Extending some "party member" effects to pets...

[Nezha]

(I posted this in GEO section but was unsure how to move it...)

This post mainly concerns the new jobs Geomancer and Rune Fencer and whom their ability effects extend to and I don't plan for it to be longwinded. I was looking forward to these jobs allowing for some new subjob combinations until I read: "...party members within area of effect," which immediately sullied any hopes I had for either class, just as the afterglow effect descriptions did.

I literally only play one job (which anyone on my server could tell you which that is) and I have for nearly seven years now... Being of a class that has historically been neglected, it would mean a lot to me to get others input, especially DEVs, even if the answer is "No." I was hoping at the least, Camate or another NA DEV could read this and give it consideration, or even better, urge the D-Team to re-examine party member area effects and possible extend some of them to pets.

I don't think this is too far fetched and I think it might promote balance in the way that Geomancers and Rune Fencers would become more versitile and useful for job classes outside of status quo melee or mage class, which is the truely unbalanced issue, but thats another can of worms for a different post. Thanks for reading! :)

[Luvbunny]

I agree with you that Geomancer buffs should affect the pets. I think all buffs that affect your party should apply to the pets as well. It's not like your pet going to survive for long on big events anyway, even with the buffs. Then again, an alliance of beasts, puppetmaster and summoners would be terrific, but you will need spots for the corsairs, bard, geomancer and scholar :)

[nyheen]

i think this point in time aoe buffs should hit the pet too:)

[StingRay104]

I don't think i can thumbs up this enough, best idea I've seen in years on these forums.

[Mokeil]

Our loyal pets get hit by enemy AoE effects, but not by friendly ones... This one's got my support. Well past time it happened.

[Kaisha]

I remember when DNC sambas worked on pets. They sure patched that quick.

[sweetidealism]

YES PLEASE. Buffs for pets would be the greatest thing ever! <3

[Karbuncle]

I remember when DNC sambas worked on pets. They sure patched that quick.

Man that was patched in like, 2 days... Yet major flaws? brb working on it 8 years.

I know the Mechanics allow for pets to get buffs from players, and I would praise the day pet jobs could finally benefit from March, COR Rolls, Protect/Shell... basic stuff... But I don't think that day will be soon.

But man, You can have the +'s i have to give.

[nyheen]

I remember when DNC sambas worked on pets. They sure patched that quick.

still dont understand why this was a huge problem for

[Mifaco]

Can't let that crab attack 5% faster, the game balance might be thrown off!

[Yinnyth]

still dont understand why this was a huge problem for

It wasn't a huge problem, but it was a mistake they made. They never intended for it to function that way. Similar to when they accidentally made it so that the harlequin horn and gjallarhorn changed chocobo mazurka to flee speed.

Both were unintended buffs which made certain jobs stronger than they were intended to be, so SE immediately patched them. The difference, of course being that mazurka giving flee speed is a big unfair buff to a job that is and always has been desirable whereas sambas affecting pets still was not enough to make pet jobs useful enough to consider for endgame.



I fully support the changes requested in this thread. The way the game currently functions, having the right buffs and gear are how you deal the big damage. Pets have minimal gear available to buff them, and that gear requires the master to sacrifice their own damage potential. Pets also have minimal buffs available to them, and no sane cor would give bst roll over drk roll except in very specific situations. So the bottom line is that pets do not get buffs which all players require to be at the top of their game.

[detlef]

If you allowed things like BRD songs and COR rolls to affect pets, you'd pretty much obsolete every DD/tank/healer job in the game.

[Karbuncle]

If you allowed things like BRD songs and COR rolls to affect pets, you'd pretty much obsolete every DD/tank/healer job in the game.

lol? Not a single pet job in the game would be powerful enough that people would regularly replace DD With them. For a handful of reasons, Lets begin stating them shall we?

1) Avatars have the Dmg of about a Sword, and the Delay of a Polearm. They're pathetic in terms of Melee DPS, Even fully buffed, a RDM Melee would out DD Them. They suck for everything short of their Bloodpacts, and even they are lack-luster compared to any DD.

