Leveling Astrologian and need a bit of help

[Ninster]

I'm one of those insane people that wants to do as much of EVERYTHING as I can. So I'm a SMN-main trying out astrologian. And it's been some time since I last healed anything.

Still, I'm currently 42 and astrologian isn't really clicking with me yet. I don't have all the cards memorized yet, but I'm getting there. Even at that, I'm still at a loss as I start getting more options as to what to do with cards. So... a little help with card management will go a long way, I think. Healing and DPSing, and switching between the two is something I think I have fairly solid. At least enough to learn from my mistakes anyway.

At the moment I have Royal Road and Spread for card options. Shuffle I think is my next one? Anyway, how do I effectively use cards from start to finish in a dungeon? Say my very first draw is a Balance or Bole. Do I use those on the first pull or Royal Road/Spread for the next card? What about subsequent draws?

In general, what about the buffs themselves? I've been placing Balance on DPS and Bole on tanks, but I'm not sure what to do with Spear or Arrow. Ewer I'll use on myself if there's no other casters, and Spire... I think I've been opting to Royal Road it every time.

I'm nervous about healing in general, and I think it got me when I went into Stone Vigil just a few hours ago, since about the third or fourth pull in the tank grabbed more than I could heal and no sooner than that he dropped without a word after he went down. One of the DPS followed suit, and somehow me and the other DPS waited until we got both replacements and the run continued without a hitch. It was kinda bizarre how it started out but apparently I did pretty well after that first wipe, so I'm kinda confused. I've tanked SV enough to know that it's really hard if you try to rush it, but as a healer I don't exactly have control over whether the tank takes his time planning out pulls or not.

[Taranok]

As a disclaimer, I am only a level 48 Astrologian, and I do not have end-game healing experience, so I cannot say exactly how to prioritize everything.

First things first are to understand and know at-a-glance what each card does. Your card options are:

Bole: Damage Down
Balance: Damage Up
Arrow: Attack Speed Up
Spear: oGCD Down
Ewer: MP Cost Down
Spire: TP Cost Down

If you do not know this by heart and understand it, you will never be able to use the card system effectively.

Next comes royal road:

Bole and Balance: +50% potency
Arrow and Spear: 50% potency AoE
Ewer and Spire: Double Duration

This is all very obvious, but you need to know these by heart, just as you need to know what each card does.

So, the next part is strategy, and this is where you start to finesse the cards. You need to prioritize what you want versus what can give you it. So what are the lowest value cards, what are the highest?

Highest value: Balance, Arrow and Bole. The first 2 are very powerful damage steroids, and you will almost always be looking for one of the first 2. Bole itself is very powerful as an extra 10% mitigation, but it is highly situational.
Moderate Value: Spear. Spear is very hit or miss, and you basically need to have coordination to maximize it unless you personally use it for your own abilities, namely your MP regen, which will become a problem eventually.
Lowest value: Ewer, Spire, Bole. Ewer and Spire are very hard to use in PUG settings, but gain a lot of value in organized raids with voice communication. Bole is either the strongest or weakest card to draw, and it exclusively depends on what you are personally trying to do.

Royal Road priority:

Double Duration is the best, but least-bursty, of all of the buffs. You are able to throw them away casually in most situations, and double duration gives more effective use than +50% potency. Sometimes you might want something specific, and there's no harm going for it if you want to. It is basically good with anything.

+potency comes next. It's good, but 30 seconds of +10% damage is better than 15 seconds of +15% damage. However, sometimes someone has a very nice combo about to go out, or maybe they're about to do an opening rotation. You can always use this. It is best used with Arrow or Balance, but can see effective use from every card, it just depends on what you are after.

half potency AoE: This is either the weakest, or strongest, of all of the royal roads. It is pretty much never a good idea to use it with Ewer or Spire, except in organized raids where you need a ton of people to regen TP (I doubt you will ever want it for Ewer even in organized raids), but you can have hilarious results with Balance or Arrow, or insane burst trains with Spear when running this one. If you are in organized raids, an extra 5% damage mitigation can be the difference between wiping and scraping by.

But how does this all come together, which is really the crux of the question you are asking. The answer is, set goals.

Do you know you need high-burst, perhaps either single target or group-wide burst? Start preparing. Throw Arrows or Balances to Spread, try to cycle to them, and queue up the correct royal road.

Can't find the right cards? It's okay, just find the next best card that can still accomplish your goal of higher burst. Spear starts to look better at this point. Maybe you didn't get the right card to royal road but have the right spread card, maybe the inverse. This is fine, improvise. That is what the system is about.

Do you know heavy burst is coming and someone might be at risk of dying? Start shuffling and pushing for Boles. If you cannot find them, then you have a ton of other options to try to save them, hope for it, but prepare to not have it. You can prepare an indefinite amount of time in advance with spread.

Maybe a pull is about to end but you just got an amazing card? Again, spread.

"But what if someone could use the buff now?" Then use what you have. Never hold back something that is strong for something that may be better later. If you got a balance and can use it immediately without royal road, and do not need a strong damage buff at a specific time later, just throw it down range.

