My problems with AST buffs.

[loreleidiangelo]

OP's previous post history aside, I actually agree with this topic. A popular suggestion on this forum was to make Noct the "buffing" Sect and Di the "healing" Sect, and be able to use them relatively interchangeably depending on your group needs. I think that would have been a much better implementation than the potency band aids that we got.

I won't be maining AST again until the next Savage tier (if then), so their general lack of identity doesn't bug me in the day-to-day, but I feel like the length of time that it took to implement some basic potency changes and two skill reworks was way too damned long. I really thought the changes would be closer to a total rework considering how long they were taking and how hush-hush the devs were about them.

[AzureFlare]

I agree the entire idea behind the class and its implementation is botched. The whole concept of hybrid healer was fail from the start.




By being creative but apparently that's a lot to ask.

And then you dive into the rabbit hole where you have to do endless balancing and people will complain that their job is too weak/other jobs complain it is too strong.. now what does that remind me of..

[ckc22]

And then you dive into the rabbit hole where you have to do endless balancing and people will complain that their job is too weak/other jobs complain it is too strong.. now what does that remind me of..

I have no issue with Astrologian being a viable healer. I have issues with them having carbon copies of abilities that are straight up better than the original classes.

If SE find it so impossible to balance jobs without homogenizing everything into the ground then perhaps we should only have 4 jobs : Tank, Healer, Ranged Dps, Melee Dps. No need for anything else.

[SenzorialBoundries]

snip

my toughts exactley whats the point in having different job for each role if they all have the same abilities with rebranded names.

[Gaston]

Why forum doesn't have diagree mark point?

[winsock]

See, you can throw definition as much as you want.
The fact is [I use] words are getting used differently then their definition.

^ fixed that for you.

Saying "In 3.05, it was viable to use AST in Alexander Savage" is accurate. You not understanding the definition of the word doesn't make it any more or less true.

Back to my original point/post:
The increased difficulty on the healing end was not a problem in and of itself. The problem was there was very little, if any, tradeoff for the increased healing difficulty. It was an inferior option and there was little reason to take it.

As the potency gap becomes narrower, AST is borderline becoming a WHM + cards + disable + better instaheals + CU mitigation. It's still early, but there is legitimate concern in WHM becoming the inferior option, in favor of AST a.k.a. WHM rev2.

[Muahbec]

my toughts exactley whats the point in having different job for each role if they all have the same abilities with rebranded names.

Sure, AST could have been an unique healer with a cool "time star mage" players even made a thread asking for unique changes, people wanted an unique healer.
But no, SE created a hybrid. That's it they're not going back.
And as we all know hybrids are a total pain to balance.
What i don't agree with you is that, why are you so bothered about their buffs?
SCH still is stronger than AST, SCH is probably the healer with the greatest amount of tools (their CDs and the fairy CDs), and WHM have a bunch of really useful CDs that can literally save a party from wipe (Divine seal is amazing, assize is awesome, Tetra is awesome, asylum, bene, etc) this whole thread is completelly unecessary.

Also just a small coment, why aren't you bothered that WHMs got their own stronger version of lustrate? Why aren't you bothered that both SCH and WHM got a big instant AOE nuke? (Indom/assize) WHM and SCH also have pretty similar abilities I could compare them aaaaaaalll day but there's no need of that, because as i said, this whole thread is unecessary.

[ChocoChick]

As someone who has AST on the side, it's clear that SE did in fact changed their unique identity with the buffs. Of course no one is complaining that the buffs were weak but by changing some of the skills mechanics and not just the numbers, you change what was unique of AST.

The changes most have in question are:

Collective Unconscious now gives 10% dmg reduction and a regen buff that refreshes once inside. This poses a few problems. Firstly by giving both the effects of diurnal and nocturnal, you now lessen the amount of decisions a player has to make. Decisions makes interesting gameplay in my opinion as you actually have to think about things. Now I have to care less about what stance I choose at the beginning of the fight.

[ChocoChick]

Continued..

Secondly, channeling this spell for longer periods of time is now not as necessary. Once everyone has basically gone into the spell (especially when shielding everyone before a big hit), there's no need to channel it any further with everyone getting a regen buff and making use of the damage reduction already. This is a big change previously where channeled diurnal CU continually gives regen (and nocturnal CU which is somewhat pointless but gives you continual damage reduction).

[ChocoChick]

Continued..

Disable now acting similarly to Virus, it now reduces damage for the duration it's applied. This is a huge change from its previous state where it was a spell that reduces damage for only ONE attack. Undeniably it is stronger (which isn't what we are complaining about) but I liked the spell because it was supposed to reward you for good timing for the reduction of damage. Right now, it is much more forgiving and doesn't quite have the same feel. I believe all we needed was extra potency on the damage reduction to keep it feeling the same yet stronger.

Again no one is complaining that the buffs are too weak, just they have changed some of the core identities of AST and we really want to not mimic WHM or SCH through our more unique spells.