2) BST Pets lose a lot on enemies higher level than them. Even fully buffed, they wouldn't compare to something like a good WAR or SAM. While BST pets would probably be the pets that benefit the most from this, it wouldn't replace typical parties. Know why? POINT THREE B*TCH

3) Pets can't be cured. This means that pets die quickly, its costly, and every time they die, you'll have to fully resign all songs for every pet resummoned. In any fight, the time it takes to do this will likely get you killed. Theres no fight slow enough that a pet can be resummoned, sung to 3 times, and resent into battle every couple seconds when it dies. At least not any fight pets aren't already used in all the time.

4) I included this in 3, but i'll say it again. Pets die quick as FK, because of this songs would need to be recasted aaalll the time, no battle or enemy is just going to sit there while you resummon pets to resing to them. one could argue you could have a Token DD or tank hold the enemy, but then one could argue they could do that right now.

5) Pets will still kill slower than good players, and since time has honored "Speed > Strategy", theres no supporting evidence to say players will suddenly adapt a 14 man/buffer Pet alliance just because pets will be a little bit stronger.

All in all, you're delusional as FK if you think any pet job comes remotely close to being broken, that allowing them to be buffed would obsolete every other job in the game. Avatars have been disposable damage since the beginning of their release, and for a time they were used for that method, but being disposable and capable of damage doesn't mean you see 18 man SMN Alliances, does it? They died for a reason, people realized healing a DD Tank was faster and more reliable. buffed or not, this is still true. Allowing them to be buffed would not change any of that.

The only thing it will do is actually give people a reason to consider pet jobs as a viability instead of what they are now. Solo, Not invited, or a proc whore.

Pet jobs as they stand now are worthless outside of a few niche events (BST in Dynamis, SMN for its 2hour)... Pets are just too darn squishy for them to be used in the manor you're proposing. People won't do it, they'd sooner chose a zerg strategy over a Pet alliance.

[Yinnyth]

If you allowed things like BRD songs and COR rolls to affect pets, you'd pretty much obsolete every DD/tank/healer job in the game.

If that happened, they balanced it wrong. It's not about overpowering pet jobs, it's about making them acceptable in the traditional party setup which involves one or more jobs providing powerful buffs. People would sooner take an undergeared thf than a well-geared smn because the thf could at least benefit from the marches and haste.

[SpankWustler]

If that happened, they balanced it wrong. It's not about overpowering pet jobs, it's about making them acceptable in the traditional party setup which involves one or more jobs providing powerful buffs. People would sooner take an undergeared thf than a well-geared smn because the thf could at least benefit from the marches and haste.

This.

If some buffs would be too strong on pets due to certain mechanics, or just have to be omitted because the crazy guy who lives in the vents of SE's offices threatens to eat everybody's lunch for two weeks straight otherwise or whatever, just those buffs could be omitted. Even if in the end it were somehow narrowed down to pets only benefiting from Bard songs and Geomancy or only benefiting from attack speed buffs, that would still be huge.

It doesn't have to be all or nothing.

[Dazusu]

Why not? Not like pets are over-powered as it is already.

[Teraniku]

Take into account there's already code in the game for them to do this as well. Example: Fellowship NPC's can receive the Rampart buff from the player they are linked to. Even if they could only receive buffs from their "master" it would still be a huge benefit and allow a lot more Subjob combinations availabe. SMN/RUN or SMN GEO anyone?

[Camiie]

Why not? Not like pets are over-powered as it is already.

You're right. They're not. Take away atma or pit them against something higher level and their effectiveness drops substantially. Read Karbuncle's post for more on the matter.

[DaBackpack]

I like this idea a lot and there's no good reason why it shouldn't happen. The problem MIGHT be that since you can't cast single-target spells on pets, it would take a reworking of the game mechanics to allow only AoE buffs to work.

I feel that this change might make DRG slightly more relevant. March'd wyvern + Spirit Link = more TP for you. Then again there's still the problem of the wyvern losing TP at WS...

[Leonardus]

At least allow buffs to hit pets at 1/2 strength or something (Or hey...a job trait!). It's quite dull treating them as some kind of third party you can barely interact with.

I'd call that old samba glitch a small step forward, but apparently SE is deathly afraid of removing the glass cage around our pets. That's too bad.

[Horadrim]

snip.

You know, Karbuncle... I've always loved reading your posts. Even the time or two (I'm pretty sure it's happened before, maybe on KI) you ragged me for saying something stupid. lol

[Luvbunny]

Agreed with what Karbuncle has outlined in the post. Pet should get buffed, period. It won't break the game, and it's not like they will suddenly replace all other DD jobs. If anything, it makes BST and PUP somewhat doable DD on endgame events.

