diurnal sect or nocturnal sect which do you like better

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by nexas506

Nocturnal for me. I dont have to keep track of when everyones regen is aabout to wear off and i can focus more on the cards.

---

Everyone shouldn't need regen and it shouldn't be up at all times (on everyone), I don't know what content you've been playing..... and even if for some retarded reason EVERYONE needed regen AT ALL TIMES, you have aspected helios which lasts for a whole 30s, which is the time it takes to draw 1 whole card, and this shouldn't distract you hardly at all.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Lithe

I like noct way more! Almost insta shield ftw!

---

That breaks in almost .02 seconds lol, and look at how much MP it costs compared to how long it lasts, and it you want that shield to be up always then it's gonna drain your MP. Maybe if the shield didn't break SO easily it would be better. But by time I throw it up and hop into Cleric, oh guess what, shield's gone and tank is taking damage, lol.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MyaValentine

Everyone shouldn't need regen and it shouldn't be up at all times (on everyone), I don't know what content you've been playing..... and even if for some retarded reason EVERYONE needed regen AT ALL TIMES, you have aspected helios which lasts for a whole 30s, which is the time it takes to draw 1 whole card, and this shouldn't distract you hardly at all.

---

First of all, how you worded that response was very rude.
second, its easier for me to throw a sheald and not have to worry about them for a few seconds, rather than keeping track of regens on a tank thats taking constant damage, so i can take that time to plan out my cards and try to line up a good combo.
Sorry not sorry that i found a play style that works for me.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by nexas506

First of all, how you worded that response was very rude.
second, its easier for me to throw a sheald and not have to worry about them for a few seconds, rather than keeping track of regens on a tank thats taking constant damage, so i can take that time to plan out my cards and try to line up a good combo.
Sorry not sorry that i found a play style that works for me.

---

Well, it's the internet and you'll never know exactly how I mean stuff via text; so if you took it offensive, sorry (or should I say like you do, sorry not sorry) for that.
:)

Personally, I found Noct Sect to be entirely underwhelming coming from a SCH. Even if with a WHM, I'd suggest an AST go Diurnal, unless shields are absolutely necessary for survival.

Toggle between the two. For instance regens great for most fights, esp if you are a dps healer, noct is great pre pull to give the tank a cushion if they wanna pull big without the regen hate from mobs.

They are both situational imo and I am constantly jumping between the two depending so I cant really saw I have a favorite.

What I pick really depends on the situation.

If you have a run that is mostly damage taken by the tank, noct is better for me. The increase on heals and the shield work perfect. In general I can keep a party alive even with moderate aoe dmg taken and shielding.

In instances were group aoe dmg occures frequently I go with diurnal. It saves your mp to a degree.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MicahZerrshia

Toggle between the two. For instance regens great for most fights, esp if you are a dps healer, noct is great pre pull to give the tank a cushion if they wanna pull big without the regen hate from mobs.

---

They can't really be toggled. You have to decide ahead of time which one to use, since the stances can't be changed while in combat. You could switch up between pulls or before a boss, but honestly there's rarely any reason to. If you're in an 8-man, you'll be in whatever stance won't be countered by the other healer, and in a 4-man you should be in Diurnal because it's vastly superior in terms of healing potential.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MyaValentine

That breaks in almost .02 seconds lol, and look at how much MP it costs compared to how long it lasts, and it you want that shield to be up always then it's gonna drain your MP. Maybe if the shield didn't break SO easily it would be better. But by time I throw it up and hop into Cleric, oh guess what, shield's gone and tank is taking damage, lol.

