Do all classes require 15+ buttons rotations?

[The Casualty]

Not that it's in the particular theme of the thread, but am I the only one who sometimes has trouble actually hitting my damage potion? I swear to god, the tinctures in this game just don't feel responsive at all despite mashing the shit out of them when they're off CD. I'll hit them multiple times to make sure and then about 5-6 seconds later half way through my burst window I realize it wasn't pressed at all lol. Can you just not dual weave them or something? It's minor of course, but holy fuck it's annoying.

You cannot double weave an OGCD with a potion, no. It takes up both slots.

[Lord Kragan]

Most of them aren't smooth at all and are, as you mentioned, clunky.

Tab targeting in this game is awful, thankfully it's rarely used in 'meaningful' content.

I'll echo an earlier statement as well. The more I pick up jobs the more annoying I find a lot of them are to play in synced content. RDM in my opinion is one of the best feeling jobs in any content despite naturally losing abilities as well. The job defining dual cast makes the flow of the spec feel the same regardless of era you're playing, and you actually have access to meaningful AoE, at a fundamental level anyways. The job just feels 'complete' at 50, it's not stingy when it syncs you below that, and only slightly builds on itself. Meanwhile you have to wait ages for DRK and DRG to get their AoE combos to feel complete, and don't even get me started on BLM.

Basically, I doubt the difficulty of the game would be compromised if they went back and cleaned up some of the older jobs. Fleshing out their AoE earlier and adding a couple core functions that make some jobs not dog water to play at low levels. The AoE at the very least, because having access to stronger AoE isn't going to disrupt the balance of doing things like Ultimates or synced trials/savage content anyway.

I'd also add up machinist. At level 50 you've got overheat and the turret plus the ensured crit. The rotation improves in feel, but mechanically, it stays pretty similar across level tresholds.

[Rogalicus]

I don't know, I feel like it very much overcomplicates things.

In general, you have two combo sets you go through and you weave oGCDs between them if they're up. If you do your two combo cycle once, Wyrmwind Thrust lights up and you can use it. If you Mirage Dive twice, Geirskogul lights up and you can enter Life of the Dragon and throw 3 Nastronds and 1 Stardiver over its lifetime.

Other than that, it's three buffs and a movement ability.

I don't see overcomplication, that post's purpose was to count all the buttons Dragoon uses in normal ST fight. If anything, EW added one more and you also need Piercing Talon keybind now for downtime.

[Yarathir]

I don't see overcomplication, that post's purpose was to count all the buttons Dragoon uses in normal ST fight. If anything, EW added one more and you also need Piercing Talon keybind now for downtime.

But two combo sets that never really change plus a bunch of oGCDs and buffs to click at will (when they're up) unless you're a minmaxer isn't really all that complex.

[Ghost of Cow]

But two combo sets that never really change plus a bunch of oGCDs and buffs to click at will (when they're up) unless you're a minmaxer isn't really all that complex.

That's a fair point. In fact, there are few instances where you completely break your rotation by doing something wrong nowadays. (The way Enochian or Summoners entire life were, etc)

While some things are important for maximizing your DPS (timing Mirage Dives, etc) you're not completely breaking your job by making a mistake.

[Yarathir]

That's a fair point. In fact, there are few instances where you completely break your rotation by doing something wrong nowadays. (The way Enochian or Summoners entire life were, etc)

While some things are important for maximizing your DPS (timing Mirage Dives, etc) you're not completely breaking your job by making a mistake.

Positionals are also not as important anymore as they used to be. You used to have to hit positionals for Raiden Thrust and other stuff, but they took a lot of it out.

Of course, hitting them is still more than advised, but you're not punished as hard for it anymore.

At least for DRG.

[Katchii]

Positionals are also not as important anymore as they used to be. You used to have to hit positionals for Raiden Thrust and other stuff, but they took a lot of it out.

Of course, hitting them is still more than advised, but you're not punished as hard for it anymore.

At least for DRG.

The only punishment is your damage gets reduced, which is still bad, just not as bad as it used to be. Previously, the abilities affects (player buff or enemy debuff) wouldn't activate unless you hit the positional in addition to the reduction in potency, now all that still happens, you just don't get the potency increase from hitting the positional, or in the case of Samurai, you don't get the extra Kenki.

