AST’s heal kit is actually fun

[SargeTheSeagull]

Not without its flaws, but fun! I power leveled it from 80 to 90 back before 6.1 and haven’t really touched it since. I got a new mmo mouse and decided to play around with ast because I have nothing better to do than waste time waiting for this detestable laryngitis to go away. Anyway, after setting stuff up I did one simple run of p11 normal and I forgot how satisfying it is timing healing spells correctly. Setting earthly Star down 11 seconds before a raidwide, hitting a tank with exaltation right before a tb, using macrocosmos to laugh at a multi-hit stack. It feels really good. I think that’s something the devs should really lean into in the DT rework

[Renathras]

Kind of agree.

I hate AST's high APM, but in terms of the spells and mechanics themselves, there's a lot of good stuff there.

Earthly Star, Horoscope, and Macrocosmos are all timing based actions that can be pretty "hypercasual" fire and forget and still be useful (e.g. using Star on CD and just benefiting from the healing passively), but also have a variable application time, allowing "sweatytryhard" optimization on when to detonate Star or when to use Horoscope (gives you up to 30 seconds) to maximize their effects.

Synastry is an ability that I pretty much never see any reason to use, but IN THEORY it's kind of a neat idea for a spell. You can use it to increase healing kind of like Soteria (I think, anyway?), and you can use it to give focused healing to someone. If they made it work with ALL GCD heals (including AOEs), that'd be kind of neat. Tank or that one DPS low on health from getting hit with some mechanic AND the raidwide that hit the rest of the party? Synastry them and then throw out a Helios. In a oGCD focused game, it's always going to be a held back spell, but the single target only thing reminds me uncomfortably of SB WHM "generate Lilies/Confession by casting Cure 1/2 on people". It's still a neat ability IN CONCEPT either way.

Collective Unconscious is one of my favorite spells (and even 8 years later, I'm miffed they didn't give Y'Shtola's barrier spell to WHM... <_< ). I hate that the meta for using spells like that and Passage of Arms is to just "flash" them, but I still like the spells themselves, and even just flashing it gives a "Physis with benefits" and rewards timing to make sure the damage reduction mini-snapshot is used to cover the damage while minimizing the time you're frozen in place holding it. And for Jonny Casual who just hits the button and rides the full duration, it's still doing useful mitigation and healing. Again, another fantastic case of skill floor low, skill ceiling high allowing optimization. And its reasonable 60 sec CD means you get to interact with the ability a lot, unlike something like Temperance, Holos/Panhaima, Seraph, or Lilybell/Macrocosmos which are long CDs you tend to save for more specific situations/mechanics.

Speaking OF 2 min CDs, though, Neutral Sect is such a great ability. "Why yes I AM a Barrier Healer, now!", and it works with both the lore of the Job and gives Aspected Benefic and Helios a distinguishing characteristic from their base versions. 30 seconds of Eukrasia (without an increased MP cost) is probably broken, but it's so neat that if your co-healer goes down, you can layer out some additional protection on the party to buy time to raise them back on their feet without losing a Tank or DPSer while you're momentarily unable to heal (because of already having to use Swiftcast...several times...)

And Essential Dignity, your go-to single target heal, is like a better Tetra. You get it at level 15 and it can heal from 400 to 900 potency, allowing it to be used kind of "hypercasual" as a good panic button (where you just get more benefit when you're in a more dire situation without needing to think about it - this is good design for Jonny Casual since he's not thinking about stuff like that but is most likely to need it in an emergency), or you can try to maximize its effect by playing chicken with the 30% mark (max potency) on the Tank's health bar. It again allows for a low skill floor and higher skill ceiling. In a HEALING skill. But due to how it gets better as the situation is more dire, it also can benefit people on the skill floor and does so kind of passively without them thinking about it. "OMG! I'm brand new and my Tank's about to die! Oh wow, that heal saved the day! Not sure how that works, but yay!", and they get it at 15 (vs 60 for Tetra on WHM) and it gets a second charge at level 78 making it even more flexible.

Like, if AST had the cards removed but had the rest of its kit, I'd love the everloving hell out of it right now, since I find its oGCD and GCD kits to be really enjoyable.

NOTE: I'm not advocating for THAT, but I am saying I REALLY love its non-card kit and mechanics a lot. The "Draw/Target/Play, now do that 3x in less than 7 seconds while refreshing Combust and not dropping a Malific cast!" ruins the Job for me, but if we're just talking the healing kit, GCDs and oGCDs, and even the DPS kit (the only Healer with a ranged AOE attack, yes please!), I love it. I get some people love the hectic Card burst, which is why I don't advocate for changing it - my standing rule against taking things from people who enjoy them - but my god, I love its non-Card ability suite so much!