---

Where do you people even come from? Here's some math for you. Adloquium is a 300 potency heal with a 300 potency shield that doubles to a 600 potency shield on a crit. Nocturnal Aspected Benefic is a 250 potency heal which "nullifies damage equaling 130% of the amount of HP restored." Now, the tooltip is phrased a little weirdly, but, like Adloquium, it creates a shield equal to how hard the heal hit, not how much HP was restored. Going from there, we can start doing the math. 250 x 1.3 = 325. Already, Nocturnal Aspected Benefic produces a stronger shield than a Scholar when we remove unpredictable elements from the equation, which as a healer, you should be doing so to begin with. Now we add in the 5% modifier that Nocturnal Sect provides, this boosts Aspected Benefic from a 250 potency heal with a 325 potency shield, to a 262.5 potency heal with a 341.25 potency shield. However, there is another aspect (heh) that is overlooked when comparing the two. Scholars often do not have their healing steroid available since the metagame prefers Selene over Eos. Already Nocturnal Aspected Benefic is doing just a bit more than Aldoquium does, but now we add an additional 20% (60% for the heal) to that from Synastry, which, through some code failing doesn't also boost the shield by 40% if you're casting it on the effected target, but regardless, we're looking at massive 441 potency heal with a 409.5 potency shield. This is a 950.5 potency instant cast healing spell, that costs less than Aldoquium. So not only is Aspected Benefic's potency value much greater than Aldoquium when buffed and properly modified, it is more powerful on demand, which Aldoquium certainly is not.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Lemuria

They can't really be toggled. You have to decide ahead of time which one to use, since the stances can't be changed while in combat.

---

Exactly, you just contradicted and proved my point in one swoop. It's all about pre-planning.
Regen is not always superior if you look more strategically and beyond basic numbers.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MiniPrinny

snip

---

And then you remember SCH has a fairy that acts as free source of healing and Noc AST becomes completely worthless.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by AlphaSonic

And then you remember SCH has a fairy that acts as free source of healing and Noc AST becomes completely worthless.

---

Yes... the fairy that heals slower, at a lower potency than physick, cure, and benefic, and generally is in a stance that only allows it to use a party-wide Esuna once a minute. That fairy... I wouldn't trust Lily to heal through a dungeon, let alone a raid.

You forgot that the Fairy comes with a SCH that has a similar toolkit as a Noc AST and you see that Noc AST it's the same as a fairyless SCH. Seriously, they could remove Nocturnal Stance from AST and except the people that enjoy PvP and the people that enjoys gimping themselves in dungeons and raids, nobody else would notice. Moreover I think people would be happy to see Noc AST disappearing from PvP.

I like diurnal but because I'm a whm so I'm a regen whore. Plus the Hots combo you can do with Dirunal sect is soooo sexy rawr.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MiniPrinny

Yes... the fairy that heals slower, at a lower potency than physick, cure, and benefic, and generally is in a stance that only allows it to use a party-wide Esuna once a minute. That fairy... I wouldn't trust Lily to heal through a dungeon, let alone a raid.

---

I generally use Eos over Selene, and her heals are quite powerful. Rouse + Whispering Dawn is amazing, buff up her heals with Fey Illum as well. Though the thing is Fairy is not solo, you have Fairy + your shields. With Noct, you have noct + no fairy. You lack:
- Crit shields
- higher potency shields
- Instant Cast AoE heal
- Deployment of large shields
- Eye for an Eye
- Regen of any sort while in shields
- Fairy healing (about 1/3 of your heals if you are using Whispering Dawn and heavy healing encounters like Seph Ex, otherwise 100% of your healing cuz u dun need to heal)
- Sacred Soil 10% damage reduction that can be cast and allow you to actually do other stuff such as move, deploy shields, succor, dps and so on
- Shadow Flare, AoE slow

Without the above, the shields of Noct just seem weak. Diurnal is the way to go

Diurnal is hands down better. Nocturnal just feels like something you'd switch to temporarily, before reverting back to the 'default' stance. Perhaps that's how it should've been set up in the first place, a Sect you can swap in and out of (with appropriate cost and CD) but by default you remain in Diurnal. Taking a WHM-type build and throwing in an Adlo and Succor equivalent instead of HoTs might've worked out at a Level 50 Cap, but when the SCH can do more with its shields (Deployment, ET), along with them not being disjointed from the rest of its tooklit, a Level 60 Noct AST just comes of lackluster as a stand alone build.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MiniPrinny

Where do you people even come from? Here's some math for you. Adloquium is a 300 potency heal with a 300 potency shield that doubles to a 600 potency shield on a crit. Nocturnal Aspected Benefic is a 250 potency heal which "nullifies damage equaling 130% of the amount of HP restored." Now, the tooltip is phrased a little weirdly, but, like Adloquium, it creates a shield equal to how hard the heal hit, not how much HP ....

