3.1 : Astrologian "adjustments''

I've tried to stick with AST, but I just can't get over how much better SCH is by comparison.

I prefer AST's playstyle, but the raw potency of SCH in not only healing but damage output is just too good to be ignored. :\

That and the mana management is just a bazillion times better...

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Originally Posted by RichardButte

I've tried to stick with AST, but I just can't get over how much better SCH is by comparison.

I prefer AST's playstyle, but the raw potency of SCH in not only healing but damage output is just too good to be ignored. :\

That and the mana management is just a bazillion times better...

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Yep, in the same boat.

At least I can play it in void ark now.

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Originally Posted by RichardButte

I've tried to stick with AST, but I just can't get over how much better SCH is by comparison.

I prefer AST's playstyle, but the raw potency of SCH in not only healing but damage output is just too good to be ignored. :\

That and the mana management is just a bazillion times better...

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To each his own. I was always WHM but am pretty much only AST now. I got SCH to 50 and just can't go further, dunno what it is I just have zero interest in Scholar. I hate using a pet and I don't want to be expected to DPS. I'd rather do it when I'm able to, as I want to heal with any DPS being bonus. I love playing AST now, it can easily keep up with everything I used to do as WHM. I've done Void Ark 5 times so far, always as AST and I've never had any issues. iLVL 191 here.

Use to see over 200 white mages on at night but id wager the astrologian has taken allot of traditional white mage mains.

I am currently level 56 AST and i have to say I am enjoying it. I like the visuals, and up until you get Gravity, it pretty much plays like a WHM, especially if you go Diurnal Stance. But with RNG-buffs.... In fact, my controller set up is roughly the same for both .

I find myself not using nocturnal sect unless I team up with a WHM since it's seem pretty weak compared to SCH's shields and Diurnal. This isespecially true for big pulls and aoe damage. Since regens can stack, but not shield.

I still prefer WHM overall though

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Originally Posted by Vlady

Use to see over 200 white mages on at night but id wager the astrologian has taken allot of traditional white mage mains.

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A lot of that has to do with white mage being way stronger before 3.07 than D.AST, so people invested their esos into WHM and sticked with it for a long time. Besides, I see a ridiculous amount of WHM every day on my own server, already had a Void Ark run where I was the only non-WHM, so N=1 arguments have little value here.

I just wish Nocturnal would be on par with SCH. The AST vs WHM debate has been discussed over and over now and gear has already gone past the point that we could just ditch the discussion and acknowledge it doesn't really matter, but AST vs SCH is such a non-discussion in favor of SCH. It isn't even like nocturnal is weak, at all. Sure, potency-wise it is inferior to diurnal, but it allows you to boost eHP and gives you a spammable 'oh shit' burst heal should you ever be in trouble, and the potency difference isn't even that detrimental aside from Aspected Helios. Against the other benefits of having a SCH though, N.AST just seems like a less reliable healer that requires more effort to match an 'okay' SCH, while a remotely good SCH completely trumps nearly every N.AST.

The more I play, the more I appreciate the other healer WHM slightly larger range on Medica II. As an AST, there are times where I know my Aspected diurnal Helios isn't going to hit everyone reliably. WHM and AST are definitely similar, but they DO have strengths/weaknesses.

Noct just shouldn't have as many weaknesses to SCH very few weaknesses. Too large of a gap. I do hope they don't just increase potency though. Give them something else..like, empower shield by 30% when using CO. Maybe give their shield a % to reflect damage. Or maybe when the shield pops, it heals for 10% of the amount shielded.

I would be all for a new type of shield mechanic for astrologians that gives a partial shield that reduces damage taken by a % until it the damage breaks the shield hp buffer and turn nocturnal into an offensive stance.

Remove cleric stance for astrologian and let nocturnal be a weaker version of cleric stance but no healing potency decreases with above unique shield mechanic.

I think what would be cool, is to change the sects completely, pretty sure it won't happen. Durnal should give lower regens, but gain a percentage of damage taken to the regen porency. Noct could maybe lose initial healing potency but bock a percent of damage for a set time and heal for damage blocked once the timer ran out.
This could allow for greater distinction between healers and make celestial opposition and time dilation useful for noct sect.

