Thread: Very concerned about 4.0 gameplay having no strategy

each job is getting one cool down , this is one of the key things they where changing so the op is write its one on every job now

I mean squares main goal going into SB was to decrease the dps disparity between high tier player and newer players to not discourage someone from trying the game if they know that itll take months before they can do even remotely decent numbers. Remeber some of us have been doing similar iterations of the same rotations for 4+ years now. Unfortunately unless square wants to significantly increase the skill floor where doing the most optimal min max rotation only yields you little to no real gains, the best course of action is to increase the skill floor some and decrease the skill ceiling some. This means removing overly complex "in head calculations as you put it" and still having mechanics that will separate the veterans from the newbies. We havent seen all info, but in case of monk, they lost B4B but gained a new 30% dps cd that increases gcd by 15%.

Originally Posted by Khel

It levels the playing field. Some classes got access to much better cross class skills than others. That has nothing to do with taking away strategy IMO.

My post has nothing to do with the change between cross-class skills and X-role skills per se; remember, they haven't just been removed from borrowing classes, but even the class they came from. It's that the removal of percentile abilities greatly decreases the issue of CD synergy/holding (for internal reasons), which thus far has been THE most important consideration in gameplay (e.g. "macrorotation") for all DPS. That will reduce skill-gap, certainly, but it also removes the majority of everything that's going on behind the surface of XIV combat, leaving only fight-specific interactions. That's a huge blow to be taken as someone who already likes XIV combat as it is now.

Originally Posted by KaiSunstrider

I mean squares main goal going into SB was to decrease the dps disparity between high tier player and newer players to not discourage someone from trying the game if they know that itll take months before they can do even remotely decent numbers. Remember some of us have been doing similar iterations of the same rotations for 4+ years now. Unfortunately unless square wants to significantly increase the skill floor where doing the most optimal min max rotation only yields you little to no real gains, the best course of action is to increase the skill floor some and decrease the skill ceiling some. This means removing overly complex "in head calculations as you put it" and still having mechanics that will separate the veterans from the newbies. We havent seen all info, but in case of monk, they lost B4B but gained a new 30% dps cd that increases gcd by 15%.

A rotation-changing 13% DPS increase for 20s per 60. I'm actually looking forward to that one because there might be a reason to hold onto it to some extent, or adjust one's rotation to fit it, to ensure that it's getting it all it can out of those 20 seconds despite essentially losing GL3.

That said, effective complexity will vary from person to person; I don't see why the issue should be removed completely as not to reward those who were able. Even if still a relatively shallow form even then, these are core issues of thinking, nuance, decisiveness. Its not just better "button spamming" or key cycling. However brief the actual windows of adjustment may be, it makes for valuable consideration. That should NEVER be restricted. And it SHOULD be rewarded.

Just as players SHOULD be taught how to do decently in such a system. Instead, SE's just pulling themselves out of the range of responsibility, preferring to give up on the system than to provide worthwhile in-game instruction and support. That is NEVER a good sign.

Honestly there is something to be said about this.

Right now the game actually requires some tactical thinking. Not to the extent of something like FFXI where you had to know Elemental vulnerabilities, skill chain combos with other classes, and Magic Burst info... but rather more of a personal character skill level in utilizing your abilities in a tactical function according to the dungeon or task or scenario you are faced with.

Example:
What skills can I chain togather to destroy this large group of mobs?
What skills should I use for this single target boss mob... and will that change on the next boss mob?
What should I use Raging Strikes in my opener?
Or should I save it for the DPS check that will be coming up?
Should I use a hard cast of Bio/Bio2/Miasma when I can stand in place and Turret for now and save Tri-Disaster for later when there's heavy movement mechanics in the fight?
Or do I need my DoTs on target immediately and hence use Tri-Disaster?
Should I use my Quick Cast now for Shadowflare (AoE Trash Pack)?
Or save it in case I need to Quick Cast Raise later (Raid)?

