Astrologian Job Changes and Updates — Dawntrail 7.0

The Dawntrail expansion includes a highly anticipated rework for some of Astrologian's core job mechanics, as well as several new traits and job actions.

In Dawntrail, Astrologian's card mechanic is almost completely reworked to remove randomness and add utility effects. The consistent nature of the new card system should allow you to reliably plan around having access to these utility effects at specific points in an encounter, while still allowing a high degree of flexibility in when you decide to use them.

• Cards are no longer random. They are separated into two predetermined sets of four cards. Each set includes a damage buff, a defensive buff, a curative buff, and a Lord of Crowns or Lady of Crowns.
  • Astral Draw:
    • The Balance (offensive): 6% damage buff to a melee DPS or tank, or a 3% damage buff to any other role.
    • The Arrow (defensive): 10% buff to all healing received by the target.
    • The Spire (curative): 400 potency shield for 30 seconds.
    • Lord of Crowns: 400p AoE damage within 20y of you.
  • Umbral Draw:
    • The Spear (offensive): 6% damage buff to a ranged DPS or healer, or a 3% damage buff to any other role.
    • The Bole (defensive): 10% mitigation buff.
    • The Ewer (curative): 200p regen, for a total of 1000p over 15 seconds.
    • Lady of Crowns: 400p AoE heal within 20y of you.
  • All buff cards are single-target and last 15 seconds, with the exception of The Spire, which provides a shield for 30 seconds.
  • Once per minute, you may draw one set of four cards. The whole set will be drawn simultaneously, filling your job gauge. You may then play each card as you see fit over the next minute before drawing the next set of cards, alternating between the two sets.
• Draw is replaced by Astral Draw, which always draws The Balance, The Arrow, The Spire, and Lord of Crowns.
  • After using Astral Draw, the action changes to Umbral Draw, so the next draw will provide you with The Spear, The Bole, The Ewer, and Lady of Crowns.
• Astrosigns, Astrodyne, Redraw, and Undraw are removed.
• In place of Play, Astrologian has Play I, Play II, and Play III to selectively play the offensive cards, defensive cards, and restorative cards, respectively. Minor Arcana is still used to play Lord of Crowns and Lady of Crowns.

Other than the card system rework, Astrologian receives a few changes to some of its pre-Dawntrail spells and abilities. These changes are as follows:

Action	Type	Adjustment
Divination	Ability	Duration increased from 15s to 20s. (New) Additional Effect: Grants Divining, allowing the execution of Oracle within 30s.
Fall Malefic	Spell	Potency increased from 250 to 270.
Combust III	Spell	Potency of damage over time increased from 55 to 70.
Essential Dignity	Ability	Maximum charges increased from 2 to 3.
Neutral Sect	Ability	(New) Additional Effect: Grants Suntouched, allowing the execution of Sun Sign within 30s.

Astrologian receives a few new and upgraded spells and abilities along the road to level 100.

• At level 92, Astrologian gets Oracle, which is a follow-up ability that can be used within 30 seconds after activating Divination. It is a targeted oGCD ability that deals damage with a potency of 860 to the target and all enemies within 5y of it, with no AoE falloff.
• At level 96, Aspected Helios upgrades to Helios Conjunction. The only difference compared to Aspected Helios is that the Regen effect is 175 instead of 150, bringing the total healing potency from 1000 to 1150.
• Astrologian's capstone ability at level 100 is Sun Sign, a follow-up ability that can be activated within 30 seconds after activating Neutral Sect. It provides 10% mitigation to you and all party members within 30y, lasting 15 seconds.

As always, Astrologian receives several new traits on the way to level 100, further improving its existing spells and abilities and providing some quality of life bonuses.

Trait	Acquired	Effect
Enhanced Divination	Lv.92	Grants Divining upon execution of Divination, allowing the execution of Oracle. Duration: 30s
Enhanced Swiftcast	Lv.94	Reduces Swiftcast recast time from 60s to 40s.
Magick Mastery	Lv.94	Increases the potency of Combust III's damage over time to 70 and Fall Malefic to 270.
Aspected Helios Mastery	Lv.96	Upgrades Aspected Helios to Helios Conjunction.
Enhanced Essential Dignity II	Lv.98	Allows a third charge of Essential Dignity.
Enhanced Neutral Sect	Lv.100	Grants Suntouched upon executing Neutral Sect, allowing the execution of Sun Sign. Duration: 30s

When loading into a duty or respawning, you start with The Balance, The Arrow, The Spire, and Lord of Crowns already drawn and Umbral Draw ready. This means you can play two damage cards and a Lord of Crowns in the opener without having to manually draw and wait for the cooldown before pulling the boss. It also means that you will be holding The Balance and Lord of Crowns going into every Divination window, and you will always activate Divination, play The Balance, and play Lord of Crowns before using Umbral Draw and playing The Spear in the opener and in every burst window.

The order of the draws means that we must fit Lord of Crowns between Divination and Umbral Draw, which pushes our second damage card to the next GCD. This makes the timing fairly important, as the tail end of our ranged damage card will drift out of raid buffs if it is delayed any more than this.

The final big change in our opener is due to the standardized 20s duration on all raid buffs. Now that the buff window is longer, it is almost always worth it to refresh Combust III as the final GCD under raid buffs, specifically in the opener. This sets us up to naturally refresh our DoT under raid buffs, which quickly makes up for the small damage loss of that single early refresh.

• -12 to -4: place Earthly Star
• -2.1: precast Fall Malefic
  • Grade 1 Gemdraught of Mind
• Combust III
• Fall Malefic
  • Lightspeed
• Fall Malefic
  • Divination
  • The Balance
• Fall Malefic
  • Lord of Crowns
  • Umbral Draw
• Fall Malefic
  • The Spear
  • Oracle
• Fall Malefic x5
  • You may cast an extra Fall Malefic here if your GCD is very fast, around 2.30
• Refresh Combust III a few seconds before it expires, right before Divination and other raid buffs expire