How in the world am I supposed to play SCH on PS4?

I wanted to get my SCH to 70 with the quick easy Q's so I could get my SMN to 70 as well but just looking at all the abilities + pet commands this looks nearly impossible!

Any tips? And what are "keybinds"?

Sorry, don't take this the wrong way but please.... If you are going to queue as a sch to level up smn, please make sure you are at least decent at healing or practicing a bit before joining groups. I have experienced enough times where someone who had no idea what they were doing caused issues in groups and roulettes. And...sch healing is probably the most complicated healer to play due to the micromanagement of your pet.

That being said.

I mained sch for all of hw and play using a controller as well. I would recommend macros and lots of them. As for keybinds, they are buttons or combination of buttons to perform a action (keyboard related) and not really useful for the controller.

One thing I recommend to all healers that want to dps and heal is to do a <t> and <tt> macro.

Example would be

/ac "broil" <t>
/ac "broil" <tt>
/micon "broil"

This is a really simple macro and what is does is this. Say you have the tank targeted to heal him, while you have him targeted, you cast broil and it will attack his target. This will also work on any other targets you target yourself. Just make sure to remove error messages from your chat. You can also use this for other spells such as miasma, bio, etc.

For aoe targeting such as shadowflare and sacred soil, you can do an instant cast without worrying about where to target it.

/ac "shadowflare" <t>
/micon "shadowflare"

or

/ac "sacred soil" <t>
/micon "sacred soil"

What this does is that anyone or anything you target is where your aoe will be cast and you dont have to use the joystick to aim it. (remember: only either shadowflare or sacred soil can be up)

As for the pet, use Eos. There is very little reason to use Selene atm.

I can't get on to check the macros I made for my pet but for quick cast of a pet, the macro is

/mlock
/ac "swiftcast" <wait.1>
/ac "summon"
/micon "summon"

Also, make sure to have obey, place, and stay.

Obey makes the fairy only use regular heals without randomly casting cooldowns
Place allows you to place the fairy where you want.
Stay makes it stay there.

As for fairy spells, you are going to want cast those on your own instead of leaving the fairy to randomly cast them on it's own.

Also --Make sure to focus target bosses.

Hi there,

I play SCH quite regularly for high-end contents and I'm also on PS4. Here are my few tips that hopefully make your experience more enjoyable as SCH:

1. It's perfectly fine to put your pet in sic mode for most contents so you don't have additional pet commands to worry about. This will make your crossbar easier to toggle as well, assuming you're using 2 crossbars like I do (if you want to remove that dedicated pet crossbar you can't edit from toggle, you can do so from character config -> hotbar section). Although putting your pet in sic mode is not something I'd recommend for high-end contents, it's great for casual contents because it activates automatically whenever possible. So it's almost like you get various freebies at certain intervals, very neat!
2. You might want to consider using macros in order to cull some skills. For example, the popular protect-esuna/E4E combo, swiftcast + resurrection, rouse + whispering dawn, among other things. I think you can reduce buttons as many as 6 this way. I personally never use macro so I can't help you in this department, but I'm sure others will be able to help you if you're interested. Perhaps this is what you meant by keybinding? at least, that's what I immediately thought when I read that word.
3. Have you tried shared crossbar features? The ones you can access by double tapping R2/L2 and holding them together? I use these features for buttons I share with my other jobs (i.e. sprint, lb, mount, teleport, return, ethers, etc.). So I'm only using 2 crossbars, but they're all SCH-specific and I seem to be able to fit in everything I need within these 32 slots.

At the end of the day, SCH will still have more buttons compared to the other 2 healers and so it may be confusing at first. However, it's perfectly possible and viable to play SCH effectively on PS4. I hope you'd enjoy SCH and good luck with your leveling :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by AncientCrystal

I wanted to get my SCH to 70 with the quick easy Q's so I could get my SMN to 70 as well but just looking at all the abilities + pet commands this looks nearly impossible!

Any tips? And what are "keybinds"?

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Besides what's already been said you don't exclusively need to play with a controller, you can set it up via in game with a keyboard and mouse which if you're most used to is helpful.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Misstique

I mained sch for all of hw and play using a controller as well. I would recommend macros and lots of them.

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Just be aware that using macros brings up another set of issues, namely that they do not queue properly and as such, add an additional delay to pretty much everything you do with them.

