AST change

This is hard for me because I dont main AST. I play it occasionally but not enough to be an expert. But my thoughts on some of Yoshi-P's excuses as to why they didnt add another healer is because they are having a hard time finding another unique playstyle. I saw that their reason to add another tank is to have 2 MT and 2 OT. I think this could apply to healers as well by having 2 MH and 2 OH. The two MH would be Scholar and Whitemage. I think AST is a very good class and I enjoy it very much. Here is my idea to take AST out of SCH and WHM's shadow and make it its very own OH.

First of all we get rid of the stances. Instead we turn them into CD's. Let me show you some examples.

Diurnal Sect becomes an ability that lasts 30 seconds that empowers ALL of their heals not just Aspected. Gives them a Regen effect of 140 potency for 21s. If the target already has Regen on them, the Regen will stack but for half the duration but 250 potency(making it a more powerful Regen but much sorter).

So basically AST's are no longer in the WHM's shadow when they use that ability and in fact it enhances the WHM because if the target already has Regen it puts another stack of Regen but a more powerful one at half the time.

With that in mind the AOE one would have a Potency of 40 for 30 seconds but the stacked version would be 80 potency for 15 seconds.

This would allow AST's to strategically use their Diurnal Sect when partnered with a WHM for amazing effects or if they are with a SCH they could get the stacked effect but they would have to put both regens instead of just 1.

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Nocturnal Sect will also be an ability that lasts for 30 seconds like the change above. It will have a similar effect but with shields. The shield will stack with SCH or its own if still on the target. The only difference is while there are two stacks of shields on the target they take 20% less damage from all sources. This may seem powerful but remember this buff only lasts for 30 seconds and Nocturnal is all about mitigation where as Diurnal is all about speedy HoTs

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Now with that in mind I want to repeat that this change would require that the Aspected spells be changed to be the AST's own spells. This is where people can get creative and I would love to hear others suggestions.

Maybe when you use Aspected benefic it casts the same card buff you last used, onto the newly healed player.

Maybe Aspected benefic causes the target to move faster but it has a damage aoe that slows and deals damage to all targets near the target you healed. Sort of like a Gravity spell.

Maybe you can make Aspected Helios a targeted ground aoe heal so you can cast it on the ground and it does two or 3 heals. First heal being instant while creating a Halo effect on the ground and others who are outside of it can run inside to get the remaining second and 3rd heal while every time the heal goes off any enemy inside will also receive damage.

These are all ideas off the top of my head as these abilities will most likely be the main ones that would have to change with my sect changes.

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I appreciate you all reading this I want you to know I am not trying to ruin the AST class so please keep the flaming down to a minimum. I felt that Yoshi-P put himself in a corner by the way he designed the class and if we can make AST its own kind of healer instead of a shadow of SCH and WHM then it would open the door to them making a 4th off healer.


TLDR: Changed AST from a shadow of SCH and WHM to being its own healer so Yoshi-P has an easier time balancing the healers to make room for a 4th healer.

Thank you again and I hope to hear some constructive feedback and not just flaming.

I'm not interested in a main healer/off healer dichotomy and it would make jobs unbalanced for other content, particularly dungeons.

A lot of the things you're suggesting are grossly overpowered. A 30 second 20% mitigation is unheard of and would trivialize so much in high end content particularly.

Sorry but this is just a big no from me all around. I understand that you're inspired by how they're handling tanks but at the end of the day healing isn't tanking and needs to be handled differently.

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Originally Posted by Veis_Alveare

I'm not interested in a main healer/off healer dichotomy and it would make jobs unbalanced for other content, particularly dungeons.

A lot of the things you're suggesting are grossly overpowered. A 30 second 20% mitigation is unheard of and would trivialize so much in high end content particularly.

Sorry but this is just a big no from me all around. I understand that you're inspired by how they're handling tanks but at the end of the day healing isn't tanking and needs to be handled differently.

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No no no I completely understand. I wouldn't dream in a million years that they would use the numbers I put there. I was just putting something there as an example to showcase how the ability will work. To defend myself just a little bit though when I say Off heals I don't mean a healer that cant solo heal something. I mean off heals as a job that can do other stuff besides just healing such as debuffs(gravity), buffs(cards), enhance(sect abilities). I get where you're coming from though and I hope maybe my further explanation helped change your mind a little bit.

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Originally Posted by Djinnrb

This is hard for me because I dont main AST. I play it occasionally but not enough to be an expert. But my thoughts on some of Yoshi-P's excuses as to why they didnt add another healer is because they are having a hard time finding another unique playstyle. I saw that their reason to add another tank is to have 2 MT and 2 OT. I think this could apply to healers as well by having 2 MH and 2 OH. The two MH would be Scholar and Whitemage. I think AST is a very good class and I enjoy it very much. Here is my idea to take AST out of SCH and WHM's shadow and make it its very own OH.

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“Main healer” and “Off healer” died off in HW, and I’d rather not see it return.

I’m a far bigger fan of healers sharing the healing responsibilities, not one being a main healer while the other just does DPS all the time.

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Originally Posted by Djinnrb

Diurnal Sect becomes an ability that lasts 30 seconds that empowers ALL of their heals not just Aspected. Gives them a Regen effect of 140 potency for 21s. If the target already has Regen on them, the Regen will stack but for half the duration but 250 potency(making it a more powerful Regen but much sorter).

So basically AST's are no longer in the WHM's shadow when they use that ability and in fact it enhances the WHM because if the target already has Regen it puts another stack of Regen but a more powerful one at half the time.

With that in mind the AOE one would have a Potency of 40 for 30 seconds but the stacked version would be 80 potency for 15 seconds.

