To Reduce AST Button & Weave bloat

[Mimilu]

I like the busy card aspect but I get really tilted at not having sleeve draw to mitigate poor rng for astrodyne.

I still don't get why they changed ShB's card system. :B
If wanting to keep seals was their reason, they could of just kept ShB's Minor Arcana and Sleeve Draw then added Astrodyne with a 120 second cooldown so we had time to fish for seals, could use Minor Arcana, and have it align with our Divination window. :B

As for the OP's suggestions, I think your idea of having a normal card and a minor arcana auto-draw is fine, just have the play buttons be 30 seconds and 60 seconds respectfully. However, I think your Redraw idea just adds more busywork.

[Mortex]

It’s pretty dumb how many “filler” buttons astro has. Like lord in heaven I can’t use 2 different earthly star macros because I don’t have the hot bar space

[Recon1o6]

While I personally think ast is basically all filler now that its cards and time magic have gone, some of the buttons are just there just because the devs seemingly wanted higher button count

Here's some buttons to save space

Undraw needs to go. It never had a use
Benefic 1-benefic 2 is somehting that should have been done on launch.
Play should never have been split from draw in the first place
Likewise with crown play
Neutral sect is a combo of blantantly overpowered, lore breaking and can be made into an upgrade to synastry. On that note synastry should be all healing

[Esunya]

I don't understand why people would rather the class be dumbed down rather than play at a lesser efficacy themselves. I am sure if you just used cards whenever you're feeling not overwhelmed and used Aspected Helios whenever you're scared you'd still be able to clear any extreme and savage content before the next major patch. Why must every goddamn class be simplified to the level where even the lowest common denominator can play close to optimally when content is already simplified to the point where you don't need to play well at all in order to clear?

[YusiKha]

Snip

Thank you for your input! I'm starting to think that having to use draw, whose only use is to subsequentially allow the use of redraw and play, is actually considered one of the more difficult aspects of Astrologian's kit.
Now I see from your fflogs page that you are a Black Mage main, so allow me to put it in easier terms for you to understand.

Imagine if there was a button on Black Mage whose only purpose was to enable the subsequent use of Foul/Xenoglossy - there is no skill in pressing the button itself, as the placement of Xenoglossy in your rotation is the part that actually matters.
Would such a button be seen as 'vital to BLM's kit and dumbing down if removed', or would it be just fine if the Elemental Gauge continues to feed you a Xenoglossy usage (with stacks shown on the gauge) every 30s.
I actually based this 'moving Draw to the gauge' idea from Black Mage's Enochian-Foul/Xeno interaction, so it should seem familiar enough.

As for the 'simplification' - was it simplification to have Sleeve Draw give you 3 cards instead of refresh Draw's cooldown 3 times? Was it simplication to have ShB Minor Arcana just play the minor version instead of converting the card?
Absolutely not. It was to stop the massive amount of weaving and improve how it feels to play Astrologian. Needing to press a button whose only purpose is to allow you to press a different button only serves to clutter Astrologian's already busy burst phase and mandate the usage of Lightspeed (AST's only movement tool) in 120s intervals while it has a 90s cooldown.

Then maybe with those free buttons we can finally get an actual interesting damaging skill to alleviate the boredom of downtime malefic spam. God I wish...

[Jkap_Goat]

I miss 3.0-4.0 AST

[Vencio]

Although I’ve hardly played AST,

I support this,

Less is best & simplicity can bring great result.

I don’t see an issue why not.

I am with him/her on this

[Esunya]

Thank you for your input! I'm starting to think that having to use draw, whose only use is to subsequentially allow the use of redraw and play, is actually considered one of the more difficult aspects of Astrologian's kit.
Now I see from your fflogs page that you are a Black Mage main, so allow me to put it in easier terms for you to understand.