There's a part of me that absolutely wishes a 4 Healers Model WHM could have...well THAT KIT. AST's Kit trading Macrocosmos for Lilybell (hell, or not - Macrocosmos is a nice ability...) and replacing Draw/Play/Minor Arcana with Solace/Rapture/Misery. I'd be perfectly happy with that. The Cards ruin it for me, but the rest of the kit is /cheffskiss.

Hell, even its PvP kit is really enjoyable. It's straight up a strong support focused healer and can come in clutch with Gravity/DoubleGravity. Not to mention Celestial River is just a cool take on the twisting fate thing.

[Lailani_Fey]

I main Ast for almost every content and I do love it.
I'd trade Macro for Bell or Expedient any time however. Macro is just too involved to get it's full potential out of. It's too easy to get muffled out by mitigation and shields making coordination almost mandatory beforehand.
As for the cards, they are a nice thing to keep you busy. I actually have them bound to 1 2 3 keys because they just are used more and quicker than any other skill outside Malefic x)
But I don't do the Lightspeed superdumb outside of the inital burst. For me Lightspeed is a movement/emergency ability and carding during burst with movement is just breaking my fingers.
I do not use mouseover macros or anything like that so all use is manual monkasteering but lots of fun x)
As for timing the delayed healing abilties I try to learn it naturally during prog without timelining upfront. You could do that to optimize but it's not something I really enjoy outside of MINE prog.
Neutral Sect on the other hand is such an underrated ability. It's shields are incredibly versatile and the HoT combined with it makes it extremely strong. It's far stronger than Macro and invaluable as emergency tool.
I agree they could give Synastry some love. It's basically unused in Savages nowadays with a few niche uses in ultimates.

[VictorSpoils]

It has lots of regens, but many casual healers are too impatient for that. Especially in 8-mans, a healer will pop a regen and then one of them will just hastily heal through it. Let the poor regen do its thing, and stop spamming the same regen actions back-to-back.

It's underwhelming in dungeons. Even after using Aspected Benefic and all your mild oGCDs, you're still throwing in a few Benefic IIs. While it gives the latter action some use, it's a burden the other healers don't share.

Macrocosmos has little use in casual content, and it's only available at 90. The cruxes are everyone getting hit by a strong attack, surviving it, and your co-healer not invalidating it.

Synastry is a bona fide ARR/HW action that ought to be modified or removed. Its use is diminished in 8-mans, you can't target yourself, and the secondary healing uses the DoT font which is easy to miss.

Astrodyne's damage buff is underwhelming for what you go through to get it. You can go long stretches without three seals, and you already deal so little damage. Never liked 5% buffs to begin with, even when they're additive.

Celestial Intersection and Essential Dignity could do with a buff. The latter especially ties into the dungeon issue; picture the grueling opening pull in Holminster where you're still stuck with the one ED charge that's unlocked right around Satasha while SGE has already spent almost 30 levels dwarfing that amount of healing. Would not mind a second Lightspeed charge either.

You look back at all the cool AST actions that were scrapped and...Synastry and Undraw still linger. Why was Undraw kept instead of Royal Road? Could Time Dilation end up returning?

Anyway, here's to Dawntrail.

[Zeastria]

It's a reason i throw out WHM the moment i learned AST

I love the depth that my healkit has; i can buff my heals based on the dmg output,
- Abilties to inc heal potency in both AOE Heals (Horoscope/Nautral Sect) and ST Heals (Synastry/Nautral Sect).

HOT stacking: we have 3x (heal over time) abilties, 3x delayed heals -
AST is quite strong healer for BIG w2w pulls; because we can just prep a lot of heals in advance
and forget the tank and just spam AoE on mobs.(while u throw out cards).

Note: Dont neglect your [Synastry] ability - its actually quite powerful..it just that many players uses it WRONG!
[Synastry]+[Aspected Benefic] on Tank - it will buff that HOT by 40%!.
It also buff the heal potency of your [Benefic II] by 40%..(while it's active on the target).

Macrocosmos's strenght is based on the dmg your party takes - (Mitigation hurt this ability a lot)
It's basically an 8-man version of Essential Dignity => It can heal 8 players from 1% up to 80% in one click.

[Gullis]

I like it currently, so im kinda worried about the rework ngl

I wish Synastry worked with ogcds or something, as its a skill I never use, outside of low level dungeons, where the tank is on the squishy side.

As others mentioned above, it feels kinda unrewarding at times, as most co-healers I have, seems to have no faith in regen or delayed healing at all, but that's not really a problem with the job itself

[TheDustyOne]

Note: Dont neglect your [Synastry] ability - its actually quite powerful..it just that many players uses it WRONG!
[Synastry]+[Aspected Benefic] on Tank - it will buff that HOT by 40%!.
It also buff the heal potency of your [Benefic II] by 40%..(while it's active on the target).

Synastry doesn't affect the HoT of Aspected Benefic, only the up-front 250 potency heal. I believe there used to be a time when Synastry did affect the HoT, but I can't remember when Square patched it out. I think maybe when ShB launched?

