SCH opinons on the change

I swapped over to astro, until they make several more needed adjustments my ole scholar will be riding the bench. It saddens me considering I had been a scholar main since 2.0 beta

Does it not bother anyone else that the imposed class limitation, and to a much lesser extent, cards not stacking (which can still be circumvented by communication) may very well be the only reasons any other healer besides AST is relevant up to now?

Ask around, and I'd bet to many raiders, It's not what WHM or SCH bring to the group that gets them a spot, but instead the limitations imposed on AST from the cards not stacking, to the outright prohibition of duplicate jobs in deltascape savage.

It's almost like... a hiring quota...

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Originally Posted by Reilyn

Does it not bother anyone else that the imposed class limitation, and to a much lesser extent, cards not stacking (which can still be circumvented by communication) may very well be the only reasons any other healer besides AST is relevant up to now?

Ask around, and I'd bet to many raiders, It's not what WHM or SCH bring to the group that gets them a spot, but instead the limitations imposed on AST from the cards not stacking, to the outright prohibition of duplicate jobs in deltascape savage.

It's almost like... a hiring quota...

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Affirmative Alleviation, helping scholars and white mages see savage since 4.0

On a more serious note, I like a lot of the changes and am looking forward to testing them out tonight. I still have issues.

1. Aldo mp cost is insane for what it is. Please look at either Aldo gets better or cost goes down.

2. Please fix dissipate. We know you can have the fairy come back, summoners got that.

Hey there! I'm sorry, I know I should appreciate this, but how is AF on a 45 min cool down now? I just saw quickened reduces by 5 seconds...

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Originally Posted by Lindreus

Hey there! I'm sorry, I know I should appreciate this, but how is AF on a 45 min cool down now? I just saw quickened reduces by 5 seconds...

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Each use of a aether flow stack reduces by 5 sec. We get three meaning if you don't hold on too them for too long you can effectively make the CD from 60 sec to 45 sec for the whole fight.

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Originally Posted by Miles_Maelstrom

Each use of a aether flow stack reduces by 5 sec. We get three meaning if you don't hold on too them for too long you can effectively make the CD from 60 sec to 45 sec for the whole fight.

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And even to 30s with Dissipation, but, lol Dissipation.

love the changes. they make sch very powerful and funl in dungeons. I have more aether stacks and fairy gaugestacks now that I can spend. miasma 2 is a lot of dps and not affected by diminishing returns. fairy tether range is huge. like the entire diameter of sacred soil. excog is a powerful 800 potency heal buff. I love all the changes. if you are co .mplaining about mana problems now you're doing something wrong

also when I resummoned my fairy I still had my original fairy gauge stacks ! but im not sure if I used dissipation prior or jist forgot to place the fairy on heel

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Originally Posted by Alisi

Succor, even buffed with the healing up spell (the role spell) plus ET, still doesn't keep up. It's very slow and the healing is tiny. Indo is nice-ish but the CD is very long when we're talking about high party wide damage coming very fast (roar did enough damage to take out 50% ~ 70%-ish of the party HP per roar -- every second or two and right after he drops your HP to 1.) Can't keep up with that. And then you go OOM very, very quickly.

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It sounds like you were basically solo healing for some reason, but you can handle the 1 HP ability + Roars in much the same way you could handle Photons in A11S, and this was a phase I used to solo heal to let my co-healer DPS since Malefic II was more potency than Broil back then.

Pre-shield with Deployment Tactics before everyone's HP is reduced to critical (the barrier won't be consumed by this because it's pre-determined damage, so everyone will have the barrier for Roar and give you enough time to heal). Then, precast ET+Succor and use Indomitability immediately after. While you're doing all of this, you should also command Eos to either do Fey Illumination to buff your initial shield and following Succor, or use Fey Covenant to mitigate the damage from the immediate Roar. You won't have eveyrone topped off, no, but the mitigation should be enough to keep people alive through both attacks. Whispering Dawn would also help here, but you gotta decide a priority order for the pet's abilities in this specific scenario, since you can't use all three in the few seconds you have before Roar. I'd personally save WD for helping top people off after Roar and use Covenant for the mitigation.

You can also throw in a Sacred Soil for Roar if you feel it's not mitigated enough. It of course becomes "easier" with more communication, since you can have a Bard use Nature's Minne on the deployment target, coupled with their own MDEF+ buff, or a caster use Addle on the Roar as well.

