Screwed again: Proposed THF job adjustments.

[Laphine]

truth be told, it surely would fit us to have widescan for treasure chests~

[FrankReynolds]

you guys gotta stop falling for this crap. devs read my 1 negative comment and your 3 positive and think "well they don't seem to like bully much... lets give them wide scan instead...".

[Camate]

As there have been a lot of concerns and comments cropping up about thief lately, here is some additional feedback from the development team.

Regarding the Efficacy of Aura Steal
When compared to Voracious Trunk, Osmosis, and Absorb-Attri, Aura Steal’s superiority really shines due to the fact that it is possible to elicit a dispel effect regardless of an enemy’s inherent resistances. Also, depending on how many merit points you’ve used to upgrade it, when you consider that you can reach a 100% rate of absorption, despite the recast timer being slightly long, the effects of Aura Steal are by no means weak.

While this is only one example, it might be possible to make Aura Steal its own ability and keep its recast timer shared with Steal. However, there is a high possibility that we will need to balance this by reducing the absorption rate as a trade-off, and I don’t think this would be very desirable.

We will be carefully looking into things for the revamps to the merit point effects, so we would like to take a good amount of time and hear all of your feedback.

Regarding Trick Attack and Decoy Shot
Decoy Shot, which is scheduled to be implemented in the upcoming version update, has been balanced more around the idea of controlling your own enmity. (We understand that the effects of Yoichinoyumi/Annihilator/Armageddon are similar, but since this is comparing an ability to a relic weapon, we think that’s an entirely separate discussion.)

Let’s take a look at the below comparison:

• Decoy Shot
Recast: 5 minutes
A set amount of enmity can be diverted to another player and any excess enmity will remain on the ranger.

• Trick Attack
Recast: 1 minute
All of the enmity generated at that time can be diverted to another player.

In regards to determining the stacking of the Treasure Hunter effect via TA WS, SA WS, and SATA WS
The reason why you cannot tell if the effect is increasing is due to the fact that it is difficult to make the log display the Treasure Hunter enhancement effect during a weapon skill.

If we try to make the increase display in the log during a weapon skill, the amount of work would be on par with multiple job adjustments, so we do not have any plans of making this particular adjustment. However, the fact that it is difficult to tell when the Treasure Hunter effect increases, means that we will be looking into other adjustments.

[Manque]

It's nice to have confirmation that TH can proc during a WS. That is, by the way, what I interpret the latter half of this to mean.

I don't think I would ever swap my merits out for more Aura Steal merits... I get by with 1 in it.
I guess that's my style choice, but can anyone make a case for dropping other merits to make aura steal a high absorption rate?

I guess it would be nice to have the timers separated for things like THFAF1 or stealing cells from qiqirn in Salvage. That's about the best thing I see in these notes... and, that's pretty bad imho.

[Karbuncle]

I thank you for a second Update Camate

That being said, With the RNG Ability, Even if its only 10% of the Enmity per shot, it was said it would last 3 minutes. a RNG Shooting that for 3 minutes will likely give their target many many many times more enmity than a Trick attack would in that time. (Assuming no WS' are involved)

This might not be because TA is bad, Its simply THF is laughably weak. In the interest of Making Trick Attack not terrible, are there in plans to boost the damage through those abilities?

Perhaps add an Attack multiplier to SA and TA? Since the problem with those on hard enemies is that your attack is so low the damage is not great. If you can add a 2.0 or 1.66 Mult. to SA/TA it could go a long way in improving those abilities.

Perhaps even look into making SA and TA like Feint too? Meaning, The effect stays on until requirements are met. Further example: You use SA and the mob turns, SA does not wear off if you hit it, it will only wear off when the SA is successful or 1minute has passed.

Could that be worked?

On the note of Aura Steal, I understand is uniquesness, But 5 minutes is a bit long. Realistically, How many fights last more than 10-15 minutes? not even voidwatch mobs take that long. being able to dispel a mob once a fight is not really as broken as the devs make it sound.

Could you at least ask them if they could introduce something to reduce Steal's recast timer... Maybe to a max of ~3 minutes? It truthfully wouldn't be a big improvement but it would help in a small way. I understand the idea of maintaining balance, But as it stands THF is a very undesirable job for anything outside of Treasure hunter, and even then, well.. I don't need to repeat why TH has ruined the job.

Either way, You talk of Splitting Steal/Aura Steal. If you could put Aura Steal on a 1min~2miin timer, and make it share recast with steal in exchange for a much lower "Absorb" rate, not a single THF here would object to that. No one uses that ability to really "Steal" the buff, Its more of a "Dispel" thing, the absorb is a bonus.

So yah, If you're talking about Making Aura Steal separate than steal with a much lower Delay, Have at it. .If you're saying split them but make them share timers and both be 5 minutes still? Then yah, Keep them the same, that would be stupid of us too want..

Thanks again for the second update, Even though its kinda... grim, in terms of where THF is going. very very grim. I can be a little upset at the direction THF is going....

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Oh, Any more info on Bully? If its AOE, Single Target, THF only?

[Karbuncle]

Really i wish just once We'd get a Rep response that brings good news

I know its not your fault Camate Don't think I'm blaming you.

Edit: I mean, Does the Dev team just not see the only real endgame role THF Fill is Treasure Hunter whore and Sac-puller? How can they justify leaving this job so undesirable that their only logical use is making them go suicide on a bunch of mobs to make a pull eaiser?

Why are they so afraid of giving us something useful?

Can you present these questions to them too. You can leave out the anger.

[Washburn]

Even if aura steal processes on 100% of steal processes, steal process rate is still garbage, especially on NM's.

[Byrth]

PS. How does Treasure Hunter work?

[Karbuncle]

Now now Byrth, If they told us that, Their magical Life-raft of mediocrity that keeps THF Afloat in terms of semi-relevance would pop and all the THF's would drown in an ocean of useless.

Right next to SCH and DNC, Drowning and hoping SE throws them a life-jacket, but alas, We drown.

Bully was like throwing us a Life jacket made of Lead :O!

[Coldbrand]

Plus they're not adding anything worth stealing because then people might want to steal things. As they told us.