With all these astrologian complain threads

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Originally Posted by Ghishlain

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That's pretty much it really. When I say 'weakest healer', I mean they don't have the tools to deal with as much BS. Each heal's potency is just about good enough compared to their mirror, and adding another 10 or 20 isn't going to fix the following problem: I know I said it before, but once that 40sec cooldown essential dignity is gone, you have to mash benefic ii, and hope for the best to keep your head above water. A single good adlo crit from a SCH amounts to a 1350 heal (450 heal, 900 shield), which is enough to go heal-positive before we even consider the SCH's potential to sit on up to 6 back to back lustrates since they're tied to aetherflow, and don't have a cooldown of their own. 9 if you really want to count dissipate. I know most SCHs won't sit on stacks like that, or don't use dissipate so willy-nilly, but the point is, AST is so badly outclassed in that regard it's kinda sad (and the more I talk about it, the more I'm afraid they'll hit my favorite job alot harder with the nerf bat).

Wasting just one GCD as an AST when things are going south just spells someone's death oftentimes.

Well, this topic sure exploded when I wasn't paying attention.

First of all, thanks Ghishlain for presenting those numbers. Hopefully it'll at least knock some sense into these textbook students.

And secondly, some of you aren't getting the point of the original message. Ghishlain pointed out the basic healing kit is roughly the same. But stop looking at other class's kits. You do not play Astrologian like you play White Mage, nor do you play it like you'd play Scholar. Astrologian cards can be either really good or really bad.

You could say that
the cards ( •_•)>⌐■-■
are in your hands (⌐■_■)

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Originally Posted by Ghishlain

Essential Dignity - Reduce the CD of this ability to 20-25 seconds. If played properly, it almost always be equal or better than Tetragrammaton in healing.
Lightspeed - Have it grant Haste to the AST as well, so they can actually heal more often while the buff is up

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You can add Synastry onto that list. It's pretty useful for healing multiple targets (and saving mana!). I especially love it when I have to keep two tanks up in 8-man content :-). But yes, we don't have any emergency buttons for misakes outside of Essential Dignity and occasionally Lightspeed.

I'd prefer if they either lowered the amount of healing potency it reduces rather than a Haste. Those insta-casts are really clutch (just not the potency reduction)! I just hope they do some small hot fixes with bugs before Alexander so we can really test Astrologians in up-to-date raid content.

As a 60 Astrologian, I've slightly changed my playstyle to not only anticipate damage, but also gauge DPS and rotations of said classes. A lot of my group members are loving Arrow & Balance, with a Spire thrown in afterwards. It doesn't offer as much healing as other classes, but there are work arounds with it, and I'm sure I'll learn more. I just understand that Spread is going to be required to used tactfully as its very powerful when you use the right card at the right moment. What I'm thinking though is better timing with my own personal spears to reduce Synastry's CD and Luminous Aether to boost HPS and conserve mana. If I can squeeze in a draw and other off-gcds in it as well... I'm getting too excited!

EDIT INSERT: Also, I've been using ED (Essential Dignity) when tank falls below 50% to try to maximize its use. I feel like if I can use it to cover at least two Benefics, it will not only save mana but time as well. Of course ED will also be saved for tank busters since that increase in potency relative to target's HP makes it such a great heal... It's so satisfying when you see it crit for over 8k @_@

P.S: Devs fix Ascend for macros please. I want my macro ;-; I want to tell people I foresaw their death.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...n.-My-Thoughts.

I'll just put that here, since it sums up all my thoughts. The class is mostly fine, there's just a few choice spells that really need a look over.

Ast = card rng
Whm/sch = 100% no rng ( maybe except for fairy? Idk lol don't think so )
Why draw that super needed bole when the game can spam u spear 2 times in a row after shuffle lol. Sorry that was bad rng and u can't do anything about it, plz try again later.

