AST Adjustments 6.2

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Originally Posted by Raikai

They can add different effects to cards again if either they always have the damage+ on top of that added defensive effect... Or (probably better) moving damage buffs to minor arcana and letting the regular cards be only utility/defensive/healing aides.

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The latter part of this suggestion would lead to ASTs only using minor arcana and never the others, since the only thing people want are damage buffs.

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Originally Posted by SieyaM

The latter part of this suggestion would lead to ASTs only using minor arcana and never the others, since the only thing people want are damage buffs.

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Since Minor Arcana is entirely separate from normal card draw that is rather unlikely.

I wouldn’t be too surprised if maybe they made AST the ‘SGE’ of pure healers. Meaning we augment our spells to add a HoT or buff or something to that effect. That could be us switching between Nocturnal and Diurnal.

Per the Live Letter Digest, postponed until 7.0

just thinking to myself of some changes I would like to see while reducing button bloat.

Healer QoL in general:

Tier 1 cure upgraded to Tier 2 = -1 button

AST changes:

-Aspected Benefic is now a shield that upgrades to Celestial Intersection. -1 button
-Single target regen redundant in conjunction with the proposed card changes.
-2 charges

Cards/Draw/MA:
-Draw still functions the same (3 charges) i.e. 6 cards, but instead, augments the next gcd heal (single target and aoe) and makes it instant cast at the cost of reduced heal potency while applying drawn card buffs
-Draw acts similar but not identical, to SGE Eukrasia to give you an idea of function, this would also buff Synastry usage
-Benefic 1/2 = single target, Helios/Aspected = aoe
-Card buff duration reduced or alternatively apply a stack system to target/s.
-Remove Play, Crown Play, since Draw works differently and is only activated when using a gcd heal that is affected by Draws new effect (effectively making your gcd heals the "Play" button)

-Minor Arcana reverted to 4.0 version i.e. 1 sec recast, Lady/Lord (functions as an ogcd proc similar to Shield Swipe from 2.0 PLD)
-Minor Arcana active when Draw is used until card is spent.
-See Card Effect changes on how MA works.
-Remove Redraw, Undraw, since Minor Arcana now functions as the sole way of removing cards you don't want.

Card Effects:
-Balance/Bole = crit chance up
-Arrow/Spear = direct crit chance up
-Ewer/Spire = increased sks/sps
-Lord of Crowns = if Balance, Arrow or Spire is drawn and MA is used
-Lady of Crowns = if Bole Spear or Ewer is drawn and MA is used
-Remove increasing dmg from AST to better balance with other healers not having access to frequent dmg up abilities.

Draw and MA changes = -4 buttons.

Astrodyne:
-Changed to function as aoe raid utility.
-1 seal = magical defense
-2 seals = magical + physical defense
-3 seals = magical + physical defense + increase duration/stacks of current active card effects on all party members.

These changes basically try to promote gcd healing while still gaining benefits and ease of card use. It also returns RR effects, albeit much easier to utilize since using a gcd heal will apply the card in addition to the heal. Removes a lot of buttons that didn't need to be there in the first place. Still retains the "three" system all healers have i.e. lilies, aetherflow, addersgall, card seals. Changing the cards to apply a stack which affects the next gcds (i.e. the tanks) could also nerf the raid potential of AST since it will no longer affect ogcds but at the cost of making it more consistent.

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Originally Posted by Deceptus

Per the Live Letter Digest, postponed until 7.0

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Another expansion where I hardly touch astro in that case. What an awful feeling....

if they truly wanted to make things "accessible" for ast with minimal effort they could at the very list fix their awful macro system so it actually queues actions.

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Originally Posted by QooEr

if they truly wanted to make things "accessible" for ast with minimal effort they could at the very list fix their awful macro system so it actually queues actions.

