SCH help and tips!

[Jeckyl_Tesla]

First time properly playing SCH. It's level 60, so just leveling him up.

And boy am I struggling. Full Shire, Baelsars Wall, can't keep the tnak up with massive pulls with Physik spam. Everyone taking dmg? My AoE heals don't heal for shit it seems, so I got to get Succor up first, which doesn't seem to negate anything, like 5% hp. But maybe I'm being bad. Fuck it, I'll use Indom, which only heals for 5% on everyone instead? I'm confused as to how to keep the team constantly topped up without running out of MP.

I need a hand, maybe I'm missing something? Need some tips please.

[QooEr]

the first thing is you do Not need or should keep ANYONE at full hp at all times (unless youre doing some savage fights, but this is baelsars). Scholar has a fairy that slowly but steadily heals people up, and people are rarely ever taking constant damage so try to leave more work to the fairy. This isn't limited to embrace, try to use succor less and whispering dawn more, its not only more powerful (700 potency vs 300) but also completely mp free.

if you need to spam heals on tank you can rouse the fairy and use whispering dawn to get a strong regen on them, you also have fey illumination and largesse. try doing adlo and > physick or adlo> emergency adlo if the tank is really hurting bad and youre out of aetherflow stacks for lustrates.

[Archamgel]

Like QooER said, NEVER try to keep everyone topped off. No matter what healer, that is a waste of mp, because you will always overheal that way. Now, onto Sch things.

I believe this to be the most important thing, and the first thing you should do when entering battle, is place your fairy. She will stop healing if you move to try and follow you. Get used to placing her near the tank (make sure the tank is settled in). She will be far more effective once she is placed near them so she can turret heal.

Next, line up Rouse, Fey Illumination, and Whispering Dawn (you can switch the place of Rouse and Fey illumination, as long as both of them are popped before using Whispering dawn) because that is a buffer for you as it will regen the tank and everyone else. Once you pop Fey Illumination, you can just use Rouse+Whispering Dawn while it is on cooldown.

Third, as with any caster, always keep an eye on your MP. This is one part of all the "common" problems with Sch I don't understand. Aetherflow and Energy Drain is going to be your main method of keeping MP up. Now, I don't mean blow all your Aetherflow Stacks on Energy Drain, because you may need it for healing. What I mean is to use it during battle when Aetherflow is about to come off cd and you don't need to do any major healing. Spend whatever stacks you have on Energy Drain and then use Aetherflow. If you would like a good reminder of when it is off cd, you can use this macro for your Aetherflow button so that it makes a sound when it is off cd.

/macroicon "Aetherflow"
/ac "Aetherflow"
/wait 60
/echo Aetherflow available for use again! <se.7>

Activate Lucid Dreaming when at 50% and you shouldn't even need to do it for the rest of the encounter with the Aetherflow and Energy Drains.

Finally, onto healing. I will break this down into Single and AoE.

Single

When you have used all of Eos's abilities I said above and that isn't enough (it rarely is anymore), then you can use Physick. Only use Lustrate if you have the Aether to spare (it is coming off cd) or the tank is in immediate danger.

Don't try to keep up Adloquium anymore. It isn't worth it. Our shields are, apparently, not our thing anymore (must regain composure). The mana is far too much to try and keep it up since it mitigates so little damage. Now, don't get me wrong, you do want to toss one on the tank every once in awhile for that chance of a crit, but don't keep trying for a crit.

If the tank is not in the "Oh no, he is going to die unless I get a Lustrate off this instant" state and you know you have time to cast, do an Emergency Tactics Adloquium. This is our Cure II/Benefic II. You can only use this every 30s, but, it can do some good healing, and some great healing if it crits.

AoE

Like Adlo, don't try to keep up Succor for the same reasons you don't keep up Adlo, not enough efficiency to justify the cost. Succor is good, however, to toss out on occasion. It won't buffer much, but it is something. What your main focus is for AoE is Indomitability and Emergency Tactics+Succor.

That is basically it for the AoE. Keep up Rouse+Fey Illumination+Whispering Dawn, or just Rouse+Whispering Dawn. AoE is a scary thing for us Scholars. If Indom, ET+Succor, and a buffed Whispering Dawn can't do it, then clench your butt cheeks and pray for Thal to save you.

