A way to fix DRG's weak firepower endgame.

[Ophannus]

So previously I suggested to the devs that DRG get something analgous to Berserk or Last Resortl; a Stance that boosts Attack for a duration to help DRG not hit for such low damage endgame compared to WARs, DRKs, and SAMs. Instead I offer this suggestion. Instead of enhancing our Attack, which is more along the lines of a Warrior or a Dark Knight type job, let DRGs have a Job Ability that simply allows us to ignore a portion of a target's defense for a duration. It fits Dragoons style more so than being a berserker or ravager that just goes in with brute strength, but rather since Dragoons are tactical warriors, exploiting chinks in a targets armor (i.e Angon, Wheeling Thrust, Camlan's Torment, 'Jump' under the effect of Spirit Surge, Gungnir's Additional Effect) is more of Dragoon's theme.

Piercing Strikes
Level 97(or as a proposed Tier III merit point Job Ability at Level 99)
Duration: 2 minutes
Recast: 5 minutes
Effect: Attacks and weapon skills will ignore a portion of a target's defense but lowers your evasion and defense.
Attributes: Lowers your evasion and defense by 15% but allows your attacks, jumps and weapon skills to ignore 20% of a target's defense and makes your attacks non-attribute so they can be used on Skeletons, Flans, Narakas etc. These are targets where a Dragoon is extremely weak and have no recourse except to wield a staff which hampers our usefulness. Since a Dragoon specializes in piercing weapons it would make sense that Dragoons could 'pierce' armor and ignore special shields and defenses much like Formless Strikes, the duration is shorter than Formless strikes and unlike Formless Strikes, imposes a heavy penalty on the dragoon more so than even Berserk or Last Resort; lowered defense AND evasion. Currently since Dragoons *need* /SAM to survive and maintain a 5-hit build and Hasso, we can't sub /WAR which other 2handers don't have a problem with, they either don't need /WAR due to having Last Resort, are a WAR so they can freely sub SAM, or are a SAM so they can freely sub /WAR. Dragoon, lacking a way to have Hasso and an Attack Boost JA like DRK/SAM, WAR/SAM and SAM/WAR can't have their cake and eat it too which is why this job ability would balance us while giving us something unique to bring to the table. This ability is unique in that the more defense a target has, the more effective the ability becomes so it would really help us against high level targets with monstrous defense, again which is where Dragoon's effectiveness as a damage dealer is severely hampered.


Alternatively instead of this JA being a stance, it could also be made into non-stance ability similar to Monk's Focus/Dodge with no negative side effects but the duration/recast would have to be significantly different since there are no penalties and thus no risk, in which case it would be:

Duration 1 minutes
Recast 5 minutes

Personally I think the former would be more effective.

[Jaall]

I agree with the concept but I don't think it would really give us enough being only 2 mins out of 5. You'd still be spending 3 mins being as useless as we are now in comparison to WAR and DRK so not much would change. Maybe if it was more like what berserk used to be and had a small amount of downtime but the majority of the time you could have the effect active. It would kinda act as DRG's version of berserk/LR while being specific to the jobs nature. I just don't agree with 2 mins as that's not enough time to really get your damage up to speed and considering DRK and WAR are so far ahead, but I do agree to add balance to it, it can't be the whole 5 mins.

[Umichi]

introduce t3 merits that increase duration to 3-4 mins and make the ability a high level one.

[Ophannus]

Well the merits would increase it. But also keep in mine one thing. Decreasing a target's defense(or ignoring) is more effective than increasing your attack by the same value. Increasing attack increases the numerator but lowering defense decreases the denominator.

1000 Attack vs 1000 Defense. pDIF is 1.0

1200 Attack vs 1000 Defense is 1.20

1000 Attack vs 800 Defense is 1.25

So you always get more bang for your buck by lowering a mob's defense by 25% than increasing your attack by 25%. This is why Angon is so good. Instead of thinking that Angon decreases a mob's defense by 25%, you could alternatively think of it as increasing the ALLIANCE'S attack by 33%.


Mob has 1000 Defense, player has 1000 Attack
Berserk increases your attack to 1250, your pdif is 1.25.

