AST cards ramble

[ForsakenRoe]

Honestly, work!

Thank you, let me address your points, because I have nothing better to do atm (smithing cannonballs in runescape, it's slow and afk)

For buff variety, yeh, I feel that we cannot have a system that has damage competing with utility, as people choose damage pretty much every time, and complain when they're 'forced' into using the utility instead (look at Lady of Crowns for example). An idea that some put forth is to split the cards so that utility is separated from the damage, so the 'having to choose between the two' isn't a thing, but I instead elected to keep the 'Draw card' thing as just one system, to try and keep it from getting complex to play. Stuff like 'oh if I use this mit utility card, it gives me X seal, which screws my Astrodyne' could potentially come up, and I couldn't be bothered trying to resolve all that. But yes, I do feel that the whole thing we have now of 'pump all cards into your most geared DPS' is kinda bland. With this there can be room to do other, quirky things for optimization's sake, like the mentioned 'what if you could give PLD an extra Sheltron lmao'

For the Spear, I had thought this as well, I have the effect of the X of Irons temporarily convert the AST's damage to physical, similar to Steelsing from Bozja. Coincidentally, I was thinking it might be worded weird atm, but the idea would be that you'd be able to take advantage of the Spear's effect in some form, even though you're a magic user. I might go back and rewrite stuff or even change Spear to something else, but if the worst comes to the worst in solo play, we can consider the fact that Redraw cannot give you the same card, so having one 'dead' card for yourself is not actually an issue, as you can use any of the other five results just fine even in solo. Plus, Spear and Spire granting Celestial Seals, but being the exact opposite effect of each other (mag/phys damage) seemed fitting. I really, really, don't want to make Spear be 'lmao it gives crit rate' though, mostly because I don't want to do the maths to try and get it's raid-damage contribution to be roughly equal to the others (gear makes crit's effectiveness scale real weird mathematically). I might have an idea, and if it's balanceable enough I might add it in an edit at the end of this post (and in the OP)

Lightspeed would remain, however, due to the 'play cards in burst' changing to have Minor Arcana as an instant, and less Majors to play in raidbuffs (maybe 1, maybe 2 if I let people pool for 2min, not decided yet), Lightspeed's 'GCDs are instant so you can weave' is less pronouced, and so it gets to be used on Malefic as a mobility option, for those times where you want to DPS but the raid says 'run 45 miles to resolve this debuff'. Due to not being needed for the 2min window, I think it'd be fine staying at 90s (alignment is no longer an issue), and it probably wouldn't need a second charge (though I wouldn't say no to one). Arrow's instantcasts are actually not anything to do with Lightspeed, I just figure that if the GCD goes to 1.5 because of the card, you can't weave anything and that's not ideal, so instantcasts it is (plus it'd probably feel cooler to machinegun 5 spells in 8 seconds if they're instant rather than locking you down movementwise). But also remember, the effect of the instantcasts is actually only there for solo play, the intended use of the card is to throw on your melee or ranged

And we're playing the tail end of an expansion where 'the indomitable human spirit rejects the cruel indifference and apathy of the universe' is the name of the game, so even if it doesn't go anywhere beyond posting here, I think the fact you enjoyed reading it is a success on it's own. If SE want to take anything I've written and use it, I'd be delighted, so much so I don't care for credit or shoutouts, being able to play a more fun and engaging healer would be reward enough as it is. I write my rambling job redesigns because I guess I can't let go of what I went to uni for, to study games design and how to make them, it's in my blood. But also, I guess I write them to stand up and prove a certain crowd wrong, to show that it IS possible to make a design that adds something for hardcore players to optimize and have fun with, while keeping it super accessible and forgiving for someone who's still levelling it.

I'd like to believe that SE devs, should they choose to actually make changes, would choose that kind of design, so what I make would, I believe, have a higher chance of being implemented in some form. Also due to my studies I'm pretty cognizant of the dev pipeline, and the manhours required to do VFX stuff, so I try to keep my stuff grounded and 'able to reuse old animations', to keep the dev time down to a minimum. A full rework to some classes is cool, like SMN 'looks' cool at least (gameplay is subject to personal taste), same with MCH, the multitools look cool. But I do wonder how long it took to make those new animations and VFX, and so I try to avoid that pitfall. Like my pride and joy, my WHM redesign, would require, I think, one spell effect to be designed, that of the heal skill Blessing of the Elementals. Banish, Quake, Tornado, Flood, all of those while new, also have spell VFX in the files already that can be adapted

Anyway thank you again for taking the time to read (and for giving me something to do while these cannonballs smelt)

edit: the idea is not balanceable, most likely. I was gonna try to find a way to make Spear be 'the target melee/ranged can use a specific CD, with no regard to it's cooldown or cost'. So eg, Monk gets a free use of Riddle of Wind, DRG gets a free Wyrmwind Thrust, BRD gets a free Barrage, etc. But the potencies and gear differences and all that would make it insanely busted for certain classes, I think. Like how do I balance 'gear stacked SAM with Dance Partner gets a free Shoha' versus 'struggling DNC with no gear gets a free Fan Dance 4', it's cool in theory but the maths is a nightmare, especially when considering that not only do the chosen skills have to be balanced against each other, but also against the other cards effects

edit 2: might have found a way to get it to work, I'll put it in, and have 'if this is imbalanced, do 10% physical damage as a safe boring option' in brackets