Back in ARR I used to macro embraces into all of my dps abilities to maximise my fairy output but it wasn't until I did some side by side testing that I realised how much this was impacting my ability to DPS. It's really easy to test yourself, just make a broil macro and get a friend to use a hotkey next to you, spam a dummy for a couple of minutes and watch as they end up 1-2 GCDs ahead.

SCH is pretty much the worst healer to play on gamepad due to having the most button bloat by far. My only advice would be to either use the pet hotbar as one of your button bars or use switching macros along with your summons to switch hotkeys when you alternate between Eos and Selene.

I play on Ps4, not using a single macro and I don't have any problems managing my skills and my fairy.
In the end it doesn't matter if you have 2 pages for your skills or 4, as you can straight go to the page you want using R1 + the appropriate button. So if you press R1 + X or R1 + circle doesn't really make a difference. It's just a matter of getting used to it.

While I play on PC, I use controller. Game allows you to assign 48 skills (on my settings, maybe you can squeeze more) and it's more than enough.
Don't use macros with GCD skills, they slow you down.

You actually shouldn't have less skills on SMN.

Use W - Cross Hot Bar, so that you will have 32 slots to play around. You just Hold L2+R2 or R2+L2 to access the other 16 slots. I macro my pet abilities to put in my main 16 slots. Example below. They have the same time, so both will always be available to use.

/micon "Whispering Dawn"
/ac "Rouse" <me>
/pac "Whispering Dawn" <t>

Quote:

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Originally Posted by supaiku

I play on Ps4, not using a single macro and I don't have any problems managing my skills and my fairy.
In the end it doesn't matter if you have 2 pages for your skills or 4, as you can straight go to the page you want using R1 + the appropriate button. So if you press R1 + X or R1 + circle doesn't really make a difference. It's just a matter of getting used to it.

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This. You get used to it. I started on the Ps4 before migrating to PC and continue to use a controller. I find it faster honestly. But thats just me.

Another thing you can do is make it so when hold down r2 and l2 you will bring up 8 extra spots up and place all your dps skills on there. You should then be able to fit the rest of your healing spells onto hotbar 1 with proper macros. I don't need to flip through pages with this set up and I only have a few rare spells on hotbar 2 such as dissipation in case that really rare moment i need that skill. Prioritize most important spells and macros. I find that many of sch skills are important, but then there are just some that you're not gonna really be using that much.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by AncientCrystal

I wanted to get my SCH to 70 with the quick easy Q's so I could get my SMN to 70 as well but just looking at all the abilities + pet commands this looks nearly impossible!

Any tips? And what are "keybinds"?

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For dungeons you don't really need every last obscure ability. The most essential basics of your kit would be physick, adlo, succor, lustrate, and indom. Probably emergency tactics for a little more party healing. Then for the pet, you'd want rouse and WD easily accessible. That's all you need to get through any dungeon in the game. The rest of the stuff, work in as you go, you'll get a feel for it as you play.

I'm not a hard core raider so if that's your goal I'm not sure how much this will help but I do use a fair amount of macros on sch, although not as much as some. I don't macro embrace and DPS spells together. My main macros are:

I have two different "primary cross hotbars" for SCH, one for Selene and one for Eos set to cross hotbars 7 and 8. I have it macroed that when I summon the appropriate fairy it copies the correct hotbar to cross hotbar 1.
/chotbar copy SCH 8 SCH 1
/ac "Summon" <me>
/micon "Summon"
This way I don't have to have abilities for a fairy I don't have summoned taking up space on my bar.

I have a macro to make casting manual embraces while DPSing easier:
/pac "Embrace" <t>
/pac "Embrace" <tt>
/micon "Embrace" pet Eos
This way if I'm hard targeting the mob, I can still cast embrace while the GCD is cycling on the tank without changing targets.

I use interupt macros for Whispering Dawn, Fey Illumination and Fey Covenant, i.e
/pac Steady
/pac Guard
/pac "Whispering Dawn" <me>
/micon "Whispering Dawn" pet "Eos"
This will interrupt whatever the fairy is doing to start casting that ability so don't spam it b/c it will keep interrupting itself.

I also use macros mentioned earlier for Shadowflare and Sacred Soil to make them easier to place, and I have heel and place macro'd together, in that order. Most of this is tricks or macros from or inspired by the How to Train Your Fairy thread.

