Fix AST's Accessibility Issue

[Risvertasashi]

You make a valid point. I wasn't sure if it was a viable way for balance, but AST has been lacking in the MP management department since the other two healers have better management. Especially in regards to N.AST, which needs the extra MP. If 1k MP is that much, they could simply just make it 500 MP since that's what a Aetherflow is for SCH. Though in hindsight, we already have WHM that has a ridiculous amount of MP Management(Infinite MP for 12s, Free GCD Healing, Free Instant Cast, etc.) while SCH has to manage a fairy while on GCD and their Aetherflow which is all oGCD.

It's worth noting that a frequently-overlooked SCH CD lets them use anything without consuming aetherflow and guarantees crits. Sort of the SCH version of thin air.

N.AST has issues, but they run much deeper than MP - to make it competitive with SCH, we need to be talking about completely different things. AST as a whole... well, let me put it like this. As of the 5.1 buffs, AST is already topping the damage charts ahead of every other healer, and every tank. And buffing AST's MP (along with faster casts, etc) in stormblood is what sent the healer balance from the relatively balanced 'SCH+AST for farm, but WHM for prog' to the completely out of control 'SCH+AST for everything', so I'm a bit wary about this.

500 MP would be more reasonable, but I think it would be better still if the ability was on something not in the healer role.

Then why not make the "undesirable" cards more desirable, rather than tossing out the baby with the bathwater? The old card system had a minor flaw, and that could have been remedied without scrapping the whole thing and replacing it with something that I cannot even see the benefit of without a parser...

They started to do that.

What happened was more and more of the cards became DPS buffs. Inferior to Balance, however, so most people still sought that.

[Side-Eye]

They started to do that.

What happened was more and more of the cards became DPS buffs. Inferior to Balance, however, so most people still sought that.

Making all of the cards practically the same (and worse than Balance) was not making the old cards more desirable -- it was just a cheap, quick, easy thing to appease DPS who just wanted bigger epeens.

Squeenix could have kept the flavor of the old cards and simply made each better at its purpose, and given Spire a purpose to replace TP. And if they were going to kill off RR/spread, they could have attached a minor DPS boost to each of the cards so that they could provide their original benefits and still be useful on a recipient even if the original benefit wasn't particularly needed at the moment.

What they did was neither creative nor inspired; and it left a lot of AST mains wondering why the F so much was taken away that was scarcely related to the card system, like TD buff extension and AE stun.

[HyperiusUltima]

Making all of the cards practically the same (and worse than Balance) was not making the old cards more desirable -- it was just a cheap, quick, easy thing to appease DPS who just wanted bigger epeens.

Squeenix could have kept the flavor of the old cards and simply made each better at its purpose, and given Spire a purpose to replace TP. And if they were going to kill off RR/spread, they could have attached a minor DPS boost to each of the cards so that they could provide their original benefits and still be useful on a recipient even if the original benefit wasn't particularly needed at the moment.

What they did was neither creative nor inspired; and it left a lot of AST mains wondering why the F so much was taken away that was scarcely related to the card system, like TD buff extension and AE stun.

SE was looking to simplify things because there was too much going on for the player; the level of complexity was something they were looking at, and they wanted to slow it down so that it's not as difficult compared to having to throw cards around. Play fixed many of the Draw Issues when trying to spam it to get the action in because of ping, but either way they should have not removed CO's Stun. TD on the other hand could've been redone for just their own cards to nerf them a bit since it was generally applied to all buffs since inception. Again, look up above for what my suggestion is along with @Risvertasashi's arguments because mind you reverting back and forth from one thing to the other takes a lot of development time to test, perfect, and make sure everything works properly with the new system they had set up for Shadowbringers.

[Side-Eye]

SE was looking to simplify things because there was too much going on for the player; the level of complexity was something they were looking at, and they wanted to slow it down so that it's not as difficult compared to having to throw cards around.

