4.0 Scholar predictions

[Connor]

As we all know by now, 4.0 is going to see some 'changes' to the battle system.
During the 3.0 series Scholar has been widely considered to be somewhat more powerful in PvE compared to the other two healers (though this gap is much less between SCH/AST because of Balance).


I'm predicting two changes that I can see happening in 4.0 to tone Scholar down a bit. While it's most likely that we'll just see potency boosts/drops (like with every other 'major job change'), these are my crazy ideas on what could happen so it can remain equal to its co-healers.

#1: Fairy will not longer automatically cast embrace
I know even before posting that I'm going to get absolutely shat on for suggesting this. But personally I feel like the fairy's auto-Embrace makes it too easy for the Scholar to simply sit back and do nothing. In most content the Fairy is able to take on a large amount of the Scholar's healing responsibilities, and buff the party with Haste (albeit a weak one), and use powerful AoE Regens, and offers great utility that no healer is able to do (AoE Magic Defense Increase, AoE HP Restoration increase, AoE Esuna). When you consider it like this, personally I think the main reason that Scholar is overtuned is the Fairy being maybe a little too powerful, especially for a pet that's supposed to be supplementary to your healing, not your main source of healing. I understand that many people will say, "but other healers have Regens that do the same thing!". And this is true - to an extent. But, Astrologian and White Mage have to use time and resources on their Regens, which is the fundamental difference that makes the Fairy so much more powerful. Not to mention that Regens from Astrologians and White Mages can't create new Regens, nor Esuna the party, nor raise the party's healing/defense, nor buff the party's dps.

#2: Deployment Tactics will no longer spread the effects of Critical Adloquium to party members (instead spreading only the pre-crit effects)
This is another one that's going to make people foam at the mouth with rage, but honestly I think it's likely that they'll do something to this ability. Personally I don't believe any healer should have the power to make certain mechanics easier to deal with that wouldn't have been had the party setup been AST/WHM, and making it so the double-shield from Critical Adloquium doesn't spread would mean this ability doesn't need to be drastically changed to be make a bit less powerful.

3# Scholar MP Management
It's well-known that Scholars (when managing their MP properly) have almost infinite MP. As a Scholar I honestly can't think of any times where I've had to make a conscious effort to conserve my MP or risk running out. This somewhat applies to other healers as well, but Scholar requires almost no management of their MP because any Scholar worth their salt will be using most of their Aetherflow on Energy Drain for the dps boost. I think - for all three healers - in 4.0 we're going to see more focus on managing MP, if only because it's almost redundant in current content where there's little if any need to actually manage resources.

4#: Ease of DPS

It really doesn't bode well for me when I have to start every point by stating that I'm aware that this change would cause extreme backlash from most Scholars, but nevertheless...

Scholar is a bizzare case in FFXIV, in that it's a healer that's also technically a DPS. As mentioned in point #1, Scholars have much more freedom to dps than their co-healers because they have a Fairy that can shoulder their healing responsibilities. And with such a large portion of their abilities being dps-focused, it's clear to most that Scholars are ideal for contributing personal dps.
This isn't a problem itself, of course; there's nothing inherently wrong with a hybrid job. The problem is that this hybrid job has to compete with other healers that don't have the priviledge of being part-DPS. As such, Scholar is able to dps much more freely than it's co-healers, often without having to bother with healing requirements, MP Management, or other means of bottlenecking their dps such as party buffs (like Astrologian cards, which can cut into the GCD).
I think in future we'll see Scholar's ability to DPS moved to be more in line with that of Astrologian / White Mage. This doesn't mean that any of their DPS abilities needs to changed or nerfed, but simply that they should have the same bottlenecks as other healers (whether it be healing requirements, having to buff the party with GCD stuff, having to manually control the Fairy in times of heavy damage, etc).

Obvious Disclaimer: All these predictions are based solely on my own opinion and reflects only my own thoughts on Scholar. They do not reflect the opinions of the community or Scholars in general. Naturally, the developers will choose to take Scholar in the direction that the community wants it to go in, which seems to be an even heavier focus on DPS for Scholars than currently (in my opinion). again, this doesn't reflect what the community actually wants, it's just how I've interpreted what I've been reading the past few months.

[Silver-Strider]

Embrace - Don't see that happening
Deployment tactics - Can totally see that happening, or even just making it use an Aether stack to deploy could work.
Not really sure how they'd cut into SCH resource management, unless they made Pet skills cost MP to use, which would be devastating to say the least.
They could make Cleric Stance affect the Fairy's healing potency as well, which would cut SCH DPS quite a bit as they have to be more cautious with it to since they'll no longer have that safety net

[Connor]

Embrace - Don't see that happening
Deployment tactics - Can totally see that happening, or even just making it use an Aether stack to deploy could work.
Not really sure how they'd cut into SCH resource management, unless they made Pet skills cost MP to use, which would be devastating to say the least.
They could make Cleric Stance affect the Fairy's healing potency as well, which would cut SCH DPS quite a bit as they have to be more cautious with it to since they'll no longer have that safety net

Yeah haha, the first one was a pretty crazy idea I came up with and I'm aware it's a shot in the dark that won't even hit the dartboard.

That said, I actually had the idea of maybe giving the Fairy it's own MP bar, separate from the Scholar's. That way the Fairy can continue to auto-heal while the Scholar does DPS, but without the Scholar being able to rely on the Fairy as much as they do now. This would also make Scholar very difficult to play, though, as they'd be managing two separate MP pools and might cause them to feel force to micro-manage their Fairy, which I don't think is something people want. I wouldn't mind having to do this personally, as I already try to micro-manage her as much as possible, but it could make the job feel very unfriendly to newer Scholars

[Cabalabob]

As you said, embrace is SCH's version of regen/medica II, and while it doesn't have the same management requirements as whm and ast, it does have its own.