[Rogalicus]

But two combo sets that never really change plus a bunch of oGCDs and buffs to click at will (when they're up) unless you're a minmaxer isn't really all that complex.

Why are you talking about complexity if the original post and my take are about the number of buttons in rotation?

[Yarathir]

Why are you talking about complexity if the original post and my take are about the number of buttons in rotation?

Why would you object to the number of buttons if not because of complexity?

[Ghost of Cow]

Why would you object to the number of buttons if not because of complexity?

Number of keybinds, comfort, ergonomics, etc.

I will admit that some jobs I just resist playing due to the number of keybinds I would need to play it. Without a fancier mouse or using keybinds that are harder to reach, it quickly becomes a hassle.

[Yarathir]

Number of keybinds, comfort, ergonomics, etc.

I will admit that some jobs I just resist playing due to the number of keybinds I would need to play it. Without a fancier mouse or using keybinds that are harder to reach, it quickly becomes a hassle.

Fair point, which is why I stick to 5 buttons at most. 6 and it becomes bullshit to reach on the keyboard. For dragoon, this is what I opted with

My True Thrust, Vorpal Thrust, Full Thrust/Heaven's Thrust, Fang and Claw and Wyrmwind Thrust are tied to 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5
My Life Surge, Disembowel, Chaos Thrust/Chaotic Spring, Wheeling Thrust and Geirskogul/Nastrond are tied to shift + 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5
My Jump/High Jump, Mirage Dive, Spineshatter Dive, Dragonfire Dive and Stardiver are tied to ctrl + 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5

My stun and my True North are tied to my two extra mouse buttons on the sides, my three buffs are tied to ` (grave), so `, shift+` and ctrl+`

My Elusive Jump is tied to R and my AoE is tied to Alt + 1, 2, 3.

The rest of my abilities are remaining role abilities and aren't so important that I need to reach them within an instant. The way I've done it isn't the most optimal, but it works for my brain. Most people would probably opt to use more lettered keys, like Q and E (after binding Strafing to A and D) but other than Elusive Jump, I try to stray away from lettered keys because it's easier for me to remember my combos better through sticking to numbers. On a whim, I can tell that:

1, 2, 3, 4 is one half of my basic combo and shift+ 2, 3, 4 is the other half and that ctrl 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 are my oGCDs to be woven in between my basic combo.

[Onikaroshi]

Most jobs in FF are an illusion of bloat, they're combos or abilities that lead into other abilities that could easily be placed on a single button like in pvp the devs don't want to.

So I do it myself, saves your fingers.

[Katchii]

Number of keybinds, comfort, ergonomics, etc.

I will admit that some jobs I just resist playing due to the number of keybinds I would need to play it. Without a fancier mouse or using keybinds that are harder to reach, it quickly becomes a hassle.

I invested in a MMO mouse and gaming keypad years ago, for ergonomic reasons. Literally game changing for me, but I 10000% understand why feeling forced to do so to play a game would suck. I don't know how some people do it without those peripherals though.

But like I said, having those peripherals was literally game changing for me, both in terms actual game play but also ergonomically.

[Yarathir]

I invested in a MMO mouse and gaming keypad years ago, for ergonomic reasons. Literally game changing for me, but I 10000% understand why feeling forced to do so to play a game would suck. I don't know how some people do it without those peripherals though.

But like I said, having those peripherals was literally game changing for me, both in terms actual game play but also ergonomically.

I do intend to invest in an MMO mouse as well just to make it easier for me to hit beyond 5 without having to reach all the way across the keyboard. Also, keyboard turning is more of a thing in FFXIV than it is in.. say.. WoW. With that context, having keys on the side of the mouse makes sense. I'm curious to see if it'll make things feel better.

[Cthulhu 2020]

In a nutshell, yes. Bard and Dancer have a little RNG but aside from that pretty much every class has a strict rotation that doesn't deviate. Even when jobs have a resource to "manage" the generation is always static and predictable so it's really still just a rotation.

To make matters worse, balance entirely revolves around "buff windows" (As in, "Everyone's cooldowns are 60 seconds so we must line them all up together at every 60 second mark.") so the optimal gameplay becomes even more rigid. It also means that any little interruption can severely impact your final DPS.

