SCH concept changes

[KarmaYraeon]

Continuation of my other post for AST.

• Dissipation

Just make it affect all HP recovery via healing actions, even if it means reducing it to 15%. I generally just don't like this ability to begin with in the first place tbh.

• Energy Drain

Rather than using Aetherflow, it mimics Summoner to help streamline the differences between them and free up a button;

Energy Drain (60s);
Deals unaspected damage to target and all enemies nearby it with a potency of 300 for the first enemy, and 60% less for all remaining enemies.
Additional effect: Aetherflow III
Additional effect: Restores 20% of maximum MP.

• Fey Union

Allow it to be cast on enemies to deal a little bit of damage rather than heal, or afflict a damage debuff/incoming dmg buff for allies, as to give sch more opportunities to spend fey gauge.

• Gap Closer

While it was a consideration for a while, playing Sage and having Icarus at my disposal really cemented the thought that other healers should have one too, if only for the convenience of keeping up with a running party. Nevermind the mechanical benefit.

• Recitation

Duration increased from 15s to 30s, and reduces the cast time of Adlo and Succor by 2.5s. Recast time increased from 90s to 120s and give it 2 charges.

• Selene

Separate Selene from Eos;
Fey Action 1 (60s cd) becomes Whispering Dawn for Eos, and Gentle Caress for Selene
Fey Action 2 (120s cd) becomes Fey Illumination for Eos, and Fey Wind for Selene
Seraph imitates the Fey Actions of the faerie that is active when Summon Seraph is used.

Gentle Caress;
Gradually generates a barrier around all nearby party members that lasts for 3s after Gentle Caress ends.
Potency: 50
Duration: 21s

Fey Wind;
Afflicts all nearby enemies with Paralysis.
Duration: 20s

Fey Union;
Gradually restores HP of party member with which Selene has a Fey Union.
Cure Potency: 100
Additional effect: Erects a magicked barrier which nullifies damage equaling 150% (180% at lv. 85) of the amount of HP restored.

• Tactics

Since scholar fundamentally plays around with its shields more than sage, I figured it could do with more variety. For example;

Exploitation Tactics (90s CD);
Grants Volatize with the next Galvanize status.
Duration: 15s
Volatize effect: Deal unaspected damage to attacking enemies equal to 20% of damage suffered to Galvanize effect.
Additional effect: Grants Vulcanize with the next Catalyze status.
Duration: 15s
Vulcanize effect: Deal unaspected damage to attacking enemies equal to 10% of damage suffered to Galvanize effect.

[Osmond]

You know what, that doesn’t sound bad at all. Sacrifice a button and consolidate to energy drain with a big nuke w/ a fall off. Gets rid of the bloat.

Nah on the gap closer, expedient is good enough.

Hmm, don’t want them to change recitation. They can just change the code to make Aldo/succor instant…..but increase the MP as a trade off.

The fey union change….the shield can work, but will have to nerf the cure potency as a trade off.

[KarmaYraeon]

Another consideration was also simply streamlining the class with Summoner, though since aetherflow isn't gained until lvl 45 they aren't exactly related but that's besides the point.

Nah on the gap closer, expedient is good enough.

Expedient is nice, but on a 2 minute cooldown it can make things kind of awkward when that's all you have. Given scholar has to hardcast everything, it would mean keeping up with the tank during large pulls in dungeons, or getting into positions during raid mechanics would be a little bit easier on them between casting healing. The same could be said about all of the healers really, and I think that the big thing is that it would depend on what the gap closer actually is. I figured that maybe unlike Ikarus, it could be something that pushes the scholar back 15y like Bard's Repelling Shot. Another fanciful idea is to give them their own Between the Lines, where they can dash to their faerie, giving you more incentive to manage its position during a fight, and rewarding you with safety and time-saving for doing so.

Hmm, don’t want them to change recitation. They can just change the code to make Aldo/succor instant…..but increase the MP as a trade off.

