I finally got Sch to 70, and man was it a slog and a half. I have also ran quite a few dungeons since getting 70 (no ex's because I would rather take something else). I was a Sch main, but after doing a single run of Sirensong Sea, I knew this wasn't the Scholar I had mained since 2.0. This is going to probably end up long, but it is just from loving Sch. A run down of my issues while leveling and having reached 70:
-Tools that I have always used for those "Oh, sh**" moments became something I had to blow through just to keep the tank alive at the end of the fight. Emergency Tactics was always on Cd, I blew through Aether using Lustrate like a mad man, and Eos was micro managed like I always have her (Place her>Fey Illumination>Rouse>Whispering Dawn). And I had no time for anything else, and this is with tanks that I know where using Cd's, dodging AoE's, and were properly geared. With not so great tanks, it was eit her I used all my resources to keep them at 10% most of the fights, or they died. My ability to keep tanks alive shouldn't have been this rough! It did get better once I got to 70 and was wearing that gear, but what's the point of having to work twice as hard as other healers to barely scrape by and have time to contribute more?
-That first part wouldn't have been a problem if it weren't for this one. Our shields are absolutely worthless. Even crit Adlos were taken down in 2 or so hits. And if it isn't a crit? Psh, they would burn through the shield and still damage our allies. I could deal with the increase in mana, but that is only if they were much stronger than what they are now. Scholar has always been the ablative healer. Proactive instead of reactive. These shields are nothing more than wrapping my allies in toilet paper (crits are 2-ply) and sending them to face guys with swords, guns, and magic.
-To me, Scholar is an ablative healer, but it's best form of mitigation has always been killing the things that are throwing out the damage in the first place. And here, this is where Scholar (and my heart) just falls to pieces. Contributing damage to fights has always been my favorite part about scholar. I have half my as skills as damaging ones, so I definitely plan on using them. Sch 4.0 hits about as hard as throwing the empty toilet paper roll that I used for shielding at the enemy.
Bane nerf was FAR too harsh. We are the only ones that get hit with an 80% damage loss, we only have 2 dots to spread, and they only add up to 70 potency. Going from that, down to 14 potency after the fifth is just way too harsh. This is even before considering that the healers that are considered the "pure healer" and "buffer" have 200 potency attacks that only drop off to 100 potency after the fifth. It was far more satisfying (and definitely more dps) doing Holy spam with Thin Air. This also doesn't take into account that Aero III doesn't do less damage to targets at all, and Assize is a 300 potency nuke and heal now with no damage drop off.
As for single target, Whm still has us beat with higher potency and less mana intensive damaging spells. (All of this kind of makes me wonder if they even thought of the 10% damage we used to get from Cleric Stance.)
-Dissipation is still a thing on my skill list. i believe that says more than enough, but I will go into detail because of how terrible I think it is. We only have three healing spells. These are Physick, Adloquium, and Succor. 20% on these may make them better (with 3 Aether Stacks on top), but I will never see this as worth taking away a fairy. Eos can put up Fey Illumination, be Roused, and place a regen. All of that, while giving you 20% to your spells as well. Sure, this is for a shorter duration, but the entire time, she is healing along with you. This, added with the new fairy gauge, just makes that one ability clash with the entire kit and makes me think we should get something instead of that.
-The fairy nerf was warranted. I was perfectly ok with the fairy nerf. More often than not, I would joke with my friends saying things like "Who? Me? Healer? No, that is Eos' job. I'm just a 3rd dps" and would continue running everything in cleric stance with little healing or mitigation from me.
The fairy nerf on top of all of our problems, though? No. Choose one or the other. You can't just put a huge nerf across the board for us, fix Whm mp issues, and say "better buff Astro some more". That's not how any of "balancing" works. I'm not saying those jobs are perfect (I have a 70Whm, so I know those issues as well), but we just can't even compare to the raw healing of Whm or the far better and less costly shields of Astro (who just keeps trying to take our jerbs!). We are the mitigation job. We mitigate
so we can contribute dps and ease the healing from our co-healers. I want that back, please. (PS-Give back Sustain. There was a grand total of 0 reasons to remove it. Tanks give just many cares to guide a cleave to fairy as you have reasons for removing Sustain.)
