On Healing Hands - A Comprehensive WHM Guide (v3)

I very much agree about Raetic+1 being a poor recommendation as the only alternative to Queller's Rod.

I get why people use it, they like big cures and I'm not opposed to having Raetic+1 in the guide, but the simple fact is that it's NOT efficient. You pay massively increased MP, and gain a very small bonus to your Cure.

Can it still be free? Yes. Will it always be? Well, when was the last time you cast a capped Cure 3 or 4? These days, it's pretty rare to be capped.

So what really matters isn't that you can still make your cure free because of course you can, it's whether your Cures fall on useful tiers that are efficient for you to use. Raetic shifts those tiers. That's all it does, you can no longer cast a Cure on the ~40mp point, you have to spend 30 or 50. And it doesn't do so very efficiently, as you can see from the testing above where the increases are far short of 30% on cures that you would actually use.

I get that people like Raetic+1 and have success using it but to represent it as the only alternative to Queller is just poor guidance especially when all the best WHM's I know use Chatoyant.

That's really the key thing. Rhaetic is fine and all and an arguable improvement over something like Queller "This is my First Day on WHM" Rod.

But nothing really can compete or compare with Chatoyant (at this time, if ever).

I think it's a bit more complicated.

Nothing beats raetic +1 for Cure I. Everything else is pretty situational. It's also pretty good for Cura spam when you're in misery and want something that can go a bit further.

Chatoyant is extremely mp efficient, in particular with Aurora Storm II.

One thing I would like to touch on though, is please let the "WHM's don't run out of MP" myth die. I heard someone mention this in an LS yesterday, about not having to cast refresh III on the WHM, because if they are any good they won't run out of mp.

There are lots of ways to run out of mp as a WHM when just curing.
One example is if you only have two people taking high damage AoEs from the mob. Spamming Curaga III is going to drain you (particularly when you are removing debuffs and don't have time to single target). Crappy DD's without DT/Hybrid sets will kill your mp. Poor PT positioning will kill your MP (way to go player hanging out on the other side of Omen Bosses missing the Curaga).

In general, there is always a conflict between MP efficiency and time for cures. Experience will help you get better at judging the trade off, but Arise is a 300MP penalty for waiting too long trying to be MP efficient.

personally only time ive ever ran into mp troubles was when 1 of the following happens

-something is actually sapping mp/gives mp down/curse
-have to spam raise/arise(even with a cmp build this can cause a strain if it goes on long enough with no refresh support)
-blowing mp of buffs/debuffs for an extended period or just doing a full cure for fun

cures tend to be the least costly unless i am just overcuring, or i just forget sublimation/cap it too early without noticing due to getting hit

Sillyness is silly.

What Raetic +1 does is shift heals down a tier, Cure IV rarely ever gets used along with Curaga IV. Instead almost all healing is Cure II / III and Curaga II with the occasional Curaga III if something bad just happened.

On WHM's MP, they shouldn't ever run out of MP if just healing. LA and conserve MP lowers the cost of spells while the battery exists to replenish whatever MP gets spent in the first place. Raising dead people is the big MP killer and the GEO should be using their radial to solve that problem should it arise.

Of course there are idiots thinking Cure V/VI/Curaga V are good ideas, and if they don't listen we just remove them from the group.

I would absolutely kill to have access to Raetic +1 on my RDM, as it stands only WHM and SCH can really abuse it.

Curaga v might not be a good idea often, but I see nothing wrong in cure v and vi. They provide way better cureskin, reducing tp gain by mob significantly. Especially useful for groups based on subtle blow DD jobs including MNK for Chi Blast. Cureskin is one of the best thing WHM has and should be abused as much as possible. With minimal amoumt of refresh (/sch and ballad iii for example) you can keep cureskin for a very long time lossing very little mp. Its also much safer than waiting for hp to drop before you cure.

I have been using Reatic Rod for months and have had absolutely zero mp issues at all that didn't come up from spamming Arise/Protect/Shell. I even ended up muling my Chatoyant Staff because the swap is unnecessary. If you're a new WHM, you're not going to be going for a Raetic anyway and I wouldn't recommend it to them but if you're experienced, there really is no need to lug a Chatoyant Staff around. If you're running out of mp, either you or your party is doing something wrong or it's a very niche environment.


My favorite reason for using it, however, is not having to blink anymore when I cast cures which was incredibly annoying.

Raetic isn't going to make someone who never runs out of MP suddenly start running out of MP. That's not the narrative people should be arguing.

It is going to shift the bar though. They're going to be a little closer to that knife's edge where the MP starts going down, and it'll take a little bit less stress on their casting to make them reach that point.

And for what benefit? Can anyone say using Raetic has ever helped them save a life? Even one? Or does it just mean you sometimes cast Cure III instead of Cure IV?

To me, it's a no-brainer. You accept a measurable efficiency drop for an insignificant gain. That's a bad deal. The WHM's job is to be the final line of defense that does not falter. Anything they can do to ensure they never falter is worth doing, and to me that means avoiding Raetic.

I'm pretty sure the only way I'd ever swap to Raetic+1 is if I started regularly low-manning with a DRK tank. It's the only time I might find myself wishing I had higher tier Cures.

