Enmity in general

[Dale]

I know exactly how successful DDs are successful, because I've cleared most most battlefields on D without a tank (haven't done Return To Delkfutt's yet without Pld, though I hear it's very doable with Nins, haven't tried that myself), simply bouncing hate between melee DDs efficiently, a problem is, there's absolutely no reason to do this (on most fights) if you have Rngs, and it really limits subjob options in these scenarios making for very repetitive fights. And even if you do bring melee, you limit yourselves generally to the more survivable ones who fight in hybrid sets pretty often.

Smart DDs hit appropriate DT sets when they're going to get hit, and turn their back when shadows (or whatever else they're using to mitigate damage efficiently) are down, that's controlling their damage taken, and WHEN they have enmity, but that's -NOT- controlling their enmity overall, they have just as much as you do, you simply have hate because you did the -LAST- thing, the enmity system is really easy to understand, if you can't explain some bit of special technomagic that these people have access to that others don't the more likely thing is that you're just mischaracterizing what exactly the good DD are doing rather than the bad ones.

Have you tried clearing a battlefield without a healer? If you haven't give it a shot sometime - then you might see why there can be a good reason to do it.

We are basically talking the same language though, just using different words. But it doesn't just have to do with who did what -LAST-. Controlling the amount of damage you do is a factor as well. It's not just about who did what last and limiting the amount of damage they take.

And I agree the enmity system is easy to understand. If you start getting hit and stop doing damage you will lose enmity and no longer be at the enmity cap. And that's basically what I've been saying this whole thread and why it's possible for someone to control their enmity.

[Dale]

Optimizing DD output isn't a new fangled idea among MMOs. What you're describing above is the difference between someone who does (or at least more so) compared to someone that doesn't. As far as draining your MP or them dying, that's kinda the point we're at. MP refresh is ridiculous. Healing output is ridiculous. Outside of insta-gib TP moves or status effects rampaging your ability to keep someone alive, there's very little in the game anymore that carries a threat of death, outside of a bad healer.

If you feel that someone doing bad DD so that you can sorta pseudo maintain hate and tank is a workable and interesting system, then by all means. It's already been said multiple times that you can clear content that way, but that doesn't exactly give a reasonable use to the tank jobs.

I don't agree with the way you characterize it because I don't consider it doing bad DD. I consider it doing smart DD.

We just approach this from a fundamentally different perspective. I believe a tank's job should be to protect other party members - but not necessarily hoard the enemy's attention constantly. This game's enmity system: and how it allows other jobs to acquire threat has always been something I liked about it. So I don't see this it as a flaw.

As far as healing out-put and MP refresh being ridiculous - that would depend on the party set up. For example: if a group of melee DDs and a paladin went into a battlefield that wouldn't be the case. And if a single one of those DDs simply went crazy and hoarded all the threat even while their defensive abilities were down they would end being a burden and would sustain a lot more damage and drain up a lot more of the Paladin's MP than necessary and would risk causing the group to wipe. But if the melee DDs played smart and allowed room for the Paladin to protect them and re-aquire threat when needed the Paladin would be not only be reasonable in that situation but a huge asset.

But anyway: you agree content can be cleared this way so we really aren't disagreeing over any substantial. We just have different preferences in combat systems. You favor one where the tank holds all enmity while the DD use optimized rotations for max damage and I favor one where enmity is more interchangeable and retaliates when damage is done and its the tank's job to get it back before the damage dealer dies.

[Malithar]

As far as healing out-put and MP refresh being ridiculous - that would depend on the party set up. For example: if a group of melee DDs and a paladin went into a battlefield that wouldn't be the case. And if a single one of those DDs simply went crazy and hoarded all the threat even while their defensive abilities were down they would end being a burden and would sustain a lot more damage and drain up a lot more of the Paladin's MP than necessary and would risk causing the group to wipe. But if the melee DDs played smart and allowed room for the Paladin to protect them and re-aquire threat when needed the Paladin would be not only be reasonable in that situation but a huge asset.

Yeah, h'okay. Using extenuating circumstances to make a point doesn't really work out when you're balancing a system for the entirety of the game, not some Valkurm Dunes nightmare party of a Pld and 5 melees. I really can't imagine that working out for anything beyond normal for any fight. Acc becomes a major issue, and without buffs, you'd focus too much gear and food towards Acc, neglecting everything else. Never mind being absolutely devastated with any chain of AoEs.

The 25 page derail in the Job Adjustments topic suddenly makes sense with the case you were making with a shield War. They won't pull hate as quick. -.-

You favor one where the tank holds all enmity while the DD use optimized rotations for max damage and I favor one where enmity is more interchangeable and retaliates when damage is done and its the tank's job to get it back before the damage dealer dies.

