AST changes for 6.0: Let's forget 5.0 happened, and just fix what was wrong with 4.0

[ty_taurus]

Not necessarily.
In fact, the only scenario where a DPS card would completely negate the usefulness of a support card, would be a situation of absolute optimization. By that point, however, Support, or healing in general, has likely been made obsolete, so you're really saying "any system where DPS competes directly with Healing results in the Healer being ignored."
I suppose, when you look at the game's current state and how the developers have been interacting with us, you're totally right.

If you must look at everything through DPS, consider that the Bole used to be more opportunities for an AST to focus on DPS, since it reduced all incoming damage for a time, meaning it lessened the need to heal. This was the same in solo content and in party content. With regards to the job itself, it was a boon. It just wasn't a direct boon to the DPS jobs.

The problem is that those are niche situations, and the majority of the time, the old cards giving you utility is actively hurting your performance. I'm a fan of the old system in terms of how fun it was, but pretending it didn't need to be adjusted is just ignoring the problem. Things can be optimized AND fun at the same time, you know.

Really, the cards just need to be redesigned from scratch into a system that does separate DPS support from utility support with preferably less buttons needed to manage the whole thing. AST shouldn't have as many buttons as it does dedicated to this card system. Moreover, it would make a big difference to move that DPS support potentially from the cards onto the GCD so that AST can be the support healer who's damage comes almost exclusively from buffs. Naturally those numbers need to be balanced around that and they should probably not be percentage based and just flat potentiates, but both the old and the new systems are ultimately not where they need to be in the slightest.

[MintnHoney]

The problem is that those are niche situations

A niche situation would be something like how I used to use an Enhanced Bole to take the place of the OT in PUGs to save the the other healer (and the rest of the party) from The Fury's Spear in Thordan EX, when the OT would zone out (as they often did, in my experience) or would not position themselves to take the hit. I did not list such a situation, because I did not wish to prompt this particular response.
I should know better by now.

and the majority of the time, the old cards giving you utility is actively hurting your performance.

This is a matter of perspective.
Your perspective appears to be AST w/ Balance vs. AST w/ anything other than balance including no card, wherein AST w/ Balance performed better.
My perspective is AST w/ Card vs. AST w/ No Card, wherein AST w/ Card performed better than AST w/ No Card. This remains true even with this expansion, even if I don't like 5.0 cards.

The difficulty of AST w/ Card, is that [Card] equated to a variable level of boosted performance, which made it somewhat difficult for the Squeen to balance out. However none of the cards were truly a performance drop.

I'm a fan of the old system in terms of how fun it was, but pretending it didn't need to be adjusted is just ignoring the problem. Things can be optimized AND fun at the same time, you know.

For one thing, I'm not advocating the previous system was perfect, nor that it could not have been improved.
For another, as far as I'm concerned, optimization should be a long-distant secondary to the fun in the gameplay, as the point of someone being able to optimize is that you would master what is given. To shift this priority, in my experience, means that this would only end up being fun for a niche group of players (supposedly, raiders), while everyone else generally suffers. This is technically proven by the amount of players who dropped AST as soon as this expansion dropped, and how little the flocked back to AST until Squeen started panic-buffing AST more and more, as they seem to do every expansion.

We're not likely to see eye to eye on this. I'm not keen on seeing things only from the raiders' perspective, and believe that a serious raider would likely have the agency to figure out what works best for their current meta while also being able to provide feedback on what would make gameplay smoother, regardless of what's presented to them.

Really, the cards just need to be redesigned from scratch into a system that does separate DPS support from utility support with preferably less buttons needed to manage the whole thing. AST shouldn't have as many buttons as it does dedicated to this card system. Moreover, it would make a big difference to move that DPS support potentially from the cards onto the GCD so that AST can be the support healer who's damage comes almost exclusively from buffs. Naturally those numbers need to be balanced around that and they should probably not be percentage based and just flat potentiates, but both the old and the new systems are ultimately not where they need to be in the slightest.

At this point, if it were a choice between a total redesign and keeping the cards as they are now, I'd rather a total redesign. In that sense, we agree.

I'm going to assume that you had meant that you believe AST should be able to provide a constant output of buffs via (a) GCD(s).

One issue I immediately think of is that it makes the AST extremely co-dependent. That leaves very little room for AST to have any real agency of its own, and that's a problem. I'm personally not interested in making AST, or any of the healers for that matter, into a party's whipping boy (at least not more than they already are).

