Future Battle Balance Adjustments

[Camate]

Greetings,

Below is a comment from Akihiko Matsui in regards to battle balance plans moving forward.

Matsui here.

I'd like to give a rough breakdown of the direction we are looking in for future battle adjustments.

• Tanks
  In regards to the issue where enmity immediately reaches the system cap, we would like to make another round of enmity system adjustments based on high item levels. We are aiming to address this in the February version update.
  
  Additionally, we would like to make it so it is easier for tanks to build enmity and properly hold their targets when there are melee damage dealers in the party with them.
  
  Also, rune fencers are currently weak to physical attacks, so we are looking into adjustments from various angles such as via equipment and job traits. We feel it necessary to make them comparable to a paladin for all-around tanking.
  
  While we feel adjustments to ninja are necessary, if we were to simply enhance Utsusemi there is a concern that they would be able to completely shutout enemies (though it depends on content). Naturally we would like the tank and healer roles to work together in a party setting, so we are currently looking into a better way to address this.
  
  
• Damage dealers
  Based on the above, there may be some concerns over rangers and other damage dealers who have specialties involving enmity reduction possibly losing their place.
  
  When it comes to pure damage dealers, there are various types of individual characteristics such as accuracy and attack power, but we would like to reduce the gap based on damage dealt over time.
  
  Especially when forming parties with support jobs, a difference is elicited between jobs with large boons and those with small boons, so we feel it necessary to make adjustments with this in consideration.
  
  There’s a ton to think about when it comes to support and healer balance as well as the treatment of jobs that possess a wide range of roles, but to start out we would first like to make adjustments to enmity and tanks, and strengthen the foundation of party play.
  
  I'll be discussing the specific plans for adjustments and the implementation timing bit by bit as we move forward.

[Nezha]

I, and many I'm sure, would really appreciate it if while you were making this adjustment to tanks and enmity that you would also look into adjusting the Valoredge automaton, so that it maintains hate better (i.e. adding extra enmity to shield bash, its weapon skills, its base enmity accumulation rate, or via a job abilities/attachments.) It would be groundbreaking to see Valoredge tanking in a party or alliance setting and it would alleviate the burden of currently having only one end-game tank: PLD. This being said, this is not necessary for PUPs sake only, because searching for only 6-7 jobs of the other 22 jobs that exist for events seems silly, it would be great if there were more options to choose from to fit tanking roles such as PUP, RUN, NIN, and maybe even WAR, BLU, and DNC too! I would figure the point of having versatile jobs is to do just that!

[Raging_Oracle]

We have a "job type" bottle neck issue currently with respect to low-man (x<=6) difficult and very difficult battlefield content.

THF, NIN, RDM, BLU, PET take ridiculous amounts of damage over time to effectively tank anything less there are 5 WHM in a 6 man party (exaggeration, but you get the point I hope). I'm not going to get into the why, as players that play these jobs already know why I say such things.

We have multiple DD jobs
We have multiple Specialty /Tool Jobs
We have multiple Mage Jobs
We have multiple pet jobs
We have multiple Ranged ATT jobs
We have the 1/2 Tank Rune Fencer

We Have Only 1 True Tank Job and the barrier to "an Ochain for all" is the amount fighting your going to do for soul and horn NMs, not to mention the plate acquisition.

Not everyone wants to level PLD and fight for weeks to build an Ochain or any other RME Shield. Some people just don't like the job, don't have the time to level it and/or don't have the inventory spaces to level it. Given that you are not providing other options its seems as if you are indirectly telling us all to Level Paladin Or Don't Play and an increasing amount of people are choosing to walk away and not play as opposed to waiting for a PLD to log on.

Want to WKR? Got a PLD? No? Then there will almost always be no WKR

Want to SKCBC for Synth Mats? Well it seems so far that you need to at least be set to difficult to get a drop and popular trend dictates your probably going to need a PLD to do Very Difficult and most Difficult content

Want to do AA? Same Things apply

Yes PLD should have there place, but right now its a tanking monopoly and some more options would be nice. When a server doesn't have enough true tanks (PLD With RME Shield(s), etc) people are not going to be able to create many concurrent parties due to shared resources. As a result, people will not be able to do the things they want to do, nor get the opportunities to earn the drops they want and will stop playing.

If you goal is to get people to just buy the 119 reforge materials on AH then your doing a great job.

