Originally Posted by
Seraphor
The cards are a semi-permanent increase in damage. Keeping them up is functionally the same as keeping up a DoT to increase your sustained damage. When it comes off cooldown/runs out, you replace it. Sustained damage.
And yeah, if NIN had to refresh Trick Attack every 30s to get 15s of passively increased damage, it would be functionally similar to a DoT. Once you math all of this out, it's all just damage dealt, what matters is how you deal it, and refreshing a cooldown is refreshing a cooldown.
Malefic IV: 250 pot per GCD
Combust: 60x10=600 pot per 30s
Cards: 3-8% damage increase depending on card
DPS spam over 30s with two card uses therefore equates to 250x12 + 60x10 +3-8% = 3708-3888 total potency, average 3798 potency.
Lets say you reduced Combust by 10 potency, and increase Card buffs to 4/5/8/10% instead, and installed the effect I mentioned earlier guaranteeing Lady effect.
Malefic IV: 250 pot per GCD
Combust: 50x10=500 pot per 30s
Cards: 10% damage increase
DPS spam over 30s equates to 250x12 + 50x10 +10% Lady of Crowns = 3850 total potency.
You make it more consistent, plus you get your Divination on top every 120s.
This results in AST getting a net buff in party settings, similar to the buffs the other two healers would get, but it doesn't make it any worse at solo duties, which would otherwise be the case of any buffs to the card system.