Also, if there were a lot of deaths, it's not surprising you were OoM really fast.

excog still is very hard to use despite of it's potency and duration buff.
always get killed off by my co-healer and the tanker themselves casts clemency.
when it doesn't proc, it is like 1800mp down to the drain.
then comes the tank buster. my co-healer pre-cast cure2 and it instantly topup the tank right after the tank buster, felt like my excog is not needed at all :/

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Originally Posted by sumiree

excog still is very hard to use despite of it's potency and duration buff.
always get killed off by my co-healer and the tanker themselves casts clemency.
when it doesn't proc, it is like 1800mp down to the drain.
then comes the tank buster. my co-healer pre-cast cure2 and it instantly topup the tank right after the tank buster, felt like my excog is not needed at all :/

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Is this any different than two people using their big heals simultaneously after a big hit? Doesn't feel like it to me. Excog is still situational but in those situations the added potency is nice. I'm still not convinced they don't need to tweak Aldo and succor a touch but the excog change seems to fit what the spell is for which is a pre cast reactive heal to a large hit like a tank buster.

I've gotten some use out of Excog in Savage so far, such as when healing through Twin Bolt. Do I need it? No, but it does have some value.

The overall QoL fixes are mostly great, even if the Indom potency buff wasn't strictly necessary.

I'm encouraged by the direction of SCH changes and am going to play with them for a while in casual content and in Savage. So far my group has only had time to clear v1.0, but I experimented with both SCH and AST. They feel perfectly fine to me, but I have to admit that AST's high shield potency and ability to pop Lightspeed for uninterrupted healing to cover mistakes while handling mechanics is a helpful advantage in progression even considering the Balance nerf and AST's characteristically low personal DPS.

Okay so to all of the SCH out there, I semi found a loophole for Excognition. The main purpose for the skill is crap but hear me out. If you use it on a party member, besides yourself cause why SE, but if you use it on a party member already below 50% it will go off instantly. I'm sure many people figured this out before the changes, but now that the potency is 800 its a better catch up skill for raised players.

But loophole aside the main purpose for the skill is still meh, so close yet so far.

I think it's a great step in the right direction. IMO I think they just need to do something about the shields, dissipation, and Selene and we'll be golden. There is no reason Noct AST should have stronger shields than SCH does. Shields and tactical healing is what SCH is all about right?

The way healers are now we are pretty much balanced. Groups are using all 3 healers equally, no healer feels blatantly OP or UP. Why do they need to "fix" SCH shields AND dissipation AND Selene AND Excog?

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Originally Posted by ToasterMan

I think it's a great step in the right direction. IMO I think they just need to do something about the shields, dissipation, and Selene and we'll be golden. There is no reason Noct AST should have stronger shields than SCH does. Shields and tactical healing is what SCH is all about right?

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The comparison of noct aspected benefict and aldo is so winky right now.

One gives better shields, cost much less mp, and is instant cast.

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Originally Posted by ToasterMan

I think it's a great step in the right direction. IMO I think they just need to do something about the shields, dissipation, and Selene and we'll be golden. There is no reason Noct AST should have stronger shields than SCH does. Shields and tactical healing is what SCH is all about right?

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Actually yes. There is. Noct AST has almost no passive healing. Their only form of passive healing is tied to a 90s cooldown. SCH has a regen of sorts in the fairy.

However, this does not excuse SCH's shields being so expensive while its essential healing is for so little. The main reason they did that was so that SCH's can't fish for Crit Adlos for Deployment. It's simply because Deployment exists that Adlo is so expensive. I can't begin to fathom why Succor is so expensive while being so horribly inefficient either. I mean, if they want to make it that way, then, fine, give us a real Medica (stick it in at 40, or put it at 35 and move Succor back to 40) as well and bump up the potency of Succor and give it the added shield crit chance.

If anything, Deployment should be adjusted as well simply because they're so afraid of the critlo deployment.

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Originally Posted by ToasterMan

I think it's a great step in the right direction. IMO I think they just need to do something about the shields, dissipation, and Selene and we'll be golden. There is no reason Noct AST should have stronger shields than SCH does. Shields and tactical healing is what SCH is all about right?

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They shouldn't touch the shields. The reason you shield for less is because you have additional healing coming out from your pet that Nocturnal Stance doesn't have access to.

