Can Scholar's Dissipation get a trait at higher levels to feel less punishing to use?

[inhaledcorn]

I'm at work and admittedly haven't read stuff in this thread but I keep reading about people complaining about dissipation. It works fine, you can find plenty of use windows. The only issue it has is that your resources don't work towards your gauge... Which the gauge is currently pretty janky anyways so it's not like you're missing out on much. If the gauge were more useful I'd be asking for better dissipation. But as is it's one of the few things scholar has left to think about. Please don't dumb it down more.

Edit to clarify: SCH is about making choices and gimping yourself in one portion of your kit in order to leverage another part of your kit. Dissipation follows that design and works fine imo.

Meanwhile on AST: What do you mean you need to watch your resources? Watch this: *literally outheals everyone without losing a single shred of DPS and has the best DPS support in the game*

SCH gimps itself completely and still can't even reach the throughput that AST can with 0 effort. Why do I need to hit 3 buttons to achieve what the other healers can do in 1, and why do I need to be punished for it?

That's what turned me off from SCH. It's the only job stuck in the HW punishment mentality with the DPS rotation of ShB.

[EaMett]

Meanwhile on AST: What do you mean you need to watch your resources? Watch this: *literally outheals everyone without losing a single shred of DPS and has the best DPS support in the game*

SCH gimps itself completely and still can't even reach the throughput that AST can with 0 effort. Why do I need to hit 3 buttons to achieve what the other healers can do in 1, and why do I need to be punished for it?

That's what turned me off from SCH. It's the only job stuck in the HW punishment mentality with the DPS rotation of ShB.

Absolutely. But this is a valid "flavor" for a healer. Not to say that the implementation is perfect either. But overall, I think the point I'm trying to make is that it's really down to preference here. And I'm in favor of more playstyles

[Grimoire-M]

Meanwhile on AST: What do you mean you need to watch your resources? Watch this: *literally outheals everyone without losing a single shred of DPS and has the best DPS support in the game*

SCH gimps itself completely and still can't even reach the throughput that AST can with 0 effort. Why do I need to hit 3 buttons to achieve what the other healers can do in 1, and why do I need to be punished for it?

Because you have those buttons up twice or even three times as often as everyone else and are the only one who can shift it around what others are doing at minimal loss?

I’m of the opinion Scholar’s role as a tactical healer means it has to trade high impact binary cooldowns in-order to gain access to its versatility and flexibility. While it will never be the highest throughput or most clean healer, it should be the one with the largest toolbox and have to make harder choices in order to make use of that to its fullest extent. That keeps its utility and power in line in the first place. And you only need to look at the imbalance of its prior iterations with higher throughput to see why that matters.

For contrast, part of my issue with Sage is it has the advantages of both Astrologian and Scholar and pays very little if anything for it.

[Nizzi]

That's what turned me off from SCH. It's the only job stuck in the HW punishment mentality with the DPS rotation of ShB.

I agree with what you're saying, it can be frustrating to be punished for doing your job when others can do it comparatively better or easier for no punishment.
At the same time, Aetherflow/Energy Drain/Dissipation are really the only actual "tactics" that Scholar has, for a job with its lore of being a tactician. The tactic of using it for either healing, and sacrificing the DPS, or using it for DPS at the risk of healing you may need to do is something I like about Scholar. It's decisions that aren't really present in other healers kit, and it helps fulfill the job fantasy for me a bit. Tactics don't always have to work, and I respect that about Scholar.

