[Megathread] Final Fantasy XIV

[Wrecktangle]

Socal, not sure where the server is located. BnS buddy showed latency at 100ms~, though window's resource manager showed anywhere from 50-400ms. I'm not really sure which is more accurate. Majority of the time I'd say 100ms for interacting with NPCs and all that stuff, but combat it just doesn't feel like it.
BnS Buddy only helped the stutter up to a certain extent. I had to OC my CPU (5820k) from the clock stock (fine for most everything) to 4.5GHz to get something less stuttery.

They were in Dallas TX IIRC. I'm surprised it was 100 there. My BNSBuddy & RM usually matched (with one or two instances of BNS.exe being a little bit higher like 70-100. If they didn't match for you, I'm not sure which is correct haha.

I was luckier than most in that my processor had extremely strong single core power and it was OC'd a fair bit. I was actually glad it basically didn't need my GFX card because that was the weak link in my build lol.

Anyways - good game, RIP BNS - had you been managed properly you could have not been awful. I'll probably dabble in it when the UE4 engine drops for it, to see if it's gotten better. i still have like 4.5k gold saved up since I never spent it on anything.

I'll admit, using those big moves at the end feels good. Building up to it for 1-2 minutes does not, especially when you end up wasting it because the boss goes immune or the trash pack dies before it can be used. I REALLY fucking hate that, it feels terrible. I end up just saving it for the bosses most of the time or severely gimping my output on the remainder of the current pack only to use it on the next trash pack, reducing my overall output just so I don't waste it. And on bosses....they need smoother and faster transitions so every fucking class doesn't lose their buff and have to start from scratch to begin ramping up their damage when the boss changes. It's old and frustrating as hell.

Build/spend just can't be 1-2 mins (like DRG/SMN). That's not good design. It hamstrings you. Ideally it should be faster, but not too fast (like WoW Ret) otherwise it dilutes the satisfaction.

At the time however, I mostly played Paladin. The Paladins Ret spec was based almost around it's short cooldowns, where it was entirely possible that you'd have two abilities coming off cooldown at the same time and have to decide which one to use next. You could decide to use them in an order to prevent more future cooldown clashes from occouring that would give you stable DPS over a longer period, or you could decide to use them in the order that would give you the most immediate DPS. There are situations where each of them was the best choice and you had to weigh up the opportunity costs appropriately.

I was a top 20 Ret back in WotLK. I had numerous top 10 world parses. I consistently did ~15-20% more DPS than other rets with identical gear. People always used to bash FCFS as mindless (and sure it was if you actually just mashed), but if you followed the example you set above, it led to better results. It was actually very nuanced.

I'm not suggesting that FF14 should just copy WoW - Many MMO's have tried and failed to do that already. I'm suggesting that by condensing their vast number of skills down to the essentials and by loosening up their combat mechanics to allow players to make more decisions on the fly in combat they can turn what is already a good game into one that's absolutely fantastic. They're in a position now where they can afford to take a couple of creative risks, they've played it too safe for too long and it's getting stale.

Agreed wholeheartedly on this.

Thing is... A situation like this can't occour in FF14. All melee classes use the same resource, TP, for their attacks. You wouldn't get a skill that offers an opportunity unique to your Job, just one that's stripped down to it's function - Dealing AoE damage. It's much more aparent that you've got a reskin of the same ability when it does the exact same thing. There are no real unique class mechanics for abilities to play into outside of gimicky things like Mudras. It's not even as if managing your TP is something you need to be aware of most of the time.

I said this a year ago. TP is archaic at this point. It should be removed, combat rebalanced/tuned around its removal. Adjust melee/tank AOE DPS as necessary.

Pretty sure my group would prefer me to go AST for the card buffs instead of WHM. They're just too afraid to ask.

Let me tell you from first hand experience.

Yes. They are. Except I told him every single raid. Multiple times. The extra 200-400 DPS helped my logs

Good insight on the Spriest stuff.

