Why not? My PLD fix-it thread

[Chocobits]

We don't need more flail moves- in fact flail type moves are actually preferred over many mob's other TP moves these days, so I guess you'd be doing us all a favor.

Flail moves only make it dangerous to pull hate if you don't understand that it's a flail move and you shouldn't be standing behind the mob in the first place.

I didn't directly state that the flail moves would be triggered via positioning, which is why I encapsulated it. Omnidirectional flails that occur when hate shifts was more where I was going with it. And although I didn't clarify, by flail I mean the currently overpowered AOE damage we've already seen - except that instead of mobs doing it whenever they have a fancy, there would be a trigger for it that could be avoided. Melee have been in zerg only mode and healers have been in curebot mode long enough. Adding penalties once again for overzealous damage output or curing is how to make tanking relevant again.

At 75 cap, did you have 8-10 idiots with BRD buffs smacking away at Tiamat's face? I'm sure a few elite groups managed Wyrm zergs but for anything less than 5 melee + BRD having relics, it would be laughably stupid to try zerging a CoP Wyrm. And by zerging I mean anything that didn't start with "D" and end with "RK" using multi hit weapons, because that's not zerging in the context we are talking about or in line with what we use today.

What I'm trying to accomplish is to make enmity MATTER once again. The only way PLD tanking or any kind of real tanking that doesn't focus on 3-4 people spam curing whatever high HP DD has been designated "tank" for that session will work is by making it impossible for other jobs to do it. And that means instituting steep penalties for overzealous damage/curing.

[Ryce]

Choco, I like a lot of your suggestions, but I think your overall goal here is to restore the balance of battle to something like it once was. I'm not entirely opposed to that, but I don't think SE has any desire to take the game "backwards".

The new direction of FFXI seem to be all about "zerging" or at least more active battles. As a DD, should I really have to hold myself back from doing the one job I'm here to do? It's much more fun to get my Job Abilities into rhythm and Weapon Skill to my heart's content. SE wanted it that way. A lot of players like it that way.

Now, if this is the reality of the game moving forward, which I argue is true, the solution is not changing the game to make PLD fit - it's changing PLD to make PLD fit. How can we insert a PLD tank into the zergfest while making it fun for the PLD and beneficial to the party? I can think of a few ways.

Cover. This is the signature PLD ability, yet in XI it's situational. Make Cover a job trait with a high proc rate (80% before gear/merit enhancement). Increase the shield block rate when Cover procs (as you suggested). Perhaps add an "enmity lock" effect on a Cover-Shield block, boosting the PLD to max enmity +1 momentarily. This allows the PLD to protect an ally and grab hate, mitigating damage and healer resources.

The PLD's job is now to move around, coming between the mob and the ally with hate. PLD holds hate for a few hits before another DD inevitably steals it - and the process continues. I think this adjustment would work well with your proposed adjustment to cure-generated enmity. With mages reluctant to cure bomb, PLD would be a welcome addition to the front lines.

I'm eager to see any fix to PLD. It's really a shame that PLD is only useful for certain fights and only when a Relic AND Empy shield are in hand.

[Sarick]

The new direction of FFXI seem to be all about "zerging" or at least more active battles. As a DD, should I really have to hold myself back from doing the one job I'm here to do? It's much more fun to get my Job Abilities into rhythm and Weapon Skill to my heart's content. SE wanted it that way. A lot of players like it that way.

This is how I feel, the tank job should be capable of tanking to an extent outside the bounds of hate control.

Now, if this is the reality of the game moving forward, which I argue is true, the solution is not changing the game to make PLD fit - it's changing PLD to make PLD fit. How can we insert a PLD tank into the zergfest while making it fun for the PLD and beneficial to the party?

Agreed but, how would they do that? I think a few changes to cover would be a good start.

Cover. This is the signature PLD ability, yet in XI it's situational. Make Cover a job trait with a high proc rate (80% before gear/merit enhancement). Increase the shield block rate when Cover procs (as you suggested). Perhaps add an "enmity lock" effect on a Cover-Shield block, boosting the PLD to max enmity +1 momentarily. This allows the PLD to protect an ally and grab hate, mitigating damage and healer resources.