Adjusting for this would lead to bloating out issues that we currently face as of this expansion, for AST: that our buffs lack impact, outside of direct numerical comparisons coming from parses.
Considering that a 5% DPS increase is considered a lot to Squeen, the increase for a consistent, purposeful GCD to do the same thing, would need to be smaller than that. We then face the same problems we always do: (i)levels grow, and stats with them. Therefore, assuming that skill levels never change, yes, even 3% starts to mean a lot more than what it originally did. RDPS then starts to grow far too much, and then, to keep up, they either need to boost WHM/SCH, or else reduce AST in efficacy (the latter is the more likely scenario, considering past actions taken, though we'll see panic buffs to AST in response when people drop the class, as has been proven a few times now).

Eventually, we face the same problems we face every expansion: why be X job, when Y and/or Z job accomplishes a given task just as well, if not better, but with less tedium/work?
Some would say "flavor," but that would be against the numerical expressions which that lead to this situation in the first place. And since any other perspective is deemed "short-sighted" at best, then we've effectively written the job off, even for raids, as players end up not wanting to play it.

You mentioned wanting to change to a flat potency increase, rather than a % increase; consider that a 5% of 200 is 10. If we go by flat potency increases, we're still facing those previous problems; how much is "too much," and what's the point if we spend all of our time agonizing over giving 10-20 potency to other party members, when the same amount of potency would be best made up in other ways that allow for potentially more utility and less tedium?

Bringing AST's personal DPS options into the equation, at some point, the AST may decide that their personal DPS output is better than providing the small %/potency DPS increase it could provide instead. At that point, if Squeen were serious about making them prefer to provide the DPS increase via constant buffs to the party, they'd need to either drop AST's personal DPS potency (which would basically kill them off from solo content entirely), or do what we already know they can't do (increase the potency of the buff provided).

This also doesn't address the issue of the majority of gameplay boiling down to pressing one or two buttons, an issue which is shared across the healing board. With such a situation, you merely change who we target for our 1,1,1,1,1, and maybe change that to a 3,3,3,3,3.

Unless Squeen really is willing to take risks and leave it's current battle design philosophy of planned choreography and specific numerical requirements, I don't think we can bring that sort of style into gameplay while providing impact and fun. It throws too much out of balance.

[ty_taurus]

First of all, I disagree that any design, let alone just the ASTs, can only ever be fun and optimal for either endgame raiders or casual players. I want something that works for everyone as much as is possible, and while that will probably never be the case 100%, we can at least make AST work very well at both a high skill level and a low one. The thing about old card utility is that it's only good when you need it whereas DPS support is almost always valuable unless there's no enemy that can be targeted. And this is what I meant when I said "a majority of the time, utility hurts your DPS performance" because if that Bole wouldn't save you, nor would it mitigate enough that would otherwise have costed you or your cohealer GCD DPS, then Bole is not optimal, and even if that does happen, it's difficult to tell in the moment if that's the best option unless you can't redraw anyway, so even then, Bole could end up getting shuffled. This is what happens when you try and share resources with utility and DPS. I think it can be done, but the DPS support needs to be on a longer cooldown or have a certain setup so it can't theoretically be used every time. The other option is that the DPS just isn't worth it in comparison the the DPS gained through the utility, such as SCH's Energy Drain vs other Aetherflow tools which can allow you more uses of Broil instead.

The problem is that the cards all theoretically have the same cooldown, so anytime you were given an Arrow for example, or Spear, you could've theoretically had a Balance and have done more for the team's DPS.

Okay, so to be a bit more detailed into thoughts I have on a total redesign:

What I have in mind for GCD offensive support is a tool that you can place on any ally, including yourself, that deals X potency damage to the primary target of that ally's spells and weaponskills specifically with a maximum of X amount of hits, and the effect duration is X seconds. What we want is for this to be more than Malefic per use, but because you can apply this to yourself, you can have that damage buff your otherwise weaker Malefic when soloing.

Something I think could work for the cards is going back to utility support exclusively. It's difficult to think of six different forms of utility that all feel equally useful, though not impossible. The other option is to have some overlap, but I think the cards could also augment this GCD spell's DPS output depending on who you use it on. Let's take Bole for example and say it returns to a flat damage reduction, perhaps if it's used on a tank, your GCD support will also heal the ally every time the attack triggers. Something like that.

