Quote Originally Posted by Semirhage View Post
So...why does Benediction, which is a far, far weaker, jankier ability than Macrocosmos, have the same cooldown? Why does Astrologian get AOE Benediction plus damage on the same cooldown as Benediction? Could it be because healer balance is in the spot it's been for literal years, i.e. Astro has a whole flying boatload of free healing, infinite MP, higher total damage output than a "selfish" job, buffs, mobility, and a partridge in a pear tree?

Awful design decisions aside, the balance within the healer role has always been pretty bad ever since Astro was introduced to the game. You don't have jobs complementing one another with different strengths in different places. You have one or two jobs that can do everything extremely well with zero weaknesses, and one or two jobs that are strictly inferior in almost every single category except maybe one or two. That's not balance.
Because the general level of healers can't use macrocosmos as a benediction button to save their life in majority of the content because they have to start being aware. Delayed heals? I still see ASTs using Benefic II without touching their oGCD heals because they start panicking when everyone suddenly loses a chunk of HP immediately. Sad but true.

I'm still of the mind that AST doesn't need to get its heals nerfed. If they do, they might as well reduce button bloat instead first before nerfing a unique skill like this one. I'd rather they bring WHM to the same level as AST for the "Pure Healers" to be competitive, because as it is now, WHM needs a decent amount of healing redesign to be competitive.

Heck, all healer toolkits need a big re-examining. I'm fine with tanks getting more self-heals and party heals, but it leaves healers with only one or two offensive skills in a weird place still.