Actually, I like it the way it is now for the most part. DDs need to be changed in such a way that they don't cap enmity within seconds, and shedding enmity should come at a faster pace, whether through damage, turning, whatever. Without /Drg, you have no options currently that are viable, and even /Drg won't help a melee keep up with the enmity they're gaining. I don't want a mob glued to a tank by default like some games do, I want them to work for it. But I want them to be capable of getting hate, not just hitting cap and fighting with every other person to be the last to have an action on the mob. Building near retarded setups is not the answer to that.

[Dale]

Yeah, h'okay. Using extenuating circumstances to make a point doesn't really work out when you're balancing a system for the entirety of the game, not some Valkurm Dunes nightmare party of a Pld and 5 melees. I really can't imagine that working out for anything beyond normal for any fight. Acc becomes a major issue, and without buffs, you'd focus too much gear and food towards Acc, neglecting everything else. Never mind being absolutely devastated with any chain of AoEs.

The 25 page derail in the Job Adjustments topic suddenly makes sense with the case you were making with a shield War. They won't pull hate as quick. -.-.

The example I gave Malithar wasn't an extenuating or rare circumstance. That is a common occurrence for me because most of the people I play with prefer to play as melee DDs. So for me, the situation I describe is very common and happens almost daily.

Not sure why you are bringing up the job adjustment topic or what that has to do with my post so think I'll avoid commenting on that. Don't think I have the energy to go through that again. So I'd ask you to please not try to stir that up.

Actually, I like it the way it is now for the most part. DDs need to be changed in such a way that they don't cap enmity within seconds, and shedding enmity should come at a faster pace, whether through damage, turning, whatever. Without /Drg, you have no options currently that are viable, and even /Drg won't help a melee keep up with the enmity they're gaining. I don't want a mob glued to a tank by default like some games do, I want them to work for it. But I want them to be capable of getting hate, not just hitting cap and fighting with every other person to be the last to have an action on the mob. Building near retarded setups is not the answer to that.

I didn't know you were content with the current enmity system. I got the impression from your posts that you wasn't and preferred more of a tank and spank model. So now I'm sort of confused what we are arguing about?

I would support making enmity shed at a faster pace when players receive damage. I even mentioned that in an earlier post so we agree about that. I'm dubious about raising the enmity cap though, because I'm worried it might cause enemies to stop retaliating as effectively. But I'd be willing to give it a shot and see since a few paladins on this board seem to have such a huge problem with it.

[Malthar]

I really don't know why you guys keep arguing with Dale. He believes the sky is green and nothing will convince him otherwise. If you tell him to look up and see the blue sky he will tell you you're lying and it's some sort of trick and he will never look up again.

[Dale]

I really don't know why you guys keep arguing with Dale. He believes the sky is green and nothing will convince him otherwise. If you tell him to look up and see the blue sky he will tell you you're lying and it's some sort of trick and he will never look up again.

That wasn't very fair considering my last post was agreeing with many of the points made since he seemed relatively content with the enmity system - just thinks it could use some tweaking.

But the reason I'm not going to agree with a few of the paladins in this thread is they aren't correct when they give the impression you can't control your enmity on this game and everyone will just end up at enmity cap exchanging blows based on who did what last. That's just not the case. Because you can control it. I and people I play with control it every damn day on this game.

Can the system be improved? Sure. But it's not nearly so bad as people make out.

[Selindrile]

Have you tried clearing a battlefield without a healer? If you haven't give it a shot sometime - then you might see why there can be a good reason to do it.

Yes, have done so on normal plenty, a proper paladin takes next to no damage on many of these fights on Normal or less, so if you're just trying to get a somewhat gimpy melee friend a win, can go in with a Rng + Pld + AFK Gimp and just duo it for their AA clear. (have done this quite a few times)

That said, I have no idea why not bringing a healer would convince me for the need for proper use of PDT sets and defensive abilities when I already said this is what good DDs do.

We are basically talking the same language though, just using different words. But it doesn't just have to do with who did what -LAST-. Controlling the amount of damage you do is a factor as well. It's not just about who did what last and limiting the amount of damage they take.

This is where you don't understand the enmity system, after a certain point, you're both capped on enmity pure and simple, and all that matters at that point is whoever did the -LAST- thing to the enemy. Making sure you're not hitting it when your damage mitigation tools (Read: Utsusemi) aren't up is smart, sure, but that's not making better use of your time than intentionally lowering your damage, that makes 0 logical sense, once your tank is enmity capped anyway.

