Scholar Fixes

[Supersun]

The impression I get from a lot of "SCH" is that if their job is not the 100% mandatory healer for progression (and even then, see HW launch), they think their job is underpowered.

I actually just found a pretty good metric to pretty much prove my point that Scholar is in fact lacking on healing.

The problem with looking at FFLogs to find the best healers is that the primary way FFLogs filters the "best" clears is that they sort by the length of the fight. Basically, the healers that appear on the teams that are highest up aren't the healer that heal the best, but kill the fastest. I don't think there's any dispute that Ast + Chain Stratagem will be a better comp than anything with White Mage at killing things fast.

But you can also sort to see the best healers and that list sorts by HPS, heals per second. Wanna take a bet what THAT list looks like? I'll give you a hint, there's not a single scholar on the list and it displays the top 100 classes. They are all Whms and Asts.

The best Whm had a HPS of nearly 6,500. The top Scholar on the other hand had an HPS of 4,250. Basically, White Mages and Asts are out HPSing Scholars by more than 50%

Now is this the best measure. Not really, I mean regens naturally out HPS shields, but still, by more than 50%? White Mages are Scholars are hard to compare because they really don't compete for the same spot, but given that White Mages are able to compete with Ast in regards to HPS it shows that in terms of healing that White Mage and Ast are relatively balanced (Though that may be an issue in itself since White Mage + Balance is pretty much going to beat White Mage 99% of the time in raid invites).

If Scholar didn't have Chain Stratagem I'm pretty sure all the comps would favor Whm/Ast instead. One of the classes needs to be Ast and Whm as mentioned before already heals as well as Ast, but does Sch heal as well as Ast atm. I really don't think so, the fairy isn't going to be enough to make up just the sheer potency and MP differences with their spells, and Asts shields are pretty much undebatably better though it's a bit harder to compare those 2 since you can't exactly filter by Noct Ast on FFlogs.

[AlphaSonic]

Snip

I like how some SCH sometimes forget to count the fairy constant healing. That costs 0 MP whilst AST regen (in diurnal) is less MP efficient than spamming Benefic I.
BTW, even if the fairy was nerfed, it's still free.

[Spiroglyph]

I like how some SCH sometimes forget to count the fairy constant healing. That costs 0 MP whilst AST regen (in diurnal) is less MP efficient than spamming Benefic I.
BTW, even if the fairy was nerfed, it's still free.

I like how people keep throwing this argument around like this alone is enough to make SCH something great. It's FREE. It's free, it's gotta be great, right?!

Because we all know people never had any issues whatsoever with the following:
Benediction
AST cards
(this is just some things about the HEALER classes, the two that come to mind immediately)

AST always had cards to play around with and they were always something unique to them that added depth and utility to them - and they're free. No MP, not even actual cast times, just managing OGCD every half a minute-ish.
Were they always as reliable as they are now, though? No, they were not. AST cards have seen some changes since HW release to make AST into the huge utility surprise bag it is now (spread balance as of 4.x is brilliant now - was good before, but DAMN), but they NEVER cost anything beyond short animation lock times.

Fairy, though? Yeah, it's free.
... IF you forget dissipation, lack of sustain and possibility of fairy dying, and such things.

Can never complain about FREE things, though!

We have a FREE regen following us whenever we go, what else could we POSSIBLY need more?!

[Rawrz]

I like how some SCH sometimes forget to count the fairy constant healing. That costs 0 MP whilst AST regen (in diurnal) is less MP efficient than spamming Benefic I.
BTW, even if the fairy was nerfed, it's still free.

I remember that time i wanted to cast a regen on two people as an SCH. Eos healed one and said "how can i heal both? Maybe summon two of me? Oh you can't. Bummer. But I'm free so there's that. Wait im a regen now? People keep saying I'm the gap to the potency between phyick and cure II. How can i be a regen too?? Oh right cuz I'm free so obviously im the greatest gift on the wardens green earth. My bad. "

[Deox]

The best Whm had a HPS of nearly 6,500. The top Scholar on the other hand had an HPS of 4,250. Basically, White Mages and Asts are out HPSing Scholars by more than 50%

If Scholar didn't have Chain Stratagem I'm pretty sure all the comps would favor Whm/Ast instead. One of the classes needs to be Ast and Whm as mentioned before already heals as well as Ast, but does Sch heal as well as Ast atm. I really don't think so, the fairy isn't going to be enough to make up just the sheer potency and MP differences with their spells, and Asts shields are pretty much undebatably better though it's a bit harder to compare those 2 since you can't exactly filter by Noct Ast on FFlogs.

SCH is always going to be the secondary healer, at that point it's not about HPS pointless overhealing is pointless overhealing. As long as SCH has the answers to respond to moments the main healer can't handle something on their own, the SCH will always be Viable. Any SCH worth a gain of salt in 8 man content abosultely does not cast a single heal unless required. Occasional indoms, lustrates, adlo for tank busters, occasional real healing when party is taking split high dps and micro managing the fairy's abilities to assist the main healer.

