If I was on the development team, this is what I would have done for SCH

[Shihen]

I disagree in how flexible AST really is. It's more "fill in the hole" than it is "flexible". AST can be the WHM or "SCH" if one currently isn't available, but it can't switch mid-battle.

Flexibility probably wasn't the best word for me to use. What I meant was flexible in its role, 'filling in the hole' so to speak. I was actually planning to touch on this originally but left it out for being a little too deep down the rabbit hole. I'll try to keep my thoughts on it short, but the two main issues for me were having flexibility be a class' identity and the similarity between the new spells and spells currently in the game. SCH already has a few identity issues with AST over 2 spells, but the proposed changes would also turn Adlo into Regen and Succor into Medica II on a cooldown. Not that it wouldn't be fun to do, but I think if the class focus was that it could do a little bit of everything, it would struggle to find a place over healers with defined strengths because most endgame content is designed around 2 healers that can compensate for the other's weaknesses. Groups would have to ask themselves if a WHM can heal the best, and an AST can shield the best, why bring a SCH who does a little bit of each when they can just bring the best at each style together?

This would also leave the door open for a true, pure "shield" healer (the true opposite WHM, having strong shields attached to recovery spells and a large, on demand, HP-percentage based Shield that the WHM used to have, and nice oGCD healing, but almost no regens except for a cooldown or two and very little support [and probably really high personal DPS]).

This is what I'd like to see SCH become and why I think its current strengths should be tweaked to highlight the shield aspect of their role. I'm not sure if it was intended or not, but almost everything here already applies to SCH. Adlo/Succor shield and heal, there is great oGCD healing in Lustrate and Indom, the only regen the class has is Whispering Dawn, support is fairly strong in Chain Strat, and personal dps is high. I'd argue it just needs to work out the kinks in its current kit and add a powerful health based shield that becomes the defining part of it, preferably through Selene.

In my ideal world, groups would look at a fight and say "This fight has tons of incoming damage/nukes/tight dps checks, we better make sure we bring a WHM/SCH/AST". Each healer ends up the best at something. But the problem right now is AST, just barely, is the answer to too many scenarios that SCH used to be the answer to. Their strengths need to be defined more clearly in ways that don't intersect, and I think making SCH the de facto shield class is one of the ways to do that.

[inhaledcorn]

This is what I'd like to see SCH become and why I think its current strengths should be tweaked to highlight the shield aspect of their role. I'm not sure if it was intended or not, but almost everything here already applies to SCH. Adlo/Succor shield and heal, there is great oGCD healing in Lustrate and Indom, the only regen the class has is Whispering Dawn, support is fairly strong in Chain Strat, and personal dps is high. I'd argue it just needs to work out the kinks in its current kit and add a powerful health based shield that becomes the defining part of it, preferably through Selene.

In my ideal world, groups would look at a fight and say "This fight has tons of incoming damage/nukes/tight dps checks, we better make sure we bring a WHM/SCH/AST". Each healer ends up the best at something. But the problem right now is AST, just barely, is the answer to too many scenarios that SCH used to be the answer to. Their strengths need to be defined more clearly in ways that don't intersect, and I think making SCH the de facto shield class is one of the ways to do that.

Well, no, Whispering Dawn is a Regen, but, when we compare Noct AST to SCH, SCH has a lot of passive healing in the fairy, while the AST has nothing except Celestial Opposition. When I said "Regen", I meant passive healing. SCH always had this passive healing in the fairy. Embrace is basically a slightly stronger Regen tick now to fill in the holes their base heals have, but their base heals aren't strong enough on their own. That's why I say these changes would "leave the door open for a true shield healer" since SCH, as it turned out when a true, pure shield healer emerged, wasn't a pure shield healer. That's why it was so strong. It was a mini-WHM and a mini Noct AST with amazing MP management, an absurd combination of Critlo-Deploy that could straight-up ignore mechanics, great healer Healer DPS since the downside of Cleric Stance meant almost nothing to them, and strong, passive healing because the fairy had a much higher heal potency on Embrace. These changes emphasize this idea of "Mini WHM and Noct AST" further, while not being as good as those that specialize in those roles. And, if the fairy gauge change I suggested doesn't happen (and it's highly unlikely that it would), then SCH would be further gated by cooldowns spread between itself and its fairies. This also doesn't change much from how a SCH plays currently, relying heavily on their very powerful cooldowns, but, at the moment, I would say that they're too reliant on them. This puts some healing thoughtput back into the GCD for less skilled SCHs but also greatly rewards SCHs for planning their cooldowns spread between themselves and their fairies, especially since both fairies would have very useful skills (and it would be easier to switch between them).