In Savage mode, I've found that Indom is very helpful for the raid wide damage, and can cover a lot of it without the other healer if it crits on everybody. Excog is a godsend for the tanks along with Adlo, but the cost for Adlo is still too expensive and makes me take an MP hit I don't need in a heavy healer-reliant fight. Succor is still useless as all hell outside of ET, and feels like it should never be used except for with ET.

Dissipation I've found is helping for those "crunch" points where HP to 1 spells are being followed by tank busters, since Lustrate is being used like a madman for one of the tanks while the other healer is topping off the other tank (because that tank buster WILL kill them if not topped off). However it really needs to resummon the Fairy when it ends, the cost of summoning Eos is another unnecessary hit to my MP in a fight where I can't afford to waste any.

I feel like we're doing better, but it still feels like we need more.

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Originally Posted by BloodPact

They shouldn't touch the shields. The reason you shield for less is because you have additional healing coming out from your pet that Nocturnal Stance doesn't have access to.

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You mean the pet that fires of embrace so we have a benefic 2 size heal when combined with phsycik or the Aoe regen to help bring people back up while succor absorbs damage that isn't even a complete hit anymore mean while you can spam Helios and aspected Helios while we have large cooldowns and massive mana costs. I'm not saying Ast shields need to be nerfed but they should not cost less and heal for more barring crit Aldo. If they want to leave our potencies where there are fine, but how about a mana fix a bit. Granted mana isn't usually an issue if people are not being stupid.

After the changes on tues I do feel scholars are in better place. Hell I'd be happy if succor just had Aldo's crit aspect. Then it would be some give and take with the Ast shields.

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Originally Posted by VanilleFang

The way healers are now we are pretty much balanced. Groups are using all 3 healers equally, no healer feels blatantly OP or UP. Why do they need to "fix" SCH shields AND dissipation AND Selene AND Excog?

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I agree. we need to look at the kit as a while and not just blindly compare potencies. however Selene could really use a rework. there's hardly any use for her. it would be NICE if she was put on par with eOs so we have am actual choice of who to use as a pet. right now my only use for selene is during the opener.

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Originally Posted by Feidam

You mean the pet that fires of embrace so we have a benefic 2 size heal when combined with phsycik

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You mean like how a Regen with a Cure I is like a Cure II heal?

So the new Quickened Aetherflow is amazing and does actually make Dissipation worth using. Consider:

Aetherflow
Broil II > Energy Drain
Broil II > Rouse > [Whispering Dawn]
Broil II > Energy Drain
Broil II > Energy Drain
Broil II > Dissipation
Broil II > Energy Drain
Broil II > Energy Drain
Broil II > Energy Drain
Broil II > Aetherflow

Replace Broil IIs/Energy Drains with DoT management or heals as needed, but that's a solid 30 seconds of being able to use an Aetherflow stack with nearly every GCD. That is a lot of burst DPS/heal potential.

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Originally Posted by Feidam

You mean the pet that fires of embrace so we have a benefic 2 size heal when combined with phsycik or the Aoe regen to help bring people back up while succor absorbs damage that isn't even a complete hit anymore mean while you can spam Helios and aspected Helios while we have large cooldowns and massive mana costs. I'm not saying Ast shields need to be nerfed but they should not cost less and heal for more barring crit Aldo. If they want to leave our potencies where there are fine, but how about a mana fix a bit. Granted mana isn't usually an issue if people are not being stupid.

After the changes on tues I do feel scholars are in better place. Hell I'd be happy if succor just had Aldo's crit aspect. Then it would be some give and take with the Ast shields.

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You have no idea what you're talking about. You don't have "large cooldowns". You have superb abilities under Aetherflow that just got lowered to 3 every 45 seconds. That's you main "cooldown". You have a COMPLETELY SEPARATE entity that doesn't expire which is a 100% uptime, MP free regen, and it can use its abilities totally outside of your own GCDs and oGCDs (e.g. it can use Whispering Dawn while you cast Physick (GCD) or use Energy Drain (oGCD)). No ever mentions that plus. The MP increase for your spells is also fine. Learn to live with it. For 4 YEARS Scholars were basically laughing at WHM because MP for Scholar used to be "just a pink bar in my user interface that I don't know what it's for". Adlo and Succor aren't mean to be spammed. Those days for Scholar are gone. It did need help in 4.0. It is perfectly fine now.

