An AST Guide?

Has anyone seen an AST guide laying around? If not, do you think that one should be made to help players having a rough time with the class?

For my own sake, I'm compiling a list of the abilities from the other healer classes to compare, and was mainly wondering if anyone else would want to see it when it's done.

If y'all want to see it when it's done, are there any specifics you want addressed?

Of course, a guide would be helpful for everyone who wants to grab a hold to AST, therefore if you got the time, go ahead! :X

Considering the things that should be mentioned:

-Stat-weightings (incl. reason why you think stat x > stat y)
- which one to buff with which card (too many apparently dont know it)
- which card to RR and when to do so
- how to use Time Dilation
- Core Mechanics (in general for those who havnt played the healing role yet)


I'll let you know if something else comes to my mind ^^

so far

//edited cuz i went full retard and pressed tab+enter.. xD

A lot of this has been covered in recent threads.

One point that I find important is this:

Balance and Arrow are by far the most universally effective cards; the others, at least in their present state, exist primarily to be fed to Royal Road or to be Shuffled. The conditions for making them useful to cast range from uncommon to incredibly rare, and RNG has an excellent chance of denying those cards to you when you might actually want them.

Stat priority remains unchanged (WHM meta: DET/PIE), and Spell Speed remains a garbage stat UNLESS it is significantly buffing HoT effects, which I haven't really tested.

Hence why I thought an AST guide might be relevant. Recent threads are pretty scattered, with information popping up throughout. So, going through and grabbing all that info for a guide seemed pretty worthy. I just wasn't sure if the community would want to see one.

A lot of what I've read from other threads has been on the cards, and when to use them, and how they're weak/unreliable. I think the best way to look at the cards is a matter of priority (Is RR up? Is it the RR I want? Is this a card I want to RR?) and rearrange them accordingly. Due to Draw running on RNG, it seems silly for anyone playing AST to try and make some sort of "god-tier combo" around a pair of cards that may never come up.

Something I do need someone to help me out with, is Time Dilation. I'm only 46 AST atm. I want to know if TD works with extended RR. I don't particularly care what card you RR so long as someone can tell me if the time limit goes from 30 > 45 or 40 > 55.

Spell Speed for AST still seems like it isn't worth it. The only HoT effects they have are Aspected Benefic and Helios which you really shouldn't dropping all that often. So far I've had very little reason, but that may just be familiarity with content from all players at this point. Also, is there a WHM guide someone can direct me to so I can see why you'd PIE over MND? Last I was aware it was still MND and I've been building my AST similarly.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...ilebasic?pli=1

Quick google search turned this up. I hope it helps.

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Originally Posted by Apeiron

is there a WHM guide someone can direct me to so I can see why you'd PIE over MND? Last I was aware it was still MND and I've been building my AST similarly.

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There's no such thing as PIE over MND. The gear all comes with MND; MND is a given.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Apeiron

Due to Draw running on RNG, it seems silly for anyone playing AST to try and make some sort of "god-tier combo" around a pair of cards that may never come up.

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This is true, but it's also true that most of the cards provide negligible benefit in the majority of situations, so you'll still end up feeding most of them to RR or attempting to Shuffle them away.

Don't think much guides will pop up till after alex as most ppl r focused on tht atm

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Apeiron

Something I do need someone to help me out with, is Time Dilation. I'm only 46 AST atm. I want to know if TD works with extended RR. I don't particularly care what card you RR so long as someone can tell me if the time limit goes from 30 > 45 or 40 > 55.

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Just a thing on TD, cuz it's description is somewhat misleading (or at least it was me xD)

The tooltip says its increasing the time of beneficial effects on the target, so in the beginning (before I unlocked the skill) I thought it might increase the duration of ALL beneficial buffs (i.e. Blood for Blood, etc.). Yet it only increases buffs you apply - and all of them - so it increases the time of Aspected Benefic & Helios, Card-Effects, even Protect^^. It has no diminishing return of any kind as far as i noticed so you can stack it with the shiny effect from the lv60 ability (*spoiler*another +5sec duration in AE)

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Originally Posted by Cynfael

There's no such thing as PIE over MND.

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I would not want to sign this, at least not for all healer jobs. Back in the days of Garuda EM (the time i quitted FF14 for a while - therefore i can't bring a more recent example) using the Tank Ring from Garuda EM as a SCH (Vita/Crit/DTR) was a viable choice, because the way MND affects Adloq isn't all that big (or at least it was in my opinion neglectable, cuz of the crit synergy with Adloq). It made a difference <50 iirc. Furthermore to stay on topic I'd rather skill PIE with SCH than MND at that point, also because MND was rather not worth it, or it didnt feel worth it to me. With more Mana i could spam Adloq more often, etc.


Edit: Sry for double-posting

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Originally Posted by YuiSasaki

I would not want to sign this, at least not for all healer jobs. Back in the days of Garuda EM (the time i quitted FF14 for a while - therefore i can't bring a more recent example) using the Tank Ring from Garuda EM as a SCH (Vita/Crit/DTR) was a viable choice, because the way MND affects Adloq isn't all that big (or at least it was in my opinion neglectable, cuz of the crit synergy with Adloq). It made a difference <50 iirc. Furthermore to stay on topic I'd rather skill PIE with SCH than MND at that point, also because MND was rather not worth it, or it didnt feel worth it to me. With more Mana i could spam Adloq more often, etc.


Edit: Sry for double-posting

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What you describe is more of a personal preference (or, to be generous, a specific encounter vs. ilvl strategy) rather than a general meta.

VIT can situationally be prioritized over MND when you are attempting to progress at an ilvl lower than what the encounter was designed for (i.e. meeting a HP check), as ACC frequently is, but this is virtually never the case with PIE for a couple of reasons: 1) healer equipment is already fairly saturated with PIE and 2) MND not only contributes to healing potency over the course of a fight, but increases DPS potency as well with Cleric Stance, which is vitally important for early progression when the party is struggling to meet the minimum clear requirement.

For situations outside of end-game raid progression, it's pretty much impossible to wind up with too little PIE. MND all the way, and the PIE you need will just come with your gear.

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Originally Posted by Sarynth

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...ilebasic?pli=1

Quick google search turned this up. I hope it helps.

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I'm going to go over this to see if this has covered all the things I'm thinking of, or if it has anything I haven't, or missed something that I didn't think of originally. Thanks for the link.

Anyone know off hand if Disable can be stacked with other AST Disable? I don't believe it can, but can't recall. I know you can slap it on top of Virus, but....

Virus and Virus won't stack so my guess is: no it won't stack..

Virus gives a debuff which prevents another Virus though. I don't believe disable does any such thing.

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Originally Posted by basketofseals

Virus gives a debuff which prevents another Virus though. I don't believe disable does any such thing.

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That's because they nerfed Virus from 2.0. Originally, applying Virus would just refresh the timer of an existing Virus. All it did was extend the duration and not stack the mitigation.

Confirmed it myself, and the verdict is that it doesn't stack. It does, however, refresh disable if it hasn't been used up. I'm guessing it works on the first action to avoid the same problem they ran into with virus. Also means that AST can slap disable on a boss, one after the other.