Those are tactical questions you have to ask yourself and adapt them to the fight you're in. Because no situation is really ever the same.

So yes that is a factor.

But at the same time a newbie walking into the char for the first time may not have the slightest idea of how or what the skills are actually used for even if reading the tool tips...

....because what's on paper, and what is the reality of the game are two different things. Combat is fluid, tactical, and chaotic in the real game, but that's the nature of combat... and the more options you have at your disposal, the more likely you can adapt a tactic to fit the scenario.

That said... those hot bars are getting awful full... and you can only put so many things on there.

Originally Posted by KaiSunstrider

I agree that CD synergy/holding for maximum multiplicative gains is a nice flavor that many of us enjoy, but those favorable synergies are also why many players get denied from groups in favor of classes who synergize the best together because of buffs that affect only a certain portion of the jobs and are not blanket raid buffs such as trick attack.

That's why I specified "internal", i.e. between one of your own CDs and another of your own CDs.

Agreed, though. Compositional synergies can be a dangerous thing. Without them, especially in a game with barebone undermechanics, you can feel basically alone even as one dps among 14 others. But if they're too strong, jobs can be filtered out of a given meta. Not necessarily because those outliers are weak, but simply because they are perceived as such, and at least in that particular fight, their other utilities can give anything more productive.

I'd often wonder what would happen if you made the ranged classes dually magical and physical in damage type, such as Bloodletter, Sidewinder, Iron Jaws, and periodic damage on Bards and Gauss Round, Hot Shot, and crits made during Gauss Barrel on MCH either benefit from magic vulnerability instead or benefit from whichever is present, non-stacking. Especially with Foe built into Ballad and songs now seemingly instant oGCDs on Bard 4.0, that might be enough already to push double-casters back into viability.

Another thing that they *might* have been able to do is ensure that buffs of the same type stack additively even if calculated separately. I suspect, though, that if they could easily limit this, then they would have done so already, given their attempts not to allow for escalation of same-type buffs and their ensuring that potions, etc., are based on one's base stats, rather than, say, one's Hawk Eye-affected value. Iirc, at present two pure % damage buffs (RS and BFB) would simply add atop each other, as would two % crit buffs (e.g. IR and Litany), whereas stacked buffs of different types (e.g. IR, HE, BFB-RS or IR, RS, Berserk on an early PvP Marauder) act multiplicatively; but additionally, if one buff is present on the attacker and the other, in the form of a debuff, is present on the target, then they any effects therein will always act multiplicatively, because they are calculated separately and are likely unable to be consolidated to a single modifier.

Raid debuffs therefore naturally have more potential for synergy over anything you could do on your own. But, that's not to say that this is really that large a contribution. The difference between 120*1.2 (RS + HC/TA, multiplicative) and 140 (the same, but additive) is still under some 3% effectiveness. That's significant when competing for FFlog fastest times, but given that this overlap will only occur for 20 of every 180 seconds, it's contributing at best .32% dps. In the end, a single improved Shukuchi to more quickly reach and complete 3-man time gates could make nearly the same contribution to clear times.

I am quite confused, not gonna lie.

As Mch, the only "strategy" that this cd management involved was delaying blood for blood by 10 seconds. That's it. The rest lined up automatically.

And you know, I don't really see it as strategy. In fact, it's really annoying to have so many cooldowns with this combat system. You invariably waste some of it as you need to either pop tons of them before the fight(Wasting time on the earliest ones) or you have to spend a long time popping them during combat(Because you don't want to waste GCD time), losing some effectiveness because you can't stack them properly. It just doesn't feel great.

If there was a macro to pop them all simultaneously, sure. But as is, I'd probably prefer just having 1-2 more impactful CDs. And you still wouldn't use those on cd necessarily, but rather when you need the burst.

Perhaps they reduced the complexity of standard "optimal" rotations in order to allow for more involved fight mechanics.