Adjustments to Embrava and Perfect Defense

[Miiyo]

The rewards from legion are not good enough to warrant the level of difficulty you have given it. I'm not saying change the rewards. I'm saying if the only thing you have in your yard to steal is a decent set of lawn furniture you probably don't need a 20 foot high fence topped with razor wire.

I'll say it for you. Most of the abjuration gear sucks (Whm head, body, and feet are really nice). It's as big a disappointment as level 75 evolith system and the gear that came with. It's even accompanied by augments just as sad as those with evolith. No way in the world it should be that we're here years after AF3+2 and most of the Abjurations are as expensive and retardedly hard to get as they are and they're a pile of steaming crap.

"Let's release new content and give rewards that are a ton more expensive, much more hard to get, and with worse stats than items they can much more easily obtain and probably already had!"

Progression:
1. The act of progressing; forward or onward movement.
2. A passing successively from one member of a series to the next; succession; sequence.

[Silvers]

For both existing content and content to come in the future, I believe that conditions where special monsters are created for the sole purpose of counteracting Perfect Defense and Embrava is not desirable at all. The main idea behind the adjustments to Perfect Defense and Embrava is to correct the situation so it will not come to this.

As a result we would like to make it so summoner and scholar can widen their range of play and usefulness via other elements. We understand that these adjustments might be somewhat of an inconvenience, but we appreciate your understanding.

In other words, currently we have been giving consideration towards Perfect Defense and Embrava when making adjustments to content and monster strength. Likewise we have had to scale back new equipment stats and abilities for other jobs for the same reason.

In the event that we were to continue at this pace, content and monsters would be created where the effects of Perfect Defense and Embrava would be ineffective, so in order to redraw the standard values for content and equipment we will be making these adjustments.

We apologize for how late these adjustments are being made.

I'm starting to think that it would be a better route than staying on course with your current planned of action with as much people are against the proposed change. Making monsters render the abilities useless or near worthless in a battle situation maybe a better way in forcing players to find alternate ways of strategies to defeat monsters. SE is against Zerging, especially in certain battles. They have made this very apparent in past updates, and their proposed current one. If these changes were to go through, players would only adjust their Zerging strategy to use a few different jobs in the result would be as it has been making the patch a “temporary fix”. What SE’s been doing and want to continue to do, Only rotates and rearranges players’ perspectives on what jobs are popular.

It is the content of the monsters and events that needs to change. Players and the developers alike, can list a number of things surrounding monsters and events that are in need of adjusting. While making changes, please keep in mind past mistakes so you do not repeat actions that have put players in situations where they heavily rely on special abilities (2hrs). I would truly like to know why SE adheres to the same methodology that has generated problems in the past. Players have already tried a number of ways to complete content, maybe a different approach is in order. I would like to ask if or why not time extensions were thought to be added to Legion or Nyzul Isle Uncharted? Are the proposed changes the only way can you see to fix the abilities? Could alternatives be brought to the table by developers (and players maybe) then voted on by the FFXI community? If we could ever be part of the decision-making process, this is definitely one of time we would probably like to be in on.

[Zuidar]

I don't see why the Dev team decided to even change regain effect into refresh in the first place instead of lowering it.
Back when this was first announced, they mentioned to lower the effects, but now they instead change and take away something our DD's loved instead of just lowering it. There's plenty of jobs that gives refresh as is already. We already have Bards for ballads, Corsairs for Evoker's Roll, Red Mage for Refresh I and II. Why does the Dev Team insist on replacing something that was unique. This wasn't necessary since we have Red Mages who shine in with their Refresh I/II, Corsairs who roll in the Evoker's, and Bards who sung their Ballads.

Now what about our spell "Adloquium", will there be any possibilities of this spell being enhanced since that Embrava will no longer be DD-friendly? (Apart from still having the Regen effect on embrava)
And to think the base duration of the RDM spell Refresh and Refresh lasts longer than that of embrava, they sure did over-did the balancing, taking away something big and unique then they give back something so little, yet typical and common

[Calatilla]

SE created the zergs not the players, so how can you say the devs are against zerg tactics? Sticking time restrictions on battle instances, giving temp items that make you immune to physical or magical damage, a proc system that terrors the mob for a set amount of time. ADL is a case of kill or be killed, legion you have to go through several waves of mobs in a 30min window. You're encouraged to zerg content, I don't see how the devs are against it.

