Quote Originally Posted by Kurando View Post
We know why they did it, to remove synergy of one particular job bringing so much, that's how good SB AST was before. Though this replacement wasn't exactly thought through enough, essentially 8 cards all doing the same thing and silly seal balancing, just seems messy.
I get your point, but this statement of them is absolutely stupid, simply because Ninja still has Trick Attack, wich remains to be the most powerful Raid DPS increasement by a large margin. Its so powerful that EVERY other job builds their rotation and opener around trick attack windows. This means Ninja will still easily outclass Monk & Samurai in every 8 man raid. It just boggles my mind why they nerfed ASTs raid utility by a good 90%-95% (That number is quite accurate and potentially even higher with the loss of spread, extended cards, the ability to have a spread card ready at pull alongside cards duration now only lasts half as long) and at the same time they keep Trick Attack untouched. To make it even worse, the card nerfs are so intense that the average AST, who doesnt know how to properly weave cards will be a 100% guranteed dps malus for the group. As soon as a AST starts clipping their cards (for example by using them after benefics or by using draw/play right after another without a malefic in between) its a dps loss and literally pointless to even bother with the cards. This means right now the skill ceiling with the card system is absurdly high and no AST other than the higher skilled players can make real profit with it. For every average and below AST it will sadly be a pointless thing to bother with and i am sure this shouldnt be the goal of the job.