Elements to be Implemented in the March 27th Version Update

[Ziyyigo-Tipyigo]

I want RUN/PLD and PLD/RUN to be the new tank standards.

Heresy. Clearly the new tank standard must be RUN/DNC

[Guppie]

RUN

I think you've touched on something important here. I believe a key factor in these changes is the introduction of the upcoming expansion, including Rune Fencer and Geomancer; the two news jobs will likely possess major defensive abilities, and the changes are intended to make them more appealing.

I think we should wait and see how the new jobs (and /subjobs) work out. And in addition to the new jobs, SoA will of course also introduce new equipment, and it is possible a major theme of the new gear will be improved defense.

[Evilkairi]

Will we see the New Sp's (1hrs, 2hrs whatever you wanna call em) implemented whit the update or are we waiting 2-4 more months to maybe get all that content wich been promised so long now?

[Teiei]

Enmity Adjustments
In regards to enmity, we will be performing the first stage of the content that was discussed previously. To start out, we will be making adjustments so that if the target is level 51 or above, the enmity generated in proportion to the damage dealt, and the enmity incurred in relation to the amount of HP cured, will be reduced. In the case that the target is above level 99, the amount of enmity generated will be reduced to 30% compared to before adjustment (the current level). We are also making adjustments at the same time so that the enmity gains from Cure V are reduced.

While this isn't limited to enmity adjustments, we understand this is an element that we need to continuously follow and address, and I wanted to remind you that this would be the first step.

I think I understand what they're attempting to accomplish with this adjustment.

However, in order to truly be effective I can see at least two additional things that need to be changed.

First, they need to increase the enmity lost by players when taking damage. And second, they need to adjust the abilities and spells tanks use to gain enmity.

The idea is that since tanks should be taking less damage from monsters than everyone else, they should be able to quickly grab and maintain (less damage = less enmity loss) high enmity levels throughout the fight. However, this idea has failed in that damage dealers gain enmity far faster and maintain it easier than the tanks. Reducing the enmity gain from damage is a good start, but if they were to also increase the amount of enmity lost when players take damage then it would be far more effective in keeping the tank the target of the enemy for most of the battle.

Picture a tank and damage dealer; the tank should ideally be capable of using various abilities and spells to immediately garner a large amount of enmity. However, the damage dealer will also gain enmity while attacking and at some point surpass the tank. The monster would then turn to attack the damage dealer and, as a result of being hit, the damage dealer loses enmity and drops below the levels of the tank. Once safely below the tank's enmity the damage dealer can continue to attack and slowly rebuild enmity till the cycle repeats.

Increasing enmity loss from taking damage would help immensely in making this idea work out.

Finally tanks need a way to gain that initial enmity spike that is greater than a damage dealer's attacks. If they made enmity gain abilities scaled with level then it could be a nice solution to this problem.

I also know that Trick Attack might be an alternative to the tank's initial problem with spike enmity. However, if they're reducing enmity gain through damage then Trick Attack's enmity will also be lowered.

[Yinnyth]

I think I understand what they're attempting to accomplish with this adjustment.

However, in order to truly be effective I can see at least two additional things that need to be changed.

First, they need to increase the enmity lost by players when taking damage. And second, they need to adjust the abilities and spells tanks use to gain enmity.

The idea is that since tanks should be taking less damage from monsters than everyone else, they should be able to quickly grab and maintain (less damage = less enmity loss) high enmity levels throughout the fight.

Tanks should be the guys who are at the greatest risk of taking damage. It's their entire job to do whatever it takes to make sure everyone else in the group doesn't take damage, and they usually achieve that by taking the damage themselves. I think this change would be better achieved through more accessable equipment and abilities which increase enmity decay, not a complete increase across the board.

Also, these enmity adjustments are just a first step. They intend to make other changes as well. Probably not the changes anyone is specifically suggesting, but their overall goal is the same as ours.

[Sarick]

Picture a tank and damage dealer; the tank should ideally be capable of using various abilities and spells to immediately garner a large amount of enmity. However, the damage dealer will also gain enmity while attacking and at some point surpass the tank. The monster would then turn to attack the damage dealer and, as a result of being hit, the damage dealer loses enmity and drops below the levels of the tank. Once safely below the tank's enmity the damage dealer can continue to attack and slowly rebuild enmity till the cycle repeats.

You're forgetting that there are always more DD's then tanks. If you have a 5 to one ratio of DD vs tank. The attention of the enemy will be reduced by 1/5th or the number of active DDs. This would influence the tanks actual effectiveness.

The DD's would be cycling through the hate list before the tank had a chance to effectively tank. You see by the time the 5th dd loses hate or dies if, the 1st one was still alive they would've already gained enough hate back to get the enemies attention before the tank can take it back.

As a result the real tank wouldn't be effective and would be better replaced by another DD because the monsters attention would always cycle through everyone almost equally.

I think this sums up way the enmity system would still be broken as there are similar existent broken issues already in the game. The only true way to mitigate damage in these cases is to create an ability or modify existing abilities/spell such as "cover" or in a ninjas case AOE shadows to protect the players they're defending despite the enemies attention.

This update seems to simply delay or reduce the bouncing by at least 30%. I doubt it will be extremely effective in large groups. It might even cause issues with back line jobs taking quick hate or more bouncing hate. Eventually the back line jobs are going to cap out as well and the only effective ways to lose that hate is die, de-zone, take severe damage or do nothing as hate degrades. There are other alternatives like hate shifting/stealing but those take more detail to explain and actual skill to master.

[MarkovChain]

Ok girls someone explain me why every endgame content gets ajusted except ADL ? Can we at least nerf ADL's HP ? Even legion got nerf to ridiculness. Not that it matters because noone does legion so even less will do it after the nerf, but still, ADL provides the means to get the best weapons in the game >< so people will need it ad infinitum. In other words marrows are becoming ~ 2x harder to gather.

[Sarick]

Ok girls someone explain me why every endgame content gets ajusted except ADL ? Can we at least nerf ADL's HP ? Even legion got nerf to ridiculness. Not that it matters because noone does legion so even less will do it after the nerf, but still, ADL provides the means to get the best weapons in the game >< so people will need it ad infinitum. In other words marrows are becoming ~ 2x harder to gather.

Wasn't you the one boosting about trioing ADL and how the embrava + smn two hour was over powered? Seriously you dug your own grave don't complain.

[Prothscar]

hahahahaha



ok then now to respond to the adjustments:

actually looks really good, im impressed that SE's finally addressing these issues and actually succeeding in making changes that will have some feasible impact on gameplay. tanking for a few minutes instead of a few seconds should now be possible as the damage required to cap CE has effectively tripled

[Rorrick]

Camate, can we get clarification on whether or not the attack ratio adjustments for one-handed weapons will apply to Hand-to-hand or not?