Mob has 1000 Defense, everyone in the alliance has 1000 attack.
Angon decreases a mob's defense to 750, THE ALLIANCE'S pDIF is 1.33

[Jaall]

I agree that it's better than an attack boost but DRG really needs a fix like that and I'm not sure 2 mins would cut it, especially in the eyes of people who haven't played DRG but lead a lot of events. But if merits were to increase the duration I think it's a brilliant idea!

[Mirage]

3/5 minutes sounds good to me, and in line with a lot of other damage boosting abilities.

[Giers]

I dunno seems like the wrong way to address a job that has a hard time keeping up in all optimal situations at all times with a buff that is not always on

[Mirage]

Last resort and berserk isn't always on either, don't think anyone is gonna argue that those two aren't very good JAs that improve the two jobs by a lot.

[Jaall]

At the moment, I think it's the only way DRG is gonna have the opportunity to compete with other jobs considering SE obviously has favourite jobs, and DRG is by far not one of them. We're obviously not getting the attack boosts we've been asking for since, well forever and none of the other problems are getting addressed like Angon not stacking with Gungnir def down. Either SE isn't putting enough into this game anymore which is very likely the case what with FFXIV, or they aren't accepting the other ideas people have put across, so the only way to really get through to them is keep bringing forward ideas and keep proving that DRG needs fixing.

I personally think this would work better than just an attack + boost because DRG is so far behind compared to WAR and DRK. Unless of course you sell your soul for a Ryunohige, but I don't really want to put that much time into a game just to be good, and I doubt many people do. If they make the effect stack with gungnirs def down and angon, it would make gungnir a very worthwhile weapon to have and make DRG very desirable in events like legion where the effect would benefit the whole ally. Also it wouldn't make Ryunohige considerably better as to make it unbalanced but wouldn't have any negative impacts on it at all, only balance out DRG's relic and mythic which would be very welcome for anyone I'm sure.

[Tanama]

We are working hard to ensure that each job plays an equally important role in the new systems and NM battles, and we welcome any comments you may have that will help us accomplish this objective.

Dragoon
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/attachment.php?attachmentid=379&d=1310725549&thumb=1


Vision
Experts with the lance who can take command of any battle with their wyverns, which can either deal heaping helpings of pain or relieve their party with a reinvigorating breath.

We aim to make jumping a more dynamic aspect of dragoons' fighting style and to have wyverns evolve into more versatile allies with the ability to enfeeble enemies.


Example Adjustments

Adding the effect of reducing magic resistance to certain wyvern breath attacks.
Adding an ability that makes wyverns more difficult to KO.
Adding an effect to Jump, High Jump, and Super Jump that reduces enmity of the player behind the dragoon.




The quote above is old now and since then we've been granted:


Healing Breath IV
Updated Remove Breath
Spirit Surge adjustments
Jump timers reduced
Attribute ranks increased (HP, Evasion and Parrying skill)
Spirit link adjustment


Damage wise, reducing Jump timers was a step in the right direction but the development team stopped increasing our damage after that. It would seem that adding a damage boosting job ability is not in their plans for Dragoon. As the only two-handed damage dealer without a melee boosting JA, should we be granted one or did the dev-team plan for our wyverns to be able to fill that gap? If that is so, then they are sadly mistaken. I am sure the dev-team can see the wyvern does next to no damage versus high level content and only serves to boost Soul Jump, Spirit Jump and occasionally heal.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/attachment.php?attachmentid=1258&d=1326453186&thumb=1

Experts with Polearms, Jumps and our wyvern are Dragoon's main themes but they are all underwhelming when you compare other melee job's strengths and how they currently excel at it-- with the exception being the wyvern's healing capabilities. I think Samurai with an equal DMG polearm can deal higher Stardiver damage with Overwhelm.

As the only experts with polearms, Dragoon should be dominating the high-level battlefields together with Warriors, Dark Knights and Samurai. Jumps should be pulverizing the enemies as we reach awesome heights then landing on the enemy with all of the weight we carry, impaling them deep with our polearm. High level monsters should be feeling the effects of the frigid cold, frostbite inducing Frost Breath and the intense heat of a burning Flame Breath should leave the monsters burnt to a crisp. Armor-piercing polearms can and should be as devastating toward high level targets as the other two-handed weapons.

