautiful curtain of star dust covering the target. Earthly Star blows up a galaxy is always a joy. Neutral Sect has mini planets orbiting you feels like you are fate itself.

SGE has tech based aesthetic which is awesome. The only thing I wish is that they dabble in more color schemes than blues and purples. Pan/Haima are my favorite.

SCH has a similar tech aesthetic with a bit of fantasy. I wish they would lean into the military tactician a bit more. The job fantasy already has a bit of Orator (Tactics) aesthetic. I want more poison designs for the offensive side and they already have the fairy healing aspect down. Side note, I wish they would return to the look of Broil 2, 3 and 4 are a letdown and look boring. Broil 2 felt cool, because it was like you were shooting missiles/fire magic at the enemy and the sound effect was satisfying.

WHM used to be my favorite with the nature elements but the job has moved toward a holy/air/water theme. I just hate the color scheme. Misery is gorgeous, Holy upgrade is pretty too. Temperance will never be pretty because it looks cheap and reuses the wedding wings prism sfx. Stone IV is still my preferred dps spam. There was something about throwing rocks with that crunching sound effect was so satisfying. And yes, I still want Aero 3 back.

[Kele_Star]

I think all of them have their own cool flair.

My favorite is AST because I love space themes and the astrology motifs are gorgeous. The job basically stays relevant because of the sfx when the devs butcher their kit. Celestial Intersection has a beautiful curtain of star dust covering the target. Earthly Star blows up a galaxy is always a joy. Neutral Sect has mini planets orbiting you feels like you are fate itself.

SGE has tech based aesthetic which is awesome. The only thing I wish is that they dabble in more color schemes than blues and purples. Pan/Haima are my favorite.

SCH has a similar tech aesthetic with a bit of fantasy. I wish they would lean into the military tactician a bit more. The job fantasy already has a bit of Orator (Tactics) aesthetic. I want more poison designs for the offensive side and they already have the fairy healing aspect down. Side note, I wish they would return to the look of Broil 2, 3 and 4 are a letdown and look boring. Broil 2 felt cool, because it was like you were shooting missiles/fire magic at the enemy and the sound effect was satisfying.

WHM used to be my favorite with the nature elements but the job has moved toward a holy/air/water theme. I just hate the color scheme. Misery is gorgeous, Holy upgrade is pretty too. Temperance will never be pretty because it looks cheap and reuses the wedding wings prism sfx. Stone IV is still my preferred dps spam. There was something about throwing rocks with that crunching sound effect was so satisfying. And yes, I still want Aero 3 back.

Neutral sect always is a joy to look at because of exactly whatyou said. I really with there were more planet references in there tool kit it would be so cool to see a diamond rain attack to reference neptunes weather or an ability to reference saturns rings. And yeah earthly star is probably my favorite attack in the game because of what you said above <3

I love AST, but I prefer the simplicity of the lower level weapons and spells (Gravity and Malefic).
Probably because to me, those feel more closely related to space than divination, I think mathematical elegance fits them better than fancy ornaments.

The star shower of Macrocosmos is also kind of related of what you said as well, more space based attacks, im not really sure what fall malefic is suppose to be visually

[Connor]

For me it’s always been Scholar that has the best healer aesthetic. I love the visual effects for its shield effects like Adloquium and Succor. I still put Sacred Soil down whenever I’m on my plot just to admire how it looks lol (plus it’s oddly satisfying to smack a dummy on the head with a book lol).

Chain Stratagem has great visual effects too with the screens, though I’ve always wondered wtf our chars are doing during it. Like, we conjure up all those screens…then cover our eyes with the book lol. I still love it though.

In terms of offence honestly I think the first version of Broil (aka Microwave lol) was peak visuals. There was something satisfying about pointing at an enemy and watching space warp around them (though I guess it’s the aether that’s warping which causes it to explode lol). And ofc it sounded like a broken microwave for absolutely no reason. I feel like the ‘throwing fireballs’ thing is kinda bland to lol, Black Mage kinda has that covered already, so i find Broil IV to be quite boring to look at. The sigils are cool I guess.

Eos and Selene look fine, their abilities aren’t the most exciting visually but then I guess the devs are going for ‘fairies are the Egis Seraph is the demi’ style thing. Seraph’s abilities aren’t very exciting either lol. Not bad, just kinda ‘meh’. Considering Seraph is basically desire for salvation given physical form, you’d think her abilities would be a little flashier.