Dev Team Feedback - SCH

[HyperiusUltima]

So, looking back on the thread, there's plenty of the same thrown around.

1) "SCH is uninteresting/boring."

Reflects in the trailer. Didn't really wow people, but drew their ire that nothing fun or interesting happened.

2) "SCH needs more than one DPS button."

Healer design. This I can see happening when they go to do damage control after SCH is kicked to the curb, if they bother. If anything I'll just be blunt and figure 'potency adjustments' are enough from how the combat team handles this job.

That's at least the two most common things I hear here anyhow(which are commonplace on the healer forums too). As for the White Knight list, I follow Deceptus on those lines because the veterans have seen more than enough over the years to understand SE and their handling of Healers in general - and their tendency to bring a lackluster response, such as taking a hammer to glass in the case of Warrior back in Stormblood for example when Shake it Off was just a self-Esuna.

The only things I can see for SCH are really if they actually do a big fairy rework somewhere mid-expac, honestly. And of course, if SGE was buffed somewhere along the line before then because of lackluster potencies, you're going to get meta complainers as well once things are solidified in 6 months after launch.

[Deceptus]

It seems to me that the Broil line of upgrades is all over the place looking at the potencies in EW

Broil > Broil 2 is 9% increase

Broil 2 > Broil 3 is a 6.5% increase

Broil 3 > Broil 4 is a 15% increase.

It really does seem like they just threw potencies out there without any normalization.

[HyperiusUltima]

It seems to me that the Broil line of upgrades is all over the place looking at the potencies in EW

Broil > Broil 2 is 9% increase

Broil 2 > Broil 3 is a 6.5% increase

Broil 3 > Broil 4 is a 15% increase.

It really does seem like they just threw potencies out there without any normalization.

Lemme look at the other jobs real quick and check their maths.

According to calculation:

WHM

Stone -> Stone II 35.7% Potency increase

Stone II -> Stone III 21% Potency increase

Stone III -> Stone IV 17.3% Potency increase

Stone IV -> Glare 7.4% Potency Increase

Glare -> Glare III 6.8% Potency Increase


AST

Malefic -> Malefic II 13% Potency Increase

Malefic II -> Malefic III 23.5% Potency Increase

Malefic III -> Malefic IV 9.5% Potency Increase

Malefic IV -> Fall Malefic 8.6% Potency Increase

Honestly, I think I see a more downward trend when it comes to them adjusting their jobs over the years so they don't have a Healer doing a lot of DPS on one spell. Still, the potency makes sense if we look at it as an expansion overview with how they've treated healers each expac as well as a set of design choices they decided to take in regards to the jobs for that point in time.

[Raikai]

I had so many hopes for a SCH heavy rework in the light of SGE... alas.

The concept I wanted for the job, with a rework, is making Faeries the shielders. Every fairy heal is a shield, even Embrace... Scholar's hardcasts are regular ST/AOE heals. Why? It's kind of baffling that the current "shield healer" avoids casting shields (as you should avoid your hardcasts heals), because none of the oGCDs, except Seraph, are shields.

You'd think a shield healer would spend most of their time shielding, but in the current case, actual shields are just something that happens very infrequently with the Seraph or the spread Critloquium... If the fight is going well, most of the bulk of my healing comes from Lustrates, Excogs, Indom, Whispering Winds and Fey Blessing.

[NobleWinter]

I didn't have much hope for anything major changing for Scholar. The trend with every expansion has been to neuter the job and remove intricacy. We always lose more than we gain it seems. The only thing I have any hope for is that they will make Eos and Selene have some distinction again as core parts of the healing identity of Scholar. It's clear dps options are dead. Personally, I would like to see the two Summon buttons become useful instead of odd bloat. Summon Eos and Selene should both give a "Helping Hand" buff to the Scholar. Since SMN can switch pets instantly we should be rewarded with something more than just our pet being present for the cast time. I think Eos should grant a 20% increase in potency to our next Healing Spell Cast with the Helping Hand Buff and Selene should reduce the cast time, recast time and MP cost of our next spell by 50%. This way we can summon Eos during downtime or the beginning of a raid for bigger shields and use Selene as our alternative to Presence of Mind and Light Speed for a faster revive on a party member, especially if we ourselves have just revived and don't have the MP to spare. This means both fairies would still offer the same general kit with only a slight difference on their impact immediately after being summoned. Selene is still a support fairy and Eos a healing Specialist without one being glaringly better than the other most of the time.

[HyperiusUltima]

I didn't have much hope for anything major changing for Scholar. The trend with every expansion has been to neuter the job and remove intricacy. We always lose more than we gain it seems. The only thing I have any hope for is that they will make Eos and Selene have some distinction again as core parts of the healing identity of Scholar. It's clear dps options are dead. Personally, I would like to see the two Summon buttons become useful instead of odd bloat. Summon Eos and Selene should both give a "Helping Hand" buff to the Scholar. Since SMN can switch pets instantly we should be rewarded with something more than just our pet being present for the cast time. I think Eos should grant a 20% increase in potency to our next Healing Spell Cast with the Helping Hand Buff and Selene should reduce the cast time, recast time and MP cost of our next spell by 50%. This way we can summon Eos during downtime or the beginning of a raid for bigger shields and use Selene as our alternative to Presence of Mind and Light Speed for a faster revive on a party member, especially if we ourselves have just revived and don't have the MP to spare. This means both fairies would still offer the same general kit with only a slight difference on their impact immediately after being summoned. Selene is still a support fairy and Eos a healing Specialist without one being glaringly better than the other most of the time.

This is actually a neat concept to build on - however the core problems still remain with the kit as it is. We need to address SCH's lackluster design of its two abilities, Dissipation and Seraph. As someone said in a different thread trying to talk about Dissipation issues(which I will link in OP once I'm done with this post) and how to fix it, they suggested we either throw the skill out entirely and get something new since it only serves to lock us out of our fairy for a meager 3 Aetherflow stacks and a +20% Hardcast healing buff. If I had to choose, I'd just rework Dissipation entirely.

My idea is get rid of the idea of a 2nd Aetherflow, but instead follow your idea on design - using Helping Hand. If Eos is out, she basically turns into a Heal Bomb for 600 Potency. You'll get Selene back, but you won't be able to use Helping Hand for the time allotted. If it's Selene being Dissipated, it's a DPS Buff that reduces Auto-Attack Delay by 10%, and provides a 5% DPS buff to challenge SGE with. This would allow us to play more with our Faeries and not lock ourselves out of those skills while balancing Aetherflow usage.

The next problem is Seraph, and honestly I'm not entirely keen on the third Fairy so to speak. I'd rather have an ability that has BOTH fairies work together in unison to provide a decent HP shield for the entire party. Something like 30 Gauge would be enough to invoke this and it'd actually eliminate the issue of being on a 1-action gauge and free up a button on SCH from unnecessary bloat.