Ideas to make the Scholar more unique...PLEASE READ

Well I, as a Scholar, have been thinking of things to make our class a bit more even in the playing field. Not that I see our class is massively op, but we do have some mechanics that makes our class highly desirable. We have no issues with mp what-so-ever, and I don't believe that should be the case. I feel that us having to actually manage our mp is something everyone magic based class should have to worry about. I know I will catch a lot of flack for this post. But I do enjoy scholar it is my main healing class, even before all the whms started jumping on the bandwagon. I am the type of person that will play a class regardless of how many buffs or nerfs they get because i am attached to a class and want to shine regardless of the positives or the negatives. I have been playing arc/sch since release and have no intention in changing in spite of the changes that may happen in the future.

I think Aetherflow cooldown should be increased to a minute and a half, or even two minutes. Usually I am sitting on stacks of Aetherflow unless the battle is particularly hard, and I am using Sacred Soil and Lustrates. Some people even simply use it for the mp gain, which shouldn't be touched and remain a part of the mechanic. They will have a full stack of aetherflow and blow the cooldown again simply for the gain. Honestly, I hardly find the need to fall back on it, I feel that a minute and a half would be ample considering the next suggestion i would make.

I think Energy drain should merely regain life. This would keep in line with saving us mp, since we wouldn't be using a heal to actually heal ourselves, but we would be draining it from the monster/aether. I see this as fitting more in with the type of class it is, a pet based healer. Had SE kept sustain a spell that drained health instead of mp, this would fit more in line with my train of thought. Where as the conjurer pulls from nature to heal their allies, we pull from ourselves, and the Aether within us. Makes the class a bit more dark, which I would like and would be an interesting change from a typical healer.

Lustrate I feel should have been kept at 20%, and was an unecessary buff, considernig all the fixes our pets were getting and now with macros things are as they should be. But if they implemented the changes mentioned above then a 25% heal wouldn't be something blowing peoples minds.

Now I know again lots, especially scholars, will be up in arms, but I am merely putting out ideas to fit the type of class/job. I see a healer with a pet as something that should draw upon things such as themselves and their pets to heal/sustain. I see skills that would draw more upon our life or a pets life as more interesting without breaking us. I don't think our mp management should be non-existant. I also feel that whm should get changes to certain skills to make them more mp efficient. Plus if we had skills that would pull more from our life, in whm/sch combos the aoe heals would help us all the more and make us even more of a grand duo.

whatever, just spit balling and thinking about our class and how to make them even more interesting than they already are without breaking them

Aeno

BLM and SMN don't really worry about MP either (BLM especially, they have infinite MP); for whatever reason, they decided that only WHMs need to learn MP management. You can argue that this isn't a good design, but it is what it is.

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Originally Posted by Aenomaly

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Just for the sake of arguement, you mind stating what kind of end game material you have done? Aetherflow is perfect the way it is, lustrate is needed in end game fights due to the lack of straight up healing capabilities SCH currently have.

I honestly don't see how this makes Sch more unique. The changes you've stated here were in short:
Make Aetherflow have a longer cooldown
Remove MP regain from Energy Drain
Roll Back Lustrate from 25% > 20%

and you mentioned changing Sustain back to a HP-spell, rather than MP.

This doesn't change the way the class plays, just makes it harder to play. I am happy with the adjustments to Sch in 2.1... sure I would have liked for sustain to remain HP based, but I know that I can run out of MP very quickly if I have to tank + raid heal because the other healer is slacking. Even in some 4 man content (WP speed or Pharos) I can find myself running on empty if people aren't watching what's going on and I have to spam heal / AoE heal. perhaps this will change as I transition from darklight to Myth/allagn but I don't think it will change much!

This was just to get the ball rolling with ideas, we would be effectively be focusing on life/mp instead of just mp. I only mentioned three, which would affect the summoner as well in terms of mp management, for the person above. This would change the concept of the scholar and then other spells could be based around it. I honestly can't see how any scholar runs out of mp. Between the 20% on aeitherflow, the energy drain, the minute cool down to aetherflow, the heals from fair costing nothing....etc. So yes changing the job to a healer based more upon its own life would make them more unique and as the game matures more spells could be added to support it.