The non savage content is easy enough as it is to all be done with 1 sch alone or 2 even and that is literally the worst healer combo possible due to incompatibility. The class needs quality of life fixes to make them feel a bit less clunky overall they don't need some absurd healing power boost.

I remember that time i wanted to cast a regen on two people as an SCH. Eos healed one and said "how can i heal both? Maybe summon two of me? Oh you can't. Bummer. But I'm free so there's that. Wait im a regen now? People keep saying I'm the gap to the potency between phyick and cure II. How can i be a regen too?? Oh right cuz I'm free so obviously im the greatest gift on the wardens green earth. My bad. "

What is Whispering Dawn?

[Xhareem]

SCH is always going to be the secondary healer, at that point it's not about HPS pointless overhealing is pointless overhealing. As long as SCH has the answers to respond to moments the main healer can't handle something on their own, the SCH will always be Viable. Any SCH worth a gain of salt in 8 man content abosultely does not cast a single heal unless required. Occasional indoms, lustrates, adlo for tank busters, occasional real healing when party is taking split high dps and micro managing the fairy's abilities to assist the main healer.

Didn't know SE has set a 4th role: secondary healer. Thanks for inform us. So, according to your reasoning, the very moment an encounter can be healed with a primary healer?(not SCH), SCH are totally out of the scene, since SCH can't compare to a real damage dealer. How sad for us SCHs...

[Spiroglyph]

What is Whispering Dawn?

A cooldown :P

SCH is, as you said, "viable" and even good at 8-man content.
My first runs of susanoo ex and lakshmi ex were done on SCH, and despite dying a few times (really should've watched that guide before going in, sorry people who carried me), I had shortage of neither MP nor stacks.

Why is this?

Because damage comes in bursts at specific times of the fight - for most of these, you can spare to spread a shield or just use succ, throw an Indom right after, and your co-healer with their spammable party heals and hots can top up the rest, while your fairy helps with some magic damage mitigation and yeah, whispering dawn.

The thing with this, though, and I'm fairly sure I've pointed this out before as have other people is that the skills which are GREAT for 8-mans are not nearly as useful in roulettes, which is the type of content most of the payerbase run regularly - whereas sacred soil has a place as mitigation in 8-mans, you won't see many people using this in dungeons, where it's practically useless.
Indom isn't going to help much either, as you'll have to blow a stack where ideally you'd be using it on your STR acc tank dressed almost entirely in green gear who sprints right at the start and pulls everything from spawn to boss because it's meta, or whatever the hell else they've been told.

AGAIN, SCH has never NOT been viable and the same applies to now, but you cannot deny that everything from our (and fairy's) heals to our DPS and mitigation has been nerfed down to the effing ground.

As you said, we've always been the off/secondary healer - but this is in content where you have TWO healers...

It's not that we CAN'T carry out our duties in expert or dungeons in general anymore - we can, of course, but you'd have to agree that a great deal of our tools are not really tuned to heal through constant and consistent damage...

I honestly do feel kind of awful for complaining about DUNGEONS of all things, but come on now, at least let me keep the fairy when I dissipate... otherwise I'll be halfway in building up my gauge due to lustrate + excog and then have it rendered useless just WHEN I need fairy to use that tether healing...

[Deox]

Didn't know SE has set a 4th role: secondary healer. Thanks for inform us. So, according to your reasoning, the very moment an encounter can be healed with a primary healer?(not SCH), SCH are totally out of the scene, since SCH can't compare to a real damage dealer. How sad for us SCHs...

Did you know there are 3 different dps roles too? Melee, Caster, Ranged (support) themoreyouknow.jpg

And SCH dps is pretty damn good atm btw

I honestly do feel kind of awful for complaining about DUNGEONS of all things, but come on now, at least let me keep the fairy when I dissipate... otherwise I'll be halfway in building up my gauge due to lustrate + excog and then have it rendered useless just WHEN I need fairy to use that tether healing...

I was running with tanks that were chain pulling the i300 dungeons when I was still in i290 gear. It's a small challenge yeah but sch since release has always been the worst dungeon healer due to our bad aoe, and yes they made it even worse lol

If a majority of your end game time is going to be focused on dungeons and you wanted to do them fast and efficiently it was always recommended to level WHM

[simiii]

Didn't know SE has set a 4th role: secondary healer. Thanks for inform us. So, according to your reasoning, the very moment an encounter can be healed with a primary healer?(not SCH), SCH are totally out of the scene, since SCH can't compare to a real damage dealer. How sad for us SCHs...

It's called the off healer.... you know just like off tanks that dps?

[Riyshn]

I actually just found a pretty good metric to pretty much prove my point that Scholar is in fact lacking on healing.

-snip-

HPS on it's own is a useless metric though, unless you filter out overheal - and even then it's not worth much. Healing only matters up to the point that it causes someone to not die - or if you want to be really generous, to full HP; anything after that is worthless. HPS also doesn't take into account the healing that becomes unneeded due to shields.

No one's saying that SCH doesn't have the healing potential to manage in current fights - we absolutely do. The issue is that we have to put in so much effort to manage what the other two healers can do when playing at near minimum.