Woah! wait a minute here and think about what your saying. A TRAIT! That's just breaking the class. What if they have a backup tank or want to let a DD behind them do extra damage with say counter. The changes to cover would be nice but, by making them a trait you take active management control and skill opportunities from the player.

More on cover.

If it's a job ability it can be used frequently at the command of the player. As a trait is ALWAYS active and doesn't allow direct player management of the covering. In some situations this is a bad thing. The player should be in command of the cover stance not an automatic easy mode trait that activates without their control.

It's like a player making a tank with enmity plus max merited playing a WHM or BLM. The same could be said for a player having max merited negative enmity on a NIN or PLD. It's stuff like this that by design should be user oriented and maintained. The backwards thinking of the person who made these merits should've designed them so the player could switch merited enmity on demand without penalty or never added them at all.

The PLD's job is now to move around, coming between the mob and the ally with hate. PLD holds hate for a few hits before another DD inevitably steals it - and the process continues. I think this adjustment would work well with your proposed adjustment to cure-generated enmity. With mages reluctant to cure bomb, PLD would be a welcome addition to the front lines.

This was the entire point of reducing the recast on cover and changing the poling, but your point about locking the covered target for covers duration would be useful.

I'm eager to see any fix to PLD. It's really a shame that PLD is only useful for certain fights and only when a Relic AND Empy shield are in hand.

I agree, you don't see people asking for a PLD in the tough fights where a good DD can deal damage and tank. A PLD is a turtle that can't protect the people around them because the class doesn't have the resources to function if other jobs can create more hate. This makes them almost useless for their role.

[Sarick]

What I'm trying to accomplish is to make enmity MATTER once again. The only way PLD tanking or any kind of real tanking that doesn't focus on 3-4 people spam curing whatever high HP DD has been designated "tank" for that session will work is by making it impossible for other jobs to do it. And that means instituting steep penalties for overzealous damage/curing.

Enmity does matter but it's broken. If the job isn't capable of mitigating damage through player skill then the enmity system is doing its job well by making it hard to control the battlefield. PLD if left only to the broken enmity system isn't going to enable it's protective properties. I don't care how high you get hate there WILL be resets and situations where hate will shift quickly.

The PLD job needs another form of battle management that makes it excel even when people are zerging. This way it makes up for it's offensive weakness by allowing DD's the opportunity to do more more damage while making it easier on mages to heal. PLD is obviously tough enough to take the hits but they can't utilize that if the enemy walks right past them in favor of other soft targets.

I'm not saying make it an automatic easy button either. Just give PLD a better allowance to to it's job and tank. If cover recast was reduced today to 30 second it'd be an alternative to provoke flash and cure bombing. It'd still need a lot skill to use because the tank would need to be very aware of who is being attacked. They would also still need to try and maintain hate for the few seconds when the enemy shifts targets.

[Chocobits]

And that's all I was trying to draw out, was some discussion.

Nobody wants to go back to 2007 tanking because it sucked just as bad back then lol. I actually enjoy the faster paced combat and I think the game was never really designed to work with the slower paced combat to begin with - we and the devs both clung to that fallacy for too long. That is the real reason PLD has fallen behind.

It all comes down to this, in my eyes:

PLD has enough self-survival tools per se. They don't have hardly shit that mitigates damage to other players, and it was our mistaken assumptions so many years ago that it was "the tank's job" to hold hate so that other players couldn't receive damage. That isn't and shouldn't be PLDs job.

And yet SE has refused for years to do anything about that or give PLD any kind of damage increase or alliance damage mitigation tools. That's really all PLD needs to be relevant. Even if PLD COULD mitigate some damage, and even hold some hate, would you use that for anything other than the most difficult battles? You wouldn't use them for Legion still, because that would cost you a valuable Jesus wielding a 2h relic slot. They're still great for gathering mobs and doing the 'ol Kirin kite.

So PLD needs, simply, some new traits/abilities that enhance cover, cure enmity raised, recast reductions for existing abilities, and for F*** sake can they get a 200-250% damage increase on Atonement?

None of that fixes RDM, which I was also taking into consideration when I was toying with the idea of artificially slowing the pace of battle. RDM.. I don't even know what to do there. Make debuffs more potent and longer lasting - and fix silence so that it works for a set duration like it does on players. And stop making every mob in the game immune to.... everything?