It's a long-standing complaint about the game, but there are also a lot of people who enjoy it, so eh.

This is a bit overstated. You can clear the hardest content in the game without lining up buff windows rigidly. That's really just if you're world first progging or trying to parse 99's.

[Katchii]

I do intend to invest in an MMO mouse as well just to make it easier for me to hit beyond 5 without having to reach all the way across the keyboard. Also, keyboard turning is more of a thing in FFXIV than it is in.. say.. WoW. With that context, having keys on the side of the mouse makes sense. I'm curious to see if it'll make things feel better.

It really does, honestly.

It turns your easily reachable keys from ~5 (or up to 20 I guess with modifiers like +ctrl, +alt and +shift) to easily 2-3 times that, all ergonomically which means it's faster and more comfortable. MMO's like FFXIV with large numbers of abilities are just as straight forward to play as one that uses 5 keys.

There's a learning curve though, as with any new peripheral. But it's 100% worth it in the long run. Took me ~8 hours of playing with it to get super comfortable with it. Only took about 1 to get functional though.

[Dzonathan]

Not really no, I use it and it just stops the useless presses.
Your 123 combos are one button that’s about it maybe one other set, it’s not reduced that much.

The other guy did mentioned you can put oGCD into the buttons so I'd probably do just that to reduce button bloat.
It's not like certain classes dont use certains buttons only in specific situations like DRG only really using Life Surge before Full Thrust and Lance Charge anytime it gets off CD.

[Deneios]

MMO mouse is something i wouldnt trade away in any mmo game. its so good to have 3x9 buttons under your thumb with just ctrl and shift modifiers.

[Shakzor]

For some jobs, i just don't understand why their combos aren't one button, like machinists 1-2-3 combo or gunbreakers basic combo when the powder DID get combined into one button
And for others, some abilities are just... dumb, like blackmage having seperated spells to build ice and then umbral hearts. It's just an unneded button in the end cause it adds neither difficulty nor "complexity", just delays the fire spam by one gcd.
A lot are nigh impossible to reduce, like samurais 3 combos or bards songs and dots, but for a few, they could de-bloat the bars by making it combo buttons or adjusting things, cause a lot of the bloat came from the need to have something learned every 2 levels

[Tojara]

GNB use to be like that with their spender, which when I picked up the job annoyed the ever living shit out of me. Why have 3 different buttons when you physically can't use the second or third one without using the prior to light that one up to begin with? They fixed that with EW though.

DRK has a 1-2-3 ST combo that realistically has no reason to ever be broken, nor does anything in the kit break that combo unless you press the 1-2 AoE combo instead. This combo, and many more within the game are examples of combos that could literally be 1 button instead of 3 or 1 button instead of 2 when talking about the AoE combo.

DRG is a bit different because their ST combo alternates between a dot with a maintenance buff, and just pure ST damage, with 7 buttons being allocated to the full combo. However, like many other combos in the game there's no reason that the AoE 1-2-3 combo couldn't be made with one button either.

Keep in mind with the above two jobs, they also allowed you to press your ranged ability without breaking either of your combos with EW. Meaning that aside from just pressing the wrong bind out of order, or jumping into your AoE abilities (or vice versa) you generally can't break your combo anyway.

Before people whine, the PvP in this game generally does this for you anyway. If you play either of the above jobs in PvP they put the DRG ST combo (without the DoT) into a single button press that cycles through your core rotation automatically and the same for the AoE rotation. DRK is the same, basically taking what would be 5 key bind pressed and narrowing it down to 2. It's weird that they do this in PvP but not PvE, because PvP bars are already incredibly sparse. PvP generally takes away most of your oGCD abilities, a lot of your defensives (if it's a tank role), steroid abilities and generally any maintenance ability that your job might have. You might have say 30-34 binds allocated to PvE in FF14, but when you go into PvP you will only have like 15-20 abilities max.

But yeah, in general agreement and this is from somebody who plays on a PC too. I've watched people play on console and I wouldn't wish that nightmare on anybody. Advantages to this is obviously more comfortable key binds, especially for those that don't have MMO mice or play on consoles. I realize it's hard for some jobs to have this happen, but a lot of them can easily happen as evidenced by numerous jobs you take into the PvP mode of the game.