SCH: Incorperating it's PvP design into PvE?

https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/jobguide/scholar/#pvp For those who need a reference as to what I'm talking about.

I just wanted to get some secondary opinions on the subject stated in the title. My personal thoughts are such. I love the design of SCH in the setting of PVP. It essentially has this theme of being an aggressive battle medic who gameplay loop revolves around building the fae gauge with a combination of aggressive and healing actions, and spending the gauge on maintaining a healing + dps buff. Said Guage builds up faster with using your aggressive spells (Broil/Biolysis) and slower whenever you use healing spells.

In addition, instead of Aetherflow, Lustrate and Indom are on a shared charge system, with Excog on it's own seperate charge system. Casting Dissapation (which is said buff you maintain in its pvp version) will restore a charge of Lustrate/Indom whenever cast.

On top of what is stated here, you are infact able to single weave on Broil in pvp, which I find personally satisfying.

NOW with that said. I'm fully aware that you can't exactly do a perfect 1:1 translation of this due to the fundamental difference in the game styles and the fact the pvp toolkit is an incredibly truncated version of the pve one. So I'm going to pick out a couple of the systems that I think could be reasonable added with some tweaks and ask for your thoughts on them. Also of note is that PvP SCH doesn't use the faerie. I am doing this with the assumption that it would still utilize one in its pve version.

1. The building of fae guage with spells, combined with more ways to spend them. While PvP Dissapation is lovely, I would personally think pve fae guage spendage should be a dropped more involved then simply keeping up a maintenance buff.

2. Replacing Aetherflow stacks with a charge system on Lustrate and Indom. Excog and Sacred can be argued for getting stacks as well, but my personal thought on this is that it's not as mandatory for them. Aetherflow itself could simply just be a cooldown to instantly "reload" a stack or two while giving MP, or could potentially be removed/reworked elsewhere.

What do you see as the advantage of a charge system as opposed to Aetherflow? Charges are more passive, because they regenerate automatically without you doing anything, whereas Aetherflow requires you to actively press a button to replenish your stacks. It's not massively interactive, since you're just pressing your Aetherflow button on cooldown, but it's still something. Charges seem to be a simplification, which might be appropriate for PvP. But it doesn't seem necessary in PvE.

I mean the most simple solution would be too bring back quickening aetherflow gives us a fairy gauge spender that isn’t bad or on a long as cool down and make Dissipation not remove one of the core components of the job you play. The problem is they need too give sch something else too get mana back and a decent aetherflow spender when there is no healing required and let’s be honest that’s a lot in 90% of the content as they try so bad to remove energy drain since begin shadowbringer.

I would say it's time to retire Aetherflow stacks on SCH and just tie the aetherflow abilities to the fairy gauge, with the gauge going up a set amount with each fairy heal that goes out (fairy abilities would give more). Replace the Aetherflow ability itself with something that instantly gives 50 gauge (so we have something to start with). Make various costs for the current Aetherflow skills, such as Lustrate being 10, Sacred Soil being 25, Indom being 20, and Excog being 25. Keep Energy Drain but make it a 50 gauge use for high damage so we can avoid overflow while at the same time making it dangerous to use it. Seraph should also become the default fairy at level 80, compensating for the fairy's useless Embraces at endgame with actual small shield heals that can at least make up for the bad healing with small shields.

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

I would say it's time to retire Aetherflow stacks on SCH and just tie the aetherflow abilities to the fairy gauge, with the gauge going up a set amount with each fairy heal that goes out (fairy abilities would give more). Replace the Aetherflow ability itself with something that instantly gives 50 gauge (so we have something to start with). Make various costs for the current Aetherflow skills, such as Lustrate being 10, Sacred Soil being 25, Indom being 20, and Excog being 25. Keep Energy Drain but make it a 50 gauge use for high damage so we can avoid overflow while at the same time making it dangerous to use it. Seraph should also become the default fairy at level 80, compensating for the fairy's useless Embraces at endgame with actual small shield heals that can at least make up for the bad healing with small shields.

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I actually wouldn't mind this for SCH. It gives importance to your fairy in battle and not just extra healing that at time feels negligible. The only issue I see is Fey Union? Would it still cost gauge or would it use a new separate resource? Also I would completely remove Energy Drain and just replace it with Aura Burst (PvP ability)

>Embrace is so weak and useless

Lol, it's two THOUASAND healing potency per minute that requires zero mana, neither GCD nor weave window, and retargets itself if it would overheal. And that's after accounting for the 33% pet tax.

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Originally Posted by AvenoMatt

I actually wouldn't mind this for SCH. It gives importance to your fairy in battle and not just extra healing that at time feels negligible. The only issue I see is Fey Union? Would it still cost gauge or would it use a new separate resource? Also I would completely remove Energy Drain and just replace it with Aura Burst (PvP ability)

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I would have Fey Union instead be a buff given when you use Dissipation. The fairy basically "joins" with you, increasing healing, spell speed and giving 50 gauge. An "OH CRAP" button that is actually useful. The fairy would of course resummon the second the duration ends. Because as mean as this is...Fey Union as is sadly is forgettable and not very useful in most cases (assuming both healers are competent).