[Silvers]

SE created the zergs not the players, so how can you say the devs are against zerg tactics? Sticking time restrictions on battle instances, giving temp items that make you immune to physical or magical damage, a proc system that terrors the mob for a set amount of time. ADL is a case of kill or be killed, legion you have to go through several waves of mobs in a 30min window. You're encouraged to zerg content, I don't see how the devs are against it.

Look at what SE has been saying and what they had done in the past; a number of game changes were made to prevent and hamper quick kills to HNMs. My point is why make continuous adjustments to do address issue of their content being zerged that do not affect the core problems of why players implement the strategy. It's just an "Endless Waltz"; Players finds/refines a method to kill faster, Players Zerg SE's prized NMs/content, SE makes adjustments to render current zerg paradigm useless. If SE is really promoting zergs, then why do they intend such a change to Embrava? There are other adjustments that can be justly argued on this point as well that have been mentioned by others in this thread.

We do agree with that SE pushes players to zerg, and it's by their design. If we weren’t pushed to be so heavily dependent on Embrava and Perfect Defense this would had probably never been made an issue. We generally do not just fire off 2hrs at every moment it's ready. Players usually fall back on them when they feel they are needed. So why isn't the issue of players feeling they are so direly needed being really being examined or addressed? I believe they are against Zerg but do not what to completely invalidate it as a potential strategy. One thing I believe in wholeheartedly is one's interpretation or perception of fact does not exactly equal truth. I think others as well as myself, would like SE to clarify why they chose this course of action, and if there could be another with some middle ground. Be it if you agree we me fully, somewhat, or not at all on if SE is for or against zerging, I think we all can agree that content around NMs and various events needs to be changed.

[saevel]

I'm starting to think that it would be a better route than staying on course with your current planned of action with as much people are against the proposed change. Making monsters render the abilities useless or near worthless in a battle situation maybe a better way in forcing players to find alternate ways of strategies to defeat monsters. SE is against Zerging, especially in certain battles. They have made this very apparent in past updates, and their proposed current one. If these changes were to go through, players would only adjust their Zerging strategy to use a few different jobs in the result would be as it has been making the patch a “temporary fix”. What SE’s been doing and want to continue to do, Only rotates and rearranges players’ perspectives on what jobs are popular.

You have no idea what your talking about.

Currently there is no other strategy possible for these fights. I dare you to attempt to "find another way" to kill ADL without PD (embrava isn't needed). Find "another way" to do Legion without Embrava / PD zerg. Find "another way" to kill Prov Watcher without fanatics spam / super buffing DD zerg.

Come on, tell everyone on here your wisdom and profound understanding. This new secret technique that you know of that allows us to fight monsters that one / two shot you in seconds.

[Silvers]

You have no idea what your talking about.

Currently there is no other strategy possible for these fights. I dare you to attempt to "find another way" to kill ADL without PD (embrava isn't needed). Find "another way" to do Legion without Embrava / PD zerg. Find "another way" to kill Prov Watcher without fanatics spam / super buffing DD zerg.

Come on, tell everyone on here your wisdom and profound understanding. This new secret technique that you know of that allows us to fight monsters that one / two shot you in seconds.

Were you tired when you read the post, or are you dense? I'm hoping it's not the latter of the two. I thought that the extremist like sarcasm considering that it would be a better option opposed to all the nerfs was clear to anyone who had read the whole post. Did you bother to read it all? Here is the part that you did not quote.

It is the content of the monsters and events that needs to change. Players and the developers alike, can list a number of things surrounding monsters and events that are in need of adjusting. While making changes, please keep in mind past mistakes so you do not repeat actions that have put players in situations where they heavily rely on special abilities (2hrs). I would truly like to know why SE adheres to the same methodology that has generated problems in the past. Players have already tried a number of ways to complete content, maybe a different approach is in order. I would like to ask if or why not time extensions were thought to be added to Legion or Nyzul Isle Uncharted? Are the proposed changes the only way can you see to fix the abilities? Could alternatives be brought to the table by developers (and players maybe) then voted on by the FFXI community? If we could ever be part of the decision-making process, this is definitely one of time we would probably like to be in on.