Aetherflow and Energy Drain are Arcanist abilities, which impact Summoner (who uses Aetherflow for Fester and Bane on a regular basis - longer cooldown on Aetherflow would directly nerf them). The game doesn't really have anything that modifies abilities just because of your job (closest is Warrior, which just builds Wrath stacks while in defiance from some abilities, doesn't actually change the abilities themselves) and traits are at the class level, not job.

Part of the reason (at least as I see it) why SCH have better MP management is we often have to waste MP. Casting Succor before an aoe when everyone is at full health wastes half the spell, but you do it anyway. Ditto for Adloquiem before a big hit where you're using it for the shield even if they're full health. Nevermind if you find yourself in a situation where the party needs to be healed up, you don't have a WHM/Whispering Dawn available, and you end up spamming Succor and wasting the shield portion repeatedly.

Changing the MP cost of Adlo/Succor (already slightly more expensive than Cure II/Medica) or even Physick would also adjust how MP efficient Scholars are without messing with Summoner all that much.

Scholar is fine as is, as someone who mains a SCH healer. Its true I rarely find myself running out of mana, but since I use lots of Lustrate and Sacred Soil, changing the CD on Aetherflow wouldn't do anything other than make the class more difficult to play, because you're making our good abilities on a longer CD. I agree with the person a few posts up in wanting to know what end game content you're working on, if you're sitting on 3 stacks Aetherflow constantly. Our mana regain does feel a little"OP" since the only time I ever run out is if I have to raise more than 1 person a minute, or solo heal something like Titan without a bard. Most of the changes OP proposed don't make anything more "unique" and while they are not all bad... They are not really needed right now, or seem to serve a purpose other than to irritate the player or possibly upset the balance of a class.

As the person above me said, your proposed changes to aetherflow would only adversely affect the class. I depend heavily on aetherflow when I heal coil because unless I have my fairies heal macro-ed to mine, I have absolutely no options for a bigger heal. We would basically become gimped WHMs. Coil requires big heals to be pushed out as quickly and mana efficiently as possible which is a role that lustrate serves. By increasing the cd of lustrate to 90 or even 120 seconds, it means that for that extra time, all we have to offer our parties are shields that last about 1-2 hits. Why would anyone want to take schs to coil instead of whms?

Basicly calling for a sch nerf, anyway its fine the way it is. The endgame stuff is sometimes pretty mp intensive, especially when you have to res.

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Originally Posted by Aenomaly

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The suggestion you mentioned in your post is considered a big nerf to SCH and will severely hinders SCH in end game content. Maybe you have not gone to a Twintania fight where tank HP drop from full to 10% in two hits. Your argue that we shouldn't heal our self is absolutely right, our pet should, energy drain is not used to regain lost HP after you mend your pet (pre-patch). You couldn't see how SCH run out of mp at your current level of game play is because you might not have gone too far end game.

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Originally Posted by Calyanare

BLM and SMN don't really worry about MP either (BLM especially, they have infinite MP); for whatever reason, they decided that only WHMs need to learn MP management. You can argue that this isn't a good design, but it is what it is.

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SMN do, if you want to maximize your DPS.

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Originally Posted by Calyanare

BLM and SMN don't really worry about MP either (BLM especially, they have infinite MP); for whatever reason, they decided that only WHMs need to learn MP management. You can argue that this isn't a good design, but it is what it is.

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That's wrong on both counts though.

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Originally Posted by Sylari

That's wrong on both counts though.

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BLM don't have to worry about conserving MP. The BLM "paying attention to how much MP I have so I know when to switch to regen mode" isn't the kind of MP management the OP was talking about. SMN... Okay, I'll grant that, since I haven't played SMN in anything harder than Titan HM, SMN probably does have to worry about conserving MP in longer fights.

