Game/Job balance suggestions

[Catmato]

it probably affects stats other than just HP.

When HP scaling was introduced to Delve, SE said that enemies' HP would be reduced, but their strength was not adjusted.

[Urmom]

So you got baited on semantics, good one there.



... so at minimum it's a 50% skillchain damage boost multiplicative before resists/bonuses, and grows from there depending on your coordination with melee. Meaning your heaviest hitting melee are likely to hit the damage cap and your lesser damage WSes that skillchain will hit harder. Knowing where to cut that off so you're using it as a boosting DPS is up to actually having someone who know's what they're doing organizing your skillchains.

You're also overplaying how many players can even hit max damage in skillchains. There's still a clear hierarchy of melee who are better suited to open skillchains than to close them. In a skillchain/MB meta it's free, unresistant damage that scales.

Only time when holding TP is a DPS loss is if you've got Melee sitting on 2000 + TP frequently and their WS hits hardest among the group. Usually in situations like that you have them participate as the closer for multiple openers who aren't building TP as frequently or don't have as high damage output with their WS.

If you're halfway decent at skillchaining you won't be ruining your DPS. You're also forgetting the other important factor here - keeping your skillchain window open continuously.

I think you are highly overestimating how well people can not only coordinate doing ws but also somehow timing when they get enough tp for holding it to not be a downside. Fact is in practice more than 2 dds at high attack speeds it often becomes detrimental to make sure you perform skillchains. Having some idea of timing to try for them helps but actively holding tp and dmg back not so much. This is why it adding more dds lowers your average dps and sometimes even overall dps.

And you are forgetting that keeping your skillchain window often open isn't actually a plus because you are constantly changing the elements making the timing of those MB much harder. Not to mention each step shortens the window to begin with. You are also forgetting that too much magic that close together imposes huge penalties on the dmg.

And don't forget to do these long multi step multi weapon type skillchains you will have to use inferior ws and inferior skillchains. So it's not like you it's not like you are necessarily doing more dmg than the guy just self lighting

[OmnysValefor]

Urmom nailed it.

---

The simple fact is all the coordination, preparation and babysitting that such a strategy requires often leads to inferior or equal results than just bringing PLD, WHM, GEO, SCH, [GEO, SCH or BLM], BLM. There are no melee that need cared for or waited on while they wait for amensia to wear off. TP isn't being fed, excess tp isn't being fed, animation locks + dread spikes aren't killing your dual wielders, vex/attune probably isn't needed. Your source of skillchains doesn't have to worry about sitting vulnerable or struggling to hit the boss.

Hyrist, you called me out earlier as if I'm saying that these are red mage problems.. they aren't, but they're problems that affect red mage and a lot of other jobs. The tragedy is that the game is designed in such a lopsided fashion that when you doneed a good BRD or RDM or NIN, it's often difficult to find one and I can't blame people "Oh, now you want me?"

[Raydeus]

The tragedy is that the game is designed in such a lopsided fashion that when you doneed a good BRD or RDM or NIN, it's often difficult to find one and I can't blame people "Oh, now you want me?"

Can confirm.

[Hyrist]

Hey, when you argue on behalf of laziness , there isn't an argument in the world that will convince those that prefer it otherwise.

But it's 2016. It's not as if all our players are playing on 3 different consoles. VoiP is free and plentiful. All it takes is one shot caller, especially if that shot caller knows what their doing.

A self Skillchainer benefits from Inundation as well. However, they're not going out damage a team that turns that one self skillchain into two separate skillchains, especially if they're properly stacked. A mage team that can continuously burst will also out DPS a team that has to wait between the WSes not skillchaining to burst, all other variables being the same. Then there's also the unspecified Burst bonus that comes with skillchain stacking. (which we should have numbers on by now, guessing research is harder these days.)

Oh, and you can keep any element you chose through 3 skill-chains consistently. With fire, you can do it for four, and is the only element that can. (That trick is only for longest bursting window though, not for max WS/SC damage) So no, altering your Mage's Elements and hurting their windows flatly isn't a thing, and if it is, you're doing it wrong. Again, you prioritize free-nuking of your bursters if your Mage DPS outscales your Melee - which in this Meta it does a bit of lost WS damage is easily overcompensated by one more MBed nuke in the same span of time. More than likely though, you can find enough hard-hitting WSes to complete that chain without devastating your damage. Only hurts damage when you're stacking weapon types too much and you wind up stretching one Weapon's capability of reaching all tier 2 skillchain types.