With that said, Dragoon's job traits could use a makeover.


Attack Bonus I ~ IV
Accuracy Bonus I ~ IV
Dragon Killer
Conserve TP
Critical Defense Bonus
Drachen Evolution I ~ V - Improves wyvern's attack, accuracy, breath damage + accuracy and reduces attack delay.
Jump Mastery I ~ VI - Grants a TP Bonus and critical damage increased by a % amount with each tier -
True Pierce I ~ IV - Grants a damage bonus to piercing attacks. [This trait could also be shared with THF and DNC]


As you can see, the last two traits were inspired by Dead Aim and True Shot. The OP's Piercing Strikes can serve as Dragoon's stance as Velocity Shot is to Ranger with reduced Attack Delay by 10%, further reduced via merits. The OP's idea as well as the others being talked about in these forums should be lighting up bulbs for the development team.

I would hope.

[Ophannus]

I'm extremely conservative with all of my recommended Dragoon posts. I don't think we need more accuracy and attack bonus traits, though I'd welcome them. Dragoon is hybrid-ish in that we're relatively strong AND accurate whereas other DDs tend to fall into either or except during periods of higher acc under JAs that grant acc bonuses. Given that we have A+ Polearm, have tons of acc gear and 3 traits, our ACC is probably #1 amongst 2handed DDs.

Jump Mastery would be mitigated if they simply gave DRG "Critical Attack Bonus I". I always felt like we deserve it more than DRK, given that our DEX is naturally higher, we have multiple abilities revolving around Critical Hits, and we have multiple critical hit weapon skills. DRK has none of these, instead we were paradoxically given Critical Defense Bonus up to tier III.

True Pierce would be nice but I'd rather them make piercing weapon damage resistence more in line with blunt and slashing. Right now there are very few(if any) mobs that takes -50% damage to slashing or blunt damage but many that take -50% to Piercing. I think this was done because there are many more mob types that are WEAK to piercing so they felt that because more monsters are weak to it, they ought to make more enemies that are strong to it. Unfortunately the -50% penalty is absolutely,catastrophically devastating to Dragoon. I could understand 25% but 50% makes us laughably worthless. Hitting Naraka mobs for 50-60 damage in Legion while fully buffed and doing 400-500 damage weapon skills while everyone else is nailing 2k+ weapon skills make me very, very sad. I know "tomahawk, Banish III" but still.

Drachen Evolution is superfluous. Our Wyvern's DMG is actually quite high it's just that its Attack is low. I'd rather us get a Job Ability that restricts them from using TP during a breath or even preventing them from using breaths after a ws at all(since their melee does more than breath and breath charge delay slows down their melee). Additionally letting them retain their TP lets us get a nice bonus chunk of TP every 90 seconds from Spirit Link(drains half of the wyvern's TP, wyverns can get 150-180 TP every 90 seconds roughly, so it's almost a free WS worth of TP).

[Jaall]

These are some really great ways to boost drg's endgame potential and I agree with most of them, but then I think really instead of creating whole new JA's for DRG, why don't they remove the attack penalty on drakesbane and add an attack boost to both stardiver and drakesbane? Pretty simple job I would have thought and would allow the ws's to be on par with most other weapons, while not making normal hits OP. Just another idea to add, seems to work very well for Ruinator and has already been implemented so we know it's possible and can work.

[Mirage]

well, boosting stardiver increases its power for non-DRGs too, but it doesn't matter too much. Also, changing the WS won't help DRG with its auto-attack damage problem.

[Jaall]

The only other jobs that use stardiver is sam, and they dont have A+ skill in polearm so we'd still have the upper hand. Only times I ever see sam using polearm these days is in VW for procs when there's no DRG. Also I don't really see a massive problem with auto attack damage seeing as in most zergs it's the WS damage that makes people come out tops. I don't really tend to notice other peoples auto attack damage so not sure how big the problem is tbh.