Hmm i have been ast from the start of heavenward... What annoys me is that we are compaired to whm and sch.. I dont even say diurnal or nocturnal sect no more only my whm stance or sch stance, which is wrong, i want to heal as a astrologian with my cards xD

Tbh make diurnal sect the healer stance with specific cards to aid healing and turn nocturnal sect into dps and buffer stance and give that specific cards to aid with damage and support

For example whilst in diurnal every held card effects your aspect benefic so if u hold bole your aspect healing spells grant the damage reduction buff aswell as heal them

Whilst in nocturnal sect your cards can enhance certain spells for example whilst holding balance ur malefic 2 apply weakness increase the target damage taken by 5% from all sources

Astrologian need to be purely focus around its cards aspect healing and there cooldowns

Another example would to use time dialation to extend all debuffs by 15 sec which is 5extra ticks worth of damage for all jobs

Turn royal road into a card eater skill which u burn for mp and drop all effects what royal royal road and make royal road reduce the next draw by 10 sec so im waiting 20 sec instead of 30 for my next draw

For example im looking for bole for my aspect benefic due to high damage but i draw spire i royal road spire for mp and reduce my next draw by 10 seconds, 20 second later i pull bole, i spread bole and now all my aspect healing spells grant the damage reduction to players with my aspect healing spells on them

Aspected helios gives 5% damage reduction for 20 seconds
Aspected benefic 10% damage reduction for 10 seconds

How ever they cannot stack

Now if i want the 15% damage reduction for tank busters i would be force to use the spread card to gain the enhance version but they would need to reduce spread cooldown alot and buff all cards to 20% to make it worthwhile

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Originally Posted by Yhisa

stuff

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Just saying, you don't need to do 3 post. You just need to edit your post if you want to remove the character limitation.

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Originally Posted by NamoNanamo

Just saying, you don't need to do 3 post. You just need to edit your post if you want to remove the character limitation.

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Yeah i know but u cannot edit your posts on tablet that why i posted 3 times

You can
Just copy your whole post
Send a line
Edit and paste the whole thing

There is no edit button on the tablet or phones so she had to use 3 posts. SE should remove the ridiculous limit since we have a post limit per day anyway. Ultimately I wanted a gambler dps job over a healer based card job. Having the gambler outfit be the artifact gear slinging cards like Gambit and random buffing the crowd would have been more fun then healing with card shuffling imo.

What annoys me with the AST community is that we trying to copy spells from other classes... Please stop.. Im always seeing this

1) gravity to be like holy or to give heavy (why heavy when gravity hits around a target slow would be way better and for mitigation since ur slowing attacks down)

2) illuminate aether to be like "shroud of saints"
3) turn spire into crit buff "dragoon already gives this"
4) turn synasty into perminate buff "so it be like a fairy and heal 2 targets"

This is just a few i keep seeing pop up in threads A LOT majority people want copy skills of whm or sch... And this is the problem

We need pure focus on our cards and turn us into a pure buffer healer job... Not a copy of the current healers ast have got many issues that is not even listed which is over looked

Issues with astrologian

1) time dialation is wasted in nocturnal sect, unlike diurnal i can extend my HoTs which provides more healing and can combo bole+hots on tank

2) stella is useless and is never used apart from pvp
3) benefic 2 procs needs to change
4) celestial opposition needs a rework 5sec to buffs is useless, stun is nice
5) spear card only works on cooldowns u have not used
6) ewer is eatten if drk uses darkside (annoying)
7) expanded cards only expand around the person u place it on
8) my cards is over written with another ast in party even if i used extended balance with time dialation (really frustrating)
9) aspected helios (diurnal) does not stack with another ast but 2 whm medica 2 can

And this is the minor stuff.. Iv been playing ast from the very start and keep at it, so i often see these frustrations alot ... But when i meet a ast in raid with me.. I always have to change to nocturnal because all AST knows that diurnal >nocturnal and this is a problem

