[Dev1235] Job Adjustments

[Sapphires]

First the /DNC step recast isn't going to change the rate of which THFs kill in Dynamis. All it will do is allow them to proc all the mobs they kill. I personally don't stop attacking or turn my back just to proc. You get more money just killing it and trying to proc the next one. Second Dynamis doesn't matter for end game balance who the hell even cares.

I'm well acquainted with the merits of straight up killing and not turning or waiting on staggering.
Its very easy to be straight up obnoxious and kill an entire camp solo already without consideration for staggering to run off competition, so staggering is very much a factor on people's farming take. Not everyone mains thf and has high TH by default.

I'm raising my concern to the devs and want to know if they made thoughtful consideration of the impact of this change on zone congestion and farming of a currency that is a cornerstone of the game economy.

[Glamdring]

ok, 1st relax and take a breath people. in the past it has sometimes taken more than 1 job adjustments post to get everything in an update, so there MAY -not will, may- be more to come.

now, as to updates, the pet accuracy buff is golden, unfortunately no damage, def or attack speed buffs so we'll still have issues but at least it's not pure "whiff" like it is now, and after all, they could multiply pet physical damage 10 times, if it doesn't connect it doesn't exist.

now, the boost to accuracy for our job's primary weapons... nice all told but it steals some of the uniqueness from some of the jobs. still, if uniqueness was keeping you from getting party invites then uniqueness can go F itself. As to the thread post about thf irrelevance now, I wasn't aware of thief getting any invites for any reason but TH before today so on behalf of all the dancers out there who might get a party invite now, stuff it! and yes, I play both dancer and thief. And by the way, I think TH will STILL get thief more invites than dancer even with the changes, people want drops more than anything.

the ninja changes. Lord knows they needed something, with all of endgame able to strip shadows in like 2 seconds max they needed another way to be relevant and a DD bump isn't a bad choice. I don't know if it's enough but we'll see. if nothing else it should make the job a bit more fun. and it gives smiths a reason to make shuriken again-ok, for the 1st time.

Blues, ease up! you have been buffed 2 updates in a row now, some jobs go 2 years between updates and then they aren't any good. Be thankful for what you got, it's more than 19 other jobs have gotten over the same span.

Summoner and Atmos... it's been what, 4 years since he was announced and this is it? wow, I am so underwhelmed right now I'm going to have someone check me for my coma scale score... only possible utility I see is if it works on megaboss killer abilities, like the venom shell on the uraganite NM in alluvion skirmishes, but that is not the pattern SE has followed in the past and I'd lay odds it isn't the case now.

the geomancer ability entrust, not sure how this works. it's POSSIBLE this could be used to get a 3rd buff out there. It's also superior to bard in 1 respect; my biggest problem playing bard is that even with the announcement in every one of my casting macros that I am casting a buff right now other players run out of range anyway. My attitude, fine, you didn't want the buff, damned if I'm going to chase you down to put it on you. But now Geo can indi-haste a melee so even if they try to run out of range another melee may force them to take their haste anyway. I can dig that. and if that means I can still cast another indi on myself then I can backline with the mages using indi refresh or whatnot and save a geo for something else. That is a HUGE win if it works that way.

[Ulth]

I'm well acquainted with the merits of straight up killing and not turning or waiting on staggering.
Its very easy to be straight up obnoxious and kill an entire camp solo already without consideration for staggering to run off competition, so staggering is very much a factor on people's farming take. Not everyone mains thf and has high TH by default.

I'm raising my concern to the devs and want to know if they made thoughtful consideration of the impact of this change on zone congestion and farming of a currency that is a cornerstone of the game economy.

It's not going to change the congestion of the zone. It might change the best farming method making white proc on DNC more profitable than THF/DNC. But even at the current cool down job ability proc is heads and shoulders above ws and magic, so it's not like there will be suddenly more people going for job ability procs, since they are already the best option. Also sharing camps is not feasible. If I don't weapons skill I kill the last mob in a camp at about the same time the first one respawns. Check the zone in search before you go in to make sure there are enough camps to go around. If there is someone in the camp you want, don't go camp on top of them. Just ask when they will be done and move in once they run out of time. People camping on top of you when there are 2 other camps in the zone is what is really obnoxious.

I don't like the crowds in dynamis as much as the next person, but short of making it an instanced zone nothing is going to change that.

[Catmato]

All this talk of COR and BRD combat skills... Where's my WHM A+ club skill? and native dual-wield prz

[Selindrile]

Warrior

5% More attack for warrior main under berserk, better than nothing, but not exciting.

Thief

A+ for a job's main skill should've been done ages ago, and this will have a very minor effect.

Beastmaster

A+ for a job's main skill should've been done ages ago, and this will have a very minor effect. I doubt they'll go far enough on the pet changes, we'll see.

Ninja

Ratk and Racc in my tp set? Hah no thanks, even sange which seems like it could be very cool, will just make Nin better for farming trash content, and still all but useless on high end content.

Dragoon

Changes nothing whatsoever.

Summoner

This is likely overly optimistic but if Atomos is just a targetted spell you can cast with another Summon out and it can steal anything including SPs, this could be situationally good, if either of these things are untrue, highly dissapointing.
Apogee sounds extremely undwhelming, but yay new ja, I guess.
Avatar's favor may be a positive, depending on how much extra MP/tic the perpetuation cost is, if too much it will be annoying. And we'll see how the pet acc changes affect Smn.