[MrTharne]

That fucking roast from Y'shtola. x)

[Faroth]

I can only speak for Ret. If you mash things on cooldown you will run into exorbitant downtime, which influences effectiveness of certain talents, thus reducing your performance (or increasing it by picking something slightly weaker, but easier to manage).

Ret has a pretty deep flow under the surface, but if you mindlessly mash you'll still be decent thanks to a high floor, but again, you can be decent in any game by simply pushing buttons as frequently as you should.

There are tons of little optimizations among the talents that directly impact how valuable they are to you. Remember that sims assume very high mechanical accuracy, which encounter design, unfamiliarity, and general skill divides can go against the grain, in a positive net fashion. I've seen it countless times.

That and Ret has incredibly robust utility this expansion. I'm more pleased with my utility than my rotation. I really think Ret could use an extra button or two and that's someone who uses talents that give extra buttons already.

Like I said, I didn't get too far and it was in Legion for Paladin & Warrior. I made that mention as an acknowledgement of new talents/abilities leveling in Legion and rework in BfA may have altered the experience from what I got to do. But the "primarily spam a main ability for procs and another for resource generation" is a complaint I saw pop up now and then for a few different classes. Maybe they're better in BfA. Honestly from what I've played, I have no motivation to play alts this expansion. If I were maining WoW as my primary MMO, I'd just want to level all the classes up through Legion for class order hall stories and their unique rewards and leave a single main for current stuff.

I'm not really up to speed on WoW's current class design, the last I played was at the end of WotLK going into Cata.

Ah, gotcha. That was probably my favorite period of WoW both in design, progression, flavor, story. All of it. But yeah, class design and feel of play was pretty great then. I can see more on the spot decision making back then. I mained Prot Paladin for our ICC raid and Survival Hunter outside of that at the time and both felt pretty good, even with hunter having a proc as a main damage boost with explosive shot it never felt like I was *just* waiting for it.

[Granyala]

Let me tell you from first hand experience.

Yes. They are. Except I told him every single raid. Multiple times. The extra 200-400 DPS helped my logs

Good insight on the Spriest stuff.

*chuckles*
Well personal DPS isn't much of a concert for me, because I am paired with a damage greedy SCH/AST player who quite likes the fact that I do the healing and she gets to lolDPS.

Suits me just fine, 3 button DPS bores me to tears, I much rather heal. Played RaidDPS for 8.5 years so I'm burned out of the role somewhat.
That being said: I really don't want to deal with cards on top of healing/doing boss mechanics.

[Katchii]

Build/spend just can't be 1-2 mins (like DRG/SMN). That's not good design. It hamstrings you. Ideally it should be faster, but not too fast (like WoW Ret) otherwise it dilutes the satisfaction.

Agreed, the process needs to be long enough to feel rewarding and impactful, but not so long that it feels like a chore doing it. Everything in this game , in regards to combat, just feels like it takes longer than necessary to execute. Going back to the encounter design though, this wouldn't be SO bad if the encounters were designbed differentl. Taking 30+ seconds to ramp up into anything wouldn't be so bad if the buff lasted more than 10 seconds and bosses didn't go immune for 10+ seconds at a time at almost the exact same time most classes are just getting into their sweet spot. The two systems are just at odds with each other. The fact that the game has a design that allows for all of that effort to simply be wasted, with practically zero way to plan for it (you know it's coming just not exactly when and there's little to no warning a lot of the time) is horrible design. There are several ways to address this; reduce class build up time, reduce boss transition times, add a way for classes to extend the buff without having to target an enemy (maybe a cooldown), add a pre-transition window so there's a warning or indication of when NOT to blow your build up, allow the boss to remain targetable during these transitions, etc...

'm no expert on class design, but I can say that one of the reasons I don't play my favored class more often (Summoner) is because of how dependent they are on their 2+ minute build up into using Demi-Bahamut and how easily that can be wasted on many boss encounters. It's also why I'll never main Black Mage, because of how stupidly challenging it is to juggle the different buffs while executing encounter mechanics in order to stay in Enochian long enough to cast Foul, but at least they have a way to keep Enochian up so long as their paying attention. It really does feel absolutely awful. So I've switch mainly to Red Mage, which I am enjoying a lot, but it's not what I'd prefer to play.