[saevel]

You don't understand how the current mechanics of enmity are implemented, specifically the relationship between CE and VE. Bumping the hate "cap" up does absolutely nothing, it just takes one more WS to cap it and I ws once every ~7s with full buffs. What's breaking the system is the sheer amount of hate that damage generates, the number is so large that it instantly dwarfs all other "tools". A PLD wearing full DD gear spamming resolution would hold hate infinitely better then one turtled up with sword + board. During the last few years before abysesa PLD's had started to learn that more damage = more hate and would use hybrid gear sets focused on haste.

Now after your at the hate cap the monster attacks whomever hit it last, a melee under full buffs is swinging so fast that the probability of the PLD being the last to hit the monster when it's enmity value is checked again is very low. Thus even implementing ALL those changes you would accomplish absolutely nothing, the core problem isn't solved and we're still zerging. In fact because the healers are now generating a sh!t ton more hate your now having them cap out CE insanely fast and once their capped they'll be eligible to be "it" when the monster's enmity is recalculated. When the monster does an area of effect move it will reduce the CE value of everyone within range, the NM will then momentarily target the healer who was out of range and had capped TE.

To give you an idea of the vast different between "hate tools" and a single Weaponskill.

Cap is 20000 TE divided into two categories. VE goes down at the rate of 60 per second, CE only goes down when your hit or a THF use's hate JA.

Individual caps are
10000 VE
10000 CE

Provoke: 1 CE 1800 VE
Flash: 180 CE 1280 VE
Shield Bash: 1 CE 900 VE
Sentinel: 1 CE 1800 VE
Invincible: 1 CE 7200 VE

Cure enmity actually goes down as the target's level goes up.
Level 50: CE = Cure * 1.0, VE = Cure * 6.0
Level 75: CE = Cure * 0.727, VE = Cure * 4.36
Level 99: CE = Cure * 0.59, VE = Cure * 3.58 (extrapolated from Kanican's chart)
So a 700 Cure IV will generate 508 CE and 3052 VE

Now for damage, the multiplier goes down as the target's level goes up.
Level 50: CE = Damage * 2.162, VE = Damage * 6.49
Level 75: CE = Damage * 1.538, VE = Damage * 4.62
Level 99: CE = Damage * 1.07, VE = Damage * 3.5

Now how much has our damage gone up since level 50, then again since level 75? It's gone up by a value much greater then the reduction in CE/VE multiplier

A 3000 point WS (very conservative) will give you
3210 CE, 10500 VE (capped at 10000)

A super buffed DD can do that every 7~9s (if their not they need to turn off the TV and pay attention) which gives you 3~4 WS's within a single 30s period of time, once melee damage is added your capping CE / TE within two WS's.

Heck just smacking the monster (absolutely no WS's) gives you capped hate. At 200 damage per swing (again very conservative) your getting 214 CE and 700 VE for every swing. With capped haste I'm at once swing per 87 delay or 1.45s. That's 20.7s to cap VE and 67.7s to cap CE. Slightly over one minute of only melee is capped hate, and that's not counting things like goading belt or QA,TA,DA procs.

Are you now clear on the sheer magnitude of difference between damage and "everything else" for hate generation. Nothing short of a taunt mechanic or a dramatic nerfing of damage hate (and corresponding nerf to cure hate) will ever allow a non-damage oriented tank to tank.

So yes you know nearly nothing about the current hate system other then the ignorant cry of "ITS BROKE HERE IS MY UNINFORMED IDEA!!!"

[Chocobits]

You don't understand how the current mechanics of enmity are implemented, specifically the relationship between CE and VE. Bumping the hate "cap" up does absolutely nothing, it just takes one more WS to cap it and I ws once every ~7s with full buffs. What's breaking the system is the sheer amount of hate that damage generates, the number is so large that it instantly dwarfs all other "tools". A PLD wearing full DD gear spamming resolution would hold hate infinitely better then one turtled up with sword + board. During the last few years before abysesa PLD's had started to learn that more damage = more hate and would use hybrid gear sets focused on haste.