I think the main concern there is that adlo and succor are already 1000 MP each. Given they don't have many MP management tools, it would feel kind of bad to make them permanently 200-400MP more. It would really just be a QoL matter to help with using recitation in the first place, since sometimes if you start casting too late you don't actually get to use the buff at all thanks to it timing out mid-cast.

The fey union change….the shield can work, but will have to nerf the cure potency as a trade off.

I'd already taken that into consideration, not to worry. Since Fey Union is normally 300 potency per tick, I'd just listed it to be lowered to 100 potency and a 150%/180% shield on top. If you used a full gauge that can be up to 1800 potency shield which would be insane of course, but that's also an entire fey gauge worth of healing wasted otherwise.

[ForsakenRoe]

just doing quick maths cos I like the sound of some of these ideas, particularly the last one, my broil does around 9.5k, and my succor does around 4.8k, making a shield of 7.7k (ish). If we were to use this move on succor, I assume it'd apply the Volatize status to every player? In which case, it'd do (7700 / 5) * 8 damage, which would be like 12k. Which is fine by me, it fully refunds the lost broil, but I guess the problem is that if it's a dps gain in any way, it'd be expected to use it on CD for logs like Earthly Star. Though, with a 30s duration on shields, I guess it's probably fine? Is the 'duration' listed under Volatize the duration of Volatize on allies, or the duration of the ability to apply Volatize? Because if it's the former, I think it should match the duration of the shield it applies, and if it's the latter I think it'd be hilarious for stuff like Curtain Call, Terminal Relativity, etc. Times where you have to shield in quick succession during week 1, as the shield would get popped every GCD and your DPS would actually increase instead of decrease. SCH is already plenty strong on DPS though, so maybe knocking it down to 10% on Volatize too, so the shields are 'damage loss but not quite as much' would be less nails in the coffin for SGE

But since it'd allow us to use succor without screaming about how awful it is to have to use succor, I support. Also, if we did Exploitation Tactics > Recitation > Adlo > Deployment Tactics, would that spread the Exploitation to everybody? With my gear, that'd mean (11800 * 1.8) = 21240, * 8 = 169920. Divide that by 5 to get the 20% and that's about 34k lmao. Then we have to add 10% of 21240 for the Catalyze, giving us a total of about 36k. Even at 10% for Volatize we'd end up at almost 19k, double that of a Broil. Usually I don't like to get too hung up on maths when ideas are being floated but like this I think it'd end up being a button we press every time we're about to do Deployment Tactics and nothing else, similar to how Zoe only ever seems to get used on Pneuma for SGE. I'll still take it though, just so SCH shields feel less jank to use. And it'd fit in the lore to explain how they fought off the blackmages so easily because that bit never made massive sense, but if the black mages blew themselves up on the SCH's barriers, that does make a lot more sense

[KarmaYraeon]

Admittedly, I was mostly just throwing down numbers as a general idea, rather than having done much actual maths behind it, but I will say I was also mostly considering potency, rather than actual numbers. In the case of Exploitation Tactics, adlo would give up to 108 potency worth of damage, succor up to 64 potency per person, critlo up to 324, and crit succor 128 potency per person.

Of course, these are pretty substantial numbers, but that is also considering that this is assuming the entire shield is consumed, which may not always be the case. Also that they require a GCD cast prior, so its hoping to cover 2 GCDs worth of damage. Unlike Afflatus Misery since its buff, I imagine that this ability would perhaps be far more feast or famine in terms of damage, where sometimes you get your moneys worth and more in damage dealt, but other times you miss out on covering the losses for having cast a GCD heal, but at least you got a little bit of damage back, rather than nothing at all. Also the general idea was mostly just an example of giving sch more interaction with their shields. Of course, if this damage looks to be too high, it can always do as you mentioned and just have both Volatize and Vulcanize only do 10% each, with the only discrepancy being what shield they affect (galvanize vs catalyze, that is).

