Quote Originally Posted by Eloah View Post
For those who don't remember, Chemist was originally going to be our first healer added back in HW. But early in development they couldn't get the Mix command to function as intended. From that scrapped concept they developed Astrologian, using cards as an alternative to Mix, and Machinist, using a gun as a weapon, since at that point a "gun-wielding job was already "hinted" at.
Things have changed a lot since then though.
We know that their early draft of Chemist was pretty much the same role as AST, a buffer-healer, with a variety of different effects. AST took up that role... for two expansions. Now AST has had it's buff variety stripped away, and their 'buff' philosophy has narrowed. They also made steps towards breaking the regen/shield dichotomy that AST originally accommodated for.

A Chemist's 'Mix' command probably would have been broken if it was dishing out various different buffs, or if it was RNG like AST's card, just wouldn't work. But a Mix command now, wouldn't have anything to do with buffs, it would have to be centered around healing. So it could instead mix regens, shields and potency boosts instead of speed, crit and damage buffs.