Please make it so out sects are healer and dps stance for example

Diurnal sect
Whilst in diurnal you can only draw spire, ewer, bole ...turn ewer into tp and mp regen, turn spire into something else, bole reduce damage, while in diurnal sec cards last longer, spread change ur healing spells base on what card u hold, bole gives shields, ewer gives regen, spire something else

Nocturnal sect
Whilst in nocturnal sect you can only draw balace, arrow, spear , while in nocturnal sect all cards gain enhance , holding a card in spread it gives u a perminate buff for urself, balance 5% damage, arrow 5% haste, spear something else

Royal road
Use your draw card and expand it across all those within ur party

Shuffle
5 sec cooldown
Shuffle a card and replace it with another (fishing for the cards u need)

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Originally Posted by Yaichiro

Most likely they will receive some kind of MP buff.

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Don;t they already have lower costs than the other two classes? They don; need a buff, it's more likely that the costs will be increased, making this a nerf

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Originally Posted by Yhisa

What annoys me with the AST community is that we trying to copy spells from other classes... Please stop.. Im always seeing this

1) gravity to be like holy or to give heavy (why heavy when gravity hits around a target slow would be way better and for mitigation since ur slowing attacks down)

2) illuminate aether to be like "shroud of saints"
3) turn spire into crit buff "dragoon already gives this"
4) turn synasty into perminate buff "so it be like a fairy and heal 2 targets"

This is just a few i keep seeing pop up in threads A LOT majority people want copy skills of whm or sch... And this is the problem

We need pure focus on our cards and turn us into a pure buffer healer job... Not a copy of the current healers ast have got many issues that is not even listed which is over looked

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Gravity is a bit like Damned if you damned if you don;t kinda thing. Each of the effects associated with Gravity's pull (Slow, Bind and Heavy obviously) are already in other spells. so they kinda have to go with pure damage buff

As for the cards I did have an idea for an "Aspected Malefic" attack that gives a debuff to mobs based on the card you drew but new moves are outside the scope of patches usually

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Originally Posted by Yhisa

Issues with astrologian

1) time dialation is wasted in nocturnal sect, unlike diurnal i can extend my HoTs which provides more healing and can combo bole+hots on tank

2) stella is useless and is never used apart from pvp
3) benefic 2 procs needs to change
4) celestial opposition needs a rework 5sec to buffs is useless, stun is nice
5) spear card only works on cooldowns u have not used
6) ewer is eatten if drk uses darkside (annoying)
7) expanded cards only expand around the person u place it on
8) my cards is over written with another ast in party even if i used extended balance with time dialation (really frustrating)
9) aspected helios (diurnal) does not stack with another ast but 2 whm medica 2 can

And this is the minor stuff.. Iv been playing ast from the very start and keep at it, so i often see these frustrations alot ... But when i meet a ast in raid with me.. I always have to change to nocturnal because all AST knows that diurnal >nocturnal and this is a problem

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1. Nocturnal cannot be buffed or altered without astrologians losing healing potencies in duirnal.
2. Why must every ability be useful in pve? It has nice applications in pvp.
3. Ben 2 proc allowing reset of draw would be awesome.
4. Lackluster cooldowns for the insanely strong cooldowns we already have. It works with Aether so its not as bad as you make it out to be.
5. Spear is useful on machinist with its plethora of mini cooldowns and is a potent card to use on yourself. If they change it then give it a buff that places it on someone that says next major cooldown used is reduced by 20% its cooldown that stays on you until you use a major cooldown.
6. Any form of refresh should not be given to a dark ever. Not an issue as it is suppose to be that way.
7. Seems more of a timing issue over it being a real issue. Like our shorter helios range. Just something we have to deal with and not even worth mentioning.
8. Same issues with scholars and galvanize. Its called coordination. In dungeon finder runs the content is not challenging enough to really care.
9. We already have taken the title of strongest single target healer from the white mage. Want us to have the few advantages that the white mage has as well?

Half of your issues are personal issues over actual problems with the Astrologian.

