Immanence Balance Discussion

[Zeldar]

Sure would be nice if we didn't push the remaining playerbase, regardless of how they play, away. Regardless of how solo-preference players play is irrelevant to the issue that some aspects of the game are far far weighted toward certain jobs.... If the BST nerf was needed, many more nerf's are needed as well...

Sure would be nice if they changed the core of the game to meet your gaming style? I guess it sure would be nice if football wasn't so hard-hitting so even a 95 pound girl could play linebacker with the big buys. I guess it sure would be nice if your 5 of your friends could control the rest of your party in every final fantasy game too. Yeah, this is the same line of thought as all those pansy parents that think every kid should get a trophy just for showing up. All games have core systems that are meant to be followed.This games core system is that of an MMORPG. They have deviated from that enough for solo play.

[Ketaru]

Perhaps.

I think fixing ACC was a good start but the underlying issue is Enfeeble / TP spam. Maybe they could give MNK, NIN, SAM a trait that gives them a chance on hit to inhibit TP gain. It would give people a reason to bring said Jobs as well as improve survivability for melee. If they don't want to mess with how often enfeebles can hit, perhaps they need to buff diminishing returns on players?

That would be all well and good for MNK, NIN, or SAM. But at what would point would enemies be so nerfed that the difference in playstyles between ranged jobs and melee jobs completely lose all meaning? Thinking about a job like RNG- which, in my opinion has been punished more than enough for its brief moment as a bandwagon job back in the early 2000s- shouldn't the fact they can safely deal damage at a range count for something in deciding jobs to bring?

[kylani]

Sure would be nice if we didn't push the remaining playerbase, regardless of how they play, away. Regardless of how solo-preference players play is irrelevant to the issue that some aspects of the game are far far weighted toward certain jobs.... If the BST nerf was needed, many more nerf's are needed as well...

I hated the bst nerf, though the main thing I hated was how SE broke the commands more than the changed distance itself. I am fine meleeing with my pet. I actually like meleeing. It's fighting beside my pet and the commands not working that drives me crazy.

That said, I really hate comments that say 'because my job was nerfed, other jobs should be'. I don't know anything about immanence except what I've read, so I'm not weighing in on whether it's unbalanced or not, but no job should be nerfed because another job was. Jobs should be adjusted for general balance. If other jobs can be buffed to balance things, I'd prefer a buff over a nerf. That said, I understand sometimes some adjustment is needed because you can't buff everyone.

At this stage of the game, I mainly hope SE finds a way to balance so that everyone can enjoy the game on the job they love. Nothing makes me sadder than folks having to play a job they hate, to get gear for the job they really want to play. I loved my old static groups. Somehow I lucked out into finding folks who enjoyed playing together and figuring out how to make it work with jobs folks wanted to play. Those days/victories will always be sweetest to me because it was about teamwork and friendship and enjoying figuring out how to beat the content with what you had, not about the expedient way to get something. It felt more like an adventure, and gear was just a nice side benefit.

[Shyles]

I agree with alot of what Kylani said. Everyone likes buffs, but sometimes things do need to be nerfed. That isn't to say that nerfing/removing/adjusting Immanence is going to fix everything, but it will certainly even the playing field quite a bit. I think at the end of the day, the Immanence gimmick would have to be eliminated as a viable strategy for end-game if other strategies are going to be more widely explored. It's far safer, it needs less support, and it's far less gear intensive than melee options.

The question that I wanted to pose to people in this thread was, How? What are some options? I offered that MB bonus could be recalculated to be based on SC damage rather than the # of steps. An MB from a 2-step Darkness should hit harder than a 2-step Scission for example. I think that would help tremendously since I think it would encourage players to use melees for SCs instead of a Scholar, but maybe it wouldn't! What are some other options that we could discuss?

Should Immanence or MBs not be adjusted, but rather make Physical DD equally as safe and accurate with similar offensive gear requirements?

Should Immanence be removed entirely?

Should Scholars get a BST-like nerf, and have to stand in melee range when skillchaining with Immanence? (Ex: Makes it possible for your next elemental magic spell to be used in a skillchain, but range is reduced)

Should Immanence spells have an unquantified hit-rate penalty like Desperate Flourish?

These are all just random examples that popped into my head, and some probably would have bad consequences. Let's talk about potential solutions and consequences.

As it stands, we have a situation where players have to pick between using a safe job and unsafe jobs, and the choice is pretty easy. If there are safe and unsafe jobs, that's just a sign of bad balancing. There shouldn't be any safe jobs, which is why BST's "Ready" range was reduced. There should be a certain balanced amount of risk to every job, regardless of role. That's why I think an Immanence nerf is more necessary and critical right now than buffing physical DDs.

[Olor]

I think that immanence should have a chance of missing and require wearing an accuracy set with as much accuracy as melee DDs need to wear in order to actually hit. Just make it like BLU spells - they can miss. I think making it a lot harder to land would take away the main advantage it has over melee DDs.

[Shyles]

I think that immanence should have a chance of missing and require wearing an accuracy set with as much accuracy as melee DDs need to wear in order to actually hit. Just make it like BLU spells - they can miss. I think making it a lot harder to land would take away the main advantage it has over melee DDs.

I could get behind something like that! So specifically with blue magic spells, it's the physical damage spells that are subject to accuracy/evasion, right? So what if spells under the effect of Immanence were counted as physical damage?

[Zeldar]

Actually magic spells are subject to magic accuracy and magic evasion as well. Its not uncommon to nuke a set of mobs and see 1 or 2 out of 10 take half the damage. I could get behind immanence having a small chance of missing if the SCH isn't geared well, but since it is basically magic damage, it would make sense for it to be based on magic accuracy.

[OmnysValefor]

The only time magic accuracy comes into play really is the fact that a double weak sch (thus floored magic acc, all spells hittin for 0) will still land both Immanence.

In practice, that's not really a concern, because if your sch is double-weak, it's probably a wipe and they're probably struggling for stratagems anyway.

But yeah, you can have an awful-geared sch mule popping Immanences for you.

[Olor]

I could get behind something like that! So specifically with blue magic spells, it's the physical damage spells that are subject to accuracy/evasion, right? So what if spells under the effect of Immanence were counted as physical damage?

Exactly. BLU physical magic needs accuracy to land and unlike magical magic it can miss entirely. If they made immanence the same it would make SCH less than 100% reliable - making other SC openers more competitive.

I don't think it would solve it entirely but it would help lessen the advantage SCH has over physical DDs in Skillchaining without changing the damage equation of magic bursts entirely and thus making everything way more difficult.

[Rooj]

It doesn't matter if Immanence can miss. The people who only bring mages to content are still going to only bring mages to content, who cares if it takes a few more minutes to beat a boss, when they are under the impression content can never be cleared with melee.