Essential Dignity

[Rajeme]

I didn't even read all of ur comment but u can't say that it's 1800 every 60 seconds because it's 600 each 20 seconds. And that's HUGE!

I only said that approximately because the 2 skills are pretty different, and also work pretty different from each other. Just like how you stack Aetherflows, I can also stack Synastry for 1000 and 500 potency. And because it works too different so I only took Tetragrammation as the closest example.

Let say it another way, example if you somehow buff Essential Dignity for reducing recast time to 30s, that means the recast time is twice faster than Tetragrammation. And I won't take Benediction into the equation because it has a healthy 5 minutes cooldown from last I saw.

So I will say my conclusion: AST needs another emergency heal, that means they need to tweak something except Essential Dignity, because in my opinion this skill is already great: Good enough for what it is but not too overpowered which can shadow other 2 healers, just like how the developers intended.

[Eraqus]

Lol does everyone have to tell you again this is one of astro's few good skills? Its an awesome ability for such a short CD.

OH really? And please can u tell me who are u to say that it's like that? This skill AS AN EMERGENCY HEAL as it is now sucks . If it was not the only emergency heal it would be cool. But ryt now as the ONLY ONE it sucks.

[Sidra]

How does it suck? It's instant, costs no resources, and heals a lot - especially on a low hp target. It's a great emergency button a pretty low cooldown. If you're having an emergency more than once every 40 seconds, you are really doing something wrong. And it dungeons its nice you can get an extra gravity in knowing you can come out of Cleric Stance and pop it - and with it's low cooldown it's basically used every pull to help DPS.

Also keep in mind that in Noct - Aspected Benefic is instant cast for a 500 potency worth of HP/shield also a nice skill to help with emergencies.

Sometimes I feel like I am playing a different game than other people. AST isn't perfect - I am not sure it's cards are good enough, and it seems like less has to go wrong before you have MP issues than the other healers. But in general it's healing kit is just fine. Nitpicking good skills seems misguided.

[amihavingfunyet]

Oh, since we are on topic, AST can also use Synastry+Essential Dignity, which can act as a make-shift dual emergency heal, which means you can instantly heal 2 people at the same time, one for 1000 potency and one for 500, which is not even nearly bad.

Only problem, Synastry doesn't work with Essential Dignity. Neither does it with HoT ticks and I'm pretty sure AoE heals don't work either. Feel free to test it.

[Krixus]

OH really? And please can u tell me who are u to say that it's like that? This skill AS AN EMERGENCY HEAL as it is now sucks . If it was not the only emergency heal it would be cool. But ryt now as the ONLY ONE it sucks.

Nvm, go play a dps please.

[Troile]

Personally I don't have issue with essential dignity. I don't think changing this skill alone will fix the root of the complaint....that being some (I won't speak for all) AST's feel inferior when it comes to emergency healing bad situations.

Speaking from the experiences I've had with SCH, AST at the same level is missing that safety net feeling. For example, as a SCH I could have 3 unused Aetherflow stacks, and the Aetherflow skill ready to roll meaning I could use Lustrate 6 times back to back if needed (this is on top of the faerie's own healing skills and your other heal/shield options). Whereas with an AST I've casted Benefic II, Aspected Benefic (regen), Aspected Helios (Regen), and now Essential Dignity only to watch the tank's HP bar continue to hover near death as I spam Benefic II until either regen wears off or Essential Dignity is off cooldown (all the while trying to fish for a Bole in between GCD's).

I won't even mention the new ability added in Heavensward to refresh Aetherflow stacks. We can argue that a SCH will not always have this situation, but the fact is a SCH can easily create this situation if he/she wanted. I cannot speak for WHM, but at least with SCH vs AST the ability to handle, either prepared or unprepared, emergency situations is vastly different. It's not enough to just do the math and say it boils down to 1 lustrate every 20 seconds. While it may be mathematically accurate, it doesn't quite get the feel across since it's more like 6 lustrates in 17.5 seconds, then another 3 in 50 seconds. Please don't take this to mean i'm saying "SCH" should be nerfed, i'm perfectly fine with how SCH plays, and I don't want to do the same things as a SCH....if I did, I would just play a Scholar. I'm just highlighting a single aspect of how the class can be played.

That being said, I would be perfectly fine with AST being less equipped to handle those situations if they had something else that made them unique and useful. The real problem is, as I see it, that AST excels at nothing at all, unless you count having the best skill/spell animations. The overall feeling is just that of being passable, yet inferior, at performing every task.

My apologies for any difficulty in reading this, my purpose was speed rather than ease of reading. At any rate, SE should be aware of all the gripes by now. Either they tweak AST or the company deals with fewer people wanting to play the class and whatever other consequences may come with that.

Also my apologies to the OP since your post had nothing at all to do with anything but the skill animation. It just somehow turned into this.....so to answer your actual question, i'm actually not bothered by the animation or the similarity to lustrate animation-wise. I think all of AST's animations are awesome.