I was a top 20 Ret back in WotLK. I had numerous top 10 world parses. I consistently did ~15-20% more DPS than other rets with identical gear. People always used to bash FCFS as mindless (and sure it was if you actually just mashed), but if you followed the example you set above, it led to better results. It was actually very nuanced.

This is the kind of game play I envision would emerge from making all moves able to combo from each other rather than the current straight forward combo sequences. I like the word "nuance" here because it underlines a more strategic decision making process rather than a simple or single choice. Even if in those situations where there truly is only one right choice to be the most optimal, having a process to work through means there's more than just "right" or "wrong" choices, there's a spectrum and it gives a whole different feel and sense of satisfaction when it all comes together.

I said this a year ago. TP is archaic at this point. It should be removed, combat rebalanced/tuned around its removal. Adjust melee/tank AOE DPS as necessary.

Agreed 100%.

Let me tell you from first hand experience.

Yes. They are. Except I told him every single raid. Multiple times. The extra 200-400 DPS helped my logs ;

)

WHM is more straight forward, in my experience, which lets you focus more on the fight and what's going on since there's no additional mechanic for you to manage besides your healing really (their Stormblood mechanic is stupid IMO as there's no real planning or anticipation for it).

AST on the other hand feels almost identical to WHM as far as the core healing and damage spells go if you're in Nocturnal sect, but has the added card mechanic to deal with that just adds an extra layer of depth that has a pretty noticeable impact on group performance. I personally just like the aesthetic/ theme and spell visuals of AST over WHM.

[Granyala]

Yeah ASL LB is the prettiest by far.
Tickling the whole raid with feathers is cool also.

[Wrecktangle]

Do you guys remember that post I made a while back about the PLD who did nothing but shield lob?

Well he's back with a new post, and unfortunately he never took me on my offer to teach him how to PLD. It's worth a solid read if you have some popcorn handy.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...is-with-people

Like I said, I didn't get too far and it was in Legion for Paladin & Warrior. I made that mention as an acknowledgement of new talents/abilities leveling in Legion and rework in BfA may have altered the experience from what I got to do. But the "primarily spam a main ability for procs and another for resource generation" is a complaint I saw pop up now and then for a few different classes. Maybe they're better in BfA. Honestly from what I've played, I have no motivation to play alts this expansion. If I were maining WoW as my primary MMO, I'd just want to level all the classes up through Legion for class order hall stories and their unique rewards and leave a single main for current stuff.

Oh I'm an idiot. I must have mixed this post up with another. I thought it said you were like 113 or 114 (so BFA). Disregard!

'm no expert on class design, but I can say that one of the reasons I don't play my favored class more often (Summoner) is because of how dependent they are on their 2+ minute build up into using Demi-Bahamut and how easily that can be wasted on many boss encounters. It's also why I'll never main Black Mage, because of how stupidly challenging it is to juggle the different buffs while executing encounter mechanics in order to stay in Enochian long enough to cast Foul, but at least they have a way to keep Enochian up so long as their paying attention. It really does feel absolutely awful. So I've switch mainly to Red Mage, which I am enjoying a lot, but it's not what I'd prefer to play.

I always thought the idea of a BLM being a burst caster with the ability to store instant casts as a mechanic to offset bad swings would be cool. You'd always want to have 1-2 on hand, but never want to be capped kinda thing. I don't think BLM needs the AF swing, Enochian Timer, Umbral Hearts, and Foul to be a compelling/fun job. It is a little overbearing IMO. I'm not entirely sure how I'd rework it tbh as I don't have a ton of experience on it.

Regarding SMN I really don't like the spellset. It just doesn't feel like what a SMN to me would cast. I don't have enough experience to give any concrete rework thoughts on it though.

[lawow74]

Do you guys remember that post I made a while back about the PLD who did nothing but shield lob?

Well he's back with a new post, and unfortunately he never took me on my offer to teach him how to PLD. It's worth a solid read if you have some popcorn handy.

