Are rotations hard in FFXIV?

[Katchii]

http://wikidiff.com/constant/frequent
http://wikidiff.com/constantly/frequently
the words describe 2 different levels of occurances. So wth are you trying to tell me here?



So adjusting the UI only works if you it fits your part of the story, but you forget how to do it if it doesn't?



Yes, because everything else would be a lie, do you see pros disabling the HUD or UI? No you don't - for a reason.



Eh..... no?




When did I ever specifically say that every part and every mechanic ever done in every single scenario is done differently because of the GCD?
Just because you pick a specific situation where it doesn't end up being different (tbh, I'm not even bothering to find a difference in your example because there is absolutely no point) doesn't mean that all the other situations where it does, become void.#

On top of that, the bolded part has nothing to do with what is being said. So yeah, I try to do the most damage, whether it's with a 0,5s GCD or a 50s GCD - that's my role - that doesn't mean I'd handle boss mechanics the same way in both scenarios.
Just because I decide to "avoid damage!" or "increase my damage!" in both cases, doesn't mean it's the same thing.
That's just blatantly ridiculous.




Exactly my point? The thing is - if you change the GCD to 5 seconds, it's much easier to not have an impact anyone else's gameplay.
This means you, especially as a group will use different strategies to deal with different mechanics. Whether it's making room for melees, or ignoring it because their is simply no point.

Etc. etc.

This whole argument should've been over after you explained that you didn't mean what you say literally but I really dislike the way you "shape" the truth to your advantage for absolutely no reason. Acting dumb as shit on purpose by pretending to not know the difference between frequent and constant for example.

For this part of the argument that's bolded, no one has said they don't look at their hotbar. Everyone needs to look at their hotbar/ procs to perform well. Good players have to look at it less, but still have to look at it. Additionally, where you place it on your HUD has an impact on how much time you spend looking at it; if it's far from the center of your screen it takes more time, if it's closer to the center of your screen it takes less time. So combining this information, if you have a "bad" player who has to look at their hotbars often who also places it at the bottom of their screen...their performance will be sub par and they're likely to fail mechanics because they spend so much time looking at their bar so their focus is split between mechanics and performance. A good/ high performing player will place their bars closer to the center of the screen, but won't have to look at it often so their focus isn't split between mechanics and performance as they are able to do both but they still need to see their hot bar so they're aware of procs and other things.

The whole constant vs frequent argument is semantics. You know what someone means when they say they had to deal with constant interruptions at work, or saying they eat constantly...you understand the message they're trying to convey. Don't be obtuse.

TL;DR - You don't have to take your eyes of the action and away from the mechanics in order to look at your hot bar.

[Wrecktangle]

http://wikidiff.com/constant/frequent
http://wikidiff.com/constantly/frequently
the words describe 2 different levels of occurances. So wth are you trying to tell me here?

That they are synonyms, thus similar (note: similar =/= same, which you've acknowledged). The original point of my response was that the person I responded to had stated the slower GCD had given them more time to look at stuff, stuff that I said does not need to be looked at for any significant length of time or frequency, thus the length of the GCD as being relatively irrelevant in the specific context of the discussion. I stand by that statement.

You then proceeded to tell me that I was wrong and that if I was not FREQUENTLY looking at my hotbars that I'd be making more mistakes, especially in a messy raid environment (which is where you should be focusing on telegraphs, teammates positions, and cast bars, etc. NOT hotbars). I stand by this as well.

The other piece was me saying that a faster/slower GCD doesn't impact how you handle mechanics. It's my fault I wasn't specific enough that's true, but my second post clarified it pretty well I thought (I should have specified encounter mechanics in the first response).

I listed examples of SusanoEX and how you still have to do the encounter mechanics the same way regardless of GCD length. If the GCD was 1.5s you wouldn't drop the lightning on the same side. You wouldn't ignore the sword or get the balls in a different order or fashion. You wouldn't ignore the jail, etc. It could however change how you manage your uptime though, to which I can concede that individual job mechanics would change based on GCD changes. I still stand by the notion that the encounter mechanics don't change, but in retrospect that's a fairly obvious assumption; one I'd normally ignore as a discussion point, so that's my bad for going further down that path than we needed too.

[Deleted]

@Katchii
Not sure if your comment is actually adressed at me, or if you quoted me for reference.

I'm not the one who acts as if "looking at your hotbar frequently" means not looking at anything BUT your hotbars.
I'm also not the dude who says or am saying that he/I can't look at the action and the hotbar at the same time.

Wrecktangle said "if you are looking at your hotbar you are playing sub-optimal", which is BS, because everyone looks at the hotbars.
All of a sudden, glancing doesn't mean looking anymore and frequently means focusing and is permament.

I still stand by the notion that the encounter mechanics don't change, but in retrospect that's a fairly obvious assumption; one I'd normally ignore as a discussion point, so that's my bad for going further down that path than we needed too.