There's also the possibility to extend this effect to multiple spells that each do different other forms of support or even healing. Think about a GCD spell on a long cooldown that restores MP to your cohealer and also causes their next DPS spell to trigger an attack of X potency, or something like that. This is the kind of vision I have for AST, personally.

[MintnHoney]

The thing about old card utility is that it's only good when you need it

Again, this is all perspective.
You view one as a loss, I view both as gains, though in different amounts.

Okay, so to be a bit more detailed into thoughts I have on a total redesign:

What I have in mind for GCD offensive support is a tool that you can place on any ally, including yourself, that deals X potency damage to the primary target of that ally's spells and weaponskills specifically with a maximum of X amount of hits, and the effect duration is X seconds. What we want is for this to be more than Malefic per use, but because you can apply this to yourself, you can have that damage buff your otherwise weaker Malefic when soloing.

I'm not against the idea; I like the idea of being able to enchant allies with on-hit effects, and often wondered what it would be like if the cards each added their own elemental-aspected on-hit damage effects to compensate for "weaker" primary card effects (each of the cards have an element attached to them after all).
That said, let me play around with this a bit.
To start with, let's begin by looking at AST by itself, and let's assume that they cut our Malefic Potency to, say, 200 in order to give this to us. Let's compare 6 GCDs, assume all GCDs are cast with a 2.5 second recast.
If it takes 1 GCD to cast this enchantment, then we need to make make up for the missing Malefic within 5 spellcasts. This makes the minimum potency 40.
If we're trying to make the experimental Enchanted Malefic equalize with the current Malefic IV's potency within these same 6 GCDs, then the potency of the Enchantment effect would need to be 175 potency to make up for the missing GCD ((200+175)*5= 1500 = (6 Malefic IV)).
If we wanted it to be stronger than our current Malefic, we would need to increase the potency from there.
For AST alone, under that lens, it could be neat, though maybe a little tedious for having to refresh the buff every 15 seconds.

However, once we bring other party members into this, we'd need to cap the effect at being placed on 1 party member at a time, otherwise our DPS would skyrocket like there's no tomorrow. Even on just 2 members at a time, and even with 2.5s GCD recast, it would dwarf WHM and SCH's DPS output. We could reduce the potency if we place the enchantment on other party members (eg., the effect is at 100% strength if on AST, 50% on other party members), but in the instance of a 4 man party, if it takes the 2.5s to be able to apply one enchantment, then we're looking at a potency loss for the AST, still, for being unable to contribute its own damage in the meantime, so the AST would just want to keep the spell cast on themselves, essentially making it a self-buff.

Maybe there would be other variables we could plug in to make this better, but it still ends up being that the effect would need to be pretty strong to equalize the loss of AST's own DPS. I'm also ignoring how Squeen doesn't want to allow specific Synergies, along with other abilities and spells AST could use (for example, AOE spells/skills; does this affect those? If so, how?).

I know you wanted it to be on the GCD, but actually, I think an idea like this would be better suited to something like Synastry, which could be upgraded to include something like this via a trait at later levels, or just be revamped to add it in from the start.

Something I think could work for the cards is going back to utility support exclusively. It's difficult to think of six different forms of utility that all feel equally useful, though not impossible. The other option is to have some overlap, but I think the cards could also augment this GCD spell's DPS output depending on who you use it on. Let's take Bole for example and say it returns to a flat damage reduction, perhaps if it's used on a tank, your GCD support will also heal the ally every time the attack triggers. Something like that.

There's also the possibility to extend this effect to multiple spells that each do different other forms of support or even healing. Think about a GCD spell on a long cooldown that restores MP to your cohealer and also causes their next DPS spell to trigger an attack of X potency, or something like that. This is the kind of vision I have for AST, personally.

On the subject of the cards, for the AST we currently have, and the skills we currently have, it may be best if we remove damage increase from all cards, including minor arcana, and leave it to Divination only.
Due to the consistency they've forced into the cards, it would now truly result in a DPS loss to do that, rather than it just being the loss of what could be considered Bonus effects. So there would need to be adjustments there in order to level out AST.

As for the additional effects and combo effects, etc., I'm sure it could be interesting, but if we're looking through the same lens we've been treating the rest of the discussion with, we'd still end up with one true combo to beat them all, and should only ever shoot for that one combo, else, by your own perspective about the previous cards, it's a loss and the player is playing poorly.
That is why I say that perspective should be behind the perspective of making fun gameplay; optimization is going to happen, regardless of intentions and however many roads are created, making all other roads sub-optimal, and therefore obsolete in the lens of pure optimization, outside of "niche circumstances" or homogenization of effects.