[Mirage]

They don't have A+, but they do have overwhelm, native Hasso and /war. In either case, I already said it didn't matter a lot. It is however more logical to fix the job rather than just one of the things used by the job.

And again, autoattack damage.

[Jaall]

I agree they could do a lot more, but the fact is they aren't. DRG has always been ignored much like SMN, getting maybe 1 update every 3 years which nobody knows the reason behind. I think, personally, asking for smaller things will have more of a chance of being implemented as it's very hard for them to lose balance with smaller adjustments, whereas whole JA and traits would need serious consideration. And on top of that they would be introduced a lot faster as they can be done as an adjustment and not completely new content. SE has always ignored some jobs even though they are in dire need of changes and DRG is a perfect example of that. Everyone agrees with the fact that DRG is very lacking in pretty much everything, hence the nickname "loldrg" that has been around since it was introduced and yet SE has ignored that and not addressed the underlying fact that DRG is lacking attack options. At least if they gave DRG ws's an attack boost it would be a welcome start and would improve DRG until such a time (if one will ever arise) where DRG will get its much needed JA's and traits.

[Mirage]

But if they're gonna change something for DRG right away,why not let it be the JA instead of changing the WSes?

[Jaall]

Because we've been asking for JA for a very long time and seen nothing or no intention at all to change them, so why not try a different tact and ask for WS changes? I don't see any downside to asking for WS changes especially with the state DRG is in at the moment. No change is bad and a WS dmg bonus would certainly help us a lot, but I agree more needs to be done. Just a shame SE are having none of it, despite all the complaints and obvious signs that it sucks, so just my opinion, we should ask for less to get more.

[Tanama]

It may come down to what the development team decides to do with tier III merits which we probably won't see until after Seekers of Adoulin is released. Will they follow the same path as the tier II merits and offer two new job abilities and two new traits? Only time will tell. At this point I will be surprised if they add some game changers for us.

I won't hold my breath but when they add the third merit category, I hope we get traits and job abilities as powerful as the effects of Overwhelm, Desperate Blows and Saber Dance. Upgrades to Jump damage would also be welcome considering the dev-team are more than likely going to split the Jump timers with Soul Jump and Spirit Jump having longer recasts.

EDIT: There is also this to consider:


Happy Friday everyone!

Next, on to dark knight…

There are two large principles that the development team is keeping in mind:

To make job adjustments by comparing aspects collectively to close the gap between dark knight
To not make adjustments by comparing only fire-power to leave dark knight behind


As mentioned previously, with the adjustments to the attack/defense ratio, a greater emphasis will be placed on defense. In the event that you jump into battles and pay no attention to your defense, you will take damage for nearly two-times the amount that it is now, so the way the job is played will change. With that said, based on these changes to the attack/defense ratio we will be fleshing out specifics for what kind of adjustments are necessary for other jobs and let you know once we have some information.

[Jaall]

Would be nice to see what new merits they give, hope it's not more solo stuff for DRG. One change I really do wanna see is the def down stack with Angon, and Gungnir and Angon def down stacking, or at least Angon overwriting it. Not really sure why that change never happened but yet another example of why SE confuses me! Only time will tell I guess. I doubt anything major is gonna happen from now until SoA is properly launched so I guess 6 months+

[Umichi]

I always thought there should be a system as to how we do damage with jumps. for example doing a super jump followed by a regular jump would result in a 50% damage bonus or ignores % of enemies defense. not only would this encourage strategizing jumps it would also give us more otpions for gear rather than just sticking to spirit and soul jump almost 100% of the time. not only that but it would encourage the use of our "Super jump" merit option and falls in line with the whole "Deals devastating damage on command" unlike other jobs who just do massive damage per hit we would use the system of jumps to be our combat.

on a side note they did mention the plan on splitting timers for jumps so this opens even more options for a jump system... as a matter of fact im going to post this idea so we don't derail your idea.

[Tanama]

Jump Mastery would be mitigated if they simply gave DRG "Critical Attack Bonus I".