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Queueing macros would be a massive improvement over what we have now but would also give AST a montorous 45 buttons, giving the class that already has the worst button bloat in the game 7 more buttons I don’t think is really the right solution here rather than just at this point removing AST’s intense reliance on party targeting

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Originally Posted by Supersnow845

Queueing macros would be a massive improvement over what we have now but would also give AST a montorous 45 buttons, giving the class that already has the worst button bloat in the game 7 more buttons I don’t think is really the right solution here rather than just at this point removing AST’s intense reliance on party targeting

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how do macros give ast more buttons? the point is to make macros functional so you can consolidate actions and the like

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Originally Posted by QooEr

if they truly wanted to make things "accessible" for ast with minimal effort they could at the very list fix their awful macro system so it actually queues actions.

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Agreed. They don't want automated gameplay, but macros containing only a single action (such as mouseover or target macros) should be allowed to queue.

Or at the very least allow mouseover functionality as an option.

But what am I saying, this is the company that made a job worse for EW and can't fix it until 2 years after release. Heck, they haven't even managed to make pots and Sprint queue after a decade, never mind macros. Smallest of indie companies and all that.

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Originally Posted by QooEr

how do macros give ast more buttons? the point is to make macros functional so you can consolidate actions and the like

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Because a macro is a button that you would link to a hotbar, the classical setup is to have a “play” macro for each position on the party list besides yourself, that’s 7 extra buttons you’d need to find a spot for

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Originally Posted by Supersnow845

Because a macro is a button that you would link to a hotbar, the classical setup is to have a “play” macro for each position on the party list besides yourself, that’s 7 extra buttons you’d need to find a spot for

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a macro is anything you want it to be, you can make it switch hotbars too like controller users do

Used to be an AST main before Shadowbringers. However since they can't stop touching the job I decided to just not touch it at all beyond leveling it up. Gonna be a long wait I guess.

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Originally Posted by Supersnow845

giving the class that already has the worst button bloat in the game

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Not to distract from the previous line of conversation, but why do people keep saying this? It's not at all true.

AST takes up the same number of hotbar slots as jobs such as PLD, NIN, and SAM.
It's only 1-2 slots more than some others, an example being its fellow healer; SCH.

Does it have a lot of things you can/need to press? Yes. Is it more than jobs like SMN or MCH? Yes. Does it have some areas it could probably use some cleaning up? For sure.
But can we stop band-wagoning this "Oh my god, it has the worst button bloat" nonsense? (This isn't to attack you specifically: I see a lot of people say this way more often than seems needed.)

I just really want sleeve draw animation back. I like the current draw animation but I’ll love to have the sleeve draw animation for draw.

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Originally Posted by Sylvant

Not to distract from the previous line of conversation, but why do people keep saying this? It's not at all true.

AST takes up the same number of hotbar slots as jobs such as PLD, NIN, and SAM.
It's only 1-2 slots more than some others, an example being its fellow healer; SCH.

Does it have a lot of things you can/need to press? Yes. Is it more than jobs like SMN or MCH? Yes. Does it have some areas it could probably use some cleaning up? For sure.
But can we stop band-wagoning this "Oh my god, it has the worst button bloat" nonsense? (This isn't to attack you specifically: I see a lot of people say this way more often than seems needed.)

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AST and SCH have 34 buttons, PLD has 33, NIN and SAM have 32. AST may have Undraw and SCH has two summon buttons with no differences, but they're still tied for the most.

from AST main, just give us auto-draw when the hand is empty, should be enough already and remove lady of crown(the overheal arcana)

Apparently YoshiP mentioned it being card changes... again...

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Originally Posted by Hanayumi

Apparently YoshiP mentioned it being card changes... again...

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Watch them become group-wide like in pvp.

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Originally Posted by Tlamila

Watch them become group-wide like in pvp.

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I'd have no issue with every card just automatically being a spread if they introduce more interesting card effects again, it's kinda what you were fishing for anyway before they turned everything into balance lite.

AoE cards would be a good way to spread the APM out over the course of a minute rather than it all being dogpiled into the first few seconds of each 2 minute burst window as well.

I always wonder if spear wasnt better than balance because spear gave a crit 10% or 5% if spread than balance with flat 10% or 5% since crit means mire damage heal and migi? also whoever was that entitled raider to make now a world war thing that ast was only to fish for balance wow. Glad that time I was not into raiding. I love using all cards cept spire in sb so whoever think amma aim balance only was not getting that desire. If you boot someone for using the job what it was met to do that is horrible.

