COMPLETE Astrologian Job Breakdown from DAWNTRAIL Media Tour!

[@MazzieMay]

Oh man, my muscle memory is going to be the final boss any time I play AST

[@SpellboundTutor]

I'm an old boomer AST. For me, it wasn't the RNG per se that made me fall in love with old AST, it was that every card did something unique. So while I did like the quirkiness of having cards that increased crit or increased sks/sps or acted as an MP regen, I see the new cards as a strong step in a direction I really love.

[@marcusaurelius4777]

How? You literally just give this garbage to the tank now. Mits, regens, and heals to the tank as they are single target. You COULD give them to a DPS that's near death, but that will be very low in occurrence.

[@syris1952]

With these new mechanics, this would be the perfect time to add Time Dilation back, please, I really would love to see it make a return

[@kingkalamity2301]

Can't wait for it to get reworked again next expansion

[@ruick78]

Babe wake up new astro expansion class

[@knightofastora916]

More like mid expansion.

[@JimC1984]

The minimal changes homogenization and the dungeon bgm its starting to actually feel mid myself. Will give it a fair play and all before i call it mid concretely​@@knightofastora916

[@abuhurairah6268]

Meh we'll see it changed again by 6.1

[@Vinex3431]

Shits soo obnoxious lmao it's like the person in charge of managing ast doesn't even play the job and agrees to whatever idea seems cool...

[@tsbulmer]

Undraw *gone*? That we lived to see the day...

[@BlaBlaBla-76]

Lol, I never had it on my hotbar😂 Has to be most useless skill in the game.

[@cosmosofinfinity]

@@BlaBlaBla-76 I feel sorry for whoever drew the icon art

[@gsil247]

What's undraw, I don't know this move?

[@24Sparja]

@@gsil247 right now on astrologian you have a button to draw a random card, if you want to discard the card rather than use it on someone you can press undraw

[@kuri_curry]

Would say "Draw" gone is more fitting. I never had undraw in my hotbar. it's a waste of a resource.

[@Lilybellmusic]

re 3:38 - I'm pretty sure that doesn't actually amplifies shield healer's outgoing heals, but rather incoming heals they get (same wording as Krasis)

[@iamme1743]

I’m pretty sure as well. Which would insane to combo with an SCH Spreadlo uwu

[@Double0Anims]

@@iamme1743 Still does if you ahve a warrior. Buff the warrior, he thrills, SCH does spreadlo off of war.

[@Memyx]

Yeah, I think he was thinking of how, like, Zoe works. Not the case.

[@iamme1743]

@@Double0Anims protraction -> thrill -> astro’s shit -> spreadlo I’m feeling the happy chemicals in my brain 🤤

[@benscott2093]

it does. it's been a popular misconception for a while because of the wording and a lot of people still get it wrong. you throw that on the person GETTING the heals not the person dishing them out

[@16ShiningUmbreon]

I am an OG astro from Heavensward. Played it since it was released and I loved the card system. When they changed the card system I stopped playing. I think I am going to play it again now! Old astro is back baby!!!

[@fairlyenjoyable]

I'm interested to see how it feels in-game! Thanks for the thorough update, Happs!

[@MoonTiger88]

AST became my favorite healer some time ago, and have to say, I'm kinda loving these changes.

[@KROOF]

As someone who really fell in love with Astro from the FTP experience, this is making me want to dive back in. 🔥

[@MrCarlWax]

Fun to see you here!

[@Prism_Heavy]

As someone who started playing healer on Astro back in Stormblood, I am loving the new utilities on the cards now. I was so scared seeing the job action trailer and seeing the screwed up card ui. They should have never forced all cards to just do dps. I loved stb astro because it was so unique, had a bunch of utility and was generally harder to play than the other healers. This is making me so excited I might have to play through dt as astro instead of sage. It will never be as it was in stb, but I am just so overwhelmingly happy cards are going back to utility-based.

[@Eoson]

AST loss some MP regen. Draw was 5% MP every 30s with Astrodyne every 90s offering 50 potency MP restore for 15s on one seal (Astrodyne can be up faster at the start of the fight but effectively every 3 draws so 90s). Now we only have Draw at 5% every 60s.

[@clawtooth35]

Astro had no MP issues and even overcapping in Endwalker so we'll be fine

[@reidypeidy]

@@clawtooth35 We now have less MP regen than White Mage in EW since Assize was every 40 seconds and White Mage was NOT fine in the MP regen department. So yeah, they will need to add more MP regen to Astro, they took too much away

[@KuroKitsuSan]

@clawtooth35 ​ ast used to have MP issues, thats why those changes existed in the first place. this 5% only every 60sec is potentially pretty bad. the other healers get like...20% and ast only gets 5%

[@Paperenzo036]

One of my fav things about AST is its near infinite mana economy vs the other healers. Whenever I get a really shitty run where half the party keeps dropping dead + plus I have to spam heals to top off from raidwides, I’m always okay with AST because I always have mana. When that happens with other healers though, there will come a moment where I have to literally pause and not do anything because I have to wait for my mana to come back.