---

If you say so, love. Most people prefer sch shields to ast shields. Ast is weaker as both sch and whm even by a little but still. It's meant to be. But it has the benefit of the cards. Usually from what I've experienced. Sch shields do actually hold up a little longer than said Ast shields. Personal experience though. Maybe you've encountered other results.

Noct sect and how bad it is is just SE scared of AST becoming too good. It's similar to how MCH started out and DRK only ended up good because of the raid structure. Face it, after NIN SE got scared of new jobs becoming OP, which is funny considering the only OP part was it would literally go forever only even barely needing Invigorate.

edit: Let's be honest here. They could remove the "in combat" restriction of switching stances and you'd still be in diurnal most of the time.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MicahZerrshia

Exactly, you just contradicted and proved my point in one swoop. It's all about pre-planning.
Regen is not always superior if you look more strategically and beyond basic numbers.

---

Nice cherry pick, but there's no contradiction here. Diurnal Sect is always the superior choice when it comes to Astrologian, there's simply no contest. Some people will cite the cute potency boost on Noct, but it's only a 5% boost, which still doesn't make up for the regens. Our shields only give 130% shield bonus and the healing element has a lower potency than Scholars. We don't even have a pet to make the difference, or a crit bonus.

The only reason to use Noct is when your regens will be annulled by the presence of a white mage. That's literally it. You will never find a good Astro swapping between stances mid-dungeon because there's literally no good reason for them to do so.

I'm a regen healer, so it's Diurnal for me. I just can't get into Noct. But i'm sure it works great for certain situations and for certain types of healers. I also dont care for Scholar healing and much prefer White Mage Healing. So that may be why i choose the stance thatI do.

As long as we clear the content, it's all good. ^_^

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kaurie

Though the thing is Fairy is not solo, you have Fairy + your shields. With Noct, you have noct + no fairy. You lack:
- Crit shields
- higher potency shields
- Instant Cast AoE heal
- Deployment of large shields
- Eye for an Eye
- Regen of any sort while in shields
- Fairy healing (about 1/3 of your heals if you are using Whispering Dawn and heavy healing encounters like Seph Ex, otherwise 100% of your healing cuz u dun need to heal)
- Sacred Soil 10% damage reduction that can be cast and allow you to actually do other stuff such as move, deploy shields, succor, dps and so on
- Shadow Flare, AoE slow

Without the above, the shields of Noct just seem weak. Diurnal is the way to go

---

Nocturnal Sect has benefits that Scholar doesn't, benefits that are often over looked... for some reason. From what I know comparing their skill sets:

- Instant cast healing for 10s every 150s
- Instant cast Benefic II on occasion
- A very potent (150 per tick) AoE regen and damage reduction barrier on a 90s CD
- A proper AoE heal that doesn't have a 30s CD
- Disable, which is better than Virus in every way
- Higher potency shields (not by much, but they are) that can scale up to 950 effective potency between the healing and shielding components on demand
- The ability to effortlessly heal two targets on demand with no micromanagement
- An AoE stun (not very useful in raids, incredibly useful in dungeons)
- The ability to reduce their enmity generation for a significant amount of time
- Higher potency DoTs that can't miss (Miasma and Aero can, Bio and Combust can not)
- A passive 5% boost to all healing spells (think of it like always having a slightly weaker over time Divine Seal active)
- And finally the cards, all six of which are exceptionally powerful, have a myriad of uses and applications, and can be used at almost any point in any fight.

Many of these are unique to Astrologian as a whole, yes, but these effects are part of what must be taken into consideration when looking at Nocturnal Sect. So no, I think what the problem really is that the metagame is overly rigid and stubborn to change. The Sect itself is fine.

I preffer to go Diurnal

despite maining SCH for ages i do preffer HoT over shielding tbh if only because for the way I play it gives me more room to do other stuff.
i just never got on with the WHM kit much so i went SCH initially and learnt from there

strange how I feel the AST kit is closer in similarity to the WHM kit yet i feel the least synergy with WHM and more with AST on equal level to SCH

ive tried Noct but i often feel like, by the time ive shielded, gone cleric and DoT'ed its gone and i have to go back to healing.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MiniPrinny

*snip*

---

Wait, what? There is no way your shields are stronger than SCH. If I crit adlo for 8,000 damage, my shield nullifies 16,000 damage. If you put up a shield for 8,000 damage, you prevent 10,400 damage. Even with smaller numbers my 5k crit will prevent 10k damage and your 5k shield will prevent 6.5k. Our shield don't double potency when they crit, they just make a shield that is double what the crit amount was. I admit I am bad at math so if you can break down how AST shields are stronger in terms of numbers, then please do.