Which is why I don't know why you even tried to defend your statment.

Not looking at your hotbar means disabling the UI, on top of that, why is/was it even important to note that he plays sub-optimally if he focuses (more than others or good players) on it?
It doesn't make his statment any less true.
It was , frankly speaking, a garbage comment from start to finish.

I mean, lets not pretend we've never been kicked off the cliff or have been doing mechanics flawlessly ever since we started playing FF14.
People fall of the edge in O4 because they didn't notice the boss casting that ability. They don't notice because they focus on something else. Rotation - Cooldowns - Buff uptime - debuff uptime - proccs
A slower GCD allows us to have more time to adjust and things become overall easier because of that.


"okay, uhm, I had an odd situation now and lost quite a bit of uptime - lets see which buff is going down first"
*uses Hakaze*
"Oh Jinpu is lower and will soon expire...let's see 10s, I have 1 Sen, shit it's the left Sen - ah but Hagakure is off CD, so I can use Yukikaze - transfer Sen into Kenki and proceed with the Jinpu Combo"
*uses Yukikaze*
"oh but I'm at 70 kenki because I wanted to wait for the next group buff before I use all my shintens, okay, I need to get down to roughly 40 kenki to be on the safe side"
*uses shinten + hakaze + hagakure*
*boss does a cast that has no visual clue other than the castbar+name and wipe you instantly*
FFFFFFFFFFF

Every Raid fail ever.

[Kazgrel]

Only time I ever actively look at my hotbars is to check the cooldown for something that's over 1 min. More often than not, I can see and discern about 95% of what's on my hotbar simply by having it in my peripheral vision.

[Katchii]

@Katchii
Not sure if your comment is actually adressed at me, or if you quoted me for reference.

I'm not the one who acts as if "looking at your hotbar frequently" means not looking at anything BUT your hotbars.
I'm also not the dude who says or am saying that he/I can't look at the action and the hotbar at the same time.

Wrecktangle said "if you are looking at your hotbar you are playing sub-optimal", which is BS, because everyone looks at the hotbars.
All of a sudden, glancing doesn't mean looking anymore and frequently means focusing and is permament.

We're saying that someone who focuses on hotbars at the expense of paying attention to mechanics is suboptimal; meaning they have to look (and we mean LOOK, not glance) so often they can't react to mechanics effectively. We're on the same page here. It just seems like you're refusing to believe or acknowledge that such people exist and that the way you play, which based on your stance and your performance claims is efficient and effective and allows you to look at both at the same time, is the only way anyone can ever play.

Can we at least acknowledge that a good balance between paying attention to your hot bar and paying attention to the mechanics is something not all people have?

[Sorrior]

Fuck that. I was considering trying FFXIV on my PS4 but if that's the shit I need to do then frankly I can't be arsed.

Unless of course I can play the game 99% solo like you can in WoW, i.e. questing, soloing low level content, all the little side stuff etc?

Actuallly game has ALOT to do outside of hardcore raiding where such openers are required so give it a try.

But yes you can bar dungeons and primals which nobody woth any sense expects savage raider type dps in.

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Cross hotbar system.

Allows 2 separate hotbars of 8 buttons. One controlled by L2 the other R2. And you can another 16 buttons that can be accessed by double tapping the L2 or R2 button. The buttons used on each 8 bar is up down, left, right, square, cross, circle and triangle.



Not an optimal setup at all. Just an example of how it works. Those top bars are the double tap ones.

The big 16 you just hold L2/R2 down for the left and right one respectively. I've found the best thing to do is put on the W Cross Hotbar is buffs and main spells on the standard one.

You also can customize which bars you swap between meaning no accidental bar hopping. Then you can add another to the whole hold l2 theb r2 route.

Effectively meaning you can have 4 full bars within reach in a second or so. Not that you need that many. Since the revamp I have plenty of space left over

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Thank you for showing us that. I want to play FF14... but me and a friend are seriously stumped at how to comfortably control that many buttons on a keyboard. I just don't think I can. I've been considering trying it with a controller, and that screenshot helps demonstrate just how reasonable / easier it would be.

I say try it the free trial is unlimited time till 35 so given how many classes you can be on one character that is alot of gameplay.

Also be sure to check out customization options for it makes it ALOT easier.

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I've never figured out how you don't fat finger those tiny buttons on the sides of those and screw up a rotation. I always thought I'd be Bunny-ninjutsuing all the time with one of those.

The old steelseries wow controller was GREAT (i mean original one) never been able to find it's equal for me. Was the right size for my hand buttons were spread out in a sensible way abd was goddamn durable..I miss it

[Vargarii]

A priority system is something completely different though,

you are always casting Shifu Yukikazu and Jinpu in the same order, even if you use Iaijutsu and Hagakure because they have buffs attached to them which you need to maintain
At worst you don't care about which Sen builder you cast first (Meikyo Shisui).