This would allow AST's to strategically use their Diurnal Sect when partnered with a WHM for amazing effects or if they are with a SCH they could get the stacked effect but they would have to put both regens instead of just 1.

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AST isn’t in WHM’s shadow. It’s the other way around—WHM is in AST’s shadow and has been since Creator; because AST can do everything a WHM can, and it provides utility (which WHM cannot). Empowering AST’s regens would serve to make WHM even more unwanted in optimized groups, and it would honestly serve little purpose, as their healing is already fairly strong currently in Diurnal Sect (healing in general is overpowered in this game).

WHM is generally considered the “raw, pure healer”, and the devs spout that its “burst healing” is its utility; but there’s not enough outgoing damage in even the hardest fights to warrant the amount of burst healing that they currently provide. If a fight does 1 million damage, you only need to heal 1 million damage; WHM may be able to heal 2 million or even 10 million damage, but it’s all wasted after that first million is satisfied.

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Originally Posted by Djinnrb

Nocturnal Sect will also be an ability that lasts for 30 seconds like the change above. It will have a similar effect but with shields. The shield will stack with SCH or its own if still on the target. The only difference is while there are two stacks of shields on the target they take 20% less damage from all sources. This may seem powerful but remember this buff only lasts for 30 seconds and Nocturnal is all about mitigation where as Diurnal is all about speedy HoTs.

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Between a SCH’s Deployed Adlo and an AST being able to mitigate 20% just about every other raidwide AOE, what would be the point in bringing WHM or any other healer? This suggestion breaks AST even further, and just makes it more meta than it currently is.

You’d have to give this a seriously long cooldown for it to not be completely broken—it’s already overpowered even if it did have a cooldown similar to Deployment Tactics, because now SCH/AST can plan to alternate shielding for several raidwide AOEs and reduce the need for more healing...which would defeat this idea of a “main healer”.

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Originally Posted by Djinnrb

Maybe when you use Aspected benefic it casts the same card buff you last used, onto the newly healed player.

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This would also further hurt WHM and/or a new 4th healer provided the 4th healer doesn’t have an answer to Balance. AST is so strong because of its cards, Balance in particular—it doesn’t really need them empowered further.

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Originally Posted by Djinnrb

Maybe Aspected benefic causes the target to move faster but it has a damage aoe that slows and deals damage to all targets near the target you healed. Sort of like a Gravity spell.

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In higher end content, the CC wouldn’t be particularly useful, as most bosses are immune to slows. Personally, I don’t see the need for increased run speed, but that’s me. I tend to stand still in fights and only move for mechanics/if I have to.

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Originally Posted by Djinnrb

Maybe you can make Aspected Helios a targeted ground aoe heal so you can cast it on the ground and it does two or 3 heals. First heal being instant while creating a Halo effect on the ground and others who are outside of it can run inside to get the remaining second and 3rd heal while every time the heal goes off any enemy inside will also receive damage.

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I’ll repeat what I said before: giving AST more healing serves no real purpose unless content is changed to balance it out—i.e., things need to hit harder a lot more frequently than they do now. Right now, there just simply isn’t enough damage to warrant massive amounts of healing that HoTs can’t cover. Even in the hardest fights.
I personally don’t count “White Hole”/Cleansing Strike/“Reduced to 1 HP” type mechanics as decent healing mechanics; but that could be because the devs went a little nuts with them this expansion, and they result in more overheal usually than they should.

That said, AST already has an ability like this: Earthly Star. And it is ridiculously strong—750 potency AOE heal under Giant Dominance every 60 seconds that blows anything WHM can do out of the water. And it can be pre-planned and timed to blow up immediately after a raidwide, removing the need to cast GCD heals.

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Originally Posted by Djinnrb

No no no I completely understand. I wouldn't dream in a million years that they would use the numbers I put there. I was just putting something there as an example to showcase how the ability will work. To defend myself just a little bit though when I say Off heals I don't mean a healer that cant solo heal something. I mean off heals as a job that can do other stuff besides just healing such as debuffs(gravity), buffs(cards), enhance(sect abilities). I get where you're coming from though and I hope maybe my further explanation helped change your mind a little bit.

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AST and SCH both already do both of these things: AST provides card buffs (and ways to manipulate said cards, either by spreading them to an entire party, increasing their potency, or by extending their duration) and SCH provides Chain Stratagem/Fey Wind. Both of them have extremely powerful heals: Indom is ridiculously strong and SCH’s are adored for their Deployed Crit Adlos; and AST has both Earthly Star and Collective Unconscious, the latter of which is the strongest regen in the game.

The only one that doesn’t have a type of utility is WHM, and that’s why it suffers. It only has raw healing, but the amount of raw healing it brings simply isn’t needed (except perhaps outside of prog—WHM is used a lot in Ultimate prog because of its healing and AST has MP problems...however, progging an Ultimate on AST isn’t impossible and very much doable; WHM is simply “safer”).

To be honest, I think AST works too well as it is.

WHM is the job with no identity, I'd rather they changed WHM to that it was no longer so similar to AST, regardless of which one technically came first.

AST is in a very good spot since Creator as said HyoMinPArk and even better since 4.3
It could do with a bit of QoL tweaks but it's virtually the best healer in terms of healing output, raid buff and decent personal DPS.
Yet, I agree that it could be good to have some re-thinking of sects- as shielding is not so efficient unless a fight requires it. That's just what I'm looking for in 5.0. The rest is almost already perfect.

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Originally Posted by Mansion

Yet, I agree that it could be good to have some re-thinking of sects- as shielding is not so efficient unless a fight requires it. That's just what I'm looking for in 5.0. The rest is almost already perfect.

