Astrologian 5.0 Discussion

[Suishouhime]

It's more about risk vs reward and choices.
Imagine you have : 2 solar seals, 3 lunar seals and 0 celestial seal.
You get a Bole. What do you do ?
Redraw for Balance, Spear or Spire ? But you can get Arrow or Ewer, which will result to the loss of one seal (because you have already 3 lunar seals).
And if you don't want to redraw, then use the bole (which give you the 3rd solar seal) or Minor Arcana to get either Lord or Lady (lost a seal).

Thanks Ivory for sharing my idea

It was a great idea. Kept the versatility I love about AST while also streamlining Royal Road into Divination. Really liked it!

[MrAptronym]

Do the cards need to be balanced against each-other though? I think an RNG based mechanic is fine having mediocre, decent and amazing outcomes. The job gives you tools to try and mitigate what the RNG gives you, having a goal when you use them isn't a bad thing.

That said, they seem to have something in mind with the whole reduction in synergy thing, which I suspect heavily influenced the AST redesign. (which is a weird thing to do when introducing dancer, but whatever)

[Gemina]

Do the cards need to be balanced against each-other though? I think an RNG based mechanic is fine having mediocre, decent and amazing outcomes.

This would be fine if AST was forced to use the card they are dealt like when they first get access to draw @lv30. It is also the only way I can see the cards keeping the effects they currently have, but...

The job gives you tools to try and mitigate what the RNG gives you, having a goal when you use them isn't a bad thing.

The goal determines what you do with the card instead of the situation. Sure, every once in a while you might draw the Ewer after raising a caster, but would you redraw the Balance in this situation to try and get the Ewer? All those RNG mitigation tools just make it more and more like fishing for that single goal. It is bad because the way I see it, it was inevitable that the Balance would cannibalistically devour the entire card system until only it remained. And now here we are.

It could be worse. They've could've scrapped the card system entirely and just gave AST a ogcd that simply increases rDPS by 8% with a 3 minute CD.

[ParadoxHealer]

Thank you to the other people voicing their frustration with the changes, as I have been very upset to see my favorite healing class in any game simplified and gutted.

AST was about working with what you drew, choosing which card to royal road, etc., and developing a strategy from the chaos. There is barely anything random with the new system and little challenge. Everything that made me main AST and love playing it is being removed.

For those who keep telling us to calm down and stop complaining, consider your favorite class being gutted. If you are excited for aspects of the expansion, that does not mean you cannot have understanding people who are watching their job be ravaged.

[Rahspdoy]

It could be worse. They've could've scrapped the card system entirely and just gave AST a ogcd that simply increases rDPS by 8% with a 3 minute CD.

And yet.. thats exactly what they did.

Its hidden away behind a flashy UI to make it look like an actual mechanic. But all you have is a off-cooldown Buff you get to cast, that really doesn't care 'who' its cast on, because even if its the Mele DPS face of the 2-sided card, you can still throw it on the Ranged DPS. the 3 minute cool-down version is just a 2nd skill all on its own thats also off gcd that effects the entire party rather than a single one the 2-sided card does.

[Rollout]

I feel like there should still be unique effects on each of the cards. Like, keep the overall damage increase for all the cards, but also include a bonus depend on the card you used.

Balance: 5% Direct Hit Chance Buff
Spear: 5% Critical Chance Buff
Arrow: 5% Recast Time Reduction
Bole: 5% Damage Reduction
Ewer: Increased MP Regen
Spire: Increase HP Regen

Hell, maybe make it so that Divination requires a card to be drawn to use and that bonus effect is spread to the entire party.
Will people fish for the best card still? Yeah, probably, but the best effect is still on the card, the flat damage increase, so it's fine either way.

[Mortex]

Called it back then. Didn’t trust them when they told us there will be no 4 healer this expansion so they can balance healers and now we got his. Can I have my bahamut and ultima Token for my astro weapon back pls ? So I can buy a weapon for a job that isn’t gutted and feels like a boring farce.

[xwr]

I think the new cards are......... thoughtfully designed, to the extent that you do not need to know them at all.

They know you won't remember which card is for melee or ranged , so they show you, cross is for melee, and circle? is for ranged.



They know you need seals, so they let you know what you have and what you get.



So after deleting all the useless information, what you should care is:

[Gemina]

With my last post in mind I put together this little list of card effects. I honestly feel they didn't have to scrap the old card system, and only just remove any rDPS increase. Basically change what the Balance, the Spear, and the Arrow do. rDPS increase would have to be removed for SCH as well, but that's another topic.

Spread, Royal Road, and Sleeve Draw remain intact. However, Minor Arcana along with Lord/Lady are gone, but you'll see why. The Seal system remains as well, but Divination is now a high potency AoE offensive ability with drop off on a 90sec cooldown, giving AST more layers of RNG to get through, but less time to acquire the seals they want. The potency would be based on a little bit of a game where the highest potencies are obtained by having three of one seal, or one of each.

Anywho, on to the cards. I tried to keep their lore in mind. I believe the new Play ability is ogcd, so will leave that out.

The Balance: ST damage on enemy target. Potency 180; RR potency 240
The Bole: Defense increase on self or party member; RR duration 200%
The Spire: Heal on self or party member. Potency 300; RR potency 450
The Arrow: Self-Haste; RR duration 200% *cannot AoE
The Ewer: MP refresh up on self or party member; RR duration 200%
The Spear: ST damage on enemy target + blind. Potency 150 duration 6s; RR potency 200 RR duration 200%

edit: also wanted to point out that roading a card is the same as playing it when it comes to the seal. You still get the corresponding seal for that particular card.

[Suishouhime]

Again, though, I think the problem is people focusing too much on rDPS for Savage over literally every other type of content; the large majority of things to do in this game aren't meta-optimised Savage raids, and these problems of meta obsession to the exclusion of non-meta choices aren't a problem for the majority of players, because it never stops people running dungeon roulette, or treasure maps, or FATEs, or hunts, or 24-man raids, or Ex trials, or even the regular 8-man raids. I don't think everything should be balanced around something a minority of people play, especially not when it results in removing mechanics that give a job a strong sense of identity.

There's a reason why the Destiny community is and has always been peeved that the game removes PvE fun and utility because of balancing issues in PvP. FFXIV avoids that by simply balancing PvP separately. Similarly, if rDPS is the sole issue regarding why AST's cards had to be removed or fundamentally changed, you do the easy thing: balance Savage raids separately, too.