I agree, Raetic is great and all but I don't really NEED any more cure power especially if it comes at a greater cost. Can I swing it? Sure. But did I ever need it at all? In my runnings? No, never except that DRK tanking thing.

Honestly if we didn't have mystic boon and yagrush I'd say Raetic +1 would probably have a place, but because we have those two things and those two things bounce off eachother very well-- allowing you to throw out full cures and curaga 5 freely that there isn't a reason to have it.

My WHM would melee it up in pretty much everything that allowed it to safely do so, short of a few ambuscade bosses and wave 3 dynamis because of accuracy issues, so MP was rarely ever a concern and cures being free or not free or just dumping full cures for that girthy cureskin was nice.

When not meleeing and subbing Scholar, even with light arts down it's not like you need that extra kick from the CP2 to save anyone, often a cure 3 would take care of any DD and a cure 4 would be enough for whatever tank. The drk running around with his 9,999 HP can just have a full cure.

Refresh is so plentiful on gear tthat it doesn't even matter when you're getting back 9-16/tic without a bard that by the time anyone is in actual danger you're back up to be able to throw your cure 3 again at which point you're setup to continue to throw cure 3 and cure 4 because they're free or close enough to free that the next mp tick is going to just put you in a positive gain.

Could anyone share their TP and WS sets with Yagrush? What's the best off-hand and what WS do you guys find yourself favoring?

WHM DD section has been added, But I would like feedback if it's more or less correct.

Realmrazer is a 7hit with copied fTP (0.9 base fTP). would think double fotia + wsd cape would be superior.
the rest seems right to me.

Thank you, I'll edit it.

Just FYI, quite a bit of such info were added to bg community guide months ago, it listed exactly when and how each JA should be used, including common ones from SJ, as well as macro tips and tricks.

It even explained the logic behind spell prioritization which is IMO No.1 key for being successful as a healer.

https://www.bg-wiki.com/bg/Community_White_Mage_Guide

Feel free to contribute and make them more complete :) Or if Wotasu wants they can just copy and paste everything onto v3 guide here.


My opinion on raetic is that it gives whm more freedom on SJ choice depending on situations, it's less about efficiency nor cure power obsession v.s staff. Both are viable as long as you can maintain MP and it's just more of a preference on other issues like blinking or recasting storms.

Thank you for that info, I didnt look at that guide since it says it's empty c.c..
I'll most likely steal some stuff! D:<

Oh awesome, I always forget to check BG for new/updated guides. Nice work. If I have time, I'll try to contribute.

Technical question here, researching gear for builds, and I think I found a discrepancy on BGwiki.

https://www.bg-wiki.com/bg/Ebers_Pant._%2B1

https://www.bg-wiki.com/bg/Yagrush_(Level_119_III)

According to these two pages, the "Enhances Divine Benison effect III" on the Yagrush 119 III and the "Divine Benison +2" on the Ebers Panataloons +1 have the same exact effect? +20% Fast Cast and -10 Enmity?

Also, do -na spells count as "Healing Magic" in regards to the "-13% Healing Magic Casting Time" on the Orison Pantaloons +1? I'm thinking it does since status removal is healing magic technically, and we also already have a stat strictly for "Cure Cast".

Edit for more information.

https://www.bg-wiki.com/bg/Divine_Benison

According to this page here, LVL 90+ WHM gets +50% FC and -25 Enmity on all status ailment removal. So, if the pages for both Yagrush 119 III and Ebers Pantaloons +1 are correct, than you cap -enmity and Fast Cast on status ailment removal with just a Yagrush and Ebers Pantaloons +1 Divine Benison Effects.

-25 enmity from trait, -10 from Yagrush 119 III, -10 from Ebers Pantaloons +1, and -5 from any other random source.

+50% Fast Cast from trait, +20% from Yagrush 119 III, +20% from Ebers Pantaloons +1 is already 90% Fast Cast. 10% over the cap.

That's seems like a bit much doesn't it?

Yeah, I remember testing it myself and I think the numbers are off as well. Never bothered to track all the numbers but it was pretty clear from recast time that it wasn't capped Fast Cast with just those items based off the difference in recast time on spells when I added more Fast Cast gear. Either the numbers are off or it's just casting time and not fast cast at all.

Did you account for the -40% cap on recast reduction from fast cast?

How about nuke (Light) sets, since we are looking at DD as well.

This is what I am sporting
ItemSet 374415



Kaykaus Tights +1 (D path)

You'll have to go into more detail than that to say anything is off. SE gives players the tools to overcap on stats all the time, so those three things supposedly resulting in 90% Fast Cast doesn't really mean anything.

Oh yeah, I forgot about that part. Guess I would have to test the actual cast time then but that's pretty hard to eyeball with how fast status removal spells go off already.

Thank you for your input I'll add a nuke set as well :)

Cohort probably BiS for whm nuking now, among other things

Divine magic reeeaaaaly needs some adjustments though.

wouldnt stinkini +1 be better than metamorph for black halo and realmrazer?

Not if you can use daybreak c.c kinda..
But Pld yes :/

Wow, I missed those augments on Cohort, I might add that to my list.

Yeah, it is BiS for nuking and enfeebling magic at minimum. Can squeeze it into other things as well. 120 macc with 34 enfeeb/ele is hard to beat.