[Zhronne]

I think they're afraid of the deevaluation of "Pet: " gear, the overpowerness of stacking buffs plus such gear etc.
Pet jobs, or at least some of them (mainly BST) are already in a delicate position.
We need to pay attention to what we ask, maybe we'll get buffs but also get seriously nerfed.

Imho it's understandable to accept the fact that simply allowing all buffs/spells (especially cures) to be appliable on Pets might be a bit too much, but even then they should make a selection of buffs and make so that some party buffs are indeed shared with the pets.
The Corsair Model (where you buff the master to grant pet-specific buffs) just doesn't work well imho, altough I'm afraid it's a bit too late to change things.


Other games use a much simpler model.
Pets do not benefit from party buffs, but their stats scale with the master's. So raising the master's stats will also grant a bonus, to a certain extent, to the pet.

[Zhronne]

I think what you're saying works very well for Avatars, possibly wyverns too, but it doesn't really completely apply to Automatons and especially BST pets.

First you're comparing the pet to a SAM or WAR. Yes I concur the pet alone won't do as much as them, but pet + master might as well.
The fact they cannot be cured is arguable, once you allow buffs next thing people are gonna ask is about cures.
Even without them you have a lot of very powerful instruments to cure pets. BST can bring reward time to very low recast times, and the highest tier of food with a good build (and Beast healer) heals for like 2500 instant plus a fuckton of regen.
And let's not forget Dawn Mulsulms.
Last but not least, this doesn't apply to automatons but it does apply to BST pets, they have an insane amount of HP, especially if you pair it with Familiar.

I also don't completely agree with the underestimation you're making of Automatons and Pets (especially those who are summoned at level 99 thanks to AF2+2 gloves). Their stats are really high, especially the pets'.
They start sucking on higher level stuff just because you have no other means to buff their attack/strenght/whatever.
But if you were allowed to do that I'm sure you'd get pretty nice results from them.
Not as good as an awesome SAM or WAR or DRK of course, but still much better than you're making it look like from your post (unless I misunderstood you, in which case please forgive me)



Also to my own view the main concern SE has before allowing buffs to be applied to pets it's not the fact that they would do too much damage, because that wouldn't really be a huge issue in the end.
I think they're afraid about the fact that a small amount of people (or even a single player) would be able to circumvein their precious battle strategies by deploying pet jobs against NMs.
This already happens to a certain extent, and it annoys a lot of players already, just imagine the scale this would reach if they allowed all buffs to be applied on pets.


I'm not saying they shouldn't do it, I am actually advocating this to happen, but with some limits here and there, because it's easy to understand that they are seriously concerned about this.

[Yinnyth]

I think they're afraid of the deevaluation of "Pet: " gear, the overpowerness of stacking buffs plus such gear etc.

I think they're afraid of making any "Pet: " gear that's actually useful. The best pet gear in the game is perpetuation cost gear for SMNs because enough of it gives them a free pet. The rest of the pet gear is marginal at best, and certainly nothing compared to what DD jobs are capable of wearing on themselves. The fear of a pet becoming overpowered with buffs is as irrational as the fear of a level 99 SAM wearing level 40 gear becoming overpowered with buffs.


First you're comparing the pet to a SAM or WAR. Yes I concur the pet alone won't do as much as them, but pet + master might as well.
I can't speak for BST since I haven't played it since I capped all my SJs way back in the day, but PUP is in no danger of outdoing heavy DDs even if you factor in the damage from the master and the puppet. This is mostly due to how overpowered haste effects are, especially when combined with double, triple, and quadruple attack. Pets will not reach capped haste. Maybe with soul voiced marches and 3 overdrived wind maneuvers, the puppet could hit that 80% cap, but they'd still have several disadvantages:

1. No empy/relic/mythic frame for puppets to increase their base damage, so their base damage is determined by their level and no amount of gear grinding can change this.

2. Very few pieces of attack gear available for pets, so the pet relies completely on maneuvers and buffs for its attack. The maneuvers still fall short of giving the puppet as much attack as a standard 2h DD with berserk and average gear, but the DD still gets buffs and the puppet doesn't.

