AST Healer used in World Third A8S / M4S

[Ghishlain]

World Third Clear Video can be found here.

Reddit Comment Thread where link was found here.

Cleared March 18th, 2016 so it's a week after Elysium's World First on March 11th, 2016. Figured it'd be a good watch for any interested healers.

I'll need to check this video out later (and other M8S videos) in full because that last phase looks amusingly wicked when I skimmed the video.

[Kerrigen]

I watched it when it was released and it definitely is super impressive and inspiring. They actually don't look like they're struggling all that much during the last burn, and MP levels remain consistently high.

The fight looks like it's really kind to AST's CDs as well (this is a trend with every piece of content in 3.2 so far, hopefully it's here to stay). Lightspeed, Collective and Disable look very useful throughout.

There's also a few mistakes with card buffs management (I think at some point they must have panicked and used a Balance on themselves by accident, lol), which doesn't diminish their accomplishment at all but is still comforting to see at that level of play as cards definitely can get in the way when healing is that tight.

In the end I'm happy to see an AST in the first 3 clears, very few people would have banked on this. Midas Savage has excellent tuning.

[GeekMatt]

AST has a bad wrap from the nerfed launch in 3.0, so not only are there fewer being used in top tier statics due to people being comfortable with the tried and true duo, but there's still a lot of hesitation to use the job due to past performances. I wouldn't be surprised in SE took this into consideration when balancing mechanics in 3.2 to try and have AST utility shine at least a little bit. But even in situations where the hardest mechanic is DF players struggling on new mechanics, I've been very impressed with ASTs ability to power heal through all the NM stuff at the launch of 3.2. Farming Midas in DF was so much fun when you can compensate that much for derps and deaths

[Nekotee]

I will definitely watch it !
I agree about the fact that AST CD are really tailored for the new fight and it do feel super great to run as the most powerful heal now XP
Lightspeed is the best oh-shit-button to save the whole group !

[DarkmoonVael]

Something something something......what about nocturnal sect...something something.

Perhaps this will help all those people who have written off AST and never given it another chance. I think all the skilled healers in the game have already acknowledged Diurnal AST being a competative healer. Now its time for the rest of the community to give up on the notion of "lol AST".

[lulunami]

AST has a bad wrap from the nerfed launch in 3.0, so not only are there fewer being used in top tier statics due to people being comfortable with the tried and true duo, but there's still a lot of hesitation to use the job due to past performances. I wouldn't be surprised in SE took this into consideration when balancing mechanics in 3.2 to try and have AST utility shine at least a little bit. But even in situations where the hardest mechanic is DF players struggling on new mechanics, I've been very impressed with ASTs ability to power heal through all the NM stuff at the launch of 3.2. Farming Midas in DF was so much fun when you can compensate that much for derps and deaths

The AST buffs in patch 3.2 made AST a lot stronger. Before these buffs, the AST complaints were certainly valid. Noct AST is still in a bad place compared to SCH however.

[GeekMatt]

I feel like Noct AST is in a bad place because there's no sense in using it so long as Dirunal is viable, since it offers better MP and better DPS. I don't get why we try to measure Noct up to SCH though. In the one area where the two are the same (shielding) they're both solid (with Noct Aspected Benefic being one of my favourite healer tools in the game), and when it comes to DPS no other healer measures up to SCH, but AST brings does bring unique benefits to the table in it's support and utility. I would never try and replace a SCH with another healer if I was pushing world firsts because it excels at DPS but if it were strictly to keep a party alive and DPS wasn't the concern then they could compete, and I'd measure up each healers utility to each piece of content, not to eachother.

[Ghishlain]

I feel like Noct AST is in a bad place because there's no sense in using it so long as Dirunal is viable, since it offers better MP and better DPS.

I also agree with this comment and I also do believe S-E designed AST balance into a corner by designing AST as they did. It wouldn't matter at all if Nocturnal AST had a toolkit that can match SCH if the Diurnal kit proves to be a much more effective kit because of its design. You would have the same complaints if the situation was reversed because Diurnal would be taking the back burner and everyone would be saying go Nocturnal while complaining about Diurnal's inability to perform. That's why I would personally like S-E to allow a Sect swap inside combat and redesigned the kit in some way to require the AST to use both sects in tandem. Such a redesign probably won't come until 4.0 (if at all) but it's a nice thought in my mind.

[GeekMatt]

-Snip-

Totally agree. The best way to prevent a sect from being neglected is to let us use them both. Either adjust the potencies of regens/shields for AST or apply a heftier cost (mp/CD time) to stance dancing so that we're not OP. I enjoy making use of all my abilities on any job I play, so it's s little frustrating to have all this and not get to use it. Plus the Noct playstyle is just more fun IMO.