Overall Battle System Adjustments for the Future

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Currently we do not have any plans to make adjustments to these kinds of weapon skills.

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Well make some plans, because every single one of these WS are terrible and you don't notice the impact of more TP much at all (it may as well just be "damage varies with TP" anyway)

Quietus and CT should really by worked so that their damage and defense ignored varied with TP. Giving people a reason to build 300% TP for something other than an AM should be something that is appealing to at least some WSs.

We don't have a good idea what these corrections are going to do for these WSs and it would go a long way to be more direct about answering these questions, since these are WSs that people would like to be able to use that are associated with significantly more time invested than normal WSs.

Good stuff. Any plans to increase bonuses from STR/DEX for one-handed weapons (attack/accuracy respectively)?

In other news, RNG recycle adjustment please.

So will the attack ratio adjustment include Hand-to-hand as well? Given the previous response about Hand-to-hand being a single-handed weapon type, but not really, it's really hard to tell if this means all one-handed weapon types, or all of them barring Hand-to-hand (which would be super lame). It's all very ambiguous.

Could we get some information on what all this information means to Hand-to-hand users?

i don't really understand what your saying about defence but it sounds like your going to make it so we all take more damage which seems unfair to those of us who play evasion jobs, when we take a hit are we gonna start taking massive damage?

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Originally Posted by Rorrick

So will the attack ratio adjustment include Hand-to-hand as well? Given the previous response about Hand-to-hand being a single-handed weapon type, but not really, it's really hard to tell if this means all one-handed weapon types, or all of them barring Hand-to-hand (which would be super lame). It's all very ambiguous.

Could we get some information on what all this information means to Hand-to-hand users?

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From another post:

What's going to happen with hand-to-hand weapons?
Categorically hand-to-hand weapons fall under the single-handed weapon classification; however, the stats for hand-to-hand weapons are quite different from that of swords, which are literally held in just one hand, and they will not be treated the same. We will be separating hand-to-hand weapons from this balance adjustment and making changes that fit more in line with the weapon.

Two questions:
1) Will there also be changes to the STR:Atk and DEX:Acc Ratio?
The increase in Ratio is good, but it occurs to me that short of getting 4 Minuets, a perfect Chaos Roll with a DRK in the party, subbing WAR, and using Berserk - many 1H jobs will not be capping Ratio against high level enemies anyway. The extra 30 or so base attack from bumping this up to 4 STR:3 Attack could make a difference.

2) Will the changes to level correction and attack/damage done also affect pets (Wyverns, Automatons, Avatars, and BST pets)?
Currently Pets are thought to use the same damage equations as monsters. They are useful in some events (like Dynamis) particularly because of the massive ratio boost that they get from attacking monsters that are a lower level than themselves. Implementing these changes to pets would dramatically affect BST pet damage in Dynamis.


Other than that, thanks! I like the Ratio cap boost a lot.

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Originally Posted by Camate

We will need to examine whether this value is good enough or if we need to make further changes in advance before we proceed with this adjustment.

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Is this implying that they're going to consider adding more to 1hs to increase power further, or limit the increase to 2.25 ratio cap by adding penalties to 1h weapons?



I'd also put forth the following ideas for the Dev Team to go along with the blanket buffing of 1h weapons:

Blue Mage - Blue Magic Attack will require some revisions if you're going to be increasing the Defense of monsters to compensate for the level correction changes. In fact, we need them now too! My proposed solutions are as follows:

A) Allow blue magic attack to gain more from STR and skill, say double or +50% of what we get out of them now. Just add a *2 or a *1.5 to the end of the blue magic attack function (Blue Magic Skill + 8 + STR/2)*2

B) Allow a portion of the main handed weapon's attack to contribute to blue magic attack as well, say 25~33%.

One or the other would be sufficient in making blue magic usable on targets that are higher than 20 levels below the Blue Mage's level. Yeah, it's that bad. Please look into it.