If your point is to get people to stop playing then your doing a great job, as its easy to stop playing for good when you continuously cant find a true tank for a party and the barrier to entry for the AA fights are so high that players are unwilling to try to win utilizing a party without a PLD With RME shield.

It is also easy to stop playing when the development team forces you to play jobs you do not enjoy when you are used to choosing how you want to spend your time and money. If your trying to extinct or cannibalize the game you should say that's you intent so people can make the choice to move on or over to 14. Many people I know have said they will never restart a game like this from scratch and this is the last game of this type that they will play. I know that hold true for me personally.

So When? When? When? is the question at hand.

[shantaru]

well said things need change soon!!

[Tennotsukai]

At least, SE is recognizing finally. Also, I would really love to see blu pseudo-tanking again. As even said by SE, blu is meant to tank at times. Perhaps, a future update can give us spells such that allow blu's to tank much better. Upgrades to Warm-up, Barrier Tusk, Saline Coat, and Cocoon (but for magic defense) come to mind.

[Olor]

Please consider making BST a tank too. It's the only role that the job can realistically fill in a party. It's already on heavy armor. It's DD output already sucks. Let us shed hate to our pets more and gain hate more and keep our pets alive through big attacks. There are too many DD jobs and BST will never be chosen because it doesn't have damage output like a DD. BST is a loljob and its really really expensive for a loljob, so please consider fixing that, thanks.

[Camate]

Greetings,

I’d like to give you all a bit more background about the dancer adjustments that are planned for the upcoming February version update. Currently the development team is aware that dancers are having difficulties finding a spot in parties, and they would like to make adjustments to make it easier for them to participate in party content.

In the February version update we will be making adjustments to waltzes, and these adjustments revolve around the idea of the dancer being an attacker that, while falling somewhat short of the firepower possessed by monk and dark knight, are able to give curing support in situations where enemies have crushing attacks. The planned adjustment to waltzes is a very large change, and we’ve decided to implement only this adjustment to start out.

As an adjustment for the future, we are currently looking into having dancer contribute even more to the party by using their specialties, such as increasing the effect of steps much more when dancer is your main job. Additionally we are looking into adjustments for the times when it’s difficult to build finishing moves once you’ve reached the maximum number of steps.

[Edyth]

Greetings,

I’d like to give you all a bit more background about the dancer adjustments that are planned for the upcoming February version update. Currently the development team is aware that dancers are having difficulties finding a spot in parties, and they would like to make adjustments to make it easier for them to participate in party content.

In the February version update we will be making adjustments to waltzes, and these adjustments revolve around the idea of the dancer being an attacker that, while falling somewhat short of the firepower possessed by monk and dark knight, are able to give curing support in situations where enemies have crushing attacks. The planned adjustment to waltzes is a very large change, and we’ve decided to implement only this adjustment to start out.

As an adjustment for the future, we are currently looking into having dancer contribute even more to the party by using their specialties, such as increasing the effect of steps much more when dancer is your main job. Additionally we are looking into adjustments for the times when it’s difficult to build finishing moves once you’ve reached the maximum number of steps.

It's nice that improvements are being made, but they won't change the dynamics of dancers unless they become a contender for a top burst healer, just using TP instead of MP.

In other words: unless dancer offers a significant advantage over WHM in healing effectiveness, it will always be ignored. An example of such an advantage would be massive single-target heals for a relatively small amount of TP (~50%) with a low (5 seconds or so) recast time, or a very potent curaga-type dance that also costs relatively little TP (120% or so). This would allow dancer to MAYBE surpass WHM in situations where there is a frequent and prolonged bombardment of massive damage (like an Ark Angel fight). But then again, rebuilding TP fast enough may be a problem due to evasion on such powerful enemies. Without a change like this, the community is too close-minded to spend a party slot on a dancer.

If you recall the ranger's Nightingale pet summoned with the "Animals" ability in FFV, and how it's an insane full-party heal that costs no MP, dancer needs something of that caliber to be relevant.

[Sapphires]

Greetings,

I’d like to give you all a bit more background about the dancer adjustments that are planned for the upcoming February version update. Currently the development team is aware that dancers are having difficulties finding a spot in parties, and they would like to make adjustments to make it easier for them to participate in party content.