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Originally Posted by Aenomaly

I think Aetherflow cooldown should be increased to a minute and a half, or even two minutes. Usually I am sitting on stacks of Aetherflow unless the battle is particularly hard, and I am using Sacred Soil and Lustrates. Some people even simply use it for the mp gain, which shouldn't be touched and remain a part of the mechanic. They will have a full stack of aetherflow and blow the cooldown again simply for the gain. Honestly, I hardly find the need to fall back on it, I feel that a minute and a half would be ample considering the next suggestion i would make.

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http://i.imgur.com/3DePdyL.gif

no, thank you

I don't see any real reason to change scholar - they are stronger than WHM, but not excessively so. I'd like to see WHM get a few things instead, namely some sort of interesting secondary stat scaling like SCH have with crit.

Certainly do not increase the CD on Aetherflow without otherwise changing it; that'd have a bunch of side effects for both SCH and SMN.

OP seems to think like SE... Make sch unique by nerfing them. Seems like an explanation SE would use.

How bout we give Sch an ability where they explode their fairies for a big aoe healing bomb.
Or maybe that is too "Stressful" for sch seeing their pet blow up.

I main a Scholar, and out of all the points OP made, the only one that carries any weight is the point about lustrate. Lustrate was really good at 20%, and now its really, really good at 25%. That change in the patch notes actually made me grin.

Now, onto the stated purpose of the thread. Things to make Scholars even more unique:
* Virus should not be a cross class skill, lower the immunity timer by half at least.
* Signature Attack spell like summoners pets have. Eos would do a large AoE Adlo, Selene would do an aoe 'anti-virus' that buffs nearby players stats by 10-15% for 10-20s. Cooldown of 30min.
* A new pet focused on debuffing the enemy. No fair that summoners get so many, while we only get two!

Just some random ideas.

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How bout we give Sch an ability where they explode their fairies for a big aoe healing bomb.

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You just made me cackle maniacly.

Same here curious what you are you doing at end game, and what your heals are ?

In regards to your ideas, they need to be revised, you have to remember SCHs need to well geared to match WHMs of lower equipment on HP heals alone, not talking about skill before you say. Schs match them also by being able to throw out heals constantly, and they need to due to the lack of big hits WHM can.

If you want to dampen or entirely remove SCH mp regain you will need to re address SCH and WHM lvl 50 base stats traits included. Reduce GCD of EOS buffs to be in line with WHM, and give them there own refresh skill. You need to remember WHM has a lot of tools SCH doesnt have like CC, targeted regen, stronger base shield + stone, buffs and 100% instant heal, plus the fact end game gear is tailored to WHM needs not SCH.

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Originally Posted by Sanguisio

end game gear is tailored to WHM needs not SCH.

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Not really, Just look at the mythology accessories and belt .
Its all critical chance which is quite meh on whm but great for sch. SE could of made it det which benefits both healers about equal.
Whm need to do primals and coil for det/ss peices.

How about they just make it so the freecure procs for white mage are on crits, that way we can pretty much kill any diversity between the jobs while crippling badly geared whms (like how bad scholars suffer to good ones) while buffing the good ones. (Although I don't think you can even get a crit rate of 15% or higher with gear, but then I don't know the numbers)

Yeah crit is good, but you need alot to make it work really well, whereas determination affect WHMs more apparently and WHM specific gear is full of it ^^.

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Originally Posted by Sanguisio

Yeah crit is good, but you need alot to make it work really well, whereas determination affect WHMs more apparently and WHM specific gear is full of it ^^.

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I have read on this forum that sch pets get as much scaling from det as they do mind. 1 det = 1 mind for sch pet.

Whm don't synergize with det anymore then sch do. They certain don't benefit from it as much as sch do from crit. All three secondary stats are quite unimportant for whm but most agree that crit is the bottom for whm. Speed build has been nerfed with the hotfix revert of the allagan breeches.

Whm specific gear is 3/5 speed. Not exactly "full of det".

Sch crit bis is pretty much mostly mythology gear and whm is mostly coil/primal if going for det.