3. No food for pets. Only the master can get boosted by food, and that's mostly a waste because (if gear and buffs are ignored) the puppet is stronger than the master.


BST can bring reward time to very low recast times, and the highest tier of food with a good build (and Beast healer) heals for like 2500 instant plus a fuckton of regen.
And let's not forget Dawn Mulsulms.
Which is supposed to be the equivilant of meds which players use. Granted, meds currently suck because they don't stack well enough, their use timer is too long, and medicated status is BS for most of them, but if you want to spend gil to improve your survivability, or the survivability of your pets, you should be able to. Once they get around to fixing alchemy, this will be a non-issue because players will have even stronger potions than pet food, automaton oil, and dawn mulsums.


Also to my own view the main concern SE has before allowing buffs to be applied to pets it's not the fact that they would do too much damage, because that wouldn't really be a huge issue in the end.
I think they're afraid about the fact that a small amount of people (or even a single player) would be able to circumvein their precious battle strategies by deploying pet jobs against NMs.
This already happens to a certain extent, and it annoys a lot of players already, just imagine the scale this would reach if they allowed all buffs to be applied on pets.
Which content does this happen in? The biggest advantage that pet jobs get in this regard is the lack of weakness when their pet gets killed. It still doesn't change the fact that everytime your pet would be killed, it needs to be resummoned, rebuffed, and sent back out. Where do you see this becoming a problem?

[Karbuncle]

Well, I'm not a fan of the slippery slope debate as its a cop-out argument held close by politicians, So i'll ignore the "If we give them buffs, they'll ask for cures!" even though i know you're likely right and people would go that route and those people can kiss my a** in the most horrid way possible because i hate those types.

But, I did make a note to mention BST pets would likely be the ones who gain the most from the idea of being buffed. Now, On paper BST Really isn't a terrible job, its just not great in terms of whats it meant for, and thats really a DD. The idea of BST From the beginning was likely a reasonable solo job and a DD For parties when not solo, they kinda failed at point B For a long time, and to some extent still do.

I didnt mention PUP at all mostly because we've shown Puppets haste caps at 50%, Which is already obtainable, making the songs/buffs they'd benefit from the most being mostly acc/atk related... which while it'll help automatons, Isn't going to send PUP into a spiral of Ig-Alima solo's and Alliance of Puppetmasters doing Provenance Watcher... Just ain't happening.

Now, this really brings on my next point, to address the power concerns with BST pets. While allowing certain songs to hit them would level the playing field a bit in terms of how well they perform on high level monsters, I don't think its going to close the gap as well as it could for players (??? Correct me if im wrong, I know BST pets work off the monster formula, but I forget how this effects them really...) - I know a player could bust out some wicked rewards, and with all the shiny gear i think it can be lowered to like 50 second timer or somethingwhatever.... but lets take a look at this a tad realistically.

If an alliance of BSTs decided to do something like Legion, they probably could right now, they'd need someone holding mobs so they'd likely bring about a token PLD like all groups do... But even if you could Embrava/Sing to those pets, It'd likely be about the strategic equivelant to a turtle PLD Set up of 2004-5 Era, While it would be safer on your buffer, It'd be less reliable and slower in terms of killspeed.

Also, while Reward is great, Pets HP pool is finite, and their damage reduction, while impressively reduced with the PDT% gear you can get for your pets, they will die in any serious endgame event, buffed or not, the AoE's spewed out by enemies will hurt. Beyond that, there are some mobs that you will just flat out get raped by as a group of BSTs, especially in the final chambers of legion.

Now, in events like Meeble Burrows, where 3 BSTs could probably take on some/most of the bosses right now anyway, this would just serve to speed it up... but i also addressed this a bit, where It would only really serve to further their kill speed in events they'd already be able to do... not really add to the list of events they could do.

Plus when it comes down to it, Alliances of pet jobs are just impractical, especially if you throw in a Song rotation for the pets. You'd also have to throw in a healer for the BRD, and possibly a stunner so the BRD isn't floor'd when trying to resing buffs in events like Legion, that on top of the PLD, a THF if you want better drop rate, a stunner or two if you want to avoid massive pets dying at once because of AoEs... and you may as well just brought a normal alliance set up, which is going to be more reliable as the cures aren't restricted to a 50sec~1:30min timer.