Beastmaster, Summoner, Puppetmaster, and Dragoon - Pet attack is pretty abysmal, and will also require some attention. I'd propose a similar change to suggestion B for blue magic attack:

-Allow a portion of the master's attack and haste to affect their pet. Say 25~33% attack and 33~50% haste.

For instance, the master has 600 attack and 25% haste, allow the pet to benefit from 150~198 of the master's attack and 8~13% of their haste. This solution wouldn't be overpowering and would serve to make pets more useful on the battlefield as offensive tools.

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Originally Posted by HimuraKenshyn

From another post:

What's going to happen with hand-to-hand weapons?
Categorically hand-to-hand weapons fall under the single-handed weapon classification; however, the stats for hand-to-hand weapons are quite different from that of swords, which are literally held in just one hand, and they will not be treated the same. We will be separating hand-to-hand weapons from this balance adjustment and making changes that fit more in line with the weapon.

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I know about that, and I even mentioned it in the post you quoted. This adjustment is something that should be applied to Hand-to-hand as well, which is why I'm asking. Hand-to-hand suffers from the long delay of two-handed weapons and the attack/accuracy penalties of one-handed weapons. There's absolutely no reason this adjustment shouldn't apply to Hand-to-hand as well, but the ambiguity with regards to Hand-to-hand adjustments necessitates a more direct response.

Player -> Monster level correction is still an issue. You say it would affect lower levels too much, but that sounds more of an excuse to me. If it's only a problem at low levels, then why not have level correction penalties vary by level, or with combat skill?

It makes sense from a logical/lore perspective anyway that we could become more effective at eliminating a higher level opponent's advantages at higher levels, or at higher levels of combat skill.

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Originally Posted by Camate

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With these adjustments could you also make adjustments to weapon skills that have “defense ignored varies with TP”?

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Currently we do not have any plans to make adjustments to these kinds of weapon skills.

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This is displeasing. Quietus and Camlann's Torment are to remain among the worst of the Empyrian weapon skills until further notice.

It is apparent the JP, EU and NA communities all consider weapon skills with "defense ignored varies with TP" as disappointing. Not recognizing this is a mistake in my opinion and as long as this ideology remains within the development crew, it leaves opportunities for future weapon skills to be added with this plague of an effect that is "amount of defense ignored varies with TP".

Why are we back at the point of the dev team ignoring us again or at least feeling like it?

Jan felt like this.

New Director : I'm sorry, I see alot of you feel we haven't been listening to you so I will take time to read the forums and i see you feel the game need readjusting so that's what we'll do ^^.

Player base : \o/ FINNALY, THANK YOU!
Later

Dev Team: This is how we will readjust the game.

Player base : Err, some of that ok but....

Dev Team : This is how we will readjust the game! Oh here's some more bad ideas cause FFXI.

Player base : /sigh

(that's just how i felt it went)

Honestly, though, I see better much more balanced ideas coming from the forums than the dev team.

They are alot of long winded ways i could make this next point like paragraph on how making content that excludes people, by your own admission, is the only content in 1-3 months wll make the excluded people quit but it's much better said this way.

If content is not
1. Fun
2. Accessible
3. Doesn't take over a month and 20 hrs+ game time to get the item you want.

Then your doing it wrong.

As an example of accessiblity
In Nyzle if you had pure AH gear then you should be able to get a peice of gear ever 10 runs on average ( 10 days per peice of gear is fine) as long as you know what to do.
And ofc the better players will get it every 1-2 runs.

This update has gotten more and more disappointing as the thread goes on..

What seemed like an awesome new subjob option for 1 handers in the DRK last resort change turned into yet ANOTHER buff for SAM.

The removal of level correction which was exciting for Everyone turned out to be monsters only so that's now just a buff for monsters.

The pdif change in conjunction with the fact that level correction is still in play means that 1 handers are even more screwed than ever. Sure the ratio cap is being put at the same level as 2 handers but it's still gonna be impossible for 1 handed jobs like Thf or dnc to get anywhere near the cap with the monsters getting a better buff from their def.

And BLU is just getting completely screwed, def raise just means they now need even more BLU skill which they have no place to get it from to compete with high level monsters where the level correction was already killing them.

