[Megathread] Final Fantasy XIV

[Katchii]

I wonder how useful it would be though. Your own DPS is not as relevant if you have no one to compare it too.
If I am doing 14k and have no idea what everyone else is doing that number doesn't mean as much.

Highly depends on how much you're paying attention to those numbers.

In a vacuum, you're right. But if you know you were doing 14k yesterday on a dummy, were pulling 13.5k in a dungeon, got a new piece of gear and then am doing 15k in this raid, you have a gauge for your normal performance and where you fall personally and can see if you're performing better or worse than you normally do.

Also, with a personal tool like that people could still post logs and you could see how you stack up against other people.

I agree it wouldn't be as useful as a full group DPS meter, but it would be far from useless.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

DPS meters only matter if you're a raider. The average content difficulty of FFXIV is very low, even compared to the average difficulty of WoW. There are hardly any DPS checks in the game outside of raids and you can meet them even with half of your party not knowing what they're doing.

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The only remotely "hard" casual content in the game is the level 60 Red Mage solo duty, and maybe the critical engagements in Bozja (if you consider that to be casual content).

[StrawberryZebra]

That's the fault of the content though. SE is simply too timid when it comes to content dealing damage to players. Always has been.

They could also slash healing values across the board, it acomplishes the same effect. Whatever the reason, Squenix have never put healers through their paces. I can't recall a single healing intensive fight, they've always been about completing mechanics correctly. It could be they're worried about raid success or failure being in the hands of just a few people, which is a sentiment I do understand. It's frustrating when your raid is wiping over and over and you're powerless to prevent it.

On the other hand, the lazer focus on dance mechanics does give their raids a unique stand out point, which is a plus in a market with lots of competetors.

Cleric stance removal is tricky. On one had it was fucking dumb and clunky, but on the other it DID offer opportunities to optimize and the community CLEARLY indicated that they valued that. SE knows that they fucked up healing, but I don't think they know what they wanna do. I know what I want them to do, but I'm not sure the community is ready for healers who don't have godhood quality throughput and infinite MP pools (although my proposed ideas would also shift other tools to the other jobs, especially putting tanks in control of how much damage they actually take, and deal.)

I remember you and I thrashing out plenty of ways they could reward healers for aggressive gameplay without resorting to what we're left with now. Not that I expected Squenix to be paying attention to us, but they option they've chosen is the least interesting and least rewarding one. Without adding more nuanced decisions on the healing side of the Job to compensate, we're left with Jobs that paradoxically have a wide toolbox of abilites while at the same time feel every bare bones.

They've said repeatedly that they want healers to heal but they've never delivered on that idea. At this point I don't think they know what direction they want to take healers even as they're adding a completely new one in Endwalker. Healers don't exist in isolation, changes to them directly affect tanks and DPS too. The whole system needs a review from top-to-bottom, everything from health bars to DPS output, and there need to be intentional failure points built into the design where a lack of performance ends in a wipe.

It's the kind of radical redesign that would leave the game feeling completely different, and Squenix has shown themselves to be highly risk averse when it comes to FF14. I'd be very surprised if they do anything but leave things at the status quo for Endwalker, especially given the recent bump in popularity the game seems to have had.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

At this point I don't think they know what direction they want to take healers even as they're adding a completely new one in Endwalker.

They might be redesigning healers to focus on combat, maybe even giving them a combat rotation, and then maybe they throw out a heal if someone needs it. Basically Red Mages, perhaps. The promotional material for Sage thus far has focused on the Sage being awesome in combat by shooting stuff up with his Gundam Funnels.

[Lane]

Does anyone have a creative solution for two trial accounts to group together? Asking around town or outside of dungeons for a kindly stranger to group us up is hit or miss and I couldn't find anyone who could invite us to the Novice Network where we could more easily ask (Crystal data center). This seems like it's going to be an ongoing problem between queuing for the Duty Finder and then not being able to stay grouped whenever we have to do a solo duty. SO isn't completely sold on the game yet, so not ready to buy just yet.