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Originally Posted by IceBlueNinja

I always wonder if spear wasnt better than balance because spear gave a crit 10% or 5% if spread than balance with flat 10% or 5% since crit means mire damage heal and migi? also whoever was that entitled raider to make now a world war thing that ast was only to fish for balance wow. Glad that time I was not into raiding. I love using all cards cept spire in sb so whoever think amma aim balance only was not getting that desire. If you boot someone for using the job what it was met to do that is horrible.

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The issue wasn't people booting the job for "worthless cards" the issue was that the cards were too situational for being randomly gotten.

Like Lady of Crowns is usually a dead card and Lord is always better cause damage Balance was good because it was 10% damage.

When you would want to use Bole/Ewer you never got it. Because RNG. And there wasn't a really good way to mitigate said RNG. That was the issue. Balance was ALWAYS good to use. Bole/Ewer? Not so much.

Its why I like the cards in PvP. Ewer is probably the least worthwhile right now, but if your team or you are low on mana when you get it, it feels good to use. Spire AND Balance however always have uses.

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Originally Posted by ASkellington

The issue wasn't people booting the job for "worthless cards" the issue was that the cards were too situational for being randomly gotten.

Like Lady of Crowns is usually a dead card and Lord is always better cause damage Balance was good because it was 10% damage.

When you would want to use Bole/Ewer you never got it. Because RNG. And there wasn't a really good way to mitigate said RNG. That was the issue. Balance was ALWAYS good to use. Bole/Ewer? Not so much.

Its why I like the cards in PvP. Ewer is probably the least worthwhile right now, but if your team or you are low on mana when you get it, it feels good to use. Spire AND Balance however always have uses.

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Exactly and it’s not like it would every form part of like a mitigation plan, if you were going to die to a raidwide but saved the pull with a spread bole then you won’t be able to do that next pull you’d just be out of luck, if you teammate was saved from going OOM by an ewer then just fix why they were going OOM

If all 6 cards were situational there may be an argument but as it was balance was just the best card in every situation

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Originally Posted by Supersnow845

Exactly and it’s not like it would every form part of like a mitigation plan, if you were going to die to a raidwide but saved the pull with a spread bole then you won’t be able to do that next pull you’d just be out of luck, if you teammate was saved from going OOM by an ewer then just fix why they were going OOM

If all 6 cards were situational there may be an argument but as it was balance was just the best card in every situation

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Exactly.
The cards were good but SE made the cardinal mistake of tying utility to rng in a game where encounters are heavily scripted and good players use that to their advantage instead of freestyling and eating dps losses left, right and centre while also making it share a cooldown with damage in a heavily dps focused game.
That was the worst setup they could've chosen for old cards and that's entirely on them, not the players for trying to make the best of it or not using cards as they wanted when it goes completely against their own design.

So you drew a Lady during an aoe. Can you use Lady instead of eg CO and use CO later? In theory yes but in practice chances are that the next usage for CO is mapped shortly after another 1min passed. So delaying it would mean not being able to use it when you where supposed to use it next and it snowballs into more delays.

In a game with a lot of constant and random damage it would always be a gain but FFXIV is not designed for it and instead of realising their mistake and fixing it they simply scraped the system because "Well, looks you all don't like the cards, now you only have damage, hope you're happy now..".

Most are saying aoe cards will be good but what if you have 2 Astros? You basically will just keep overwriting each other. I can see that being a hurdle yes?

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Originally Posted by SweetPete

Most are saying aoe cards will be good but what if you have 2 Astros? You basically will just keep overwriting each other. I can see that being a hurdle yes?

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Don't BRDs buffs currently overwrite each other too or was that fixed?

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Originally Posted by SweetPete

Most are saying aoe cards will be good but what if you have 2 Astros? You basically will just keep overwriting each other. I can see that being a hurdle yes?

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It’s workable with cards having a 15 second duration vs 30 second recast. A little communication and it wouldn’t be a problem at all. No different to DPS jobs really

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Originally Posted by SweetPete

Most are saying aoe cards will be good but what if you have 2 Astros? You basically will just keep overwriting each other. I can see that being a hurdle yes?