Past that, it is like others have said of making use of the various ways to configure hotbars to make things convenient for you. I use four hotbars for SCH, but I have it set up using the various hotbar config options (under character config) to make them all easily accessible. I have it set that while my weapon is drawn taping R1 will swap between cross hotbar 1 and 2, pressing L2 and then R2 and holding will bring up the left side of cross hotbar 3, pressing R2 and then holding L2 will bring up the right side of hotbar 3 and double tapping R3 or L3 will bring up the face button sets for the right or left sides of cross hotbar 5. Cross hotbar 4 is general use hotbar that is shared across all my jobs with things like chocobo commands, mounts, minions and potions/ethers.

PC with controller player here. there used to be a guide about this on how to set up for ease of use for PS3/4 and controller players. it's buried deep within this section of the forum. While I can't remember what it's called, I still have my hot bars and setting the same as when that guide was around. Note about the Pet Bar, you do not need to set pet actions to your own personal hot bar (I have some set, but only because sometimes I forget which ones do which just by looking at the picture) you can press R1 if a pet is summoned to go straight to the Pet bar. Sorry for the extra big pics... These settings work fine for me and are easy on my hands (the reason I don't go keyboard+mouse). I ripped this from an old thread back during ARR. it's helped me this far. I won't post my hot bar setup since everyone is different and that specific setup may feel clunky to others.


Character Config:
https://i.imgur.com/SIyuj4q.pnghttps://i.imgur.com/iBy4arv.pnghttps://i.imgur.com/2q4YGQY.pnghttps://i.imgur.com/vDO6mjm.pnghttps://i.imgur.com/YGjOPpx.pnghttps://i.imgur.com/PAOYO8D.pnghttps://i.imgur.com/dFt2Mdr.pnghttps://i.imgur.com/ollayFB.pnghttps://i.imgur.com/ocsUCvZ.png

if you aren't doing hard stuff, don't bother micromanaging the fairy apart from fey union at 70. The bulk of your heals are from proper use of OGCDs. The fairy also will survive virtually anything the dungeon or raid will throw at it, so placement is less important. You also tend to triage some abilities pretty quickly. The ability that lets you spread galvanize and eye for eye is a lot less useful than you think for one.

Generally what you should do is keep all your frequently used abilities on the main crossbar, and less used ones on the extended. Things like rouse, sacred soil, lucid dreaming, etc, can go on the extended, since you use them rarely. main crossbar should be your heals, your three DOTS, your aetherflow abilities , and thinsg you find you need a lot. The problem is that everyone seems to think you need direct control over the fairy for casual content, which adds an absurd amount of buttons. You really don't.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ULoki

Use W - Cross Hot Bar, so that you will have 32 slots to play around. You just Hold L2+R2 or R2+L2 to access the other 16 slots.

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This and also someone post screenshots that if you enable the WXHB you can get an extra 8 buttons. 40 buttons should be more than enough to manage the pet. The WXHB is a pretty cool setup as you just set the page and it will be either your D-pad or Geo buttons.

I just discovered this a few weeks ago and it revolutionized all my jobs and the buttons I have out.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Wintersandman

This and also someone post screenshots that if you enable the WXHB you can get an extra 8 buttons. 40 buttons should be more than enough to manage the pet. The WXHB is a pretty cool setup as you just set the page and it will be either your D-pad or Geo buttons.

I just discovered this a few weeks ago and it revolutionized all my jobs and the buttons I have out.

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48. You can set them to be 8 each side for 16 more in total.

I play sch since ARR doing end game content (proging in unending coil now) on ps4 and I never had a problem.
Also i dont use macros and I manage my pet.
Basically what i find more easy.
I use 4 hotbars, 1 for only healing, 1 for dps and some healing just in case, the pet default bar and long cooldown plus swiftcast res and limit break bar.
Just dance on them presdimg R1+ assing buttom and its gg.
Its not hard, just getting used to it

First, I don't recommend your method of leveling SMN. I understand DPS queues are long, but playing SCH and SMN is day and night, especially post 50 when their HW abilities are introduced. I would highly recommend queueing up as both to get your ACN experience points.