[@l.k.2355]

Astros are FEASTING thank god

[@Daniel-qt5ib]

I'm SO excited for cards not all just being the same damage buff!

[@OPickler]

Im just mildly annoyed that it's astral draw that gives the barrier and umbral draw that gives the regen, when those are the opposites of what diurnal and nocturnal sects used to represent

[@sophiastorm8616]

Right? They could have avoided confusing players

[@silvergrove8517]

At the risk of spoiling things, we do learn in Shadowbringers that Astral and Umbral do not necessarily mean what we would assume at first glance. Also, Astral does not equal Diurnal, nor does Umbral equal Nocturnal. Not strictly speaking, at least.

[@sophiastorm8616]

@@silvergrove8517 you're right but my brain still makes the connection 😂

[@silvergrove8517]

@@sophiastorm8616 oh for sure. Especially for someone going through for the first time, if they pay attention, they will be very confused lmao

[@OPickler]

Ah, admittedly, I dont remember much of that little lecture, being however many years ago as it was

[@Alphafonz]

Honestly I love this return to form for the cards!

[@TsuchiGamer06]

The return of HW Bole made me smile. But I like how it waffles between both aspects, instead of constantly fishing for 3 signs, you're literally going Astral and Umbral (without the sects) so the AST flavor is still there

[@HildagardeGaming]

My main question about Astro still remains unanswered: What is happening with Astro's MP economy? With Astrodyne gone, we lose our key MP recovery outside of Lucid Dreaming and go back to having the worst MP economy of the healers. Here's a comparison going forward: Sage: Addersgall grants 1 stack every 20 seconds and each use of an Addersgall stack grants 700 MP and Rhizomata granting a free stack every 90 seconds. That's 2100-2800 MP a minute recovered. On top of that, Toxikon is a free skill and they start battles with 3 uses. Scholar: Their extra MP comes from Aetherflow, recovering 2000 MP every 60 seconds. White Mage: Assize grants 500 MP every 40 seconds, but this lack of MP recovery is backed up with Lillies every 30 seconds for free healing/damage and Thin Air granting a free spell use once every minute, starting with 2 stacks, and saving the White Mage anywhere from 400 to 2400 MP on that cast. Temperance will grant them three free Glare IVs every 2 minutes, adding more free toys to their arsenal. Astro: With no Astrodyne, all they recover is 500 MP a minute with Astral/Umbral Draw. What I'm hoping is they could either add an MP refresh into one of their core skills, like Collective Unconscious of Celestial Opposition (or even Synastry to make us remember this skill exists!), or even return Lightspeed to how it was originally, giving the reduced cast time and reducing the cost of their spells by 50%. Astro's been my main healing choice since HW and I want to see it in a good spot. I don't want to go back to being MP starved or having to pump Piety materia where Det/Crit/Spell Speed could be placed.

[@iPlayOnSpica]

I've noticed, but let me add: current AST's Draw is a 30s cd and gives 500mp. So even without accounting for Astrodyne, it being a 60s cd and 500mp in dt is a huge nerf.

[@samanthaabel1079]

@@iPlayOnSpica i agree here ... i think they will prob need to up the mp regen or put on maybe celestial op? maybe ? like whm get with assize

[@iPlayOnSpica]

@@samanthaabel1079 No, I say it's better to put additional mp recovery on either the card Plays or Essential Dignity

[@tsjeriAu]

@@iPlayOnSpica This was my suggestion when I was discussing healer changed with my static coheal, just put the current draw mp on whichever cards you do play in Dawntrail, then you get the same mana as SCH essentially, with 4x500mp from the singular draw and 3 cards played.

[@BasTrompper]

@@iPlayOnSpica after doing the math, on 2.40 GCD Ast would be OoM after 6 minutes assuming perfect use of their mp recovery its dumb

[@TheBorgey]

Loving the fact that Cards are going back to what they were with some minor changes and no randomness. My fav healer is back after getting butchered.

[@Shizukanexen]

Lol I want Barrier/Regen stances back cause I liked nocturnal AST >>; but this looks fun! Bye Astrodyne, you will not be missed.

[@chickennugget6684]

the infinite mp though, i will miss.

[@toastee5421]

why do y'all hate Astrodyne so much?

[@chickennugget6684]

@@toastee5421 tbh i like it, but maybe that's cause i don't really worry too much if i don't get 3 seals

[@toastee5421]

@@chickennugget6684 so these peeps just have a personal agenda against it?

[@marcusaurelius4777]

@@chickennugget6684 What do you mean? You always get three seals? Who gives a fuck if you don't give three unique ones? You will always at least get 2 unique ones for the mana and speed. This is why casuals like you infest and destroy jobs with thoughts like this. AST has been lobotomized to be nothing more than "prettier WHM".