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Add bonus effects to Celestial Opposition and Time Dilation.
Restores the potency of any partially spent shields in addition to extending their duration.

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Originally Posted by Seraphor

Add bonus effects to Celestial Opposition and Time Dilation.
Restores the potency of any partially spent shields in addition to extending their duration.

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It could make it, but I'm not sure it would be worth it and you can already "cheese" a powerful shield for a given damage with Largesse and Mantra/Nature's Minne. I think shielding has a really narrow use, so it's not worth it to balance it.

In all regular gameplay and most of Savage, mitigation (Addle and this kind of things, or HP% value shields like TBN, Benison) is just enough, regens and off-GCD will do the rest. You only need shielding (Aspected helios and Adlo) in niche situations like Ion Efflux spam or Morn Afah.

AST doesn't need more of anything. What it does need is an identity of its own. It basically stole WHMs identity and added a card gimmick to it. Both of those jobs as far as their heals go basically play identically to each other and Yoshi has came out and said that healing has been a problem since AST's introduction into the game.

Healers in general need their identity back, because all they are right now is a green DPS. The focus is to heal as little as possible so you can focus on adding damage. While this is not something I have a problem with per se, my issue is the amount of downtime they have that allows for their DPS time to be around 90% of the encounter. Game mechanics focus too much on you fail you die, or become so weak as we gear up that they can be outright ignored. There is no middle ground and it is a huge problem.

It has been mentioned that healing basically comes in two forms: barriers and direct heals. You can toss HoTs and ogcds in there, but these healing methods are used to sustain DPS uptime, so I personally do not include them. Barriers and Direct heals are on the GCD. This is where I get stumped because I don't really know another way a healer that can use GCDs that are not barrier or direct heals. It can't really be HoTs because this type of GCD won't save a player who is at critical damage if an unavoidable comes raining down that finishes them off. Timed/explosive heals won't work because they would just be used to upkeep high DPS output much like Excog does now, and Excog is ogcd anyway.

What I have thought of is instead of having the MH/OH like you suggested similar to how tanks have a MT/OT, we have a Direct Heals (DH), and Barrier Healer (BH) dynamic. With this in mind AST would have to lose one of its secs, or its secs would have to work differently. A suggestion I have seen tossed around is that the two secs affect what AST cards do. We would then need a fourth healer to balance out the ratio of 2:1 DH or BH type healers the game would have at that point.

Right now, having two DHs isn't that big of a deal. Having two BHs though is a problem because shields do not stack. Barriers would need to be nerfed a bit so that they can stack with each other, and I feel shields providing more than 100% of HP restored to the barrier to be OP and just ridiculous. This can instead be achieved by another BH adding HP to the shield with their own GCDs. DH/BH would still be the ideal set up, but two BHs or two DHs can work because of the diverse utility they bring.

This then leads to healer utility, which needs to be spread out not only in order to establish diversity amongst the healers, but also grant balance through strengths and weaknesses amongst them that would allow the DH/BH dynamic to work.

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Originally Posted by Gemina

AST doesn't need more of anything. What it does need is an identity of its own. It basically stole WHMs identity and added a card gimmick to it.

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People keep saying this, but what exactly did AST steal from WHM?

GCD heals?
A DoT and a DPS spell and an AoE DPS spell? So it’s only different from SCH in that it only has one DoT rather than two?
A oGCD cooldown AoE regen? That actually functions differently?
Benefic and Benefic II? So it’s just the fact that SCH doesn’t have a Physick II that makes it “stolen from WHM”?

These seem like healer basics to me.
The Aspected spells don’t work the same, Diurnal Benefic/Helios have a heal plus a HoT so it’s not the same as Regen/Medica II.
If anything it takes this from SCH, as Noct Benefic/Helios are basically Adloquium/Succor.

What else could AST have used?
Seems to me the problem isn’t that AST stole from WHM, but that WHM doesn’t have anything to it besides the most basic healer toolkit.
Fix WHM, give it an actual identity and a unique mechanic that isn’t 100% passive and inconsequential, don’t strip stuff from AST in order to bring it down to WHM’s level.


The problem with shields is they’re not an efficient form of healing unless they’re timed absolutely perfectly. A pure shield healer wouldn’t work very well in difficult single healer content. SCH has HoTs via it’s fairy, and Diurnal is almost unanimously favoured over Nocturnal.
I don’t think this dichotomy like MT/OT would work, and they’ve specifically said they’re trying to balance three healers before they add a fourth.
If anything, they need to give all healers options to shield or regen, but have unique applications of those.
WHM needs shields in some form. Give it Protect back as an exclusive ability, add Shell to that, and have some kind of unique interaction with lilies.

I like your ideas I had offered some suggestions prior. I wanted to see something added similar to planetary Indulgence. An instant AOE heal. Calm down folks get your finger off the mouse pads. Yes I know they have Earthly indulgence. Please know earthly Indulgence is something that requires targetting and two clicks to cast therefore not making it instant. White Mages have benediction Scholars have Lustrate. I would like to see a big heal like this added to to astrologian as well.

I main Healers my second choice is tanking. I am recently back to game. I can tell you the only time I have ever felt like a failure as a Healer was while playing on astrologian. They just don't, while leveling that is, have the ability to keep up at the level of a scholar or White Mage. Take your fingers off those mousepads again. The recent letter from developer he acknowledged this which is why they will not be adding a fourth healer in this expansion rather balancing the three classes as they are in desperate need of balancing.

I do really enjoy your ideas. I like to play all three classes of Healers. I want to Healing capabilities to be very similar. The Spells can be as different as night and day for all I care as long as each class has the ability to Output the same HPS, or close.