Blue Mage

Casting times on those spells don't matter too much as they're not generally used.
Duration on Barrier Tusk, Orcish Counterstance, Nature's Meditation, Saline Coat, Memento More are potentially great, we'll have to see how long the duration becomes. The stoneskin spells duration was rarely an issue, the potency, casting time and cost on diamondhide is /shrug. Regeneration could be a small bonus depending on value.

Puppetmaster

Long overdue, doubt it's enough but we'll see.

Dancer

I like this list, however, it does seem to compound the JA/Attack delay problem, when are Dnc actually going to find time to TP? lol, and I'm fine with X/Dnc getting the lower timers too, but I do think they should revisit WS and Magic proc rates considering this to open up dyna camps, not that that's a huge deal.

Geomancer

Entrust is full of potential, if it allows another indi-bubble to be cast, letting you have 3 buffs for some of the time, this is quite powerful. If using entrust stops you from having your own indi-bubble, then they should lower the recast timer to the duration of your indi spells so you can position the other bubble wherever you want, having to keep it centered on you is frustrating, and powerful as a third bubble would be, I may just wish I could keep 2 bubbles wherever I want them instead.

[Byrth]

The DNC changes further exacerbate the job's already-choppy playstyle. We need a JA delay reduction.

[Afania]

The DNC changes further exacerbate the job's already-choppy playstyle. We need a JA delay reduction.

What do you expect? Potent def down that can be used with absolutely 0 penalty? That'd be totally broken/OP. May as well play the SAM or MNK if moar dmg is what you want.

[ but I do think they should revisit WS and Magic proc rates in lieu of this to open up dyna camps, not that that's a huge deal.

This is quite a huge deal IMO, that means relics can be made more easily, and that'd affect the game design direction.

It's either relic in the future would be even less relevant than it is now, or the game difficulty is based on everyone must own a relic. Both results are bad.

[Malithar]

What do you expect? Potent def down that can be used with absolutely 0 penalty? That'd be totally broken/OP. May as well play the SAM or MNK if moar dmg is what you want.

Considering the amounts of -def Dia II/III (10%/15%, no penalty, unless you're going to say MP, then I'd say stfu), Angon (25%, 60% up keep JA, costs 500 gil or whatever for an Angon), and Geo-Frailty (41%, high MP cost, 1 of 2 bubbles able to be kept up) provide, I'd agree that using up to 10 (but as low as 7) steps to cap the defense reduction at...what was it, -23%, is a pretty extreme cost. Not to say it'd never be worth it, but it's still a lot of work compared to what other -def abilities provide, and while you do gain finishing moves, it's still costing you TP as well.

Edit: Frailty obviously with Idris, I don't keep track of non-Idris numbers anymore, so sub in whatever that is.

[Byrth]

Yeah, Box Step is the most expensive form of defense reduction in the game by a long shot. What they should have done is double the potency of DNC steps (for DNC main at 99) and leave the maximum daze level at 5, and then not change the recast of steps. Then we only have to suffer as much JA delay as we used to, we get the same potency of debuff that we get now, and it's *still* effectively the most expensive form of defense reduction in the game.

To expand that list Malithar made:
* Dia II/III - 10/15% defense reduction, takes about 4 seconds to cast and recover from if you include magic delay and 30/45 MP. So it's 3 MP/defense down and 2.5% defense down/second. It is single target and has a near-instant activation time (<1 sec).
* Angon - 25% defense down, costs about 300 gil and 1-2 seconds JA delay (12.5% defense down/second). It is single target and has an instant activation time.
* Indi-Frailty - 37.5% defense down, 147MP, takes about 5 seconds to cast and recover from if you include magic delay. So it's about 4MP/defense down and 7.5% defense down/second. Also, it moves around with (after this update) whoever you cast it on and affects everything nearby. Instant activation time.
* Box Step - 23% defense down at level 10. Costs between 500 and 1000 TP to max out and takes between 15 and 20 seconds of forced JA delay to reach max potency (respectively). It is single target. So it's 22~43TP/Defense Down and 1.15% defense down/second. Not only that, but will take (even after this patch) at least 35 seconds to hit max potency (currently something like 1.5 minutes).


So no, Box step is not going to be overpowered if they scaled its potency up so it was 23% at level 5 daze and reduce the max daze level back to 5 (effectively 2.3% defense down/second). It would still be the least efficient Defense Down option, but the job would suck less to use.

[Glamdring]

Considering the amounts of -def Dia II/III (10%/15%, no penalty, unless you're going to say MP, then I'd say stfu), Angon (25%, 60% up keep JA, costs 500 gil or whatever for an Angon), and Geo-Frailty (41%, high MP cost, 1 of 2 bubbles able to be kept up) provide, I'd agree that using up to 10 (but as low as 7) steps to cap the defense reduction at...what was it, -23%, is a pretty extreme cost. Not to say it'd never be worth it, but it's still a lot of work compared to what other -def abilities provide, and while you do gain finishing moves, it's still costing you TP as well.

Edit: Frailty obviously with Idris, I don't keep track of non-Idris numbers anymore, so sub in whatever that is.

it opens a different possible job build for acceptable parties so it's not totally pointless, after all, parties may not be packing a rdm, drg and geo, or allows the geo to go with a different bubble buff/debuff, and I DO like options.