So what looked like a really promising update has turned out to be just a brainstorming session by the devs while
Eating shrooms..

The update to magic is a nice touch but other than that all these changes are a major let down.

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Originally Posted by Rezeak

As an example of accessiblity
In Nyzle if you had pure AH gear then you should be able to get a peice of gear ever 10 runs on average ( 10 days per peice of gear is fine) as long as you know what to do.
And ofc the better players will get it every 1-2 runs.

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Okay, it's extremely easy to hit floor 80. So, you should currently be able to get a piece of F100 gear every 5 run once you understand the event.

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Currently we do not have any plans to make adjustments to these kinds of weapon skills.

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Are you serious? Honestly, does no one see how much these weaponskills suck? Man, I was debating leaving F11 for the new 14, but still had my doubts. Welp no longer! All I see is an indirect nerf to Drk to buff, wait for it...wait for it....SAM!!!
to have no adjustments to the two worst emps, that have some of the worst trials by emp standards. THESE WEAPONSKILLS ARE TERRIBLE! Why can't your development team see that? So not only is my main job further trashed by nerf, then the defense adjustment making it harder for Drk to already survive, and not even adjusting these weaponskills that by far NEED ADJUSTING! It sickens me how ignorant the development team is to what the playerbase wants.

Here is what you should be doing, so I'm not just ranting >.>
1.) Drk is to OP? Its because of resolution. We never had any "balance issues" before this came along. Remove a hit and move on.
2.) Seriously, adjust the Ignores Defense weaponskills. There all terrible. How is it my emp can only deal 3k INSIDE Abby, but a non emp greatsword can blast out 7ks? (Outside, lucky to even hit a 2k with swaps)
3.) Remove Order lamp floors. Not a single part of "how fast can you guess the order" is skill. Just ignorant design that should be done away with.

If this is any indication of how the future looks not only for my job, but for my weaponskill that's in need of a severely heavy rework, I'm done. This is not what we want.

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Originally Posted by Prothscar

Is this implying that they're going to consider adding more to 1hs to increase power further, or limit the increase to 2.25 ratio cap by adding penalties to 1h weapons?



I'd also put forth the following ideas for the Dev Team to go along with the blanket buffing of 1h weapons:

Blue Mage - Blue Magic Attack will require some revisions if you're going to be increasing the Defense of monsters to compensate for the level correction changes. In fact, we need them now too! My proposed solutions are as follows:

A) Allow blue magic attack to gain more from STR and skill, say double or +50% of what we get out of them now. Just add a *2 or a *1.5 to the end of the blue magic attack function (Blue Magic Skill + 8 + STR/2)*2

B) Allow a portion of the main handed weapon's attack to contribute to blue magic attack as well, say 25~33%.

One or the other would be sufficient in making blue magic usable on targets that are higher than 20 levels below the Blue Mage's level. Yeah, it's that bad. Please look into it.


Beastmaster, Summoner, Puppetmaster, and Dragoon - Pet attack is pretty abysmal, and will also require some attention. I'd propose a similar change to suggestion B for blue magic attack:

-Allow a portion of the master's attack and haste to affect their pet. Say 25~33% attack and 33~50% haste.

For instance, the master has 600 attack and 25% haste, allow the pet to benefit from 150~198 of the master's attack and 8~13% of their haste. This solution wouldn't be overpowering and would serve to make pets more useful on the battlefield as offensive tools.

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^ This...definitely!

Repost from another thread, since it's arguably more relevant here:

It's also worth noting that one-handed weapons are at yet another inherent disadvantage against two-handed weapons except at extremely low Delay values, since between 180 and 530 Delay TP returns per hit are calculated so that 100 TP is reached after roughly 60 seconds un-Hasted, but because higher delay/two-handed weapons tend to have higher DMG values, DPS balance tends to be distorted in favor of the weapon types that drop the bigger Weapon Skills. And of course, further exacerbating issues is, among other things, the whole Samurai job . . .