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Originally Posted by BloodPact

You have a COMPLETELY SEPARATE entity that doesn't expire which is a 100% uptime, MP free regen, and it can use its abilities totally outside of your own GCDs and oGCDs (e.g. it can use Whispering Dawn while you cast Physick (GCD) or use Energy Drain (oGCD)).

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Fairies can die. LOL. And they nerfed embrace into the ground. WD is nice but it's tied to the fairy. GL getting it off if the party needs healing AND it has a CD. So, no, WD isn't up 100%. The fairies will try to embrace everyone up first so you have a 50/50 chance of getting it off when you need it. But precasting it takes care of that.

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Originally Posted by BloodPact

The MP increase for your spells is also fine. Learn to live with it.

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LOL. You know Astro is going to come out of this with their MP costs as they are? Scholar is the forerunner here. They are testing the MP costs on Scholars first. This is the way every, single shield based healing class goes. Astro's are going to be in for a rude awakening if you honestly think this will just be us. So you gloat and feel superior while you can. Then the old good Astro's will be the Scholars who know how to deal with the MP costs...

It's funny, SCH has now become discount AST.

Better, faster, cheaper shields as well as stronger heals in general.
Arguably better crit buff in Spear.
No micromanaging an unreponsive pet.

Wait, did I say funny. I meant sad.

The changes to SCH are nice but missed the mark by a mile.

E-Tactics CD reduction is great but we're still paying ~2k MP for our Cure 2/Benefic 2 and Medica/Helios. Even with the triple potency on crit, it does not justify the absurd cost of Adlo and Succor so maybe E-Tactics reduce the cost of both by half, just to help our resource management.
Buff Chain Stratagem. Reduce the CD, increase the buff and/or duration.
Make the pet prioritize orders over auto Embrace.
I have more but it's a hassle to edit on my phone

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Originally Posted by paoweeotter

I agree. we need to look at the kit as a while and not just blindly compare potencies. however Selene could really use a rework. there's hardly any use for her. it would be NICE if she was put on par with eOs so we have am actual choice of who to use as a pet. right now my only use for selene is during the opener.

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Yeah, Selene definitely needs a tweak. My post was asking why we need to "fix" all of those things, instead of tweaking 1 or 2.

If SCH get a stronger shields, and a better Selene, and a better Dissipation, and Excog is buffed again then SCH would just be flat out OP. That is not how you balance a game.

Tweak Selene, and maybe reduce Adlo cost by a little. Nothing more really needs to be done. SCH is not hurting anymore and it's not being excluded or left in the dust. It's a perfectly functioning healer that could use like 1 or 2 tweaks tops.

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Originally Posted by Silver-Strider

It's funny, SCH has now become discount AST.

Better, faster, cheaper shields as well as stronger heals in general.
Arguably better crit buff in Spear.
No micromanaging an unreponsive pet.

Wait, did I say funny. I meant sad.

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Eh? Stop looking at the shields as an isolated ability. There's a whole kit that surrounds them.

Spear is better than Chain Strat in what way? Spear increases Crit rate by 20% for one ally, or 10% for all allies... Chain Strat always increases Crit by 15% with none of the extra RNG. Granted Spear increases healibg crit rate, but Chain strat gives everyine +15% on their DPS. Oh wow, Spear lasts 5s longer. So OP.

But they have to play with RNG and Yugioh cards? So... yeah. No pet but cards.

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Originally Posted by VanilleFang

Eh? Stop looking at the shields as an isolated ability. There's a whole kit that surrounds them.

Spear is better than Chain Strat in what way? Spear increases Crit rate by 20% for one ally, or 10% for all allies... Chain Strat always increases Crit by 15% with none of the extra RNG. Oh eow, Spear lasts 5s longer. So OP.

But they have to play with RNG and Yugioh cards? So... yeah. No pet but cards.

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The change to the spear card was a good thing for Ast. I don't get why scholars are upset about this. Chain strat is still a nice skill for the dps check phases. I agree with you people need to let this go.

The recent buffs to the scholar are nice. It is true, imo that the scholar is much closer to the pack than it was in 4.0. I still don't think that Aldo or succor are where they should be be. Either they need a small potency buff to go with the high mp costs or a small mp reduction to go with current potencies. However, I do realize with more crit at later gear levels in the life of the expansion may solve this issue.

Selene. Poor Selene. I kind of feel they just forgot about her. Her aoe cleanse is nice, but highly situational. The fey wind buff has always been decent imo. Silent dusk has never worked. What to give her however is a tough decision imo.

