Scholar Minor Improvements
Hello and thank you for taking the time to read this. I am sure that you get many comments and complaints about job changes, and there are many people who dream up amazing new abilities and traits that you should give to particular jobs that they play. I do have a few minor suggestions, which I find quite reasonable, that I would like to propose for scholar.
I appreciate the attempt at balancing the healers in general for the Stormblood expansion, and feel that scholar has been made on a much more level playing field with other healers. Here are my few minor suggestions that might help to make some of the skills more effective in the job's toolkit:
1) Pre-4.0, when cleric stance affected healing output, Excogitation would have a valuable addition to the job. Scholars could have applied Excogitation to a player, entered Cleric Stance, and had more freedom if the ability was triggered. In 4.0, this type of utility is not present nearly as much, due to the change in Cleric Stance. Lustrates can now be used quickly in almost any circumstance. A scholar can, for example, cast Bio II or Ruin II and use a Lustrate immediately before their next attack, without even delaying their global timer. This weakens the case for adding Excogitation to the skill set.
Excogitation is even less important as a job tool because there is a decent amount of risk in using it versus Lustrate, in its current form, with virtually no reward for that risk. Lustrate potency is at 600 (and the ability to critical hit) and Excogitation at 650. The expected value of heal for Lustrate is actually higher than the expected value of heal from Excogitation. One of the most problematic issues with Excogitation is the fact that it does nothing if the target never reaches low HP. I would like to suggest making one of the following changes to Excogitation listed as follows:
A) Excogitation Lv. 62
Range 30y Radius 0y
Cast Instant Recast 60s
Grants target party member (remove “other than self”) the effect of Excogitation, restoring HP when member’s HP falls below 50% or timer expires, whichever occurs first.
Cure Potency: 800
Duration: 30s
Additional Effect: Increases Faerie Gauge by 10
Aetherflow Gauge Cost: 1
Or
B) Excogitation Lv. 62
Range 30y Radius 0y
Cast Instant Recast 60s
Grants target party member (remove “other than self”) the effect of Excogitation, restoring HP when member’s HP falls below 50% or timer expires, whichever occurs first.
Cure Potency: 650
Duration: 30s
Basically option A increases the potency slightly, allows the ability to complete if time expires, and allows use on self, whereas option B does not increase the potency but instead changes it to an ability that does not cost aetherflow.
2) Fey Union as a skill is truly a creative idea that I appreciate very much. It is true to the identity of the job and a very thoughtful addition by the design team. I do have two major concerns about this ability.
A) As you are no doubt aware, many players mention the AI interface for pets with some skepticism. A common critique is that pets will not follow commands easily if one of their abilities is being used. For example, I will often wish to use Whispering Dawn but will have difficulty making it execute while the fairy is attempting to Embrace party members. Fey Union has an even deeper level of difficulty to get the ability to execute. With Whispering Dawn (and other abilities), I can spam the button hoping that the ability will execute after the pet completes its current cast. With Aetherpact having a 5 second cooldown timer, if I want to initiate Fey Union, it is even more difficult to time this ability to occur during combat while the pet is not executing any actions, since I must wait at least 5 seconds to try again if the initiation fails. I do realize that this design is probably in place so that players do not accidentally initiate Fey Union and then accidentally cancel it immediately, and I can appreciate that part of the design, but getting the skill to activate can be quite tricky at times.
B) Using the skill requires the target to stay proximal to the pet throughout its use. The design of the Fey Union tether was well done by the design team, but often times dodging many types of mechanics will make this ability unable to have its intended effect.
I would like to recommend the following adjustments to Aetherpact:
Aetherpact Lv. 70
Range 30y Radius 0y
Cast Instant Recast 5s
Orders faerie next action to execute Fey Union with target party member other than self. Faerie will follow target until effect ends. Effect ends upon reuse.
Faerie Gauge Cost: 10
The Faerie Gauge increases when a faerie is summoned and an Aetherflow action used by you inflicts an effect on a target.
Essentially the change is that, when activated, Aetherpact will be the next ability used by the pet, and the pet will follow the target party member until the effect ends.
I would like to thank you for your interest and time in reading my suggestions. I do not believe that these minor changes would be a large boost in the power of the job as a whole, but rather a way of making the current design even more fluid and enjoyable to play.