(Also maybe don't list Bio as an example of a DoT you get that can't miss as an advantage over SCH since... you get that from ACN/SMN/SCH.)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LadyVal

I admit I am bad at math so if you can break down how AST shields are stronger in terms of numbers, then please do.

---

Obviously a guaranteed Crit adloquium will be stronger, but you can't look at the -maximum- shield size when comparing them, you have to look at the average, and that's dependant on Crit Chance. Scholar shields are 100% of the heal amount normally, but 200% of the doubled heal amount on a crit. AST shields are always 130% of the heal amount regardless of whether it crits or not. Obviously in the unrealistic situations of having 0% crit chance, AST will be around 30% stronger shields than a Scholar, and in the situation with huge amounts of Crit chance the scholar will win out.

Not sure of the exact break point of crit as I don't have time to do the math just now as I dont have heal potencies to hand, but it's likely somewhere around 25% crit chance where a Scholar starts doing on -average- more shieldage than an AST, but it's not clear cut. AST has the advantage in lower gear levels or where crit isnt particularly common on gear in a particular tier, Scholar has the advantage when geared to the hilt with high crit.

And even so, although Scholar -can- always push out much higher shields, AST has the advantage of always being able to guarantee that their shields are a base amount higher than the weakest scholar shield. I guess it depends on what's better for an encounter - a small shield that's sometimes randomly a stupidly huge shield, or a fairly consistant medium sized shield.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LadyVal

(Also maybe don't list Bio as an example of a DoT you get that can't miss as an advantage over SCH since... you get that from ACN/SMN/SCH.)

---

AST can't access bio since they cross class CNJ and THM.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LadyVal

Wait, what? There is no way your shields are stronger than SCH. If I crit adlo for 8,000 damage, my shield nullifies 16,000 damage. If you put up a shield for 8,000 damage, you prevent 10,400 damage. Even with smaller numbers my 5k crit will prevent 10k damage and your 5k shield will prevent 6.5k. Our shield don't double potency when they crit, they just make a shield that is double what the crit amount was. I admit I am bad at math so if you can break down how AST shields are stronger in terms of numbers, then please do.

---

If you don't include Crit, Noct AST shields are stronger by approximately 13%.

However you can't ignore Crit when calculating the two side by side because Crit provides such an insane bonus to Adlo that it wouldn't be a fair comparison to not include this RNG component.

Overall as long as the SCH has 10% Crit, their average Shield strength will be better than Noct AST Aspected Benefic.

You can find my theorycraft / math about this on this thread here.

Also I disagree with Miniprinny about the fact that Disable is "always better" than Virus. Virus will win if the tank buster is approximately every 90s+ since you'll get a Supervirus of 15% off on each tank buster versus Disable's 10% every tankbuster. Likewise, if a tank buster is every 60s that means you'll get Disable on every tank buster whereas Virus every other tank buster. It's all a matter of circumstances. However, if you compare the two side-by-side, Disable provides 10% mitigation for 18s total every three minutes and Supervirus provides 15% mitigation for 20s total every three minutes and therefore Supervirus is generally superior.

Overall, at this point in time Noct AST provides a mitigation kit that's different from how SCH provides mitigation because of the way the two are designed.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MiniPrinny

snip

---

All those things that most of the time will be useless because or they are too niche to be useful in most of the situations or they are stupidly too hard to make it function. Who cares about instant casts (that aren't off global cooldown) unless you are getting interrupted or paralyzed. Who cares about being able to cast Helios when you partner can do that AoE healing and you just need to assist your partner if it needs help. Who cares about double target healing when in nearly most of the fights only 1 person are all people take damage.
And most of what you have listed would be useful, if Noc AST would be the main healer (and can be done by Diu AST except the shielding part)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by AlphaSonic

And most of what you have listed would be useful, if Noc AST would be the main healer (and can be done by Diu AST except the shielding part)

---

And... what exactly is stopping a Nocturnal AST from doing this? Between the boosts to the Ewer, the regen-centric healing style of White Mage, White Mage's higher damage output than both Scholar and Astrologian, and finally the sheer fact that any group worth their salt will take a Machinist or Bard to restore MP during phase transitions because you're going to be taking a White Mage or Astrologian even with a Scholar... I don't see the problem.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MiniPrinny

Snip.

