I am stuck in a Scholar midlife crisis!

[MrKusakabe]

Thank you for your time guys. It is actually helping me a bit that I am not alone. Else I'd just put my book next to my Bard clothes - in that dusty chest in my inn room in Gridania and never go back. But now, I am maybe overreacting in my mind.

Are you using a ps4 controller or kb&m?

I am using keyboard and mouse. Tried to use an XBOX controller but when you are a PC gamer and used to have all the skills accessable either by tapping a key or by clicking on it I found it hard to have it in seperate bars. It's muscle memory since September 2013 and I don't think I can change.

Scholar being "less desired" than the others? No, absolutely not. Is it getting worse by design? Yes.. But it's not being singled out.

The sad truth is that healers in general are neglected and seemingly undesirable to Square's attentions. Astrologian's lore and gameplay was gutted even worse than Scholar's. White Mage is left with several useless skills, basically the same gameplay depth they've had for years and was only at the top of the pile at the start of the expansion by the grace of not being gutted during their reworks. None of them got any particularly good love in Shadowbringers.

They just don't want to properly fix healing in general.

Scholar is great by design. When I read the official job guide I linked in my opening post, I am so like "Yes, yes, yes!!". The lore was always very stupid and probably the worst ever: Tomberry stares into the sea for 15 quests and you do some stupid errand quests. Or rescue "Alka Zolka The Suicidal". You can really feel Square Enix can't write a lore around them.

[...]For perspective, I was a SCH main from early access of 2.0 all the way around to the start of Stormblood, I loved the job, I swapped to RDM for a bit to do something different for a change and once the novelty of playing RDM died down, I jumped between playing the two. RDM has the really nice advantage of flowing really well, so I can totally see how there is a stark contrast with SCH when coming from RDM. I didn't like SCH in SB too much as it's where I was started to get bored but was excited to see what ShB would bring and now I'm a DNC main and if I heal, I heal on AST. AST doesn't flow well either (probably less well than SCH), but it has more to do and that helps keep me from being bored.

But if you're struggling to get back into it and the abilities feel confusing, maybe break it down and even try lower level content to get back into the swing of it. Starting with lower level abilities and working up until you get back at it and stuff should start piecing together.

Unlike Scholar, Red Mage has a beautiful flow. It is like going into the kitchen with random ingredients and mange to get something tasty out of it, no matter if sweet (ranged) or spicy (melee). Some nice sauce (Vercure) and dessert (Verholy) are also ready to enjoy. On Scholar I feel unprepared. I walk into the enemy to do some "Art of War" blows which is such a bullshit skill and my healing skills are not feeling to match each other. If you take the cooking analogy, my Scholar rotation is resulting in:

(This is a Zelda: Breath of the Wild reference when you put random shit into the cooking pot and the result is what you see above)

I also thought of systematically go back to milestone dungeons. The problem there is that I am fine up to the Aetherchemical Research Facility - which is Level 60. But I just Physick-spammed trough it. I used to the need to create Sacred Soil and HP-shields and all that in the past, but these are too easy and the later dungeons might be too tough if I can't get the synergy done between my upcoming skills. Unprepared as said..

[...]
I want to tell you it gets better, and from a healing perspective it does. You learn some really cool abilities 60-80, and SCH is without question a top-notch shielder, and mitigating damage can be very gratifying, and there will definitely be times where a well-timed shield makes the difference between whether or not that player survives the hit. Rezzing players is it's own mechanic really, and while there is nothing to it but to do it when Swiftcast is up, when it is not; it can force you make some tough choices. They have powerful heals through their aetherflow, and with Energy Drain back, you have something to dump those stacks on if heals are not needed.

It is still a pet class, and there are still issues that need to be addressed with the pet classes. Never the less they are still effective in combat. A tip I can give you is to use place if you are not sure where your fairy is at. She obeys your place commands no matter how much distance is between you and her. You can also always call her back to your side so she follows you around again as well.
[...]
I wouldn't be playing healers if I didn't enjoy them, and I am still here. That doesn't mean everything is a-ok, but yeah. Perhaps you will find something you enjoy about the job as well if you stick with it. Up to you though.

This is the sort of heads-up I was also looking for. I see there is some nice stuff coming up, but it feels so clunky. I really do not even understand certain tooltips, as pathetic as that is. When I read "next galvanize..." and I am like "What is that? Where do I trigger this in the first place?!". In 2015, I had it all sorted out: These buttons are shields, this is the panic heal, this is the AoE heal, that needs Aetherflow. Now I have Aetherflow AND a cooldown on a skill, and this is so confusing to understand the logic. If am already gated behind stacks which are behind CD, why does the spell itself is also limited?

I used to send my pet into the boss room or over places I can't reach during some mechanics. But I could see her by selecting her in the party list. Also, when she got damaged, I knew the guys there get damged, too, so I had great overview of the arena. Like "damage hotspots". I took care of special cases with my toolkit and Eos did First Aid and scouting. Now I am spending more time to move her around or get her back on my heels. Which adds to my entire confusing gameplay.