Strong points i see in asts unique spells are
- synastry. Will be powerful in mechanics that require healing 2 player etc. t11 kaliya headsweeps between the 2 tanks, t12 during brand u healing brand healer while focusing on tank.
-Collective unconscious. seem to have some potential despite its odd design of rooting player etc. using disable with all the other debuffs before a big attack ofc.
-the card system if everything goes right. Being yugi and drawing the needed card everytime cuz u "believe in the heart of the cards".
-time dialation etc for comboing on a super strong dps.

SCH since release has received so many buffs.

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Originally Posted by Lycinder

Could have sworn that back when I was in DD I would draw use auto attack on a mob the tank pulled and couldn't spread it, though DD exp runs were quite the blur anyway so I guess I remember different.

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I've got to back to this and comment... AST has my favorite auto attack among the three healers. Aggressively karate chopping mobs with card in hand is ever so slightly more satisfying than the SCH book whack.

I wonder if making synastry 100% uptime would be op with a decrease in the healing done maybe.

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Originally Posted by Lycinder

They were replying to this (incorrect) statement

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Sorry, there's nothing incorrect about it. Playing well as SCH is 150% simple as hell. It requires almost no effort to shine as a SCH.

AST is fine they can keep up with the other healers if played correctly which is harder than the other classes due to AST need for situational awareness.

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Originally Posted by NorthernLadMSP

Sorry, there's nothing incorrect about it. Playing well as SCH is 150% simple as hell.

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Easy to do the minimum required effort to keep people alive, sure.

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Originally Posted by NorthernLadMSP

It requires almost no effort to shine as a SCH.

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This is where you're wrong. All of the following is the effort a SCH needs to 'shine'.

-Fairy positioning
-Direct control of when, and where the fairy uses abilities
-Knowing the fight well enough to swap in and out of cleric stance for damage, and healing
-Mitigating damage instead of just reacting to it
-Multitasking by putting out at least 3 sources of direct healing in under 4 seconds between fairy, aetherflow abilities, and a casted spell

Any fool could get away with not putting in effort, and do none of the above, but I wouldn't say they shine if they stand there, and wait for a reason to press the green button.

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Originally Posted by Kaizersan

AST is fine they can keep up with the other healers if played correctly

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They don't.

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Originally Posted by Kaizersan

which is harder than the other classes due to AST need for situational awareness.

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AST lack the abilities to do so.

They can still do their job, but they cannot address sudden issues mid fight as swiftly, nor as consistently as WHM, or much less SCH.

The more sources of healing not on standard GCD a job has, the easier it is for them to deal with mistakes, which is why SCH is especially strong at 'oh shit' moments. AST only has essential dignity with a 40 second downtime and HOTs if in diurnal sect. When something goes wrong, AST falls flat at pulling a group out of the fire compared to WHM, and SCH.

Like I pointed out before Fanservice AST is fine compared to the other healers the difference is it's not as easy to play as SCH or WHM so people get frustrated and give up without mastering the job.

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Originally Posted by fanservice

AST lack the abilities to do so.

They can still do their job, but they cannot address sudden issues mid fight as swiftly, nor as consistently as WHM, or much less SCH.

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Do elaborate

Fanservice I have played sch for a long time and I have been playing AST alot and I have had no issues keeping people up and to me when geared right and played right it feels just as good as when I played SCH.

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Originally Posted by Kaizersan

Like I pointed out before Fanservice AST is fine compared to the other healers the difference is it's not as easy to play as SCH or WHM so people get frustrated and give up without mastering the job.

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Mastery of the job aside, AST is just not as strong as a healer.

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Originally Posted by Lyrica_Ashtine

Do elaborate

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Let's start with lustrate.

It's a 600 potency instant cast heal that requires 1 stack of aetherflow to use.

Indomitability is a 400 potency AOE heal that takes one charge of aetherflow to use.

You get 3 stacks every time you cast aetherflow. Aetherflow has a 1 minute cooldown.

Aetherflow cools down the moment is used, meaning often times, a SCH has access to at least 6 charges at the start of a boss fight.