[@holo_val]

While I was a rng/Astrodyne enjoyer, I am loving the cards having unique effects! Excited to play DT Astro ❤

[@twistedjiji]

Hmm, was hoping AST get a gap closer too. Every other healer class has some sort of speed boost or gap closer; not sure why we're excluded.

[@Spookalina]

I agree! Wouldn't it be fun if we summoned a small comet to push us forward? Or something to that effect. I just watched the Pictomancer video and they get a paint slide movement ability.

[@tomcrescent7058]

The only reason they gave SGE and WHM gap closers is because they don't have a counterpart to Lightspeed which is one of the best healer skills, AST doesn't need it at tall

[@twistedjiji]

@@tomcrescent7058 Yeah, but for escaping and getting yourself out of mechanics, a gap closer/dash would be helpful as a healer. What good is Lightspeed if you're dead because you can't get out of a mechanic quick enough? 😄

[@aspookyscaryskeleton1474]

The fact that the busiest healer job doesn't have any mobility must be a joke on Square Enix's part

[@marcusaurelius4777]

@@tomcrescent7058 Are you stupid? AST uses Lightspeed ONLY for raid buff windows. I guess not anymore since you only have TWO cards to give out lmfao.

[@TiaCup]

As a controller player i'm gonna hate that now there are 3 play buttons😢

[@HakureiIllusion]

So uh... with no Astrodyne and less draws, how are we recovering MP

[@LadyPari]

That’s the not secret but secret-we don’t :D

[@AriesCorinthier]

5000 mp every 60 seconds should be fine. It's more than what get from cards now.

[@HakureiIllusion]

@@AriesCorinthier ...Where are we getting that 5000 MP from?

[@LadyPari]

@@AriesCorinthier math aint mathing. Its 500mp every 60 for DT. Currently it’s 5% (500) of max (10,000) every 30 + Astrodyne’s 50 potency with 1 seal + Lucid. This DT rework has brought us back to being the worst MP economy healer of all choices. I don’t know where you got that extra 0 on but we aint recovering shit lol.

[@HakureiIllusion]

​@@LadyPari For more specific math because I'm a psycho and do things like this: baseline MP usage is 400 per 2.5 seconds, assuming we don't use anything more MP intensive than Malefic/Combust. That's 9600 MP used every minute. Comparatively, MP regen is 200 per tick, plus 7 ticks of 550 from Lucid Dreaming each minute, then the additional 500 for the draw each minute, total 8350 recovered each minute. That's a 1250 deficit each minute, meaning you'll run out of MP 8 minutes into a fight... again assuming you don't need to raise or do anything that stresses your MP worse than Malefic/Combust. This will fluctuate based on spell speed and piety, of course; going off my own current EW stats, it takes closer to 11 minutes to run out than 8, but my gear isn't optimized and uses more piety than most.

[@havartivangouda1276]

i'll admit when i'm wrong; i dismissed the astro changes and was getting ready to ditch the class but this breakdown really put into perspective how much better it's going to be

[@basilnottheherb]

I've been enjoying Astro ever since shadowbringers and I feel like this was the general necessary step to build upon for future use. I'm actually really excited to play Astro and have a majority of the things I like and a couple of new toys to play with

[@jbobtorrey]

You're vid is the only one that mentioned prepull you get a free astral draw automatically, which is huge for the buff window (although I would have loved seeing a 50 sec countdown timer request 😂). You're a gentleman and an astro sir, thank you!

[@GutenStrephenHassen]

This takes me way back on the astro life, I may start playing it again. I really hated the changes made in Endwalker and never played it

[@benjaminbufton3696]

im so glad the cards have kinda gone back to old individual effects!!!!! this is the best news!!!

[@Firestar1992]

Ooooooh! I decided months ago that I’d main AST for the expansion, so with your review, I’m getting excited.

[@amethonys2798]

Curious to see what they are going to do about mana management. Yes, Astro had too much mana in EW, but removing Astrodyne and half the amount of card pulls means you are going to be forever mana negative. This is especially a problem if you have to hold the caster card the entire minute to line up with buffs.

[@kazh5677]

Back to piety baby

[@venusoneechan]

The mana we had in EW was perfect and it needs to stay that way

[@tredecim9053]

Now that the seals are gone. I feel like with how they set up this card system they might add back in Royal Road in some way for a future expansion or as a x.1 small overhaul depending on how engaging it'll be for the overall community. Could be used like a recycle function if Cards are left over from your previous draw. (like +5s/small potency increase for a random card of the next draw;I feel like the AoE alteration from SB is a poisonous ingredient). also still feel like minor arcana are kinda just there

[@reidypeidy]

Shouldn't you use "The Arrow" on the tank instead? It increases how much healing they receive by 10%, not how much healing they do to others. Or am I misunderstanding the wording on that effect?