Is the 'duration' listed under Volatize the duration of Volatize on allies, or the duration of the ability to apply Volatize?

I used the same phrasing as other similar abilities, so the 15s would be the duration of the buff after having cast it. That is to say; the sch would have 15 seconds to cast a shield. The actual Volatize/Vulcanize would simply last as long as the shield does, since its a direct manipulation of the shield itself.

if we did Exploitation Tactics > Recitation > Adlo > Deployment Tactics, would that spread the Exploitation to everybody?

I like to imagine so. Given deployment and emergency both work unconditionally with their shields, I imagine it wouldn't feel great to tag limitations onto exploitation. So in the cast of ET > Rec > Adlo > DT, looking at flat potencies, you could theoretically get up to 972 potency in a 4 man, or 1836 in an 8 man, though this again depends on everyone being in range for DT, and the shields being entirely consumed on everyone. If we made ET 10% rather than 20%, then it would be a matter of 540 potency in a 4 man, and 972 in an 8 man which would probably be much more reasonable. Could also go further and just cut the listed numbers in half, making Volatize 10% and Vulcanize 5% instead for 486 potency and 918 respectively.

[ty_taurus]

Some general thoughts on the ideas:

Dissipation
- Dissipation has been and always will be a terrible concept. It makes no sense gimping your own sustained healing and cutting off access to several actions to increase your healing output through other methods. It's like buying a $10 bill for $15. I see no reason to try and salvage it when it should just be pruned. Making its healing impact more significant makes it slightly better, but it's a tumor that's better off excised than sterilized.

Energy Drain
- It's a simple suggestion that's been brought up before and would be totally fine. One issue not being resolved though is the constant environment where the current ED feels unhealthy to continue existing, but losing it makes Aetherflow management feel sloppy when you waste unused stacks on Lustrate or overcap on unused Aetherflow. Making ED the new Aetherflow like with SMN does actually exacerbate this issue because you're now more heavily pressured to use ED on cooldown as it's a part of your DPS rotation, essentially. A small suggestion:

New action: Energy Shock or some similar name.
- This is a GCD DPS spell that deals Broil potency damage to your target and 50% less damage to all enemies nearby the target.
- Consumes all remaining Aetherflow. For each stack of Aetherflow consumed, provides some type of stacking buff. A few ideas for this stacking buff:
1. Increases the value of your next Galvanize by 3%/6%/9% depending on Aetherflow consumed.
2. Decreases the cooldown of your next Recitation by 5/10/15 seconds upon use of Recitation.
3. Restores 4%/8%/12% of your maximum MP.
Or something along those lines.

This new action would give a way to burn Aetherflow that doesn't create an awkward priority system. The reward for using it needs to ultimately be worse than using Aetherflow on Aetherflow actions, but pushes the value forward into one future use of something so you get something out of unused stacks.

Fey Union
- I disagree here. Firstly, this creates the same issue that you're trying to resolve with removing ED as an Aetherflow spender, because now your Fey Union healing is competing with DPS. I feel the Fey Gauge should either be removed completely, or it should be reworked into SCH's healing resource gauge while Aetherflow shifts to an offensive resource gauge. I see what you're trying to do by making the Fey Gauge something worth remembering that it exists, but this isn't the right solution.

Gap Closer
- I agree with Osmond, a gap closer doesn't really need to be on SCH. SGE has it because of Phlegma, and it feels aesthetically fitting on SGE, but I don't really see a valid reason to put it on SCH, especially when SCH largely outperforms SGE as it is.

Recitation
- It's fine.

