Scholar has the worst design of any job in the game, and here's why.

[elioaiko]

Agreed, SCH has a whole host of issues and could really use a redesign at this point. It's entire kit is locked off with Dissipation is punishing and only serves as extra ED fodder.

The fairy is super clunky and is too slow. If the SCH needs to cast the fairy abilities then why not make the fairy just hover over their shoulder instead of having to reposition the fairy? Also the fairy is so weak and Fey Union is barely worth using when the fairy has to be stationary and unable to cast their other abilites. It's things like this that make SCH so annoying to play. Sometimes I forget that the fairy even exist.

As for WHM, they are the less offensive in its current iteration because they had nothing to lose. They got a functional lily system and that's it. They have no real form of weaving outside of Dia so clipping will happen and weaving will feel so bad.

On top of that, WHM has no utility whatsoever and it's kit revolves around GCD heals which is bad design. Yes, lilies are used for weaving but Misery isn't dps neutral so you're less punished I suppose. In fact, if your co-healer is any good, you can literally get by on Assize, Asylum, and lilies alone.

[Imora]

So how do you play scholar now anyway? Preshielding seems to be a waste. All the shields have heals on them so if you're shielding at full HP to put bubbles on people you're wasting mana.

So what gives?

[Semirhage]

So how do you play scholar now anyway? Preshielding seems to be a waste. All the shields have heals on them so if you're shielding at full HP to put bubbles on people you're wasting mana.

So what gives?

Scholar hasn't been a "shield healer" for a long time. It's an oGCD healer with a fairy. In an ideal situation (in 8 player content) you want your AST doing most of the healing while you use lossless healing like Whispering Dawn, Seraph, and Embrace to gap fill. That's basically never the case, so you'll want to dip into Aetherflow abilities like Sacred Soil (caveat: only after you get the regen on it. It's the weakest aetherflow ability before that), Excog, Indom. If you're in a bind, Luatrate will do. Only GCD heal if the party will die without a shield or you're out of Aetherflow and people are going to die. If there's downtime where you can't target an enemy, then by all means shield/deploy away.

In dungeons, preshield and excog before the pull. Soil if the pull is larger than a few enemies. By 80, if you have to GCD heal during pulls you either have an extraordinarily large pull (the first pull in Akademia may do this), your party damage is low, or you have a squishy tank.

These are of course general guidelines. If your party is bad at dodging, then you'll have to deviate from them. The skilled playbook for all three of the healers is to burn through their free heals as often as possible, only resorting to their base kit if they're out of options.

[Aiscence]

The thing that I don't like with SCH is the fact we are supposed to be an oGCD healer but you only have very bad weaving tools (or that feel awful).

While in the past I could miasma 2 to weave, now it's limited to ruin 2 (and the dot but ...) which forces you to ED to not lose the dps and at the same time makes your more vulnerable by burning a stack, where an AST has it included in malefic (and doesnt lose his strongest tools) or WHM get a partial and satisfying cashback from using heals by getting a blood lily, without losing any powerful tools if case of need.

It's like we are getting punished when doing anything and have to deal with the consequences while others get rewarded by doing their thing.

[ty_taurus]

The thing that I don't like with SCH is the fact we are supposed to be an oGCD healer but you only have very bad weaving tools (or that feel awful).

While in the past I could miasma 2 to weave, now it's limited to ruin 2 (and the dot but ...) which forces you to ED to not lose the dps and at the same time makes your more vulnerable by burning a stack, where an AST has it included in malefic (and doesnt lose his strongest tools) or WHM get a partial and satisfying cashback from using heals by getting a blood lily, without losing any powerful tools if case of need.

It's like we are getting punished when doing anything and have to deal with the consequences while others get rewarded by doing their thing.

Each expansion I've expected Ruin II to get upgraded into a SCH-specific spell like Broil since Stormblood now. Do I dare hope anything will change about it this time? Ruin II should have the same potency as any given expansion's Broil, but should cost more MP. That's how it used to work for a hot minute, and it was perfect. Why did we not maintain that when the answer was right there in front of us?

