What Do We Want to See? - AST

[Kissune]

I'm not in the camp of mixed util/dps cards but at the same time DPS cards need some sort of rework. I'd envision something along the theme of bard songs, with astrodyne reworked into a pure utility spell bc AST has never felt like a 'personal dps dealer' to me. Ideally, I'd like each draw to feel useful and not coming at the sacrifice of damage. If it were up to me I'd see two paths. Two seperate decks to draw from, one with a set of more varied DPS cards, and one with a set of pure utility cards with seperate charges or timers. Having random utility feels bad for me when it can't be relied on, and if it's sharing a space with DPS that always feels useful and satisfying to play. I like the class fantasy of someone who doesn't do much damage on their own, but gets to spread buffs around to make their DPS more useful, it's what pulled me to the class in 5.X/6.X. Or possibly a system where your deck has a flat number of draws before shuffling, with ways to adjust the order using tools to hold on to or destroy cards like sleeve draw and royal road. Ultimately speaking, I feel like mixed DPS/utility makes it so during prog you're going to be annoyed at drawing dps cards, and during anything else you're going to be annoyed at drawing utility cards. In current EW+ fight design they can't have a healer that has extremely inconcistent damage or utility. Minor arcana exemplified 10fold just fills me with a sense of dread hehe.

I agree with OP on the healing aspect. AST has always been about its set up and release/instant weak payoff vs delayed strong payoff style of healing. Keep that, lean more into it, make it the core identity of the healing kit. Getting Noct Sect back seems like wishful feeling, but it was a very fun aspect of ShB I'll always look at fondly. I still have it on my hotbar, even.


In response to OP's general healing points
- I agree. The fast paced, high APM method of EW cards was a decent enough distraction to me to ignore just how boring general healing filler was, and now that it's being taken away it'll once more be glaringly obvious. And an extra dps button tied to divination is, I'm sorry, not a suitable upgrade.
- Agreed, or if they are going to give us a bloated amount of healing tools... Make fights actually require it, even at easier difficulty levels. With all these mit changes, ST heal changes, and mit changes in 7.0 I better be seeing tanks and healers gasping for breath by the end of even a levelling dungeon. Otherwise I'm gonna keep asking... what was the point of all these tools? Giving AST 3 charges of ED, along with "cards" that also cure or mitigate... That seems a lot of junk for little need. I anticipate discarding most cards I draw or just using them for the sake of using it.
- I'm very bored of mit checks. SCH/SGE felt like the most optimal comp in EW fights, and I anticipate more of that. If you're going to seperate the healers into pure and shield categories, the former sitting around and pressing one button every 30s compared to the latter having to actually manage CDs and mitigate every raidwide.
- MP management would be nice, but tying it to an RNG card like OP wants just seems like a recipe in frustration. I'd tie it to a reworked astrodyne that forces you to choose between using dyne for MP management, a healing amp, or perhaps mobility. Something that isn't just 'press lucid on CD, press the DPS button to get mana', I'd like to see something akin to (old) scholar energy drain where gaining mana was at the cost of something else. I don't just wanna ED wholesale, that's SCH's thing, but the same philosophy would be there.

I'd like, ultimately, cards to be about making sure the one you drew goes to the right place and the right person. Reading the fates to find the best use of it in the window you have it for. I understand the appeal of RNG cards, but the feeling of drawing something and just having to throw it away or sigh as you know drawing it means losing out on damage for that window in fights that are getting tighter and tighter dps checks that need to balanced for the lowest common denominator. I had enough of 'why are you playing AST here, isn't WHM better?' and I don't want to go back to it.

EW/ShB cards were boring, but I felt like they worked. They do have room to grow, however. At the bare minimum they should be separated by 3 different types of DPS buffs, for melee and ranged. Crit up, DH up, and Flat% up. That's the minimum at least.

Here's the Astro that I would want personally. The goal would be to rework minor arcana into your "RNG non damage buff cards" While keeping the damage buff cards but changing some to crit chance ect. (I would like more interesting damage buffs like Haste but with how the game works currently that isn't possible).

Draw CD: 30 (2 Stacks)
Note: if card is used on the "wrong target" the effect(s) will be halved like current, Also "%" should be adjusted if too weak/strong, they should roughly be around each other.
The Balance - 6% Damage to target if Melee/Tank | The Arrow 10% Crit buff to target if Melee/Tank | The Spear 18% DH buff to target if Melee/Tank
The Spire - 6% Damage to target if Ranged/Healer | The Bole 10% Crit buff to target if Ranged/Healer | The Ewer 18% DH buff to target if Ranged/Healer

Minor Arcana (Reworked) CD: 30s (2 Stacks)
Minor Arcana now act as separate "non damage buff" cards for utility.
Examples of Minor arcana cards would be, Regen/healing, Mitigation, barrier, movement speed. (more possible that i can't think of)

Royal Road CD: 90s
Changes the effect of your current drawn Minor Arcana card to be a AOE effect.

Added actions: Play Arcana, Royal Road
Removed actions: Astrodyne, Synastry, Undraw, Celestial Intersection.

How to improve healing?
1. Reduce tanks baseline defensive value, this doesn't mean remove Mitigation tools, just remove how much damage they can withstand in baseline, also up auto attacks.
2. No AOE, Per enemy hit healing on tanks (looking at you warrior).
3. Add more AOE Damage, even sometimes having aoe autos or debuffs that will require more healing resources

This also has to bonus of making utility from non healers more impactful but doesn't overwrite the healers job.

@Rithy255, This is exactly what I'd want! I like your version a lot more than my scattered collection of ideas. I'd also suggest DPS on single target dps (stuff like natural alignment) to be more common, to give them a reason to use their personals and us a reason to not just macro our ST top ups onto the two tanks :P