Feedback on 4.05 Scholar

[inhaledcorn]

/snip

Oh, yes, tell me how WHM heals with a pet. Or WHM has all these shields. Or their bubble has damage reduction. Or how they have a heal that only activates at a certain HP threshold. Oh yes, exactly the same as WHM.

If anything, WHM has better emergency heals as they have a lot of oGCD heals that aren't tied to a resource needed to use them. All WHM has is cooldown time management. SCH has pretty much all of their off globals tied to Aetherflow. All of their big heals are tied to cooldowns. The other healers don't have that problem. They have an AoE big heal and AoE heal with effect on demand. All SCH has is the AoE heal with an effect. Heck, WHM has an Indom on demand, everyone just needs to be together. And, they get an added Medica on top of that thanks to PI.

SCH's emergency healing is only as good as the amount of stacks and cooldowns they have available. Yeah, Indom and Rouse+Fey's Ilum+Whispering Dawn and Emergency Tactics+Succor is a lot of healing. However, Indom is only available every 30s and costs Aetherflow (and without the trait, only 2 a minute). Rouse + Whispering Dawn is only available every minute and up for 21s. Emergency Tactics + Succor are only up every 20s, and Succor is very expensive and heals for very little. And, SCHs usually have to plan out their cooldowns carefully for healing. If things go against that plan, they usually can't cover it. If anything goes wrong, SCH has the hardest time recovering from it. And, if anything goes wrong twice in a minute, SCH is just pretty much dead in the water.

SE has changed SCH to a more active healing role, yet SCH lacks the tools to do such a thing. That's the only thing I'm asking for - the tools for SCH to do what the designers want them to do considering all adjustments they got.

[Dregenfox]

Snip

WHM's don't have to option of casting up to 3 oGCD heals every minute. Or with dissipation + stacking beforehand, up to 12 oGCD lustrates in under 35s. That oGCD flexibility is what differentiates scholars from WHM.

The whole point of optimal SCH play is to avoid casting GCD's as much as possible with optimal use of oGCD's + fairy healing, and using those GCD's for DPS instead.

OTOH the whole point of WHM is to make GCD healing as efficient as possible by stacking Regen-effects and their variety of heals effectively. Their oGCD's are there more to cover for mistakes. That difference in playstyle is what separates SCH and WHM.

[ForgottenScholar]

Hi first time poster here,
Can I ask for clarification on where SE stated SCH was no longer to be the mitigation healer?? There has been a lot of changes to SCH in recent patches but haven't seen anything where this has stated.
My thoughts were that overall WHM was to be the pure healer class, SCH was to be the mitigation healer and AST was a mix of both with an emphasis on support through the card system.
My question with this basis is why can't we have better dmg mitigation than AST? Specifically for single target with aoe through DT. This only happens when we crit on adlo with no warning so it's a pure rng and hope it crits when we need it.
I would love to see a UI indication like on both WHM and AST when their respective teir II spells freecure and crit. It wouldn't make us OP as DT can only be used every 90 secs or was that 2 mins still?
The other changes above especially from OP are good.

[inhaledcorn]

/snip

WHM doesn't also have to worry about using that oGCD heal that could potentially lock them out of using their oGCD AoE heal, oGCD AoE DPS (more specifically their DoT spreader), oGCD damage/MP restorer, and oGCD tank-buster heal since they would lack the resource to do it (except for maybe Divine Benison) or sacrificing a whole different set of cooldowns and their passive heal to get the resources to do it.

On top of that, all healers, not just the SCH, want to avoid using their GCD heals as much as possible, but SCH wants to avoid them even harder than the other two since those heals are weak and expensive. When it comes down to using their GCD heals, the WHM and AST can do it better and more efficiently than the SCH to go back to DPSing sooner. SCH usually has to leave it to someone else because they pretty much can't. As soon as the bulk of the healing falls on the SCH, unless they're overgeared or have all of their cooldowns available, the SCH will struggle much more than the other two. That's not good balance. The problem of not being able to heal content was exactly why AST was initially barred from content. True, it's not so bad that SCH can't physically heal anything, but it's come to a point where you have to ask "What does SCH bring that the other two can't do?" Yeah, they have good oGCD heals, but Earthly Star is godly when timed right, and WHM has Assize, Medica, Cure III, and PI. SCH has Indom... on a 30s timer. SCH has Succor... that's a weak heal and weak shields and not much better under Emergency Tactics that's on a 20s cooldown (which was formerly 30s). They have Whispering Dawn... that's a passive heal on a 60s timer.

When people balk at these suggestions I'm making, they seem to do it under the assumption that I have no idea how to play SCH. I cleared O1s and O2s in the first week with my static. Sure, you can argue those are the easiest encounters this raid tier, but we cleared them after 9 hours of work - 3 hours for 3 days. We are not hardcore. We're midcore at best. However, to clear these two raid tiers so fast means that I do have some idea of what I'm talking about. Yeah, I avoid using my GCD heals as much as possible. I rely on my fairy cooldowns and oGCD cooldowns a lot. I've timed for when to specifically fire off my heals for their most optimal use.

