Overall Battle System Adjustments for the Future

[Demon6324236]

Also why can't crystal petrifacts be traded in for voidstones, or something worthwhile like 1 gil or higher?

Petrifacts --> Voidstones would create an infinite cycle that would result in unlimited stones, if that were to happen, the stone system itself would become pointless in every way. Conversion to gil is a bad idea because of the reason that, like blinkers, it would create gil from nothing, harming the economy.

[Demon6324236]

A big enticement for me to do Walk of Echoes would be for it to drop heavy metal pouches.

I like the idea of plates being added to lower fluxes, perhaps add pouches to 12~15, and Cinder/Dross to 15.

[Siiri]

For those who do pure math I believe mythic SAM is actually the most overpowered job. Any nerf to resolution would also have to include a nerf to Shoha in the interest of fairness.

Also tp bonus SAM is every bit as powerful as OAT GS Drk

[Zhronne]

My personal opinion on Matsui-san ideas

• 1-handed modifiers
  Currently 2handed weapons have a 1:0,75 conversion rate from stats (STR>Attack, DEX>Accuracy etc), while 1-handed weapons have 1:0,5
  I welcome any kind of change to 1-handed weapons jobs, altough I'm a bit unsure if this could be the right solution.
  Let's go back in time a bit and remember why the ration was changed. Yes, long time ago 2handed weapons had 1:0,5 ratio too. It was changed mainly in the attempt to make some jobs use the weapons they were originally meant to use, for example Warrior using Great Axe. Initially it was changed to 1:1, and then to 1:0,75 after a while.
  It took a while to the player base to get used to it, but it sorta worked.
  2handed jobs were mostly preferred to 1 handed jobs because of the damage tier of their weapons, because of their higher attack, because of their higher accuracy, because they were giving the enemy less TP. (this is another very important mechanism of FFXI that should be addressed. Some times some monsters are easier if fought with less people than more, and this is kinda ridiculous if you ask me)
  
  Changing the modifier ratio for 1handed weapon users (only for the main weapon and not offhand?) brings the risk of making some 1handed weapons jobs too strong, hence requiring furhter nerfs after the change. People hate nerfs, if you think something is gonna be too powerful and require a nerf after, just don't do it.
  
  Aren't there really any other solutions? Some job trait that only activates when you use 1 handed weapons and that gives some bonus of some sort?
  
• Merit Points weapon skills
  Sorry but the suggested change won't make anybody happy and won't change a thing.
  We currently have two main kind of users we can think of
  1) "Easy" players
  2) "Hardcore" players
  
  The first category doesn't really care much about being best at anything, they just enjoy the game no matter what. This category of players already makes use of 1/5 upgrades weapon skills, they are not complaining about the current situation, changing it won't bring any effect on this category.
  
  The second category is made by people who really want to excel at things. If they do something, they want it to be the best possible. If they take a weapon skill, they want it to be the best.
  Making it 65% with 1/5 won't be enough, because it still won't be as good as it can possibly be. They'll still want to get 5/5 and they'll still complain they can't do it for more than 3 weapon skills.
  
  Really Mr. Matsui, I don't see why you and your team are being so adamant in not allowing a merit cap increase.
  People are running out of jobs to experience, they are running out of things to merit. Giving them more stuff to "buy" with merits would only increase the value of merit points, the value of getting them, and would keep the cycle on.
  If things go on like this soon there won't be any player left who still look for experience points, leaving those who do in a mess because they won't be able to find a group to do experience points with.
  
  I really don't see what's the point in limiting the Weapon Skills category.
  Please, if you think there is a good reason explain it to us, maybe I will agree with you after reading it.
  Thank you.
  
• Elemental Magic Adjustments
  I have mixed feelings about these changes.
  Some of the things you proposed look very good, but having different element spells require different stats will only make it worse.
  Compared to other games FFXI mechanisms are already particularly complicated.
  If you do that change people will need different sets, different gear for each different element.
  A set to nuke for earth spell, a set to nuke for fire spell, a set to nuke for thunder spells.
  It would be a mess, especially with our limited inventories.
  At the moment, altough there are some specific equipments (elemental obis, staves etc) you want the same stats for the same spell. Making you require to focus on, say, intellect for earth and then, say, Mab for Thunder, would only make things even more complicated than they already are.
  Plese, don't do that.

