Balance was balanced

[Wilbow]

Reality check, spear is still garbage. +10% chance to crit is nowhere near +10% damage. Crit multiplier is 1.4x now. So it is just above 0.4x (due to crit dmg scaling) of the new balance. 0.2x of the old balance. It should have been 20% if it was supposed to be competetive. That way it would have been 0.8% of the new 10% balance, and won't pass it even at the end of the raid tier. Or 15% if it was supposed to be around 0.6x of the new balance.

Yeah, I get the impression that people forget that crits are 1.4x and NOT 2x, a fact that completely changes how you look at spear's usefulness. At best, we're looking at it being around half as good as balance with the right comp at the end of this tier.

As somebody who mains WHM rather than AST, my question is (with the new SB skills) if it's statistically worth it to use AoE spear or just to throw it away for another chance at AoE balance.

Because if AoE spear isn't worth throwing if you get unlucky enough to get it, AST QoL hasn't really improved at all has it?


@Richard: While heals don't benefit from Balance, HEALERS definitely can. If an expanded Balance comes along, I'm totally snapshotting my Aero II/III ASAP and then again right before it drops. So for me as a WHM, it's about ~45 seconds of doing ~7-10% more damage on average (depending on how many Stone IVs I can throw out).

If we assume I'd hit the 75th percentile for WHM on FFLOGs, I'm doing ~1k DPS, so that Balance is giving me ALONE an extra 4k damage (8.5% damage increase for 45 seconds). It's not much compared to DPS, but it's not nothing.

[Furious]

Reality check, spear is still garbage. +10% chance to crit is nowhere near +10% damage. Crit multiplier is 1.4x now. So it is just above 0.4x (due to crit dmg scaling) of the new balance. 0.2x of the old balance. It should have been 20% if it was supposed to be competetive. That way it would have been 0.8% of the new 10% balance, and won't pass it even at the end of the raid tier. Or 15% if it was supposed to be around 0.6x of the new balance.

Yeah, I get the impression that people forget that crits are 1.4x and NOT 2x, a fact that completely changes how you look at spear's usefulness. At best, we're looking at it being around half as good as balance with the right comp at the end of this tier.

As somebody who mains WHM rather than AST, my question is (with the new SB skills) if it's statistically worth it to use AoE spear or just to throw it away for another chance at AoE balance.

Because if AoE spear isn't worth throwing if you get unlucky enough to get it, AST QoL hasn't really improved at all has it?


@Richard: While heals don't benefit from Balance, HEALERS definitely can. If an expanded Balance comes along, I'm totally snapshotting my Aero II/III ASAP and then again right before it drops. So for me as a WHM, it's about ~45 seconds of doing ~7-10% more damage on average (depending on how many Stone IVs I can throw out).

If we assume I'd hit the 75th percentile for WHM on FFLOGs, I'm doing ~1k DPS, so that Balance is giving me ALONE an extra 4k damage (8.5% damage increase for 45 seconds). It's not much compared to DPS, but it's not nothing.

Crit multiplier scales with crit% from rating, which means that it is universally the best stat for dps for every class in the tiers to come thanks to quadratic growth, and that everyone's crit multiplier will be higher than 40% by a margin as much as their rating-based crit-chance.

At 3000 crit rating, for example, crit multi is 62%.

Many classes also benefit nondirectly from critical strikes even when it isn't a direct damage increase. Bard breaths from crit, monks have some interaction with crit, scholars need to crit for good shields.. is that it? I don't know enough to know other classes quirks. All of these are non-direct gains from crit that aren't visible in a pure direct damage comparison, and that don't "double dip" from balance in the same way.

Giving up a spear for a chance at a balance mid-fight would be an extremely bad choice. Even if we assume that crit damage is only 40%, the chance of rerolling a spear to get a balance is 20%, with a 20% chance at the mostly-neutral arrow and 60% chance of something worse (in most cases).

Spear is definitely not as good as balance and probably never will be, but it's good enough to use rather than using nothing.

[Wilbow]

Giving up a spear for a chance at a balance mid-fight would be an extremely bad choice. Even if we assume that crit damage is only 40%, the chance of rerolling a spear to get a balance is 20%, with a 20% chance at the mostly-neutral arrow and 60% chance of something worse (in most cases).

Spear is definitely not as good as balance and probably never will be, but it's good enough to use rather than using nothing.