Now after your at the hate cap the monster attacks whomever hit it last, a melee under full buffs is swinging so fast that the probability of the PLD being the last to hit the monster when it's enmity value is checked again is very low. Thus even implementing ALL those changes you would accomplish absolutely nothing, the core problem isn't solved and we're still zerging. In fact because the healers are now generating a sh!t ton more hate your now having them cap out CE insanely fast and once their capped they'll be eligible to be "it" when the monster's enmity is recalculated. When the monster does an area of effect move it will reduce the CE value of everyone within range, the NM will then momentarily target the healer who was out of range and had capped TE.

To give you an idea of the vast different between "hate tools" and a single Weaponskill.

Cap is 20000 TE divided into two categories. VE goes down at the rate of 60 per second, CE only goes down when your hit or a THF use's hate JA.

Individual caps are
10000 VE
10000 CE

Provoke: 1 CE 1800 VE
Flash: 180 CE 1280 VE
Shield Bash: 1 CE 900 VE
Sentinel: 1 CE 1800 VE
Invincible: 1 CE 7200 VE

Cure enmity actually goes down as the target's level goes up.
Level 50: CE = Cure * 1.0, VE = Cure * 6.0
Level 75: CE = Cure * 0.727, VE = Cure * 4.36
Level 99: CE = Cure * 0.59, VE = Cure * 3.58 (extrapolated from Kanican's chart)
So a 700 Cure IV will generate 508 CE and 3052 VE

Now for damage, the multiplier goes down as the target's level goes up.
Level 50: CE = Damage * 2.162, VE = Damage * 6.49
Level 75: CE = Damage * 1.538, VE = Damage * 4.62
Level 99: CE = Damage * 1.07, VE = Damage * 3.5

Now how much has our damage gone up since level 50, then again since level 75? It's gone up by a value much greater then the reduction in CE/VE multiplier

A 3000 point WS (very conservative) will give you
3210 CE, 10500 VE (capped at 10000)

A super buffed DD can do that every 7~9s (if their not they need to turn off the TV and pay attention) which gives you 3~4 WS's within a single 30s period of time, once melee damage is added your capping CE / TE within two WS's.

Heck just smacking the monster (absolutely no WS's) gives you capped hate. At 200 damage per swing (again very conservative) your getting 214 CE and 700 VE for every swing. With capped haste I'm at once swing per 87 delay or 1.45s. That's 20.7s to cap VE and 67.7s to cap CE. Slightly over one minute of only melee is capped hate, and that's not counting things like goading belt or QA,TA,DA procs.

Are you now clear on the sheer magnitude of difference between damage and "everything else" for hate generation. Nothing short of a taunt mechanic or a dramatic nerfing of damage hate (and corresponding nerf to cure hate) will ever allow a non-damage oriented tank to tank.

So yes you know nearly nothing about the current hate system other then the ignorant cry of "ITS BROKE HERE IS MY UNINFORMED IDEA!!!"

I did specifically mention that hate values for damage dealt need to be revisited.. it was right alongside the raising the hate cap, and the raising the values for cure enmity.... so yes, I have a very healthy understanding of everything you just said... but it's ok, nobody is good at everything, and reading is not everyone's forte. Raising the enmity caps by themselves would do absolutely nothing.. but in conjunction with adjusting values for specific actions, it goes a long way. Job abilities and cures need a much higher value and damage needs a much lower value. Thank you for reaffirming what I said twice in this very thread!!!!!!!! You're agreeing with me at the same time that you're taunting me... lame!

*Edit* I could have summarized my "limited" understanding of enmity in a couple sentences, and much more concisely than your somewhat long winded tirade:

Damage values > JA and Cure values
CE is static enmity, VE decays
CE is only lost from taking damage or from enmity transfer (THF isn't the only job that can do this, shock!)

I don't think your cure hate values are taking into consideration.. things like enmity reduction gear and traits...? WHM has them. PLD doesn't. Because of these, and the fact that WHM are using Cure V and topping off with Cure III.. they aren't using Cure IV hardly at all except as a backup because of enmity/MP inefficiency. So they aren't capping out enmity at nearly the pace you suggest.. And as you eloquently pointed out, THF has enmity transfer tools.. and you have them in for TH if nothing else on anything that isn't a loot box drop

I didn't mention specific values or go into explanation about any of the above because.. I figured we're all big kids now and all of this goes without saying...?

So yes, by way of this post, we see who is the student and who is the master. Come back some time and get schooled again! I have enjoyed it.