[@karmaspcs]

heavensword astro is back. love it

[@leonbraun3778]

Have to say I'm disappointed to see the Sun, Moon, Star icons gone (that was fun to work with) but happy to see more distinct cards back that add variety to the gameplay again =)

[@nelia039]

Looks amazing! I missed our real shields and the card effects!

[@Mandoolin]

I will miss the rng draw system but this looks really promising. We are so back.

[@ianheckman6655]

My biggest complaint with getting rid of the randomness of the cards is that it doesn't really make sense to talk about a deck of cards that you draw the same cards in the same order from? I'm not really thrilled by it even if I understand it's done to mainly balance classes, and perhaps the only way to.

[@knightsolaire5351]

It’s not really done for balance. It’s done so you can be consistent. Savage and ultimate fights revolve around having mit exactly when you need it. This allows you to have the same tools available at predictable times throughout the fight and makes unique card effects like the bole actually useful instead of fringe. The bole was always burned to upgrade your next damage card in heavensward and early stormblood because it was random when it came up so it was never *in* your mitigation plans. Now that it’s always going to come up at a predictable time and only once every minute, you have time to examine for the best time to use your utility cards instead of burning them to get the next card

[@marchabel8880]

A bit concerned about some aspects of the reworked card system. Without being able to shuffle, we will almost certainly not use some cards to avoid sitting on astral/umbral draw? Also, if we are sitting on a lord, but draw comes off cooldown would we delay drawing until raid buffs due to drift etc or an appropriate time to use said lord? Finally, with us getting one dps increase card per draw, in 4 man content this could potentially force us into using cards on ourselves or tanks in the event of 2 melee/2 ranged dps slots which currently is not optimal. Cautiously optimistic because its seems more engaging than the current system but these bugs are going to need to be addressed.

[@GayLPer]

...Huh? Just... just use the cards before draw comes off cooldown. It isn't that complicated.

[@WolfmanXD]

I'm not sure about their thought process behind loading into an instance with astral already drawn. It feels if you dump your utility pre pull, then use balance, divination, lord, draw, spear then you're drawing umbral WAY too early. This means that you'll end up having lady of crowns during your 2 minute window, and lord of crowns during the off minute. Unless you hold onto lord and balance for a full minute, which imo is gonna feel really bad.

[@mirellie4445]

I fell off of AST because i found sage so fun this expansion but what does an AST do when a raid gets nuked either by bad positioning or a mechanic that sets everybody to low hp. Whats the 'oh shit' setup?

[@MillieBoBilly]

I had the most fun with Astro in Storm blood and haven't enjoyed it as much since. This does seem pretty promising though

[@GameGod77]

As someone who hasn't unlocked AST but remembering how people described it in ShB, I wish they gave it the 2 sects back. That looked like the core of the class identity from the outside looking in and until it returns I have no desire to unlock it.

[@NargiKyrad]

It was never part of the "core fantasy" just a mechanic to make AST a "wildcard" healer so you could play it with either a scholar or a WHM due to only being 3 healers at the time, but with SGE added there was no more need of a wildcard since now you have 2 and 2

[@GameGod77]

@@NargiKyrad I heard the job quest line doesn't make sense anymore now that they no longer have nocturnal sect. Would playing through the job story still make sense even with the re-worked kit?

[@NargiKyrad]

@@GameGod77 honestly, it's been years since i did the AST questline, so i can't tell you if it makes sense or not, but as a gameplay perspective nothing major lost with noct set, just not a wildcard anymore. Also fun fact, from 30 to 34 old astro made no sense, you had diurnal sect but the spells that interacted with it were lv 35 and 45

[@BlaBlaBla-76]

​@@NargiKyradno need? Tell that to the WHMs I always seem to get partnered with.😢

[@NargiKyrad]

@@BlaBlaBla-76 jobs are not balanced around duty finder, they're balanced around 8-man parties, so PF and statics

[@theazuredemon4854]

I hope they give Astrologians 3 charges of Astral/Umbral Draw for MAXIMUM BUFFS!!! I also wish they brought back Diurnal Sect and Nocturnal Sect as their own stances again...

[@ckwi2245]

Biggest fear relieved... The cards actually have unique effects again. By effects for each card, I'm pretty happy with this as you've shown it. I'm sure my opinions will shift a bit after I go hands on myself, but I don't foresee any major complaints from my circle of people. Biggest downside is Cards still occupies 5 Buttons. 1 shy of worst case scenario, while not really being able to choose between Astral and Umbral draws is a bit of a bummer, its better than half a hot bar for just my cards. Honestly, there was a ton of ways playing cards could've come out, and most are worse than just 5 buttons. So won't complain too much on that.

[@marcusaurelius4777]

They aren't unique effects though. It's piss poor dollar store exaltation and a weak ass regen. With the cards all being damage, you had to calculate on the fly who you should give them to: if they were ranged of melee, and who was going to be bursting the most at that time during mechanics, and managing the seals to get at least 2 unique for astrodyne. Like...dude. You literally JUST GIVE THESE TO THE TANK NOW. More single target heals because ASTRO DEFINITELY NEED MORE HEALS. Yep.