Jump Mastery would not be completely mitigated by a Crit. Attack bonus trait. We will more than likely have four jumps later this year, bringing Jump and High Jump back into the picture. Jump Mastery would most definitely be a boon while the Crit. trait doesn't affect two out of the four. With that said, I would openly welcome Critical Attack Bonus traits.


True Pierce would be nice but I'd rather them make piercing weapon damage resistence more in line with blunt and slashing.

While that would be most welcome, I would be shocked if the dev-team would even consider changing resistances. Although, Matsui said something along the lines of specializing weapon types or something. The quote escapes me at this moment. Here it is:


Regarding Weapons

Please understand that the adjustments that we are currently looking into for weapon adjustments are not the end. We would like to have each weapon have their own special traits, and the adjustments will take place step by step.
and this:

Happy Friday everyone!

Next, on to dark knight…

There are two large principles that the development team is keeping in mind:

To make job adjustments by comparing aspects collectively to close the gap between dark knight
To not make adjustments by comparing only fire-power to leave dark knight behind


As mentioned previously, with the adjustments to the attack/defense ratio, a greater emphasis will be placed on defense. In the event that you jump into battles and pay no attention to your defense, you will take damage for nearly two-times the amount that it is now, so the way the job is played will change. With that said, based on these changes to the attack/defense ratio we will be fleshing out specifics for what kind of adjustments are necessary for other jobs and let you know once we have some information.
Soon enough we they are going to reveal what they plan to do with DRG and other DD jobs. This and tier III merits are going to be what shapes Dragoon in the near future. Will we get a stance ability? Another jump? damage increasing job traits? We shall see.

As for Drachen Evolution, that's intended to help with high level content. We're all well aware here how much our wyverns underperform on Level 110 ~ 120 opponents. Our damage ratio with the wyvern is 9.70/0.3 pretty much. Okipuit did tell us the dev team is looking into that so hopefully something good comes out of it.

[Ophannus]

Splitting Jump timers is a nerf since they'd put Spirit and Soul Jump back to their pre-patch recast timers e.g 90seconds and 3 minutes respectively thus lowering our TP gain actually. Jump and High Jump are currently not worth the job ability delay when fully hasted, as they're pretty much just regular attack rounds that give pretty much regular TP.

[Jaall]

I don't think SE would be stupid enough to nerf a job that's already terrible in comparison to other jobs so I'm sure there will be lower timers or maybe merits to allow that. But then I wouldn't put it past SE to make silly decisions

[Mirage]

Problem is that they don't seem to understand how big an impact JA delays make in high haste scenarios. They all think along the lines of "well if you have 20 abilities that all deal instant damage then you have a gigantic damage potential and the job is too strong."

[Ophannus]

Spirit and Soul Jump were meant to be the fix to the "Jump and High Jump aren't worth using because we attack faster if we DON'T use them and they're only the same strength as a regular hit and don't give much more TP". Wish we had an alternative to Super Jump when we feel like playing aggressively, 4x TP GO

[Mirage]

To be fair, High Jump has some utility through shedding enmity.

[Ophannus]

You mean the imaginary enmity that we never get? Or to be more accurate, the insignificant enmity we accumulate for the damage(read: lack of damage) we deal?

[Mirage]

Ok then. It would have utility whenever they decided to fix the "drg doesn't do damage" problem.

[Ophannus]

I call cognitive dissonance.

[Giers]

I'm not excited to be fixed by Tier 3 merits, I know other jobs may be in that boat but a DD never should be. An people can argue DRG's solo potential all they want at the end of the day you are always bringing a DRG to do DMG not heal. All DD classes that lack potent utility ( Haste Samba, ability to off-tank, AoE or w/e floats your boat) need to have high DMG to make up for it.

An well I think Angon is great, it would need to be fulltime for groups to really desire it I think.

I also argue that Gungnir stacking with Angon wouldn't be the boon everyone wants. Especially those that have got the Ryu, or Rhon. I can see it now, LF DRG/relic onry

[Jaall]

Ryu wouldn't be effected because it's already amazing and rhon is already pointless unless 99, but 99 has same worth as gung and gung is better. At the moment its LF DRG/ryu only... so LF DRG/relic/ryu onry is if anything a slight improvement.