[Granyala]

They could also slash healing values across the board, it acomplishes the same effect.

No you don't. You would make healing feel underpowered and very frustrating. I'd rather have a fast HP ping pong vs one big hit and then struggling with 10 casts to get the HP back up.

That is one chance WoW did to it's healing post Wrath that I absolutely hated.

[Echo of Soul]

Highly depends on how much you're paying attention to those numbers.

In a vacuum, you're right. But if you know you were doing 14k yesterday on a dummy, were pulling 13.5k in a dungeon, got a new piece of gear and then am doing 15k in this raid, you have a gauge for your normal performance and where you fall personally and can see if you're performing better or worse than you normally do.

Also, with a personal tool like that people could still post logs and you could see how you stack up against other people.

I agree it wouldn't be as useful as a full group DPS meter, but it would be far from useless.

Absolutely. For personal improvement it would be a great tool. It's one of those things that would be difficult to predict how the community would utilize the information.
Had this been WoW I could say for certain that it would end badly. "I did 15k, what did you get Matt?" and if Matt refused to post or was caught lying he'd be kicked.
I think that it would be very important that the information shouldn't be linkable ingame.

[ippollite]

Does anyone have a creative solution for two trial accounts to group together? Asking around town or outside of dungeons for a kindly stranger to group us up is hit or miss and I couldn't find anyone who could invite us to the Novice Network where we could more easily ask (Crystal data center). This seems like it's going to be an ongoing problem between queuing for the Duty Finder and then not being able to stay grouped whenever we have to do a solo duty. SO isn't completely sold on the game yet, so not ready to buy just yet.

I was gonna make a character, but you mentioned this being a continual issue, so i dont know if theres much point (since i dont play on the server or even data center (i play on japanese servers, and thus during japanese hours)). but hey ho, if you just want a one shot and our stars align, id be happy to make a character on your server and join you up. which server? i should be around the forums (or in game) for the next 4 or so hours.

[Wrecktangle]

I remember you and I thrashing out plenty of ways they could reward healers for aggressive gameplay without resorting to what we're left with now. Not that I expected Squenix to be paying attention to us, but they option they've chosen is the least interesting and least rewarding one. Without adding more nuanced decisions on the healing side of the Job to compensate, we're left with Jobs that paradoxically have a wide toolbox of abilites while at the same time feel every bare bones.

Indeed I remember

No you don't. You would make healing feel underpowered and very frustrating. I'd rather have a fast HP ping pong vs one big hit and then struggling with 10 casts to get the HP back up.

I don't know. I feel like healing shouldn't be that powerful without consequences. If you remember I had posited a system where healers had access to varying heals based on their needs, but more powerful or faster heals cost additional resources/MP. This led to a system where healers could stabilize easily like live, but it significantly reduced their MP and wouldn't just magically fill back up the rest of the fight. Alternatively, in this system other jobs could help lighten the load via defensives and tanks could also contribute rather significantly to self healing/mitigation.

Absolutely. For personal improvement it would be a great tool. It's one of those things that would be difficult to predict how the community would utilize the information.
Had this been WoW I could say for certain that it would end badly. "I did 15k, what did you get Matt?" and if Matt refused to post or was caught lying he'd be kicked.
I think that it would be very important that the information shouldn't be linkable ingame.

Had this been WoW? This happens right now live in FF14. "Hey guys, thanks for the invite for this E10S". "Hey XYZ why are your logs private? XYZ has been removed from the party." No one in savage wants people with private logs. I'd take someone with shit logs any day of the week over private logs. I've taken chances on private logs before, and regretted it EVERYTIME so comically that I usually had to share it with others on reddit. I'm talking hilariously bad play. Like 12 deaths in 3 pulls (clear party) bad or DPS so low that it was bad 2 expansions ago, let alone now.