[Prothscar]

Changing the modifier ratio for 1handed weapon users (only for the main weapon and not offhand?) brings the risk of making some 1handed weapons jobs too strong, hence requiring furhter nerfs after the change. People hate nerfs, if you think something is gonna be too powerful and require a nerf after, just don't do it.

OH NO 20 EXTRA ACC FOR ONE OF MY TWO HANDS DDDDDDDDDDDDD:


no but srsly, the change is minute. don't worry about it.

[Motenten]

Entropy actually puts out decent damage, but not as much as Resolution, and MP doesn't really matter on DRK because they never took the time to make that relevant on DRK.

Actually, that's an interesting little aside. With the magic changes, the cast times on T1-T3 nukes went down considerably. T1 are near-instant; T2 are the same speed as :ni ninjutsu; T3 are as fast as Thunder is now. Plus they're all significantly more MP efficient, and dInt (fun with Absorb-Int) has a much greater impact. Is this a step towards making drk spellcasting more useful?

Playing around with it, it looks like a Stone III/Water III would take about as long to cast as a 50%-60% hasted scythe swing (considering from the scythe perspective due to Entropy; doesn't change that scythe needs improvements to really be a valid choice vs greatsword). Would have damage in the 300-400 range with around 30-60 dInt; with something in the range of 50 MAB range from gear, 450-600 total damage (~1.5x to 2x a normal swing). The MP cost isn't that bad, at 64-75 MP, and it would return about 10 TP from Occult Acumen.

Not enough to decidedly replace normal melee, but enough that I could see it being at least marginally useful, particularly in unbuffed situations. Also, at the bottom end with T1s, could a very fast-casting spell that gives back a couple TP be useful in making an easy improvement to any x-hit build?

Would need a more experienced drk to make a better evaluation, though.

[ManaKing]

You still believe Scythe WSs are in need of buffing because they are generally out performed by almost every other 2H weapon though?

Is that a correct assumption?

[Godofgods]

hell.. +1 just for the detailed post lol

[saevel]

Really? because my first post about this subject said take a hit off of resolution and add it to Entropy and Quietus

And thus you are advocating nerfing Resolution right out the gate. It's fueled by pure spite due to the number of Wagnaroks running around.

Scyth WS's have sucked for a long time. Prior to Resolution Great Sword WS's sucked even more then Scyth did and thus DRK's everyone used Scyth. The previous "best" Scyth WS was guillotine, 4 hits with first hit being 0.875 for a total of 3.875 fTP. The mods were 25% STR, 25% MND, ohh and it can silence the target that will shortly die anyway. Quietus is only marginally better then Guilly was, depending on gear setup. For Great swords it was Spinning Slash, 2.5 fTP, 30% STR 30% INT and 50% attack bonus. This made SS decent on high level targets if the DRK wasn't getting buffed and could put out big numbers as /THF. For pure spam Guilly beat it out easily and SH is a better SA 300TP WS anyway (back when we did that). Torcleaver was a big boost for GSWD, 4.75 fTP @60% VIT.

Now compare this to Great Axe, Raging Rush 3 hits (3.0 fTP) @35% STR WSC with a 15/30/50 crit rate. RR easily beats out anything Scyth / GSWD had during that era, for 300TP SAWS you had Steel Cyclone. Then Ukon was created and the awesomeness that was UF was unleashed. 2 hit 3.0 fTP 60% STR 20/35/55 Crit WS on a job that also received CAB and additional gear that further enhances their crit damage. Tachi Gekko was modified many times due to SE over buffing it at one point in time. Y/G/K respond to +TP very favorably and resulted in Gekko being spammed @200 with a Hagun so I'll list it's 100 and 200 stats. @100 1.5625 75% STR WSC +100% attack bonus, @200 1.875 fTP, @300 2.5. This created a WS that would be extremely consistent even when under-buffed, Y/G/K was a WS you threw as much STR at as possible due to you always being instantly capped on Attack. Then SE created Fudo, 3.75 fTP 60% STR, one hit WS which covered all the situations that Y/G/K wouldn't be ideal in (being super buffed) by having a much larger total fTP.