---

- Lightspeed and Synastry are nice, but they're mainly niche skills. Synastry only became good when it got the Divine Seal type effect added onto it, which is how I see most ASTs use it, not for the dual-heal element. Incidentally this makes Diurnal better for Syn, as it makes your HoT ticks stronger.

- Ben II procs aren't instant, they just remove the cast times. You're still locked into the GCD when you use them, unlike actual instant heals like Lustrate and Indom.

- Indom (400 pot) is better than Helios (300 pot) on top of being instant cast and MP free.

- Disable is certainly not better than (Super)virus. The only time it's better is when there are specific enemy attacks that are potency based and not main-stat based. Examples are in A4S and Sephirot Extreme adds.

- Yes ASTs 2 DoTs have higher potency, but SCHs have Bio II, Bio, and Shadowflare and have an easier time maintaining those.

- Fey Wind is better than AST cards as it's a consistent reliable buff. Meanwhile to get the most of AST cards requires a lot of set up and RNG in your favour, which still ends up falling short of the DPS gain Fey Wind brings.

Quote:

---

So no, I think what the problem really is that the metagame is overly rigid and stubborn to change. The Sect itself is fine.

---

The devs themselves have admitted that Noct is lacking compared to SCH's overall toolkit (primarily because of the Fairy), to the point they think the only option they have left is to boost the power of AST cards.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Sapphidia

*snip*

---

I see! This makes a lot of sense. I suppose it would be easier to assume through experience that AST has better shields because you're not relying on crit and have a higher baseline, especially in lower-level content where crit is a minimal stat. Your last statement makes a lot of sense too.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ragology

AST can't access bio since they cross class CNJ and THM.

---

I only added this because the original wording makes it sound like she is saying AST have better DoTs that cannot miss, with Bio being one of them.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ghishlain

*snip*

---

Aha, that makes a lot of sense. Even looking through your numbers it seems like, as Sapphidia said, it only makes a difference once you pass that 10% crit margin, so you would really need to have a lot of crit to reach that point. And even then you really need to keep your crit maxed out to see large differences, it seems. Thanks for the link, was an informative read!

I guess now all I'm left wondering is why AST shields and regens compete with SCH and WHM, and why the system can't just let players keep whichever buff has the higher potency, instead of always replacing each other regardless of potency. But that is for another topic I suppose. :P

AST regens work with WHMs. It's AST-AST regens, AST-SCH and SCH-SCH shields that don't stack.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LadyVal

Aha, that makes a lot of sense. Even looking through your numbers it seems like, as Sapphidia said, it only makes a difference once you pass that 10% crit margin, so you would really need to have a lot of crit to reach that point. And even then you really need to keep your crit maxed out to see large differences, it seems. Thanks for the link, was an informative read!

---

You're welcome~

Funny thing is according to Dervy you'd only need 571 Crit to reach a 10% crit rate once you do the math backwards. You can actually achieve that number very easily in the current gear tier just on Lore pieces and a Baked Pipira Pira despite the apparent lack of Crit pieces on that set (the linked set gives 575 Crit). It's actually even easier to achieve in pure Prototype Midan gear and you get 598 Crit without food.

Of course more Crit helps more and the divide just grows wider and wider the more Crit you stack but 10% is very very achievable for any healer even if all you're doing is dumping Lore or Midas normal pieces into the job. And yes, what Sapphidia says also rings very true:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Sapphidia

And even so, although Scholar -can- always push out much higher shields, AST has the advantage of always being able to guarantee that their shields are a base amount higher than the weakest scholar shield. I guess it depends on what's better for an encounter - a small shield that's sometimes randomly a stupidly huge shield, or a fairly consistant medium sized shield.

---

Healing is always about the situational awareness and knowing which path may benefit your group the most.