[Katchii]

Absolutely. For personal improvement it would be a great tool. It's one of those things that would be difficult to predict how the community would utilize the information.
Had this been WoW I could say for certain that it would end badly. "I did 15k, what did you get Matt?" and if Matt refused to post or was caught lying he'd be kicked.
I think that it would be very important that the information shouldn't be linkable ingame.

That's pretty much what their policy is now regarding the use of ACT, though they obviously only take action against egregious uses of the information. Otherwise people like Wrecktangle wouldn't still be playing, as he's admitted to openly talking about it in game, just not in a harassing or antagonistic manner.

If they allowed and supported the use of a personal tool, it would be almost impossible for them to be have a rule that says "don't talk about this totally legit and supported tool."

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Had this been WoW? This happens right now live in FF14. "Hey guys, thanks for the invite for this E10S". "Hey XYZ why are your logs private? XYZ has been removed from the party." No one in savage wants people with private logs. I'd take someone with shit logs any day of the week over private logs. I've taken chances on private logs before, and regretted it EVERYTIME so comically that I usually had to share it with others on reddit. I'm talking hilariously bad play. Like 12 deaths in 3 pulls (clear party) bad or DPS so low that it was bad 2 expansions ago, let alone now.

Yep.

I think though that the comment was more about it happening in WoW regardless of what content you're doing. I think it's a bit of a stretch, but I've seen things like that happen sometimes. There are some people who take numbers super seriously ALL THE TIME and turn everything into a measuring contest no matter the context.

In Savage level content (ie high level content designed to be difficult/ challenging) this kind of behavior is expected and 100% acceptable. You're there to clear it and need people good and competent enough to do so. If the same thing were happening in a Leveling dungeon or Alliance raid when it's well known you can clear it with bottom feeders involved I don't think that kicking people for that is warranted. Granted, I'm not giving them a free pass for being bottom feeders, just that I don't think the content warrants that kind of action against them. I don't know where to draw that line though, because I find carrying those kinds of people frustrating too, just that I know I can clear the content with them there and don't want to deal with looking at their logs and going through the actions to kick them with them possibly getting butthurt about it and reporting the group for harassment or whatever...it's just not worth it to me, because in the end, it doesn't matter because I cleared the content.

I just want to play the game and enjoy myself. Policing other people like that takes some of the fun out of it. At least in the casual content. As I said, in the higher level content though the fun comes from clearing and there SHOULD be a barrier for entry and performance conditions/ expectations that need to be met for that goal to be achieved.

[Echo of Soul]

Had this been WoW? This happens right now live in FF14. "Hey guys, thanks for the invite for this E10S". "Hey XYZ why are your logs private? XYZ has been removed from the party." No one in savage wants people with private logs. I'd take someone with shit logs any day of the week over private logs. I've taken chances on private logs before, and regretted it EVERYTIME so comically that I usually had to share it with others on reddit. I'm talking hilariously bad play. Like 12 deaths in 3 pulls (clear party) bad or DPS so low that it was bad 2 expansions ago, let alone now.

Obviously I'm talking about casual content. I'm sure that there's plenty of toxicity in high end content on discord etc but luckily the general playerbase will rarely be subjected to it.

[Granyala]

I don't know. I feel like healing shouldn't be that powerful without consequences. If you remember I had posited a system where healers had access to varying heals based on their needs, but more powerful or faster heals cost additional resources/MP. This led to a system where healers could stabilize easily like live, but it significantly reduced their MP and wouldn't just magically fill back up the rest of the fight.

I agree that nonexistent mana management is indeed a problem. Always has been.

A healer should be able to kick into overdrive and compensate SOME fails but eventually the raid should succumb if they fail too much.
Right now, SE does this mostly via instagib mechanics / damage down stacks that lead to an eventual wipe down the line.

Not sure whether putting all the responsibility on the healer is the right thing to do.
I actually like it when DPS is punished in different ways than "ermagawd rez me / heal me back up, I failed!!"

Perhaps a combination of the two?
I think, as a healer, I should definitely feel it in my mana if the raid plays crappily. Right now, only the healers DPS reflects that.