If simplification was truly their goal, they failed spectacularly. Sure, sandpaper is more "simple" than a drill with a sandpaper attachment, but it takes a tremendous amount more work and effort to get similar results. After a session playing AST, my wrists sometimes actually ache from the constant re-targeting and clicking to use those 15 second tiny-dps-booster cards.

Furthermore, there was already a less complex option if one wanted to play a healer job without as much complexity. That's one of the things that has traditionally been great about this game: choices.

[Risvertasashi]

Squeenix could have kept the flavor of the old cards and simply made each better at its purpose, and given Spire a purpose to replace TP. And if they were going to kill off RR/spread, they could have attached a minor DPS boost to each of the cards so that they could provide their original benefits and still be useful on a recipient even if the original benefit wasn't particularly needed at the moment.

Well, for example, SE quite literally doubled the potency of bole, and people still found it to be useless.

So... how would you change it to make it useful? Either you make it not RNG (which means removing it from the card system), or you make it so powerful it breaks the game and lets you flat out ignore mechanics. Not quite as simple as "just make it better", is it?

[SleepyNeko]

Well, for example, SE quite literally doubled the potency of bole, and people still found it to be useless.

So... how would you change it to make it useful? Either you make it not RNG (which means removing it from the card system), or you make it so powerful it breaks the game and lets you flat out ignore mechanics. Not quite as simple as "just make it better", is it?

You can just keep the old cards but have the new Lady/Lord system, since lady/lord guarantees a dps increase effect on any card.

[Side-Eye]

Well, for example, SE quite literally doubled the potency of bole, and people still found it to be useless.

So... how would you change it to make it useful? Either you make it not RNG (which means removing it from the card system), or you make it so powerful it breaks the game and lets you flat out ignore mechanics. Not quite as simple as "just make it better", is it?

It could be better at its purpose by boosting two caster-centric attributes, so instead of just increasing MP regen, it could also decrease cost, or also make the next two casts MP-free, or also provide a lesser DPS boost, or also add a crit%, or....

I mean, I'm sure you get what I'm saying: there are ways to make a card better at its purpose without making that one boost so big it's game-breaking.
(edit: I mentioned caster stuff as an example but similar thinking can be applied to tank/defensive stuff too; a card need not have a single benefit, but two lessers to be better at its purpose)

[HyperiusUltima]

It's worth noting that a frequently-overlooked SCH CD lets them use anything without consuming aetherflow and guarantees crits. Sort of the SCH version of thin air.

N.AST has issues, but they run much deeper than MP - to make it competitive with SCH, we need to be talking about completely different things. AST as a whole... well, let me put it like this. As of the 5.1 buffs, AST is already topping the damage charts ahead of every other healer, and every tank. And buffing AST's MP (along with faster casts, etc) in stormblood is what sent the healer balance from the relatively balanced 'SCH+AST for farm, but WHM for prog' to the completely out of control 'SCH+AST for everything', so I'm a bit wary about this.

500 MP would be more reasonable, but I think it would be better still if the ability was on something not in the healer role.

I wasn't entirely aware of how much MP had an impact on healers in Stormblood given how I was still getting better and understanding the different jobs. If we really had to throw in something that's not MP, then we need to make sure that we don't wind up with Balance Syndrome. If anything, we could make Celestial be a minor Haste buff...though the problem that comes with that then disjoints a lot of openers. It's really hard to think of something that could benefit for Celestial, because AST does not need more healing, nor can they be given an MP Boost...on top of that making it 2% increase raid-wide for all party members just makes people fish more for that card since it's more beneficial; though honestly, they can still get a good benefit off of just RRing the Lunar/Solar Seals as well. Doing it that way may work for the time being perhaps.

Also, Recitation is dumb, yes. At the least, they could put a little more pressure on SCH's resources and just make it guarantee a critical while costing resources to make it more competitive so that SCHs have to make better decisions instead of Recitation Excog/Indom(which when those can guarantee Crits it makes SCH look strong on the healing front).