New AST from a New Player

[Side-Eye]

All of the old cards were actually good useful buffs. But 99% of the time only 1 of them was useful, and the others were vital at key moments but you had no ability to ensure having it when needed.

Both of these assertions are untrue.

First, 99% of the time it was possible to make use out of whatever cards were drawn.

Second, we DID have an ability to ensure that a particular buff was ready when we needed it. For example, if the tank was gung-ho on pulling wall to wall and/or wasn't quite geared well enough for the content, we could put a BOLE on hold and use that for a big pull or just before a tank buster.

I'm sorry that you didn't play the job extensively enough to learn these things before SHB. It was a blast, and one of the most engaging jobs of them all.

[Nhala_Levee]

Both of these assertions are untrue.

First, 99% of the time it was possible to make use out of whatever cards were drawn.

Second, we DID have an ability to ensure that a particular buff was ready when we needed it. For example, if the tank was gung-ho on pulling wall to wall and/or wasn't quite geared well enough for the content, we could put a BOLE on hold and use that for a big pull or just before a tank buster.

I'm sorry that you didn't play the job extensively enough to learn these things before SHB. It was a blast, and one of the most engaging jobs of them all.

Oh, finaly someone who can understand my pain. AST was the perfect class with perfect spells and a perfectly mastercrafted gauge. AST was perfect as that was in stormblood. And the devs broke it cause some kiddo dont want to use it as a real class, just want a dmg dynamo on its raids. Poor choice. >.>

[Kuwago]

AST of old faced an impossible to solve problem. A series of highly situational buffs coupled with one always useful buff and tied to random chance.

There were three solutions possible here:

1. Make them all do the useful buff and remove the situationals.
2. Remove the always useful buff and leave the situationals. If the useful buff is desired out it into a non-random skill.
3. Leave the cards but remove the random.

All of the old cards were actually good useful buffs. But 99% of the time only 1 of them was useful, and the others were vital at key moments but you had no ability to ensure having it when needed.

You don’t need an MP refresh or a buff to crit chance until you MEED it and then you really need it (the crit buff for instance, to squeak past an enrage timer on a progression raid in that first week when you just barely have it... that happens, and when it dies your a super hero if it was you that got your group over the line. But that’s a rare moment...)

Of the three ideas I noted, they chose the first; probably the worst possible choice for job flavor but best for matching how players adapted to the older broken system. I think the second fits the job flavor the best, and the third is lore violating but the most useful.

TBH, Cards were situational, if you don’t optimize where you use it. There were 3-4 cards that I found myself using most of the time, Top ones were Balance, Spear, Arrow and the occasional Ewer mostly for me and my co healers. I admit, Spire and Ewer were mostly RR fodder for me since I like to give everyone the buffs.

But I was able to use each cards I pulled into something albeit maybe not to the best but I made it useful. Whenever there RNG in play there will almost always be fishing no matter what it was. Before its Balance for aoe balance and now its fishing for seals.

If they want to keep this every card is balance then they need to take out the melee/range restriction and come up with something else.

[Saefinn]

Now that I've got used to AST (never picked it up proper prior to ShB as I've always had SCH/WHM levelled and AST never felt right coming from them), I'm kinda lamenting I didn't get it to 70 before ShB hit. Whilst I am liking it at 80 and find it less boring than my former main, SCH, I think I'd still have preferred how the cards used to work, especially with how it improved for SB. And whilst less boring than my SCH, it still suffers and needs its variety back.

[Side-Eye]

Now that I've got used to AST (never picked it up proper prior to ShB as I've always had SCH/WHM levelled and AST never felt right coming from them), I'm kinda lamenting I didn't get it to 70 before ShB hit. Whilst I am liking it at 80 and find it less boring than my former main, SCH, I think I'd still have preferred how the cards used to work, especially with how it improved for SB. And whilst less boring than my SCH, it still suffers and needs its variety back.

Don't get me wrong; AST is (post 5.05) a sufficient healer, but not as good as it was before. The 'situational' utility it brought was just useful enough to overcome any heal shortcomings and provide value to groups/raids, and it was just RNG-reliant enough to keep it from being overpowered.

Now, the job's usefulness is limited to inconsequential damage buffs (invisible to the naked eye -- gotta have a parser to even notice), and the utility of extending buffs has been stripped away... so even the tiniest of buffing can't be enhanced by making smart timely choices with CDs.

If Squeenix isn't willing to give back our "time mage" abilities -- like Time Dilution and the previous version of Celestial Opposition -- it needs to do two things: 1. acknowledge that rDPS and utility do NOT make up for lesser healing so heal potencies need to be increased again; and 2. change heal-based abilities like Collective Unconscious to either be click-and-go (instead of requiring us to stand still and inactive) or its benefit needs to be quadrupled.

