Astrologian Speculations! How will it fit in?

[Ghishlain]

I'm curious as well. Without CS an AST won't be as useful for DPSing or soloing as the other two healers which would be pretty bad. And without Swiftcast they would be so gimped... It's going to be interesting so see what happens with Crossclass skills. I'm wondering if they are going to change it to 3 classes that every ob can crossclass with or something. Because AST may need some ACN spells as well (virus, e4e).

Just emphasis on the bolded part, you can make the argument that AST card buffs indirectly providing DPS to groups via their buff mechanics. Say a SCH or WHM can provide 200 DPS in any normal boss fight; AST buffs would need to be able to generate a comparable number to that 200 DPS via their buffs thus negating the need for them to have CS in a party setting. Of course this is its own can of worms for balancing - will AST buffs be single target only? Area effect? Aura around the AST? Balanced for 4-man or 8-man parties? etc. And of course this changes dramatically in a solo setting as well.

[VanilleFang]

buff

Yeah I thought about too. But then the whole random factor with cards... CS is reliable. A buff isn't. Not really. Especially if it only lasts a certain amount of time. The more I look at it this way the more I don't really like it. It would be so incredibly hard to balance, especially when you add in solo play. You don't want it to be over powered, but you also don't want it to be too weak. CS, to me, is perfect. It has no flaws in any way. So to try and make something similar but completely different will be really hard for SE to pull off. That's my thoughts on it anyway.

[Ghishlain]

Yeah I thought about too. But then the whole random factor with cards... CS is reliable. A buff isn't. Not really. Especially if it only lasts a certain amount of time. The more I look at it this way the more I don't really like it. It would be so incredibly hard to balance, especially when you add in solo play. You don't want it to be over powered, but you also don't want it to be too weak. CS, to me, is perfect. It has no flaws in any way. So to try and make something similar but completely different will be really hard for SE to pull off. That's my thoughts on it anyway.

Indeed, that's why I'm looking forward to seeing what will be done. If S-E gives AST the right tools, they'll be able to get a high uptime of popular buffs like Corsairs were able to in XI. It'll be a hard thing to balance, but I imagine it'll keep the AST quite busy with this and healing duties.

Can't wait to see the move list released.