Overall scholar has remained my favorite healer even at the start of 4.0. Always loved the play style. The Ast is fun for something different but with shields. Surprisingly the whm is also now enjoyable to me with the ability to sling it's nukes more frequently and still have mp to heal.

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Originally Posted by Feidam

You mean the pet that fires of embrace so we have a benefic 2 size heal

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Scholar has been a job for years now, do people still not realise the Faeries potencies are not the same as ours?!

It has a completely different formula and Embrace is only marginally better than a Regen tick.

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Originally Posted by Kiddiotic

EOS to .. yea i leave it to fate after i mash Whispering Dawn 2 times.

That being said, i am still targeting at the fact that our Faerie needs more improvement. Obey needs to be reiterated into their AI.

PS: i still love my Faeries <3

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Main issue with Whispering Dawn is it is on the faerie's GCD. Say faerie just started Embrace. You have to wait 3s for that GCD to be over, then she can start the 2s cast. That puts you anywhere between 2-5s to get WD up.

With the right macro, you can cancel her Embrace and get her immediately started on WD. With a good macro, your worst case scenario is she just finished Embrace and you have to wait 1s for her GCD to refresh. That puts the timeframe at 2-3s to execute instead of 2-5s.

If you are interested, there are details in my guide. I haven't gotten around to doing a SB update yet, but WD hasn't changed.
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/209109-How-To-Train-Your-Faerie-A-Comprehensive-Guide

In regards to the faerie range question, there is not a max range to command faerie. She remains responsive until she unsummons due to distance.

Aetherpact is a little different because it is YOU using an ability that causes the faerie to use an ability, similar to Enkindle. I just tested it and the target of Aetherpact does need to be within 25y of the SCH. Faerie will move to get in range the target and cast Fey Union, same as how Embrace is handled outside faerie range.

Overall thoughts on the changes:

Miasma II
Heck yes. I have AOE damage again! I know some people don't like the short range, but it really helps break up the monotony of standing still and Broil spamming. Plus I'm used to it, from doing Miasma II and Blizzard II back in the day.

Aetherflow
This is a huge buff, honestly more than I would have expected before the live letter. This gives us more MP, more lustrates/energy drains, more faerie gauge, and even makes Dissipation better. After two expansions of watching other healers get more oGCD healing resources while we only got more ways to use the same resource pool, we now have an increase to our base resource. I find myself hardly ever lacking Aetherflow when I need it (granted, my playing habits are based on years of the 60s cooldown).

Fey Union
15y range seems about right. While I would prefer deactivation if the target goes out of range, not burning faerie gauge is the next best thing.

Excogitation
Buff is nice. With 45s duration, it is a lot more forgiving. The potency buff removes the issue of it being hard to justify excogitation vs lustrate.

Emergency Tactics
I don't usually use this much, but this is the primary resource we have to mitigate the bad luck of PUGing into a double SCH group, so the shorter cooldown will help there.

Indomitability
I didn't think this needed a buff, but our AOE healing was a bit on the weak side.

Overall, SCH feels a lot more powerful and now feels stronger than Heavensward, rather than weaker.

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Originally Posted by Kabzy

Scholar has been a job for years now, do people still not realise the Faeries potencies are not the same as ours?!

It has a completely different formula and Embrace is only marginally better than a Regen tick.

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You left off the part of my post that said embrace and physick had to combine to get that level.

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Originally Posted by Feidam

You left off the part of my post that said embrace and physick had to combine to get that level.

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Faerie potency at lvl 60+ is approximately 2/3 of advertised potency. 250 potency Embrace is approximately equivalent to 170 real potency.
400 + 170 = 570.

Back in 2.x, Embrace was a full 300 so Physick + Embrace used to be 700, but after two rounds of nerfs, that is no longer the case.

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Originally Posted by VanilleFang

Snip

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There is all of 2 abilities that affect the SCH's shields, E-Tactics and Deployment tactics. E-Tactics does nothing more than turn Adlo into a Cure 2/Benefic 2. Deployment tactics is literally 1 of the only skills keeping SCH relevant in Raids. It's a great skill but to say that you have a whole kit surrounding shield as a SCH is a very large exaggeration.

It's funny that you say to look at the whole kit but completely ignore the fact that AST's toolkit can extends the duration of Spear. Even with the RNG elements of AST's toolkit, Spear will see more uptime on an AST than SCH can ever hope to maintain on Chain Stratagem because AST's toolkit enables that sort of interaction. It's very possible to get 2 AoE Spears within the 2 minute CD of Chain Stratagem thus allowing for Spear to easily surpass what Chain Stratagem offers.