Lustrate, aetherflow, and indomitability do not share GCDs with other spells since they're tagged as abilities, allowing a SCH to immediately begin casting physic, adloquium, etc without having to wait ~2.5 seconds to begin the cast after using lustrate, indom, or aetherflow. That is huge. AST's essential dignity works the same way, but it's the one ability they have like that, and it has a 40 second CD to use it once.

I didn't even mention how you can order the SCH's fairy while mid cast of anything else.

ASTs may be able to spam instant casts, but since they're still spells, they will incur the ~2.5 second GCD on nearly everything.

ASTs are hard limited by cast times/GCDs. SCHs ignore them at will. A SCH can have a 100 potency AOE hot out, lustrate someone for 600 potency, and finish an adloquium cast before an AST finishes casting helios twice without burning swiftcast (which the SCH has too), or lightspeed (which gimps the AST).

Other than that, SCHs, and WHMs have actual direct buffs to their healing output in fey illumination/rouse, and divine seal/presence of mind respectively. ASTs have... lightspeed, and synastry.

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Originally Posted by Kaizersan

Fanservice I have played sch for a long time and I have been playing AST alot and I have had no issues keeping people up and to me when geared right and played right it feels just as good as when I played SCH.

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Not saying AST is weak to the point it's unplayable, but they are weaker as a healer. If your group isn't on point, and mistakes are made, a SCH has a far easier time keeping the group in one piece between their aetherflow options, and fairy while still having spell GCDs free for casts. AST leans heavily on normal spells when essential dignity is used.

Forgot to mention, SCH MP sustain is on another level.

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Originally Posted by NorthernLadMSP

Sorry, there's nothing incorrect about it. Playing well as SCH is 150% simple as hell. It requires almost no effort to shine as a SCH.

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If by "shine," you mean "be adequate," sure. Everyone would be an amazing SCH otherwise, and judging by the number of lazy, slow, reactive, and/or autopilot SCHs I've encountered in the game, this is clearly not the case.

It's more accurate to suggest that the skill floor on SCH is rather low since the fairy will help carry a poor player, whereas a poor WHM or AST has no auto-healing turret to support them.

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Originally Posted by Ayrie

AST is okay for everything, I think. It is not as broken as 2.0 warrior, but there are some ugly marks on it. MP management is going to be the first problem, especially now that whm has 2 MP income abilities. Gear scaling is going to actually highlight that more since it is based on base MP.

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Before 3.0 I never had huge issues managing mana on my WHM and our only MP regen ability is the same as your Luminiferous Aether in every way except yours has a shorter CD. Yes we get the occasional free heal but you have cheaper heals, so it balances out. I think anyone whose played WHM and switches to AST likely already has figured out how to manage their mana. Yes SCH had an easier time with mana, but that doesn't mean WHM had it hard.

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Originally Posted by Leiloni

Before 3.0 I never had huge issues managing mana on my WHM and our only MP regen ability is the same as your Luminiferous Aether in every way except yours has a shorter CD. Yes we get the occasional free heal but you have cheaper heals, so it balances out. I think anyone whose played WHM and switches to AST likely already has figured out how to manage their mana. Yes SCH had an easier time with mana, but that doesn't mean WHM had it hard.

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Also, I think that the leveling process from 51-60 has helped remind players, even SCHs, that MP-management is supposed to be a thing. We were pretty spoiled by the end of ARR in that nothing short of rez spam was likely to cause problems due to how much our MP pools grew with ilvl inflation.

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Originally Posted by Kaizersan

Like I pointed out before Fanservice AST is fine compared to the other healers the difference is it's not as easy to play as SCH or WHM so people get frustrated and give up without mastering the job.

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What is so hard about ASTRO? What is so technical? please explain the difficulty in playing ASTRO. I leveled my ASTRO to 50 and see no more difficulty in the class compared to the others, none what so ever. The cards are not difficult by any stretch of the imagination you pull card and you either use it, shuffle it, or RR it that's it and if you want to use it well then you use it, sounds real hard

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Originally Posted by fanservice

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Well, if you're using solo healing situation:

Astrologian in Nocturnal sect has +5% added potency. Aspected benefic has 262 potency then and has an equally potent shield, totaling up to 524 potency (floored down). Not the most MP efficient thing to do, however. I really doubt scholars use 3 lustrates/minute. Or the very least, I don't.Aspected Benefic can still function as a panic button heal, however.