Ultimately though, there's not much they can do about Dissipation as long as Scholar stays as it is. They could remove Dissipation or make it unable to be spent on Energy Drain, but then that's an even worse downside for very little upside. They could make it have nothing to do with the fairy, but then it's just free DPS, but still a DPS loss on healing. Effectively you'd have no thought in whether you used it or not, because as it stands Scholar really wants to be using Aetherflow on Energy Drain as much as it can.
If they remove the ability to use it on Scholar's Energy Drain, that's a DPS nerf on Scholar because Dissipation does account for part of Scholar's total DPS, even if it's a very small single digit percentage. They could buff Energy Drain slightly to compensate for the lost potency, but they've already nerfed Energy Drain this expac, so it's clear that they don't like Scholar using it for DPS, but without Energy Drain, more of Scholar's design breaks. Either they decide to go back and look at how Scholar used to function to alleviate some issues, or they completely rework it so it becomes in line with every other healer in the game, which would make the job even worse IMO. As it stands, I don't trust them to do a Scholar rework "right" with how Sage is looking.

Scholar's in a tough spot for sure, and while I do acknowledge that Dissipation can feel clunky and overly punishing, I personally like the potential punishment that comes with it. Using Dissipation on healing or Energy Drain constitutes a choice in Scholar's kit, however slight, and I don't want to take that away from it. Too much of a healer's kit is already thoughtless powerful buttons that you press to solve a problem without really thinking about how or what exactly you're going to use it for. If we remove Energy Drain from Scholar's kit, it becomes "1 nuke 1 dot" for all of it's rotation (because why would you ever use Ruin II in EW unless for movement), and I'd really hate that.

[Deceptus]

*snip*

Scholar's in a tough spot for sure, and while I do acknowledge that Dissipation can feel clunky and overly punishing, I personally like the potential punishment that comes with it. Using Dissipation on healing or Energy Drain constitutes a choice in Scholar's kit, however slight, and I don't want to take that away from it. Too much of a healer's kit is already thoughtless powerful buttons that you press to solve a problem without really thinking about how or what exactly you're going to use it for. If we remove Energy Drain from Scholar's kit, it becomes "1 nuke 1 dot" for all of it's rotation (because why would you ever use Ruin II in EW unless for movement), and I'd really hate that.

Re: Tactics

Recitation and Emergency tactics still exist. Do you use Recit on the Adlo for a massive shield? The Exco because you think the tank will survive but need him to be back at +50% asap? Or wait until the next raidwide for Indom.

Re: Dissipate

"Using Dissipation on healing or Energy Drain constitutes a choice in Scholar's kit"

Not in Endwalker. Energy Drain has been nerfed so much it's barely worth using at 100 potency. Pre-Endwalker it would give back MP and that was a main use for it, but in Endwalker the MP is being moved to Aetherflow.

It would be much better if the Quickened Aetherflow trait was brought back.

[Grimoire-M]

Re: Tactics

Recitation and Emergency tactics still exist. Do you use Recit on the Adlo for a massive shield? The Exco because you think the tank will survive but need him to be back at +50% asap? Or wait until the next raidwide for Indom.

Re: Dissipate

"Using Dissipation on healing or Energy Drain constitutes a choice in Scholar's kit"

Not in Endwalker. Energy Drain has been nerfed so much it's barely worth using at 100 potency. Pre-Endwalker it would give back MP and that was a main use for it, but in Endwalker the MP is being moved to Aetherflow.

It would be much better if the Quickened Aetherflow trait was brought back.

In Endwalker Energy Drain's finally an actual DPS gain again thanks to half-ast casting. It's right now where it's barely worth using, mostly for the MP. It's basically Ruin II but for windows where Ruin II is bad to cast unless you use it alongside Ruin II and another heal.

We've also discussed Quickened Aetherflow in the past, it can't come back on Aetherflow itself given how it's just extra Energy Drains & Lustrates and really just destroys the management aspect to it in the first place. That said, I could see another DPS ability that uses that trait, and procs on things we want SCH to care about healing-wise. Hell it could even do the Toxikon thing too or act as an indirect Nerf to Energy Drain. Or you could rework Energy Drain into that outright by making it no longer cost Aetherflow in the first place and use the trait to refund its cooldown. I'd probably give it charges like MCH and just let it proc on a bunch of different sources in addition to Aetherflow in that situation.