1. No. A thoughtful approach can be taken to ensure balance. Flat out saying that NO change can be done is completely short sighted and unfounded.
2. Astrologians don't need any "niche" or near useless skills tyvm. Stella should have a dps potency buff or some other more useful pve effect. There are pvp skills and spells that are unlocked by doing pvp-- I'll take one of those in exchange for stella please.
3. Strangely agree with you on this one-- although would prefer reduced MP cost, or "next cast is instant and doesn't expire until you use it"
4. None of Astrolgians cooldowns are "insanely" strong with the exception of synergy-- and I'd venture to say it is just "strong". AST is neither a powerhouse in healing, nor dps-- it is more or less just adequate.
5. Spear needs help. It needs to work on all cooldowns even if they have already been used. I believe that is the way it was supposed to work from the start
6. Ewer MP regen potency should be a bit higher.
7. Expanded cards should reach EVERYONE in the party no mater what end of discussion. Especially considering you have likely went to great lengths shuffling/spreading/drawing/royal roading in order to set up the combo.
8. I disagree entirely with this Vlady. It is not the same thing. Galvanize only overrides another galvanize if the effect is is more potent-- ergo no harm in that happening, same with adlo. The cards overriding each other is entirely different especially when an ast decides to expand a bole onto the entire party mid-fight for no apparent reason, when I have already placed an expanded balance on the entire party and used celestial oppostion. It is completely maddening when this happens.
9. AST is not the strongest single target healer lol. I daresay SCH is, with WHM a very close second with its amazing toolkit of Bene, Tetra, Divine Seal and Presence of Mind.

Vlady-- you seem to think there is this underground movement of AST's that are cracking their knuckles and trying to find ways to take the healing mantle away from the WHM. This will never happen. Last stat from SE I read had only 3% of the healers clearing A4 being AST. If AST was as OP as you claim it to be, that stat would be much different, and ppl would have abandoned WHM in droves the way tanks abandoned PLD when 3.0 came out in favour of DRK.

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Originally Posted by OpheliaHeartilly

9. AST is not the strongest single target healer lol. I daresay SCH is, with WHM a very close second with its amazing toolkit of Bene, Tetra, Divine Seal and Presence of Mind.

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Not going to bother with SCH vs AST (lolfairy) but Essential Dignity far outperforms Tetra, Synastry outperforms Divine Seal on a linear fight, a good AST can use Time Dilation too which can't really be compared with anything WHM has just like you can't really compare PoM/Benediction. There's a ton of contextual stuff here but having two extra skills at the cost of your two other skills being inferior to AST's isn't exactly what I'd call 'very close second with its amazing toolkit', when your base single-target toolkit is already inferior. But again, this is compared to a linear fight which will literally never happen unless Faust makes a return.

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Originally Posted by AzureFlare

Not going to bother with SCH vs AST (lolfairy) but Essential Dignity far outperforms Tetra, Synastry outperforms Divine Seal on a linear fight, a good AST can use Time Dilation too which can't really be compared with anything WHM has just like you can't really compare PoM/Benediction. There's a ton of contextual stuff here but having two extra skills at the cost of your two other skills being inferior to AST's isn't exactly what I'd call 'very close second with its amazing toolkit', when your base single-target toolkit is already inferior. But again, this is compared to a linear fight which will literally never happen unless Faust makes a return.

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I thought Essential Dignity is the Benediction counterpart?

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Originally Posted by Morningstar1337

I thought Essential Dignity is the Benediction counterpart?

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Only when it crits for 16k. Only then.

More seriously: wouldn't it make more sense to compare it to Tetragrammaton considering Benediction is not usually used regularly whereas Tetragrammaton and Essential Dignity both are? Either way you are comparing a 40 second cooldown ability that should have a 700 potency worth on average when used correctly to a 60 second cooldown ability worth 700 potency by default and a full heal on 300second cooldown. Essential Dignity on its own isn't even that far off from Tetra and Benediction together.

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Originally Posted by AzureFlare

Essential Dignity far outperforms Tetra, Synastry outperforms Divine Seal on a linear fight.

