Learning how to properly play AST

[Yhisa]

Additional bonus help

For me i like spell speed with diurnal sect because i can get 5 heals within lightspeed instead of 4 and im at 751 spell speed (can get more) it also allows me to spam benefic I faster and out heal 1 benefic II for cheaper mp cost with a 1.70sec cast and 2.20 recast .. I can even cast and run nearly also with spell speed it allows me to switch to cleric and land my dots faster + malefic spam and can easy land all within 1 benefic Il proc it also acts as a second det

And for nocturnal sec to have crit because 130% increase to shields and crit means bigger shields (not double like sch) which allows players to take abit more damage before it breaks

Diurnal = weapon damage >mind > spell speed > crit = det
Nocturnal = weapon damage >mind>crit> det=spell speed

So if u want to play AST be prepared to have 2 seperate sets of gear for eacd sect

[raela]

So I could use some advice that hasn't directly been covered yet (at least, not that I've seen). I've mained SCH essentially for the entire time I've played, and my WHM is 60.. I didn't enjoy it as much, but I at least felt steady here. Hit 50 on AST, took up my full i130 set (well, HQ crafted weapon), and went for the level 50 dungeons.. and feel like a wreck. The plan is to level it via mainly via daily level 50 roulette with my friend on DRK. We went 30-50 together mainly in dungeons.

Unlike SCH and WHM, I feel like I can barely keep on top of my friend's HP, even with spamming heals. He has the other two tanks to 60 and is generally a joy to heal, so I think the problem is me here. For a concrete example: we went to SV HM last night with a BLM and a something-I-forgot for DPS. We go for our usual large first pull.. generally make it all the way to the open area with the dragons. Last night, however, his HP was starting to drop rapidly approaching that room, so he stopped right before the hallway. I go to heal.. and he drops dead after whatever I used landed. The mobs got dragged back to spawn, which lead to quite the embarrassing cycle of wipes..

We went with much smaller pulls for the rest of the dungeon, and I still felt like I was spending too much time simply spamming heals. He got hit with a 90k right before the room with two aevis and the dravanian that transforms.. so we decided to try to clear them while waiting for the game to drop his connection. I am 99% sure I could have healed that pull on whm/sch.. but on AST, we wiped after about 10 seconds. No chance, so we waited for him.

A lot of the tips I see here are more for once you get 60, or the process of 50~60 in Heavensward dungeons. So, my (long winded) request is this: how would I manage large pulls in the 50 roulette, and how can I manage heal-tanking for those odd situations where the tank is gone? I tried Synastry but admittedly did forget about lightspeed..

[AzureFlare]

Just going to compare directly with WHM since that is easiest for me, you'll have Synastry instead of Divine Seal (given, not as great), Essential Dignity instead of Benediction (more frequent but obviously worse), Lightspeed instead of Presence of Mind (which doesn't really increase your HPS but helps healing on the move and saving some mana). So you'll be missing.. E4E, Holy stun and.. not sure what else actually. And before a pull starts it will help putting up Stoneskin and/or Nocturnal Field to help on the pull. Can't imagine there being any other difference so if you can make the pull as WHM you should be able to do it as AST.

Aspected Benefic is a bit better than Regen since it converges faster and has the heal up-front, Essential Dignity will help you catch up. And Lightspeed helps kiting for the while you do end up kiting. Heal-tanking should be the same as WHM minus where you can use Holy or Benediction, just spam Benefic 2 on yourself, sprint and spam Aspected Benefic (doesn't matter which sect since it is pure survival anyway). It should actually be a little easier with the passive boost to Diurnal now (less chance of interruption) and Nocturnal's a given since the instant shields are super good in those situations.

[TatoRazzino]

AST is stronger than WHM before 60 because they have access to Essential Dignity and WHM only gets Tetra at 60. You have a very similar toolkit, apart from Cure III (which would have been useless in the situation you described), Benediction and Presence of Mind (two cooldowns that you won't be able to keep on for the entire dungeon). Healing should be exactly the same thing, but faster in Diurnal. What you're probably missing is the Holy stun and the SCH fairy that keep the tank up while you DPS; as an AST, you won't have that, but you have a very powerful off-GCD heal that will scale with his HP: the strategy is, DPS until you see the tank getting low to around 40% of his HP and then hit Essential Dignity + Aspected Benefic; that should bring them closer to full HP. If the tank is getting too low too fast, you won't be able to DPS as AST until you hit 60 and get a stun of your own.

[Zelzubub]

I'm fairly new to endgame AST but here's what I do in those situations:

On big pulls when a tanks gathering up trash like that I follow behind him closely and right as he stops Ill swiftcast Aspected Helios followed by Aspected Benefic to stack HoTs then pop Synastry for the regen boost, start casting benefic II (hopefuly its a free proc!) (or Essential Dignity if its dire) to top off the tanks life pool you know is down at this point. Hopefully he's still alive, and if the damage is still coming in crazy hot, pop Lightspeed and chain heal at speed. Once your 58 you can throw up Collective Unconsious after your top up heal to stack yet another HoT and some damage reduction if things are really hairy.

Lots of AST's shy away from Aspected Helios for mana conservation reasons but if you use Luminiferous Aether proactively (I pop it first around 80%) I can keep it up for most fights.

If your even a little bit worried about about the tank spiking damage and dying, I wouldn't worry about dps. Everyone's dps is going to be down if we let the tank die, so my focus is on that, and I'm only dps'ing excessively when I'm running something I'm comfortable with. Otherwise its just DoTs and Malific II when I can spare the cast time. The meager dps we add isn't worth trading stability if there's any risk involved, imo.

[NamoNanamo]

Zelzubub, If I understand you correctly, you use all your spell before using Synastry ? Right ?

[Zelzubub]

HoT's yes, does Synastry only affect HoTs before theyre cast? I assumed the "Increases spell-based HP restoration" component boosted them after, kind of like applying Time Dilation. Now that you mention it, Ive never specifically looked into it.

[technole]

HoT's yes, does Synastry only affect HoTs before theyre cast? I assumed the "Increases spell-based HP restoration" component boosted them after, kind of like applying Time Dilation. Now that you mention it, Ive never specifically looked into it.

HoTs is after, it's the same wording as Divine Seal where it snapshots regen after application.

[Sidra]

Synastry is the best healing buff in the game, but I don't really like the fact it has 2 completely different aspects to it because sometimes I end up using it when I just want one of its 2 features (the 20% healing buff, or the multi target heal) and I feel like it's a bit wasted. Would rather it be 2 skills.

[TatoRazzino]

Synastry is the best healing buff in the game, but I don't really like the fact it has 2 completely different aspects to it because sometimes I end up using it when I just want one of its 2 features (the 20% healing buff, or the multi target heal) and I feel like it's a bit wasted. Would rather it be 2 skills.

AST needs this penalty to be balanced. A WHM has to choose if they're gonna be in Cleric to maximize Assize's damage, while losing a big part of healing, or if they're going to use it to heal while wasting a damage tool; SCH has to manage stacks: do I burst healing or damage? Should I AoE heal or shield? See what I mean? If we had separate skills for those two aspects, AST would take another step into the WHM's territory, and that's a bad game design decision.