Hmm sorta disappointing. Was hoping for some alternations to how LCF worked. It is nice that player defense LCF might be going away (monsters getting an attack boost if their higher then the player), that alone will make defense kinda important though PDT/MDT still rule.

Making 1H and 2H Ratio caps the same won't change much, will make 1H slightly more viable in zergs or high buff situations. Making it so that 1H gets the same STR boost as 2H would help, or making is that the 15% predicted haste from LR is applied for 1H.

There are a lot of concerns about these adjustments and it seems as if the dev team isn't hearing the community. I think we would all appreciate a response addressing some of these issues, particularly:

1. Remaining gap between 1-handed vs 2-handed jobs even after the proposed adjustment
2. The effect on blue magic (and it's weakness versus high level monsters)
3. The impact of the change on pets
4. The comparative weakness of defense ignored weapon skills.

We really would like to hear from the dev team on these issues.

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Originally Posted by Prothscar

Is this implying that they're going to consider adding more to 1hs to increase power further, or limit the increase to 2.25 ratio cap by adding penalties to 1h weapons?



I'd also put forth the following ideas for the Dev Team to go along with the blanket buffing of 1h weapons:

Blue Mage - Blue Magic Attack will require some revisions if you're going to be increasing the Defense of monsters to compensate for the level correction changes. In fact, we need them now too! My proposed solutions are as follows:

A) Allow blue magic attack to gain more from STR and skill, say double or +50% of what we get out of them now. Just add a *2 or a *1.5 to the end of the blue magic attack function (Blue Magic Skill + 8 + STR/2)*2

B) Allow a portion of the main handed weapon's attack to contribute to blue magic attack as well, say 25~33%.

One or the other would be sufficient in making blue magic usable on targets that are higher than 20 levels below the Blue Mage's level. Yeah, it's that bad. Please look into it.

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Its hard to say how exactly (how much) this will affect physical blue magic, but certainly it will need some sort of boost (x2 att might be too much, esp with no actual lvl correction). As an additional option if SE thinks the above options are too much of a stretch, I wouldnt mind a stance type JA that boosts blue att (50%?) while trading off for either less weapon att or magic damage.

As a side note, was it ever mentioned if magical blue spells were getting adjusted similar to Black magic spells?

These are exactly the type of changes that should go on the test server.
Plenty of time to experiment with a fundamental change in mechanics would be a great way of looking at balance and play impact.

I think there would be a lot of player interest in testing something like this. Please put them on the test server. won't need to play 20,000 questions that way.

People, we don't want to hear your threats of quitting ffxi when the development team doesn't have time to change something you want in the game today. Regardless of company size they can only effectively focus on a few things at a time without overlapping and messing things up. Wait and see how WSs are affected. This is an overhaul of the entire damage system, they can't make too many changes at once or just spout off predicted answers. They're not omniscient.

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Originally Posted by Byrth

Two questions:
1) Will there also be changes to the STR:Atk and DEX:Acc Ratio?
The increase in Ratio is good, but it occurs to me that short of getting 4 Minuets, a perfect Chaos Roll with a DRK in the party, subbing WAR, and using Berserk - many 1H jobs will not be capping Ratio against high level enemies anyway. The extra 30 or so base attack from bumping this up to 4 STR:3 Attack could make a difference.

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realistic situation :
even match type mobs, 560 defense. You need 1260 att to cap. A MONK/WAR with double minuets from relic horn is at ~ 1100 with berserk. With dia II you only need ~ 1134 so it's ok. I don't see anything like 4 minuets and chaos being required. Realistically though you want a DDB bard for 4 songs (2 march and 2 minuets) and maybe relic bonus but it's the exact same problem for 2Handed DDs, they don't get 200 attack out of thin air, and clearly not from the str>att conversion. With 150 str they get like 33 attack more from STR>ATT than 1 handed DDs, which is covered by relic weapons already for instance.