Thank you for your awesome ideas and for listening to my opinions as well

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Originally Posted by Lordfurious

White Mages have benediction Scholars have Lustrate. I would like to see a big heal like this added to to astrologian as well.

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This is basically Essential Dignity.
I know technically WHM has two of these, Benediction and Tetragrammaton, but SCH only has the one in Lustrate like AST's Essential Dignity.

Oh and you meant Earthly Star, not Earthly Indulgence.
I'd say Earthly Star is actually more of an Assize analogue. Plenary Indulgence doesn't really have an analogue.
But AST's Collective Unconscious is superior to Asylum, so there's that.

Essential Dignity, timed correctly, has a stupid high potency. I'm not saying it's worth a Benediction on a WAR that Holmgangs with all their HP buffs on, but still. Right now you can instantly give back 40K HP (and it's more than enough). It has a short Cooldown, and you can work around it with your Earthly Star or a Lady of Crowns.

Benediction has a high CD, and heals perhaps too much, compared to the average damage output in the game. I'm not really envious of Bene when I play on my AST.

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Originally Posted by Seraphor

This is basically Essential Dignity.
I know technically WHM has two of these, Benediction and Tetragrammaton, but SCH only has the one in Lustrate like AST's Essential Dignity.

Oh and you meant Earthly Star, not Earthly Indulgence.
I'd say Earthly Star is actually more of an Assize analogue. Plenary Indulgence doesn't really have an analogue.
But AST's Collective Unconscious is superior to Asylum, so there's that.

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I knew someone was going to mention that abilities and claim it was similar to benediction. Please allow me to correct you. That ability would be closest to the ability tetragrammatron. That is just one more ability extra that white Mages have. I would also say it is like a Scholars lustrate, because of the fact Scholars can cast it three times if they have a full stack of Aether. But thanks for your input, and sorry I did not add that into my previous comment.

Sorry I got Earthly star incorrect. I probably should have looked up the exact name as I am a recently returning player and I'm not completely up on exactly every name but do know every healing spell and what it does, which is why I mentioned that Earthly is nothing at all like assize. I can only assume that you didn't take the actual time to read my comments in its entirety. If you had you would have seen that because you need to actually Target and click it twice, it is therefore, not instant. As the game is progressing and moving forward the need for instant cast abilities is ever more prevalent, which is why I stressed these ideas. I do not believe that Collective unconsciousness is superior. While you are casting that you are immobilized you cannot move you cannot cast another spell. That is 15 seconds of downtime for a weak heal. After White Mage cast their asylum they are free to continue casting more heal spells. Since my White Mage is such an Uber Beast with terrific gear I tend to just Spam cure 3 after using asylum if need be. I really do value your input and I thank you for trying as hard as you did, but I think we are going to have to agree to disagree.

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Originally Posted by Lordfurious

I knew someone was going to mention that abilities and claim it was similar to benediction. Please allow me to correct you. That ability would be closest to the ability tetragrammatron. That is just one more ability extra that white Mages have. I would also say it is like a Scholars lustrate, because of the fact Scholars can cast it three times if they have a full stack of Aether. But thanks for your input, and sorry I did not add that into my previous comment.

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I really don't agree. Cast an Essential Dignity on someone that is under 10% HP, it will explode Tetragrammaton's potency. Especially if it crits.
Tetragrammaton is more like Lady of Crowns. Its potency is lower but you can virtually use it every 30 seconds.
Plus AST has an instant GCD heal (with added effect of the sect) where WHM only has a Regen.
It's the little things, but overall AST can ironically put out much more healing than WHM without sacrificing DPS, in a raid context. And it comes with cards.

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Originally Posted by Lordfurious

I knew someone was going to mention that abilities and claim it was similar to benediction. Please allow me to correct you. That ability would be closest to the ability tetragrammatron. That is just one more ability extra that white Mages have. I would also say it is like a Scholars lustrate, because of the fact Scholars can cast it three times if they have a full stack of Aether. But thanks for your input, and sorry I did not add that into my previous comment.

Sorry I got Earthly star incorrect. I probably should have looked up the exact name as I am a recently returning player and I'm not completely up on exactly every name but do know every healing spell and what it does, which is why I mentioned that Earthly is nothing at all like assize. I can only assume that you didn't take the actual time to read my comments in its entirety. If you had you would have seen that because you need to actually Target and click it twice, it is therefore, not instant. As the game is progressing and moving forward the need for instant cast abilities is ever more prevalent, which is why I stressed these ideas. I do not believe that Collective unconsciousness is superior. While you are casting that you are immobilized you cannot move you cannot cast another spell. That is 15 seconds of downtime for a weak heal. After White Mage cast their asylum they are free to continue casting more heal spells. Since my White Mage is such an Uber Beast with terrific gear I tend to just Spam cure 3 after using asylum if need be. I really do value your input and I thank you for trying as hard as you did, but I think we are going to have to agree to disagree.

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Essential Dignity: 400 potency, that can scale up to roughly 1200 potency. (enough to almost fully heal, plus it can Crit) 40s cooldown.

Benediction: Maximum HP, equivalent to roughly 1500 potency maybe? 180s cooldown.
Tetragrammaton: 700 potency flat heal. 60s cooldown.
Lustrate: 600 potency. Can potentially be spammed up to 3 times for 1800 potency! 60s cooldown (based on Aetherflow)

So yeah, Tetra is more similar in terms of cooldown, but Bene is closer in potency, it actually sits somewhere in the middle but ultimately all those skills do the same job.


EDIT: All three healers have similar utility in their ‘emergency’ heals really.

AST: 400 potency at higher HP, 1000 or more potency at lower HP.
WHM: 700 potency with Tetra, Maximum HP with Bene.
SCH: 600, 1200 or 1800 depending on Aetherflows.

