se does not understand scholar

[Exiled_Tonberry]

There's a huge disconnect with the devs and healers in general. It feels like they want us to play a certain way without caring about how healers actually play the game right now.

To a dev who thinks "healers should heal", SCH might seem perfect, but to us, it's a lot of unnecessary healing being forced on to us.

It took 4 years for WHM to finally embrace it's high dps/no utility style. 4 years of constant begging for something. ANYTHING. It shouldn't take that long for them to address issues.

[Tommara]

There's a huge disconnect with the devs and healers in general. It feels like they want us to play a certain way without caring about how healers actually play the game right now.

To a dev who thinks "healers should heal", SCH might seem perfect, but to us, it's a lot of unnecessary healing being forced on to us.

It took 4 years for WHM to finally embrace it's high dps/no utility style. 4 years of constant begging for something. ANYTHING. It shouldn't take that long for them to address issues.

Devs have a tendency to think they can force us to play it their way.

Instead, I play another class or leave the game entirely, which I’ve done a couple of times before (beginning when FF14 was FF11). But I don’t hold a grudge, and so come back from time to time to see if things have improved, which they have.

I changed to dps years ago. I’m good with the longer wait times since I’m a crafter/gatherer and so can kill mobs for crafting mats while waiting (as can any dps, and sell the mats to people like me).

I’ve been leveling up healers when I can (SCH is a freebie from leveling up Summoner), but I rarely play my healers in a PUG.

The FF14 devs are foolish to think that they can force us to heal by removing our options to do anything else.

I started healing in MMOs as an Everquest cleric, who could only solo kill undead, and even then, had to wait 10 minutes to recover mana before I could kill another undead. If it wasn't an undead, I couldn't kill mobs for exp at all.

When I did join a group, dps who died would apologize for dying because of the long recovery of mana to resurrect and rebuff them, which affected the entire group. And knowing that if I could have prevented that long recovery, I would have (the pace was slower in EQ. Healing a tank was a 10 second cast).

And because they failed on managing aggro, which wasn't as easy as it is now. But they didn't have to dodge stuff as much. I much prefer the aggro management mechanic though.

As long as dps are not made to share the consequences of their mistakes, things will never improve for healers in this game.

And so that’s why I play dps now.

[Miiu]

I just want to reference FFXI's Ninja job here. As I do believe the devs stated at one point its design intent was to be a high sustained dps job with a couple of thematic and mitigation tools. What did the players do? Used it as an evade tank. Eventually SE adapted to how the players were using it and gave Ninja more gear and tools for tanking.

Now with FFXIV, they seem to be going the other way currently and trying to force us to adapt to their design intent. Well, that is going to be a tall order for them to succeed with. As they either will need to make content hard enough all but the most skilled groups with the most skilled healers require constant healing, or introduce some other non-damage thing for healers to do and contribute.

The last option, which seems like it is being rejected is accept that healers can and will dps during healing lulls, and want it to also be somewhat engaging.

Tanking as a Ninja in ff11 is still the most fun I had with thanking in any mmo to date.

But besides that. Like people mentioned SE seems to be really confused in what they want. Sure saying they want something different than players is an argument to have but the kits within AST and SCH feel clunky in comparison to what they were before. Especially for AST (sorry for focusing on them since this is a SCH thread) but the job at the moment feels like. They gave 30 employees a rough baseline of what the job should be and told them each to come up with an ability. And then when they came back they just put every suggestion in. No matter how bad the synergy is.
Sure I am over dramatizing but still.

With the way they handled healers this expansion I doubt SE we will see a new healer in 6.0.... and honestly I probably don't want to see one since I feel it would be a nightmare to see 4 healers being being balanced.

[Connor]

Hate to be ‘that guy’ but did we really need yet another thread on how Scholar is the worst job in the game etc etc.

Not saying people shouldn’t complain but there are already hundreds of threads about how Scholar is broken and boring and lazily designed and every dev who had a say in its development should be fired and blacklisted etc.

We get it, the devs get it, people who don’t play ffxiv probably get it by now, everyone hates Scholar. Surely this discussion could have taken place in another thread? I feel like the forums are becoming seriously oversaturated with Scholar / Astrologian hate threads that are all saying the exact same thing.

I just feel like players could send a much stronger message to the developers with a single consolidated thread than hundreds of different ones that are all the exact same as each other

Honestly, I’m starting to get tired of seeing all the exact same posts day in and day out. I seriously intended to main Scholar this expansion, but after seeing at least 2 threads a day on how it’s so bad and anyone who enjoys it just doesn’t understand how to play the class or healers, I honestly find myself just playing a Dancer, because it’s close to impossible to try and justify enjoying how Scholar is now to others, not without someone casting doubt on your opinions (e.g “if you don’t want an expanded DPS kit to weave into your OGCDs that do the entirety of your healing then you were never a good Scholar anyway). I honestly don’t think I’ve seen a single person try and make Scholar as it is more enjoyable, just endless calls for a reversion to every ShB change. I’ve also not seen a single suggestion that wasn’t for additional direct DPS tools instead of something actually interesting

And I mean, if a new player ever looked at the forums they’d be forgiven for thinking Scholar is literally unplayable.