RNG cards that are instant and responsive with several courses of interaction vs a fairy that
1) Can be killed, either due to enemies or because of Dissipation
2) Will not instantly execute a command over it's Embrace auto attack, resulting in time wasted repeated hitting the same command over again in hopes that it will finally go thru.

The Ast buffs do out out pace that of the scholar. But personal dps wise the scholar out paces the Ast. Is it a perfect wash in the end no, but balance will never be perfect. We just need to get it close.

Deployment tactics is a shining skill for the scholar, but I believe after 4.05 the scholar is being done an injustice if you think that is the only reason that they are brought to raids.

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Originally Posted by Feidam

Snip.

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What is it with people and selective reading on these forums? I said 1 of the only skills, not that it was the only skill. There is a grand total of 4 things a SCH brings to raids.

Chain Stratagem
Deployment Tactics
Fey Covenant
Sacred Soil

Going by this, I think it's fair to say that SCH would be a mitigation based healer. The rest of SCH's toolkit is largely irrelevant as it's the basic toolkit of all other healers as well, just with different potency/CDs/etc.

Now, I already admitted that Deployment Tactics was one of SCH's best skills. Regardless of whether or not the Adlo Crits, it still provides a shield for everyone and when coupled with Fey Covenant/Sacred Soil, provides more mitigation than all other healers. It's a proactive healer that shines by reducing damage before it happens but is a little lacking in the AoE department, with Succor being a very weak shield and heal, Indom being locked behind Aetherstacks and has a 30 second CD between each use and Whispering Dawn being on a minute long CD. That isn't to say they can't heal thru AoE situations but they are harder pressed than WHM or AST to do so. E-Tactics does help in the AoE department as well by providing Succor with more healing factor as opposed to just a heal and shield and realistically the shield from Succor is fairly minute and easily removed by any minor attack that you're probably better off using it with E-Tactics for a more substantial heal after the initial hit anyways.

That said however, I do feel SCH's identity as a mitigation healer is being somewhat infringed upon by AST. Their faster, stronger, cheaper shields are just more favorable in many situations than SCH's own shielding abilities and that doesn't feel right. AST is the best buff class in the game and offers a good middle ground as a healer between WHM and SCH but the problem is that AST's shields are often times stronger than SCH's own. Not just in potency but in MP efficiency as well as cast times. I honestly feel SE got turned around and should have increased the cost of AST's shield since it has so many advantages over SCH's own. The new Spear is also a slap in the face to SCH as it copied Chain Stratagem and gave it an upgrade on several fronts. AST's toolkit is designed with their cards in mind to extend the duration of cards for longer and despite the fact Chain Stratagem does have an advantage in solo fights, add phases obscure its usefulness somewhat as now DPS have to focus elsewhere, which could lead Spear to be superior in those situations. I won't put much mention Bole because while it does provide mitigation, it's seldom used as other cards are more favored and only used when you couldn't get anything better on your draws.

If SCH's identity as a mitigation healer is to be maintained, I feel that they should be given more tools to aid in that endeavor while also putting a greater emphasize on shields, rather than away from shields and more focus on their Aetherflow stacks which is currently the direction the class is taking. I also feel AST needs to be reevaluated because it's ever growing toolkit is just becoming too big for it's own good if it's infringing this greatly into SCH's identity.

Honestly I think they are shifting Scholar away from a mitigation healer to a free HoT healer.

A little perspective on deploy. Adlo at ilvl 318 does 5500 roughly non crit non buffed in most cases this is what you will deploy unless you fish for crits or stack every healing buff in the game up for one single mechanic. From my experience though most heavy damage now comes out much more often than 120 seconds so it only gives you a small window of breathing room and only if its heavily catered to by an entire raid. Fishing for crits isn't really a thing anymore so lets just say most deploys are 5500-8300 if you largesse+dissipate. Noct AH in the same gear same weapon tier is a 3300 aoe heal and 5000 shield for equal mp as one single adlo cast, think about that for a second. You're getting an equal shield to a regular adlo plus 3300 healing party wide, equal in shield+heal potency to just the shield alone of a deployed largesse+disspated adlo. Yes those crit catered to adlos can be godly but the consistency and power of AH isn't to be underestimated.