[@Sil3ntLynx]

lol the Synastry off in the corner

[@Joshua-xh6bm]

Card changes seem good to me, and probably the best we're going to get. My only complaints are that it still seems as overly busy as it was before. Some people liked that aspect but I did not, we'll see how it plays out.

[@ArtForSwans]

imo, they should have named the new draw skills Nocturnal and Diurnal Draw instead, if only because I still miss Nocturnal and Diurnal Sect 😔

[@marchabel8880]

The whole reason they removed the original (and best imo) card system was because they didn’t want parties waiting on an aoe balance before pulls. Fair enough. But Now they’re incentivizing waiting 60 sec after astral draw to have umbral off cooldown so both dps cards run concurrently as you waste the other 2 cards to pull the ranged dps card within the divination window. The devs do this all the time. Take something away for x reason then implement it down the road again without addressing the elephant in the room. Its confusing at best and infuriating at worst. Example 1: we used to have unique cleanse spells for each healer. Whm had esuna, sch had leeches, ast had I believe it was called exaltation?. They removed and consolidated them into esuna as a role action because “its confusing to players to have multiple abilities/spells for the same function” yet phys ranged now have 3 functionally identical party-wide mits with different names and looks. Example 2: They removed miasma 1 and 2 on sch because “its too complicated for healers to maintain multiple dots” yet now sage gets the equivalent of miasma 2 while scholars get a dot only usable once every two minutes? 🤦. Just go back to the original card system for God’s sakes and tweek it slightly. idk why its so hard for them to admit when they make mistakes it’s okay no one is perfect. And don’t get me started with “healing magick trait” increasing damage on healer dps spells. We have been spamming the same limited number of spells for literal YEARS and you give us a trait that’s simply a potency increase? Why do 2/3 of the work instead of spending the extra little bit of time and at least also upgrade the spell effects so we dont have to be looking at fall malefic/broil 4, etc for another 2 plus years. Its laziness.

[@coreywong6229]

So ast gets changed as much as mnk does every expansion? Well time to relearn ast and get better at it too. Ups and downs, at least I enjoy ast enough to be willing to work through it.

[@Jingo04]

Looking at the balance discord it seems like AST players hate this re-work as it removes the core of what made AST fun for them and play differently from other healers, unsurprisingly people who were put off by the complexities in playing the current card system and didn't play Astro before seem happy that there is a star-themed-WHM in the game now.

[@felixryan9798]

And yet the very same people complain about AST being too RNG-dependent lol. Sure, you lose half of your cards because Draw is a 60s cd now, but honestly they gain so much utility instead. Astrodyne is just a dumb RNG ability and shouldn’t exist in the first place.

[@smallanddumb9530]

As an AST player I love the update. The cards are all unique now instead of being damage increases so you are also busier outside burst windows and you get to play cards more often instead of spamming 3 cards every 2 min and not at all the rest of the time. Astrodyne was dumb since you can't actually "build" towards it. It just kinda happens and you have little control over getting 3 signs (you can increase the odds by redrawing but can never guarantee it). And I don't understand the thing with "AST is the complex healer". Sure. Maybe to an outsider it is. But as someone who has played AST for the entirety of Endwalker, no it isn't complex. All cards do the same thing, you just gotta remember that the tree, cup, and tower are ranged, the rest are not ranged. Then you break your fingers every 2 minutes just to go back to brain dead Malefic spam for the rest of it. With the new system, in a burst window, you still play 2 cards (instead of 3), you have a guaranteed Lord instead of getting spammed by Ladies the entire fight, and then you get to play 4 other cards until the next burst window, so pretty much getting 4 more oGCD effects.

[@RainbowLizardOne]

Not sure why we should listen to people too stupid to play the class.

[@slimydeity7105]

@@smallanddumb9530 don't even gotta remember names with the EW card system, just look at the color. blue for melee and purple for ranged. it's about as complex as a light switch lol

[@cait8480]

i’m just scratching my head at the design choices here. so you’re telling me i preload into an instance with a melee buff stack, and i have to wait SIXTY SECONDS before i can buff the caster dps?? or else make the entire party wait until umbral draw is available so i can buff a maximum of 2 dps at the start of the pull? and div is still on a 2 min cooldown? so either i play my hand and one dps just never gets a card under divination, or i hold onto ALL of my cards to play them under my div window, then draw again and play them so that div captures all my buffs? and people are like “well we get a guaranteed lord now so it’s good actually” ?????

[@IchiroSuzuki97]

Basically we’re back to Stormblood cards. Give or take a few differences

[@FasrielynGaming]

Yeah, i'm going back to it. No more RNG makes me a happy guy.