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Originally Posted by Semirhage

>Embrace is so weak and useless

Lol, it's two THOUASAND healing potency per minute that requires zero mana, neither GCD nor weave window, and retargets itself if it would overheal. And that's after accounting for the 33% pet tax.

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That will hit the person with the lowest HP percentage that you have 0 control over. I don't know about you, but I'd prefer if Embrace was controlled again so it could be used on the person who actually needs it the majority of the time, the tank. I don't need embrace healing DPS, me, or other healers when it's the tank who we need alive.

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

That will hit the person with the lowest HP percentage that you have 0 control over. I don't know about you, but I'd prefer if Embrace was controlled again so it could be used on the person who actually needs it the majority of the time, the tank. I don't need embrace healing DPS, me, or other healers when it's the tank who we need alive.

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That's an unfortunate functionality loss to Embrace to be sure. But weak? Embrace is a ridiculously powerful healing tool and always has been. Just because its individual casts look small doesn't mean it's not one of the biggest contributors to how OP Scholar has been historically. The amount of uptime it enables for both healers is massive.

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Originally Posted by Mortex

I mean the most simple solution would be too bring back quickening aetherflow gives us a fairy gauge spender that isn’t bad or on a long as cool down and make Dissipation not remove one of the core components of the job you play. The problem is they need too give sch something else too get mana back and a decent aetherflow spender when there is no healing required and let’s be honest that’s a lot in 90% of the content as they try so bad to remove energy drain since begin shadowbringer.

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Well, putting Lustrate/Indom on charges instead of Aetherflow would simply mean you could just sit on the charges when they aren't needed. Alot of the problems tied to aetherflow are the fact you have to keep it on cooldown and any stacks unused are a waste of MP/DPS. In this setting Aetherflow would have to be reworked into something different. Not to mention i didn't go into details about potential fae guage dumps that could fulfil a similar role to Energy Drain.

I feel like if you do away with aetherflow you throw away the little thought that sch still has. Would sacred soil cost fairy guage? Also wouldn't they get rid of ed if aetherflow was gone.

Remove sch from arcanist like they been talking about doing for many years now and people can stop yelling about how sch will lose its identity blah blah. Just make it a job that doesn’t start with a class and they can rework it from the ground up. Sch has lots of issues and definitely needs a rework.

I don't like charges on abilties for Scholar. Right now with Aetherflow you can sit on 3 charges and have Aetherflow ready for an immediate 3 more, and then disappate for another 3 all in the span of 30 seconds. Wall to wall pull done and done. Charges just don't let you burst heal the same way. Saving resources and spending them efficiently is literally what being a battle tactician is all about. Thematically and practically I really dislike having every ability turned into charges. Give me Quickened Aetherflow back please. It was THE best.

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Originally Posted by Semirhage

That's an unfortunate functionality loss to Embrace to be sure. But weak? Embrace is a ridiculously powerful healing tool and always has been. Just because its individual casts look small doesn't mean it's not one of the biggest contributors to how OP Scholar has been historically. The amount of uptime it enables for both healers is massive.

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Embrace was crazy strong in Stormblood. It was nerfed in Shadowbringers, but is still very respectable. In potency terms, it's roughly equivalent to a free Excog every 25 seconds. I notice it more when it's not there.

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Originally Posted by NobleWinter

I don't like charges on abilties for Scholar. Right now with Aetherflow you can sit on 3 charges and have Aetherflow ready for an immediate 3 more, and then disappate for another 3 all in the span of 30 seconds. Wall to wall pull done and done. Charges just don't let you burst heal the same way. Saving resources and spending them efficiently is literally what being a battle tactician is all about. Thematically and practically I really dislike having every ability turned into charges. Give me Quickened Aetherflow back please. It was THE best.

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Dissipation in Shadowbringers is sort of functionally equivalent to Quickened Aetherflow. QA gave you four Aetherflow stacks per minute. Using Dissipation on cooldown also gives you four stacks per minute on average. (Using Diss on cooldown wasn't really viable in StB because you had to manually resummon fairy.)

If Embrace didn't target everyone who didnt need healing first like some kind of drunk spin the bottle game I would appreciate the constant stream of healing more but its effectiveness diminishes greatly when you start noticing the misdirected heals. I wish we could go back to fairy skills being independent of our GCD. Fey Union ideally would be a fairy skill we could trigger without interrupting our skills and Aetherpact would be a seperate buff we placed on a party member to tell the Fairy where to focus their Embrace cast.

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Originally Posted by NobleWinter

If Embrace didn't target everyone who didnt need healing first like some kind of drunk spin the bottle game I would appreciate the constant stream of healing more but its effectiveness diminishes greatly when you start noticing the misdirected heals. I wish we could go back to fairy skills being independent of our GCD. Fey Union ideally would be a fairy skill we could trigger without interrupting our skills and Aetherpact would be a seperate buff we placed on a party member to tell the Fairy where to focus their Embrace cast.

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I prefer the current Fey Union to what you're proposing, because Aetherpact is a much stronger heal than Embrace.

