WHM vs. SCH -- What is the basic difference.

[peaches]

A lot of people will tell you Scholar is preventative healing, but that is only partially true... a WHM can do the same thing almost as well with Stoneskin as our Adlo, assuming it doesn't crit. We don't prevent massive numbers unless we crit, mostly it's making sure you keep using Succor either before something is going to hit everyone, or just keeping it up just in case people take damage.

I mainly play SCH and was doing TERRIBLE as a WHM, burning through MP because I was trying to play how I play SCH. On a Scholar, sometimes I literally just spam Physick and manually press Embrace. You don't always need to Adlo, and you can spam Physick almost non stop and never really worry about MP. I find I do this a lot more in really high spike damage fights like Ifrit Ex, where you can't quite predict him putting the debuff on the tank along with the massive damage, in the way you can with Mountain Buster and Adlo+SS the tank beforehand. If you spam Physick during Ifrit, you'll almost guaranteed get a heal off right as soon as he takes a big hit, leaving no risk if in the same situation you would wait until he took the hit and then started casting. I've tried that, and sometimes he just keeps spamming his fire breath and because you weren't preemptively curing, it's easy for a tank to die.

And that is the main difference I see in comparing SCH to WHM. Yea you will do a lot more preventative work as SCH, but that's all fairly easy. Toss out Virus either right before a big hit or large party damage like Tummults or just use it on cooldown. Use Eye for an Eye during large pulls. Use Sacred Soil basically always if you have the Aetherflow to spare. Use Fey Covenant right before usually a primal's signature attack, Levi's big wave, Ifrit's hellfire, (not sure if Titan jumping counts), and Garuda for Reckoning. That's all easy and basically second nature. The real difference in play style is I find I cure a LOT more constantly as a SCH than a WHM, sometimes regardless of whether you need to be tossing out those heals. Hell, you can do it just cause you can and don't have to worry about your MP. Every Physick+Embrace is essentially a WHM spamming Cure 2

[Aloreal]

As was said before, and is my personal opinion as well, is that SCH have more in the way of proactive rather than reactive.

SCH have to be able to see a few seconds more than a whm and act accordingly. and a stoneskin + adlo combination is way more potent as SS 18% since they stack.

And also i like that people assume we can have unlimited mana, but thats for when you are not using any lustrate or sacred soil at all. even if you drop sacred soil and you use shadowflare, still lustrate is going to be needed, especially if the party is struggling around.

Even with 6 of them (cast before entering, cd off) you might find yourself lacking in mana or even dropping bellow 25% in some cases. go on level, with an on level party in Stone Vigil. its going to challenge everything you are as a sch

[DreamWeaver]

As a WHM main, I have a question to veteran Scholars, hope I can be enlightened

Sacred Soil Usage for raid damage reduction, personally I feel SS should be used for Levi Ex 4 spumes + tidal roar phase, moogle Ex meteor, T9 megaflare, and T8 Allagan Field + Defensive Maneuver ONLY, as I can only think of these 4 situations where without SS, a party wipe may occur. Why bother using for any other AoE damage? With SS, medica 2 suffice, without SS, medica 2 also suffice, why waste an aetherflow stack for any other raid damage situation other than the 4 I listed above?

PS : For those with reading comprehension, I am talking about Sacred Soil Usage to reduce raid damage, not Sacred Soil Usage to provide mitigation on tanks (which I personally found to be more useful).

[Gallus]

Any good SCH knows that lustrate>>>>>>>>sacred soil in like 99% of the cases.

[Quinaeats]

Here's a question:

Is the learning curve higher on a SCH? A lot of the time when I get queued with a SCH they almost seem like they are not healing at all and just hanging out occasionally healing but mostly doing dps.. I chalked it up at the time that SCH have a different role to play in the fight, but after reading all of your responses I see that it's not the case..

[Gallus]

Here's a question:

Is the learning curve higher on a SCH? A lot of the time when I get queued with a SCH they almost seem like they are not healing at all and just hanging out occasionally healing but mostly doing dps.. I chalked it up at the time that SCH have a different role to play in the fight, but after reading all of your responses I see that it's not the case..

Depends. In 8man endgame content such as Extreme Primals (excluding garuda extreme which is a joke) and coil, both binding and second you have very little room to DPS as a SCH. However, in any 4 man content, as a SCH, if you are a good one, you should be DPSing like 90% of the time. If you don't, you are not optimizing the class.

[Okashii]

Its usually the SCH responsibility to keep up stoneskin on most fights. I know WHM get the trait that enhances the % of hp , however, we (SCHs) have MANA for days and it can drain your mp if youre not careful.

In my group, sch never uses stoneskin. Why wouldn't the whm just use it for the big incoming attacks like Ravensbeak? Other than that and some other situations (like adds incoming etc and you need to keep aggro down), you don't need a stoneskin. Plus whm ss is greater by 8pp. The sch shouldn't waste mp on a ss; save it for an adlo reapply if anything. And WHM mp isn't too big of a deal most of the time. It's about timing your heals, knowing when NOT to heal, using SoS properly, spec'ing some PIE if you need it, using procs (freecure is awesome), making use of buffs, and choosing the right spell for the right time. Oh, and trusting your fellow healer. When you get that synchronization down with the other healer and you both have an understanding of what the other will do, it's a world of difference.

One thing I've noticed is that in raid-wide damage situations, I usually take a bit more of a minimalist approach which saves some MP. Some whm's like to use a cure3 on a stacked group after heavy aoe damage. However, unless there is more damage expected shortly afterwards, a med1 or med2 may be the better approach.