But again, if all you want to be is lazy, then you can always just settle for the 50% bonus skillchain damage. You don't need to be special or skilled for it. Just happens to be a really nice spell for melee, that gets better the more you get smart with your skillchains. It's something that's been overlooked.

[OmnysValefor]

I don't appreciate the insult.

The problem is that one tactic approaches the boss with "this will probably work", and the other tactic approaches the boss with "this is smarter, safer, faster, and easier" in 90% of content. Manaburn presently has all the benefits and none of the weaknesses.

- Safe mages
- TP feed is not an issue
- Accuracy for skillchain components is not an issue -- If Strats are available, a scholar and stand at max range, double weak--when magic acc is floored--and make a skillchain. Granted, if a mage is double weak, they probably won't stay alive for long, this is just to illustrate how irrelevant magic accuracy is for sch skillchaining.
- For whatever reason, Magic Accuracy seems easier to meet, and bursting grants a m.acc bonus
- Without melee, you can focus all your buffs towards one type
- All mages benefit from most mage buffs
- The tank just isn't likely to die most the time, especially if less tp feed is coming
- Mages produce far less enmity which matters after a hate reset or in content where enmity is a bit shakier (like HTBF)
- Most debuffs/aoes don't even hit mages so there's less babysitting/distraction for the healer.

I actually can't believe the game is where it's at and am kind of disappointed, but don't blame me for it.

[Hyrist]

I was tired of being political correct. It really does boil down to the habitual obsession with gamers taking the path of least resistance and that's all that there is to it. Call it efficiency or laziness, but it boils down to even if benefits or a harder tactic were to out-scale the 'safe way', you will always find the majority argument to always side with the least amount of effort involved. Even if the better result incurs more risk, players will prefer the riskless route. That's why higher difficulty trials typically run with a uniform group. In my humble opinion it stops being a game at that point and turns it into a chore. The playerbase's obsession with this is as much at fault with the decline of the game and the push towards more soloists over groups.

We're reaching the point where, as a player, you should be looking for other players, not looking for other jobs. Making tactics work rather than arm-stringing players into play jobs they don't enjoy just to participate. The inverse quickens this game's end dramatically.


I am in agreement with you that several components of the game flatly should not exist how they are. As I'm particularly harsh right now, let me get some nastiness out of my system by putting some short and cutting changes to accommodate the issues you listed. We are in a suggestion thread, after all.

- Safe mages - More AoEs specifically targeted at Long range only attacks where safe range is close. Have this alternate with normal aoes. Also have AoE attacks that target the lowest on the hate scale. You should absolutely never have a 'safe' class in an mmo.
- TP feed is not an issue - Remove TP feed and give every monster high Regain or, by comparison, give monsters inverse Occult Acumen multiplied by a factor of 10-100. Heavy or frequent damage should be universally dangerous one way or another.
- Accuracy for skillchain components is not an issue -- If Strats are available, a scholar and stand at max range, double weak--when magic acc is floored--and make a skillchain. Granted, if a mage is double weak, they probably won't stay alive for long, this is just to illustrate how irrelevant magic accuracy is for sch skillchaining. - Remove Immanence, replace with a skill that grands Magic Burst Accuracy and Damage.
- For whatever reason, Magic Accuracy seems easier to meet, and bursting grants a m.acc bonus. - Tune the Magical Evasion Scaling to level and Melee Evasion Scaling per level to match. Have all skillchains grant an Physical Evasion Down debuff of 30%, debuff lasts five seconds.
- Without melee, you can focus all your buffs towards one type - hard-cap M.Atk,M.Defence difference calculations to similar levels of attack.
- All mages benefit from most mage buffs - Remain unchanged. Physical Damage calculations are also universal. Have March apply to Ranged Attack speed.
- The tank just isn't likely to die most the time, especially if less tp feed is coming - Redundant, addressed TP feed argument above.
- Mages produce far less enmity which matters after a hate reset or in content where enmity is a bit shakier (like HTBF) - Targeted AoEs on different parts of the Emnity scale (above) removes 'safety' issue. Hard-cap enmity reduction below lvl 75 levels to be sure.
- Most debuffs/aoes don't even hit mages so there's less babysitting/distraction for the healer. - Targeted AoEs at back-line, AoEs that strike at ~50 radius.

I actually can't believe the game is where it's at and am kind of disappointed, but don't blame me for it.

I don't blame you for the state of the game. I blame the playerbase mentality for shamelessly and uniformly exploiting it to the point of excluding our fellow players. Valuing gains to the point that will lead us into a quicker dead end both in terms of capping characters out quicker and having little to nothing to do, and in pushing players away causing this game's lifeline to close out sooner, above actually working with and playing with people, as people and enjoying the time we have in game rather than the loot in your pool.