Basically, they can all do the same thing, but WHM takes up two slots on your hotbar to do it.




Earthly Star: 720 cure potency, and 200 DPS potency.

Assize: 400 Cure and DPS potency.
Plenary Indulgence: Only cures.

Again, Earthly Star does both jobs in a way. It uses a scaling mechanic, which I suppose you could attribute to Plenary Indulgence, but functionally, its a Heal/DPS combo.
So with Earthly Star and Assize, in both cases you would typically use the skill on cooldown for its DPS value, whereas Plenary Indulgence you'd save for cures. Hence why Earthly Star and Assize are more similar in function.




Asylum: 100 potency over 24s. Requires party members to remain within the area of effect, and chances are, they won't.
800 total potency (reliant on party members staying within the area for 24s)

Collective Unconscious: 150 potency over 15s, plus 10% damage reduction. Effect is imbued upon party members, allowing them to leave the area of effect. This means it only needs to be used for a split second to bestow this effect for 15s on all party members in range, you don't need to stand still. You can also extend the duration of this effect with Celestial Opposition and Time Dilation, increasing the effective potency of the HoT.
If you do stand still however, you can extend the duration beyond 15s, making that potency far better than Asylum, and with a damage reduction to boot!
750 total potency (guaranteed, can be extended to 1200 or even 1500 with both CO and TD, without needing to stand still, and even further if you do stand still)


But I thank you for your view, and thank you for not being too condescending about it, but it would appear that you don't quite "know every healing spell and what it does."

EDIT: All three healers have similar utility in their ‘emergency’ heals really.

AST: 400 potency at higher HP, 1000 or more potency at lower HP.
WHM: 700 potency with Tetra, Maximum HP with Bene.
SCH: 600, 1200 or 1800 depending on Aetherflows.

Basically, they can all do the same thing, but WHM takes up two slots on your hotbar to do it.

Earthly Star: 720 cure potency, and 200 DPS potency.

Assize: 400 Cure and DPS potency.
Plenary Indulgence: Only cures.

Again, Earthly Star does both jobs in a way. It uses a scaling mechanic, which I suppose you could attribute to Plenary Indulgence, but functionally, its a Heal/DPS combo.
So with Earthly Star and Assize, in both cases you would typically use the skill on cooldown for its DPS value, whereas Plenary Indulgence you'd save for cures. Hence why Earthly Star and Assize are more similar in function.

Asylum: 100 potency over 24s. Requires party members to remain within the area of effect, and chances are, they won't.
800 total potency (reliant on party members staying within the area for 24s)

Collective Unconscious: 150 potency over 15s, plus 10% damage reduction. Effect is imbued upon party members, allowing them to leave the area of effect. This means it only needs to be used for a split second to bestow this effect for 15s on all party members in range, you don't need to stand still. You can also extend the duration of this effect with Celestial Opposition and Time Dilation, increasing the effective potency of the HoT.
If you do stand still however, you can extend the duration beyond 15s, making that potency far better than Asylum, and with a damage reduction to boot!
750 total potency (guaranteed, can be extended to 1200 or even 1500 with both CO and TD, without needing to stand still, and even further if you do stand still)


But I thank you for your view, and thank you for not being too condescending about it, but it would appear that you don't quite "know every healing spell and what it does."[/QUOTE]

Please fact check your information is incorrect and you're sharing misinformation.

Facts-

1. Whm Benediction full cure.

2. SCH Lustrate 600 cure potency, and can be cast up tp 6 times potentially in a row if aether stacks are full and off cooldown.

3. AST Essential Dignity cure potency 400. Higher if target hp is low.

I'm not sure where you came up with the number you came up for essential dignity but what I wrote above is what the tooltip says. Moreover I can tell you for a fact it will not bring a tank from the brink of death to full at the most I've seen maybe 50%.

Actually I'm new to forums and I would like all of my comments removed I find all the people in the forms here not helpful you offer opinion,and everyone here wants to fight and get off topic. And then the community wonders why they cannot retain new blood we show up once in awhile but then have to listen to the bickering and arguing like what's happening here over off topic stupidity. Fact: the dev said there needs to be a balance that the healers are not balanced. So instead of everybody that's here trying to make an argument saying that the healers are balanced maybe you should sit down and read the letter from the editor that outlines specifically why we are not getting a forth healer and that is because the developer says there's imbalance in the healing and it's going to take this amount of time to be able to create that balance. But thank you everybody for ruining my forum experience. But mostly thank you for the misinformation and fictitious numbers associated with some of the skills.

I'm sorry, but you began with the condescending snarky tone, and boasted how you knew everything about healers when you demonstrably didn't.

My figures are correct, in as much as Essential Dignity's top potency is an educated guess because the tool tip doesn't display a top value, but all else is 100% correct.

I'm sorry you were completely wrong about Collective Unconscious, but if being proven wrong hurts you this much, what can I say? Perhaps the forums arent for you?

For everyone else’s benefit:
As I assume the “ridiculously high figures” are referring to Collective Unconscious, my source is simple math.

The tooltip reads:
Creates a wheel of fortune around the caster, granting Regen and 10% damage reduction for any party member who enters.
Can only be executed when a Sect is active. Auto-attack ends upon execution. Effect ends upon using another action or moving (including facing a different direction).
Cure Potency: 150
Duration: 15s
Damage Reduction Duration: 18s

15s is 5 ticks of the regen. (one every 3 seconds) This means 150 potency x 5 = 750 potency total over 15s.
Celestial Opposition can extend this by 10s to a total duration of 25s. 25s includes 8 regen ticks, which equates to 1200 total potency.
You can extend this even further for one party member using Time Dilation, this adds another 5s for a total of 30s, which is 10 regen ticks or a total of 1500 potency over that time.