Incidentally, on a purely subjective level, I feel like this sort of rework would make AST into something other than AST.

[ty_taurus]

So in reference to a lot of these potential pitfalls is there being a total number of hits that the enchantment can dish out. If it's only ever 5, there technically wouldn't be an issue with DPS loss due to poor performance unless the party member in question either dies or literally does not do 5 GCD spells or weaponskills in a span of the enchantment's duration. For the sake of this example, we'll make Malefic 200 Potency and each hit of this enchantment 50 potency, and the effect lasts either for 30 seconds, until the 5 hits are used, or until the effect is refreshed by the caster (which resets the 5 hits). Every cast of your enchantment, under most conditions, will be a cast of 250 potency, only it will be dealt gradually over the span of usually 12.5ish seconds.

This means being able to apply it to multiple allies really shouldn't matter as the potency you're adding per cast is the same unless someone can't dish out 5 hits during the 30 second window. If we're going to add additional utility to these via the cards, such as Ewer making your next use of it restore MP, it can also augment the effect. Since some healers may be under stress, especially if their MP is low, then this can cause all 5 hits to be dealt out at once for that one cast--meaning when you buff yourself or your cohealer, you only need to try and do 1 GCD spell or weaponskill in the next 30 seconds, such as your DoT potentially.

As for AoEs, I believe I mentioned it being initial hit only, meaning only the first target of your attack will get hit by the potency.

As for Minor Arcana, I actually do think the old Lord and Lady were fine, but what did need to change was their randomness. Random lady means you can never plan for the heal and it's just going to be superfluous overhealing most of the time since you'll be planning your heals around the tools you an rely on. I'd change this so that Minor Arcana no longer eats your current card, runs off its own CD, has 2 charges, and always alternates between the Lord and the Lady. If you pull the Lord, your next card will always be the Lady and vice versa. That in combination with the 2 charges means you can actually prepare for the Lady and use her effectively while also getting damage out of that. In fact, maybe AST could also use more tools that heal and DPS at the same time or share that responsibility to further push that support as DPS mentality.

What about a GCD AoE heal on a 20 second cooldown that heals all nearby allies and damages all nearby enemies?

[Tonkra]

I just reactivated my account after almost a year and WTF did they F*** do to AST??!!!

Sorry but my rage is huge because it is UTTER BULLSHIT.

All "cards" have the fucking freaking same effect - wtf why then we have even "different" cards if they do all the same?! Is this the "WoW"-isation? Dumping it down to one-press-button-mechanics?! They destroyed the whole core mechanic of AST and dumbed it down to a simple one click "buff skill". For what do we have several cards if it practically has just one card now?! Why do we "draw cards" if they are all the same? What a stupidily dumbed down mechanic should that be?

I am not playing AST for high heal power, i play it for the card mechanic, otherwise i could go play back WHM again.

They could have left at least the defense boost effect of the oak card. So that, depending on the situation, could use either defense boost (when the tank for example is about to die) or attack boost.
I personally myself saved often OAK in the deck and when it was needed (very low HP of tank etc) i used it as an extra benefit.


Sorry in all defense but Yoshi is doing many things not very good when it comes to classes - i know he doesnt do the balancing but his opinions on several jobs (that BLU can only be implemented as a limited job - otherwise it would be "overpowered" etc.). Final Fantasy XI was "fucking" able to create a Blue Mage without it being overpowered and same for Corsair which used a similiar mechanic such as Astrologue. And also yoshi P.'s opinion to turn the summoner at release of "A Realm Reborn" into a World of Warcraft DoT Warlock with trash pets was utter bullshit as well - Final Fantasy fans love Summoner classes because of the amazing summons, and they never have been casters with damage over time effects, too. Happily they now turned the SMN more into a FF summoner now...

But coming back for AST: the current "card system" makes practically ZERO sense, lore and mechanic wise. Different cards should mean different things / effects and shouldnt be dumbed down to one single effect.. if it stays like that they better delete the whole card mechanic and turn AST into a regular bullshit healer..

Sorry, but i am more than pissed.

