Please Return Randomness to Astrologian's Card System

[ForsakenRoe]

Being fixed over randomised aside I hate that almost the entirety of the card system now has been reduced to ‘oops more healing mechanics’.

Like ffs weren’t supposed to be a support buffer? Why draw hell would I want a regen card when I already have 5 abilities that already that do that? Spire is a shield now, oh wow I wish we had another more readily used shield that’s practically available on-demand due to charges (*stares intently at Celestial Intersection*). Neutral Sect? I’m not interested in casual relationships thanks.

HW/SB cards were obviously busted and unbalanced and whatever but my god at least they tried to pretend to be ‘buffing the party’ and not just ‘lol more healing’. The loss of RNG already took some fun out of the job for certain people, and now the job barely does the one thing it was marketed to do; buffing/supporting the party. Apparently now Astrologian’s identity is just ‘increasingly invalidates WHM’ lol

Can’t we go back to like Spear boosts critical rate and Ewer restores MP or whatever and Arrow can increase movement speed. If they’re that worried about ‘card fishing’ just keep the exact same system we have now where you pull a set of 3 at once. I’d accept not having rng if planning and using cards was actually interesting, but it’s literally just ‘throw balance, discard useless cards, Draw, throw Spear, repeat’. But I mean, does it even really make sense to limit job design purely on ‘what if that one guy abuses the system for maximal values???’. Like, is that really justification for having literally nothing but pure healing? With some of the WHMs I see I think that can absolutely be abuse too lol (so…much…overheal…)

I hate the pretzel they bent the Lore into, personally. Spire is the leading Card of the Crowns suit, akin to an Ace in our playing cards. Spire is a Barrier effect, Lord of Crowns is AOE damage, Lady of Crowns is an AOE heal, and we don't get to use Knave of Crowns, any of the <number> of Crowns (2-7), nor any of the other FIVE suits (Cups, Rings, Irons, Staves, Knives) for anything. Explain yourself SE, why Crowns in particular

Yes I agree that we 'can go back' to having tertiary effects like Bole having Mit, Ewer having MP refresh, etc. But those effects need to either be the only effects Cards have (with Balance Spear Arrow being given new effects instead of their damage contribution), or they need to all have some form of damage contribution, with those effects being a neat bonus on top, else you run into the old issue of 'Card X is good and Card Y is bad, because X gives damage and Y does not'. Personally, I'd do the latter. Ewer would have MP refres, for example, but playing it on a Healer would let that Healer do bonus damage. Bole would have Mit, but it'd also reflect damage based on Max HP (so playing it on a Tank, who's going to make best use of the Mit anyway) is the ideal play. Etc.

New AST Draws feels like if they reworked SCH, so that pressing Aetherflow gave you 'Lustrate Ready', 'Excogitation Ready', 'Protraction Ready' and 'Energy Drain Ready'.

I wholeheartedly agree with the lamentation that AST feels less like what it was advertized to be (raid buffer). The fact they had to increase Combust's potency by FIFTEEN for DT's launch, plus add Oracle as an action, to make up for the loss of 2 damage cards per 2min, is comical and tragic in equal measure