5.0 AST is a failure

[Liselsia]

So I am just a casual player so my opinion means little. When I first heard about AST changes I was excited. I had it in my head that AST was playing like XI's RDM or WoW Cassic's PLD where it was a buffer job that also healed. Obviously jumping into the class it was very much not the case. With long cooldowns buffing still takes a large backseat.

So what if they removed cooldowns entirely ? If AST main job was to maintain 100% uptime on both Cards and Divination with healing in between ? Obviously numbers can be tweeked but I am more so talking about the playstyle.

[tesni_g]

So I am just a casual player so my opinion means little. When I first heard about AST changes I was excited. I had it in my head that AST was playing like XI's RDM or WoW Cassic's PLD where it was a buffer job that also healed. Obviously jumping into the class it was very much not the case. With long cooldowns buffing still takes a large backseat.

So what if they removed cooldowns entirely ? If AST main job was to maintain 100% uptime on both Cards and Divination with healing in between ? Obviously numbers can be tweeked but I am more so talking about the playstyle.

I would really like to disagree with you on your first point--casual players have just as much a right to offer feedback as anyone else. Most of FFXIV's millions of subscribers are casual and I do feel that such serious problems with AST are much harder on casual players than they are with "hardcore," because the hardcore already came into the expansion with the mindset that they will level several jobs, and will play what best meshes with their established group. Most serious raiding healers I've encountered are omni, because that flexibility is valuable.

So the casual player will struggle a lot more -- keeping up on the heals, but also, what are they going to do? A casual player levels their jobs a lot slower and the prospect of leveling another healer to see if it doesn't suck as bad is overwhelming. They won't think "the problem is the class."

I am super concerned about a toxic meta this time around. There will always be a meta but I never felt like the SCH/AST meta in SB was toxic. I was WHM main when I first jumped in to savages (Delta) and I rarely encountered any exclusion of WHM. If anyone harbored resentment I never got that vibe, because WHM could do the content. It wasn't fun or engaging on WHM, but doable. I feel that AST right now is not really doable. I'm afraid that this meta will be more pervasive. The actual hardcore raiders will switch mains quietly and play. The midcore/pug raiders will vocally disown AST, and that will bleed down to casuals who don't really understand why AST is bad, just that "everyone" hates it.

[Crushnight]

I would really like to disagree with you on your first point--casual players have just as much a right to offer feedback as anyone else. Most of FFXIV's millions of subscribers are casual and I do feel that such serious problems with AST are much harder on casual players than they are with "hardcore," because the hardcore already came into the expansion with the mindset that they will level several jobs, and will play what best meshes with their established group. Most serious raiding healers I've encountered are omni, because that flexibility is valuable.

So the casual player will struggle a lot more -- keeping up on the heals, but also, what are they going to do? A casual player levels their jobs a lot slower and the prospect of leveling another healer to see if it doesn't suck as bad is overwhelming. They won't think "the problem is the class."

I am super concerned about a toxic meta this time around. There will always be a meta but I never felt like the SCH/AST meta in SB was toxic. I was WHM main when I first jumped in to savages (Delta) and I rarely encountered any exclusion of WHM. If anyone harbored resentment I never got that vibe, because WHM could do the content. It wasn't fun or engaging on WHM, but doable. I feel that AST right now is not really doable. I'm afraid that this meta will be more pervasive. The actual hardcore raiders will switch mains quietly and play. The midcore/pug raiders will vocally disown AST, and that will bleed down to casuals who don't really understand why AST is bad, just that "everyone" hates it.

We have had this problem before, when 3.0 ast was released it was horribly undertuned in terms of heals, dps and buffs (sch fey wind reliably beat out aoe balance), the heals weren't addressed until 2 weeks after savage was released, buffs 3.2, personal dps never changed which was fair.

The exclusion from 3.0 to 3.2 was real and absolutely horrible as an ast you even felt like you were holding your group back compared to the other 2 hlrs in content especially noct asts.

Then what happened with 3.4 was horribly stupid on the devs part they made balance 20% and so aoe balance 10% for 30 secs which could be extended with Celestial Opposition, this resulted in whm getting the swift boot out of groups left and right, thus was whm now classed as the 'worse' or non-meta healer right up to ShB.

What has ShB done?

repeated 3.0 making ast undertuned so i hope the devs really don't repeat 3.X in its entirety because there will never be any semblance balance and certainly never a 4th hlr at this rate

[TankHunter678]

So I am just a casual player so my opinion means little. When I first heard about AST changes I was excited. I had it in my head that AST was playing like XI's RDM or WoW Cassic's PLD where it was a buffer job that also healed. Obviously jumping into the class it was very much not the case. With long cooldowns buffing still takes a large backseat.

So what if they removed cooldowns entirely ? If AST main job was to maintain 100% uptime on both Cards and Divination with healing in between ? Obviously numbers can be tweeked but I am more so talking about the playstyle.

The old AST was the buffer job that healed. The current AST is just worse in every regard, especially when it comes to buffs. The cooldowns on drawing cards and using them has not changed, the durations slashed in half, the effects slashed and homogenized, and the buffing takes even more of a backseat because our healing potencies are just not where they need to be to make up for the lack of passive healing boost coming from the sects. Not to mention that the cooldown of divination is stupidly long.

If they removed the cooldowns entirely then the class would be broken beyond repair. Either it would be throwing out buffs constantly and not doing DPS or healing due to all the APM required for that, or it would be doing no buffing or dps because it has to struggle to keep up with healing, or it would be doing no buffing or healing in order to actually contribute DPS. It could also result in the buffs being nerfed so hard as to be pointless with the entire system being better off removed then kept.

The old AST card system was vastly superior, actually requiring planning and thought outside of 8 man savage raids. Each of the buffs save spire had its place and felt impactful. It felt good to use those buffs. Even as a casual player myself who could never fit into savage raiding I could see that and felt that. AST was the healer that got me into healing because of that.