FFXIV White Mage Guide
In this FFXIV White Mage Guide we’ll go over everything you need to know to play one of the most powerful healers in FFXIV. White Mage is your typical Final Fantasy healer, using iconic healing spells such as cure and regen. It keeps things simple, with slow powerful heals. The FFXIV White Mage uses holy magic to heal their party, while generating “lilies” which they can use later for extra healing or huge damage.
White mage is what we call a “pure healer” in that it focuses on large powerful heals rather than shields. to keep it simple, white mage heals when players are hurt rather than preventing them from being hurt in the first place. Read more about pure/shield healers and other healing terms in our beginner healing guide
Despite its simplicity the white mage has some of the best healing in FFXIV. And with this FFXIV White Mage Guide hopefully you can learn to spread your angel wings and master this powerful healer
White Mage "Healing Gauge"
The white mage healing gauge is how you build up to your most powerful heals or your biggest damage attacks. Your aim is to grow the Lilies and then use them for powerful heals, every time you use 3 heals you will blossom a “blood lily” which can be used for huge AOE damage.
Gaining Lilies: Every 20 seconds in combat 1 lily will appear on the healing gauge up to a total of 3.
Consuming Lilies: Lilies can be consumed to either single target heal with “Afflatus Solace” (800 potency) or group heal with “Afflatus Rapture” (400 potency).
Blood Lily: For every 3 normal lilies consumed through either affaltus solace or rapture. You will create a “blood Lily“. This allows you to use the white mage’s most powerful attack “Afflatus Misery”. This deals huge damage to the enemy you target and 50% damage to all enemies around them.
White Mage Key Spells and Abilities
White Mage’s have a whole range of powerful spells and abilities at their disposal. So Lets breakdown some of the ones you really need to know! And some tips on how to better understand and uses these.
This isn’t a complete exhaustive list, but this FFXIV White Mage Guide will try to cover all the essential ones you need to know and learn to really perform as a powerful pure healer. Normal spells coloured in yellow, with lily spells in blue
Check out the Official FFXIV Spell List for more information on each individual spell
Cure II – Your key single target healing ability. Only requires mana to be used and can be spammed.
Afflatus Solace – A stronger single target heal. costs 1 lily to use.
Tetragrammaton – Very large single target heal, but has a 60s cooldown.
Benediction- Heals Target to full HP. Your absolute best heal, but has a 3 minute cooldown. So usual best to save for panic moments.
Regen – Heals the target over time for 18s. Keep this up on tanks when possible.
Liturgy of the Bell – Summon a flower that will heal whenever someone takes damage. This is one of your most useful Group Heals when you know high damage will be coming.
Afflatus Rapture – A more powerful Group Heal, that requires 1 lily to use.
Medica II- Group Heal and adds a 15s regen. Amazing for large damage moments.
Assize – Deal AoE Damage and Heal group. One of the best white mage spells and should be used every time it is available.
Asylum – Heals anyone standing in the circle over time. And increases healing of anyone inside by 10%
Glare III – Your Main single target damage
Holy III – Your Main AoE damage. Also stuns all enemies.
Dia – Damage over time ability. Keep this up on bosses at all times.
Afflatus Misery – After using 3 lilies, this unlocks the blood lily allowing you to use this for HUGE AoE damage.
Divine Benison – Shield that absorbs 500 damage. Don’t wait for tank busters as this only has a 30s cooldown and has 2 charges, so use it as much as you want to reduce damage.
Aquaveil – Reduce Damage on one player by 15% for 8 seconds. Great defensive for incoming tank busters or areas of high single target damage.
Temperance – Angel Wings that increase healing by 20% and reduce damage of nearby party by 10%.
Plenary Indulgence – After using this. Casts of medica II, Cure II or Afflatus Raputre will give an extra heal for 10 seconds.
Thin Air – Next action costs 0 MP.
Raise – Resurrect one party member to life.
Swiftcast – Next spell is cast instantly. Great to pair with a raise for an instant resurrection or with a large heal.
Presence of Mind – Reduce cast time by 20%. Useful for pushing out damage or lots of healing over 15 seconds.
Esuna – Remove detrimental effect (identified by a blue line, i.e poison).
Lucid Dreaming – Gradually restore MP.
Surecast – Prevents knockback and interruption.
Rescue – Pulls Party member to you. Useful for taking people out of damage areas and saving them.
White Mage Rotation
Here are the main tips for White Mage in FFXIV:
ABC (Always Be Casting): You want to be constantly dealing damage, while using certain spells on cooldown. Essentially there is never a time that you should be stood still.
Weaving is a very important part of any class. Basically weaving other abilities between your GCDs, for example. Consider casting divine benison, tetragrammaton, benediction and aquaveil inbetween your 2.5 second cooldown. To get out as much healing as possible
Use off Cooldown or Hold? A big question for healers is whether to use something as soon as its available or saving it for big damage moments. As a white mage you do have the powerful heals to get through, which some healers may not. So I’d suggesting only holding back a small amount of “big cooldowns”. Consider saving “Benediction” for an emergency heal and try not to leave yourself with no lilies. This all holds up until specific savage/ultimate fights where things arn’t so simple and are fight specific.
White Mage Materia - Stat Priority
White Mage Stat Priority is as follows:
Magic Damage > Mind > Piety > Crit > Direct Hit > Determination > Spell Speed.
Take this into consideration when looking for new gear and Materia. White Mage does find itself out of mana quite easily, especially in long fights. So consider melding a little of this for progression raids. Where as unlike some healers like Astro, spell speed is not so important as we benefit more from chunkier stats like mind/crit/direct hit.
Hope this FFXIV White Mage Guide has helped explain some of the basics and set up some of the more advanced things to start working on. Healing in FFXIV is a journey where there is always things to improve on, but hopefully this helps set up even the newest of White Mages on their healing journey!
Check out our other healing guides below: