Astrologian impossible to balance as it is

[Lyrica_Ashtine]

Disclaimer: I had to write this in three separate sessions due to going on and off my computer, I hope the red string of the content isn't all over the place.

To start off with, this is not a call to buff or nerf either sects. Personally, I'm content with the sects as they are and don't really care of the fact it's inferior to Scholar for it's role. However, hopefully it'll shed some light on why Astrologian can never be balanced properly as it is right now. Warning: There will be no tldr.

There are Astrologians out there not being content how Nocturnal Sect cannot rival Diurnal Sect for it's intended purpose. With the current meta, a Diurnal Sect can take over a White Mage's job in a raid, but Nocturnal Sect has some... issues, if I were to describe it. These issues are caused by the Astrologian kit itself.

So let's assume Astrologian in Nocturnal Sect somehow gets mitigation on par with a Scholar: Deployable aspected benefic and 15% disable for 10 seconds, ignoring eye for an eye for now. Even with the addition of a (periodically) deployable shield for 341 potency and a 15% damage reduction on the source, it'll still miss a vital piece that Scholars does possess and, to an extend, even White Mages do: The ability to heal while being in Cleric's Stance. I'm not going to discuss the healer DPS meta here, it's a thing and that's a fact. Those who want to discuss otherwise will have to start their own topic. The fairy's embrace is good for half a physick every three seconds (200 potency/3 seconds) and Regen is good for 150 potency every 3 seconds. Astrologian's healing over time ability is locked in Diurnal Sect, something Nocturnal Sect has no access for. This does not only result into a rather tenacious task to constantly turn Cleric's Stance on and off to achieve something similar. It is also very resource heavy (on both healers) to do so:
Regen is worth 1050 potency for 618 MP every 21 seconds.
A fairy has a one time cost of 1768 MP, of which is no issue when summoned before the start of battle. In 21 seconds a fairy's healing would be worth 1400 potency.
Astrologian would need to cast a Benefic and Benefic II to match a Regen in potency every 21 seconds. Which combined together costs 1148 MP

Then there's the thing that Astrologian's MP recovery kit. It's not too much of an issue with the fact that Astrologians only have Luminiferous Aether at their disposal. Their healing kit has a significantly lower MP cost for it's potency, after all:
Physick/Cure vs Benefic: 442 MP / 353 MP
Cure II vs Benefic II: 884 MP / 795 MP
Adloquium vs Aspected Benefic: 1326 MP / 707 MP
Medica vs Helios: 1237 MP / 1060 MP
Only exception:
Succor vs Aspected Helios: both 1326 MP

This would be another issue. While Astrologians do not get that same 10% MP recovery every 90 seconds like White Mages do, the reduced MP cost makes them perfectly capable as a main healer in a group. The damage spells, however, aren't as cheap in comparison. Combust and Combust II are only periodically applied, which are both adequate for it's MP cost:
Combust and Bio: both 240 potency for 353 MP
Combust II: 450 potency for 618 MP or 0.73 potency/MP
Bio II: 350 potency for 530 MP or 0.66 potency/MP

Combust II, while being the most potent DoT for it's cost and GCD, does not consume a lot of GCDs. The main issue would be Malefic II. It costs the same as Broil and Stone III. While it's more potent than Broil and slightly less than Stone III, it's MP cost is rather high in comparison with it's healing spells. This would bring us back to Luminiferous Aether: While it's good enough for the role as main healer, it's insufficient to support the MP consumption as supportive healer (or off-healer as some call it)

Even if Astrologian would get a 15% disable and a deployable Aspected Benefic, it's still very resource and effort straining compared to a Scholar and even a White Mage. With astrologian as it is now, it's impossible to balance either: You can't take away the regen aspect of Diurnal Sect, but this is exactly what Nocturnal Sect would need.

So what if Astrologian gets some flying moon with a face that can somehow magically heal things just like a fairy? You could consider this as a "solution". The whole issue about Nocturnal Sect being unable to compete with a Scholar in the mitigation department still stands.

Then what if the deployable aspected benefic and/or 15% disable are there as well? When this happens, you'll get a Scholar with White Mage raw healing capabilities. Imagine a Scholar with Cure II, Medica, and Divine Seal while having some unique abilities of their own. Astrologian in Nocturnal Sect would simply become a Scholar without it's weakness in GCD efficiency in healing.

If a 15% disable and maybe deployable aspected benefic would be a thing, why wouldn't this also be available for Diurnal Sect? It wouldn't make much sense that one sect gains benefits on some spells and/or abilities, rather than a variation. For example: 15% disable in nocturnal sect, 10% disable in diurnal sect. Why would this be a thing? Just simply to make Nocturnal more viable? With this in mind, the first ability that suffered from this decision is Collective Unconsciousness. It's both a good move from Square-Enix, but also a bad one. Collective Unconsciousness used to have effects depending on the sect. Neither were really good on it's own, sadly. And the part you actually want in the particular sect were locked in the other: Diurnal could have used the 10% mitigation and Nocturnal could have used the Wheel of Fortune effect - Remember the lack of sustained healing during Cleric's Stance I mentioned before?
Now that the effects are combined, it's good for both sects. Which is a good thing. But it also reduced the amount of abilities/spells depending on the sect from three to two. Effectively diminishing the differences between both sects. With this, it wouldn't be possible, with Astrologian as it is, to have Nocturnal Sect gain some sort of sustained healing through HoT. Simply because Diurnal wouldn't have much else to get aside from stealing the shielding effect from Nocturnal.
If the whole moon/sun-like fairy was a thing, then Diurnal would get something similar and Diurnal would simply become a White Mage with a fairy.

With Astrologian as it is, it's nearly impossible to change or add any existing abilities/spells to make Nocturnal more "appealing". There was a topic out there that proposed changing Time Dilation to "space dilation", some Deployment Tactics equivalent. This would lead to other issues: If it also affect cards, Enhanced/extended Balance/Arrow spread over the group would simply be too good. If it doesn't affect the cards, you're missing out on an extra 15 seconds buff time on the precious cards you're drawing. Also the only ability that allows Enhanced effects rival Extended (+50% effect vs +100% duration). For whoever wants to argue about this, you can consult this topic.

Of course, Square-Enix could just pull a black mage on us and increase the flat potencies. But would that really solve anything? Remember what the issues were with Nocturnal Sect:
Damage spells are nowhere as MP efficient as the healing kit for it's available MP to use with each encounter.
No continuous sustained healing available and it's alternative is extremely resource heavy.
Being on par with Scholar in Mitigation would make it a Scholar with White Mage (direct) healing spells and abilities.

To conclude, unless Square-Enix decides to make certain effects only available on Nocturnal Sect and have no variation of it in Diurnal Sect, Nocturnal Sect Astrologians will never be able to completely fulfill the role Scholars have with the current meta. Even if they did, is it really something we'd want? Imagine Aspected Benefic with no HoT in Diurnal, just flat 250 potency healing while it has a 130% shielding in Nocturnal. We'd simply shove the issue from one problem to another. Personally, I've accepted the fact that Nocturnal Sect will never be able to take a Scholar's role as supportive healer and I'm fine with that. If it wasn't the case, whm/ast would be more viable than ast/sch or even whm/sch if Diurnal Sect wasn't as it is right now. If either sects were too good, it would simply overshadow another healer and the weakest link would go to a job as whole, rather than an aspect of it. Nocturnal sect does have it's uses and is by no means completely not viable. It's merely sub-optimal. Much like having a White Mage as a supportive healer or a Scholar as a main healer.

[Tint]

where is these tl dr thing at the end? D:

whatever, i think the real problem is the astro is a support healer with weaker heals but is unable to support his co-healer :x

[Galdous]

If you are talking about pre buffs to astro then yes the astro is a support healer with weaker heals. If you are talking now the astro is support with stronger heals then both the white mage and scholar. The scholar is for now brought on more for its offensive abilities then just its pure mitigation. In Nocturnal stance the astrologian has stronger base heals counting the buff from the stance itself. If they would let astro nocturnal stance be a slightly weaker form of cleric stance without potency issues and reduction in mana cost to dps spells then I feel that would go a long way of letting the astro play the part of scholar.

[Dyvid]

I'm wondering how overpowering it would be to allow sect changes in combat.

[Ghishlain]

If you are talking about pre buffs to astro then yes the astro is a support healer with weaker heals. If you are talking now the astro is support with stronger heals then both the white mage and scholar. The scholar is for now brought on more for its offensive abilities then just its pure mitigation. In Nocturnal stance the astrologian has stronger base heals counting the buff from the stance itself. If they would let astro nocturnal stance be a slightly weaker form of cleric stance without potency issues and reduction in mana cost to dps spells then I feel that would go a long way of letting the astro play the part of scholar.

The problem is broader than what you're trying to make it out to be if you're trying to compare the AST kit to the SCH kit. I think Lyrica hit it fairly bang on in the head but I will add one point that pushes SCH healing to be much better / more efficient than AST heals - the Fairy. Fairy provides 4,000 potency healing every minute for absolutely 0 MP cost AND 0 GCDs consumed to the SCH . Noct AST has to spend a healthy amount of resources to perform a similar amount of healing (10 Benefics @ 10GCDs and 3,540MP).

In the end, any significant change to Noct will most likely happen in 4.0 when S-E can implement more tools to be used.

I'm wondering how overpowering it would be to allow sect changes in combat.

It wouldn't be too overpowered in my own opinion, but it wouldn't serve too much incentive to do so either. There would be no reason to Sect Swap when party with a SCH since you don't want to risk overriding Deployed Adlo / Crit Adlo. Double hot + a shield would have some applicable use in WHM/AST compositions and probably make it a bit more desirable but it's hard to fill the niche that SCH currently has in the current meta iteration so this composition will be unlikely to occur.

[AzureFlare]

Though I really like your analysis and share the sentiment that Nocturnal has no place as it stands right now, the answer to your own question took a really sharp turn for as broad as the answer is.

Let's run back to 2.X scholar for a bit. No Emergency Tactics, no Indomitability (the biggest offenders for this comparison). You still had to frequently used Sacred Soil to support your AoE healing if you really needed it and a lot of your overhealing was simply preshielding with Succor because you would fall behind (there was no healing alternative besides Eos). You had the ultimate strength of Scholar also be its major downfall: mitigation, mitigation, mitigation. But you can't mitigate damage that is already dealt. Now, with 3.0, a lot of the weaknesses of SCH got dealt with and they got dealt with so well, they are even contesting WHM in certain scenarios: you can burst heal 700 potency onto the raid in about 3 seconds and you still have an answer to Medica 2 in the form of Eos should you really desire so. There are clear differences between SCH and WHM's AoE healing still: WHM can Divine Seal to boost itself, SCH can use Indom way more often than WHM can Assize (and for higher potency), WHM can juggle Medica 2 which Eos can't (and sacrifices Selene), Asylum has its quirks and so does Sacred Soil. That said, yes, a WHM will beat a SCH in the long run if they so desire, but a SCH has answers for situations where a WHM may find itself lacking.

Now the reason I'm bringing this up is that with 3.0, SCH went from 'my biggest asset is also my biggest weakness, but I got a fairy so it's k' to 'Oh my biggest weakness? Hold on, let me use these buttons and.. done. Oh the fairy? Yeah, just spamming heals while I watch Netflix.' And this is the healing aspect. Its weakness now stems more so from not being able to do what others can, and not from its own abilities/mechanics. Let's add that up with the points you made.

So what if Astrologian gets some flying moon with a face that can somehow magically heal things just like a fairy? You could consider this as a "solution". The whole issue about Nocturnal Sect being unable to compete with a Scholar in the mitigation department still stands.
Then what if the deployable aspected benefic and/or 15% disable are there as well? When this happens, you'll get a Scholar with White Mage raw healing capabilities. Imagine a Scholar with Cure II, Medica, and Divine Seal while having some unique abilities of their own. Astrologian in Nocturnal Sect would simply become a Scholar without it's weakness in GCD efficiency in healing.

What if, for a moment, we just send SCH back to its 2.X self ability-wise and only keep Deployment, Dissipation and Broil? Your biggest asset is mitigation and you're no longer able to 'lolIndom' when you slacked off. Yes, SCH will still have the fairy which Noct Sect has no answer to, but Noct Sect will have that 'Cure 2' and 'Divine Seal' and 'Medica' which SCH won't. The only problems that may arise is when a SCH's mitigation is needed to tip the scales when, let's say, an PLD/WAR/AST/WHM/SMN/MNK/MCH/something can't, and frankly, I'd rather blame SE for designing their fights poorly than Nocturnal for not being able to perform that obscene amount of mitigation on-demand.

If a 15% disable and maybe deployable aspected benefic would be a thing, why wouldn't this also be available for Diurnal Sect? It wouldn't make much sense that one sect gains benefits on some spells and/or abilities, rather than a variation. For example: 15% disable in nocturnal sect, 10% disable in diurnal sect. Why would this be a thing? Just simply to make Nocturnal more viable?

And why not? It wouldn't be the first time things are balanced differently for the sake of balance. If we need to do things shaky to toss someone in need a bone, then do things shaky. Clearly, there has been no time for a well-thought way to fix things and it can't be done quick. Might as well do it dirty if doing it dirty allows it to be done quick. Yes, CU was a disaster, but it was a disaster in more than a single way. Channeled Asylum/Sacred Soil was really lackluster no matter which way you bent it, and that hasn't even a thing to do with the sects themselves.

Basically, the whole remainder of the post is 'What if we did this, but oh then we overshadow SCH. What if we did that, oh SCH/WHM already has it.' Really, SCH/WHM aren't all that different from each other anymore either, they can do very similar things but in different amounts/frequencies which sets them apart. With a disparity this huge between N.AST and SCH, there are plenty of ways to give it small buffs that would still let 'the mighty SCH overlord' sit high on its throne, and even if we did overtake it: So what? Likewise, so what if we need something very similar to WHM or SCH, change a few things around and presto, AST ability/buff? And the best part, we can do this without nerfing SCH!

Yes, SE designed themselves in a corner with the sects. Yes, there are people having a huge issue with the sects and what they stand for. Yes, it is impossible to sate everyone. Yes, it is impossible to balance AST just like it is impossible to balance SCH/WHM to WHM/SCH (hello videogames people). No, it is not flat-out impossible to cut the huge difference that is N.AST and SCH, but you might not like the way it is done. We're already this deep, might as well toss N.AST something so it can compete while we wait for a proper overhaul. Just a sign from SE that says 'we haven't forgotten about you and we understand your issues!'.

[NamoNanamo]

It wouldn't be too overpowered in my own opinion, but it wouldn't serve too much incentive to do so either. There would be no reason to Sect Swap when party with a SCH since you don't want to risk overriding Deployed Adlo / Crit Adlo. Double hot + a shield would have some applicable use in WHM/AST compositions and probably make it a bit more desirable but it's hard to fill the niche that SCH currently has in the current meta iteration so this composition will be unlikely to oc

I mostly agree.

WIth a whm, you could diurnal in stance dps+ hots; and switch back healer stance with nocturnal for shield and stronger heal. It would lead to a better mp management.
You could do the same with sch but it would be less efficient and you'll need to coordinate with your scholar.

At least, it would be fun cause since Monday, I'm playing noct Astro on a3s with a whm and I'm sad to not get the 5%as while I'm dpsing.

[Judge_Xero]

Can you really compare Fairy Potency and Healer Potency directly like that? It's to my understanding that Pets do not benefit from Maim and Mend II which is a difference of 30% apples to apples.

Edited: Looks like you already scaled it down to 210 Potency to compensate, for the comparison.

[Sidra]

AST fairly competes for the main healer slot with a WHM, but is nowhere near as good as a SCH in the off-healer slot for a lot of the reasons you mentioned (fairy helping main healer, AOE shielding, unlimited MP while dpsing). I don't really think they need to change anything, just in 4.0 the new healer should be more off-healer leaning.

Can you really compare Fairy Potency and Healer Potency directly like that? It's to my understanding that Pets do not benefit from Maim and Mend II which is a difference of 30% apples to apples.

You can't if you use the listed potencys. For instance Embrace toolptip is 300 potency, but clearly does not heal as much as the 300 potency heal of Adlo. But what he did is right, Embrace is very very close to half of a Physick. So he just made it 200 potency, which sort of converts it and makes it ok for an apples to apples comparison.

[AlexanderThorolund]

I wasn't going to post but as a iLv 200 Astro I do feel like I have a voice on this. I read the OP and I don't really see the issue. I use nocturnal 99% of the time. The 1% being 8man content with a Scholar. Nocturnal gives me so much more freedom to DPS.

I think people need to be more specific in their issues with the class.