Remember Ewer and Spire? These are your go-to sacrifice cards for anything but an extended, difficult fight. Shuffle them away, or sacrifice them to royal road depending on what you need. Only use them if someone has an immediate need for them that has long-standing consequences (basically, if it's requested).


At the end of the day, all cards should do 1 of 2 things. You should either give someone a benefit now, or prepare for a bigger benefit later. You will know the situations where you want to prepare, and when it's not necessary. This will merely come with time and with group goals. Everything else is just about prioritizing what you have access to.


The best combos, however, are in my opinion:

AoE Bole, Balance, Arrow, or Spear. Spear is the weakest outside of high-end play, balance is the most obviously potent, arrow the most hilarious (and far more useful to everyone in the group, not just the DPS/Tank) and Bole is great if you know a very threatening doom aoe is coming.

Duration Anything. Duration goes well with anything, just fall back on what you are after. Someone need to regen TP? Duration Spire will help. Ewer? Same. Balance and Arrow are straight damage steroids (I have personally boosted a WHM who then went on to Presence of Mind with Holly to have a 2.06 second cast time, and it was hilarious). Spear is harder to work with, especially a longer duration one, but it works well on classes like the Summoner or Machinist especially, and with a 40 second duration, most classes will have something to fire that will benefit from it. Bole is absolutely amazing for reducing pressure on the tank, as it's 10% mitigation that they or you did not expect to have, and is also invaluable, especially in dungeons.

+50% potency is easily the weakest. You will almost never want to sacrifice a Balance, but Boles are situational enough to consider sacrificing for more damage later. I wouldn't drop it on an Ewer or Spire unless you know they needed better efficiency yesterday (it will help physical DPS/Tanks regen quite a bit, for example), but there are times for it. Spear is great, both personally (for your MP regen skill) and for others, but is, again, harder to work with. Balance and Arrow are hilarious when boosted. But the problem will always come down to the situation that Balance and Bole are your two strongest cards, and it's hard to justify a sacrifice for them.


However, never underestimate the raw value of the cards. Only sacrifice to Royal Road/Shuffle if what you have currently will not work now or in the foreseeable future. The cards should be treated as random benefits, not as bespoke tools. They are transient. And they can be very powerful when used right. You won't always hit a home run with an AoE Arrow immediately before a boss pull, but if you can set it up, then you should. But don't go out of your way for this unless the thing you are looking for is absolutely critical to your future needs. The cards are plenty fine on their own.


TL;DR/Tips List

• Learn what all of the cards do, both royal road and natively. If you cannot at-a-glance it, then don't bother playing Astrologian as you will be spending too much time thinking about what you can do, and not enough actually doing your duties as a healer. You will personally know if you can handle this or not.
• Prioritize your immediate goals with the cards. The majority of the time it will just be to use what you get, either to set up something better because it's useless to the present situation, or to just use it now.
• Do not be afraid to simply throw cards without augmentations.
• If you know the card cannot be utilized fully now, combat is about to end, or you absolutely need its benefit at a later point because it will be better then, save it to spread.
• If it is not useful saved, shuffle or sacrifice depending on your present situation. You will need to figure out what these situations are yourself, as the complex needs of the system itself and how transient it is will make it impossible to accurately quantify.
• Remember: The cards are a bonus, they are not your primary method of doing much of anything. You get the ability to freely boost your group or yourself basically at random. You can exercise limited control if you need a specific or ideal circumstance. Usually you will build these after you know you can set up something, as preparing well in advance is under-utilizing the mechanic, but sometimes this is a benefit.
• And finally: If you do not want to use the card you have, already have a better royal road for your goals up (or the royal road that the card itself would grant is worse, which can be the case for AoE especially), and don't want to or cannot store it or shuffle it? You can always right click the card's buff icon to put Draw immediately back on cooldown.

This is a bit long, and I am not 100% settled that this is fully accurate, but the card system is very complicated despite how ultimately arbitrary it actually is. And that's the important thing. It is arbitrary. It's a choose-your-own adventure of roguelike buffs. Use it when you can, but you should always expect to be able to do your immediate healing goals without the cards factored in. They are a bonus, not a guarantee, and should be treated that way.

And finally, example goals:

• Bonus Damage
• Bonus Mitigation
• Bonus Efficiency
• Setting up a future Wombo Combo (E.G. AoE Arrow/Balance)
• Waiting for something better and just getting Draw back on cooldown now.
• Having Fun as you curse the stars, wondering why you just royal roaded a Spire only to draw another Spire into a shuffle that also drew, you guessed it, another Spire. Sometimes, the stars themselves will tell you it's time to do something, who are you to question their majestic will?

[PetiteMalFleur]

In most dungeons I just use the cards as I draw them. I will shuffle cards I can't immediately use and RR them if shuffle is on cd. If I happen to pull a balance or arrow near the end of a trash pull I will spread it to buff the group for the next pull. In dungeons the fights are really short and when I spend too much time trying to RR that perfect combo I end up with very few buffs going out at all.

The poster above me said it all. I suggested reading through it carefully. He gave excellent tips.