Indomitability has 400 potency, but cannot be spammed back to back. In nocturnal sect Helios is 96 potency behind on this, but can be casted in succession. If indomitability isn't available, Scholars will have to do with Succor. Which Aspected Helios is only 3 potency behind on with the same effect in Nocturnal Sect. Or recover more HP over time in Diurnal sect.

I'm not sure what you're trying to get at with the aetherflow abilities part. From what I understand from it, unless you're sleeping, wake up and noticed the tank/party is in bad condition, then yes, that would be beneficial. But if you're in the heat of battle and paying attention, how is this a "huge" benefit?

You also mentioned Astrologians can spam instant spells, but be locked for 2.5s every time for doing so because they're spells. Why does this not apply to Scholars who can only use 3 aetherflow stacks every minute? You could argue each use of Aetherflow ability has a 20s CD between each on average. Scholars do not ignore GCD/Cast times at will at all with the Aetherflow limitations. You could burn all your stacks in matter of seconds, if you want. But what about the remaining time while Aetherflow is on CD? Scholars are restricted to this.

And I'm not sure why you're mentioning the ability to control fairy mid cast here. What's the relationship in all this?

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Originally Posted by Zeikial

What is so hard about ASTRO? What is so technical? please explain the difficulty in playing ASTRO. I leveled my ASTRO to 50 and see no more difficulty in the class compared to the others, none what so ever. The cards are not difficult by any stretch of the imagination you pull card and you either use it, shuffle it, or RR it that's it and if you want to use it well then you use it, sounds real hard

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The hard part is setting up the proper card chain before boss fight knowing in a moments notice who will benefit from the card you draw the most so you don't waste a card that is far more effort then any other healers as they just focus on healing and cleansing debuffs and plus Disable is very time sensitive otherwise it gets wasted on a auto attack.

No I don't mean adequate. I mean awesome. It's not difficult. If you find it so difficult to be a great SCH, I'm guessing your skill level is fairly low.

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Originally Posted by Kaizersan

The hard part is setting up the proper card chain before boss fight knowing in a moments notice who will benefit from the card you draw the most so you don't waste a card that is far more effort then any other healers as they just focus on healing and cleansing debuffs and plus Disable is very time sensitive otherwise it gets wasted on a auto attack.

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That's not hard that's luck as in hoping you get the card you want because its random, that's not difficulty/ randomness does not equal difficulty. Now if you could choose the cards to use now your talking technical. WM needs to know when to pre cast medica2, eye for eye, SS, so on and so forth, SCH needs to know when to pre shield, SS, Sacred Soil, whispering dawn, fey ill, fey glow, the new selene buffs etc etc. Having complete control over your farie is more technical than getting lucky on a card pull.

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Originally Posted by NorthernLadMSP

No I don't mean adequate. I mean awesome. It's not difficult. If you find it so difficult to be a great SCH, I'm guessing your skill level is fairly low.

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Same could be said about Astro

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Originally Posted by NorthernLadMSP

No I don't mean adequate. I mean awesome. It's not difficult. If you find it so difficult to be a great SCH, I'm guessing your skill level is fairly low.

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And there's the unsubstantiated personal attack out of left field. I don't recall insulting you, so I guess the lame jab was just a freebie?

AST have to do everything the other healers have to do, with less oshit button, less free mana and less free GCDS. But they also have to manage cards on top of that.

Please, SCH has no mana issues and a free GCD every cast due to have fairy pet, alongside some extra free gcds from 3 lustrate/1 lustrate + 2 indomitability every 60 second.

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Originally Posted by NorthernLadMSP

No I don't mean adequate. I mean awesome. It's not difficult. If you find it so difficult to be a great SCH, I'm guessing your skill level is fairly low.