As an addendum I still don’t understand where this concept of Scholar being a DPS/healer hybrid came from. It came from a DPS job purely for developer convenience (so they could add a new healer job without making a whole new class). If you ask me the ‘Heavy DPS / Low healing / fairy solo healing’ identity it used to have was purely incidental, but they didn’t want to change it so drastically mid-patch when every healer and their gran’s dog is a Scholar because deeps. It’s almost as if they tried to rectify Scholar’s incidental identity this expansion by simplifying the DPS kit and giving it more if a focus on healing (even if the concept was poorly executed)

[Miiu]

I mean scholar is far from the worst job in the game. It functions well. The healing output is great and you have more tools to heal than you know what to do with. It is just boring compared to what it was.

[Kolsykol]

There's a huge disconnect with the devs and healers in general. It feels like they want us to play a certain way without caring about how healers actually play the game right now.

To a dev who thinks "healers should heal", SCH might seem perfect, but to us, it's a lot of unnecessary healing being forced on to us.

It took 4 years for WHM to finally embrace it's high dps/no utility style. 4 years of constant begging for something. ANYTHING. It shouldn't take that long for them to address issues.

I mean, do you think that '' healers '' are all this big collective of people who all agree with each other?
The whole dps issue in regards to healing in FFXIV altogether has a lot of different sides and opinions.

No one here speaks on behalf of '' healers '' in FFXIV, we're just a handful of people on the internet.
And people who have issues are far more likely to speak about it because the people who aren't having issues have no reason to sit around complaining about it on the forums they're just enjoying the game.

I don't disagree with most of the issues that people are having, but people shouldn't think that they're these spokespeople on behalf of the '' healer community '' or whatever.
And I am saying this as someone who's extremely disappointed with how they've handled MNK too, but I am not going to sit here and proclaim to speak on behalf of MNK's and that I know what most people want.

[Connor]

No one here speaks on behalf of '' healers '' in FFXIV, we're just a handful of people on the internet.
And people who have issues are far more likely to speak about it because the people who aren't having issues have no reason to sit around complaining about it on the forums they're just enjoying the game.

I don't disagree with most of the issues that people are having, but people shouldn't think that they're these spokespeople on behalf of the '' healer community '' or whatever.
And I am saying this as someone who's extremely disappointed with how they've handled MNK too, but I am not going to sit here and proclaim to speak on behalf of MNK's and that I know what most people want.

It’s also worth mentioning that the forums themselves are not a representation of the community because of the simple fact that it’s a minority of players that post on the forums in the first place, regardless of what side of the ‘argument’ they’re on. I’ve seen people suggest that the consensus on the forum is the consensus of the community, which there doesn’t seem to be any actual evidence to support or reject. With people being unwittingly pushed into the groups of either “pure healer’ or ‘DPS healer’, any chance of a real community consensus becomes impossible (because people have already split the ‘community’ into diametrically opposed groups’). And even if you aren’t advocating absolutism on one side or the other, you’re automatically going to be assumed as belonging to one of these two groups. And I’ve not really seen many suggestions for a ‘third way’ for healers besides either DPS / oGCD heal or GCD heal / don’t DPS.

I don’t think anyone has ever taken actual numbers of players posting on forums compared to active subscribers, but honestly I predict that it would show there are much less players posting frequently on the forums than there are actually playing. Not to say that these players who don’t post would say something different than the forums, but I do agree that nobody on any of these forums really speaks for the ‘community’ outside of their own circle (even if that fact should itself be self-evident). I know I’m speaking for nobody but myself when I post, if not only because I always end up liking things I shouldn’t lol

[Hawklaser]

As an addendum I still don’t understand where this concept of Scholar being a DPS/healer hybrid came from. It came from a DPS job purely for developer convenience (so they could add a new healer job without making a whole new class). If you ask me the ‘Heavy DPS / Low healing / fairy solo healing’ identity it used to have was purely incidental, but they didn’t want to change it so drastically mid-patch when every healer and their gran’s dog is a Scholar because deeps. It’s almost as if they tried to rectify Scholar’s incidental identity this expansion by simplifying the DPS kit and giving it more if a focus on healing (even if the concept was poorly executed)

It has to do with the original arcanist class base, which is essentially gutted out of Sch now. Arcanist formed the DoT/Pet class foundation that Sch and Smn both built upon. Physic was to keep Carbuncle alive to tank for you in solo content in addition to other tools that came later. Sch built upon this base in the healer/party support direction. Smn the pure Dps direction.

Originally the classes were more generalist and customizable for solo play, and the jobs more specific and specilized for dungeons. IE Lancer could set cure as an extra while Dragoon could not, but Lancer would not have access to some of the better damage options Dragoon at the same time.

[Sylve]

I'm genuinely curious as to WTF these SCHs are doing if they can't use 3 AF charges per minute.
First charge should always be Sacred Soil.
Second should almost always be Excog since theres absolutely no reason to not use it.

