Why is SCH hated?Follow

Yes and no (respectively xD).
But what game balance? Is there a game balance in FFXI? Aren't we supposed to work together?
Scholar is FFXI version of the old-style Sage class. This class was supposed to be able to cast both White and Black magic. With no penalties.
But if SE was really to introduce Sage like that, it would have given SCH infinite stratagems. Hence why we only have four.
And we do have penalties if we chose to specialize in White or Black magic. We become incapable of casting high-tier spells of the non active Art, and our proficiency in that school of Magic reaches the bottom of the sea. We still have 1 minute of recast for each of the Arts, so we can't freely switch between them without thinking first.
We can't buff, heal, nuke and debuff as freely as a lot of people think. We have timers and penalties.
It's like if SMN got 4 BloodPact charges, each one with 1 min recast.
It might DD, heal and buff with no penalties, but it would be limited by MP.
Guess what, SCH has MPs too. Yes we have Sublimation, but so has /SCH.
BLM and WHM need an improvement for they are the true specialists, but SCH is not unbalanced.
SCH and DNC are the fruit of really original concepts, way more than BLU, COR and PUP.

The real problem is: there is very very little room for new and unique things in this game that SE can do for all the jobs.
We have: healing, magic damage, melee damage, enhancement, debuffing.
There can be only a given number of combinations between these elements, and after 6 years of life I honestly think we used them all.
SE could have created yet another hybrid ala RDM but we really didn't need that, do we?

There's nothing wrong with SCH imho, and I hope everyone will see this when SE will finally adjust WHM and BLM.

Edited, Aug 17th 2008 9:08pm by Eeri

I've seen quite consistent damage dealt using Helices on exp mobs. And yes, I know that Modus Veritas doesn't affect damage but it does affect speed, which is more important at higher levels because monster's don't last as long. The ability allows us to get the full damage far easier than waiting on the normal tics. It's not difficult to macro out healing gear for nuke gear, and it takes just a few moments to switch from Light to Dark arts. If your party is going to die in such a short space of time, perhaps it's time to find players who know how to time their shadows better.

Agreed, Modus Veritas is once every ten minutes, but you're playing as a HEALER and should not be expected anything less of. If you were playing as a nuker, you'd use Addendum: Black and blast away with Tier 4's as well.

To illustrate my point on helix damage. I saw an xp mob (Mamool Ja) hit with Cryohelix for around 150 damage. Multiply that by the ten tics you get in a minute and that's a juicy 1500 damage. Modus Veritas doubles that damage, but halves it's duration, letting the Scholar deal heavy damage once every ten minutes for a fraction of the MP of a tier 4 nuke.

Edited, Aug 18th 2008 3:18am by Crystan

Holy crap. People are still on this?

I can't say much about black mage, I've never leveled it. But I'm a career white mage. Or at least I was. Leveled scholar, really liked it, but it can be a very complex job to play.

I still prefer white mage if I know I'm 100% main healing. -Enmity control, +Cure Potency, and Cure V. -na ga spells are a rare problem. I know on sch most healers will beat me out on a -na spell to the tank before I get a ga spell out.. and if we have a 1 healer/1 tank in an endgame setup... my -na ga spell will effect 1 or 2 people and have no effect on others.

In a merit party situation.. I can think of Imps and Skoffins. Both of which happen to really spam their moves.. and in most cases.. I'd rather just keep the enspells/stoneskin/phalanx up and single out each -na spell... it's harder to do.. requires more work, but I think more effective.

I pray for a white mage in my endgame ls. Then I can have fun on scholar doing other things like helix's and nuking to some degree. Or maybe focusing more on support.

FIFY

Nobody liked MNK back before 2005 because of our low spike damage. The multi-hit WS nerf was more for the DRGs who could spam Penta Thrust at level 49.

However, all the bandwagon RNG came to MNK because the "discovery" of DoT was finally happening in the 6 months or so prior to ToAU.

The more you know! *cue music and logo*

Edited, Aug 20th 2008 10:52am by Acturus

I have both RDM and WHM leveled and hope to level SCH one day after I've seen my hero Momotarutaru shine during Dynamis.
Every job has its pro's and cons but you will get an invite for exp or merits anytime.

People always have an opinion to give about a job that they did not level. Ignore them lol.