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Now you're just trolling. Do tell me what the other two healing jobs have over SCH at skill ceiling play in terms of things to take into account and keeping the throughput high. Just for the heck of it. Curious to know, if you think SCH is easymode.

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Originally Posted by Lyrica_Ashtine

But stop looking at other class's kits.

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We HAVE to look at other classes' kits because, if they can get the job done better than we can, we're not going to be brought to raids.

And right now, I wouldn't bring an AST to a raid and I'm maining it. Buff the cards, fix some of the oddities and they they MAY have a worthwhile healer here. As it stands now, the class just isn't there yet.

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Originally Posted by Zeikial

That's not hard that's luck as in hoping you get the card you want because its random, that's not difficulty/ randomness does not equal difficulty. Now if you could choose the cards to use now your talking technical. WM needs to know when to pre cast medica2, eye for eye, SS, so on and so forth, SCH needs to know when to pre shield, SS, Sacred Soil, whispering dawn, fey ill, fey glow, the new selene buffs etc etc. Having complete control over your farie is more technical than getting lucky on a card pull.

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Still not getting it all the cards have a good use like I said the difficulty comes in deciding in seconds who is the best person to receive the card without being able to see TP levels or who has used abilities that could benefit from lowering cool downs and if you aren't playing on voice chat you aren't going to be able to ask who needs it the most.

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Originally Posted by Kaizersan

Still not getting it all the cards have a good use like I said the difficulty comes in deciding in seconds who is the best person to receive the card without being able to see TP levels or who has used abilities that could benefit from lowering cool downs and if you aren't playing on voice chat you aren't going to be able to ask who needs it the most.

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One of the ways in which I feel the cards should be buffed is to make Spear reduce the CD time on things already on CD and give Ewer TP AND MP regen instead of cost reduction.

Wow healers are catty.

It actually wasn't an insult toward anyone specific at all, but a general statement. And no I'm not trolling, I'm dead serious. Being an amazing scholar is a walk in the park. Sorry if people here don't agree, but nothing you say will convince me it's a hard job to master, and this is coming from someone who's mained it since Jan. 2014.

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Originally Posted by RichardButte

One of the ways in which I feel the cards should be buffed is to make Spear reduce the CD time on things already on CD and give Ewer TP AND MP regen instead of cost reduction.

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I agree with the spear change and Ewer could be changed to refresh and the tp down card changed to regain the only other thing I'd change is spread use out of combat so you can prep cards before hand.

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Originally Posted by Lyrica_Ashtine

Astrologian in Nocturnal sect has +5% added potency. Aspected benefic has 262 potency then and has an equally potent shield, totaling up to 524 potency (floored down).

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Adloquium is 300/300, and when it crits, it's 450/900, but I'm not here to split hairs about spell potency, though adloquium's potential dwarfs it.

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Originally Posted by Lyrica_Ashtine

Not the most MP efficient thing to do, however. I really doubt scholars use 3 lustrates/minute. Or the very least, I don't

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A SCH has the freedom to make that choice, if they feel it's necessary, which is alot more than an AST can say with their one essential dignity every 40 seconds.

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Originally Posted by Lyrica_Ashtine

Aspected Benefic can still function as a panic button heal, however.

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If you need the heal now, yes, but otherwise it's a poor one; it incurs the 2.5 second GCD before you're allowed to begin to cast another spell. Lustrate does not do this.

After casting aspected benefic, you have to wait ~2.5 seconds to start your next spell cast, which means you'll finishing casting your next benefic 2 ~4.5 seconds later. Assuming no crits, that's almost 1200 potency worth of healing after ~4.5 seconds. You'd get a similar result casting benefic 2 twice. Since you're in nocturn, you have no HOTs.

That is a trade.

Lustrate is an ability with a 1 second cooldown on itself, and doesnt incur GCD on anything else. After casting it, and immediately following with adloquium, that's 1200 potency worth of healing in under 3 seconds.

That is going heal-positive.

You can only compare lustrate to essential dignity, and I already stated why aetherflow+lustrate is better.