[Halfgeeek]

Remove Energy Drain. It feels so bad using it since you know you're giving up Indom, Sacred Soil, Excog, or hell even a Lustrate for 100 potency. It's a bad skill that is so unrewarding to use.

Give SCH Fester!

Synergy with Biolysis. Having a 300 potency nuke as AF dump now makes it worth it, more bang for buck.

[EaMett]

Remove Energy Drain. It feels so bad using it since you know you're giving up Indom, Sacred Soil, Excog, or hell even a Lustrate for 100 potency. It's a bad skill that is so unrewarding to use.

Give SCH Fester!

Synergy with Biolysis. Having a 300 potency nuke as AF dump now makes it worth it, more bang for buck.

100 potency is still better than 0 potency and no stack sink. I remember when they actually removed ED and aetherflow became useless. We would cast it maybe twice per 10mn encounter because all we needed were 6 stacks for the entire fight and the ogcd cost wasn't worth the mana.
I do agree that they should make it feel more impactful though.

[Halfgeeek]

100 potency is still better than 0 potency and no stack sink. I remember when they actually removed ED and aetherflow became useless. We would cast it maybe twice per 10mn encounter because all we needed were 6 stacks for the entire fight and the ogcd cost wasn't worth the mana.
I do agree that they should make it feel more impactful though.

Fester (with a short CD) can be that AF sink.

Something more than just a crap 100 potency AF spender.

I really liked Fester when playing Arcanist, having it be boosted from DoTs is an extra thing you keep an eye out for.

[AnotherPerson]

In 6.0, Summon Bahamut and Summon Phoenix make Radiant Aegis and Searing Light unavailable.

You're talking as if you're not supposed to use DPS buffs right before your trance window...

But healing isn't always in a place where you Benefit to use it before Dissipation. If there's no healing required and you use Whispering Dawn before you go into Dissipation, you're just overhealing with regens. If you need the extra healing 15 seconds into Dissipation, you don't get the full value of Whispering Dawn if you use it before Dissipation; instead wasting 15 out of the 21 seconds of the regen effect. If you're using Whispering Dawn after Dissipation, you delayed its usage by another 15 seconds from when you originally needed it because it isn't accessible during Dissipation.

Yes, there's windows where you can use Dissipation to get resources - but that's just making Dissipation into a DPS skill - which defeats the purpose of giving aetherflow and allowing the choice for generating resources for healing. At that point, you might as well change the Lv 60 Capstone skill into "Give 3 stacks of Energy Drains" instead. It's not flavor to have a severe punishment to your healing output for a marginal amount of DPS gain. You aren't being a tactician, you're just trying to manage your toolkit's terrible performance better.

Finally, you can plan for using Dissipation without an issue and use them for Energy Drains provided it's an optimized environment. Alright, what if your environment isn't optimized? You go into Dissipation because you know there's no unavoidable damage, just avoidable mechanics. Then your party members take avoidable damage by failing the mechanics and take multiple hits. Now you want to heal to recover from this setback, but a majority of your healing toolkit is locked away from Dissipation. Originally, the decision to find a window to use Dissipation is good, but it became punishing to the Scholar because it was caused by someone else's mistake. How do you plan for this? Just don't use Dissipation and leave it on a longer cooldown to avoid this issue altogether? Then you might as well not have the skill in the first place.

I'm not saying you shouldn't be punished at all for using Dissipation, but with the way Dissipation currently works, it's too punishing to allow for any good decision making. There's little and less flexibility in the skill the higher level you go. Instead of getting Expedient as our Level 90 capstone skill, if we were to get another potent fairy healing skill that requires the Fairy to be out for another set duration like Aetherpact and Summon Seraph, could you still see Dissipation as a useful skill? I certainly cannot. There's just more and more layers of punishment to using the skill rather than being a tactical and flexible skill instead.