Your post make it sound like "2 handed" will cap it easy. But let's face it : DRG won't be able even with maxed buffs, and if you target "HL mobs" well, first it's not HL mobs but high defense mobs, and secondly WAR/SAM will only have berserk available just like 1 handed DD, so they are on the same boat, 30 attack is not what will make the difference. Only DRK will likely fairly easily cap it (still need berserk+2x minuets+dia2 +Last resort otherwise they have no advantage). Let's keep in mind the the ajustement to physical damage taken is going to exclude the use of berserk SYTEMATICALLY out of perfect defense. Let's remember PD is being nerfed to 30 seconds. Let's also recall that at level 75 our 1200 HP leet DDs couldn't afford subbing WAR on weaklings mobs such as colibri in meripos.

Also they have expressed their will to remove level correction (monster > player from the defense of the player PoV) and said they'd compensate it with increased attack to make defense worth a damn, so it's no excluded that defenseless DDs are going to be eradicated even before using berserk.

Let's also face it, when playing your every day FFXI berserk is nearly useless. I know me and mdk have been farming tons of ADL popsets for our glowing weapons, which is done mostly killing up to even match mobs, and I have never seen a difference in farming speed /war or /nin.

I didn't say "EM monsters with moderate defense." I said "High level monsters" and meant something more like Paramount Gallu. Whether or not you're hitting the ratio cap is less important against low level monsters, but I guess it's worth noting that some DC monsters have over 650 defense. Your Monk wouldn't be benefiting from the 2.0->2.25 cap increase against those monsters even with Berserk, double G-horn Minuets, and Dia II.

If you're failing to cap against a 560 defense monster with Berserk and Dia II, you also won't be capping against Paramount Gallu or even particularly difficult DC monsters without the buffs I listed. Still, if I am in Legion then I have to assume that I would have the buffs I listed and currently on Dancer I would not benefit from the last hundred or so attack. So the change is good. The extra 30 Attack from STR is not a big deal, but it's something else they could give us that would slide the jobs slightly closer together. If they're being nice anyway, why not ask?


As far as 1H vs. 2H, SAM (WS Attack boosts, subs WAR) and DRK (Traits, JAs, subs WAR) benefit from the Ratio cap against these monsters, which becomes important when they are high level. WAR (all it has is Berserk, Warcry, and Attack Bonus II) and DRG (only Attack Bonus II and Angon) are more needy in terms of Attack buffs, but they're still about 50 attack better off when buffless than most 1H DDs.

50 attack is not a serious reason to prefer 2H over 1H DD and I was juste correcting you since you seem to imply that 1 handed DD would require more buffer jobs. Anyway like I said the change to damage taken will make it unlikely to use berserk ... So all in all the adjustement has little impact. It's more of a nerf to 2H-DD than a buff of 1H-DD.

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Originally Posted by Cowardlybabooon

People, we don't want to hear your threats of quitting ffxi when the development team doesn't have time to change something you want in the game today. Regardless of company size they can only effectively focus on a few things at a time without overlapping and messing things up. Wait and see how WSs are affected. This is an overhaul of the entire damage system, they can't make too many changes at once or just spout off predicted answers. They're not omniscient.

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Lol someone quit over on the JP thread because he's pissed about the lack of changes to WS.

Let's put it this way.

The more things stop mattering, the less complex the game becomes. The less complex the game is in this regard, the fewer challenges you can produce.

People want to pump their attack to insane zerglike heights? Make all the drawbacks matter. MP costs effectively don't matter? Change it. SC's don't matter because we're all spamming WS's at the target and don't give a flying fig? Change it.

L75-99 did a lot to mess with the game, and not all of it was good. Adoulin-era changes should help to improve these, but seriously- there's a ton of options here that should be looked at and tested from the playerbase.

We're the ones out there using what you made. Listen.

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Originally Posted by SharMarali

The majority of the changes are welcome and quite well thought-out.

However, like others have said, I disagree with the proposed changes to merit weapon skills.

I get the feeling that the developer team doesn't quite understand the fundamental problem. In a game where we are able to level and gear 20 jobs, we are essentially being asked to choose 3 to specialize in.

We have the choice between having 4-5 extremely underpowered weapon skills or 3 full-powered ones.