Hahaha. 'I don't need any teaching, I have over 250 coms' oh, teh lulz. Also, I love that his tanking was likened to that of 'a vodka-soaked bumblebee'.

I always thought the idea of a BLM being a burst caster with the ability to store instant casts as a mechanic to offset bad swings would be cool. You'd always want to have 1-2 on hand, but never want to be capped kinda thing. I don't think BLM needs the AF swing, Enochian Timer, Umbral Hearts, and Foul to be a compelling/fun job. It is a little overbearing IMO. I'm not entirely sure how I'd rework it tbh as I don't have a ton of experience on it.

I would probably streamline it down to being closer to how it is in PvP as to maintaining Fire/Ice crap and getting your Foul charged up. Keep the mobility CD's like Triplecast as well to help QoL. I reiterate, you shouldn't have to feel like a concert pianist to try and play your job.

Oh, unrelated sidenote: tested myself on a training dummy the other day and at ilvl 370 on BRD (I have the 390 chest and a 360 ring deviating from other pieces all being 370) I did 5k DPS. I don't think that's bad for having 1s of ping.

[Kazgrel]

I’ve seen and commented in the thread @Wrecktangle referred to on OF. I’ve chalked up that OP to being a troll at this point. Fool me once, shame on you, and so on.

Course, instead of being introspective and going “what am I dong wrong?”, they simply blame everyone else for being elitist...lel.

[lawow74]

Something I just thought of. What if tanks had an ability that, when used, caused all party members' damage to act as an AoE? IMO something like that would be a lot better sort of role action than your taunts. A choice between that and a 'do more damage to this one target' ability, you can use one or the other but not both at once. Might be nice in full-party sitches too, where one tank is holding the boss and keeping damage boosted on it, the other is grabbing adds with the AoE, then as their buffs run out they swap places to keep it going as needed.

[StrawberryZebra]

Pretty sure my group would prefer me to go AST for the card buffs instead of WHM. They're just too afraid to ask.

Perhaps. That's more an issue with the AST though. It's got unique tools unavailable to the other healers that make it slightly more desirable. Rather than remove those, I'd prefer giving SCH and WHM some of their own unique tools to help specialise them more. Ideally, you'd want the WHM to bring things that are also desirable (Read: Raid cooldown Protect!), and the SCH to also bring their own goodies.

In a perfect world, they'd all be equally desirable for their own reasons outside of their healing prowess.

This is the kind of game play I envision would emerge from making all moves able to combo from each other rather than the current straight forward combo sequences. I like the word "nuance" here because it underlines a more strategic decision making process rather than a simple or single choice. Even if in those situations where there truly is only one right choice to be the most optimal, having a process to work through means there's more than just "right" or "wrong" choices, there's a spectrum and it gives a whole different feel and sense of satisfaction when it all comes together.

I suppose the big takeaway phrase from all of this would be Opportunity Cost. Where understanding the ebb and flow of a bossfight and the underlying games mechanics leads you towards understanding which of your options are best for a given situation.

FF14 just doesn't have anything thats comparable.

I said this a year ago. TP is archaic at this point. It should be removed, combat rebalanced/tuned around its removal. Adjust melee/tank AOE DPS as necessary.

As a mechanic, I don't think theres anything fundamentally broken with it. It just doesn't function as a resource because you can't run out of it without trying. It needs a clearly defined purpose for each Job that uses it as a primary resource. Flat out removing it and giving each job their own thematically appropriate resource to work with is an option too, and probably the better choice, but I don't think TP is beyond salvaging provided Squenix are willing to put the work in. They need to think about how it ties in with the Jobs identity, and make sure it's TP mechanics reflect it for that Job.

MP is in the same boat too, situations where you've got to play carefully with it are few and far between. The idea itself is fine, but having it function as a Job resource is only really applicable for BLM.

Regarding SMN I really don't like the spellset. It just doesn't feel like what a SMN to me would cast. I don't have enough experience to give any concrete rework thoughts on it though.