[Saseal]

I haven't gotten super far with my AST (....at all), yet, but I find I use the cards based on the people in my party.... and party-to-party situationals. So since I'm still not all that high, I'd just take my post as just examples x.x

Since I'm learning, also, more experienced AST feel free to correct me pleease :0

Someone mentioned in another post that they memorized the cards by association of the images - thats how I managed to memorize (and I have a shitty memory...)

Fire = Damage up..... BURN MONSTERS WITH FIRE +_+
Tree = Steady and hardy trees.... defense up
Blue vase = MP reqs lowered. ...I don't really have an association for this, but thats become a symbol for this card in itself o_O
Twirly Arrow = CD/Spell speed/Skill speed up - going so fast it's knocking things for a loop (the whirly/loop shape reference)
Spear = GCD faster........ *eats card* -_-
Orange jaggy = TP reqs lowered. I associate the rather violent looking jaggy lines with WARs overpower. And WARS eat TP. o_Oa WARs and Violence! \o/

For Royal Road....the light blue cards (not Ewer) I associated with "all the peoples!", whereas I haven't really differentiated between the effectiveness cards and the length extension cards, yet. Mainly because I tend to give Bole and Balance right away (tree/fire), so I'm really only left with the time extender cards (Ewer/Spire - mp/tp) to toss to Royal Road.

I usually find Spire (and Spear.) annoyingly ineffective for the lower level dungeons since nothing is really TP-expensive unless BRD/MCH is spamming AoE. I'll only use it when I have a WAR for a tank, otherwise.
I'll throw Ewer on DRK tanks (esp if they spam), or myself if I find myself going through MP like water for that run (but otherwise I sacrifice for Royal Road). I'll probably pass it onto co-healer WHMs/AST when I get it into 8-man content.
I use Spear most often as the sacrificial lamb for Royal Road. >_> (and Spire, sometimes.) As I've heard it only effects GCDs that -haven't- been used yet... and it's impossible for me to keep track of who used what and when - and if their GCDs are still ticking down (not effected by Spear).
Bole, I tend to use right away on the tank. I haven't hit a tank, yet, that couldn't benefit from a lil defense buff.
Arrow <3
Balance <3

Balance I'll use right away on DPS, as I feel tossing it to ROyal Road is an opportunity missed... usually either on the MCH to help them out, or to whomever I think might be spitting out the most damage. Sometimes I'll just change it up so one or the other DPS doesn't feel left out :x;
Same for Arrow.... though Arrow I'm a little more iffy on - depends on the situation. Sometimes tank if I see them trying, but having trouble with hate, so they can go through their enmity rotation faster, MCH or like Balance, whoever I think is spitting out most DPS. I haven't co-healed with a healer yet, but I might spend it on them, as well, if it's a cure spam race (seeing as WHM/SCH heals are more potent).

Generally, I favor Arrow/Spear's Royal Road effect to spread to everyone (ALL the Arrows! ALL the Balance! +_+ AAAHAHHAA-! @o@ *Maniacal laughter*), but I'll also favor the potency and length effect for Bole on tanks...

Every now and then I forget which card I had in Royal Road and use one ineffectively... .3. Thought I had a spear effect in ROyal and ended up spending Balance on.... just myself -_- (since I was targeted at the time) instead of spreading the fun...

[lagata]

I'm a diurnal sect AST. Just cleared A2 and 1 shorted both of them through DF.

Honestly, Balance, Arrow, and Bole are the only 3 cards I pay attention to. Spear and Ewer I would give to myself or Ewer to a BLM if I am feeling frisky and ALL SPIRES MUST BURN!! *ahem*

Seriously though, if you don't need a bole, burn it to get the enhance, spread a Spear or ewer in case you need to lower your recast of LA or SC or reduce mana cost of an Ascend and keep your regens up on the tank and you should be good.

[lagata]

Also, remember that any of your Royal Road enhancements work on your Spread card too. So, if you have that Spear on Spread and you burned a Spire, if you use the Spear on yourself, then use Luminerious Aether, the recast will be down to like 80s I think...? Which is super helpful on fights that drain your mp or a party that just loves to die to mechanics.

[Vid]

Learn it, Live it, Love it.

As far as tips goes, I think everyone before me made some rather helpful contributions.

[Jill1808]

I was wondering, does Ewer actually work on DRK? Even though their skills aren't spells.

[Saseal]

I was wondering, does Ewer actually work on DRK? Even though their skills aren't spells.

Hmmm, I used on them in assumption for Unleash's mp usage (which I've seen so many spam), but now that you mention it... it is an mp-using skill, not a spell... o_Oa

oops D:

[Ninster]

Thanks for the help, everyone.

I burned my way to 50 (staying out of DD for a LONG time after this) last night and things finally clicked for me. Not to say I didn't waste cards, but I found that 90% of the time I found a solid use for anything I drew. Definitely liking AST a lot better now. Although I'm a bit baffled as to why Spread only works when in battle though. There was a few times I wanted to save a card only for the last trash mob to go down.

Hopefully the road from 50 to 60 will be just as fun as this was. Minus the DD grinding.