[@PBToaster]

Oh, wow. With the RNG gone, I might give AST a try. Have been playing WHM as my go-to healer, so let's see

[@cosmosofinfinity]

I think I like this. I just wish Synastry was gone already too. What I would have done differently is the 2 different cards per Play button still having variation, so it'd be a coin flip for each but still similar effects and not too unpredictable/unreliable while still having that random chance flavor. Still want Celestial Opposition to have stun back... Oracle having no AoE damage fall-off is epic.

[@zthur]

i cant wait im happy with this change been play ast since its launch

[@leonwolf4]

Loving this music. Oye!

[@inarikun1348]

This might come across as harsh, but I'm so upset with the card rework. 4 of the 6 cards are heal/damage mitigation effects, so most likely they will need to go to tank, and roughly on cool down, 1 for melee damage and 1 for ranged damage. If healers are currently an accessory role where it's not even necessary to have a healer in normal content, why would 4 of the 6 cards mos likely used on the most overpowered role in the game when AST's kit has plenty of heal and mitigation already? The joy in playing astrologian for me personally was making decisions on the fly. Sometimes it works out, sometimes not the best choice to make. But that was the fun of the job. Choice is what I loved about playing the job. Healing dungeons would make me doze off constantly. At least the RnG was enough to keep me engaged enough to complete the content. After playing two dungeons in early access, I had to walk away. If the cards had a combined stacked perk (like increased potency/duration), I think it would be more interesting than just "throw 4 cards on a tank on CD". There's not variance to the card play now. If I wanted to play a more predetermined job rotation, there are options for that. I hope this gets reworked soon. But at least there the next expansion for the AST rework.

[@MokiMull]

Issues found from at least in this media tour: 1. The top is mana economy. 5% regen per minute without LD is unacceptable. You will run out of mana in 2mins by just spamming malefic, and no free GCD. compare them to the others: WHM 5% per 40s + thin air/min + lily gauge aka 4 free GCD / ~min. SCH: solid 20% regen/min and SGE 21%/min 2. loss potency from Macrocosms since increasing potency to malefic. 3. dps loss in comparison with current AST because modifications of card system. No compensation from spells. 4. Enhancing defensive toolkit is questionable (not only issued in Ast, the other healers as well). 4 more single survival buffs in 2mins, with existing 3 stacks bene, 2 stacks Celestial intersection, exaltation, etc. What is more, they buff tanks in the same defensive toolkit at the same time. Over 60% of game contents you will never be asked to utilize these abilities. 5. mobility is still the worst amongst healers. The potency and value can be oversight and can be modified in the future, however, these obvious shortages already bring me bad impressions in which the dev team lacks attention in testing and evaluation. The reckless rework has been proven that they've never bothered to play AST themselves, and still dare to present it onto the media tour expecting those players to find out the errors, but no paying them to do so. Take note, Ast is one of the few jobs which has the earliest revamp announcement since 6.2（so 10 months period）, yet it turned out to be a foreseeable failure with current design. It is really bringing the player base in a speechless and disappointing situation and turn down the trust to the current developing team. How did you spend your time on this project?

[@marcusaurelius4777]

Casuals love this shit like they love BLM changes. Designing for Casuals is what did this. Casuals can't play the game. They will never parse more than 5th percentile. They don't matter for balancing and design choices because as long as it's fairly smooth, that's all they need, and for it to look pretty. They NEED to design for hardcore players in mind. Get THEIR insight because they INTIMATELY know about how the job feels and how it needs to play. They may not know every detail, but they absolutely understand the job feel better than even the devs themselves.

[@silvergrove8517]

​@@marcusaurelius4777we get it man, you despise casuals, no need to keep spamming it everywhere.

[@sadmiqoxiv]

So from how it looks.. You open with.. Malefic, Damage card, Lord, Dot, Draw, Damage Card, Malefic spam. Then redraw at 1 minute and spend the junk cards, hold damage card for 2min burst window, then basically repeat the opener.... So cards between opener and 2 minutes actually mean nothing and you just need to stop the draw drifting at odd minutes. What would have been cooler, was if you Astral Draw you go into regen stance, but Umbral Draw puts you in shield stance, so you alternate between both stances at every minute. Could have added much more flavour to the gameplay of balancing the Astral and Umbral cycles.

[@miraris5477]

>redraw he doesn't know.

[@sadmiqoxiv]

@@miraris5477 not meaning redraw, I mean astral drawing again

[@amethonys2798]

The one big downside to the changes is how many dps get "left out" on buffs. Before you'd get 3 people during buffs with a card meaning only one person gets left out. Now only one person gets a card which is a huge feels bad moment and makes you feel more like DNC 2.0 rather than someone who buffs the whole (most) party

[@MichaelMakinson]

I miss shield astro.

[@Kamishawe]

I love the direction they're going in getting variety back into Astro. What I don't like, is that the cards are all single target... as if The job needed 7 variants of "tank" mits now when three was already to much and seldom used outside of aggressive dungeon pulls.