Ast + Whm = Nocturnal
Ast + Sch = Diurnal
Ast + Ast = Diurnal/Nocturnal

Ast + 4 party Dungeons = Diurnal
Ast + 8 party Raid = Nocturnal/Diurnal
Ast + 8 partt Primals = Nocturnal/Diurnal

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Mature

Ast + Whm = Nocturnal
Ast + Sch = Diurnal
Ast + Ast = Diurnal/Nocturnal

Ast + 4 party Dungeons = Diurnal
Ast + 8 party Raid = Nocturnal/Diurnal
Ast + 8 partt Primals = Nocturnal/Diurnal

---

AST+WHM = diurnal except for very very few exceptions

Just to clarify, here is some math regarding which has higher average potency shields SCH vs AST.

Potency | Regular | Crit | Total Potency over 100 uses
| | 94.285 |5.715
Adlo | 300 28285.5 |5143.5 |33429
Aspected Benefic | 250 |30642.625 |2786.0625 | 33428.6875

The left is potency difference of the heal (300 SCH, 250 AST), the top is the crit rate required to make the total amount of shielded potency equal (5.715%). As soon as you go above 5.715, the total shielded potency is higher over 100 uses (on average) for SCH than AST.

For 10% crit rate

Potency | Regular | Crit | Total Potency over 100 uses
| | 90 |10
Adlo | 300 27000 |9000|36000
Aspected Benefic | 250| 29250 | 4875| 34125

With a total of 1875 extra shielded potency (equivalent of 6.25 uncritted adlo's) more over 100 uses.

Note: this is not accounting for the added increase in crit power with higher crit and is assuming all crits = 1.5x

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MiniPrinny

Nocturnal Sect has benefits that Scholar doesn't, benefits that are often over looked... for some reason. From what I know comparing their skill sets:

- Instant cast healing for 10s every 150s
- Instant cast Benefic II on occasion
- A very potent (150 per tick) AoE regen and damage reduction barrier on a 90s CD
- A proper AoE heal that doesn't have a 30s CD
- Disable, which is better than Virus in every way
- Higher potency shields (not by much, but they are) that can scale up to 950 effective potency between the healing and shielding components on demand
- The ability to effortlessly heal two targets on demand with no micromanagement
- An AoE stun (not very useful in raids, incredibly useful in dungeons)
- The ability to reduce their enmity generation for a significant amount of time
- Higher potency DoTs that can't miss (Miasma and Aero can, Bio and Combust can not)
- A passive 5% boost to all healing spells (think of it like always having a slightly weaker over time Divine Seal active)
- And finally the cards, all six of which are exceptionally powerful, have a myriad of uses and applications, and can be used at almost any point in any fight.

Many of these are unique to Astrologian as a whole, yes, but these effects are part of what must be taken into consideration when looking at Nocturnal Sect. So no, I think what the problem really is that the metagame is overly rigid and stubborn to change. The Sect itself is fine.

---

I appreciate the response; however, I don't think any of that makes up for the advanced power of the SCH toolkit.

A few notes:
-Instant Cast healing for 10s every 150s sounds fairly lack luster imo? I have lustrate/indom for the very few instances where having an instant cast would be beneficial. However, that's nice enough I suppose.
- Instant Cast Benefic II - proc that it casts instant while still having the MP cost. I'd rather have Adlo crit shield or free cure of WHM personally *shrug*
- Your aoe Regen / damage reduction barrier is one of ASTs biggest weaknesses compared to SCH imo. You can't do anything, as a SCH I can throw up the damage reduction barrier much more frequently, have Whispering Dawn up (with Rouse = 140 per tick), while also casting Succor and/or DPSing + having my fairy embrace at the same time
- Disable is generally much worse than SCH/SMN Virus, but they both have their uses.
- Shield potency, see above.
- It's fairly effortless for Eos/Selene to auto heal targets as she does. She also does this with 100% uptime and no cooldown
- AoE stun is nice, but not as nice as Holy. I prefer Shadowflare personally, slow set on all mobs for 30s is better than 5s of stun and then back to normal, both are nice though
- Enmity generation is a non issue on SCH due to a large amount of your healing coming from your pet
- Dots, SCH Bio + Bio II + Shadowflare = per tick is 110, per, 840 potency total or vs Combust II + Combust = 85 per tick, and 690 total
- Passive 5% is nice, but SCH has fairy healing while I am healing for a 33% increase. Examples:
Embrace (300) + Physick (400) > Benefic (420)
Embrace (300) + Adlo (300+300) > Benefic II (682.5)
Succor (150+150) + Whispering Dawn (700) > Aspected Helios (210+150) or Helios (315)
Lustrate (600) + Embrace (300) > Essential Dignity (420)
*note I added the 5% bonuses to all the AST spells
*also note that Embrace/Whispering Dawn potencies are pet potencies and not player potencies. Pet potencies are ~70% as strong (300 potency gives me 1880 embrace, and 2700 adlo)
- Cards are quite nice, and the only thing which make AST at all worthwhile imo. However, their RNG factor makes it not, for me.

