Melee while casting?

[ManaKing]

Parrying/evading/guarding/blocking while attacking can be done, as can spell casting while parrying/evading/guarding/blocking, thats even the point of shield mastery, so just saying it cant be done due to the engine is dumb, people say a lot cant be done due to engine, but look at the proc system, they told us it would be "too costly to list who triggered a stagger" and yet they did 2 updates after. There is always a way even if you need to make an exception to the rule, by treating the effect as something else. Such as classifying auto-attacks as a DOT effect during spell casts. Hell even not getting the TP per strike but allowing for the damage to be done would do wonders.

Good points actually. Several things do happen at the same time and I'll point out that you can be attacked by multiple enemies at the same time without the game exploding (aka skill defensive skills on a pile of mandies). So I would point out that the possibility of the engine allowing something to happen at the same time doesn't sound like a real limitation and more like negativity and pessimism.

Even if you just got an additional attack after you casted a spell, it would be an improvement. Obviously, some people would spam low MP moves to create DPS, but you could just put a minimum limit on the amount of MP that must be used on a spell for you to gain an additional attack. Or you only get additional attacks from specific schools of magic or magic types, like enfeebling or black magic.

Get creative. All this nay-saying is getting boring.

[Neisan_Quetz]

None of those are considered attacks. Countering as well, unless SE makes a mage only counter beyond orcish's ~10%?

[Crimson_Slasher]

Still stands that an exception function can be made. Not to mention few people outside square-enix have the game's engine code, so anyone using it as an excuse to say why it couldnt be done, care to provide your proof? Has the information been publicly disclosed? Perhaps you came across it via a 3rd party website/tool? If none of those is the case, then it is simply an assumption and can not be taken simply as true.

Also to be clear, while i find this handy in theory, i dont think it would be implimented, but it does get tiresome seeing the same "know it all players" on any game forums talking like they have the devs whispering in their ear and have been granted authority to disclose the information and furthermore educate(LECTURE) players on the game and how it should(Must?) be played. Thats not directed at anyone persay, it happens on lots of game forums, but its a sentiment im sure isnt exclusive to me.

[Neisan_Quetz]

I'm against it because knowing SE they'll probably end up give it to monsters as well, and that's the last thing I need to see.

[Greatguardian]

The player isn't parrying/countering/evading/guarding... the Monster's attack actions are being parried, countered, evaded, or guarded. Do you notice the subtle difference there?

The monster is the one acting, Not the player.

There is no exception being made. Players can only perform one action at a time.

This "Computers are magic and can do anything the programmer tells them to do" junk is annoying. It's not about being creative. It's about understanding what is and what isn't a basic constriction of a game's development. There are some things that can be changed, and some things that can't.

This is one of the latter.

[Ordoric]

place all ur concerns in the drk forum lol

[saevel]

Good ideas but your not understanding how a persistent world server works (technical name for an MMO). It's a huge database processing tens to hundreds of thousands of transactions per second. Your actions are nothing but transactions. There is a heartbeat timer that governs time, basically your attacks are just scheduled events taking place during a routine heartbeat. Things like parry / guard are just responses to the event of a monster hitting you, their not their own scheduled events. The way FFXI seems to work is they only allow one player event to be scheduled at any point in time. Now it ~can~ be made, with significant modification, so that multiple events per actor are scheduled and processed. I figure they did it this way for performance reasons.

Try not to think of the game as a pretty picture of you doing stuff but as the server processing ten thousand+ events per second and that everything you do is just an event the server process's.

[ManaKing]

None of those are considered attacks. Countering as well, unless SE makes a mage only counter beyond orcish's ~10%?

Yeah but if you have a system that can take multiple sources of damage at the same time and even have reactions for all of them, then you have a system that can output multiple sources of damage as well, so long as it is coded to do so.

I understand we can't do 2 things at once right now offensively as a player. But multiple things can be done to us at once, so it is very difficult for me to believe that it is impossible or even very difficult. I don't see any actual evidence that says it can't be done. Only that it hasn't been done up till now.

In reality, I would settle for having the programming allow your next attack to go through after a spell cast. If you don't think that can be programmed, you don't know much about programming.

[Greatguardian]

Each "Object" can only perform one action at a time.

Players can perform one action.

Monsters can perform one action.

Who these actions are performed on is irrelevant. If multiple monsters couldn't attack a player, then multiple players couldn't attack a monster.

Each action is run with respect to the Object that generated it. Each monster is able to perform their own action, one at a time, on any other Object.

Your player character does not react when guarding a monster's attack.

The monster attacks, and is met with your player's guard skill activation. That's their action, and that's how it's processed. Your character doesn't actually act at all.

I don't know how to make this any clearer for you, but it almost seems like you are intentionally failing to grasp the concept because it conflicts with what you want.

PS: Being able to throw some code into lolPython does not a programmer make. FFXI is and always will be constricted to the built-in limitations of the game's core combat engine. It was designed in such a way that no object, player or otherwise, could perform more than one action at a time - for very good reason from a development/troubleshooting standpoint.

This is not something that the Developers could change even if they wanted to. It is not something they could throw money or manpower at short of building a brand new game (hi FFXIV). That is the reality of this.

[Crimson_Slasher]

Like i said, i understand limitations in an engine, but the fact we see constant exceptions, made to classify as something other than a regular action, prove it can be done, spike spells and additional effects (enspells, en-doom on monsters) are examples of these, and ignoring them is just plain stupid. As ive stated, the player doesnt technically perform another action when spikes/enspells are triggered, they are added atop, with the scripted attack event triggering them, but like a counter, or like a parry/guard/evade/block, there can simply be a check to see if the character is in range, in attack mode during a spell cast, and if it checks as yes, then it could perform some damage. Sure its complicated, time consuming, and expensive to impliment something like this, but so was retaliation, the code can be made, but dont mistake me, i am not persay for this, nor am i saying it will be done, But it can be done.

Over the years in ffxi lots of people blame ps2 limitations, the engine, and the community of this digital dinosaur of a game, but guess what? theyre still adding content, and they are still adding new monsters, gimicks, and more. I remember when people just like you great guardian came on to the messageboards proclaiming "they cant fit any more onto the ps2 harddrive, we wont have any more expansions" after wotg, and look, we got "A Crystaline Prophecy," "A Moogle Kupode'tat," "A Shantotto Ascension," and "Visions, Scars, and Heros of Abyssea." The game didnt start melting Ps2s, and the servers were adjusted, as was the game's code in ways we cant imagine. Yet here again, someone is here lecturing us with no proof, and just talking in a condesending manner. Sure i cant prove that this can be implimented, but ive offered FAR more examples of how it can be done than you have of how it cant be done. So frankly, either provide the official documentation as provided from SE, or a Third Party Source, or admit you are making educated, but not officially stated assumptions.

We know mine are assumed, lets hear about yours.