SCH is no longer fun to play! Detailed review

[EaMett]

Hey EaMett, what's your thoughts on the mana cost for the new AOE DPS spell?

I find myself running out of mana from spamming it too much even with lucid dreaming and aetherflow being used. Frankly I find it costing 800 MP ridiculous.

I think AoW needs a bit of a reduction to it's mana cost. I feel like 15% would be a good number but this depends a lot on actual data from the player base and only SE has that.

snip

Thanks for the extra info!! Especialy the faerie name. Updated my post.

Regarding AoW, I'm basing this off of wall to wall pulls with 2.2K piety. Also comparing it to ex trials where I have so much mana it's ridiculous, there's a big discrepancy here. I'm also going to say that in the past 90% of my expert roulettes have had lukewarm party dps and this is a trend I don't expect to change. With all that in mind I felt like a 15% reduction in AoW spam was a good spot. That's one more cast every 6ish casts so not that overpowered. It also doesn't affect the other content like another management tool would.

I also think shadowflare should share a cooldown with sacred soil. That would be a lot of fun.

[Ekimmak]

Maybe I'm just an idiot, but I literally can't find where the so called pet oGCDs are. Tried dragging them from the actions tab, nothing happens. And they don't show up anywhere else.

[Grimoire-M]

Personally I don't feel SCH needs an Aetherflow damage dump, just make Aetherflow itself restore more MP and generate Fey Gauge for excess Aetherflow stacks for now. 5% MP and 10 gauge per stack feels fair to me. Bumping Broil III down to 270 and Ruin II to 220 is close to ideal, isn't it? I feel it should be a slight penalty for single weaves but that would be insignificant enough not to matter. I agree that Art of War should go to 700 MP but doesn't need to go lower. I'm more worried about Piety itself being too weak atm beyond anything else needing changes.

After that it's on SE to actually make us care about healing more.

[LegoTechnic]

Maybe I'm just an idiot, but I literally can't find where the so called pet oGCDs are. Tried dragging them from the actions tab, nothing happens. And they don't show up anywhere else.

Player pet commands are up at the top, with the actual pet abilities that you can't hotbar below. Whispering Dawn is a level 20 player ability, and Fey Illumination level 40 in your action list.

[Deceptus]

Mandatory viewing:

https://youtu.be/TSK_lnZpRfY

He sums up many of the things we have said, plus talks about the good aspects of the job. He said, however, that this is the worst version of SCH we have had in the game so far, and I think he's right.

Sadly, whatever that was has been removed

On Topic:

Solo content and open world leveling:

Ok, not going to lie. I have quite a few positive things to say about SCH but this is not one of them. It's basically like being in sastasha. You're pressing 1 button 99% of the time. You have no use for your stacks. Not having ED, shadowflare, miasma, miasma II to fill time really doesn't give you anything to do. If you have multiple mobs or want to farm multiple mobs the mana requirements for AoW really limit you.
Hands down the least fun I've had since I was lvl 15... And this was at lvl 70+. Honestly, I find this shocking.
Thankfully the amazing msq and zones we had this expansion took my mind off of it. But it's otherwise very grim.

This was 100% forseen. Anyone without blinders knew this was coming. Healers have to be able to reasonably complete the MSQ and this simply ain't it.

[LegoTechnic]

Sadly, whatever that was has been removed

It was just this video. Not sure why it was reposted.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbgDp8xCgBk

Also I am always surprised to see people leveling in the MSQ and open world zones as a SCH. Being able to do it as a SMN and switch to SCH for dungeons is a super class advantage, so why not use it?

[Yomiko_Nonaka]

Also I am always surprised to see people leveling in the MSQ and open world zones as a SCH. Being able to do it as a SMN and switch to SCH for dungeons is a super class advantage, so why not use it?

Speaking for myself : Because i don't like SMN, and i have no idea how to play it.

And also because i want to do the MSQ with my main !

[CaesarCV]

Also I am always surprised to see people leveling in the MSQ and open world zones as a SCH. Being able to do it as a SMN and switch to SCH for dungeons is a super class advantage, so why not use it?

For me it's mainly since I don't want to have to re-gear constantly. I'd basically have to do double the Dungeon Runs. And since the new MSQ notices that you're a healer a little more often that's also a factor...

[EaMett]

Personally I don't feel SCH needs an Aetherflow damage dump, just make Aetherflow itself restore more MP and generate Fey Gauge for excess Aetherflow stacks for now. 5% MP and 10 gauge per stack feels fair to me. Bumping Broil III down to 270 and Ruin II to 220 is close to ideal, isn't it? I feel it should be a slight penalty for single weaves but that would be insignificant enough not to matter. I agree that Art of War should go to 700 MP but doesn't need to go lower. I'm more worried about Piety itself being too weak atm beyond anything else needing changes.

After that it's on SE to actually make us care about healing more.

The problem with this is that we don’t really need mana in any content other than dungeons. Also the way ruin II is currently set up our ogcds are expensive DPS wise. You wouldn’t bother to weave energy drain if it were for the mana only. Just like you don’t bother to weave AF at the present if you still have stacks left.

Ruin single weave can’t have a slight penalty or you simply wouldn’t use it and clip your gcd. It has to be a dps gain compared to a clip. And clipping should be avoided because it’s just clunky gameplay. With that said, 220/270 would work.

The other option would be to keep things as they are. Giving the stack dump some dps as expected. Meaning that single weaves would have to be double weaves with the stack dump to not be a dps loss. This is worse than what we had in sb but better than the current configuration. I however feel like this wouldn’t be to SE’s liking because it makes this a little too complicated as per their apparent design philosophy.

Honestly, whm has enough leeway atm that a slight buff to sch with a stack dump dps skill wouldn’t dent its situation. We’re talking on average an extra 150pot per minute. With a higher gain potential for those who like to push optimization.

[Trunks]

Honestly, whm has enough leeway atm that a slight buff to sch with a stack dump dps skill wouldn’t dent its situation.

This is complete nonsense. WHM is still in a precarious spot, and its position has been altered more as a result of AST nerfs than anything done to WHM. The challenge with SCH right now is that it remains overpowered, but now it's simply as boring to play as WHM is.

I'm all for making gameplay changes to SCH. I really understand how jarring it is and I think it's extremely unfair that they gutted SCH and AST because they couldn't be bothered to fix WHM. But the moment you start talking about straight buffing SCH, you lose me, and many others I suspect, because fundamentally SCH remains the strongest healer by far.