Selene
- Always in favor of giving Selene a different set of tools, and I do respect that this does not include any offensive buffs that would make Eos feel invalidated, though I think there's more room to consolidate here. I'd have Fey Illumination and Whispering Dawn merged, but remove the magic damage reduction aspect, and have Eos' two unique actions be that and Fey Blessing. For Selene, I don't necessarily think the barrier angle really fits with Selene. In most casts, the difference in whether you're applying a regen or a barrier with your faerie are two shades of the same flavor, and so it ends up feeling superfluous, generally. Instead, I'd suggest making Eos offer more healing and Selene offering more utility. Merge the removed magic damage reduction from the combined WD/Illumination over to Selene's debuff and have her inflict a debuff along with a magic damage dealt down effect so it has universal applications and isn't exclusively just a trash mob button (also I personally like the idea of having SCH inflict Toad instead of Paralyze since it's not going to work on any enemies that matter anyway). Then instead of a barrier, I'd honestly move Expedient over to Selene. I know most people would probably disagree, but I think it makes the choice between Eos and Selene far more meaningful when you're deciding between more OGCD healing or additional utility, especially considering Expedient is always a luxury, but never a requirement. Perhaps just make it the sprint and move the mitigation elsewhere to something SCH always has ready.

Exploitation Tactics
- I'm not sure if having damage based on damage taken is a good thing because it creates a lot of very cheesy situations. It should probably just be flat potency striking enemies that hit your target. That said, it's an interesting way to create incentives on barrier application, especially since it can potentially make Adloquium a DPS gain, though that also can create a weird and potentially dangerous incentive, not to mention how much damage it could deal when applied with Succor since it would supposedly affect the entire party. You'd be getting large DPS gains every 90 seconds and barriers when SCH is already a much stronger barrier applicator with its GCDs than SGE. Charges could help, but you'd probably also want it for burst windows. Honestly, I worry this might cause more harm than good even though it's an interesting idea. That's kinda the unfortunate aspect to healer DPS meta, it's very difficult to combine DPS and healing as the healing ends up being wasteful in pursuit of more DPS.

Overall
- There are a few good ideas here that could smooth out some of the clunk that SCH faces, but not all of it, and in some cases may cause different, new clunk in place of the old clunk. It also isn't going to address SCH's non-existent gameplay loop which is what all the healers really need to focus on with reworks, but I do admire some of the creativity here.

[KarmaYraeon]

Dissipation

Very true. While the idea was mostly just working under the assumption that the ability otherwise remained the same. If they are adamant on getting rid of the faerie, maybe they could do something like the following;

Dissipation > Assimilation
Unifies you and your faerie, granting you a full Aetherflow stack. Also increases HP recovery via healing actions 20%. In addition, allows the execution of Whispering Dawn, Fey Illumination, Fey Union and Fey Blessing without a faerie for the duration.
Duration: 30s
Current faerie will return once the effect expires.
Summon Eos or Summon Selene cannot be executed while under the effect of Assimilation.
Can only be executed while in combat.

Energy Drain

I think its important to note that overcapping on aetherflow is mostly a nonissue given you can always spend it on energy drain as it currently is, but I suppose to that end consolidating them into one button kind of defeats the purposes of having energy drain as an aetherflow spender in the first place. I was also considering the alternative idea of changing how they use aetherflow and faerie gauge entirely;

Energy Drain (60s)
Deals unaspected damage to target and all enemies nearby it with a potency of 100 to target and all enemies nearby it.
Additional effect: Aetherflow III
Additional effect: Restores 20% of maximum MP.

Aetherflow
Now a trait rather than an ability, each stack of aetherflow is a new spender resource.

Ruin II
New effect: Action changes to Sear while under the effect of Aetherflow.

Sear / Sear II / Sear III / Sear IV
Spell, instant cast, 2.5s recast, 400 MP, 25y range, 5y radius.

Deals unaspected damage with a potency of 220 / 240 / 255 / 295 (matches Ruin/Broil potency) for the first enemy, and 40% less for all nearby enemies.
Additional effect: Increases Faerie Gauge by 10
Aetherflow Gauge cost: 1

(Mostly just for the instant cast broil potency, Sear 4 would also be a DPS gain over AoW 2 vs multiple targets up to and including 38 targets)

Embrace, Whispering Dawn, Fey Illumination, Fey Blessing
New additional effect: Increases Faerie Gauge by 5

Faerie Gauge
Now only increases with Sear and faerie actions. Lustrate, Sacred Soil, Indom and Excog instead use 10 faerie gauge to cast. Fey Union could perhaps cost 5 per tick instead of 10, and tick every 1s for 150 potency rather than every 3s for 300 potency.