[TidalConflux]

Had this been WoW? This happens right now live in FF14. "Hey guys, thanks for the invite for this E10S". "Hey XYZ why are your logs private? XYZ has been removed from the party." No one in savage wants people with private logs. I'd take someone with shit logs any day of the week over private logs. I've taken chances on private logs before, and regretted it EVERYTIME so comically that I usually had to share it with others on reddit. I'm talking hilariously bad play. Like 12 deaths in 3 pulls (clear party) bad or DPS so low that it was bad 2 expansions ago, let alone now.

Wait until you tell them about the well-known blacklists on the JP servers.

[Granyala]

Cleric stance removal is tricky. On one had it was fucking dumb and clunky, but on the other it DID offer opportunities to optimize and the community CLEARLY indicated that they valued that.

Conceptually Cleric was awesome. You had to make a decision, calculate a risk and plan ahead, especially when solo healing: can my tank survive up to 7 seconds w/o healing?

What was not so awesome was the crappy backend design, I cannot count how often I wanted to disable it, it didn't take and I pressed the button again, just to instantly re-enable it once the server woke up. That was pretty much my only complaint and why I was super glad to see it go.

Though they also toned down normal content difficulty by ... A LOT. I still remember crazy trashpulls in dungeons, bosses actually hitting worth a damn etc... all gone now.

[Wrecktangle]

Obviously I'm talking about casual content. I'm sure that there's plenty of toxicity in high end content on discord etc but luckily the general playerbase will rarely be subjected to it.

So to be clear, you're acknowledging here that I am correct about endgame. With that out of of the way we can discuss how this translates to more trivial difficulty content.

Firstly, a personal DPS meter for trivial content would be near useless. Not entirely useless, but near useless. Your DPS will vary DRAMATICALLY based on what your party comp looks like and how good they are. Couple that with how miniscule DPS increases individual gear pieces provide and crit variance would muddy the waters so much that your average player wouldn't be able to decipher it meaningfully.

Secondly, people would share that information almost assuredly and those that didn't would be ostracized exactly like you imagined. Even in casual content. Would they be kicked? No I highly doubt that, but I also highly doubt it would be the case in any other game even WoW.

I think though that the comment was more about it happening in WoW regardless of what content you're doing. I think it's a bit of a stretch, but I've seen things like that happen sometimes. There are some people who take numbers super seriously ALL THE TIME and turn everything into a measuring contest no matter the context.

For sure, which we both agree is a stretch. Does it happen? Absolutely. Does it happen more than it should? Sure. Does it happen commonly? No.

Yep.

I think we're still seeing a lot of people for whom XIV is "new", so they're in that new game smell phase where they still believe everything is pure and nice and there are rainbows and unicorns everywhere. Lets explore everything! Wow, people are being so nice! I don't even think about my gear, I'm just having fun! Wheeee!

Of course, once they realize that communities everywhere have the same sort of people and behaviors, they'll say that the game changed somehow.

I've seen it here in this very forum. People who used to literally butt heads with me over opinions are now iterating the same ones I shared years ago. The only difference was it took them a bit longer to get to the conclusion or they hadn't been playing as long as I have.

I agree that nonexistent mana management is indeed a problem. Always has been.

A healer should be able to kick into overdrive and compensate SOME fails but eventually the raid should succumb if they fail too much.
Right now, SE does this mostly via instagib mechanics / damage down stacks that lead to an eventual wipe down the line.

Not sure whether putting all the responsibility on the healer is the right thing to do.
I actually like it when DPS is punished in different ways than "ermagawd rez me / heal me back up, I failed!!"

Perhaps a combination of the two?
I think, as a healer, I should definitely feel it in my mana if the raid plays crappily. Right now, only the healers DPS reflects that.

Agreed 100%

Wait until you tell them about the well-known blacklists on the JP servers.

I am not familiar with JP Servers much only my own experiences, but that doesnt surprise me.

