(Note: I may refer generally to mages that can heal as 'white mages,' but I understand that the range of classes that can heal are much broader than that, including Paladins, Bards, Conjurers, etc.)
I think there will be a bit of a range of opinions on this matter. Personally, here are some considerations I have regarding white magic and healing mages.
1. Healing mages need to be able to contribute something significant; like a field medic, their presence could make the difference between life and death.
2. There must still be a point where a healing mage cannot save someone. Death must be possible, since death in Eorzea (death of NPCs etc) is either directly seen/implied multiple times.
3. As Aysun mentioned, there is still a need for medicine and apothecaries by lore, so a healing mage can't really replace the IC need to carry such medicines.
4. I also agree with what was said by ForestGuardian says about there can't be such a huge gap between the restorative potential of healing magic versus the destructive potential of black magic.
Bringing these all together, I sorta view healing mages as ones who sooth wounds and heal grievous injuries. I see them as being capable of doing a lot more than just healing cuts and scrapes and curing headaches and whatnot. To some degree, there's a lot that adventurers can recover from on their own that a white mage doesn't necessarily tend to (for example, cuts that later would form scars). I think its reasonable that a white mage wouldn't expend their energy to fix these small things necessarily. That seems like a good spot for the medicines to be accounted for.
Here's what I personally think would be something approaching the limits of White Mage. A Warrior takes two direct stabs through them with a nasty polearm. This should arguably bring them down, and they would die in time without help. A White Mage could step in to restore tissue enough to keep the Warrior from death, but I think ICly the Warrior should still feel an ache there for some time, if not taking a few days to recover ICly, if not simply due to the loss of blood.
Something that I think would be going too far? A White Mage reattaching body parts... bringing someone back to life from the dead... etc. Things like that, to me, seem too big.
I think it also falls upon the 'fighter-class' roleplayers to roleplay their characters fairly and when and if your character takes a seriously compromising hit, that you don't pull a "I'll just walk it off... even though blood is pouring out of me, and my arm's broken." I think theirs a lot in place as Merri said to justify characters not taking the wounds in the first place (armor, and we're not exactly 'normal' people either with the buffs and whatnot that we get), but when we do take a serious wound, we should require help.
I think there will be a bit of a range of opinions on this matter. Personally, here are some considerations I have regarding white magic and healing mages.
1. Healing mages need to be able to contribute something significant; like a field medic, their presence could make the difference between life and death.
2. There must still be a point where a healing mage cannot save someone. Death must be possible, since death in Eorzea (death of NPCs etc) is either directly seen/implied multiple times.
3. As Aysun mentioned, there is still a need for medicine and apothecaries by lore, so a healing mage can't really replace the IC need to carry such medicines.
4. I also agree with what was said by ForestGuardian says about there can't be such a huge gap between the restorative potential of healing magic versus the destructive potential of black magic.
Bringing these all together, I sorta view healing mages as ones who sooth wounds and heal grievous injuries. I see them as being capable of doing a lot more than just healing cuts and scrapes and curing headaches and whatnot. To some degree, there's a lot that adventurers can recover from on their own that a white mage doesn't necessarily tend to (for example, cuts that later would form scars). I think its reasonable that a white mage wouldn't expend their energy to fix these small things necessarily. That seems like a good spot for the medicines to be accounted for.
Here's what I personally think would be something approaching the limits of White Mage. A Warrior takes two direct stabs through them with a nasty polearm. This should arguably bring them down, and they would die in time without help. A White Mage could step in to restore tissue enough to keep the Warrior from death, but I think ICly the Warrior should still feel an ache there for some time, if not taking a few days to recover ICly, if not simply due to the loss of blood.
Something that I think would be going too far? A White Mage reattaching body parts... bringing someone back to life from the dead... etc. Things like that, to me, seem too big.
I think it also falls upon the 'fighter-class' roleplayers to roleplay their characters fairly and when and if your character takes a seriously compromising hit, that you don't pull a "I'll just walk it off... even though blood is pouring out of me, and my arm's broken." I think theirs a lot in place as Merri said to justify characters not taking the wounds in the first place (armor, and we're not exactly 'normal' people either with the buffs and whatnot that we get), but when we do take a serious wound, we should require help.
![[Image: 51f7fee1a068d6073b38115a.jpg]](http://cdn.guildwork.net/albums/images/51f7fee1a068d6073b38115a.jpg)