This can all be executed in a couple of seconds, by using Collective Unconscious, Celestial Opposition, and Time Dilation, all at once right after the other, and it doesn’t require anyone to stand still, because the Regen is a lasting effect that is bestowed upon any party members that pass through the area of effect.

The 10% Damage Reduction is a separate effect, and this does require you to stand still and to be within the area of effect.


EDIT: Oh, she edited out the name calling and swearing. That's ok, the mods can still see it.

All I've done is lay out the facts regarding these skills potencies.

You're really not too bright are you? So while you're in a trance doing absolutely nothing for those 15 seconds you are limited to your 750 cure and a little tiny bit of damage mitigation. Let's run the numbers again shall we Junior? During that same 15 seconds of White Mage cast Asylum. 100 pure potency with a tick every 3 seconds for 15 seconds for a total of 5 ticks that's 500. During that time the White Mage is free to cast. What's a 1.85 second test time during that same 15 seconds a White Mage can get 8 cure 3s off. But for argument's sake I will use the numbers only for 7 just to make it fair in case I had a little bit of a leg or what not. 7 x 550 cure potency(3850) plus the 500 cure off of asylum = 4350 total cure pot over the same 15 seconds

Heres the numbers your measly little 1200 output vs the 4350 that's a White Mage outputs over the same duration of time. Even if I factor in that 10% damage mitigation the White Mage wins. Let me take the argument further since you don't seem to understand this. Let's say during that same 15 seconds one or two people died. You can't stop casting that or everyone stops receiving the healing. So White Mage could raise somebody in about one second flat if macro correctly. Still getting 7 of The Cure threes off but being more beneficial to the party at that point in time. I don't know why you want to keep making the argument that this is the best thing ever know it's never great when you have to stand still and channel the only time I have ever seen this used is in raids when massive AOE damage is incoming that is the only time that it has a beneficial use for this ability. If I decide to do dungeons I never use the skill in a dungeon because there is hardly ever a use for it or time for me just to stand still in one place for 15 seconds. However when I'm on the White Mage I use Asylum all the time. I don't care which one you think is better I'm telling you that anytime you have to stand still for 15 seconds it's not a good thing. Especially during dungeons there is so much happening that if you are the one that standing still for 15 seconds then chances are you are the one that I am constantly Reviving.
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To reiterate: The regen from Collective Unconscious does not require you to stand still for 15s. You can carry on healing or DPSing as normal, and the effect will continue

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Originally Posted by Lordfurious

Please fact check your information is incorrect and you're sharing misinformation.

Facts-

1. Whm Benediction full cure.

2. SCH Lustrate 600 cure potency, and can be cast up tp 6 times potentially in a row if aether stacks are full and off cooldown.

3. AST Essential Dignity cure potency 400. Higher if target hp is low.

I'm not sure where you came up with the number you came up for essential dignity but what I wrote above is what the tooltip says. Moreover I can tell you for a fact it will not bring a tank from the brink of death to full at the most I've seen maybe 50%.

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Check your facts.

Benediction may be a full heal, but it's on a 3-minute cooldown and only really serves its full purpose against immunities like Holmgang and Living Dead (particularly the latter). Essential Dignity is on a 40-second cooldown with 400 potency that scales up to 1,000 when your target's HP is below 20%. This scaling has been figured out after rigorous testing by healer theorycrafters.

SCH Lustrate? Essential is still better, because the lower your target's HP, the higher its potency. And it's not a damage loss, since I know SCH like to use Aetherflow for Energy Drain to get rid of their stacks before Aetherflow comes off cooldown again.


Seraphor already went fairly in depth about where you're wrong, so I won't repeat things they already said. But since you're a returning player who said they haven't played the game in a while, perhaps you should consider that your facts are probably old and/or flawed - much like your Collective Unconscious example - and take your own fingers off the keyboard.

So 10% damage buff goes away as soon as you stop channeling. If you do not believe me look at your buff status when you use the skill. You will notice that immediately after leaving trance and moving you lose that 10%. Asylum I have macrod to <t>, and I can cast it 30 yalms away. And astrologian has to be standing where they want the ability to go off. I use Asylum all the time on tanks in dungeons cast safely from a range.

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Originally Posted by Lordfurious

So 10% damage buff goes away as soon as you stop channeling. If you do not believe me look at your buff status when you use the skill. You will notice that immediately after leaving trance and moving you lose that 10%. Asylum I have macrod to <t>, and I can cast it 30 yalms away. And astrologian has to be standing where they want the ability to go off. I use Asylum all the time on tanks in dungeons cast safely from a range.

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You don't need the 10% mitigation buff for 15 seconds. In optimized settings it is timed for an AOE raidwide, which hits once (I.e., in O12S, I've seen ASTs time it for an Ion Efflux hit, which is a single burst of damage - not multiple in a span of 15 seconds). ASTs never sit in CU, especially now that it applies the HoT instantly. The only times they'll sit in it are during phase transitions where you aren't even able to attack. No damage lost.

Ideally, AST should be standing central to the party anyways. There's no need for everyone to be spread out in Narnia. Especially since Helios/Aspected Helios have shorter radii than Medica/Medica II. CU is better spent as a party HoT, not a single-target HoT.

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Originally Posted by Lordfurious

Actually I'm new to forums and I would like all of my comments removed I find all the people in the forms here not helpful you offer opinion,and everyone here wants to fight and get off topic. And then the community wonders why they cannot retain new blood we show up once in awhile but then have to listen to the bickering and arguing like what's happening here over off topic stupidity. Fact: the dev said there needs to be a balance that the healers are not balanced. So instead of everybody that's here trying to make an argument saying that the healers are balanced maybe you should sit down and read the letter from the editor that outlines specifically why we are not getting a forth healer and that is because the developer says there's imbalance in the healing and it's going to take this amount of time to be able to create that balance. But thank you everybody for ruining my forum experience. But mostly thank you for the misinformation and fictitious numbers associated with some of the skills.

