Regarding AST

[KDSilver]

I guess I personally feel that the only way forward for AST's identity to stand on its own is to focus more on the card system. It could mean an entire redesign of how it works, but it is their unique mechanic, and finding some way to make it work better to support their toolkit as a whole (not just to be buffs you toss out whenever you can) could seriously help their identity.

That, but I think they could also go deeper with the time spells such as Time Dilatation and Celestial Opposition.
Those 2 are very unique and totally an Ast skill. It has a good synergy with his HoTs and every other buff he can provides.

[Ametrine]

....

While it would be nice to see some cards maybe used to buff spells, such as maybe using a certain spell with a certain card drawn buffs or augments it....frankly I think AST is pretty much where it should be.

I agree AST is fine, it's just kinda in a point of clunk. I think it's learning curve.

And, frankly, the whole deal with the cards is, yes, delegating them costs GCDs used to cast those Malefics, but proper party buffing is going to more than balance out (if not improve) overall damage verses my spamming pitily Malefics. That's the whole point.


As for the remaining garbage card, I would rather SE just consolidate Spire's TP refresh into Ewer (just make Ewer refresh both) and make Spire work like pre-SB Spear, where it chips seconds off OCGD skills.

The issue with old Spear was more that, since the bonus only worked on OGCD's used under it's affect, coordinating it was a mess in most scenarios as part of the RNG and the amount of extra communication needed. You'd end up with it being a dead card, or inadvertently encourage a player to blow important cooldowns under the guise of getting the back ASAP. When it worked, however, it was a game changer, it was simply a difficult card to maximize.

The thing is, the other two healers now have personal abilities that positively affect their OGCDs skills; the Lilies and Quickened Aetherflow. So, now we have a bit of a hole in our skill set by comparison. With Ewer treated as our secondary option for mana recover outside Lucid (Assize/Aetherflow and Absorb), the card modification to an OGCD buffer could work as well.

(That said, SE may consider Lightspeed our "mana return" alt since it cuts costs so much, but Thin Air and Dissipation can throw a wrench at that argument.)

[Malkria]

Another though I have had today while thinking this over. Why not make the AST a true hybrid? Where cards can not only be cast on party members but maybe done on enemies for debuffs or damage. This could be as simple as an inverse, such as bole and balance increasing damage taken by target, to maybe direct damage such as Ewer and Spire giving dots and spear and arrow doing direct damage. Not only would this give more reason for the AST to have the weakest attack of the healers, but would also make the card system far more dynamic in choosing between buffing your team or debuffing/attacking the enemies.

Just a thought.

[loreleidiangelo]

Another though I have had today while thinking this over. Why not make the AST a true hybrid? Where cards can not only be cast on party members but maybe done on enemies for debuffs or damage. This could be as simple as an inverse, such as bole and balance increasing damage taken by target, to maybe direct damage such as Ewer and Spire giving dots and spear and arrow doing direct damage. Not only would this give more reason for the AST to have the weakest attack of the healers, but would also make the card system far more dynamic in choosing between buffing your team or debuffing/attacking the enemies.

Just a thought.

I mean, it would basically make enemy-casted Bole the best card in the game instead of AOE Balance, unless the modifiers were changed. A better Trick Attack than actual Trick Attack, that also stacks WITH Trick Attack as well as things like Chain Strategem? So you might be saying, "okay, make it 5% damage taken increase" but that's still missing the fact that you can have it up every 30 seconds whereas AOE Balance can only be up every 60 seconds (barring Sleeve Draw). So THEN you might say, "make it 2.5% damage taken increase then" but then that's still a pretty huge buff to AST's kit overall since that essentially removes a "dead" card from your kit, meaning that AST actually has zero "dead" draws now (barring back-to-back Spire/Ewer).

I still maintain that removing the RNG is the way to go for AST. I WANT to be able to use my defensive card once in a while without wistfully thinking "I should have Shuffled this into a DPS increase". I don't want my defensive/support cards to turn into offense cards, I want to be able to use them without feeling like I'm giving up something better in return. Minor Arcana was a mistake that only enforces the idea that there are "bad draws you should get rid of", Spear change was a big buff but I would have rather its original function received improvement (reduce CD timers on moves that are already on CD, wasn't hard to fix tbh) rather than changing it to just another damage buff. It's too late to go back to that now, but I'd much rather the cards be on-demand use with cooldowns relative to their strength, so that you can't just sack Bole/Spire/Ewer in the hopes of MOAR DEEPS INCREASES. It's binary and dull. Also, removing the RNG element opens the door for the devs to give us new cards in the future without making the players feel like its another wrench designed to dilute Balance/Arrow/Spear RNG.