With the proposed changes, we will have the choice between having 4-5 somewhat underpowered weapon skills or 3 full-powered ones.

I don't see that this is an improvement. In order to get the most out of these weapon skills, we're still limited to choosing only 3, which is in direct opposition to the ability to be flexible and versatile in job selection.

That said, once again, the remainder of the proposed changes are excellent ideas and should go a long way toward patching existing issues. I can only hope that the developers will reconsider increasing or eliminating the restrictive and arbitrary cap on merit weapon skills.

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The problem is that the Development folks DO NOT play the game the way regular players play them. Hence, they do not understands why most players would rather have the best 5/5 ws than an inferior 1/5 ws.

It seems some people are asking SE to nerf Twilight Scyth.

http://www.bluegartr.com/threads/112...=1#post5575871

That weapon is only ever used in very specific situations, otherwise it's very weak.

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Okay, it's extremely easy to hit floor 80. So, you should currently be able to get a piece of F100 gear every 5 run once you understand the event.

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I wouldn't say it's *extremely* easy, it's not THAT much easier than hitting F100 is. Still quite possible to be screwed by bad floors/luck

IMO any group that could "easily" consistently clear F80 certainly has the potential to hit F100, and in many cases they'd be better off by just trying for F100

I'd like to respond to a couple of questions and feedback that were brought up regarding the battle system adjustments.

Damage and Defense

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Right now, without damage reduction gear I am still taking roughly 800 damage or so in Legion from single hits. Using Last Resort or Berserk without any damage reduction gear and we are talking about eating nearly 1500 damage. Even with 50% damage reduction, that's still 750 damage, making it quite difficult to use Last Resort or Berserk. I don't want you to increase the damage cap any more from what it is currently. However, I do agree with adjustments that simply make it so the damage you receive is decreased significantly when you increase your defense.

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To briefly reiterate what was announced previously, we will be making adjustments so that:

• The maximum value of damage received is increased higher than what it is currently.
• It will be possible to reduce damage more than currently.

We've also seen quite a lot of comments mentioning that backline jobs as well as lightly armored jobs would be affected negatively from the aforementioned defense adjustments.

As a general direction on this issue, while the defense of heavy armor jobs and light armor jobs will not be the same, in order to prevent this from becoming too large of a disparity we will be making it so there will not be situations where a certain job is unable to rush in and attack.

As was suggested in feedback, we will be looking into various ways to do this such as increasing the amount of light armor with damage reduction or increasing the amount of evasion gear.

Hate Cap

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Please make sure to deal with the hate cap issue properly. I'd really like to see adjustments that make it so the hate cap cannot be reached easily or adjustments that make tank jobs function better as tanks.

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We plan on making adjustments to hate.

Producer Matsui will be explaining further details to provide insight on the current situation and how things will be changed. We also received the below message from him as well:

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Originally Posted by Akihiko_Matsui

I'd like to take a moment to explain about the current calculation method as well, but I just need a little bit more time.

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Regarding Weapons

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I think that both one-handed and two-handed weapons need to be adjusted. Raising one-handed weapons up to the level of two-handed weapons is too simplistic of a solution, and comparatively the balance would be maintained through compensation via equipment.

Current situation:
Accuracy: One-handed weapons < Two-handed weapons
Damage: One-handed weapons < Two-handed weapons

Proposed adjustment:
Accuracy: One-handed weapons > Two-handed weapons
Damage: One-handed weapons < Two-handed weapons

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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.

Finally, in regards to weapons that deal non-elemental damage, specifically the Twilight Scythe.

The below is a simple compilation of the opinions we've seen on the forums:

• Leaving it the way it is currently is fine
• It needs to be adjusted
  • Leave the effect as it is and lower the damage value
  • Change it to the same effect as Murasamemaru (WS are non-elemental damage)
  • Increase the jobs that can equip it

Due to the fact that adding more jobs to this weapon doesn't lend itself very well as a solution, I'd like to remove this as one of the options; however, we would like to hear everyone's opinions for and against adjustments to Twilight Scythe. We would like to proceed carefully with this, but please keep in mind that just because one opinion is greater in volume does not mean that we will base our decision solely on that.