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This is honestly fairly rich. You don't have much of a leg to stand on when you called me an "arrogant elitist" in another thread for simply correcting your healer misconceptions there. Perhaps people would be more polite with you if you weren't so rude with them and didn't call them names simply because they're correcting you.

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Originally Posted by Lordfurious

So 10% damage buff goes away as soon as you stop channeling. If you do not believe me look at your buff status when you use the skill. You will notice that immediately after leaving trance and moving you lose that 10%.

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I... already said that.

The potencies are the main thing being compared here.
To simplify it again:

Asylum = 800 potency, that only works if all party members remain within the area of effect. (They usually wont unless theres downtime for a raid-wide attack)

Collective Unconscious = 750/1200/1500 potency, that is guaranteed by snapshotting the regen on the party.

CU is already the better option.
The 10% damage reduction is a bonus that can be utilised for raid-wide attacks where you can just stand still for a few seconds, but shouldn't any more than about 5 seconds if you time it right.

I would maybe by 900 I'm not buying 1200. In fact are you want to go lower than that I'm thinking 800 and here's why; if a tank pops holmgamg and is at 1 mp.
Benediction will bring them to full.
To lustrates will bring the tank to 3/4 health
One essential dignity the tank is about 50%.

I'm not sure what this rigorous testing involved but apparently it doesn't involve linking any proof to back up the numbers that you're putting down there for their fictitious. We know for a fact that lustrate is 600. To lust rates to bring the tank to 3/4 health at 1200 cure potency. Well then there's just no way that essential dignity can be the same if it's 1/4 less. So here's my simple mathematics 1/4 less of 1200 is 300. That's roughly a cure potency of 900 so I still think that that 1,000 is inflated.

I don't know who these people are that did this rigorous testing to get to their inflated number but I don't buy it. When Square Enix publishes a number I will believe it. And this right here is one of the biggest problems with the forums you're presenting something as fact with no proof to back it up other than was so and so did a test and well they knew what they were doing. That doesn't cut it and even if had they had meters to show me I still wouldn't buy it. I only trust and rely on the numbers Square Enix has provided.

Did I not say "roughly" and "educated guess"?

I may be off a bit, my understanding was that it was 1000 potency AT 20% HP, and assumed it went further as HP dropped lower than 20%.
But if 1000 is the maximum that it hits at 20% I accept my guess was wrong there.

All I've done is state the facts.

You've taken issue with these facts and tried to disagree... with facts.
That is why I have repeatedly attempted to correct you.

It doesn't matter anyways so devs are balancing healers for the new expansion. So to everyone here that's arguing how balanced healers are you should probably immediately quit your place of employment. Contact Square Enix tell them you need a job as a developer because obviously you're smarter than they are and you know more than they do.

Seriously you guys have to be trolls I can't stop laughing at some of the crap that I keep reading.

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Originally Posted by Seraphor

People keep saying this, but what exactly did AST steal from WHM?

GCD heals?
A DoT and a DPS spell and an AoE DPS spell? So it’s only different from SCH in that it only has one DoT rather than two?
A oGCD cooldown AoE regen? That actually functions differently?
Benefic and Benefic II? So it’s just the fact that SCH doesn’t have a Physick II that makes it “stolen from WHM”?

These seem like healer basics to me.
The Aspected spells don’t work the same, Diurnal Benefic/Helios have a heal plus a HoT so it’s not the same as Regen/Medica II.
If anything it takes this from SCH, as Noct Benefic/Helios are basically Adloquium/Succor.

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We can sit here and compare Benefic to Cure 1, and Benefict 2 to Cure 2, etc. etc. All that's doing is rearranging furniture on the Titanic. You are not seeing the issue as it exists today. They keep saying it because AST failed to bring a new form of healing into the game. It isn't called a SCH with cards because the majority of the time they a paired with SCHs which forces them into diurnal sect. There is not much reason for an AST to be paired with a WHM so they can be in noct because WHM brings absolutely nothing to a raid set up, which makes the whole 'fill the role that is necessary' dynamic a complete and total ruse.

Upon AST introduction in 3.0, it was useless. The devs couldn't figure out what to do with it so the buffed the schite out of it and in doing so, they shoved WHM into the dirt. Actually, that's an understatement: They buried WHM underneath the feet of AST. Some players such as myself still enjoy playing WHM. It's an AoE machine that shines on large trash pulls when the utility that SCH and AST bring isn't needed. In single target scenarios such as trials and 8-man raids, it's reduced to throwing rocks. SCH and AST spend a fair amount of time spamming Broil and Malefic respectively, but at least they can also provide utility, and have to monitor those CDs.

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What else could AST have used?
Seems to me the problem isn’t that AST stole from WHM, but that WHM doesn’t have anything to it besides the most basic healer toolkit.
Fix WHM, give it an actual identity and a unique mechanic that isn’t 100% passive and inconsequential, don’t strip stuff from AST in order to bring it down to WHM’s level.

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Again, healing kits are not the issue and hasn't been for a long time. The issue is AST is saturated with utility. Not only can it provide raid utility, but it also has it's own such as Lightspeed, Synastry, and Minor Arcana making them more effective than they are already. The job is ridiculously OP to the point of being broken. Having them in your group is akin to using a gameshark.

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The problem with shields is they’re not an efficient form of healing unless they’re timed absolutely perfectly. A pure shield healer wouldn’t work very well in difficult single healer content.