[Liam_Harper]

The thing that I don't like with SCH is the fact we are supposed to be an oGCD healer but you only have very bad weaving tools (or that feel awful).

It is rather strange, considering the oGCD kit increased when they moved fairy abilities there, but rather than address this over the expansion they increased the tax to weave (by making Ruin II a 90 potency loss and nerfing ED which is useful to offset tax for single weaves).

Meanwhile AST also has a lot of oGCD's but has both Lightspeed and 1.5 sec Malefic to facilitate free weaving because of that. Where does that dev thought process come from?

[Anahlise_Auhn_Giinslai]

Each expansion I've expected Ruin II to get upgraded into a SCH-specific spell like Broil since Stormblood now. Do I dare hope anything will change about it this time? Ruin II should have the same potency as any given expansion's Broil, but should cost more MP. That's how it used to work for a hot minute, and it was perfect. Why did we not maintain that when the answer was right there in front of us?

I have.. experienced this. $_$ at Lv54 Scholar, and did not do the Lv54 subclass quest, my Ruin I and Ruin II have the same 140 potency. X'D
there is some sort of glitch or some thing. the Lv54 trait upgrades Ruin II potency and upgrades Ruin I to Broil I, but.. at Lv54 without doing the Lv54 quest, the lv54 trait increases Ruin II potency, but does not upgrade Ruin I into Broil I, as Broil I is locked behind the Lv54 quest...
so I.. half learned the trait?, but the trait is shown greyed out and not learned/not active, yet still upgraded Ruin II potency...

[Grimoire-M]

Each expansion I've expected Ruin II to get upgraded into a SCH-specific spell like Broil since Stormblood now. Do I dare hope anything will change about it this time? Ruin II should have the same potency as any given expansion's Broil, but should cost more MP. That's how it used to work for a hot minute, and it was perfect. Why did we not maintain that when the answer was right there in front of us?

It doesn’t necessarily need to be the same potency as Broil, just enough potency that Ruin II + Energy Drain outstrips Broil + Energy Drain in terms of DPS. I don’t believe the current iteration does that by enough to justify using it outside of extended movement, though if the problem is with healing abilities then those need dedicated help.

Personally I’d like to see an independent DPS oGCD added to Scholar that offsets the healing taxes Scholar has through some proc (a tweaked version of Quickened Aetherflow’s cooldown refresh comes to mind as an example but other options certainly exist) It could even act as an indirect nerf to Energy Drain and/or offset for GCD healing by keying off of the Scholar’s healing actions in general, though that has problems with Embrace. That would carry a lot of weight for one ability, but it does work.

[FusionSamurai]

It doesn’t necessarily need to be the same potency as Broil, just enough potency that Ruin II + Energy Drain outstrips Broil + Energy Drain in terms of DPS. I don’t believe the current iteration does that by enough to justify using it outside of extended movement, though if the problem is with healing abilities then those need dedicated help.

Personally I’d like to see an independent DPS oGCD added to Scholar that offsets the healing taxes Scholar has through some proc (a tweaked version of Quickened Aetherflow’s cooldown refresh comes to mind as an example but other options certainly exist) It could even act as an indirect nerf to Energy Drain and/or offset for GCD healing by keying off of the Scholar’s healing actions in general, though that has problems with Embrace. That would carry a lot of weight for one ability, but it does work.

Broil is 290 potency. Ruin II is 200, ED is 100. It's still worth to use Ruin II+ED. If anything, ED should have been nerfed more to 90 potency, which makes ED more open as a weaving tool IMO

[Shurrikhan]

It could even act as an indirect nerf to Energy Drain and/or offset for GCD healing by keying off of the Scholar’s healing actions in general, though that has problems with Embrace.

I almost suspect the default parameters of "your healing" do not include that of your pet anyways. Even if it does, though, it could be easily enough excluded, I would think.