SMN is a victim of a lack of clear Job design. The current itteration is torn between being a Pet class, a DoT class and a burst damage nuker, without really focusing on doing one of them well exclusively. Sharing it's base class with SCH only adds to the complications.

If I had to choose one, I'd push it towards being a Pet class and look at adding skills that play more into that fantasy. Right now, you get to use the Primals signature attack every 3 minutes and that's the only pet command you can put on your hotbar. I'd expand on that by making issuing pet commands an integral part of the Job. Go all in on the experience of having Ifrit and Bahamut at your beck and call. That's what I'd expect from a Summoner Job.

The other upshot of this is it would open the door to having a DoT Mage job further down the line.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...is-with-people

That's depressing. And hillarious. Very surprised by his UI though, I figured Shield Lob would be on 1 rather than all the way over on 6. Then again, Rage of Halone is on there twice, and cross class skills are absent entirely.

Course, instead of being introspective and going “what am I dong wrong?”, they simply blame everyone else for being elitist...lel.

It's not my fault I never learned to accept responsability!

[lawow74]

It's not my fault I never learned to accept responsability!

And all I can think of is this song.

[Remilia]

*chuckles*
Well personal DPS isn't much of a concert for me, because I am paired with a damage greedy SCH/AST player who quite likes the fact that I do the healing and she gets to lolDPS.

Can I have you as my healing buddy.

[Katchii]

Do you guys remember that post I made a while back about the PLD who did nothing but shield lob?

Well he's back with a new post, and unfortunately he never took me on my offer to teach him how to PLD. It's worth a solid read if you have some popcorn handy.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...is-with-people

There a TLDR? It's a 24 page long thread with most of it just being "report him." There a specific post in there you wanted us to see?

I always thought the idea of a BLM being a burst caster with the ability to store instant casts as a mechanic to offset bad swings would be cool. You'd always want to have 1-2 on hand, but never want to be capped kinda thing. I don't think BLM needs the AF swing, Enochian Timer, Umbral Hearts, and Foul to be a compelling/fun job. It is a little overbearing IMO. I'm not entirely sure how I'd rework it tbh as I don't have a ton of experience on it.

Regarding SMN I really don't like the spellset. It just doesn't feel like what a SMN to me would cast. I don't have enough experience to give any concrete rework thoughts on it though.

BLM is the epitome of a turret caster with big flashy spells that put out big numbers, which feels amazing when you're able to actually do that. The problem is your DPS plummets the second you have to move at all because of how tight the Enochian timer is and how it works. Having to keep it up for 30+ seconds when the buffs only last 15 and having to switch ice and fire in tandem by casting the right spell at the right time, all while dodging mechanics and making sure you land somewhere within enough time left to actually cast your spell...it's infuriating, for very little actual gain since other classes can do the same or better damage with far less effort and frustration.

I just enjoy SMN because it's a pet class and affords a huge amount of flexibility and survivability in all content. I'll admit the toolkit isn't very Summoner-ish, with the "Summoning" part being mostly relegated to a targettable DoT. I'm not sure how i'd rework it either, but I'd tie the primals and their powers more directly to the class rather tem being more of a side thing. Maybe having them be similar to now, but also having the active one augmenting your spells to do different things. Like Ifrit would make your spells more fire aspected with burn DoT's and fire aesthetics, with Titan being more direct damage and slows or embrittle type things, Garuda would be wind aspected, obviously, with spells for DoT's, slashes, and haste buffs or something.

Another option would be for the Summoner "abilities" being command type spells that affect the egi directly and have almost ALL of the damage come from the pet, so the Summoner is really just a conduit that channels, controls and applies the power of the primals directly to the Egi with supporting abilities that empower and assist the egi. Maybe have the SMN spells be super weak but they cause the egi to attack or do some action, so the Summoner still directly controls everything that's going on and when, but adds a little more of the SMN feel to the class rather it just being the FFXIV equivalent of an Affliction Warlock.

[Wrecktangle]

There a TLDR? It's a 24 page long thread with most of it just being "report him." There a specific post in there you wanted us to see?