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Makes 0 difference than right now. Outside of Savage and EX content where I am with people who I can communicate and coordinate my Divination gets written over or my cards do. Its just as annoying now and it will be just as annoying with AOE cards. That's a player issue.

Ideally if we have varied card effects even if AOE, say Balance and Bole, they would stack because they're different buffs. My balance would give 10% damage the other AST's Bole would give X mitigation.

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Originally Posted by SweetPete

Most are saying aoe cards will be good but what if you have 2 Astros? You basically will just keep overwriting each other. I can see that being a hurdle yes?

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That would be a terrible excuse to use because every comp with 2 of the same raid buffs/ debuffs suffers. DNC, DRG, BRD, AST, SCH, NIN... doesn't matter. Randoms in DF will rarely coordinate if at all and if you try to do it chances are it gets ignored. Almost every time I told the other NIN that I can use instant TA so he can use it at 15s it just got instantly overwritten. If I delayed it, they waited and then overwrote it.

It's a minor annoyance in DF and ultimately doesn't matter at all and in Ex+ you can coordinate if you really run a double comp. But SE doesn't try to balance around double comps, otherwise the dps wouldn't overwrite each others debuffs/ buffs. So if a double comp sucks for whatever reason (and especially without communication) it's just tough luck for the static/ PF that chose to run it.

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Originally Posted by Nizzi

Don't BRDs buffs currently overwrite each other too or was that fixed?

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Last time I checked BRD songs they still overwrote each other and unlike AST you don't even have the option to delay those.

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Originally Posted by Nizzi

Don't BRDs buffs currently overwrite each other too or was that fixed?

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Yes but it’s part of bards personal rotation too so it benefits them allot.

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Originally Posted by Sebazy

It’s workable with cards having a 15 second duration vs 30 second recast. A little communication and it wouldn’t be a problem at all. No different to DPS jobs really

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Most eorzeans could care less to be honest. I’ve seen it. Most don’t wanna communicate or work with you sadly.

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Originally Posted by Rilifane

That would be a terrible excuse to use because every comp with 2 of the same raid buffs/ debuffs suffers. DNC, DRG, BRD, AST, SCH, NIN... doesn't matter. Randoms in DF will rarely coordinate if at all and if you try to do it chances are it gets ignored. Almost every time I told the other NIN that I can use instant TA so he can use it at 15s it just got instantly overwritten. If I delayed it, they waited and then overwrote it.

It's a minor annoyance in DF and ultimately doesn't matter at all and in Ex+ you can coordinate if you really run a double comp. But SE doesn't try to balance around double comps, otherwise the dps wouldn't overwrite each others debuffs/ buffs. So if a double comp sucks for whatever reason (and especially without communication) it's just tough luck for the static/ PF that chose to run it.

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So basically outside of savage it’s okay to deal with the annoyance? I’ve never liked it tbh. Like when I play on sch and get sage as partner and I see them shield allot I just let them shield. With Astro it’s different because you both drawing cards with the same effects. So unless you ask the other Astro to work with you it will be a huge annoyance and waste of time drawing if they just gonna overwrite you anyway. I didn’t like it in HW Ast and I definitely won’t like it if they implement it with the adjustments in 7.0

Sorry just my opinion. That’s all.

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Originally Posted by Absurdity

Last time I checked BRD songs they still overwrote each other and unlike AST you don't even have the option to delay those.

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But again you are using the same rotation on bard and it benefits them entirely because of repertoire. Astro will most likely have varied effects again.

I can see it now. I draw balance and the other Astro overwrites it with ewer lol. Just being realistic here that’s all.

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Originally Posted by SweetPete

So basically outside of savage it’s okay to deal with the annoyance? I’ve never liked it tbh. Like when I play on sch and get sage as partner and I see them shield allot I just let them shield. With Astro it’s different because you both drawing cards with the same effects. So unless you ask the other Astro to work with you it will be a huge annoyance and waste of time drawing if they just gonna overwrite you anyway. I didn’t like it in HW Ast and I definitely won’t like it if they implement it with the adjustments in 7.0

Sorry just my opinion. That’s all.

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Honestly it is just something you learn to deal with as double Astro. I treat it the same way as a cohealer who is over healing because it feels just as annoying and it is just as minor.

