Astrologian Speculations! How will it fit in?

[tjw]

Raising % chances? Maybe AST will be able to make other classes procs pop more often...

That would probably be OP, on second thought.

If AST had a decent AoE heal and also increased crit/proc chances, no one would bring WHM anymore but a SCH and AST. That crit Adlo. I'm assuming that if they do, it will be an increased chance worthy of actually being used. A 1% increased chance will be useless in the long run.

[Arupopo]

Maybe AST will get an ability that restores another characters mana. Making it more viable with WHM.

[Vlady]

I personally can see barrier stance giving Astrologians a partial barrier that absorbs 20% of incoming damage up to whatever potency is on the heal. Like a mitigation ability.

[Dualblade]

snip

Remember that the Conjurer job in atleast Bravely Default used Summons for various buffs, rather than being a healer/using the elements.

[Oriens]

I'm personally tired of hearing "if AST has XYZ then no one will bring WHM or SCH cause of ABC"-- so what? As it is now, a full party can't bring every job along for the ride. Please get used to 1 healer and 1 tank being left out of the picture in 3.0. The sooner you acknowledge this fact, the better.

[Zaft]

I'm personally tired of hearing "if AST has XYZ then no one will bring WHM or SCH cause of ABC"-- so what? As it is now, a full party can't bring every job along for the ride. Please get used to 1 healer and 1 tank being left out of the picture in 3.0. The sooner you acknowledge this fact, the better.

That's the thing. Look at WoW. Look at Mythic raids. You can only bring 20 people to a Mythic raid. There are 11 classes and 34 specs that you can be. Some people get left out. But that doesn't change the fact that nobody has ever been "HURR NEVER BRINGING X CLASS" since the class/ability revamp in Burning Crusade. Some specs are stronger than others, sure. Resto Druid had a rough spot in early Mists of Pandaria where it wasn't nearly as good as any other healer, but it was still brought to plenty of content, because unless a class is SEVERELY weaker than another, people generally don't care.

[Brightshadow]

That's the thing. Look at WoW. Look at Mythic raids. You can only bring 20 people to a Mythic raid. There are 11 classes and 34 specs that you can be. Some people get left out. But that doesn't change the fact that nobody has ever been "HURR NEVER BRINGING X CLASS" since the class/ability revamp in Burning Crusade. Some specs are stronger than others, sure. Resto Druid had a rough spot in early Mists of Pandaria where it wasn't nearly as good as any other healer, but it was still brought to plenty of content, because unless a class is SEVERELY weaker than another, people generally don't care.

And on top of that healers and tank tend to be harder to find than DPS, so its very unlikely you'll get kicked for being a white mage, and not a scholar (Just an example if White Mage are the weakest healers in 3.0)

However, while we still don't know much about the astrologian; I do believe they should have there own unique healing niche because if they can heal like a white mage, and shield like a scholar what would be the purpose of even adding the job into the game it wouldn't add anything different other than animations. And it would damage the other 2 healers because currently its not a wise idea to bring two of the same healers, but rather one of each; astrologian could potentially be devastating to scholars and white mage.

[MirielleLavandre]

My one concern, and maybe not even a concern, is that AST will bring more to the table than either healer. They need to make AST strong enough to solo heal 4 mans, and also to function as the 2nd part of a raid healing team. However, in the benchmark we see them using 1 card to give what seems like a fire based damage buff to the whole party. If they can even increase this buff or make it stronger by waiting and drawing a 2nd card, then I guess I'd wonder who would want to bring anything other than an AST? Healing 'well enough' to do 4 man dungeons, and also providing a damage buff and/or other buffs? Being able to switch out between shields/raw heals depending on need? It seems AST could be everything both heal classes are (of course, not to the same degree, but enough to get by) with extra buffs thrown in. At initial launch, it almost seems too good to be true ^^

[LycorisSelunis]

If my other mmo experience is true, they will likely range from grossly OP or a bit OP at launch, then get nerfed a tiiiiny bit next patch, then get nerfed to the ground second patch, and balance out sometime after that although the general consensus of the class will be a mix of the game's populous either remembering it being op or crying that it was nerfed to unplayable. Although I hope for a good balanced new job to have fun with, I rarely expect such things right off the bat, it would be too perfect.

They made a great deal mentioning how stance changing will be limited and how you would want to use one stance to complement your cohealer but I am still wondering just HOW limited it will be, for 4 man content. Can you switch between trash and bosses? change mid boss for a certain phase? do you queue as one stance and get locked into it? I rather doubt the last one but hey it's a thought.

I should probably not post at wee hours of the morning.

[Menae]

That's the thing. Look at WoW. Look at Mythic raids. You can only bring 20 people to a Mythic raid. There are 11 classes and 34 specs that you can be. Some people get left out. But that doesn't change the fact that nobody has ever been "HURR NEVER BRINGING X CLASS" since the class/ability revamp in Burning Crusade. Some specs are stronger than others, sure. Resto Druid had a rough spot in early Mists of Pandaria where it wasn't nearly as good as any other healer, but it was still brought to plenty of content, because unless a class is SEVERELY weaker than another, people generally don't care.

People at the bleeding edge care a lot and will absolutely stack good classes/specs in WoW or any other game. It's less likely that groups will stack as much in FFXIV because of the LB penalty, but some will certainly be inclined to PREFER classes over one another, and that attitude can and will bleed down into the prejudices of less talented free companies. I'm not arguing that it'll kill game balance or anything, but it can affect what FCs are looking for. You might have to parse slightly better as one class to make it in. As Brightshadow alluded to, this is less prevalent for healers (and parsing as a healer isn't really a thing anyway), but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Also, to rebut: the "fact" that nobody has ever been "HURR NEVER BRINGING X CLASS" in WoW has abso-freaking-lutely not been a fact. People say it all the time; it's usually for poorly performing melee specs. Come to think of it, that was during and before BC too. WoW's never been very good about melee.