It's for when things go wrong and my plan is interrupted that SCH lacks the flexibility to recover that the other two have. SCH has almost 0 wiggle room for mistakes by the rest of the party, even worse its own. If I die and Aetherflow's on cooldown, I'm pretty much still dead. I have almost 0 healing potential because the little bit of MP I get from being revived has to go into resummoning my fairy. I have to beg my party for MP, even if Lucid happens to be ready to use. Sure, you can argue, "Well, don't mess up." Yeah, and we live in a world where pencils don't come with erasers.

[Dregenfox]

snip

I don't get how you're upset that SCH can't match a WHM's raw AOE output, because that is pretty much their entire reason for being invited to a raid.

Assize + medica + PI is roughly 750-900 potency depending on confession stacks, but that's once per minute.

ET + Succor + Indom is 800 potency, and can be done every 30 seconds.

Cure III is good in the right situation, but it's a small AOE and costs a lot of mana. But if we buffed SCH's AOE healing then what is the point in bringing a WHM?

[Enla]

I don't get how you're upset that SCH can't match a WHM's raw AOE output, because that is pretty much their entire reason for being invited to a raid.

Assize + medica + PI is roughly 750-900 potency depending on confession stacks, but that's once per minute.

ET + Succor + Indom is 800 potency, and can be done every 30 seconds.

Cure III is good in the right situation, but it's a small AOE and costs a lot of mana. But if we buffed SCH's AOE healing then what is the point in bringing a WHM?

Personally I'm fine where SCH is concerned in terms of AOE heals. With the CD reduction of Emergency tactics, the increased viability of Eos, Indom, and now Excog to help mitigate tank busters, SCH has never been in a better position when it comes to AOE heals and anything more would put us dangerously into the same territory where AST's current reside in terms of doing far too much, far too well. Especially considering the fact that Rouse + Whispering Dawn AND Largesse + Indominability and Emergency Tactics is pretty strong when paired. Not as good as repeat Medicas, no, but hardly limiting enough to make fights unwinnable if mass damage is incoming. I haven't had a single problem with solo AOE healing in any of the current progression raids.

[Amaret]

Lagresse doesn't buff ability heals.

[Alysiae]

registered for the forums just to reply to this. wanted to say thanks, because i had no idea miasma II was added back in, holy shit i totally misread the patch notes on miasma so i had to

i read both of your posts about sch and must say both were very interesting reads. agree with most of it though at the moment, i think sch is in a much better place and i am quite happy with it. it is definitely played slightly differently, back in 2.x adlo and succor were my go to, now, doing savage i find myself doing indom and tactics a lot more for spot healing/topups rather than succor.

i am unsure if i have my stats wrong (trying to stack crit and det), but my succor does like 2.7k average or so without a crit and when most lv 70's have like 30-40k hp, a 2.7k heal and shield feels negligible when i see whm and ast aoe healing for 7-9k non crit.

indom now does about 9k which is much nicer, critting for 13k at times, but still i see ast's aoe crit heal for around 20k sometimes and it makes me cry a little as i'll never hit those numbers. i guess that isn't my role, and i am sufficient at healing end game content now so am mostly happy.

i've used dissipation maybe once in my sch life, fey union i almost never use unless i'm being lazy in a dungeon run and i want to do dps. general consensus seems to be that these two skills are pretty useless right now and need major changes.

[Lildragora]

Largesse + Indominability

I'm fairly certain Largesse only affects healing spells, not abilities.

In response to OP:

I like the ideas for the fairy gauge and dissipation, albeit if im spending gauge for my fairy abilities I would expect lower CDs or more potent effects. As they would be going from a no cost to a gauge cost. Nothing drastic, but something to make me feel like im gaining added functionality rather than paying for old functionality.

Adlo and Succor though, should just have a flat 150% shield and the crit chance. Negating the base 150% for a 200% in the event of a crit. Thats my personal flavor on those abilities.

Side Note: If you want to use Fey Union, Lakshmi EX is a great place for it. Chanchala tank buster + Excogitation and followed by Fey Union is pretty solid. Healing MT while you get mitigation up for the OT buster

[paoweeotter]

WHM doesn't also have to worry about using that oGCD snip

agreed! this echoes my experience especially in V3S pugs. scholars are great oGCDs healers and can correct some mistakes. but I've been in an instance where indom had just been used for aoe heal but the raid took uneccessary aoe damage afterwards and my cohealer died. when indom is down and the raid is at 15% hp your only choice is succor spam and lustrates. maybe whispering dawn if it's available or dissipation to lustrate 3 people up. it's a tough spot to be in as a SCH.

in this situation a wHM or ast can more easily stabilize the raid. ast lightspeed is my go to oh shit cooldown in this exact situation. I don't have a whm but I assume they cam easily heal everybody up as well.

im not saying that SCH need to have equivalent tools to deal with unexpected raid damage. each healer has it's own niche and It wouldnt be a good game if everyone is going to be a copy paste of each other.