1. You have to make sure your fairy is in range of the target at all times. Where whm and ast only need to be for the initial cast.
2. the fairy only heals 1 person at a time. Medica II covers the entire party
3. it doesn't follow the same logical priority you do unless you force it. (Tank on 20% hp is lower priority than a dps on 10% hp when no AoEs are coming).
4. Have to keep fairy alive or it will heal itself instead of the party, and if it dies it has a long cast/high mp cost.

I honestly think they'll get rid of crit adlo entirely and maybe just buff the natural potency a bit to compensate.

If all healers get mp management then maybe, but I don't think this will be singled out on sch. If anything they'll probably give whm more mp recovery than nerf sch.

Again I don't see dps as a sch issue and rather than nerf sch I think they'll probably be brining the other healers up to its level. We probably won't be getting any more dps tools in the sch kit while whm and ast will probably get stuff like stone 4, holy 2, maelfic 3 and gravity 2. While sch will get things its missing in its healing kit like an instant cast GCD heal (something it sorely needs in pvp).

[Feyona]

As we all know by now, 4.0 is going to see some 'changes' to the battle system.

It really doesn't bode well for me when I have to start every point by stating that I'm aware that t
Scholar is a bizzare case in FFXIV, in that it's a healer that's also technically a DPS. As mentioned in point #1, Scholars have much more freedom to dps than their co-healers because they have a Fairy that can shoulder their healing responsibilities. And with such a large portion of their abilities being dps-focused, it's clear to most that Scholars are ideal for contributing personal dps.

I think rather than nerf any healing abilities I have heard talk of getting rid of surplus spells so my thoughts are that to make scholar more balanced with other healers it will be some of the dps ones, that get removed. Nerfing sch aoe when its already weak in that area doesnt make sense but you could be right. You dont have infinite mana when your healing, just do a few adlos

[Feyona]

As you said, embrace is SCH's version of regen/medica II, and while it doesn't have the same management requirements as whm and ast, it does have its o

If all healers get mp management then maybe, but I don't think this will be singled out on sch. If anything they'll probably give whm more mp recovery than nerf sch.

Again I don't see dps as a sch issue and rather than nerf sch I think they'll probably be brining the other healers up to its level. We probably won't be getting any more dps tools in the sch kit while whm and ast will probably get stuff like stone 4, holy 2, maelfic 3 and gravity 2. While sch will get things its missing in its healing kit like an instant cast GCD heal (something it sorely needs in pvp).

I certainly hope they dont nerf adlo its the only thing you can use to keep tanks alive in some content our heals just arnt strong enough to out heal the damage otherwis and if you use lustrate 3 times thats your pool gone

[Cabalabob]

I certainly hope they dont nerf adlo its the only thing you can use to keep tanks alive in some content our heals just arnt strong enough to out heal the damage otherwis and if you use lustrate 3 times thats your pool gone

It wouldn't really be a nerf though, if they buffed the potency to 350 or buffed the shield to be 150% of the heal and took away the crit effect it would be more in line with asts aspected benefic and would be an overall buff to your shield strength since you're not relying on a crit to get the full effect.

If you're relying on a crit to save the tank you're on pretty shaky ground already, this would make it so a crit is nice but not necessary.

[Feyona]

It wouldn't really be a nerf though, if they buffed the potency to 350 or buffed the shield to be 150% of the heal and took away the crit effect it would be more in line with asts aspected benefic and would be an overall buff to your shield strength since you're not relying on a crit to get the full effect.

If you're relying on a crit to save the tank you're on pretty shaky ground already, this would make it so a crit is nice but not necessary.

Sch has such a unique healing style and I love it, I would say its fine how it is to heal with except sustained aoe. Yes but why change it? Like ok tank taking loads damage put adlo , physic still losing, another adlo so top with lustrate, still going down lustrate between physic. Crit adlo no more health loss and I had plenty to do before the crit. And my adlo crit is about near 9k and that doubled with crit dont want to change I like shield healing

[Connor]

If all healers get mp management then maybe, but I don't think this will be singled out on sch. If anything they'll probably give whm more mp recovery than nerf sch.

Again I don't see dps as a sch issue and rather than nerf sch I think they'll probably be brining the other healers up to its level

Aye, I bring up in my post that if they change the way MP Management works for one healer then they'll likely do the same for the others.

As for Scholar DPS, I agree that there isn't an issue by itself. The main reason I brought it up was just because Scholars have a bit more freedom to do so than a White Mage / Astrologian. You're right though that rather than just nerf Scholar, a much better way to balance things would be to allow other healers to DPS as freely as Scholar can.

dont want to change I like shield healing

Sorry if this hasn't came across properly; the reason I brought up Critical Adloquium wasn't anything to do with the spell itself, it's just the fact that mitigation as high as Scholar's can allow for many mechanics to be ignored that wouldn't have been otherwise. I agree that shield healing is one of the best aspects of a Scholar and I don't think it should change. My suggestion wasn't to remove Critical Adloquium itself, simply to make it so it can't be spread by Deployment Tactics. And of course, naturally the Scholar would be given something to compensate for losing the ability to spread a Critical Adloquium

[Cabalabob]

Yes but why change it?

Because that is exactly the problem. Adloquium + fairy are the reason nocturnal AST is rendered useless. Crit Adloquium is too powerful, it blows aspected benefic out of the water. On top of that when in nocturnal sect not only is your main shield worse than sch's, but you don't have regens or a fairy to cover healing while you dps like whm or sch. Nocturnal AST isn't going to be used unless it can be put on par with adloquium and cover healing. And while I think healing is something that needs to be covered on ast's end, the simplest solution for shielding would be to remove the crit effect from Aldo and just buff Aldo's overall performance.