It’s also all but a given that the expansion will include at least two new jobs.

[ADVSS]

fairy cooldowns becoming actual spells on the GCD? Are you sure this wouldnt be a buff to scholar?

[Ceasaria]

No, the cooldowns will remain the same. Just this mana cost will be the only modification.

[Supersun]

All that does is narrow the number of possibilities for design, because you're now designing around strict paradigms instead of trying to meet a much broader requirement. It's not a good direction to take things, and I'd rather see the tanks and healers brought in line with each other over creating specified slots for them in groups. If it means WAR and SCH have to be nerfed, it's still better than designing all healers to fit into either a WHM-esque or SCH-like mold.

You are designing around strict paradigms either way.

Either you are trying to shoehorn soon to be 4 healers into 2 slots or 2 main healers and 2 off healers into 2 different slots.

The problem is that as with MMOs the best will be used. It's a LOT harder to design and balance 4 different classes to be balanced and equal against each other to fill 2 slots than 2 classes against each other to fill one slot.

If 4 healers are trying to be exactly balanced against each other equally I can almost guarantee that at least one of them will either be underwhelming and not want to be used or overwhelming where that one is always used, and the more and more classes you add to this pool the harder and more obvious this will start to become. Especially when we start hitting 5 and 6, there's no way that every healer is going to be viable if they are all balanced against each other, unless you make some content good for one healer and some other content good for another healer, but in general that feels pretty crappy anyway.

The same thing applies to the main and off healer parading as well, but this way you cut the number of classes competing against each other in half. Rather than Whm vs Sch vs Ast vs New, it's a lot easier to balance Whm vs Ast, and then Sch vs New. The same problem will still eventually show up, but it should take at least twice as long.

[Duelle]

SCH was here long before AST. Please don't blame SCH for AST issues. I am more inclined to believe that if AST couldn't be designed in a way that has it stand on its own two feet, it should have been left out.

The only reason AST could not be designed to stand on its own two feet was because the devs wanted to stick to the two-healer meta they created for ARR. Problem is that doesn't work because your healer slots are very specific, which means any of the other approaches to healing (HoTs, transfusions, damage converted to heals, smart heals, etc) compete only with WHM and not with SCH. Thus you can't design a healer around any of the available approaches because instead of encouraging all sorts of combos, you end up with SCH+<insert other healer>.

Again, you don't fix what's already working and AST probably should have been left on the drawing board. Paying customers have demands though, and these demands put further constraints on time along with hastened decisions. Introducing new jobs is what rocks the boat, and that's where we are at, and they are about to bring in two more? It's crazy.

Limiting the game to only two healers is crazier. Growth comes from variety, and this game can always use more of it when it comes to job classes.

If the design doesn't work with new additions to the healer roster, you change the design to make additions possible. This isn't a single-player game that has a finite development cycle, but an MMO that by nature continuously grows and adds things, and the design has to reflect and support those principles.

Funny thing about balance: For one group of people, it's all cheers and shots. For another group of people, it's the start of a long depression. Which end to you think Yoshida's balance will have current SCH and WAR mains land on?

Believe me when I say I sympathize with those who feel concern. That said, to leave problem jobs alone for the sake of sparing the feelings of certain people is irresponsible when the repercussions are far-reaching. And when a job is designed in such a way that the only way additions can hope to compete is to copy from it, it's a serious problem.

[Claire_Pendragon]

Problem is that doesn't work because your healer slots are very specific, which means any of the other approaches to healing (HoTs, transfusions, damage converted to heals, smart heals, etc) compete only with WHM and not with SCH. Thus you can't design a healer around any of the available approaches because instead of encouraging all sorts of combos, you end up with SCH+<insert other healer>.

(Correct me if I'm wrong) I assume SCHs roll is DPS while heals are going off, mixed with shields for tank/party busters, correct? Then the part highlighted I feel isnt completely accurate. In the example of HoTs, simply applying HoTs in place of a fairy alone can be quite similar, even more so if off the GCD. Ticking away at an equal amount, while you keep the DPS up. Next would be dmg mitigations, which plenty can be made since SCH only has 2 forms atm. As for the other examples you gave, I feel they are not quite detailed enough for me to give examples of how to make them fit, as I don't want to just assume what you mean by them.

[ADVSS]

So the problem isnt with sch being good at mitigation, but with whm with 3 stacking regens, instant full health spell, instant 2.0 lustratex2 potency? Which is why over time of 3.0 AST gets pushed more of a WHM contender than dealing with Noct stance? I'm curious, why SCH seems to be the one everyone blames because its good at its niche, when other ideas are blown out the water cause the other choice was good at many more things, to the extent they cant create another original healer without making it more and more like whm... .

