would this be OP?

[Grimoire-M]

Even in Savage and Ultimate, you do not need to stack double regens, be it on the party or on a tank—Medica II + Di Aspected Helios is overkill; Whispering Dawn + CU is overkill; Whispering + Di Aspected Helios + CU is definitely overkill (our AST/SCH actually did this for Garuda cleanses during prog and the overheal was 50~60%). It just isn’t necessary. Speaking as someone who has done the content, double regens end up being an overheal more times than not, and any time you’re overhealing means you’re wasting your resources that could be better used elsewhere.

I've done it on the main tank only so I can focus my attention elsewhere. That's it. I agree that in an ideal scenario, you wouldn't even use anything but the fairy to heal the main tank. That's not what happens though.

If people aren’t moving in for heals, that’s on them. Not on you. And it doesn’t mean Noct AST suddenly needs more tools to make dealing with that easier.

There are situations like Akh Morn on O8S where the party takes a bunch of AoE and you don't necessarily want the main tank to turn the boss to get them in there. I'm aware of the 'Stand in the Cure III/Star or you're fucked' situations. Hell some of the movement I do on SMN is a compromise between what makes the healers' lives easier and what helps me see the fight better. There are spots in Kefka and O7S where the tanks and DPS would be split up but may require a minor HoT prepared beforehand just to minimize time spent healing them in order to focus on something else more important, like mines and adds, or Kefka clones. Those are the situations I'm referring to. Not the BLM who doesn't want to move whatsoever. Though we have one of those, too.

For high mobility situations, you either master slidecasting, or you make use of other tools at your disposal (Swiftcast or Lightspeed—the latter of which has made AST better than WHM for fights where you have to do a lot of moving, such as Final Omega).

For high mobility high healing situations WHM has to plan their few AoE cooldowns in advance for the most part. I've seen ours pre-pop Asylum where they want people to wind up just to keep it rolling on the tank for a few ticks in the meantime, tack Regen (not Medica II) on players they won't be able to reach for significant periods of time to deal with positioning requirements for mechanics even if the first two ticks were useless, Cure III bomb others they can reach that naturally stack up together and set up PI in the process, and hold Assize for that exact moment where players can collapse in to get that extra safety top off even if it meant losing a use or two over the fight as a whole in prog. It was basically required to use all of those at specific points for Forsaken on them if they wanted to hold up Swiftcast for raises. Which they did.

Again: double (and triple) regens end up being more of an overheal than not. There is no content that requires you to stack multiple regens to keep the party (or the main tank) alive. Not even Savage or Ultimate, and especially not casual content.

I'm aware that AoE hots aren't worth stacking up generally speaking. The single target ones, however, are in some situations. Lengthy multi-hit busters are a thing. A lot of the HoT based AoE cooldowns actually can handle back to back AoE they have no business handling with maybe a single medica-level AoE heal added in at the right time.

If you’re a Noct AST, you don’t spam shields to mitigate autos. You pre-shield for tankbusters and AOE raid damage, but you do not spam them. They just aren’t MP efficient. The same goes for SCH and Adlo/Succor. Auto damage should be mitigated by a Regen, which, if you’re paired with a WHM, it is their responsibility to apply. Not yours. If you aren’t paired with a WHM, then you should be in Diurnal Sect yourself, not Noct.

Where did I say Noct was spamming shields specifically to make up for the loss of their HoTs? I said they would spend more GCDs, yes, but that does not imply they'll only use Noct Benefic to do so. They would top off a tank via Benefic I/II where possible, not those. You're clearly assuming I don't know what the spells do. The only reason you'd ever use a Noct Shield that way in that degree is if the tank was dipping below half HP, you knew you had to move, and knew it wouldn't lead to overhealing when you could heal them with a Benefic I/II later because the autos would break the shield in time. This kind of situation happens when the other healer isn't doing their job, yes, but it also happens when the tank's trying to get damage in too. Sometimes you just want the tank to be at a comfortable HP level until the actual problem mechanic happens and double regen does that for you with no extra effort on your part.

And it’s the WHM’s responsibility to regen. If they aren’t doing it, then that is not the fault of a Noct AST. Someone playing a job incorrectly doesn’t mean you need to give another job tools to make up for someone not playing their own job correctly. Giving AST more tools like the ones that have been suggested in this thread will just make it far more valuable in content than WHM, which is already struggling against AST enough as it is (and who has no hope of competition against SCH).

Personally, I call out WHMs that I don’t see using Regen when I’m in Noct Sect. I do not think I need a passive regen a la a SCH fairy to make the healing in Noct easier.

Whether it's a WHM not using a regen or a SCH AFK spamming Broil II or a Tank sitting in Shield Oath, things happen. Dutyfinder pugs is not the place to look for others to rely on. SE has a tendency to make sure all healers have what they need to handle that content and not give a damn beyond that.