This is just one scenario, but it just drives the point, allowing pets to be buffed by just the basics, Songs/Rolls/Dances, won't exactly open a new era of BST/SMN/PUP alliances soloing the world killing off all other jobs... If anything, it'll just speed up kills for people who already do this for the lulz. Its not going to break any jobs, and the only one who'd really come close to needing serious balance concerns is BST, as their pets are a bit on the strong side, and HP to make Blissey blush.

But, I still maintain it would not obsolete any job, simply make pet jobs more appealing, as their biggest flaw right now is the heinous lack of buffs for pets, especially haste related, which is almost entirely what this game is about when damage is concerned.

:D




Edit: Oh, and i was going to mention Pet:Bonus gear horrifically pales in comparison to even what a level 70 DD could equip, but dude above me covered that. Though i do see the point you were trying to make. If pets could receive Marches, Pet Haste gear would be diminished for Automatons, and the Haste attachment would probably crash in price too... But for BST pets, it would just make haste+ for pet more appealing, as it would stack better toward reaching the cap (Which i assume is probably 50% just like Automatons).

P.S Correct me if im wrong on the Automaton thing, I thought i read somewhere it was 50%... could have just been because their Gear haste and JA haste are all they can benefit from atm...

Edit2: Also as i reread my post i feel i want to add a point. The only reason BST isn't used in Nyzul isle, and the reason they would not be used even if they could be sung too, is because pets cant go 800% Through the rainbow which is how most players like to f**k that event BECAUSE ITS SO HARD QQ WAAH

[Zhronne]

I can't speak for BST since I haven't played it since I capped all my SJs way back in the day, but PUP is in no danger of outdoing heavy DDs even if you factor in the damage from the master and the puppet. This is mostly due to how overpowered haste effects are, especially when combined with double, triple, and quadruple attack. Pets will not reach capped haste. Maybe with soul voiced marches and 3 overdrived wind maneuvers, the puppet could hit that 80% cap, but they'd still have several disadvantages:
Automaton haste caps around 50%, like Karby said (and this doesn't mean they wouldn't get advantage from marches/haste btw Karby, you'd just avoid using Turbo Charger, the attachment that gives you haste with Wind Maneuvers up).
Dunno about BST pets but they can already reach around 27% haste, altough that of course implies some sacrifice on the master's side, as it's typical with the majority of "Pet: " gear.


Which is supposed to be the equivilant of meds which players use.
Uhm... Which med exactely corresponds to a pet food that heals your pet for roughly 3k health every 35ish seconds and an additional 2kish over 3 minutes of regen?
Something close to that could possibly be Vile Elixir, but they aren't exactely cheap, have med time, take like what, 5 seconds to use etc?
And let's not forget the overall HP pool pets get. My Falcorr with Familiar has like what, 6k HP or something around that?
And a lot of -PDT and -DT.
The big difference from a player's DT and PDT builds, is that there you have to accept the compromise of reduced stats in exchange for DT/PDT, while tipically this isn't the case for pets.
Add to this the natural resistance to certain elements that some pets have, their evasion etc.

Of course, like Karby said, their HP is still finite, and ~40 seconds Reward, as good as it is, it's nowhere close a Cure V spam from a WHM every 5 seconds.

Once again, I am advocating SE to do this change and have been for a long time. I'm just saying that they can't just pull a switch and make all buffs apply to pets from one day to another without exclusions, and we shouldn't ask this either because we might regret it once they give us this together with a huge nerf to pet jobs.

I'm just saying that the best scenario is imho one where they give us some buffs, a selection, and fix crap like the COR pet rolls which could be good in theory but will never be used with the current state of the game.



Once they get around to fixing alchemy, this will be a non-issue because players will have even stronger potions than pet food, automaton oil, and dawn mulsums.
And why are you taking for granted that they will?

[Karbuncle]

In all honesty, the idea of Pets not having to trade off for PDT is a bit untrue, and a bit true... i guess?

Basically, the reason PDT is considered more of a trade off for players is because they have excellent gear choices for raw damage... Pets dont. Really when it comes to Pets, its between PDT, or... Nothing. So their trade off is 'less' only due to the point Pets aren't allowed access to the amazing benefits we as players get.