[@aritone_n]

HELL YEA. my love for AST since 3.0 and maining it is even more increased! i love this haha

[@bakkagami7234]

Kinda wish the draws were different buttons even if the cd was shared. Would've preferred to choose which draw or even being random over it just always being the same rotation. Just makes it less interesting imo

[@ravynx]

ED may not have been needed in statics but in "normie" content that 3rd charge is definitely welcomed.

[@eeli3]

err where do i get my mana now exactly

[@TheAzarak]

Astro had an absurd amount of mana regen to the point where you never had an issues even after multiple resses. This never should have been the case in the first place.

[@Prism_Heavy]

@@TheAzarak Because they had no mana regen in shb and had to give certain abilities give mana back near mid point. They wanted to make sure they had enough mana regen in ew. I'm afraid we'll be struggling with mana regen like we did back in shb again

[@silvergrove8517]

You get mana everytime your draw, if I heard right. With Astrodyne gone, I guess you have that and Lucid Dreaming, unless I missed something?

[@eeli3]

@@silvergrove8517 yeah 5% mana back every minute 😭even loser whm has better regen now i used to be able to rez like a champ back in my day...

[@silvergrove8517]

@@eeli3 hm, that is fair actually, if that is all the MP generation you get, that is a bit limited. WHM gets some MP from Assize and get free casts with Thin Air. SCH and SGE have Aetherflow and Addersgall respectively, so AST might have gotten the short end of the stick MP-wise. Unless they get MP everytime they play a card as well?

[@karenpojar2514]

All these new skills... And no mana to use them. With the new cards being extra charges of stuff AST already had. I guess I will go join the MNK mains by switching to picto until the inevitable mid expansion bandaid fix.

[@tencatogaming1927]

So are you forced to pull Astral draw to get Lord of crown for damage?

[@DuskSky25]

Yes.

[@felixryan9798]

Which you should every 2 min, because you draw once every min

[@tencatogaming1927]

@@felixryan9798 So the fact that you get more rdps from the dps offsett the loss of the lady vs crown?

[@felixryan9798]

@@tencatogaming1927 It’s more that youre guaranteed to pull a lord for every 2 min windows now. It’s not gonna be a gain over what we have at the moment when you do have the chance to only pull lords in a fight, but you won’t have to deal with only pulling ladies and losing out on dps because your RNG is questionable

[@tencatogaming1927]

@@felixryan9798 I understand the fact that now we can choose to draw the crown for buff window. But… maybe it’s just better to draw crown both of the times? If you don’t do you will lose 400 potency. So what is the point of drawing the cards with the lady?

[@artful_alicat]

I like this a lot actually. I think thematically it fits better for an Astro to be “in control” of the cards being drawn, so to speak, instead of playing like a gambler who can suffer from rng lmao

[@Pikachu-qr4yb]

In my head that’s how I just decided to rewrite my head cannon lol

[@bwpbwp9613]

Do they still have collective too?! Thats a lot of mit for a pure healer

[@Rollenstone]

It's on the hotbar in the video so yes.

[@TheAzarak]

It really seems like they abandoned the pure vs shield healer and instead made 3 healers with all kinds of healing and white Mage with only pure healing lol

[@silvergrove8517]

​@@TheAzarakSCH seems to have a throughput phase that may rival WHM at this point, with Seraphism. Very MP heavy though.

[@Daniel-gx7ou]

but how are we managing mana with this kit?

[@RoyalBLMPotato]

Much prefer this over EW ast, but I prefer SB ast over this. If they can add some card interaction back similar to what we had before along with more time based mechanics I will be happy. RNG is controversial and even though I do like it I can live without it IF I get my interaction back with my cards and more time mechanics to play around.

[@Saieden]

Wait, so we can balance, die, rezmage, and balance again?

[@pain-ter4651]

I'm a little concerned about mana management now... 5% every 60 seconds instead of 30, plus no astrodyne... i liked infinite ast mana lol

[@James-kv3ll]

Feels like there’s more buttons now…. Yay?

[@abuhurairah6268]

Goodbye Draw animation, you're the last card animation since release and I'll miss you. Oh, and Redraw. I can imagine PUG nightmare seeing AST keep eating their cards themselves now

[@Spookie24]

oof the new card system gonna take a while to relearn. rip my play macros T_T

[@Wanderingplayer227]

celestial opposition needs to be better it doesnt make sense for a regen healer to have a basic aoe heal as a 60s CD and does the same thing as aspected Helios for the wait. Thats the kinda thing a barrier healer would get a 60s cooldown -_-

[@HakureiIllusion]

You also get Collective Unconscious, Horoscope, and Earthly Star every minute for AOE healing, Lady of Crowns every 2 minutes guaranteed now, and Macrocosmos every 3 minutes if you need extra. Astrologian is not hurting for AOE healing even if you ignore the GCDs.