In the February version update we will be making adjustments to waltzes, and these adjustments revolve around the idea of the dancer being an attacker that, while falling somewhat short of the firepower possessed by monk and dark knight, are able to give curing support in situations where enemies have crushing attacks. The planned adjustment to waltzes is a very large change, and we’ve decided to implement only this adjustment to start out.

As an adjustment for the future, we are currently looking into having dancer contribute even more to the party by using their specialties, such as increasing the effect of steps much more when dancer is your main job. Additionally we are looking into adjustments for the times when it’s difficult to build finishing moves once you’ve reached the maximum number of steps.

going to reply to this in pieces below...

while falling somewhat short of the firepower possessed by monk and dark knight, are able to give curing support in situations where enemies have crushing attacks.

In my experiences as dancer main in delve, skc battles, and new archangels and divine might, a full waltz potency set dancer + divine waltz II is a nice instant burst aoe heal,
However:
*Please increase area of effect radius of Divine Waltz and Divine Waltz II (currently ~10' yalms) to match that of WHM Curaga (15' yalms). The difference seems minor but its quite relevant for things like post-meteor attack hp recovery during AA TT/DM
*Paralyze aura monsters make us an unreliable as support healer because a paralyze proc resets the timer.
*Dancers lack the ability to area of effect healing waltz (remove 1 status effect from all party members within a distance of the dancer). 'Crushing attacks' right now usually apply multiple status down effects, it would be helpful if dancers could at least emulate the affect of a sch/whm or whm/sch doing accession+erase, with a high tp cost or cooldown to balance it.

As an adjustment for the future, we are currently looking into having dancer contribute even more to the party by using their specialties

Increasing the haste samba benefit more from dancer main jobs would be nice here, subbed dancer gets a significant amount of JA haste from it compared to dancer main- a broader difference between the two would help.

A combination like Drg/Dnc for something like Tojil was generally taken over a dancer main because they are a more potent dps choice and could also bring 2 of the best dancer JA to the fight (haste samba + box step, while still being a must-have job for runs because of Angon)

, such as increasing the effect of steps much more when dancer is your main job.

The only step non dancers generally care about usually is capped out Box Step, The new AA-MR fight on harder modes is the only time I remember ever where Quickstep has become highly desired.
Feather step feels like it needs a boost, especially when harder content monsters appear to have significant critical hit evasion, its never something you willingly apply unless you somehow capped out box and quickstep.

Dancers would be more appealing for others to bring for events if we can further 'out step' others subbing dancer. Consider letting presto give 1 more finishing move than it currently does (it would then become +4 moves when you presto+step on a new target) and an additional level increase on the step affect (daze Lv. 3 on a new target with presto+step).

Additionally we are looking into adjustments for the times when it’s difficult to build finishing moves once you’ve reached the maximum number of steps.

Usually dancers swap to a different step if they want presto+step to give 3 finishing moves and the previous step level was capped. I don't see this as a crippling issue

Finally, in closing, I would like to still be able to use some fair amount of TP and finishing moves for dealing damage on hard content. Healing support is great, there's been lots of times i've felt good about saving people with waltzes, but the joy of attacking extremely fast, doing competent damage and being able to self skillchain and solo lots of things is why most people love the job.

Can you please look into reducing the cooldown on Climactic Flourish from 90 seconds to maybe 60 seconds? Its ability to do damage combined with Rudra's Storm weaponskill makes it one of our best options on extremely hard targets (delve boss/hardmode skc/aa/dm) but the cooldown time seems rather extreme when you look at how far we lag behind in damage contribution to pure DD jobs.

[Ataraxia]

This is probably the best post i seen done by Camate and I for once am very happy to know that they are looking into making future adjustment to Dnc job. For 5 long years i never bother to sign up but Thank you to that post Camate made i have sign up in Forum and I am very interested in what kind of adjustment to dnc. Like Camate said increasing the effect of steps is a very good start. Since people that sub dnc have access to quickstep, box step and stutter step. I was wondering would that make more since if a Main job Dnc like for example feather step have multiple effect like box step and quickstep in it? Or can add a new Ja steps that bring down enemy attack and magic attack it be nice. Anyways I'll hold off on what i want to see on Dnc and let Camate and the Director come up with some good ideas for Dnc and I'm all for it whatever you got cook up. =) In the meantime I am looking forward into February 18 update it's gonna be fun and excitement.