[peaches]

As a WHM main, I have a question to veteran Scholars, hope I can be enlightened

Sacred Soil Usage for raid damage reduction, personally I feel SS should be used for Levi Ex 4 spumes + tidal roar phase, moogle Ex meteor, T9 megaflare, and T8 Allagan Field + Defensive Maneuver ONLY, as I can only think of these 4 situations where without SS, a party wipe may occur. Why bother using for any other AoE damage? With SS, medica 2 suffice, without SS, medica 2 also suffice, why waste an aetherflow stack for any other raid damage situation other than the 4 I listed above?

PS : For those with reading comprehension, I am talking about Sacred Soil Usage to reduce raid damage, not Sacred Soil Usage to provide mitigation on tanks (which I personally found to be more useful).

In answer to this, there are a few general places I'll use SS. When Aetherflow is either almost off cooldown, or it is off cooldown and I have stacks to spare, and don't foresee any major damage incoming where I may need 4-6 Lustrates, and my MP is high enough I don't need to use Energy Drain, I'll spend one of them on SS. In Titan, it can be useful for Stomps if some people aren't full health, or say if you have two Scholars healing and the AoE numbers aren't quite high enough - any mitigation you can get there helps, but ONLY if you have stacks to spare. I find sometimes if I'm in a situation where I could use a SS, I need Lustrate even more.

An example in some pretty easy content is Garuda HM. If the tanks mess up grabbing Suparna and Chirada and they run towards the healers or dps, I'll put up a SS. Sometimes I'll put one up there anyways, because most tanks don't position them right so we always get hit by wicked wheel.


But yea, like Gallus says Lustrate is almost always better than SS if you HAVE to choose between one or the other, and are low on Aether stacks. It's just too useful of an ability. You can use it to heal while moving, to help heal while you're DPSing without exiting Cleric's, give the tank a quick pop of health if he takes spike damage - this actually saves a lot of wipes, because sometimes the tank will take massive damage while there's movement, and the time to cast Physick or Adlo is way too long to save him, let alone movement + a heal. Or it can be used to quickly top up a DPS/healer in any situation, but especially when there is raid damage coming up soon that isn't avoidable, and they may not survive.

Here's a question:

Is the learning curve higher on a SCH? A lot of the time when I get queued with a SCH they almost seem like they are not healing at all and just hanging out occasionally healing but mostly doing dps.. I chalked it up at the time that SCH have a different role to play in the fight, but after reading all of your responses I see that it's not the case..

I'd say there's a bit of a higher learning curve in 8 man content. Knowing how to manage your Aetherflow stacks is huge, for MP regen and making sure you have an Aether on hand for unforeseen damage. Knowing when to use specific cooldowns like Sacred Soil, Fey Covenant (20% magic damage reduction), Virus, Eye for an Eye, knowing when to pre-bubble a tank, knowing how to position your fairy so it won't die in some fights but is still in range to heal everyone. It's not terribly difficult, but I just tried WHM recently and found myself standing around a lot more than as SCH. I didn't really have any options other than Regen, Stoneskin, or a cure of some type.

Gallus is right about that though. Most of the time in 8 man content you don't have time to DPS, unless you have a good second healer you can trust to keep thing up for you while you do that, if you really do need the extra dps. But in 4 man content, you can usually DPS the entire time if the tank is pulling one group at a time. I've macro'd my fairy's heal to every one of my DPSing abilities and set it to focus target, so every time I do any DPS ability, it spams Embrace on the tank which is anywhere from 600 to 1200 crit, and usually it's plenty to keep them alive. If they dip to half health or under, just pop a Lustrate without exiting Cleric's Stance. All this being said, I can be pretty lazy sometimes and just hang back and heal :P

[givemeraptors]

Here's a question:

Is the learning curve higher on a SCH? A lot of the time when I get queued with a SCH they almost seem like they are not healing at all and just hanging out occasionally healing but mostly doing dps.. I chalked it up at the time that SCH have a different role to play in the fight, but after reading all of your responses I see that it's not the case..

When I do Trials Roulette I frequently DPS more than heal because I find it fun and engaging (even on Titan!). If everyone is dodging properly I don't have much to do otherwise...

[DarkLordCthulhu]

In my group, sch never uses stoneskin. Why wouldn't the whm just use it for the big incoming attacks like Ravensbeak? Other than that and some other situations (like adds incoming etc and you need to keep aggro down), you don't need a stoneskin. Plus whm ss is greater by 8pp. The sch shouldn't waste mp on a ss; save it for an adlo reapply if anything.

Thats why I said in most fights. I agree with you that WHM should be using SS to mitigate those big attacks like Death Sentence and what now. You also stated that in your group the WHM is responsible for SS so Im assuming you run with a static. I pug alot and outside of the pre fights buffs i rarely see WHM use stone skin during the fight. Not even when they know mountain buster is coming.

The only fight ive seen WHM keeping up stone skin is Levi ex cause of the debuff received when healing the ot. I'll keep using that trial as an example since ive been farming so much, and have yet to see a mirror T.T
Both healers know that we will be getting hit my whirlpool soon. WHM wont take the time/mana cost to SS. However I (SCH) can SS both healers while still healing with Eos. I also SS healers/MT and that Derp DPS thats cant dodge while Levi is doing dives. If need be can energy drain + aetherflow and boom, back to full MP.

So yea SS should be WHM for those hard hitting boss moves cause of that extra 8% mitigation. I was just saying SCH can be more liberal with our SS use. Cause of personal experience i guess i feel it should be the SCH responsibility since i dont see WHM doing it.