[ZeroFool]

... 2. change heal-based abilities like Collective Unconscious to either be click-and-go (instead of requiring us to stand still and inactive) or its benefit needs to be quadrupled.

I'm hoping that a change would feel more like the latter; it should be as powerful as it looks when it's channeled. Seeing CU used in cutscenes and how awesome it was whenever Y'shtola took a defensive stance, I looked forward to how that power would be translated to an active ability. It translated poorly, with 10% damage reduction and piddly regen, combined with a small radius which encouraged turtling.

I personally really like the channeling aspect because it sets it apart from the other support bubbles. Something to actually justify being rooted in place could be rapidly regenerating shields for everyone inside the bubble which disappears if players step outside, to reinforce its 'protection' aspect.

Just anything that makes it more interesting and not just another set and forget bubble that people may or may not even step in.

[Sylvain]

I'll be honest, while the new system may feel less exciting because there are no surprise, it is true that in the end, we were fishing for balance (which is the exaxmxt same as fishing for divination symbols).
Using a single target card was always a dps loss. While it could have been exciting for a BLM to get a 150% arrow, it was still a bad draw.
The situational utility of cards, mostly Bole and Ewer were... Well very situational. The only time I was happy to get a Bole spread was during hello world 2. While it could give some comfort on other boss, it was useless,. We killed those bosses with less ilv so more mitigation was never properly useful. At best it would made me sqvd a helios. Same for ewer, never up when I or my cohealer died... Making it again something I would just royal road or minor. The most frustrating part was having the spread effect ready and drawing a ewer, that I could have used for mp but couldn't because..., ell I had the spread buff.

The old card system was maybe more diverse, but in a dps centric game, because it was rng the only thing u were actually aiming for were dps cards. The odd that the Bole or Ewer would be drawn at the right time were very slim (altough, I have to admit it made it all the more exciting)

Perhaps they could rework and give cards double effect, a dps effect and a support effect. You would then either pick what effect would be the most useful, either raw number on your dps player or utility (mostly on tank / healer) that's the closest compromise I could see and, would bring back a bit the excitation of randomness, like drawing the right supportive card at the right time.

But beside this, I dont see much of a difference between the old systeme and new, I was fishing for balance, now I fish for divination symboles...
My only issue is the opener. Too many weaving at once it's not fun

[YusiKha]

Perhaps they could rework and give cards double effect, a dps effect and a support effect. You would then either pick what effect would be the most useful, either raw number on your dps player or utility (mostly on tank / healer) that's the closest compromise I could see and, would bring back a bit the excitation of randomness, like drawing the right supportive card at the right time.

The problem is that unless the support buff is enough to change a benefic into a malefic (and with a cohealer and our host of oGCDs is that really likely?) then the DPS cards will always be preferable.
What I feel would be better is if you get a second 'play' action after the card, which would be a support/healing effect.

Though Bole's issue is still here - you can't ever guarantee that you have the right support skill. If you can't plan for having it, you have to assume that you won't have it.

[MitsukiKimura]

Having played AST for quite a while, I would suggest a different effect for lady of Crowns and Lord of Crowns instead of damage. Since TP is not a thing anymore, if you drew a shire card it would be completely useless until you had draw again for 30 seconds mid fight. I would like another way to regain MP also, Lucid Dreaming is nice and so is lightspeed but I feel like the Piety build just doesn't cut it since SCH and WHM have different means to obtain some mp. I personally would love if they added a special effect for each card.
Balance:5% damage boost
Spear 5% crit boost
Bole 5% defense boost
arrow 5% cast time reduced
Ewer: 30 Mp potency regen for 10 seconds
Nothing too Major, I'd feel like this would give Astro back it's diversity from the other healers. Being the weakest dps of the 3 healers.

[Kuwago]

Having played AST for quite a while, I would suggest a different effect for lady of Crowns and Lord of Crowns instead of damage. Since TP is not a thing anymore, if you drew a shire card it would be completely useless until you had draw again for 30 seconds mid fight. I would like another way to regain MP also, Lucid Dreaming is nice and so is lightspeed but I feel like the Piety build just doesn't cut it since SCH and WHM have different means to obtain some mp. I personally would love if they added a special effect for each card.
Balance:5% damage boost
Spear 5% crit boost
Bole 5% defense boost
arrow 5% cast time reduced
Ewer: 30 Mp potency regen for 10 seconds
Nothing too Major, I'd feel like this would give Astro back it's diversity from the other healers. Being the weakest dps of the 3 healers.

maybe they change balance into 5% direct hit so that Balance fishing wouldn't be a thing again. I feel like Ewer should be at least 40 potency since its still under RNG and not a guaranteed MP regen