[Side-Eye]

I think going into 5.0, Squeenix had regrets about ever having given AST abilities which extended buffs -- because such abilities can really throw balance out of whack between other jobs, especially when a given buff can improve performance of one job more than another; being able to extend that buff has a multiplicative effect which is impossible in balancing DPS jobs. Therefore, as much as "time mage" was built into astro as an integral part of the job, I don't expect we'll get it back.

However, taking away a whole skill/spell category *should* have been supplanted by another type, so the job would still feel like a complete package. That did not happen.

One potential category in particular could have given AST some depth to replace the time-shifting abilities: Damage to target-of-target.

This type of DD would have been especially helpful for astro, because cards already force a lot of extra clicking / re-targeting to place buffs on groupmates. In effect, AST would be able to keep the tank targeted while casting a nuke-type spell which damaged the tank's target. Perhaps this special type of nuke would be a cooldown with a few charges, so as not to wholly replace, but to supplement, Malefic. (This would actually be a great basis for redesigning the AST job gauge, so that Divination could be separated from it and turned into a non-random ability on a 2 minute timer.)

[glamazon]

I love the idea of forgetting 5.0 but not all of it.
Keep divination and seals and the party wide dig buff. That is amazing and fun.

Keep minor arcana but make it magic dog buff and physical dmg buff

Change the cards to add variety
Balance: dmg buff
Bole: dmg resist buff
Spear: crit buff
Arrow: DH bufff
Spire: mp buff
Ever: run spd in combat buff

Also Change undraw into royal road

[Bsrking5]

It would be even worse.
Cause if you don't need any form of mitigation or extra healing (which already happen), you'd fish for Balance again or just minor arcana into Lord everything.
I'd be 4.0 with even less option.

Hmm I see your point.

So this would be more inline of what I was thinking
Balance: buff on target that reduces attackers damage by 5%
Bole: 10% damage resist
Spear: 20% physical damage resist
Arrow: 10% increased healing
Spire: 20% magical damage resist
Ewer: MP regen
And the minor Arcana changes
Lord: nocturnal Sect 250 pot heal and shield
Diurnal Sect 100 pot heal and 100 regen for 15 seconds
Lady: Diurnal Sect 250 pot heal and shield
Nocturnal Sect 100 pot heal and 100 regen for 15 seconds

[Nimloth]

I've raided with AST in Stormblood, in Edens Gate, Eden's Verse, and I'm currently progging through TEA. I was one of the strongest opponents of the card changes when they rolled out. I didn't read through the entire thread, but I wanted to chime in with my opinion.

After playing around with the class for the changes to the class in the past 2 raid tiers and progressing in TEA, I don't really have concern with the cards anymore. Most people that I see advocating for card changes, just advocate on changing them to other forms of damage increases; I'm not really sure how this is suppose to be more fun. I also, see occasionally people advocating that the bole should be defensive, but I strongly disagree. It's extremely difficult to plan a bole around a specific mechanic due to the random nature of the card, this is why in SB you didn't see ASTs holding out for that ellusive 50% AoE Bole. It just seems that most of the changes being advocated for aren't really any different from how the class is currently being played. To me, it just seems like a lot of effort is being placed on charging a system that won't really make the class more interesting or fun to play. If you give raiders the option between using a defensive CD or a DPS buff, they are going to choose the DPS buff. I know they probably made the changes in Shadowbringers with that in mind.

There are some things that I think need changed though. I believe Sleeve Draw needs a bit more thought and they probably need to rework the seal system to make it more rewarding. Sleeve Draw in it's current iteration feels really bad for a 180s CD ability, I'm not sure why they didn't align this ability with the divination timer. I think the Lord and Lady need to be brought back in a more meaningful way, it was really nice to use minor arcana to get either a healing or damage card. I don't see a reason why we can't have a 8% damage increase assigned to a different ability to free up the minor arcana to start pumping out DPS and healing cards again, perhaps they could be assigned to a different CD. Outside of that, I'm been mostly happy with the changes. Celestial Opposition feels like a meaningful oGCD heal since they made the change way back at the beginning of the expansion. Neutral Sect feels rewarding to use and has a lot of viability. Celestial Intersection always feels meaningful to use in either sect.

One complaint I still have is that they need to give healers something to do during downtime. I'm not really sure why we couldn't get a simply little rotation that combos and maybe gives something like a healing up buff at the end of the combo to reward optimization. At the very least they could give us an extra dot, because as it stands, spamming one button is very very boring when compared to other classes.