"Did they need to cast Medica 2 when I have a Giant Dominance ES on the ground? No. Does it really harm me? No."
"Did they just overwrite my Divination that I casted literally 2 seconds before them? Yes. Does it harm me? No, this isn't Savage where it matters. Its just an Alliance Raid." Same with cards.

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Originally Posted by SweetPete

So basically outside of savage it’s okay to deal with the annoyance? I’ve never liked it tbh. Like when I play on sch and get sage as partner and I see them shield allot I just let them shield. With Astro it’s different because you both drawing cards with the same effects. So unless you ask the other Astro to work with you it will be a huge annoyance and waste of time drawing if they just gonna overwrite you anyway. I didn’t like it in HW Ast and I definitely won’t like it if they implement it with the adjustments in 7.0

Sorry just my opinion. That’s all.

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Don't blow this out of proportion by making it out to be something that constantly happens. If I'll get another AST in my party every once in a blue moon that is hellbent on overwriting my cards then I'll gladly take that if it means the class gets fixed for all content in return. Getting your cards overwritten if you happen to do a roulette on AST and it's 8man and DF also happened to pair you with another AST that also plays aoe cards exactly when you do just to spite you is a very minor annoyance and a rare case compared to being a complete mess in... every content in this entire game? And that's already a lot of ifs and ands.
Yes, I'd definitely rather deal with that than current AST.

Did that dps need to use Addle right after I did? Did the other tank need to use Reprisal when mine was already on? Did the other healer need to healspam everyone to full? No.
Is it a bit annoying? Yes. Can I shrug it off and move on with my day? Also yes.
Overwriting things happens, it's not game breaking and it's definitely not something that is worth having a class in all content be a bloated mess to play to avoid it. Because making buffs stack would likely be the only solution and that is a can of worms you really don't want to open.

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Originally Posted by SweetPete

Most eorzeans could care less to be honest. I’ve seen it. Most don’t wanna communicate or work with you sadly.

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Originally Posted by SweetPete

So basically outside of savage it’s okay to deal with the annoyance?

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It feels like a bit of a reach to me if I'm brutally honest.

It's one of those things where you can work around it even if the other healer isn't being cooperative. You can see their card buffs clear as day and simply stall yours till theirs drops. It's a niggle where as long as 1 of the pair is paying attention and is willing to work around it, it's a complete non issue.

Having 2 tanks fight over agro is vastly more problematic but that doesn't seem to be viewed as a genuine issue, just one of those things that is what it is. This is the same, except it barely matters in the grand scheme of things.

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Originally Posted by SweetPete

Most eorzeans could care less to be honest. I’ve seen it. Most don’t wanna communicate or work with you sadly.

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Because outside voice comms, communication in this game requires typing which takes time to type and time to read.

In the middle of a fight is a bad time for that.

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Originally Posted by Rilifane

Don't blow this out of proportion by making it out to be something that constantly happens. If I'll get another AST in my party every once in a blue moon that is hellbent on overwriting my cards then I'll gladly take that if it means the class gets fixed for all content in return. Getting your cards overwritten if you happen to do a roulette on AST and it's 8man and DF also happened to pair you with another AST that also plays aoe cards exactly when you do just to spite you is a very minor annoyance and a rare case compared to being a complete mess in... every content in this entire game? And that's already a lot of ifs and ands.
Yes, I'd definitely rather deal with that than current AST.

Did that dps need to use Addle right after I did? Did the other tank need to use Reprisal when mine was already on? Did the other healer need to healspam everyone to full? No.
Is it a bit annoying? Yes. Can I shrug it off and move on with my day? Also yes.
Overwriting things happens, it's not game breaking and it's definitely not something that is worth having a class in all content be a bloated mess to play to avoid it. Because making buffs stack would likely be the only solution and that is a can of worms you really don't want to open.

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I agree with you that Astro is messy right now. I’m not saying that it doesn’t need the changes the devs are wanting to do. Not saying that at all. I’m just voicing my concerns that’s all. Yeah it will be an annoyance to have my cards overwritten but it won’t be nothing I can’t deal with.