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The only thing Essential Dignity has going for it is the 40 second cooldown. The variable potency rewards a peculiar healer mentality in some that you need to watch your tanks HP deplete with your finger hovering on the key for ED in order to use it when they drop to near death. The only reason you can say it outperforms Tetra is because you get to use it more often per fight, but unless the tanks HP is 50% or below (give or take) Benefic II has the same potency and is likely more appropriate than standing there with a "wait for it... wait for it... BAM ED!" As for Synastry outperforming Divine Seal... I guess? I use Synastry most often for the buff to healing power rather than the "heal two targets at once" benefit. For an AST outside a raid environment healing two targets at once is infrequently required, and when it is, its usually multiple targets that need to be healed and an aoe heal covers that. As an AST myself, I am all too familiar with the "whm and sch are amazing" rhetoric followed by the subsequent "but... Synastry is the best healing cooldown in the game" type answer. I realize after that answer though, I've played my ace, and the rest of my hand is a little "meh".

Hmmm... Or maybe everyone stop making ast into whm/sch??

Go read the entire thread and all i see is that people ripping off whm or sch skills and want mimic versions...NO STOP

Its about time we stop compairing whm/sch to ast and actually have ideas to seperate us from our healer counterparts, not copy there skills or make a wish lost of skills we want like theres... For example this is what i see

Gravity to be like holy....or gravity with heavy o.O like wtf people why..why..why

Please for the love of ast find ways so we are NOT comparied to whm/sch..... Once we all can stop doing this AST would be soo much better

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Originally Posted by OpheliaHeartilly

The only thing Essential Dignity has going for it is the 40 second cooldown. The variable potency rewards a peculiar healer mentality in some that you need to watch your tanks HP deplete with your finger hovering on the key for ED in order to use it when they drop to near death. The only reason you can say it outperforms Tetra is because you get to use it more often per fight, but unless the tanks HP is 50% or below (give or take) Benefic II has the same potency and is likely more appropriate than standing there with a "wait for it... wait for it... BAM ED!" As for Synastry outperforming Divine Seal... I guess? I use Synastry most often for the buff to healing power rather than the "heal two targets at once" benefit. For an AST outside a raid environment healing two targets at once is infrequently required, and when it is, its usually multiple targets that need to be healed and an aoe heal covers that. As an AST myself, I am all too familiar with the "whm and sch are amazing" rhetoric followed by the subsequent "but... Synastry is the best healing cooldown in the game" type answer. I realize after that answer though, I've played my ace, and the rest of my hand is a little "meh".

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About Essential Dignity - If you're using basically on cooldown and with the tank down 12% HP, it'll outperform Tetra on cooldown. There's some semantics involved but if you're using it on a tank with 25% HP loss only, ED will outperform Tetra with notably less overheal too thanks to the variable nature of the ability. ED is just easier to use and it'll beat Tetra in most scenarios. And hey, it's a free Benefic or Benefic II every 40 seconds. More to love.

On paper, Synastry provides the best single target burst. You can basically turn every Benefic into a Benefic II when healing a tank which is amazing for the AST's MP. Or turn Benefic II into the equivalent of a mini Benediction (1,092 potency says hi!) every 90s. It has a longer a cooldown but the single target implications (or two target implications) is very potent. To me it serves a different purpose of being able to revitalize a tank very fast compared to the more general purpose Divine Seal.

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Originally Posted by OpheliaHeartilly

Stuff

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Synastry buff itself also works on single target, to be fair, turning any direct heals into 68% (1.0 * 1.2 * 1.4). I never said Synastry is the best healing cooldown personally, and I don't even think it is, but it is great in the two things it can do. Just like how Divine Seal is vastly superior when it comes to boosting AoE healing and I'd pick Divine Seal over Synastry any day in an AoE setup.

And why would I wait with Essential Dignity when I can cast a heal, ED right after and laugh as the netcode lag is so real it'll heal with a potency higher than it should be healing at? Or even better, juggle ED with Aspected Benefic and Cleric Stance. The behavior is only peculiar when you grow in the mindset '<100% = bad' and idle just for the sake of idling, but I wouldn't even bother using ED above 50% unless I know I absolutely need to before things go sour given it can crit for big numbers too.