Imagine if there was a button on Black Mage whose only purpose was to enable the subsequent use of Foul/Xenoglossy - there is no skill in pressing the button itself, as the placement of Xenoglossy in your rotation is the part that actually matters.
Would such a button be seen as 'vital to BLM's kit and dumbing down if removed', or would it be just fine if the Elemental Gauge continues to feed you a Xenoglossy usage (with stacks shown on the gauge) every 30s.
I actually based this 'moving Draw to the gauge' idea from Black Mage's Enochian-Foul/Xeno interaction, so it should seem familiar enough.

As for the 'simplification' - was it simplification to have Sleeve Draw give you 3 cards instead of refresh Draw's cooldown 3 times? Was it simplication to have ShB Minor Arcana just play the minor version instead of converting the card?
Absolutely not. It was to stop the massive amount of weaving and improve how it feels to play Astrologian. Needing to press a button whose only purpose is to allow you to press a different button only serves to clutter Astrologian's already busy burst phase and mandate the usage of Lightspeed (AST's only movement tool) in 120s intervals while it has a 90s cooldown.

Then maybe with those free buttons we can finally get an actual interesting damaging skill to alleviate the boredom of downtime malefic spam. God I wish...

Having filler buttons that require some level of thoughts on top of having a simple 1 button malefic spam rotation is indeed preferable to what you are proposing. If BLM was indeed back in its state back in 2.0 where all you did was spam Fire 1 then yes I would actually say yeah, having a button that enabled Xenoglossy would perhaps be preferable to just simply be handed out for free.

Everything is all relative and each class can be difficult in different aspects. I think a lot of classes have abilities with lower cooldown you want to avoid drifting and planning those out is indeed part of their difficulty and optimization. Drifting and delaying them would mean you'll either slowly drift out of raid buff windows and/or you will lose a cast over the course of the fight.

[Liam_Harper]

I don't understand why people would rather the class be dumbed down rather than play at a lesser efficacy themselves. I am sure if you just used cards whenever you're feeling not overwhelmed and used Aspected Helios whenever you're scared you'd still be able to clear any extreme and savage content before the next major patch. Why must every goddamn class be simplified to the level where even the lowest common denominator can play close to optimally when content is already simplified to the point where you don't need to play well at all in order to clear?

For me the problem isn't the complexity, it's the reward and design.

AST has the same APM as in ShB, but a bulk of it has been bundled into the 2 min burst window, forcing Lightspeed to exist purely to facilitate this gameplay of break your hands every 2 minutes and then fall asleep until the next 2 min burst.

Astrodyne is just Lucid on a stick. The 2 and 3 buffs are meaningless and barely contribute a percent or two of your dps. This in turn makes Redraw almost meaningless.

MA is 0 complexity. You either proc lots of Lords or sucks to be you. Lady is fairly worthless. Lord is just a free Malefic.

There is no reason Draw/Play and Crown Play/MA shouldn't be merged into one button. It doesn't increase complexity to split them.

Complexity is great, but shouldn't you be rewarded for doing well with it? Astrodyne and MA don't reward you. They merely exist to make you press buttons but give almost nothing in return. It's poor design.

[VictorSpoils]

For me the problem isn't the complexity, it's the reward and design.

AST has the same APM as in ShB, but a bulk of it has been bundled into the 2 min burst window, forcing Lightspeed to exist purely to facilitate this gameplay of break your hands every 2 minutes and then fall asleep until the next 2 min burst.

Astrodyne is just Lucid on a stick. The 2 and 3 buffs are meaningless and barely contribute a percent or two of your dps. This in turn makes Redraw almost meaningless.

MA is 0 complexity. You either proc lots of Lords or sucks to be you. Lady is fairly worthless. Lord is just a free Malefic.

There is no reason Draw/Play and Crown Play/MA shouldn't be merged into one button. It doesn't increase complexity to split them.

Complexity is great, but shouldn't you be rewarded for doing well with it? Astrodyne and MA don't reward you. They merely exist to make you press buttons but give almost nothing in return. It's poor design.

"Look, Ma! I'm pressing buttons!" -AST