With that out of the way, what I recommend is what I do whenever playing a class/job for the first time. What I do is slap all the abilities on my crossbars and start doing some FATEs. From this I figure out where I want what, and make changes accordingly. As an example, Physick feels more natural to me pushing R2+down on the control pad, but it took trial and error to figure out that is exactly where I want it. After you 'feel' you have everything where you want it, then spam FATEs and kill outside mobs to get things transferred over to muscle memory. When you feel you are ready, then head into some content. If your squadron is qualified to do command missions, you can go into those dungeons to get some practice with a true healing requirement. Chances are you will again feel the need to make adjustments to your crossbars.

Once you are truly in an instance with RL players, it is definitely helpful to have some FC mates and/or buddies come along. Even more so if one of them is a career healer who can give you tips along the way. Eventually though, you will want to queue with randoms to get a taste of those lovely intangibles that keeps you on your toes, and improves your response time. This is where everything I previously mentioned will be very helpful.

Next, I also highly advise that you go to your menu and set up a hotbar or two to be displayed on your UI. These are not for you to interact with, these are for you to view your coolddowns without cycling through your crossbars. So the abilities that you want to put on these displayable hotbars are your abilities with a long CD duration. Put your fairy abilities there, your role skills, and job abilities like Indom.

As far as actual healing goes. Just go out there and heal. Seriously, you don't need a play by play guide on how to do it. Reading about how to perform in a party, and actual performing are very different. All you need to know are the basics, which for healer is:

- Stay out of bad
- use the ABC rule
- healing always takes priority over damage, and tanks take priority over everyone except you.
- help your tank by not stripping agro, and go to him/her if you do by accident or a mob slips through their fingers when they gather everything up.
- use offensive spells and abilities when healing is not needed

Mana, pet, and CD management, and how to optimally use your toolkit comes with experience. I know you're probably wanting something about micromanaging the fairy. The only advice I have here is put them on Obey 100% of the time. Try to think of Lily as an extension of your own abilities and not someone to micromanage.

The learning stages can be a very enjoyable experience, so the most important advice I can give you is go out there and have fun! I hope your experiences as SCH are very positive.

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Originally Posted by Terkhev

48. You can set them to be 8 each side for 16 more in total.

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I thought you could only select either the D-pad or 4 buttons not both since it is circle (selection) vs a checkbox.

I play on PC with a controller for SCH and have no issues.
Only macro I use is for defaulting my pet's obey/sic behavior and automatically swapping their embrace icons.

Hotbars
I use 3 cross hotbars:
1 - healing skills
I have mine and Eos's skills
2 - attacking skills
I have my attack skills and Selene's silence/buff skills
3 - emergency or occasional skills
protect, quickcast and resurrection, pet obey/sic and summoning changes

I personally don't like the r2+l2 set up so I don't use it. I typically use R1+relevant button to access my healing bar instead of cycling. I might cycle from healing bar to attack bar, then use R1+button again to get back to heals.

Learning targeting

This guide really helped me learn controller targeting.
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme..._general_tips/

I use soft targeting all the time when healing DPS or doing my own dps.

Change controller buttons directly
The ability to change the buttons is REALLY limited in this game. If you go to controller config (the one that actually shows you an image of a controller), you can technically change what some of the buttons do from a preset list.

I wouldn't really change most of them, but the L3 + R3 (when you push in the analog stick).

L3 I made to be the target's target, so if I'm on the tank and click L3, I'm now on the mob s/he was attacking and can quickly throw a dot out.
R3 I have macro 99, which I use for Sprint, because dodging is way too important to rely on cross hotbar switching ;)

change to keyboard layout
Even on a PS4 you should be able to switch to a keyboard layout (you can still use a controller while doing so). This is a personal preference of course but it's so useful.
The benefit of using it is having it show both crossbars AND keyboard hotbars.
I use the keyboard hotbars to place skills for which I want to track cooldown so that I don't have to switch back to the cross hotbar that actually has it.
So I can still see my healing CDs while I'm on my DPS cross hotbar.
And I can still see Sprint despite not having it on any cross hotbar (since I have it on macro 99 for the controller set up)

removing pet bar from cycling
Another personal preference. I'd rather assign the pet skills and obey/sic/summon to my own hotbars than use the premade one.

changing targeting cursor
By default it's based on camera, you can change it to use button+d-pad.
Personally I'd rather use the camera, but that's because I play with controller while in keyboard mode, so I have my mouse cursor always in the center and I alter my camera angles to aim based on that, which I find faster than the d-pad.