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Originally Posted by Lyrica_Ashtine

Indomitability has 400 potency, but cannot be spammed back to back. In nocturnal sect Helios is 96 potency behind on this, but can be casted in succession. If indomitability isn't available, Scholars will have to do with Succor. Which Aspected Helios is only 3 potency behind on with the same effect in Nocturnal Sect. Or recover more HP over time in Diurnal sect.

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You forgot emergency tactics that can turn the next succor into medica. You also didn't mention Eos bringing whispering dawn's AOE HOT that ticks for 100 potency for 21 seconds, and is used right after rouse to increase the fairy's output by 40% almost every time.

Anyway, I am aware. I admitted that SCH still has the least sustainable AOE healing pages ago despite the buffs. Thing is, the number consistent AOE damage heavy encounters that demand WHM-level AOE-healing potency have been dropping ever since 2.0 titan hard mode.

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Originally Posted by Lyrica_Ashtine

I'm not sure what you're trying to get at with the aetherflow abilities part. From what I understand from it, unless you're sleeping, wake up and noticed the tank/party is in bad condition, then yes, that would be beneficial. But if you're in the heat of battle and paying attention, how is this a "huge" benefit?

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I'll answer your question with my own.

Would you prefer your one healing ability off the shared GCD to:

-Have ~800 potency, and be usable once every 40 seconds

or

-Have 600 potency, and be usable up to 3 times a minute, or 6 times if sitting on charges (which is pretty much what raids should wait on before every meaningful boss fight).

This is a very easy question.

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Originally Posted by Lyrica_Ashtine

You also mentioned Astrologians can spam instant spells, but be locked for 2.5s every time for doing so because they're spells. Why does this not apply to Scholars who can only use 3 aetherflow stacks every minute? You could argue each use of Aetherflow ability has a 20s CD between each on average. Scholars do not ignore GCD/Cast times at will at all with the Aetherflow limitations. You could burn all your stacks in matter of seconds, if you want. But what about the remaining time while Aetherflow is on CD? Scholars are restricted to this.

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Read above. SCHs have more freedom to do that than AST, and do it more often. When a SCH runs out, they still have their fairy at their command supplementing the SCH's heals, while not requiring the SCH to give up a physic, or adloquium cast to do so, unlike the trade that is casting aspected benefic or benefic 2. The SCH can focus-fire 300 potency embrace heals from the fairy every 3 seconds along side their own 400 potency physic, or 300/300 adloquiums (which can crit for 450/900). That is literally free healing in every sense of the word, and ignores the SCH's GCD restriction.

The one and only time AST can do that is once every 40 seconds not counting HOTs that the fairy can out-heal. How hard is that to understand? SCHs are far more flexible, and not limited by as much game mechanics as ASTs. If you can't see why SCHs can address a sudden dire situation better than an AST, I can't possibly hammer it into you any harder

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Originally Posted by Lyrica_Ashtine

And I'm not sure why you're mentioning the ability to control fairy mid cast here. What's the relationship in all this?

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Read above. It's another source of healing that's not on the SCH's GCDs. SCHs don't have to stop what they're doing to have eos cast whispering dawn or embrace.


There is still the matter of SCHs having stronger MP sustain, and Eos carrying fey illumination (20% healing buff for everyone in range, including the SCH, and the fairy).


AST just cannot match a SCH in any regard aside of group buffing (which SCH personal dps apparently beats anyway according to other posters), and AOE healing (which is an inconsistent issue that potentially two 30 second cooldown 300, and 400 potency AOE heals + 100 potency (140 with rouse) fairy HOT can handle well when the need arises).

I find scholar to be pretty simple. The fairy has inhuman reaction times when healing and knowing when to use fairy cooldowns is no different than knowing when to use personal cooldowns. Scholar may have to know when big hits are coming but so does white mage. The only difference is scholar must time the heal/shield to hit right before the big damage while white mage must time the heal to hit right after the big damage. Either way you must be ready.