[@varmintx0]

I see Synastry is still there.

[@Wanderingplayer227]

they need to remove that lol its so useless after undraw.

[@chickennugget6684]

it's really good if the other healer drops and you need to hyper heal one target, although maybe it loses some use cases with neutral sect and such yes the tooltip should probably give the idea that it doesn't have to be a heal for another player

[@SkiaSymphonia]

My FC mates are still whining about that AST isn't the same as it was in HW over 7 year ago, and they refuse to accept any changes that aren't making it that again. But they also only play DPS jobs. I mainly play WHM or Sage for healing and really didn't like AST in EW. It was so clunky to play on controller. If you're a raider with a set group and macro everything maybe it worked, but it just felt bad. And the dopamine hit of getting rng in your favour wasn't enough to pull it out. These changes seem like a step in the right direction, and I'm excited to try AST again. It seems like it'll feel better to play.

[@queenhecate8975]

We just need Time Dilation back!

[@TheAcademicChilly]

My hotkeys, poor, poor hotkeys 😭

[@9768236]

As an AST main who has mained the job since HW, I like this. Was very skeptical about another rework and thought EW was the best iteration we've seen since HW/SB, but this seems better. Looks more fun to play and the card stuff looks neat and a great callback to HW/SB AST. Hoping for the best!

[@Saieden]

It would be pretty lol if NIN or SAM's 1m burst is just so much better than all the ranged that we just give them the card instead xD

[@RichterfanReborn89]

We sages are eating good this expansion.

[@FhtagnCthulhu]

I had no hope for AST but... ehh, getting the more varied cards back seems interesting! It may be good, but I have been burned by AST reworks too many times.

[@nazotech7590]

It’s like a utility version of the older Eclipse system that Warcraft Druids had where you jumped back and forth between Sun magic and Moon magic

[@RixsEmporium]

Heck yeah this is all really cool! Very excited. I'm a little confused as to why they still call it Neutral Sect considering we don't have Sects anymore but they've always been strangely weird with skill names. Overall it looks much more fun than EW

[@mauricej007]

Looks fun!!!!!!!!

[@Kuroneko_61]

The card changes dont seem that great to me. Its essentially Aether stacks from sch, but you lose all the flexibly with how to use your resources.

[@jbobtorrey]

I'm gonna have so many mouse over macros O_o

[@mannydani9180]

I'm hyped for new Astro. Astro is my regen healer of choice but I started leveling white mage because in current content, with everything happening regarding mechanics AND having to worry about what card I got, where does it go, is it the right seal, etc was overwhelming for me. Not having to deal with that RNG and also getting more varied card effects is gonna bring me back to Astro in full force and I'm so ready for it

[@Wholesome_Fries]

They messed this class UP

[@Xilibrius]

Seems like I'm boned as a controller player since it doesn't look like I can do a play macro for each party member. I can't make 18 macros to cover all 3 types of card and trying to soft target and play cards for me is out of my capabilities so astro will be out of my reach.

[@BlaBlaBla-76]

I play on a controller...just set up your bars well and you will be fine. Only macro I use is for placing earthly star

[@Xilibrius]

@@BlaBlaBla-76 it's not about bar placement. It's about targeting cycling seven people and trying to not lose gcds is the issue I currently use play macros one for each party member that I can weave from the wxhb. Now, since it looks like there is three different play buttons that solution is no longer viable

[@OilFreeFeathers]

@@Xilibrius If you're that concerned about playing like a tryhard then get a keyboard and play the game like a normal person. Every fight in the game is already designed to be beaten by controller players. The cards are just small buffs, and you're overthinking this way too much.

[@Xilibrius]

@OilFreeFeathers that comes off rather hostile for a response about a person's concern. Saying stuff like "get a keyboard like a normal person" and "try hard"makes you come off kind of like a dick. Don't know if that was your aim maybe I'm reading too much into it. I've been playing this game on controller since 2.0 and you're talking about years upon years of muscle memory that you're suggesting is easily fixed by switching over to playing on a keyboard and mouse for one job. When I had a workaround in place that helped me to improve my performance, I don't know man. What did you aim to actually accomplish with this comment? If you want to be antagonistic you succeeded. If you wanted to be helpful, you failed because the manner in which you approach this just shows you're not a people person.

[@guffels]

Astro is the same as WoW Shadow priest. The class will just never be stable

[@cr082080]

Eh White Mage is till better imo.

[@inuclearpickle8628]

I like it will miss the rng tho

[@kitethendis3591]

WHAT DO YOU MEAN I CANT GACHA GAME ANYMORE ON ASTRO

[@solisimperium1203]

wow this astro actually looks great and fun. The cards actually doing unique different things. well not exactly like heavensward astro fun but still a nice change from the abomination that is shadowbringers and endwalker astro.

[@breadmaster-lee]

good riddance to undraw, shit should have been gone 4 years ago lol