A few other things SCH has not mentioned above
- Fey Covenant for 20% magic resistance added to all party members
- Eye for an Eye which gives a 10% damage decrease to anything that hits my target
- Deploy those adlo crits baby, nothing like giving your entire team a 12k shield and just laugh off the Seph Ex limit break
- Energy Drain + Aetherflow, never have MP problems, especially when DPSing (vs holding back DPS on other jobs to conserve MP)
- Healing not a problem? Can bring Selene for a 50% uptime 3% speed buff for all party members without the concern of RNG
- Healing not a problem? Can bring Selene to do an AoE wide debuff removal so you can continue to DPS to your hearts content when your party stands in the AoE
- Healing not a problem? Can bring Selene for instant Silence - for me this is mostly used in Hunts, but was useful in like T1


In my opinion, Nocturnal AST is barely better than SCH without Fairy. However, when you add the Fairy into the mix, it's a landslide for SCH.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kaurie

-Snip-

---

Just three small nitpicks I wanted to point out that I noticed.

For your Aspected Benefic (Noct) vs Adlo comparison, I noticed that you forgot to add the 1.5x Crit multiplier on Aspected Benefic but did include both the 1.5x Crit multiplier and 2x Crit multiplier on Adlo. Also you'll need to add the 5% potency modifier to Noct Aspected Benefic too (and of course floor your decimals on each step). This will affect your math and should get you to that 10% Crit breakpoint for Shields that I posted earlier.

For the third nitpick, just wanted to mention that Fairy potency are weaker than their listed value. The Fairy itself basically heals for approximately 33% less power than list now (just compare your Fairy Embrace to your Physick) so Embrace is closer to 200 and Whispering Dawn is closer to 469 potency. This doesn't actually change the meat of your argument though but I just wanted to point it out because I'm OCD about misinformation and try to correct things when I see it.

Despite this weakened fairy it is hard to argue against an entity that gives the SCH 4,000 potency of healing every minute at 0 MP or GCD cost to the master/mistress (more if you're using Eos). I do find the Noct AST kit more enjoyable than the SCH kit but I know that's a playstyle preference then actual power. It probably skews my perception that I DF a lot and Noct AST kit really shines in random chaotic environments while the SCH is magnificent in a controlled raid dance when you know everyone can perform properly and you're not trying to cover huge mistakes.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ghishlain

Just three small nitpicks I wanted to point out that I noticed.

For your Aspected Benefic (Noct) vs Adlo comparison, I noticed that you forgot to add the 1.5x Crit multiplier on Aspected Benefic but did include both the 1.5x Crit multiplier and 2x Crit multiplier on Adlo. Also you'll need to add the 5% potency modifier to Noct Aspected Benefic too (and of course floor your decimals on each step). This will affect your math and should get you to that 10% Crit breakpoint for Shields that I posted earlier.

For the third nitpick, just wanted to mention that Fairy potency are weaker than their listed value. The Fairy itself basically heals for approximately 33% less power than list now (just compare your Fairy Embrace to your Physick) so Embrace is closer to 200 and Whispering Dawn is closer to 469 potency. This doesn't actually change the meat of your argument though but I just wanted to point it out because I'm OCD about misinformation and try to correct things when I see it.

Despite this weakened fairy it is hard to argue against an entity that gives the SCH 4,000 potency of healing every minute at 0 MP or GCD cost to the master/mistress (more if you're using Eos). I do find the Noct AST kit more enjoyable than the SCH kit but I know that's a playstyle preference then actual power. It probably skews my perception that I DF a lot and Noct AST kit really shines in random chaotic environments while the SCH is magnificent in a controlled raid dance when you know everyone can perform properly and you're not trying to cover huge mistakes.