Conceptually Cleric was awesome. You had to make a decision, calculate a risk and plan ahead, especially when solo healing: can my tank survive up to 7 seconds w/o healing?

What was not so awesome was the crappy backend design, I cannot count how often I wanted to disable it, it didn't take and I pressed the button again, just to instantly re-enable it once the server woke up. That was pretty much my only complaint and why I was super glad to see it go.

Though they also toned down normal content difficulty by ... A LOT. I still remember crazy trashpulls in dungeons, bosses actually hitting worth a damn etc... all gone now.

I do think there's a better way to do it via resource management rather than toggleable buffs. I hate TOGGLEABLE buffs though LOL.

[Granyala]

I do think there's a better way to do it via resource management rather than toggleable buffs. I hate TOGGLEABLE buffs though LOL.

Yop, it's a clunky design.
I did like the concept of Arch Angel back in Cata on my SPriest. Cleric buff in Delubrum plays similarly, you plan your lilies and CDs around it.

I don't think healer DPS should be super complex, after all our main job is sth else but I do like the added extra by the Delu skills.

[Graeham]

I'm seriously starting to get Game of Throne vibes and it's really jarring. The game seriously needed one additional expansion before wrapping it all up. I agree with everything you've said, all the plotlines are getting wrapped up with a bow at a breakneck pace in some mad dash to the finish line. I honestly wonder what the hell happened. A Garlean world war expansion makes the most sense after Stormblood. We'll never know why they went so left of field and resolved everything garlean in the background. We sure could have used an extra xpack though if not to do the Garleans justice, but to give a more organic flow to resolving all of these other plotlines. That that would have ended the story at level 99 would have been even more appropriate falling in line with ff11 and the rest.

I'm very disappointed. The only reason I bothered investing in FFXIV in the first place was due to the heavy 'Ivalice' vibes the game had early on. When Return to Ivalice was announced, I was thrilled - and I really enjoyed seeing Matsuno's take on Garlemald. Then Save the Queen was announced and I enjoyed that as well - so to know there was a planned third act that is now scrapped just infuriates me.

I haven't been terribly impressed with the direction of the MSQ's lately, either. The game in general has become rather preachy in a way that is far removed from the nuance and realistic consequences of ARR and HW.

I'll be giving 6.0 a chance, though at this point I'm not expecting much.

[bloodwulf]

Man, i am on hour 10 of this current house camping session. I can not think of anything less enjoyable. Its been myself and another for almost the entire duration since 5am (US CST) this morning and in the last 20 minutes or so that number has tripled.

I am committed though. I just want a house to call my own and decorate.

God i hate this system.

[draugril]

I'm seriously starting to get Game of Throne vibes and it's really jarring. The game seriously needed one additional expansion before wrapping it all up. I agree with everything you've said, all the plotlines are getting wrapped up with a bow at a breakneck pace in some mad dash to the finish line. I honestly wonder what the hell happened. A Garlean world war expansion makes the most sense after Stormblood. We'll never know why they went so left of field and resolved everything garlean in the background. We sure could have used an extra xpack though if not to do the Garleans justice, but to give a more organic flow to resolving all of these other plotlines. That that would have ended the story at level 99 would have been even more appropriate falling in line with ff11 and the rest.

Maybe it has to do with the fact that ARR is an absolute slog to get through, and they're working on a "new player experience" that simply has them starting with the most recent expansion? As the popularity increases, so does the need for accessibility.

[Katchii]

God i hate this system.

Seconded.

I got a house in the Goblet a couple years ago just to have one because I thought it would be cool to have. The Goblet always had a few houses available on my server ever since Shirogane opened up.

I frequently unsub for periods of time while I don't feel like I have a reason to log in every day. Completely forgot about the housing requirement that you have to log in at least once every 30 days and ended up losing my house because I logged in on day 32 or something.

Realized this housing system is just not for me.

The concept is amazing, but the execution here is just awful.