Quote Originally Posted by Aravell View Post
If you look back at that time, I can guarantee that almost every complaint about not getting The Balance and the SCH not using Selene all came from DPS mains. The rdps metric didn't exist back then, so the only way to get the funny number on the funny number site is for an AST to feed you The Balance. I personally remember a lot of DPS mains whining about not getting The Balance, but I most certainly have never seen any AST main worth their salt complain about the cards.

This shows that the card changes aligns with their aim of making sure the DPS players have as much fun as possible, regardless of what this does to the healer role.
You were in different circles then. I know several players of varying skill levels who despised the old card system because it essentially boiled down to "Balance fishing". This opinion is especially prevalent in the speed kill community as Balance was king. A lot of people also disliked how certain cards were worthless. Bole, for example, was never worth using as you were never going to rely on inconsistent mitigation. It's no different than current Lady, which every Astro hates drawing. With all that said, I do think they could have done a better job adjusting the system than scraping it entirely. I, personally, liked old Astro a lot more than every other iteration.

Alas, the old Astro would never work in today's landscape. Arrow would completely destroy nearly every job, Spear is just a baby balance that would be even weaker due to the insane value of the two minute meta, Ewer and Bole are both worthless and we'll assume Spire would be turned into a Direct Hit boost given TP is no longer a thing. Which would just be an even weaker Balance. So old Astro would be even more of a "Balance or bust" job today than ever before. That's the problem with FFXIV's design philosophy. Damage is overwhelmingly the best option. Anything that sacrifices damage for resources or defensive benefits seldom has any value.