This would all generally allow for SCH to consolidate energy drain and aetherflow without having to completely change any of its gauges or base functionality. It would give faerie gauge far more interaction, and also give sch an opportunity for better skill expression and optimization through the use of Sear to keep up time without dropping DPS. I suppose to that end, the only problem is when you don't need to use any of these fae gauge spenders, though separating it from DPS means that it isn't really a problem to not have to use them all the time.

[ty_taurus]

Very true. While the idea was mostly just working under the assumption that the ability otherwise remained the same. If they are adamant on getting rid of the faerie, maybe they could do something like the following;

Dissipation > Assimilation
Unifies you and your faerie, granting you a full Aetherflow stack. Also increases HP recovery via healing actions 20%. In addition, allows the execution of Whispering Dawn, Fey Illumination, Fey Union and Fey Blessing without a faerie for the duration.
Duration: 30s
Current faerie will return once the effect expires.
Summon Eos or Summon Selene cannot be executed while under the effect of Assimilation.
Can only be executed while in combat.

This still doesn't work because you're losing all the free healing you get from your faerie for half a minute. Deleting a chunk of your healing toolkit to get more healing just doesn't make sense no matter how you want to spin it. And I'm not trying to say you're a strong proponent of erasing the faerie; you're trying to find a way to make this idea work since SE seems hell-bent on swatting the faerie out of gameplay as frequently as possible, but it's on them to just accept that this is shitty design and no one wants it.

If you're going to yeet your faerie across the room and kill a chunk of free healing, the rewards needs to be pretty extraordinary. More healing doesn't and will not cut it. A major burst of damage might, but then you now have to gimp your own healing output at regular intervals in order to engage with your burst window, which isn't a great thing either. There's really no answer that isn't awful in some regard.

Rather than trying to bargain for a less awful Dissipation, just delete Dissipation. It's what SCH players have wanted since 3.0.

[ForsakenRoe]

This still doesn't work because you're losing all the free healing you get from your faerie for half a minute. Deleting a chunk of your healing toolkit to get more healing just doesn't make sense no matter how you want to spin it. And I'm not trying to say you're a strong proponent of erasing the faerie; you're trying to find a way to make this idea work since SE seems hell-bent on swatting the faerie out of gameplay as frequently as possible, but it's on them to just accept that this is shitty design and no one wants it.

If you're going to yeet your faerie across the room and kill a chunk of free healing, the rewards needs to be pretty extraordinary. More healing doesn't and will not cut it. A major burst of damage might, but then you now have to gimp your own healing output at regular intervals in order to engage with your burst window, which isn't a great thing either. There's really no answer that isn't awful in some regard.

Rather than trying to bargain for a less awful Dissipation, just delete Dissipation. It's what SCH players have wanted since 3.0.

They did write healing 'actions' here, not spells, so that 20% would presumably buff Union, W.Dawn, etc too. I like this idea as it'd bring back Rouse in a sense, being able to juice up a W.Dawn in ye olde days was always nice and rewarding feeling. The loss of Embrace for those 30s would be absolutely negligible compared to the extra healing provided to the other OGCDs by that 20%. My question is, the fairy has to stand still to channel Fey Union, and can't do any other action or the tether breaks. Does this restriction still apply to the player when Assimilation is in effect?

[KarmaYraeon]

Does this restriction still apply to the player when Assimilation is in effect?

Honestly I think it would be really nice if you weren't restricted like the fairy is. It would give scholar a really solid consistent heal while moving. Of course its likely that fey union wouldn't actually be available at all and the only faerie actions available would just be WD, FI and FB but those are still solid options to have +20% on.