Other than that, here are just a few tips:

-Sacred Soil is rarely worth the Aetherflow. Example: My Lustrate heals for 11k. In order for Sacred Soil to have met that, it must have absorbed 110k dmg in that 15sec span. That's either only gonna be useful on huge pulls, or during the time where bosses do a large burst of damage (the phase where everyone is just standing there waiting for the damage is the best time for this.

-Speaking of Boss Bursts, this is the best time to use Deployment Tactics. As everyone gathers, use Adlo on someone and deploy it. It will be better than Succor overall (unless they all crit).

-Swiftcast+Emergency Tactics+Adlo/Succor is a great combo for when you know damage that can't be avoided is coming. You can hold them until after the damage goes off and instantly heal a good amount.

-Doing damage is a great form of mitigation. We only have so much Aetherflow and it is behind a cd, so ensuring mobs die before we are starving from lack of Aether and locked behind cds is key. Don't be afraid to toss out some damage. Even Shadowflare is a small form of mitigation since it has a Slow attached to it.

[Spiroglyph]

Some of our skills did get nerfed when SB was released, but still in lvl <61 content there's not much room for struggle IF your team plays somewhat adequately.

Regardless, though, here's some things you could keep in mind when running dungeons:

-There's no reason to use selene. Ever. I don't know if you were, but if so, don't do it again. She is useless

-While clearing up trash mobs, keep adlo use to a minimum - shields are meant to prevent damage and they take up a good chunk of MP, so ideally you'd cast this at the end of a pull so the tank takes negligible damage while doing the next pull. In the midst of clearing a huge pull, though? Only use it if paired with emergency tactics, as it takes up more MP than it is worth.
The same applied to succor - but in trash this is even more useless than adlo. I use it mostly for boss fights, and even then ONLY if I know some team wide damage is coming. This thing is nowhere near as spammable as AST's Aspected Helios and it should not be used as you'd use said skill.

-Try to use Eos' skills all the start of a pull - it might seem like a waste to blow everything up so fast, but bear with me: you rouse and use her healing pot increase and aoe HOT, and it's very good support for 30 seconds, good enough so that physick should be enough if your tank isn't playing a game of "let's see how many aoe's I can stand in before healer bails" - in a good team, or even an average one really, 30 seconds is enough for a big part of the pull to be down, and by then your trusty single target heal spammable skill (lmao) should be enough.

-Still speaking about fairy management: try to always place her at the start of a pull. You can use heel command again once the pull is over. If she's on heel, she will prioritize following you over casting anything, so you'll be losing plenty of embraces while avoiding aoes as you'd normally do. She's fairly durable (even despite our lack of sustain), do don't worry too much if she takes one or two hits to the face. Make sure she's far away enough to avoid most of the heat, but one or two hits from regular mobs aren't as bad as a boss cleave. Don't forget to have her follow you again after the pull though, or she'll disappear and you'll have to waste a swiftcast and MP resummonning her.

-If aetherflow is off cooldown and you still have one or twu stacks left, depending on how much you have to heal at the moment, you could possibly use a stack on sacred soil and use succ if it procs. Otherwise, I'm not sure SS would really be worth the stack.

-If the party is taking damage at the same time, use indom if they're at 65~70%. It's a fairly strong heal, but on a cooldown, so make sure you don't panic and waste it. Lustrate is a better panic button than indom!

-Shadow Flare should be on cooldown - it can be considered a form of mitigation as it applies a slow, meaning sligthly less hits. Personally I prefer this on big pulls, so if you're at the very end of a boss fight and it comes off cooldown, I would save it for the next big pull. Boss fights in most dungeons are manageable enough without much mitigation.

That's about it, but I have one last thing to say:

Baelsar, specially first pull, can be scary to heal through for scholars because we have lack of aoe skills. If this is what got to you, I have to say that I'm pretty sure every healer has wiped here at least once or twice if the tank pulls everything from the start until the locked door. Don't be to hard on yourself o7

[Jeckyl_Tesla]

This all really helped guys. Thank you very much for taking the time to answer me, cause it's made a world of difference.