Your thoughts on Astrolgian so far?

[Eraqus]

I'm not sure but let's have a challenge in a 2 minute run for AST VS SCH both dpsing . I'm sure ast will win. Don't forget lightspeed . Yeah it cuts dmg output but what with an enhanced balance card? It will do a lot of dmg with instant cast plus AST have a very powerful aoe dmg skill. Gravity. , Malefic II plus both combust 1 and 2. Hmm I don't think that SCH will win

[MidnightTundra]

Spell Speed bonuses from pet crits, oGCD nuke (Energy Drain), Miasma ( 300 pot Dot), Shadow Flare (250 pot) and Ruin II allows them to DPS while remaining mobile with a relatively low cost; AST doesnt have a spell like this.

Most important of all: SCH is not plagued by the issue of the mediocre mana sustain that AST has. Yeah, AST can cast DPS spells but they'll likely feel high costs of their spells much sooner than SCH in a fight.

All of these points lead to SCH being the more viable Healer-DPS.

[jars]

I'm not sure but let's have a challenge in a 2 minute run for AST VS SCH both dpsing . I'm sure ast will win. Don't forget lightspeed . Yeah it cuts dmg output but what with an enhanced balance card? It will do a lot of dmg with instant cast plus AST have a very powerful aoe dmg skill. Gravity. , Malefic II plus both combust 1 and 2. Hmm I don't think that SCH will win

all lightspeed would do in that situation is nerf your damage by 25%. lightspeed is never an increase, it only helps when you are moving.

[Eraqus]

Well this is true but Jr taking in count the DoT of SCH but u forget the dot of ast. They're incredibly powerful. And I repeat I'm taking in consideration a situation of just 2 min run. You can't finish ur mp in 2 minutes. Well we really need a demonstration of this. I'm ps4 so I don't have the dmg meter

[Krixus]

Not to diminish your enjoyment and apparent accomplishment with the class, but 200 DPS in a dungeon wasn't difficult to achieve as either pre-existing healer at 50. At level 60, assuming you don't end up with a tissue paper tank who attempts to speedrun, DPS can be much higher due to lvl/ilvl increase and new/stronger DPS actions.

As many have said before, we cannot compare to lvl 50 far overgeared content. And I guess I am refering to dungeon content when I say whm/ast can out dps sch, and I know 100% that they can. You hardly have to heal the tank, a whm or sch can spam holy/gravity and absolutely spank a sch's DoT dmg. And running to the next set of mobs refills our mp to do it again. In coil/alex sure sch will win, but everything outside of that whm/ast. Also astro's DoTs arnt effected by acc which means a good bit on high lvl content.

[Leiloni]

While I agree with most everything else stated, this is incorrect. Luminiferous Aether is on the same cooldown timer as Shroud. Now with whms having assize also return MP at 10%, Ast may be the healer going oom most in the expac, unless they use ewer on themselves or a spear before using LA.

And I'm telling you as a WHM pre 2.0 we never had any mana problems with just the one skill, so why would you ever come to the conclusion that AST would have issues with the same skill? If you play smart you shouldn't have any problems. As for Ewer, aside from the occasional PLD/DRK that's low on MP, you'll likely be using it on yourself most of the time anyway. BLM and SMN don't need the card so outside of that, all you have is the other healers who could make use of it.

[Blitzball]

And I'm telling you as a WHM pre 2.0 we never had any mana problems with just the one skill, so why would you ever come to the conclusion that AST would have issues with the same skill? If you play smart you shouldn't have any problems. As for Ewer, aside from the occasional PLD/DRK that's low on MP, you'll likely be using it on yourself most of the time anyway. BLM and SMN don't need the card so outside of that, all you have is the other healers who could make use of it.

WHM has much better tools to increase their healing potency without having to spam cure 2. AST on the other hand simply has to spam benefic 2 to keep the tank alive unless they overgear the content. Trust me AST has HUGE mana issues at 60 unless you overgear.

[Colonel_Hathi]

So, I got to 60 on AST. So far the only thing that I really don't like about it is the range on its aoe heals. It says it is the same range as Medica..which is 15 yalms for both of AST's aoes, but for some reason I find myself out of range of other party members a lot..even when it seems like I'm right next to them. I've played white mage for 2 years and never had this problem.

As far as the other stuff goes..I don't have trouble healing and I like how the cards are. They just give a little extra to the party and not some huge boost, which is fine, it doesn't need to be extreme to be helpful. But It would be nice to have the mp regen and stun move as a shorter cooldown though. The main thing that makes it hard when stuff hits the fan (for me anyway) is that I run out of mp like crazy trying to save everyone and the short range of the aoe heals. v.v

[VitalSuit]

Ascend is bugged where it currently cannot be used in any macros. For healers who hate pushing two buttons instead of one, this apparently justifies taking Raise as a skill instead of one that doesn't blatantly overlap.

(It should be noted that the Ascend bug needs to be fixed, yes. I'm not making light of that. But I can't condone bringing an overlap skill over something more useful, just because of having to press an extra button just to Swift a rez.)

Except that you can't use raise in combat without having the trait and AST trait only affects Ascend lol.

[RichardButte]

Just for everyone's information, it's easy to heal any of the "current" content as an AST, unless you're not very good at the class.

The real test will come when raid content releases and if any groups running an AST do well or if they ultimately find everyone going with SCH/WHM.

Until then, most of this is baseless, pointless speculation that cannot be treated as evidence of anything. A person saying "YEAH WE'RE DOING GREAT WITH AST!!!" could have gotten a string of good dungeon runs where the players were all competent. It's when the DPS all suck and get hit by everything that's the true test of a healing class and that's where AST completely falls apart.

And for the record, I LOVE the AST playstyle, but I'd feel bad bringing an AST to my raid because I know that it just doesn't have what it takes to handle it when the shit hits the fan while the SCH definitely does.