Other healers see the fairy as "free mp cures", but, honestly that just isn't the case. Fairy is a compliment to our healing style. We pay for fairy all the time in that our heals are weaker for her being there. She is there to mitigate the amount of healing we need to do directly for a bit while we do damage. Other healers have "on-demand" 650-700 potency spells, while we have a 600 potency ability that we can only use three times in the course of a minute.
-As for new stuff we got, they range from "meh" to "not good" for me.
Broil II is another damaging spell. Less potency than Stone IV, and more mana, but I welcome more damage spells. Animation is pretty nice, too.
Chain Stratagem was good on paper, but in practice, people are lucky to get 4 or 5 hits in with this up. Its usefulness is increased with more people, but it should be more useful for dungeons as well. Maybe bump it up a few secs?
Aetherpact is, again, good on paper, but not in practice. To start with, this thing takes awhile to build up. 3mins minimum. And then you have to position fairy within 10 yalms of the tank and hope he doesn't have to move. This skill can be fairly good as a strong regen for the tank, but it is super clunky. Fairy has always been fairly clunky (her delays on executing commands, not canceling a heal to execute a command, and more), and we just don't need more clunkiness on top of it. This should be at least 30 yalms.
Excogitation is just not good. There have been times where I think the tank will fall to half in the 30s window and it never happens, meaning a wasted aetherflow and a long cd. It is also only 50 more potency than Lustrate, so why risk it? If it didn't use an Aetherflow stack, this would be a pretty good ability.
-Way too many things use Aetherflow! This means that when push comes to shove, I will only be spending them on necessary things. These being Lustrate, Indomitability, and Bane (for whatever it's worth). Other abilities just aren't worth it. Energy Drain is only good for a small dps boost and to recover from not watching your mp. Sacred Soil's 10% dmg reduction isn't worth it. Excog is something I have already went over above. The level 68 trait doesn't even come close to helping the "Aether Skill Bloat", as others have already shown with their math. Either increase our Aetherflow stack numbers or generation, or, even better, make some of these Cd's.
-Lastly, but most importantly, Sch has lost its fun factor. Sch should have kept its high skill ceiling. Not every job needs to have low ceiling-floor skill gaps. Sch was great fun keeping up with dots, shadowflare, shields, deployments, ice 2, and just being able to keep the party healed while contributing meaningful damage. Now, that is all thrown out of the window, into the street, and hit by a semi. We apply 2 dots, bane them (for whatever that's worth), use shadowflare (for at least half the fight it will be up, and that's if the tank positions the mobs in it), and then spam the single target Broil II. Whm has AoE dots (that don't decrease in value) and an "on-demand" nuke with Holy (now much easier with Thin Air) and Assize for a heal/dmg nuke, while Astro has Gravity and Earthly Star (again, a heal/dmg nuke). Not wanting every kit to be the exact same, but we could use a nuke like everyone else. I'm even ok with us not having a stun, still, just give us a nuke!
Overall, I think our solid foundation was ripped out from under us. We just don't fit in well in places where the other two can have it covered better. Whm has better throughput and damage, and Astro has better shielding and utility, so all of the bases are covered better. Scholar is in dire need of some love. I know we were in a league with Warrior, but I had no idea such a wrath would come down on us from Yoshi-P and his crew.
So far, I have had a much better time with Whm, and I only had Whm to 34 before this ex-pac because I never liked it. It is a strong "pure healer" when it needs it be, which isn't often, since its regens usually do the bulk of the work.
I have gotten used to the shoehorned Lucid Dream, and have no mp issues if I manage Aetherflow and Lucid Dream.
I got my Sch to 70 in the hopes that they won't treat Sch like 3.0 Astro and wait as long to fix it, but in the meantime I will play something else.
Just as a side thought, I honestly believe all the healer problems stem from Astro being a half-baked class. Because it is almost a carbon copy of the 2 OG healers, it will always be in a vacuum of comparison. "It doesn't do regens/shields as good as Whm/Sch". This causes them to be in a weird place of trying to do what the others can without being too good or bad. If they would have given it more of an identity, it wouldn't be trying to steal ours.
Originally Posted by Starflake
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