Astrologian changes feedback

[Valmaxian]

I'm incredibly disappointed with what has been shown so far.

I could probably give a chance to an RNG-less Astro for an expansion. But losing the high APM of the job at the same time? No, absolutely not!

I live for AST's hectic burst windows, it's the only healer job that keeps me from getting bored out of my mind in normal mode content and harder content on farm. For the love of the twelve, please, don't dumb it down!

I really don't want THIS:


Turning into THIS:

(I'm betting that the new Draw button will work like Minor Arcana does now. Only executable in combat.)




If they're turning those two other cards into "healing" and "mitigation" (as they've described), then they're situational and have no business in our opener. Or even worse, those cards could go completely unused in easier content (like most of our healing spells do).
So in essence, we're trading two charges of damage buffs on a 30s CD, to one charge on a 60s CD. Can you elaborate on how am going to be just as busy?

There’s more to a job than just the opener. If we end up getting cards with diverse utility, that could make the job more interesting than just tossing damage buffs with each card. And we *have* been asking for unique card effects ever since they did away with them.

Also, It’s clear that there will be some distinction between card effects, as the Lord vs. Lady draws have different cards/ borders. IF they actually do interesting things, and IF we get some agency over which set of four we draw, that’s a system that, for me, would be more interesting than what we have now.

Current iteration: high APM, RNG, only damage buffs, which ignores card identity.

New iteration: lower APM, no RNG, unique card effects, which restores card identity. (Of course this will depend on what the cards do, but the potential is there).

[Rithy255]

There’s more to a job than just the opener. If we end up getting cards with diverse utility, that could make the job more interesting than just tossing damage buffs with each card. And we *have* been asking for unique card effects ever since they did away with them.

The issue with this is really simple, The "diverse utility" isn't diverse at all it's a mitigation... which yeah cool i guess and a heal card, This does nothing to make the job more interesting.

Without RNG, "Unique card effects" means nothing.

[Zolvolt]

The issue with this is really simple, The "diverse utility" isn't diverse at all it's a mitigation.

I guess what I'd like to ask is what do you actually want from utility? Theres no TP anymore, cooldown reduction and haste mess up most other jobs' rotations. MP is not a helpful buff anymore. offensive buffs right now are limited to +damage, +crit +direct hit and thats really it. If we don't explore the mitigation/healing route for our buffs then theres nothing but stale dps buffs left.

[ForsakenRoe]

I guess what I'd like to ask is what do you actually want from utility? Theres no TP anymore, cooldown reduction and haste mess up most other jobs' rotations. MP is not a helpful buff anymore. offensive buffs right now are limited to +damage, +crit +direct hit and thats really it. If we don't explore the mitigation/healing route for our buffs then theres nothing but stale dps buffs left.

Offensive buffs can all provide damage, but the way they provide damage can be different. % up, crit rate and DHit rate are three ways, yes, but what about 'counterattack when struck'? How about 'autoattack speed vastly increased', for a haste effect that doesn't mess up rotations? What about 'attacks hit twice for X stacks'? If we stop thinking about the cards as all needing to be specifically '15s duration', and open up the possibility of having X stacks of something, a lot more variations on how to increase our damage become available to design around

[SerMicha]

I haven't re-looked at DT Ast since I watched the LL, but I'm really hoping they keep all 6 cards and have something like the following:

Balance = X% Damage Increase
Arrow = Y% Mitigation
Spear = Z potency Heal

Bole = X+2% Crit Chance Buff
Ewer = Y% of max health Shield (stack with SCH/SGE obviously)
Spire = Z+15% potency HOT

It doesn't have to be exactly like that, but I think I would be more okay with the rework provided each hand you draw has the chance to be slightly different from the last. I could see a situation where one minute, you have Damage Card/Shield Card/HOT Card, and then next minute, you have Crit Card/Mit Card/Heal Card.

My numbers are arbitrary, AST may have to give up CU for the mit cards, and I'm not going to go into detail about AOE vs Single Target cards. I just don't remember them going into too much detail about the rework in the LL so I'm holding hope that it's not just going to be a generic damage increase/generic mit/generic heal every single hand.

[Zolvolt]

Offensive buffs can all provide damage, but the way they provide damage can be different. % up, crit rate and DHit rate are three ways, yes, but what about 'counterattack when struck'? How about 'autoattack speed vastly increased', for a haste effect that doesn't mess up rotations? What about 'attacks hit twice for X stacks'? If we stop thinking about the cards as all needing to be specifically '15s duration', and open up the possibility of having X stacks of something, a lot more variations on how to increase our damage become available to design around

I do like some of these ideas. Especially the counter attack and auto attack speed. I would worry about some jobs just 100% always being the right choice for some of these buffs, but not really something to worry about when just slinging ideas around, yeah?

[Valmaxian]

The issue with this is really simple, The "diverse utility" isn't diverse at all it's a mitigation... which yeah cool i guess and a heal card, This does nothing to make the job more interesting.

Without RNG, "Unique card effects" means nothing.

Since Astrodyne is going away regardless, the RNG also means nothing. And there are hints (extended tank defensive cooldowns, more effective second wind, and Yoshi stating that Dawntrail will up the bar in terms of difficulty) that more mitigation could potentially be VERY useful.

Additionally we don’t know what the new cards will do - most are assuming the heal card just restores HP and the defense card is just percentage mitigation. A healing potency increase card + mitigation could be nice for large pulls or early battle AoEs. And a stronger damage buff card would be really nice for that star DPS during their burst window (again IF the percentages are worthwhile).

What I’m getting out of the posts criticizing the AST changes is that the unhappy players seem to care more about adding barriers to gameplay without any particular benefit just to brag that they can do it. Lots of people can do it, nobody cares. Perhaps more utility skills are what we’ll need in Dawntrail. I’ll reserve judgement until I see tooltips.

[Ayer2015]

I wish they would redesign the Lord and Lady cards to function as empower and spread. It would be nice to get a bit of the HW ast feel back.
What the major cards do will really determine how I feel about the changes. Having the card mechanic effectively be replaced with sleeve draw on a minute CD doesn't necessarily bother me.

[glamazon]

I wish they would redesign the Lord and Lady cards to function as empower and spread. It would be nice to get a bit of the HW ast feel back.
What the major cards do will really determine how I feel about the changes. Having the card mechanic effectively be replaced with sleeve draw on a minute CD doesn't necessarily bother me.

This is the best idea i've read so far.

[Aravell]

I wish they would redesign the Lord and Lady cards to function as empower and spread. It would be nice to get a bit of the HW ast feel back.

This idea is actually pretty cool. Even if the card system was just damage up like ShB/EW, introducing the enhanced or expanded effect to the card would open up more avenues for optimisation.

It would increase the thought required and I'm all for it.