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Originally Posted by Yhisa

Hmmm... Or maybe everyone stop making ast into whm/sch??

Go read the entire thread and all i see is that people ripping off whm or sch skills and want mimic versions...NO STOP

Its about time we stop compairing whm/sch to ast and actually have ideas to seperate us from our healer counterparts, not copy there skills or make a wish lost of skills we want like theres... For example this is what i see

Gravity to be like holy....or gravity with heavy o.O like wtf people why..why..why

Please for the love of ast find ways so we are NOT comparied to whm/sch..... Once we all can stop doing this AST would be soo much better

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But yet you are allowed to make comparisons and whimsically turn astro threads into compare to white/scholar threads?

Yhisa throwing a fit because people have different opinions on how the class should be and Vlady tossing around some pretty big accusations that make the community "WTF" at almost every post. The healer forums are once again dominated by derailed topics on AST or just straight up "this class sucks" threads.

Feels like July all over again on the Official Forums.

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Originally Posted by MidnightTundra

.snip

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Hmmm? U mean reply in 2 posts? Yeah because thats every thread....

"Different opinions". U mean the same crap people keep saying wanting to be like WHM in diurnal sect and to be like SCH in nocturnal sect? Have u even read all the asts posts is stupid.... I want a damn identity and my own playstyle.. Take away my cards mechanics and ast becomes mega boring.... The only reasons people play ast is because of its cards.... But people still insist to want to be a damn whm/sch clone.... No.. But i agree with the jap forum ... A lot more focus on cards and not our healing ... Heck i would be extreamly happy if they killed off diurnal and nocturnal sect and turned us into pure enchantress style gameplay.... But that will never happen because of the community... But this is my last post because im fed up with this crap

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Originally Posted by Vlady

.snip. ?

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Hmmm? I dont need to because they do that themselves... As soon as they make a damn topic... Garentee they mention WHM or SCH and that they want X skill like Y skill :(

But yet your keep enchanting us with post after postdespite talking about no longer posting.

Damn. Vlady is still on his anti-WHM kick I see. And it's funny how whatever job he is maining is the "strongest" and pushes out WHM. (Anyone who was around before 3.0 probably remembers his " SCH is way better than WHM at everything and should be used over them in everything and no one plays WHM in end game content" threads and posts.)

Honestly AST's RNG needs to be less frustrating and needs to synergize better with everyone, especially with their own kit.

I didn't want to scroll through +11 pages to find a single answer, so please help me out, did the update make Astrologians more playable, are they on par with Scholars now in terms of versatility?

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Originally Posted by Selvokaz

I didn't want to scroll through +11 pages to find a single answer, so please help me out, did the update make Astrologians more playable, are they on par with Scholars now in terms of versatility?

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They're adequate WHM substitutes while using Diurnal Sect but Nocturnal AST doesn't quite touch SCH in terms of mitigation, healing, and consistent raid DPS contribution. So, yes and no?

It's certainly playable and can do fine on all currently available content, though. I'd still be hesitant to go AST+WHM on A3s (and then again it doesn't matter as much as before) and especially A4s but it works alright with AST+SCH.

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Originally Posted by Rivxkobe

Damn. Vlady is still on his anti-WHM kick I see. And it's funny how whatever job he is maining is the "strongest" and pushes out WHM. (Anyone who was around before 3.0 probably remembers his " SCH is way better than WHM at everything and should be used over them in everything and no one plays WHM in end game content" threads and posts.)

Honestly AST's RNG needs to be less frustrating and needs to synergize better with everyone, especially with their own kit.

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Aah snap. Got burned on that one. Let us compromise then. Astrologian is pushed back behind white mage in heal strength and stop asking for the utility and dps of scholars and stop asking for stronger buffs then I will gladly take a back seat on my responses in this regard. And if the white mage was in such a wonderful position then why did SE give them the one thing I was touting that was the number one thing needed for white mages which was an instant heal which scholar had but white didnt back then?