Scholar Rotation, Openers, and Abilities - (Patch 6.5) - FFXIV

In Final Fantasy XIV, the Scholar is the healer who protects players with strong shields and fairy magic. Due to the fast queues when running leveling roulettes, it's also the quickest way to level up Summoner. Regardless of why you are interested in playing Scholar, it can be a strong healer when you know how to use it.

Players who venture into the ways of healing in FFXIV are enlisting for more than just keeping other players alive during dungeons and other duties. Scholar has one of the most complete tool kits to assist you in performing the dual function of support and damage dealer. From the basics of the job to the opener you should use in Savage duties, this guide covers all you need to play Scholar in FFXIV. If you're looking for a more detailed guide to reference while leveling, check out the full Scholar job guide.

The basics of the Scholar job

Healers have basic concepts that you must learn and understand before you jump into your first endgame Duties. The most basic rule for every job in the game is to always be casting a skill. But for healers, this means to be always casting a damage skill when no healing is needed. It’s expected for you to contribute to the overall damage in a fight. There are Savage and Extreme duties with tight damage checks and every attack you perform means that your group is one step closer to clearing a fight. Learning the fight is key to knowing when another attack fits between mechanics or a tank buster. 

After you have accepted that you must deal consistent damage, it’s time to understand how exactly a Scholar performs the role of healing. Among the healers, Scholar fits in the proactive category due to the job’s skills that bestow shields onto themselves and their group members. When we say proactive healer, it means that the job has the capacity to prevent/mitigate incoming damage, while a reactive healer needs to wait for the damage to land for them to start recovering the party’s health, as White Mage does. However, Scholar doesn’t lack abilities that will directly heal players. A good Scholar learns to rely on shields only in specific situations.

Scholar rotation

In FFXIV, the Scholar rotation is fairly simple. When facing a single target, you will focus on two spells: Broil IV and Biolysis. The former is a GCD casting spell with 295 potency and the latter is an instant GCD spell that leaves a DoT with a potency of 70 on the enemy for 30 seconds. Your job in this situation is to keep casting Broil IV and refresh Biolysis when it’s two seconds from falling off. The Scholar has also Energy Drain, a single-target spell with a potency of 100. You won't be constantly casting this ability because you need to spend one Aetherflow stack for each ability. Outside the burst window, you should only use Energy Drain to burn the stacks you have when Aetherflow is about to come off of cooldown. 

One single-target spell that new players tend to get confused on whether they should cast it or not is Ruin II. This is an instant GCD skill with 220 potency and it might sound like a good option in situations where you need to move and keep attacking. While this is exactly the scenario for which the skill was designed, if you want to maximize your damage, learning how to slidecast Broil IV is a better call. 

On the other hand, dealing with a group of enemies is much easier. Your priority is to apply Biolysis to every enemy. The only situation where you won’t do that is in cases you know they will die too fast. Otherwise, leave DoTs on every single enemy. After that, you should start spamming Art of War II. This AoE attack is an instant spell, which means you can move while you use it. Since this is also a melee attack, forcing you to be close to enemies to hit them, the possibility of moving and dealing damage makes it extremely useful when facing multiple enemies.

Scholar burst window

Like the regular damage rotation, the sequence of abilities that you should use during burst windows as a Scholar is pretty simple. You need, first, to hold three Aetherflow stacks when the 2-minute window gets closer. What you want is to use Chain Stratagem to place a debuff on the boss and cast a sequence of Energy Drain weaved between Broil IV. After the first three Energy Drain, use Dissipation to gain three more stacks.  Considering you will focus on using your skills – and stacks! – to damage the boss, try to not let the party low in terms of HP before the burst window begins. 

Scholar opener

This opener is the most basic one among the options you have when running end-game content. Before the pull, it’s a good idea to use Adloquim in the tank, fish for a critical, and cast Deployment Tactics on them to shield the whole party, because bosses tend to cast raidwide attacks at the beginning of the fights.

1. Tincture of Mind (- 3 seconds)
2. Broil IV (-1.5 seconds)
3. Biolysis
4. Aetherflow
5. Broil IV
6. Broil IV
7. Chain Stratagem
8. Broil IV
9. Energy Drain
10. Broil IV
11. Energy Drain
12. Broil IV
13. Energy Drain
14. Broil IV
15. Dissipation 
16. Broil IV
17. Energy Drain
18. Broil IV
19. Energy Drain
20. Broil IV
21. Energy Drain

Scholar healing skills priority

Although the scenario where you are responsible for solving mechanics, attacking the boss, and healing the party might sound daunting, you can make things easier for yourself by learning your way around the healing skills and how to best use them. The Scholar healing rotation works around prioritizing oGCDs over GCDs. 

oGCDs skills

When playing Scholar, you want to try your best to always use one of the long list of healing oGCD skills the job has. One of the main reasons for this is that you can weave them between Broil IV or Biolysis, allowing you to heal the group and damage the boss. The Scholar has three types of oGCDs. First, the fairy skills. The abilities Embrace, Whispering Dawn, Fey Blessing, Fey Illumination, Aetherpact, and their Seraph variations are all instant casts and don’t cost MP.  The second group is smaller, composed of Protraction and Expedient, two free oGCDs which are not fairy skills but are good options.

The third group of oGCDs is of Aetherflow skills. Lustrate, Indomitability, Sacred Soil, and Excogitation are extremely powerful healing spells that don’t cost MP but, instead, require Aetherflow stacks. Because you only keep three of these stacks and Aetherflow has 60 seconds of cooldown, you should put thought into when you want to use these skills. By using Aetherflow skills, you gain Faerie points that are required to use the fairy skill Aetherpact.

GCD skills

The Scholar has three healing GCDs: Physick, Adloquium, and Succor. Even though these are lower priority, it doesn’t mean you won’t use them. Physicks is for moments of panic, so you don’t want to use it as a main source of healing. Adloquium and Succor are the shield skills you have but you only use them in specific situations. When you need to mitigate damage and no oGCD is available, you can cast them. A good practice is to either use Succor or Adloquium on the tank plus Deployment Tactics to shield the whole party before pulls or during downtime.

Scholar tips

It's easy to forget but Scholar is a pet job which means that your fairy is not just a cute little glowy effect, but it's an entity governed by specific rules. Every fairy skill you use is a direct command to Eos or Selene and depending on what she is doing, there might be a delay. One of the situations you can prevent from happening is delaying a skill because the fairy moving too much while following you. In general, you want to position Eos at the center of the arena from where she can reach most players for direct healing. In addition to this, it becomes easier to ensure AoE healing skills, such as Whispering Dawn. In any case, you should always take into consideration the inherent delay of actions during a fight.

A second good practice to have is always keep Aetherflow on cooldown and learn how to effectively burn the stacks you have left. Aetherflow is a 60-second-cooldown skill and you want to think critically when you use Aetherflow skills to avoid running out of stacks too early. At the same time, you should never delay Aetherflow. This skill is too important and holding stacks is counterproductive. Every time you have stacks left and need to burn them, you should cast Energy Drain and get ready for the next Aetherflow. Your second solid options are Lustrate or Indomitability in case you would like to top the group's HP. What matters the most is to keep Aetherflow always running.