Though, I'd honestly settle for pets being added to Rolls/Songs, and leaving Pro/Shell all that jazz to whatever. Heck they could even make them like NPCs, where only >you< can buff them, making something like BST/WHM a good alternative in Pet-only battles, allowing you to haste, pro, and shell your pet... Its a sticky situation, but I still believe no job short of BST would run even the remote possibility of risking breaking it.

(Also, I did mention with PUP, that the price of the Haste attachment would likely crash as a result)

[Zhronne]

In all honesty, the idea of Pets not having to trade off for PDT is a bit untrue, and a bit true... i guess?
Yes, I said "tipically". It depends on the slot of course (for instance weapon slot you could arguably say that equipping a Pet: PDT Astolfo is a loss compared to using a Pet: attack Astolfo)
Pets have way less gear options compared to players.
So whereas players would have much better DD options for the same slots, pets sometimes just have no other options xD

Which is more or less exactely what you said ;)

I concur BST is the big question mark here, I'm not afraid about SMN or DRG becoming suddenly overpowered because of their pets lol.
PUP potentially could be in a dangerous position as well, but honestly it seems to me a much better situation than BST's.


(Also, I did mention with PUP, that the price of the Haste attachment would likely crash as a result)
I wouldn't complain! Still missing all 8 Ashu Talif attachments lol

[Karbuncle]

Also, PUP I don't think would be at too much of a risk, their pets are squishy as F**K, the only one not really at risk of being squashed is the RNG or BLM, but their A.I is like "Dude, You're 10 feet away, stop nuking/Shooting and go melee it, okay?"

So they'd die a lot (They do die a lot in endgame), The PLD Automaton is basically a real PLD, with no Aegis or Ochain, and wearing a Acursed belt. Sh*t sucks :(. that, and their two ranged DD Frames dont gain a lot from BRD songs... BLM Gains really nothing except Ballad i guess, though the RNG Frame could work some fun with Minuet... the Valoredge frame would just die in seconds.

[Zhronne]

Well yeah, survivability of Automatons is ridiculous compared to BST pets, and I'm not talking just about PDT/DT.
I still hope that instead of going the unefficient and pathetic way of Stout Servant (which gave me some hopes when they released the first trait) they could have gone the way it is for other MMOs, where pets don't get damaged or get a SERIOUS damage reduction when hit by AoE moves that do not target directly them, with some exception here and there.
Just that could have solved one of the big problems of bringing pet jobs like BST and, especially, PUP to some game events :(

[Yinnyth]

The big difference from a player's DT and PDT builds, is that there you have to accept the compromise of reduced stats in exchange for DT/PDT, while tipically this isn't the case for pets.
The tradeoff is that it's a pet. Its ability to react to situations is not as fine-tuned as a real player's. You can't choose the path it runs along, it runs where it damned well pleases. It's hard as hell to control which side of the enemy your pet stands on, and if the enemy turns to face that player who's right next to your pet, it's not smart enough to get out of breath range. The pet takes more damage than a real player, so it deserves better defensive attributes.


And why are you taking for granted that they will?

New, higher crafting levels are coming, and with them will need to be new things alchemists can create. In addition to this, SE has already stated they are looking into the matter of medicated status being utterly ridiculous.

[Sparthos]

XI pets are a joke SE doesn't intend to stop delivering the punchline on.

[Ezikiel]

triple vote

[SpankWustler]

XI pets are a joke SE doesn't intend to stop delivering the punchline on.

"A rabbit, a puppet, and Garuda walk into a bar..."

"What does the bar-tender say?"

"No, they literally walk into a metal bar and suffer massive head trauma. The damn rabbit survived, too, so the bar will be on fire as of next update."

[Karbuncle]

"A rabbit, a puppet, and Garuda walk into a bar..."

"What does the bar-tender say?"

"No, they literally walk into a metal bar and suffer massive head trauma. The damn rabbit survived, too, so the bar will be on fire as of next update."

Unrealistic. If the Bar failed to provide a nerf and actually semi-provided a buff, it would be Emergency Maint'd within 24 hours.

[Caketime]

XI pets are a joke SE doesn't intend to stop delivering the punchline on.

This is exactly why I switched jobs and treat BST as dress up funtime for LS events and nothing more. Playing it now in a serious capacity is way more expensive than I care to keep up with, especially considering how wanted it is for every piece of content.