I've literally heard the argument to me that the most important factor in this game is the time/gil ratio of content. And I spent two days off the game baffled at when our playerbase BECAME the gilsellers. But that's literally the state of the game right now, and, yeah, I'm salty you're arguing on behalf of that mentality.

[Shyles]

I agree with pretty much everything, Hyrist. You touched on a lot of complaints I've had about Melee vs. Magic job balancing. I agree that there should be a similar level of survival threat for all jobs, and perhaps boss mechanics that actively encourage player movement. And I definitely agree that TP feed is an outdated mechanic that disproportionately affects melee. It would be neat to see that replaced with either HP-triggered or phase triggered attacks, and introduce more environmental ("don't stand in fire") kind of threats to keep us on our toes. That way the damage could be a threat to anyone, but avoidable if you're paying attention.

The only problem though is that now that the development team is smaller, we're not likely to see any drastic game mechanic changes like that. We're kind of stuck with primarily Radial and Cone AoE threats, which makes things a little one dimensional as far as balancing boss encounters. It will always be safer for those who can stand out of range. Still, we did see some Environment mechanics in the Cloud of Darkness fight. So perhaps there is a little hope there!

[Hyrist]

That's understandable, but I was making extreme fixes.

Easier to implement and more moderately done are things like Eminty adjustments, increase in TP feed from casting (so long as it's flagged as a different source, can we get confirmation on that?) The removal of Immanence is also kind of a critical issue. Skillchains were supposed to be a teamwork component between Mages and Melee, and that one skill completely removes that mechanic and its intended purpose.

As far as targeted WSes. If we're talking problems with making mages and Melee Equal have more global AoEs. I'm talking range radius of 50 yalms. Everyone gets hit, nobody is 'safe'. Yes, this 'burdens' the healers, but it actually makes use of them, and makes damage mitigation skills and abilities useful. The AoEs don't have to be frequent and killing on their own.)You can balance out the global damage with the removal of TP feed, have them impact soft threats. And it's not hard to program in Regain, it will just take time to do it to so many monsters at this point. Still, focusing on endgame (Escha) mobs really should just do the trick.

We have enough depth in existing code to make fights more engaging and more universal in threat. Meanwhile all these obscene efficiency arguments are really moot until tier 2s in Eschas (And spotty there.) The harder part about Escha is actually getting warm bodies to show and help gear people up. And that's due to how hostile the environment endgame is towards Melee and anything not in this 'mage onry' meta.

Most other issues are just numbers adjustments. These calculations are literally just sitting in the code and can be altered fairly easily.

[OmnysValefor]

Eh, some of these pops are expensive or annoying to farm. Loot is not 100% and when it's something half or more of your group needs 1 (or more ._.) of, you take the effective strategy.

With a bit of luck, ninja can tank many of the bosses in the game. RDM can heal it (content where the backline jobs are safe), but we don't bring NIN and RDM, we bring RUN/PLD and SCH/WHM. Why? Because it's more intelligent. It's not lazy to bring the tank that can properly mitigate the damage or the healer that can properly protect the tank. In the same way, it's only practical to bring the most intelligent strategy.

You come here and read a few posts I've made and assume things like I'm arguing for the current meta, and I'm really not:
- I've just accepted it. I've been complaining for a long time that the rate at which melee TP have now rendered more than 2 melee (sometimes including the tank) useless. Needs to be fixed but SE barely acknowledges it. Attack speed is so fast that two melee can reliably pull off three step skillchains. Here's one idea I had A command to shut off the skillchain properties of weaponskills
- I've commented on the problem that refresh/sources of full mana are probably too abundant. The trade-off used to be that melee started empty, built up (tp), mages started full and emptied out ("these kids today probably don't know the difference between hMP and HMP"). Now, Mages start full and pretty much stay full. They used to be glass-cannons but now they're rock solid machine guns even on a simple boss like delores whose mechanics were meant to try to thwart mages a little bit.
- and various other things.

A friend in game said it best: The imbalance right now often leaves you feeling like you're mercing for your own ls--you're playing on the effective jobs, to get the task done so that some guy can join and lot a piece of gear and drop--and he's content to do just that.

I do agree, and have suggested before, that Immanence needs some tough love but combat needs an overhaul first. One that, like Shyles said, we probably won't see. Square shouldn't just say "Immanence has been removed" and leave LS's struggling to to gear people have have been focusing on Amalric rather than Ryuo.

The funny thing about Amnesia is Nyzul has had the mage-counter all along. A boss that inhibits the use of certain types of magic at certain phases.