And I agree the enmity system is easy to understand. If you start getting hit and stop doing damage you will lose enmity and no longer be at the enmity cap. And that's basically what I've been saying this whole thread and why it's possible for someone to control their enmity.

If you start getting hit and stop doing damage, you will lose 55.5 damage worth of enmity per second, so you'll return to the enmity cap extremely quickly (as everyone but you seems to have noticed) the moment you start hitting it again, it's not about controlling enmity after the first 90 seconds of the fight or so, it's about controlling "whoever did the last thing to the mob" all the melees are at or very near cap.

Rangers, (because of decoy shot primarily) are the only ones who actually should consciously try to be aware of their enmity, melees generally just notice the mob spin and realize they're at cap, so don't hit it when my damage mitigation is down because I'm going to pull hate, really straightforward.

I realize you need finite numbers for a computer, so there will always have to be a cap on enmity, but really, it's the cap that screws everything up, if we could simply raise the enmity cap by 100,000xCurrent Cap (or any other suitably large number) and not change anything else, I would be happy with the system we have in place, melees would still have to keep their enmity under control behind the pld, as their enmity would be going up faster than the plds if they went all out, and if this were the case, the real game world would actually work as you're describing it now, but the cap throws all this out of the window. This would create a minor issue if the Pld died of the DDs having a lot of enmity, admittedly, but no worse than the old days, and a more than acceptable tradeoff.

I like the idea of FFXIs enmity system, I like the way enmity worked in the old days of FFXI, when we simply didn't realistically hit the cap but other things were mostly the same (except curing), but now, it's more than a little borked.

[Dale]

Yes, have done so on normal plenty, a proper paladin takes next to no damage on many of these fights on Normal or less, so if you're just trying to get a somewhat gimpy melee friend a win, can go in with a Rng + Pld + AFK Gimp and just duo it for their AA clear. (have done this quite a few times)

That said, I have no idea why not bringing a healer would convince me for the need for proper use of PDT sets and defensive abilities when I already said this is what good DDs do..

I meant to try it on a difficult battle field without a healer. That was the context of your post. Though even on normal ones I disagree and think it can be useful too.

But anyway, the reason I suggested to try it without a healer is because it can give you more of a reason to bounce around hate effectively since you said there was absolutely no reason to do this where I think there can be. It wasn't to prove to you DDs should use PDT sets or their defensive abilities.

This is where you don't understand the enmity system, after a certain point, you're both capped on enmity pure and simple, and all that matters at that point is whoever did the -LAST- thing to the enemy. Making sure you're not hitting it when your damage mitigation tools (Read: Utsusemi) aren't up is smart, sure, but that's not making better use of your time than intentionally lowering your damage, that makes 0 logical sense, once your tank is enmity capped anyway..

But this isn't what you are understanding about the enmity system:

If someone starts taking a lot of damage and stops doing damage they will no longer be at the enmity cap. This idea that everyone is going to end up an enmity cap and stay there no matter what a player does just isn't the case.

And it makes sense to lower your damage intentionally if you are taking more damage than you or your group can handle. It might wouldn't if the enmity system works like you describe and everyone is forced to remain at the enmity cap no matter what. But again: that's not how the system works.

If you start getting hit and stop doing damage, you will lose 55.5 damage worth of enmity per second, so you'll return to the enmity cap extremely quickly (as everyone but you seems to have noticed) the moment you start hitting it again, it's not about controlling enmity after the first 90 seconds of the fight or so, it's about controlling "whoever did the last thing to the mob" all the melees are at or very near cap.

I do recognize the player can move back up to enmity cap quickly if they continue to dish out damage. That's been my whole point all along and why I said players need to intentionally lower their damage when they start getting hit if they want to shed enmity and not be at the cap. So the very thing you are saying everyone but me doesn't recognize is actually the one thing I do recognize where as you are failing to recognize what they can do about it.

All that being said, I wouldn't mind increasing the rate at which players lose enmity once being hit or increasing the enmity cap as long as it didn't interfere with a monster's ability to retaliate. I just maintain the current system is functional and it is possible for players to control their enmity. It's not so flawed that everyone is going to just end up at enmity cap no matter what they do and hate is going to bounce around willy-nilly based on who did what last. That's only the case if you allow it to be.

[Malthar]

So, everyone is out of their minds except you. The madman thinks world crazy, save himself.

[Dale]

So, everyone is out of their minds except you. The madman thinks world crazy, save himself.

First: a few paladins on this thread don't represent everyone Malthar. And I don't think they're out of their minds just being obstinate for some reason and won't just admit that it's possible to control your enmity on this game.

I'm not saying the system is perfect. But it's not bad either and is far superior to a lot of other MMORPGs I've played.