DRG used Penta, 5-hit 5.0 fTP 20% STR 20% DEX, also had Skewer for 3-hit 3.0 fTP critical hit WS 35% STR mod and finally Drakesbane for a four hit 4.0 fTP 50% STR critical hit WS that had a 18.7% attack penalty.

Now with these as the background it's pretty easy to see how GS / Scyth were stupidly weak. DRK's real weapons were never Scyth / Great Sword, they were Club / Dagger / Sword depending on how rich / lucky you were. The only exception to this was if you had an Apoc and relics were stupidly hard / expensive to make back then. Apoc was good due to the +10% gear haste from the AM effect, it allowed the DRK to cap equip haste easily, the Runic Great Axe did this also and was much cheaper to acquire.

Now enter in the merit WS's which evened things out. Shoha is just a super Gekko, attack bonus and all. Stardiver is powerful and replaces Drakes / Penta as the spam WS of choice. Upheavel is powerful yet is overshadowed by the awesomeness that is UF. SE was smoking something when they made Entropy, exact same stats as Stardiver but use's INT instead thus forcing Scyth DRK's to make compromises in their WS gear selection (no double dipping for fSTR / attack). Then we have Resolution which changed the single worst category of weapons amongst DD's into something that's actually competitive.

The only reason you see so many Wagnaroks is that you can farm it entirely solo doing an every day activity and buy the final set of marrows. Ukon's require you to build Glavoid / Itzapotle / Orthrus pop sets and rely on /sh or other people to help you build it. Then you have to deal with the insanely stupid task of getting 1500 HMPs, then the final rift item upgrade. SAM / DRG have it worse in that their super game crushing weapon lies behind a 30,000 alexandrite wall.

So now we have
99 Ukon (WAR) = 99 Rag (WAR/DRK) = 99 Kogarasumaru (SAM) = 99 Ryunohige (DRG)
Right behind those is 99 Masamune / Amano, 99 Apoc and 99 Gugnir with 99 Bravura. Though 99 Bravura gets special mention, it's AM is -20% DT which could be handy for a WAR pseudo tanking big nasties.

I don't know how 99 Liberator and 99 Conqueror stack up to those, haven't seen the math wizardry behind them.

Suddenly that perceived "OMG WAGNAROKS ARE RUINING THE GAME" is shown to be a bunch of bovine scatology. Its no more powerful then any of the other super weapon combos. The only thing different is that it's much more convenient to build then the rest, it's the easiest and thus becomes the most popular. So in nerfing Res / Rag combo your only accomplishment is to relegate DRK back into abyssea obscurance. By trying to nerf / buff Res / Rag for Scyth you only exchange one super weapon for another, possibly making it so DRK would need a mythic like SAM / DRG and recreating Warrior Fantasy from Abyssea.

You still believe Scythe WSs are in need of buffing because they are generally out performed by almost every other 2H weapon though?

Demanding nerfs without actually knowing the mechanics behind what your demanding is rather foolish. Your not actually accomplishing your stating goal (making scyths more competitive) while doing severe harm to the existing player base. You sure you didn't work for Tanaka previously? And how the hell will nerfing Reso / Rag make Scyth any better in the big picture? WAR's can still use Ukkon, DRG's still get DB/SD, and SAM's still have Fudo / Shoha.

Now what you really should be asking for is Scyth WS's to be buffed in general. Either change Entropy to 100% STR so that it at least becomes competitive, or keep it 100% INT and add a hit. Leave Rag / Reso combo as is for those who went that path. Yet somehow I think your desire to punish what you perceive as a bandwagon crowd won't allow you to understand that.

[saevel]

I play DRK with a Scythe or Dual Wielding 1H axes which is why I don't play DRK anymore.

Had to reread that last part .... which explains your complete and utter lack of understanding of game mechanics. Just wanted to be clear that you would prefer DRK's resort to axe's over using GSWD?

I know 3 Scythe DRKs that either have quit in the last 3 months or are quitting because they are sick of not having a single WS that is worth using anymore and they don't like Greatswords. I know a DRK that has a Liberator and doesn't use it because it's garbage compared to his Resolution spam. Resolution has taken away people's ability to identify with their jobs and that is cancerous for diversity as well as SEs pocketbook.

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Yeah like I originally thought, your just spewing vitriol.