Good to know, and I kind of expected (hoped?) as such. I never expected or wanted it to be as good as Balance, but just good enough in comparison that it's a good idea to just use it instead of playing the odds in most situations. "Balance or bust" was just not a good system imo.

I still wish that Spear was 15% crit chance, but that's a minor gripe and overall these changes to cards are exactly what I think most people were looking for. Both Spear and Balance were major sticking points for AST, and these changes are way better for the health of the job in the long term.

[Rhinos]

Reality check, spear is still garbage. +10% chance to crit is nowhere near +10% damage. Crit multiplier is 1.4x now. So it is just above 0.4x (due to crit dmg scaling) of the new balance. 0.2x of the old balance. It should have been 20% if it was supposed to be competetive. That way it would have been 0.8% of the new 10% balance, and won't pass it even at the end of the raid tier. Or 15% if it was supposed to be around 0.6x of the new balance.

And that's not even counting spears shorter 20 sec duration. Adding that to the equation, the nerfed balance is more than 3 times as potent spear 2.0 in most circumstances. While I like the new spear effect and I think it's okay for balance to be stronger, spear's duration really should be bumped up to 30 seconds.

[Neela]

potency is just the value the devs can adjust the easiest way... but its not the answer for every problem... I doubt that MCH will have a better "life-balance" just because they got some numbers up... the mechanic and clunky playstyle remains the same way like before - its like smn won't change if we would get Miasra 2 back as well nor any ruin pot buffs. some problems can't be fixed with only pot-adjustments... less people got this -> just looking at raw pots for their vote of "yay" or "nay"... is sad to read sometimes.

It should have been 20% if it was supposed to be competetive.

Honestly their is no reason for being competitive in every point with the other two healer.... imo there shouldnt be any kind of crit buff on asts at all. but thats just me...

[Rayvein]

As an AST main, I love the changes. Balance was just so over the top strong, it always felt like a card drawing meta game of balance or buff. Everything else was just fodder. While 10% Balance is still the strongest buff card, Arrow/Spear will be very acceptable alternatives.

In general, I think this will lead to a greater up time of DPS card buffs overall (whether it be Balance/Arrow/Spear), as before it was fish for balance, everything else be damned, in a general sense.

[Rhyn]

So when people start melding crit over DH late in the raid tier (~3000+ is the current estimate), then spear will be 0.62x of the new nerfed balance. Which is still not competitive with balance. And until then it's 0.4-0.45x since people stack DH and only crit if they have to.

[Furious]

So when people start melding crit over DH late in the raid tier (~3000+ is the current estimate), then spear will be 0.62x of the new nerfed balance. Which is still not competitive with balance. And until then it's 0.4-0.45x since people stack DH and only crit if they have to.

What are you talking about, not competitive with balance? It's not competing with balance. You can't decide to use balance instead of spear, you get one or the other. If it was the same as balance, it would be both immediately better because it interacts with healing and crit-based mechanics, and equally boring.

You can't say "I don't want spear, I want balance", and hey presto. There is now an opportunity cost to giving up a spear in hope of balance that didn't exist before. If you get spear, and reroll it hoping to get balance, you absolutely lose on average, even with base levels of crit. That choice only gets worse as people get more crit.

[loreleidiangelo]

So when people start melding crit over DH late in the raid tier (~3000+ is the current estimate), then spear will be 0.62x of the new nerfed balance. Which is still not competitive with balance. And until then it's 0.4-0.45x since people stack DH and only crit if they have to.

I feel like you're kinda missing the forest for the trees here. What ASTS will have to do now is make meaningful CHOICES, which they have never had to do in regards to their cards since 3.2. Do you take that guaranteed, in your hand RIGHT NOW ".4-.45 Balance", or do you dump it on the gamble that you get lucky and get that 15% chance jackpot on your next Draw? In most every scenario you'll be using the guaranteed option that you have rather than run the risk of dumping it and still not hitting the jackpot on your next go-around. Theoretically, it's the same with Arrow, though I can't say for certain as I haven't done the actual math.

Basically, Balance is still "the best", but since its power is a little bit more aligned relative to the other cards you won't just be throwing those other cards out endlessly because you don't want to "waste" Expanded Royal Road.

[Averax]

Spear is no longer Minor Arcana Fuel.

*wipes away tears*