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Not true at all. I don't do savage, but I have solo healed EX primals and the chaos of 24-man with my SCH. Because DPS uptime for healers is around 90% of the encounter, I am quite confident SCH can solo heal savage without much issue. Shields are also OP in the game. Even though the shield restores HP at a low potency, the shield itself has more HP than what is restored to the player. Over-healing with shields also isn't an issue because they effectively increase the HP pool of the player it is casted on.

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I don’t think this dichotomy like MT/OT would work, and they’ve specifically said they’re trying to balance three healers before they add a fourth.
If anything, they need to give all healers options to shield or regen, but have unique applications of those.
WHM needs shields in some form. Give it Protect back as an exclusive ability, add Shell to that, and have some kind of unique interaction with lilies.

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I agree with you here. Giving all healers direct heals, HoTs, and shields as base kits is one way to handle them with diversity obtained through their DPS and utility kits. However, what they currently have with 2 of 3 healers being able to increase raid damage, speed, and defense cannot continue.

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Originally Posted by Seraphor

Did I not say "roughly" and "educated guess"?

I may be off a bit, my understanding was that it was 1000 potency AT 20% HP, and assumed it went further as HP dropped lower than 20%.
But if 1000 is the maximum that it hits at 20% I accept my guess was wrong there.

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I know of this test, which indicates 1000 potency:

https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...ntial_dignity/

A bit old though.

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Originally Posted by Gemina

I agree with you here. Giving all healers direct heals, HoTs, and shields as base kits is one way to handle them with diversity obtained through their DPS and utility kits. However, what they currently have with 2 of 3 healers being able to increase raid damage, speed, and defense cannot continue.

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Add buffs to the paradigm.

Give WHM buffs that compliment SCHs buffs/debuffs, so that a WHM/SCH pairing can compete with AST, but not to much that either outclasses ASTs buffs.

Combined with the idea of dual card readings (debuffs in nocturnal sect) this could allow for buffs and debuffs to be balanced in a similar way to regens and shields. SCH gets sone debuffs, WHM gets some buffs, AST gets either/or depending on sect.

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Originally Posted by Lordfurious

I would maybe by 900 I'm not buying 1200. In fact are you want to go lower than that I'm thinking 800 and here's why; if a tank pops holmgamg and is at 1 mp.
Benediction will bring them to full.
To lustrates will bring the tank to 3/4 health
One essential dignity the tank is about 50%.

I'm not sure what this rigorous testing involved but apparently it doesn't involve linking any proof to back up the numbers that you're putting down there for their fictitious. We know for a fact that lustrate is 600. To lust rates to bring the tank to 3/4 health at 1200 cure potency. Well then there's just no way that essential dignity can be the same if it's 1/4 less. So here's my simple mathematics 1/4 less of 1200 is 300. That's roughly a cure potency of 900 so I still think that that 1,000 is inflated.

I don't know who these people are that did this rigorous testing to get to their inflated number but I don't buy it. When Square Enix publishes a number I will believe it. And this right here is one of the biggest problems with the forums you're presenting something as fact with no proof to back it up other than was so and so did a test and well they knew what they were doing. That doesn't cut it and even if had they had meters to show me I still wouldn't buy it. I only trust and rely on the numbers Square Enix has provided.

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Since my healers all possess relatively the same ilvl; AST is actually the lowest. I opted to test this myself. Essentially did 10,000 more than Lustrate and roughly 8,000 more than Tetra. Keep in mind, this is based on a healer who quickly swapped from a crafter back to AST. ED would be even higher on a tank. Now since you insist on comparing ED against Benediction, let's estimate ED heals for a conservative 25,000 (it's usually much higher but we're going to lowball it). Over a three minute duration, that means you'll have four uses of ED (100,000 healing) in the same span of time. Much like why Holmgang is considered widely superior to Hallowed Ground, the sheer availability makes ED a significantly better cooldown because outside panic moments, you never need Benediction. Is it a nice CD to have? Of course, but even Living Dead can be healed pretty rapidly through a Lustrate + ED combo.

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Originally Posted by Lordfurious

Actually I'm new to forums and I would like all of my comments removed I find all the people in the forms here not helpful you offer opinion,and everyone here wants to fight and get off topic. And then the community wonders why they cannot retain new blood we show up once in awhile but then have to listen to the bickering and arguing like what's happening here over off topic stupidity. Fact: the dev said there needs to be a balance that the healers are not balanced. So instead of everybody that's here trying to make an argument saying that the healers are balanced maybe you should sit down and read the letter from the editor that outlines specifically why we are not getting a forth healer and that is because the developer says there's imbalance in the healing and it's going to take this amount of time to be able to create that balance. But thank you everybody for ruining my forum experience. But mostly thank you for the misinformation and fictitious numbers associated with some of the skills.

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Perhaps people would be more receptive if your attitude didn't amount to "I'm right and you're just dumb." Whenever someone disagrees or even offers advice which counters your opinion, you insist your experience has been ruined or our numbers are fictitious. Alright then, may I request your extensive healing experience in this game? Do you theorycraft, analyse, or even complete high end content at a solid level? No? Then how can you so confidently claim your numbers are factual when arguing against players with said experience? If this is an example of the "new blood" we're supposed to welcome. Once again, I think we'll pass.

Late but lets not forgot patch 4.5. There were specific buffs to the WHM despite the fact it's the end of expansion and usually this never happened before because the next one is around the corner and it will be changed then. (patch 2.5 and patch 3.5) However, they did the enmity changes, the HUGE buff to assize and the buff to PI. There wouldn't of been a need for it unless the situation surrounding the WHM was precarious.