[Chocobits]

Also, I did retract my suggestions for artificially extending battle by way of hate shift adjustments. BUT I do have suggestions for mob TP spam, to account for the faster pace of combat:

1) Remove Subtle Blow and do away with TP generation through receiving damage completely. We don't need it any more.
2) Increase the charge time on mobs' "Readies".

Now we have dynamic real time battles that don't rely on stun, but on coordination. Player skill vs stats on paper.

If I rocked any harder I would need a Stona.

[Economizer]

Quoting an entire comment and then complaining about a wall of text seems painfully out of place with each other.

I don't think your cure hate values are taking into consideration.. things like enmity reduction gear and traits...? WHM has them. PLD doesn't. Because of these, and the fact that WHM are using Cure V and topping off with Cure III.. they aren't using Cure IV hardly at all except as a backup because of enmity/MP inefficiency. So they aren't capping out enmity at nearly the pace you suggest..

You either don't play White Mage or you don't know the numbers behind curing on White Mage. Now at least you didn't suggest White Mages are spamming Cure VI, but Cure IV is the go to cure spell currently.

Go take a gander at the Cure Formula Changes thread. Now, even despite not adjusting for the WHM AF3+2 pants (if you're not casting in these you're doing it wrong), you could just plug in some basic numbers into Furen's Cure Calculator (which has been updated thanks to the testing done in the Cure Formula Changes thread), you will be able to see that Cure III/IV are way more efficient then Cure V, and cure for enough to primarily spam between Cure III/IV in most situations. The numbers grow even further apart when you calculate for the AF3+2 pants.

Granted, if enmity changed in a fashion that casting Cure III/IV is hazardous, we could see a situation where White Mages will no longer be using just their sufficient and MP efficient spells, but these situations would also favor against White Mage's current advantages it holds now in curing, which is the huge margin of MP efficiency, the inclusion of AoE cures, and even to some extent the cureskin effect (Cure VI doesn't get the full effects, so if it is regularly forced for the reduced enmity, the benefits of cureskin will be diminished).

Getting back to the point here however, Cure IV can cure for ~850+ and Cure III heals for ~450+ from any decent White Mage, with numbers very close from any Red Mage, and higher numbers from any Scholar (Aurorastorm). In the vast majority of situations you'll be able to go between Cure III/IV, and most situations not covered by this are covered by busting out even more efficient Curaga spells.

And as you eloquently pointed out, THF has enmity transfer tools.. and you have them in for TH if nothing else on anything that isn't a loot box drop

All THF can do is move enmity onto itself with Accomplice/Collaborator. Trick Attack doesn't transfer any enmity, just the enmity from the damage spike it creates.

[Chocobits]

Quoting an entire comment and then complaining about a wall of text seems painfully out of place with each other.

Fair enough.

As to the rest - sigh... we're obviously talking post-adjustment on the Cure IV... and obviously we aren't talking about Trick Attack for THF regarding WHM.... we're still dealing in "it goes with saying but I'm saying it anyways in the possibility you're somehow wrong" isms. I like contributions, I really do.. but really...? Do I need to state after every post that the scenarios I type out are obviously post-whatever-adjustments-I've-just-suggested...? And the need to attack me with comments like "u ubvoosly dun play gaem as heelrar" based on me not stating the obvious for every post?

Sheesh. Please also tell me to include a cure potency staff while I am at it! I obviously need to have my hand held!

I do acknowledge you could misinterpret my remark about Cure IV.. It goes through phases and in the past it was numerically not an efficient or wise spell to repeatedly cast due to the ridiculously low amount of cure potency we were given. That is no longer the case.. but a simple "You meant post-whatever-suggestions-you-just-mentioned right?" Instead of another small novel that only serves to reaffirm what I am already saying! Also, take into consideration that with the adjustments I suggested.. some cure potency might need to be sacrificed in order to get a decent -enmity value on our gear... So yes, Cure IV would go out of style with cure enmity values adjusted per my suggestions...! And it's not like we don't have refresh up the wazoo.. I didn't have a difficult time using Cure V back at 75 cap.. I don't see it being a problem at 99 cap..?

I know I am a genius but I feel like I am teaching the English alphabet to handicapped immigrants here. Am I really thinking at such a higher level that my meagerest afterthoughts are so profound they need clarification/reiteration at every phase?!