And then you're trying to convince me that for the next 55~ seconds your group is such utter perfection that no one will suffer at least 20k damage to justify a Lustrate? Or that you somehow manage to perfectly negate the party wide damage in its entirety when it does happen in such a way that Indom can't be used?
On the off chance that this is actually possible … SS will be back off cooldown before Aetherflow so you can just drop your third charge on that. Grats, all 3 of your charges are now used before Aetherflow becomes ready again.

You truly have to have to be trying your hardest to avoid casting an AF ability to have charges left over when it comes ready again.

Tanking as a Ninja in ff11 is still the most fun I had with thanking in any mmo to date.

But besides that. Like people mentioned SE seems to be really confused in what they want. Sure saying they want something different than players is an argument to have but the kits within AST and SCH feel clunky in comparison to what they were before. Especially for AST (sorry for focusing on them since this is a SCH thread) but the job at the moment feels like. They gave 30 employees a rough baseline of what the job should be and told them each to come up with an ability. And then when they came back they just put every suggestion in. No matter how bad the synergy is.
Sure I am over dramatizing but still.

With the way they handled healers this expansion I doubt SE we will see a new healer in 6.0.... and honestly I probably don't want to see one since I feel it would be a nightmare to see 4 healers being being balanced.

Balance gets thrown around a lot in this forum, but the fact of the matter is that all 3 Healers are producing similar results in the content we have so far. Proper balance is literally a case of no one healer being stronger or weaker in all areas.
WHM has strong personal DPS, able to drop Misery nukes while healing and Assize being dual function. But aside from healing, offers nothing whatsoever to the party.
AST has the lowest personal DPS (mostly on account of Potencies) but also the greatest degree of party damage utility. Is able to handle the same healing load as a WHM.
SCH has the middle ground in DPS, in both Potency per cast and the ability enable windows for itself through Shielding and Fairy healing. Chain Strategem buffs the party a bit, but not on the level of ASTs cards while offering Healing power on par with the other 2.

Any Balance changes that occur will most likely not be related to healing strength but rather in the party buffs to bring their raid contributions closer to equality.
We'll never have perfect parity and the elitist min/maxers will figure out which one offers the party even .5% more damage and that'll get designated as "Best" and that mentality will trickle down the playerbase without ever acknowledging the context of "best".

Also, in reference to your "30 employees" statement, do you realize that you're actually describing what this forum wants to happen rather than what did happen?
This forums seems to want healers to be "design by committee via forum" in regards to AST and SCH. 100 different ideas as to what needs fixing and how the devs should do it.

[Foxkid]

I'm genuinely curious as to WTF these SCHs are doing if they can't use 3 AF charges per minute.
First charge should always be Sacred Soil.
Second should almost always be Excog since theres absolutely no reason to not use it.

And then you're trying to convince me that for the next 55~ seconds your group is such utter perfection that no one will suffer at least 20k damage to justify a Lustrate? Or that you somehow manage to perfectly negate the party wide damage in its entirety when it does happen in such a way that Indom can't be used?
On the off chance that this is actually possible … SS will be back off cooldown before Aetherflow so you can just drop your third charge on that. Grats, all 3 of your charges are now used before Aetherflow becomes ready again.

You truly have to have to be trying your hardest to avoid casting an AF ability to have charges left over when it comes ready again.

Considering as soon as you and your group learn a boss fight and where the avoidable damage comes from, the absolute need to use all 3 stacks like that diminishes greatly. Especially considering how much mitigation scholars can offer en masse before the room aoe is cast unless its a spam cast (triplecast and the like).

Even though Seraph seems to be looked down upon in accordance to the forums, using Consolation and Succor reduces A LOT of damage that makes Indom essentially wasted overhealing, Fey Blessing can do the same even if it may be a little weaker if you're only healing to keep them fighting rather than to top off constantly, and E- Tactics + Succor can very easily offer the same amount of healing as Indom as well if the instant heal isn't necessary in that moment.

And this is before even using WD and not counting if you use anything with Recitation either which removes the AF cost of the next ability anyway (except Soil, but that's just a guess, I use Rec for catalyze or succor).

Hell, for the Titania fight alone the first phase generally goes (pre-pull shielding and regen) > chain/sacred > excog > broil spam till mist rune in which case I've been sitting on 1 charge since a Lustrate wasn't needed unless the tank is absolutely terrible + my co-heal is usually whm > sacred + succor for flame rune > reapply 3 stacks > repeat as necessary to aid the lightning tether to bring everyone above 50% (usually a fey blessing or ET Succor since she uses her aoe so sparingly).

You don't have to "try" to avoid using AF if the time doesn't call for its use. I'm prone to panicking and popping indoms left and right to top off when I'm new to a fight and learning when the damage is coming, once the fight is learned however, that AF usage drops dramatically to the point its just excog, sacred, blessing, WD, Succor, and Catalyze fishing 95% of the time unless the tank royally effs up somehow and that Lustrate is actually needed.