This is just not true. The 3 openers alone have one that doesn't use the same order, and when you're in combat, reacting to mechanics, your priorities can change based on higanbana falling off soon and the relative time on the other three buffs/debuffs. Also if you're using hagakure as much as possible all the time you will need to prioritize between saving for kaiten, spending it on guren(although long cd) or shinten, and proper third eye usage to get in the cheaper seigen.

If you are always casting them in the same order, you're going to be letting things drop or make other play errors in the course of the fight. While it may not be a strict priority system a la WoW, there is indeed priority work even in the main combo.

[Deleted]

This is just not true. The 3 openers alone have one that doesn't use the same order, and when you're in combat, reacting to mechanics, your priorities can change based on higanbana falling off soon and the relative time on the other three buffs/debuffs. Also if you're using hagakure as much as possible all the time you will need to prioritize between saving for kaiten, spending it on guren(although long cd) or shinten, and proper third eye usage to get in the cheaper seigen.

If you are always casting them in the same order, you're going to be letting things drop or make other play errors in the course of the fight. While it may not be a strict priority system a la WoW, there is indeed priority work even in the main combo.

It's true, go to a dummy and tell me that you aren't doing a rotation there.
If debuffs/buffs fall off, you start from step 1 in the rotation.

And the debuff you applied first is going to be the debuff that falls off first anyway. In fact, you will not make a mistake if you always apply them in the same order - even if the boss is untargetable for some time

It's far from a proper priority system. Your Iaijutsu/Hagakure usage is where decisions are being made, but that doesn't matter - by it's core, it's still a rotation and not a priority system. Funnily enough, you end up using Hagakure to not lose/waste Sen when you do your rotation more often than not.

Basically, this is how it goes:
Priority system = you use your checklist on every GCD.
Rotations = you do not do that.

Sure thing, there are decisions to be made, but as long as I know what my next 6-20 GCDs (and even oGCDs) are going to be, I can hardly call this a priority system.

And all the openers are strict rotations btw unless you have RNG-procs. Even in WoW.

[Queen of Hamsters]

To be fair, if you're looking at your hotbars in either game you are 100% playing sub-optimally. Having a slower or faster GCD is a preference for sure, but it has no impact on how you should handle mechanics whatsoever.

Amen.

The best players handle WoW's GCD, Mythic mechanics and their CD's without looking at their bars to get clues about when stuff's about to pop. Not sure how weakauras function in FFXIV though... Do they even allow addons?

[Vargarii]

Doing that gives the base, and hardly counts for the playstyle as a whole, especially not in encounters. Of course if you are standing completely still on a dummy you won't have to change anything. However in actual fights it doesn't go that way. Say in O2s, most of the time, I can time higanbana cast to go right at the dot falling off(usually at least twice on any given run), sometimes though, because of mechanics and movement, I've got 8 seconds on higanbana and need to refresh before mechanics. My choices of how to accomplish that change based on how many sen I currently have, and what my other buff timers are.

I said in when reacting to mechanics it wouldn't be the same. How is a dummy test doing that? I also said it wasn't the wow style or as you called "proper" priority, but there are plenty of priorities. You have 3 openers for a reason to use based on group comp and fight mechanics. If you always just use the one sen opener and don't ever change the order you activate your sen, you're playing poorly.

However, I will say this. You can play poorly on sam and still accomplish most content, even savage right now.

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Amen.

The best players handle WoW's GCD, Mythic mechanics and their CD's without looking at their bars to get clues about when stuff's about to pop.

Actually they typically have timers and mods to help with cds and stuff, you don't get that in FF14 because they don't allow mods.

/edit that doesn't mean I think you should be staring at your bars, I have all my stuff set up where I can see my timers and my class ui while paying attention to where I'm standing and the boss cast bar.

[Echocho]

Amen.

The best players handle WoW's GCD, Mythic mechanics and their CD's without looking at their bars to get clues about when stuff's about to pop. Not sure how weakauras function in FFXIV though... Do they even allow addons?

FFXIV doesn't have addons. In WoW you have boss mods and weak auras flare up so you don't have to look at your hotbars. WoW combat also usually consists of "Do X until Y happens then do Z and go back to X" with about 5 abilities to worry about so you don't actually have to focus as much on the buttons. In FFXIV is usually "Do X then Y then Z then A then B then C" with about 15 abilities to worry about so you need to pay attention to your hotbars.

[Eleccybubb]

FFXIV doesn't have addons. In WoW you have boss mods and weak auras flare up so you don't have to look at your hotbars. WoW combat also usually consists of "Do X until Y happens then do Z and go back to X" with about 5 abilities to worry about so you don't actually have to focus as much on the buttons. In FFXIV is usually "Do X then Y then Z then A then B then C" with about 15 abilities to worry about so you need to pay attention to your hotbars.