You know, I am not as incompetent as I seem in the OP, but right now, I am. So there must be something I am missing

There isn't much fairy to manage anymore unfortunately, she's immortal and can't be commanded directly expect positions. If you find she's way out of range, can recommend making sure she is on "Heel" keeping your head on a swivel to make sure she's right behind you before using any commands or manually place her in arenas where she'll hit everyone with the spells. I don't know how much you played of earlier iterations, but I feel it currently flows like a river of bricks after losing control over it's petGCD. You either wait for someone to take damage or fill the empty pauses between with Ruin/Broil, occasionally refreshing Bio. [...]

The problem is that I place her a lot all over the place as this is the reason why I have a pet in general: A companion to work in a team with. I think it's super idiotic when I command her to be on spot X and she is moved way, she should move back to spot X. I mean, I commanded her to be exactly there, not anywhere else. If I place her at X:15 Y:20, and she finds herself a t X:0 Y:15, she should move back. That'd help a lot and would be true to the "Position" command. It is just awkward she is unselectable. I play on 2550x1440p, it's so difficult! Like I am playing "Where is Waldo".

tl;dr: healers suck. Real bad.

The feeling of disjointedness in your kit isn't just you, all healers just get a ton of healing abilities with little to no synergy and that's it.

The synergy is really a problem! Phew, I am not the only one in that matter.

The reason why I am doing this that I like Scholar. Very much even. I am not a fan of White Mage at all. To me it is always like White Mages are from a Christian St. BlaBla hospital with pictures of god and crosses over the door in every room, while Scholars are doctors from an University Hospital, trusting in themselves and their knowledge instead of another entity. And Astrologicans are playing Yu-Gi-Oh. So I want to stay a Fairy Master. But I struggle so much. Not by the numbers, the healing is fine. It's so clunky. I can't get anything in order. Look at the difference of my two professions:

Sincerely,

[Gemina]

This is the sort of heads-up I was also looking for. I see there is some nice stuff coming up, but it feels so clunky. I really do not even understand certain tooltips, as pathetic as that is. When I read "next galvanize..." and I am like "What is that? Where do I trigger this in the first place?!". In 2015, I had it all sorted out: These buttons are shields, this is the panic heal, this is the AoE heal, that needs Aetherflow.

Should I throw Catalyze in there as well (another shield) ;p

Galvanize is the status effect gained from Adloquium and Succor. This effect in all retrospect has it's own HP that can even stack on top of maximum HP to increase to overall HP of the player. It fades when the shield breaks or the generous timer expires. It does not stack with AST noct shield, however, it can be used with of other mitigation abilities such as tank cooldowns, your own Sacred Soil, and Catalyze (what I mentioned earlier), which you will learn later. When the tooltip says "next" Galvanize, it is just referring to the next Adlo or Succor cast by you will receive the benefit.

Now I have Aetherflow AND a cooldown on a skill, and this is so confusing to understand the logic. If am already gated behind stacks which are behind CD, why does the spell itself is also limited?

My friend, right here you bring up one of my biggest gripes with the game, and that is abilities that tap from multiple resources. Every job I play suffers from this except WHM, which used to suffer from it greatly tying many of their light-based skills like Tetra, Assize, Benison, and Asylum to the lilies. These have all been severed from the lilies and just have the CD now. This improved WHM drastically, and I would imagine all jobs currently suffering from this atrocity would also benefit.

The problem was exacerbated with the addition of job gauges in SB. It is flawed design to implement a gauge as a resource and then also gate its abilities with a CD timer. If we have to build the resource up, then a CD pretty much defeats the purpose of it. It is far more engaging to have multiple abilities use and share the job gauge resource so players can choose which ability fits the current situation. If an ability is so powerful that you have to slap a CD timer on it, then it probably doesn't belong in the set of job gauge skills.

I used to send my pet into the boss room or over places I can't reach during some mechanics. But I could see her by selecting her in the party list. Also, when she got damaged, I knew the guys there get damged, too, so I had great overview of the arena. Like "damage hotspots". I took care of special cases with my toolkit and Eos did First Aid and scouting. Now I am spending more time to move her around or get her back on my heels. Which adds to my entire confusing gameplay.

Yeah, these "damage hotspots" is a crutch you do not need, but thinking outside the box is a good thing, especially for a SCH. However, not being able to see Lily in the party list was a definite problem that thankfully got fixed. But pets have some glaring issues, and some have been around for quite some time:
- Ghosting
- Too long of a delay between use of fairy action, and reception of fairy benefit
- Taking pet abilities off of the pet hotbar
- Multiple resource abilities (Fey Blessing, Consolation)
- Wonky AI

This is along with several grievances that could easily be taken care between patches. SCH's accidentally sending away their fairy can be taken care of by having the ability grayed out when the SCH is in combat. Forgetting that you placed her and leaving her in the dust in dungeons and forcing the SCH to resummon her can be taken care of by simply having Lily teleport to the SCH once the distance is too great between them. This would also help tons in alliance raid arenas, that are like what? A thousand yalms in circumference? xD

As for your hotbar setup, I don't see why you can't organize them in a way that is satisfactory to you. You have so much more time on your RDM than your SCH, so you will need to give it a little bit of time for your hotbar setup to be as proficient as it has become for you on other jobs you've spent more time with. I play on controller myself and I tend to place instant/ogcd skills on the face keys, and GCD dependent skills on the directional pad. This is because for skills that use the directional pad, I have to sacrifice movement or use autorun, so it is best to place skills there where I have to do this anyway. From there I try to categorize them based on type of skill such a damage, heal, god abilities, etc.