I would say leave the Twilight Scythe as it is. It's damage is already lower than most of the newer scythes and the non-elemental damage is only on melee swings, so WSs are still normal slashing damage.

In regards to the twilight scythe, why don't you guys just give us more weapons that provide this effect? Like previous hidden effect weapons that would deal a different type of damage. Bourdonasse being a blunt damage lance, Joyeuse being a piercing sword, etc. You can keep Murasamemaru rare because that effect only applies to weaponskills, while common weapons with non-elemental magic damage will provide us a rather favorable (imo) solution. Perhaps give them very nice and unique designs like Twilight Scythe?

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

Leaving it the way it is currently is fine

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This is the correct answer.

Edit: Formatting

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

We've also seen quite a lot of comments mentioning that backline jobs as well as lightly armored jobs would be affected negatively from the aforementioned defense adjustments.

As a general direction on this issue, while the defense of heavy armor jobs and light armor jobs will not be the same, in order to prevent this from becoming too large of a disparity we will be making it so there will not be situations where a certain job is unable to rush in and attack.

As was suggested in feedback, we will be looking into various ways to do this such as increasing the amount of light armor with damage reduction or increasing the amount of evasion gear.

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This is a problem with backline jobs, especially if you happen to be a Tarutaru (actually Tarutaru has problems with any position they'd be taking damage).

While having stuff like evasion being able to mitigate damage for lighter classes is a nice prospect, many backline jobs don't have great defensive stats.

Some jobs have methods that are supposed to cope with this, such as essentially being able to participate in a battle from a safer, ranged position, such as Black Mages.

Other jobs have to run in for various reasons however. While this risk is supposed to be part of playing the job, it will now be increased without having an increased payoff for increased risk.

Bards, Corsairs, Scholars, White Mages, and eventually Geomancers having to run into combat to apply some buff run into this risk.

One example that comes to me particularly is that of a White Mage, although this example may apply in some ways to other jobs. A few years back, the then dev team made comments about wanting White Mages to be encouraged to have more situations where it could stand in the fray. They added stuff like Afflatus Misery, Cura, Esuna, and Auspice.

Since then, this has been pretty much ignored, and I feel that increase damage from standing in the fray will remove any long term occupation of the front line for White Mage permanently. Obviously, not every situation will be friendly to this play style, but the options for it are nearly non-existent. I think that intentionally standing in the fray, with relevant buffs or armor to indicate this, should be rewarded with its own set of trade offs, not just penalized.

Finally, some time ago, White Mage had the option of a piece of armor called Divine Breastplate, opening up the possibility of the occasional, but decidedly rare piece of heavy armor for White Mage. This piece had more defense (50) then any other piece of armor in the game for years.

The newest piece of rare heavy armor for White Mage is Sublime Breastplate, which has 60 DEF, which is even less then the Manteel body pieces (63) from Sea, and way less then other heavy armors (70-81). Maybe it won't be better then other heavy armors like back in the day (especially since it is doubtful that there will be a White Mage breastplate with the damage taken -11% of the 80 defense Laeradr Breastplate), but White Mage breastplate armors should give defense boosts competitive with other pieces of extremely heavy armors, especially considering how rare they are.

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

Regarding Weapons

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I think that both one-handed and two-handed weapons need to be adjusted. Raising one-handed weapons up to the level of two-handed weapons is too simplistic of a solution, and comparatively the balance would be maintained through compensation via equipment.

Current situation:
Accuracy: One-handed weapons < Two-handed weapons
Damage: One-handed weapons < Two-handed weapons

Proposed adjustment:
Accuracy: One-handed weapons > Two-handed weapons
Damage: One-handed weapons < Two-handed weapons

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I'm not sure I'm understanding this correctly, but unless the ratio caps for attack are the same on both weapons, we will always have the problem that 1h weapons are inferior to 2h weapons in every situation found in a party.

I think that having the maximum ratios be the same for both classes of weapon but have the base Accuracy and Attack calculations be different may be an acceptable way to have 1h and 2h weapons be different if that's the decided outcome.