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

Not without its flaws, but fun![...]

AST is probably my favorite go-to pick to heal dungeons nowadays, pretty close right behind them is SCH my main but a bit of a break from ground slapping is always great

Cards keeps things busy enough to not make me fall asleep. (Hello I hate getting dupe role dps comps and getting none of the cards designated for them lmao)

Essential feels weaker now that I can't do the old close to 1,300 potency heals but finally adding a precise HP% telling us when's the best time to use the ability was a nice QoL they've made coming to EW IMHO.

Collective had their mitigation portion extended to 30y radius (understandably lmao) but I still can't get rid of the habit of making sure as much players are within the bubble when I flash it.

The delayed heals are probably the most satisfying of their kit to abuse:

• Love to drop Earthly Star as a makeshift waymark for pulling tanks: "Stop the pull here!". Most abide that.
• Macro being either useless to partywide benediction. While mits and and shields are a bane to this ability, it's also why I rarely rely on these as my first few line of defenses. Otherwise, another movement tool on top of that. I find more satisfaction using this as an AoE gain in wall pulls and use it to bene the tank back to full (need to heal them at least once with ED first!)
• Horoscope to a lesser extent because the 30s version locked behind a GCD cast. Outside specifics, I usually treat this as timeable 200p heal otherwise, or supplementary like SCH's Fey Blessing.

Lady is their only source of quick AoE burst healing that's not Earthly Star but they're random hence unreliable. It's nice to have to have it handy when Mother Nymeia favors you though lol. (Also MA timer, why you're not visible on Arcana gauge...)

The rest of their healing kits are quite forgettable to me. Why have two Intercession when you can just make Exaltation 2 charges and/or add back Essential's nerfed 400 potential potency? Why have Opposition be an "Asp Helios but oGCD"? Neutral... well... exist... great for emergencies and preplanned healing usually paired with Horoscope (great for when party's about to split up and we need more than just Star and/or Macro). But that doesn't usually happen in normals.

To a lesser extent, Exaltation since they have a delayed healing intact on it that it plays thematically well to AST's Time Mage references.

GCD heal kits are pretty standard, there's nothing to write home about although why their MP cost remains cheaper than WHM's counterpart despite having same exact potency remains a mystery despite already being a bottomless tank of MP even on 0 piety and high sps. I guess the fact that I can make up easily for cooldown-less wall pulling tanks by sacrificing first two earliest GCD to stack both aspected HoTs is something? I miss stance dancing in dungeon though

[...][Synastry]+[Aspected Benefic] on Tank - it will buff that HOT by 40%![...]

They sadly don't. Only the initial 250p gets an additional 100p. The tick remains at 250p per tick. If they happen to tick higher, chances are your HoT are 'critical ticking'.

[Zeastria]

Synastry doesn't affect the HoT of Aspected Benefic, only the up-front 250 potency heal. I believe there used to be a time when Synastry did affect the HoT, but I can't remember when Square patched it out. I think maybe when ShB launched?

I always assumed it did effect the HoT too, Because everytime i used it
=> I felt i had to heal tank less ( but i do refresh Aspected Benefic during it's duration).
But it also give a nice "safety net", since it does almost dobble your Benefic II.
( Have saved many tanks in low lvl (50+) dung ) :P
I see so many who never uses it.. its waste really, since it does make a difference
- More so on low lvl content when we dont have Celestial intersection or Exaltation.

( I hope they dont remove it in the rework )

[TheDustyOne]

I only end up using it when I know I have to start relying on Benefic II, which typically tends to be big pulls alongside a tank with mitigation allergies, or when everyone's hitting the floor. I think the skill's neat and I hope the rework keeps it in as well.

As for the topic at hand, Exaltation is one of the new buttons I hope stays, it's very much in theme with AST's time magic roots and it's one of the first things I use in a big pull. Macrocosmos feels satisfying to get value out of, and is the main reason I want more healing checks put in casual content; give me more reasons to press this big fat undo button Square. Essential Dignity has always been my favourite of the basic ST oGCD heals, it feels good playing HP limbo and getting the cooldown off in time. I love the animation and feel of Collective Unconscious, stationary abilities have a tendency to either be very clunky or niche, and while this one isn't that different, I still love holding it up when the boss goes away for that big attack. And lastly, can't forget Earthly Star, definitely my favourite of the AoE oGCD heals we have; big heal, decent damage, flexible in timing, Assize wishes it could be as good as Earthly Star.

Honourable mentions go to Synastry for being interesting, if a little niche/low priority, and Neutral Sect for invalidating the need for the regen/barrier split in content. Horoscope could be neat, but I find I don't use it all that often, if I have to use Aspected Helios, I'd rather use Neutral Sect first, and if I have Horoscope up as well, it's likely to just be overheal at that point.

I care little for Celestial Opposition and Celestial Intersection. They could be deleted tomorrow and I wouldn't care.