---

Hey Thanks! Always appreciate people pointing out my mistakes (legit, not sarcasm).

1. I figured that the shield tooltip says "Nocturnal Shield Potency" which made me think it would include any % benefit applied by the nocturnal stance. So I purposely left that out. I could be wrong here though.

2. For the Crit modifier on Aspected Benefic, thanks for pointing that out, oops here is the corrected versions (I'll also edit my original post):

Potency | Regular | Crit | Total Potency over 100 uses
| | 94.285 |5.715
Adlo | 300 28285.5 |5143.5 |33429
Aspected Benefic | 250 |30642.625 |2786.0625 | 33428.6875

For 10% crit rate

Potency | Regular | Crit | Total Potency over 100 uses
| | 90 |10
Adlo | 300 27000 |9000|36000
Aspected Benefic | 250| 29250 | 4875| 34125

3. Yeah I know fairy heals are less powerful, I left it out because I didn't know the actual conversion. However, you make a good point and I suppose that was misleading. I'll add a * in my original post. That said, my overall argument is still the same.

4. Definitely, there is a lot of playstyle choice. Personally, I find SCH handles emergency situations very well, but definitely shines more in the predict damage department. The actual HPS that a SCH can put out is pretty similar to both WHM and diurnal AST, while being undervalued due to a lot of that HPS being shields (i.e. a 2500 HP adlo counts as 2500 hp per gcd, not 5000 on your HPS).


Another great thing, that you kind of alluded to, is that your fairy can heal ongoing MP free. So if you do run out of MP (or say die and get raised) your pet can continue to heal while you regain some MP.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kaurie

Hey Thanks! Always appreciate people pointing out my mistakes (legit, not sarcasm).

1. I figured that the shield tooltip says "Nocturnal Shield Potency" which made me think it would include any % benefit applied by the nocturnal stance. So I purposely left that out. I could be wrong here though.

2. For the Crit modifier on Aspected Benefic, thanks for pointing that out, oops here is the corrected versions (I'll also edit my original post):

Potency | Regular | Crit | Total Potency over 100 uses
| | 94.285 |5.715
Adlo | 300 28285.5 |5143.5 |33429
Aspected Benefic | 250 |30642.625 |2786.0625 | 33428.6875

For 10% crit rate

Potency | Regular | Crit | Total Potency over 100 uses
| | 90 |10
Adlo | 300 27000 |9000|36000
Aspected Benefic | 250| 29250 | 4875| 34125

3. Yeah I know fairy heals are less powerful, I left it out because I didn't know the actual conversion. However, you make a good point and I suppose that was misleading. I'll add a * in my original post. That said, my overall argument is still the same.

4. Definitely, there is a lot of playstyle choice. Personally, I find SCH handles emergency situations very well, but definitely shines more in the predict damage department. The actual HPS that a SCH can put out is pretty similar to both WHM and diurnal AST, while being undervalued due to a lot of that HPS being shields (i.e. a 2500 HP adlo counts as 2500 hp per gcd, not 5000 on your HPS).


Another great thing, that you kind of alluded to, is that your fairy can heal ongoing MP free. So if you do run out of MP (or say die and get raised) your pet can continue to heal while you regain some MP.

---

No problem/ Glad to be of help~

If you want to see my testing on Noct Sect and Aspected Benefic / Helios, you can find it here. Incidentally, my Crit theorycraft happens to be on that page too if you wanted to review it since it's related to the topic at hand.

That should give you all the information you need regarding Noct Sect and its effect on Aspected spells. The nuances of Noct Sect tend to get lost since it's definitely the less popular of the two sects so I can understand why it would be confusing.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Mature

Ast + Whm = Nocturnal
Ast + Sch = Diurnal
Ast + Ast = Diurnal/Nocturnal

Ast + 4 party Dungeons = Diurnal
Ast + 8 party Raid = Nocturnal/Diurnal
Ast + 8 partt Primals = Nocturnal/Diurnal

---

this, except I'll still go Diurnal with WHM unless it's a fight with a really painful tank buster.