The fairy costing nothing, isnt true, its got a cast timer, it doesnt over heal, its got simple ai. When once i had to explain simply to a level 40ish whm who mained sch for a loooong time, how 'Regen' is basically the whm fairy, and divine seal made it stronger, so youd want that on the tank after establishing hate properly, it made sense to her, and she got good with whm, terribly good

[Claire_Pendragon]

So the problem isnt with sch being good at mitigation, but with whm. over time of 3.0 AST gets pushed to be more of a WHM contender than dealing with Noct stance.

SCHs weakness is its AoE healing, lack of CC, and lack of AoE burst. (and technically single target burst to an extent)
But that's honestly fine in 99% of content.

So it might be mimicking WHM more, but it originally didnt fulfill the role of healer as well as either WHM or SCH.

SCH can pretty much main heal most content as good as a WHM, as long as ppl dont get hit by AoEs they can dodge. (Some content has unavoidable dmg) AND it has mitigation.
So the bare minimum is to match WHM, not so much SCH, in making it functional. (It was functional, but it was much harder, and people did clear Alex Savage with AST before they got buffed.)

I do agree it should have been more so buffed in its specialty, which is the cards/support (it technically did get a buff, but that wasnt the focus)

[ADVSS]

SCHs weakness is its AoE healing, lack of CC, and lack of AoE burst. (and technically single target burst to an extent)
SCH can pretty much main heal most content as good as a WHM, as long as ppl dont get hit by AoEs they can dodge. (Some content has unavoidable dmg) AND it has mitigation.
So the bare minimum is to match WHM, not so much SCH, in making it functional. (It was functional, but it was much harder, and people did clear Alex Savage with AST before they got buffed.)

youre absolutely right, wheras the other option can stack group heal like a champ, bless you for pointing out the weaknesses too, it isnt as OP to me as people think imo, its just very player skill based., and thanks for bringing up the holes which work against it, cause i really couldnt find the words to do so myself. this late at night

had to snip quote, sorry

[Risvertasashi]

So the problem isnt with sch being good at mitigation, but with whm with 3 stacking regens, instant full health spell, instant 2.0 lustratex2 potency? Which is why over time of 3.0 AST gets pushed more of a WHM contender than dealing with Noct stance? -snip-

SCHs weakness is its AoE healing -snip-

The problem goes a little bit deeper. Noct stance got buffed too, but here's the core issue: AST is a white mage reskin. Imagine White Mage, but where Regen gives a shield instead of a HoT, and Medica II also gives a shield instead of HoT.

Does that sound like something that would replace SCH?

Because that's what AST noct stance is. SCH is so much more than a single target shield and an AoE shield.

Some other misc notes: HW improved SCH's AoE healing quite a bit. While it might not contend with WHM in something like T12, I don't know of any HW content where SCH can't AoE heal sufficiently (if they can be bothered to turn cleric off).

And, SCH fairy heals are free. It has a (re)cast time, but those don't cost the SCH a GCD like Regen costs a WHM a GCD. There's even a divine seal equivalent: Rouse. Let me know when embrace costs 600 MP per 7 'ticks', then I'll agree fairy heals have a cost.

[ADVSS]

The problem goes a little bit deeper. Noct stance got buffed too, but here's the core issue: AST is a white mage reskin. Imagine White Mage, but where Regen gives a shield instead of a HoT, and Medica II also gives a shield instead of HoT.

Does that sound like something that would replace SCH?

Because that's what AST noct stance is. SCH is so much more than a single target shield and an AoE shield.

Some other misc notes: HW improved SCH's AoE healing quite a bit. While it might not contend with WHM in something like T12, I don't know of any HW content where SCH can't AoE heal sufficiently (if they can be bothered to turn cleric off).

And, SCH fairy heals are free. It has a (re)cast time, but those don't cost the SCH a GCD like Regen costs a WHM a GCD. There's even a divine seal equivalent: Rouse. Let me know when embrace costs 600 MP per 7 'ticks', then I'll agree fairy heals have a cost.

yeah hold on

ok so sch has no physik 2, whm does, the point of supplemental healing from the fairy was to give the sch an equivalent of the edge of having no upper tier potency spell, to bridge the gap. again this is 2.x this is before hw. The "new" skills for sch sort of do this, you are correct, but so do the new whm skills give them things like lustrate(in a sense) and sure rouse is like a half a divine seal for just the fairy, eos has a party wide divine seal as well, on a cooldown, as well as scholars only regen ability locked behind just eos. I think youre on to something quite crucial to what ive been saying about HW but the design for the most part for the new job abilities, for both, is to make them more like the other, to me. Maybe im the only one that sees this, maybe im crazy but again, it isnt our decision it was the dev teams to do so. Also Dissipation. Scholars now can get big potency by losing the fairy for an entire minute, then using as much mana as casting a res off resummon in, for what a 20 sec buff when the summon lockout is a minute? Like what? Im not gonna comment, i know this skill gets use, but its just not something id do, just to give it faux whm burst personally from a design pov.