No TLDR - it's worth its # of pages in gold if you can find the time.

BLM is the epitome of a turret caster with big flashy spells that put out big numbers, which feels amazing when you're able to actually do that. The problem is your DPS plummets the second you have to move at all because of how tight the Enochian timer is and how it works. Having to keep it up for 30+ seconds when the buffs only last 15 and having to switch ice and fire in tandem by casting the right spell at the right time, all while dodging mechanics and making sure you land somewhere within enough time left to actually cast your spell...it's infuriating, for very little actual gain since other classes can do the same or better damage with far less effort and frustration.

I just enjoy SMN because it's a pet class and affords a huge amount of flexibility and survivability in all content. I'll admit the toolkit isn't very Summoner-ish, with the "Summoning" part being mostly relegated to a targettable DoT. I'm not sure how i'd rework it either, but I'd tie the primals and their powers more directly to the class rather tem being more of a side thing. Maybe having them be similar to now, but also having the active one augmenting your spells to do different things. Like Ifrit would make your spells more fire aspected with burn DoT's and fire aesthetics, with Titan being more direct damage and slows or embrittle type things, Garuda would be wind aspected, obviously, with spells for DoT's, slashes, and haste buffs or something.

Another option would be for the Summoner "abilities" being command type spells that affect the egi directly and have almost ALL of the damage come from the pet, so the Summoner is really just a conduit that channels, controls and applies the power of the primals directly to the Egi with supporting abilities that empower and assist the egi. Maybe have the SMN spells be super weak but they cause the egi to attack or do some action, so the Summoner still directly controls everything that's going on and when, but adds a little more of the SMN feel to the class rather it just being the FFXIV equivalent of an Affliction Warlock.

We're on the same page here.

[Graeham]

In my experience there's less drama overall in FFXIV...but when there is drama it tends to be the sort where those responsible are insanely stubborn.

[Katchii]

No TLDR - it's worth its # of pages in gold if you can find the time.



We're on the same page here.

I read it. That person acts like a 12 year old trying to be mature and coming up with "mature" arguments and failing miserably. Glad I'll never have the honor of grouping with them.

[lawow74]

Speaking on SMN, what I would like to see would be mechanically more similar to BRD. Rather than summon different pets specifically, have it be more channeling the spirit of a given aspect and what you do changes based on that, i.e. rotating stances with different elemental powers whose effects change based on what you want to do and what you've done mechanically. For example, going to a Leviathan aspect and dousing an enemy, then to a Ramuh aspect and electrocuting the fuck outta them. Or perhaps it's two summons at once with opposing elements whose abilities sync together. Debuff with one and slam them with the other, and rotate back.

[Granyala]

In a perfect world, they'd all be equally desirable for their own reasons outside of their healing prowess.

And in a real world, encounter A gets much easier with Option B, whereas Encounter B prefers Option A.
Net result: if you want to optimize, you have to have all 3 healers at your disposal or people will moan at you.
Raids with a richer roster will just rotate healers depending on the encounter needs.

Ever remembered raiding Sunwell w/o a Shaman?
Well, neither do I.
While not necessarily this extreme, that is the direction in which you are heading.

- - - Updated - - -

Can I have you as my healing buddy.

Hmm... maybe if I can pet your ears. They look plushy and soft.

Don't get my wrong though: I still expect you to be able to recognize critical situations which you HAVE TO heal with me because the design prohibits complete 1 man healing.

Kefkas Archangel would be one such example. Very difficult to impossible to bring all peeps to 100%, simply because I do not have enough time and s/o needs to tend to the tank... God, I swear that them tanks love to eat extra big hits when you try to keep them at 100%.

- - - Updated - - -

I’ve seen and commented in the thread @Wrecktangle referred to on OF.

Same.
While I can understand the frustration, the OP of said thread has a point: insults are a no-go.

[Dragon Claws]

Hopefully they announce the new expansion and add another healer. Maybe Dancer. If I have to twerk to heal though, I'll be concerned.