I've heard speculation that the fairy has a proximity-based priority system for embrace, so you can influence who she embraces by placing her closer to the desired target. But as far as I know, that hasn't been confirmed.

Im proposing that we have both the channeled heal in Fey Union AND a way to tell our Fairy who to focus on with Embrace when not using Fey Union by separating Aetherpact (the Scholar Command) from Fey Union (the fairy action). We wouldnt be losing the current Fey Union but gaining an additional command.

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Originally Posted by BungleBear

I prefer the current Fey Union to what you're proposing, because Aetherpact is a much stronger heal than Embrace.

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I personally dislike the current Fey Union, because unless you're in EX, Savage, or Ultimate, the ability is completely forgettable and unneeded. I rarely need it in dungeons, rarely need it for bosses, just because of how well a SCH can keep a tank up without it. Most of the time I even forget it exists and end up sitting on 100 gauge for the entire dungeon.

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

I personally dislike the current Fey Union, because unless you're in EX, Savage, or Ultimate, the ability is completely forgettable and unneeded. I rarely need it in dungeons, rarely need it for bosses, just because of how well a SCH can keep a tank up without it. Most of the time I even forget it exists and end up sitting on 100 gauge for the entire dungeon.

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The only time i really find myself sitting on 100 guage with nothing to use it on is when im in an alliance raid and the MT isn't in my group. Fey Union is alot of free healing that is just sitting there waiting to be used.

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Originally Posted by Brandedblade

The only time i really find myself sitting on 100 guage with nothing to use it on is when im in an alliance raid and the MT isn't in my group. Fey Union is alot of free healing that is just sitting there waiting to be used.

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It doesn't get used by me because a Sacred Soil + Whispering Dawn can usually heal the tank through the majority of the damage, with Excog topping them off should they hit the proc % or time runs out. And when Whispering Dawn isn't available, I have Seraph to basically shield him to the point where again, Excog will cover the rest. When we get to the boss either the tank is taking miniscule amounts of damage with the only damage I have to worry about being AoE and the rare tankbuster (which Excog is always back up for), or there's down time with mechanics allowing the auto HP regen and Sacred Soil to heal the tank enough. I think the only dungeon I felt like I had to really use Fey Union in was Amaurot. Outside of that there hasn't been a single 80 dungeon this expansion where I felt like I really needed Fey Union active.

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

It doesn't get used by me because a Sacred Soil + Whispering Dawn can usually heal the tank through the majority of the damage, with Excog topping them off should they hit the proc % or time runs out. And when Whispering Dawn isn't available, I have Seraph to basically shield him to the point where again, Excog will cover the rest. When we get to the boss either the tank is taking miniscule amounts of damage with the only damage I have to worry about being AoE and the rare tankbuster (which Excog is always back up for), or there's down time with mechanics allowing the auto HP regen and Sacred Soil to heal the tank enough. I think the only dungeon I felt like I had to really use Fey Union in was Amaurot. Outside of that there hasn't been a single 80 dungeon this expansion where I felt like I really needed Fey Union active.

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Well I'm glad to hear that, Typically I'm able to fit in Fey Union in between Seraphs to help heal the tank in conjunction with everything you've just said to decent effect. For me its trickier to use in 8 and 24 mans then 4 mans because 9/10 times you get cohealers who think they have to top everyone up instantly with a Medica ii then 3 medicas right after. However I seem to always have a use for Fey union when I'm the only healer.

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Originally Posted by NobleWinter

I don't like charges on abilties for Scholar. Right now with Aetherflow you can sit on 3 charges and have Aetherflow ready for an immediate 3 more, and then disappate for another 3 all in the span of 30 seconds. Wall to wall pull done and done. Charges just don't let you burst heal the same way. Saving resources and spending them efficiently is literally what being a battle tactician is all about. Thematically and practically I really dislike having every ability turned into charges. Give me Quickened Aetherflow back please. It was THE best.

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I disagree. The big point of contention with SCH's aetherflow design is the fact that it, by necessity, requires you to have an ability to dump excess stacks to keep it from going to waste. Not to mention one would assume in this setting you would still have other tools beyond the charges on Lustrate/Indom to cover the gaps. and even cooldowns that return charges in a pinch.

This isnt Lustrate, Indomitabilty, Sacred Soil, Excogitation, and energy drain all on one system. This would be more akin to Lustrate/Indom on a shared charge system, Excog could reasonably be left as is just with only the cd as a cost. Sacred Soil my have to take a hit in either potency or cooldown but could still function independently.

As for energy Drain? It would be decoupled from all the healer ogcds mentioned here. It would need to be reworked to accommodate the fundamental change proposed here, but there's always a more potentially useful and interesting path this could take. It could be as simple as an ogcd with it's own charges, an ogcd artack that gives you Lustrate/Indom charges in a pinch, or could even be moved to be a Fae Guage dump skill. But that is something I've personally been putting alot of thought into to avoid creating another energy Drain situation.

All lot of this system would be a massive overhaul to the way scholar works, but I do believe it could be done and even be better then what we have now.