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Another issue is that Dual Wield lowers TP gain. This isn't an issue in low Haste environments since players using Dual Wield will be making a valid trade off, but in party fights with a full set of buffs the benefit of a higher attack speed is nullified and the drawback of lower TP gain remains.

Due to this fact, there are situations where certain gear setups lead jobs known for the trait like Dancer to benefit from only wielding a weapon in one hand.

Obviously, the attack speed bonus Dual Wield cannot be increased past the delay reduction cap, and having more then a certain amount of Dual Wield when there is sufficient Haste present will go mean the extra Dual Wield goes to waste. But having more Dual Wield then necessary should do nothing rather then lowering TP gain.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

Finally, in regards to weapons that deal non-elemental damage, specifically the Twilight Scythe.

The below is a simple compilation of the opinions we've seen on the forums:

• Leaving it the way it is currently is fine
• It needs to be adjusted
  • Leave the effect as it is and lower the damage value
  • Change it to the same effect as Murasamemaru (WS are non-elemental damage)
  • Increase the jobs that can equip it

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On the Twilight Scythe, I haven't really heard any issues. But if there is an issue to be found, I'd say it is that magic damage aren't preferred over Dark Knight's melee attacks with the Twilight Scythe. This isn't the fault of the Twilight Scythe I think, but instead from magic damage sources being too weak even compared to a substandard melee weapon.

I think the best solutions would either be to do the first or second of these, with the first being obviously preferable.

• Ensure that the buffs to magic damage ensure that a decently geared and buffed player can always outdamage a decently geared Dark Knight with a Twilight Scythe without nerfing the Twilight Scythe.
• Make mobs that are supposed to resist certain damage types actually take added damage from magic.

Please continue with the adjustments to magic damage before even considering changes to the Twilight Scythe further.

Another thing to do before changing the Twilight Scythe would be to better define why it is considered troublesome, with actual situations defined, so feedback can be given on these.

I think the contast of acc and attack advantages between 1h and 2h weapons is an interesting idea. However, I also don't see how that would be different from players simply compensating w/ gear.

As far as twilight scythe goes... I seems fine to leave it the way it is. It really doesn't seem like that big a deal. A Drk is gonna sacrifice damage (GS-REsolution and no WS's) to use it in niche situations.
As a bst main, I'd LIKE it if bst could use it also :P WE really don't have any good scythes to use, and even though its our 2nd highest skill weapon, we have no good ws's or weapon options for it....

I like it when some jobs even if they are better on a 1 hand or 2 hand would have an option for the other. Mnk can use staff if a situation called for it (though footwork probably better) and PLD though usually on sword/shield combo, can use GS.

Its cool that bst has a 2h option, but that option is super weak...

I got a bit side-tracked, but really I don't see a need to change twilight scythe... if anything, add it to war and bst.. but even that's not that big a deal.

Why is twilight scythe even being discussed lol? Is this a serious issue on the JP side or something? It's a completely useless weapon, unless you fail at stunning things like bulwark or gambit. If anything, it needs to be buffed so it's actually useful...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

I'd like to respond to a couple of questions and feedback that were brought up regarding the battle system adjustments.

Damage and Defense



To briefly reiterate what was announced previously, we will be making adjustments so that:[list][*]The maximum value of damage received is increased higher than what it is currently.

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So you are going to make it harder for me to participate in legion and Odin II on my main job DRK. Please don't do this I already get crap for being a Taru.

Honestly don't even know why there bothering adjusting some of these. Twilight Scythe? Honestly? Fix Redemption! Would be nice if a weapon you work hard for, "Actually Does More Than Subpar!"

Please explain to us why ignore defense weaponskills are being "ignored." In hardly any situation are they useful. Stop wasting time with adjustments like twilight scythe that don't even need adjusting.

He's only repeating what the Dev's said to the JPs. The devs are pretty much only listening to the JPs now, can't blame them as they most likely don't speak English and can't read these forums directly. The CR's are just translators at this point in time.