In addition there's the mp management. Before white mage got assize you needed to be as efficient as possible or suffer the consequences. For example, did you know that if three people took damage it's better to use three cures than to use one cure 3 if the cure 3 will result in 40% total overhealing? Otherwise go cure 3. I think. Knowing stuff like that was important. Scholar, on the other hand, doesn't need to be nearly that on point. Finally, lustrate was a great band-aid for when you messed up.

The main difficulty from scholar comes from fight where you have to constantly move or heal your fairy and when you need to be manually casting embrace at all times. Which is ok difficulty I guess. AoE damage could also be a hassle but not anymore. That's just one man's opinion though.

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Originally Posted by NorthernLadMSP

I think that another part of the complaints stems from a lot of people who main SCH. SCH is easy as hell to play, in fact the easiest healer in the game. You could be a bad player and still do alright with SCH because of the virtually unlimited MP and free fairy heals. WHM was the more difficult of the two to excel at. They have more MP management and aggro issues to deal with. Now, WHM is the middle of the road in terms of play difficulty. Then AST comes out, and it's definitely, IMO, the most challenging to play. I think people were expecting another cake walk healer like SCH and thus they are disappointed.

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I'll echo this. AST feels no different from WHM other than the cards. It's also reflective in a lot of threads about "healers aren't required to DPS", as the ones most defensive of DPS are the ones who main SCH, not WHM. So here's a case where there is another stance and a mechanic that you have to split your attention with. If you weren't DPS'ing much on WHM, you're not going to DPS more with AST. If you were primarily letting Eos/Selene do cures before as SCH and you play WHM or AST, you'll find that you have to do all the healing and as a consequence have less opportunity to DPS.

So the people who are more likely to try and main AST are those who main WHM, because it's closer to WHM's healing mechanics out of the box than it is SCH's. What this means is that in 4-person parties, you will likely use experience you have with WHM, while 8-person parties assuming there aren't two AST's, you'll use the complementing stance. As gear creep and tactics for new dungeons ramp up, it may be far more viable to switch stances between pulls knowing in advance if shields or raw healing would be more productive.

But in the end, I think AST is going to require some changes to the card mechanic so AST is as efficient to use as WHM and SCH.

BTW... I'm wondering if it is possible to actually Macro the cards themselves, so one Macro "tries" all drawn cards and places them on their preferred targets.

The thing is Aspect Benefic can be cast on the move while Aldo can\\'t allowing you to heal/barrier on the move in fights that are movement intense this can come in handy plus the use of synergy allows you to heal 2 people at once even if the other person that you are tethered to runs out of range they still get the heals allowing you to heal outside of the range of other healers.

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Originally Posted by fanservice

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I'm not even going to bother reading the rest after the first two sentences. You're not staying relevant to the comparison you made yourself.

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Originally Posted by fanservice

Adloquium is 300/300, and when it crits, it's 450/900, but I'm not here to split hairs about spell potency, though ...
(snip)

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Aaaaaand mic drop.

But seriously, I tend sit on three aetherflows for most of the cooldown, without needing them. Often, I'll switch to cleric stance and DPS for a while and when the tank finally gets in trouble, drop stance, single or double lustrate, repop stance and resume DPSing.

In most dungeons, I can get away with DPSing 80% of the time as SCH.

I'm not saying SCH is a hard class to play (not at all), but it DEFINITELY outshines the hell out of AST in raw healing power and mitigation and ultimately, that's what we're talking about here, healing potency, not how challenging the class is.

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Originally Posted by Kaizersan

The thing is Aspect Benefic can be cast on the move while Aldo can\\'t allowing you to heal/barrier on the move in fights that are movement intense this can come in handy plus the use of synergy allows you to heal 2 people at once even if the other person that you are tethered to runs out of range they still get the heals allowing you to heal outside of the range of other healers.

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http://xivdb.com/?skill/189/Lustrate

http://xivdb.com/?skill/150032/Embrace

http://xivdb.com/?skill/166/Aetherflow

http://xivdb.com/?skill/150033/Whispering-Dawn

You make it sound like adlo is the only spell SCHs can cast at all. Abilities don't exist in a vacuum.