How does the merit of your interpretation put up what you factor in the rest of what I said? Did you read up to the post before your own, namely the following within it?

… My point is why make continuous adjustments to do address issues of their content being zerged that do not affect the core problems of why players implement the strategy. It's just an "Endless Waltz"; Players finds/refines a method to kill faster, Players Zerg SE's prized NMs/content, SE makes adjustments to render current zerg paradigm useless. …

We do agree with that SE pushes players to zerg, and it's by their design. If we weren’t pushed to be so heavily dependent on Embrava and Perfect Defense this would had probably never been made an issue. We generally do not just fire off 2hrs at every moment it's ready. Players usually fall back on them when they feel they are needed. So why isn't the issue of players feeling they are so direly needed being really being examined or addressed? I believe they are against Zerg but do not what to completely invalidate it as a potential strategy. One thing I believe in wholeheartedly is one's interpretation or perception of fact does not exactly equal truth. I think others as well as myself, would like SE to clarify why they chose this course of action, and if there could be another with some middle ground. Be it if you agree we me fully, somewhat, or not at all on if SE is for or against zerging, I think we all can agree that content around NMs and various events needs to be changed.

Your perception of what I said is not how it was intended. I do understand that you may not have gotten to the post containing the contents of the quote above. I do wonder how you were able to draw your conclusion with just the post you quoted from. Perhaps that is my fault because how I structured and presented my opinion.

I do know what I'm talking about, and I do understand the situation. What is happening here isn't anything new, and the cycle finally needs to stop. They keep taking away and/or hindering our abilities. The reason why they do this is they make it seem like we fight the way we do because we just can, when in reality we do it because we don’t have other options. SE keeps affecting the only logically choice that we can make without opening up any other paths to confront their content. It's nowhere near fair.

[Yugl]

You have no idea what your talking about.

Currently there is no other strategy possible for these fights. I dare you to attempt to "find another way" to kill ADL without PD (embrava isn't needed). Find "another way" to do Legion without Embrava / PD zerg. Find "another way" to kill Prov Watcher without fanatics spam / super buffing DD zerg.

Technically, there has been a successful Mul run without SMNs, hence, without PD as well. Whether Embrava is relevant to the success of that run depends on the regain and speed of embrava.

[Byrth]

We did some of the pre-chambers without Embrava because we have 3 scholars and 4 chambers to clear. You just have to rotate bards and get the melees some Marches. Embrava's strength in a zerg event like Legion is not the Regain, but it's the Haste and duration. SE is nerfing the Haste and the duration, which shows they understand that. What they don't seem to understand is that this will simply force us to rely on Bard swaps. Also, we don't use Summoner for much of anything anymore. We might PD some early chamber mobs just for simplicity (like the Corse), but generally we do not.

I understand perfectly well why Embrava must be nerfed. It's too much power in one spell and requires the 2-hour of one specific job to cast it. However, Embrava also may be the single most convenient enhancing magic spell in the game at the moment entirely because of the duration. Casting one spell and not having to worry about it falling for 12.5 minutes is fantastic and addresses the age-old complaints of every buffing job in the game, that they spend way too much time casting buffs. This is a great example of how spells should be. You should:
1) Increase base song durations to 3 minutes. (+70% duration * 2 = 10.2 minutes for Troub with G-horn and without Carn, 13.2 minutes with Carn, G-horn, and Troub)
2) Increase base Haste, Enspell, and Phalanx duration to 5 minutes (12.5 minutes with Perpetuance).
3) Increase base Roll duration to 10 minutes.

Nerfing Embrava was necessary because it alienated jobs and relied too heavily on 2-hour abilities, but it was unfortunate because Embrava might be the only enhancing magic in the game that has a reasonable duration and could be cast on any player target. Now instead of using Embrava we will swap bards and maintain Marches, which is annoying and hated by everyone. Congrats SE, after the nerf you will have made your game more annoying instead of more fun.

PS. We will still probably be bringing 3 Scholars to Legion even if Embrava is crap because they stun lock monsters. Expect a lot of Stun resistant crap in Adoulin.

[Garota]

I absolutely love how the SCH is still casting Embrava on the SAM... Psh! Like if a SAM even cares for Embrava anymore... Go go Refresh effect!