WHM's problems higher level content are the fault of SE being unwilling to give them ways to work around them, but I'd want them to do it in a way catered to WHM's current strengths. I'd be just as happy to see WHM get more non-shield mitigation, like their own version of Fey Covenant. They deserve to have access to better healing cooldowns through stronger Lily effects and better forms of generation. If they must get a shield cooldown, there are ways to go about it that still fit WHM's pure healer niche, such as giving them Divine Seal back with an additional effect cooldown that lets them specifically overcap people's HP temporarily, or making Divine Benison AoE but restricting that ability to a specific Lily count. SE's claim that they're the 'basic' healer is why it's in the spot it is at the moment.

I don't have a problem with Healer homogenization, so long as the way that's individually accomplished is interesting. AST gets stance swapping. SCH gets the fairy and Aetherflow. WHM gets Lilies. SE doesn't want to change up fights enough to make some healers clearly better, but does like to cater to the problems of certain classes over others, which is what resulted in this healer disparity issue happening two expansions in a row. Pretending that AST doesn't need some of the tools SCH already has to make it better with WHM specifically because 'it has better shields' is flat out untrue. The same way that it's untrue to say WHM is good because it has the best mana management and AoE Healing cause Thin Air and Cure III are so strong.

Neither is correct or practical in practice.

AST needs limited sect swapping. WHM needs love.

[Seraphor]

For me personally, the sects are a mark of S-E's inability to design a unique healer concept. Diurnal represents healing like a White Mage while Nocturnal represents healing like a Scholar. It makes it difficult to balance when there are only two healing concepts but three healers. If AST had been a bit more unique in their healing kit, the complaints of healer balance would be different. Right now all we see in the healer balance front is either AST encroaching on WHM or vice versa, or AST encroaching on SCH or vice versa. It's less pronounced on the AST vs SCH front but it's there.

I feel I wouldn't be the only one to think that, because of S-E's design decision for AST's kit, there is a lack of confidence in S-E's design team when they (eventually) pitch the fourth healer for the game.

If they remove the Sects (or made it an active buff instead of a passive buff) and made AST a more vanilla healer with the capability to buff the raid, I would be a lot happier. I feel there are quiet a few people who would feel the same. Maybe not necessarily a vanilla healer with buffs but just something that makes AST more unique than WHM and SCH respectively.

I think the dual sects represent a very good way of balancing three healers between two roles. There may be an issue with the game itself being set up with only two healer roles but AST fits into that incredibly well.
Its my favourite aspect about my second main class, and I'd be incredibly pissed off if it was removed.

[Seraphor]

If AST was changed into a vanilla healer with buffs as you say, those buffs would have to be very significant, and include both HoTs and shields.

[SWB]

I think reducing the regen and including a 5%damage down on aspected benefic/helios would allow them to remove the stances. And that way the damage mitigation can actually be extended with time dilation and celestial opposition.

[Duskane]

I doubt we will ever get rid of
SCH/Ast comp unless they butcher sch shields and the cards
A healer shield that can basically make you invincible if they crit
Other is basically a DPS increase

How can WHM or a new healers compete with that

[Gemina]

The issue is AST is already OP. Having to choose sects is one of the job's few drawbacks, and even then you can still kind of cheat a sect by casting a regen or shield prior to engagement, and then switch to the opposite sect. It's not a huge edge, but one that no other healer has, adding to AST OPness.

I could see something like this if AST needed help, but right now it seriously does not need any help. The only issue AST has right now is solo play because the card gimmick and abilities like Earthly Star seriously lose their flavor here. Jobs like AST need challenging content in order to shine because nearly all their abilities are structured around group play.

[AmeliaVerves]

I'll just leave this here:

credits: The Balance Discord




edit: in case someone wants some further inside here is the one and only big brain healer guide: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...LDaOmZY8/edit#

[Grimoire-M]

The issue is AST is already OP.

SCH is OP. AST and WHM are competing against one another because of it. AST is the better one between those two, but SCH is the actual problem. The outlier that AST is trying to compete with that it realistically can't. And WHM can't compete with either without a serious overhaul to Lilies and adding the right cooldowns to tighten up the utility gap. You can buff AST's ability to contribute in this manner to help it alongside WHM without majorly impacting its use in SCH/AST comps. At best sometimes Noct AST's shields are used for tank busters while SCH retains AoE shield priority. That's it.

AST/WHM needs the extra regens more than SCH/AST needs the reliable shield.

[Bobsmiaw]

SCH is the OP one.
Embrace -> passive regen + rouse buff
whispering down -> aoe healing
Fey union -> basically like spamming mini cure/benefic to target
This combination makes the burden for both healers lighter.
It is like Eos says "do not worry just keep dpsing or doing another stuff (like raising), I will handle the heal"
Is it possible for WHM/AST to do this?

I think SE starting to reduce SCH power by lowering both embrace and whispering dawn potency compared to HW.
But they are still OP until now.

[Sunako]

SCH was nerfed during 4.0. They had weaker shields and more mana cost and barely any aoe dps, but then barely anybody play the job anymore. Even world first deltascape was done with whm/ast. Once sch shields become equal with ast, then other toolkit surpassed what nocturnal astro bring. If shield are stronger, it is easier survive certain mechanics. It is really hard balance between those two. I think nocturnal astro just need singletarget healing over time effect. Benefic 2 should turn into shield version like Adlo and Aspected Benefic should be regen regardless your stance.