And if you are paying attention to your hotbars more than focusing on the fight in 14 you are doing it wrong. You should be memorising combos by 70. As for full rotations there are plenty of guides and yes it does take some time to get used to. But once you have the rotations and combos memorised you should have no need to be staring at the bars.

[Vargarii]

And if you are paying attention to your hotbars more than focusing on the fight in 14 you are doing it wrong. You should be memorising combos by 70. As for full rotations there are plenty of guides and yes it does take some time to get used to. But once you have the rotations and combos memorised you should have no need to be staring at the bars.

I'm assuming people look more to check cds, but that really only takes a glance.

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They could also just set up ACT timers if they wanted.

[Cosmic Janitor]

Imho most rotations are just clunky. I have spend considerable amounts of time with BLM, RDM, SAM and DRK and all the melee have a lot of combos which strike me as utterly pointless, it's just a lot of buttons for the sake of having alot of buttons, especially in the cases where you NEVER want to press them in anotehr order than the chain suggests. For SAM you gain absolutely nothing by fucking a combo, for DRK you just get the option to charge your next move, which essentially just makes the combo chain longer, since you want to do that all the time anyway. Thankfully the control scheme I've been using for over a decade now works out well here, still, alot of the moves could just be a second stage button change instead of being another move entirely.

Casters are a bit more interesting here, though RDM would benefit from more tracking feedback (showing your instant cast on all buttons rather than on the other side of the screen) and BLM is just .. I don't know. It seems to me that the game wants me to play with all the procs, but in reality playing with the procs just ends up worse at the bottom line. Also my ass does that one spell have 40% chance to proc.. maybe 25.

Most cooldowns also don't feel particularily good when it comes to the classes I've played. The effects tend to be miniscule and everything that triggers the abhorrent 2 sec GCD makes want to lit a sultana on fire. That cooldown is the worst for tanking as well. No wonder there is an even bigger lack of tanks here than in WoW, tanking just feels unresponsive.

That being said, I'm enjoying the game immensely, mostly for the change of pace and discoering new stuff. Some parts of the story are also nice .
But fuck enemies that break the telegraph scheme and have you guess by the name of the cast how horrible their next attack is gonna be.

Edit: One thing I forgot, random dungeons are often a total pain in the ass when it comes to rotations. Just when you got comfortable with your new one, you get to participate in a level 23 dungeon and suddenly all your rotations have gone to shit since none of the synergies exist or the mechanics that made them work have been taken away. Man that annoys the hell out of me, that and my tank stance resetting. That shit gets me every single time.

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I'm assuming people look more to check cds, but that really only takes a glance.

You can't really commit procs to muscle memory, the best example here is RDM. You are constantly checking your hot bar and the resource display because you need to weave the proces in the right way to do decent dps (besides aoe-ing :P).

[Vargarii]

This is true, but RDM is pretty extreme in that matter. Other classes have fewer procs and there are ways to keep an eye out. You can be checking without staring, as well. When I'm watching my procs it's purely peripheral, only checking a dot timer under my boss bar or cd on an ability requires me to actually glance at it.

[Deleted]

You have 3 openers for a reason to use based on group comp and fight mechanics. If you always just use the one sen opener and don't ever change the order you activate your sen, you're playing poorly.

However, I will say this. You can play poorly on sam and still accomplish most content, even savage right now.

The openers have nothing to do with a priorities..
They are literally the definition of rotations....

You don't use X or Y whenever it's available in your opener. You wait until you are at a very specific point before you use it.

Also, which boss right now isn't up 80s before some intermission phase? The difference is also not high enough to say that someone plays poorly even if he does the same opener all the time.

[Vargarii]

The openers have nothing to do with a priorities..
They are literally the definition of rotations....

You don't use X or Y whenever it's available in your opener. You wait until you are at a very specific point before you use it.

Also, which boss right now isn't up 80s before some intermission phase? The difference is also not high enough to say that someone plays poorly even if he does the same opener all the time.

Which I said. I'd be more than happy if they did something about that, but it isn't likely.

Also, knowing and choosing the openers is the priority. I've at no point denied that it was different, but it's not a vanilla rotation anywhere but a dummy.

[IdonotplayWoW]

The rotations are much like WoW rotations, but they're definitely not hard, it's all down to muscle memory, if you're able to keep a 10-20 button rotation in WoW, then you can keep a 9 button opener + your own personal rotation without any kind of problem. It's a relaxed game so while there are parts of the game that feel hard, they're not as "MASH EVERYTHING" like WoW.

[xenogear3]

Cannot be too hard because it is designed with a controller.

[Sorrior]

Cannot be too hard because it is designed with a controller.

Lol with probably 2-3 times the current amount of skills wow has