Immanence Balance Discussion

[Selindrile]

I see no issue at all with 1 mage class having the ability to skillchain. This is not the "fix" that was needed: the ABILITY for melees to be effective is. This is an issue they are obviously working on resolving. They have shown us that it is a priority for them, and have asked for our feedback and patience as they address the issue. SCH being used to skillchain is fullfilling a need in endgame content until we can get the melee issue fixed. Please don't encourage them to take this away from us.

I find it very odd to be on the same side of this issue with you, considering you've been arguing against the melee changes this entire time, lol. But yeah, they've obviously realized the issues melees have endgame and are working on it, let them do it, it will take some time, but in the meantime this change would prevent a lot of endgame content from getting completed at all in the short term.

A proposed "melee fix" could be to allow damage past certain threshholds to get a bigger bonus to burst damage, but, directly harming how much Sch gives now, would derail a lot of content's only realistic way to be completed at the moment.

[Zeldar]

Lol Selindrile. I've been arguing against certain melee requests, but have always maintained that its the inability of melees to survive up close that needs to be addressed. On some other issues, I think you managed to change my mind a bit. On others, I'm just a stubborn old man really.

[Shyles]

Thanks for the feedback everyone!

(Edit: Sorry for writing so much. I get carried away sometimes ><)

I kind of look at the melee/magic balance issue as something that won't be solved all at once. It will take time, and several adjustments. I think direct buffs impacting melees and AoE adjustments (like in the august update) will certainly help, but I have a feeling it won't change much on it's own. Unless Immanence is adjusted, Scholars will still be the safer and more consistent option for skillchains. On the other hand, if SE were to shut down Immanence today (hypothetical.. don't panic), then players would struggle, at least for a time. Given how metagaming works though, I think players would find other working strategies in reasonable time. Who knows. It's speculation and brainstorming, which is what this discussion is all about.

So it will probably require adjustments to both melee and magic users to find a more balanced job participation in end-game. I don't think the fact that players are relying on Immanence right now to "fulfill a need" is a good excuse not to at least talk about adjustments to it. When a strategy can render 15 other jobs impractical to use by exploiting a single job's ability even with modest gear requirements, then it has to be looked at.

Even if the upcoming melee adjustments are spectacular, do you really think Scholars wouldn't still dominate? Let's imagine melees could survive the hardest bosses. They would still take more damage than mages so healers will still work harder for melees than for a Scholar who can stand out of range. Let's imagine the monster AGI change is major and hit rate is greatly improved. We can still miss. Also paralyze, stuns, or amnesia could ruin skillchains at critical moments. Spells always land, so scholars are still more consistent. Even now, melee can skillchain for the hardest bosses if they have excellent gear swaps, an excellent healer and enough buffs. Though even with the upcoming update, Scholars would still be the least cost path. Would it be appropriate to talk about Immanence strategies then?

Lastly I just want to clarify something. I'm not suggesting that they should "take away" Immanence. I just wanted to open it up for discussion. I think Immanence is a interesting gimmick, but we can't ignore the ripple effect it's having particularly on physical DD. It's the same as if Rune Fencer's Lunge was so superior at magic bursting that it would actually be impractical to use mages. Skillchains are meant for Physical DD and Magic Bursts are meant for Mages. My suggestion wouldn't change Immanence at all, but rather change MB bonus to be calculated based on SC Damage rather than the # of steps. The goal would be to make Scholar SCs more gear dependent and make it so physical DD can actually compete with it in end-game. Well-geared Scholars would likely be fine with skillchaining as well as filling other roles. Don't you think that would be a fair adjustment to the status quo?

[Zeldar]

You are leaving out one critical point in your arguement: once they fix the melee issue, melee's will do much more damage at a much faster rate than sch. Yes yes, some mobs literally are "burst it with 4 deaths and its gone," but that isn't the majority of them. A well geared WAR or SAM will still outdamage the sch by a large amount, killing the mob much faster. DDs are more than just skillchain mules for the mages.

[Shyles]

I hope you're right. I am a little skeptical though. Even though I'm really looking forward to the update, I have a feeling that the VIT and AGI changes won't be that dramatic. People don't like wasting pop items, so they will use the easiest way to win. If Scholars still provide the safest path to victory, then their lower damage output would be a reasonable sacrifice.

We will find out soon, but I will remain cautiously optimistic.

[Zeldar]

"We will find out soon, but I will remain cautiously optimistic."

Probably the best approach when dealing with changes in the game, lol.

[Ketaru]

If enemy evasion has been reduced such that melee can hit high tier mobs without as much difficulty, I would think the real follow-up question would be, "So wouldn't that make RNGs, CORs, and maybe SAM/RNGs the preferred skillchainers now? They can pull off the damage and still be at a range."

EDIT: On top of that, RNG and COR have three magic WSs between them that never miss.

[OmnysValefor]

You are leaving out one critical point in your arguement: once they fix the melee issue, melee's will do much more damage at a much faster rate than sch. Yes yes, some mobs literally are "burst it with 4 deaths and its gone," but that isn't the majority of them. A well geared WAR or SAM will still outdamage the sch by a large amount, killing the mob much faster. DDs are more than just skillchain mules for the mages.

But that's how it should be. To some extent, the tradeoff should be safety vs speed of kill.

Although in a 6(or 7) man setup of melee, melee, tank, healer, geo, blm(maybe another blm), you run into the question of who you'll buff. An Immanence-oriented group still sidesteps that problem.

Also something occurred to me. The perfect content to test changes to AoE damage against players would have been avatar HTBFs. Because right now, if you don't bring scherzo/ward, you don't bring melee lol. (Edit: RUN might be great if your group can kill fast, but then you run into enmity problems in HTBF and one of thosee melee will be tanking)

[Shyles]

If enemy evasion has been reduced such that melee can hit high tier mobs without as much difficulty, I would think the real follow-up question would be, "So wouldn't that make RNGs, CORs, and maybe SAM/RNGs the preferred skillchainers now? They can pull off the damage and still be at a range."

EDIT: On top of that, RNG and COR have three magic WSs between them that never miss.

I have been thinking about that since yesterday too. The more I think about it, I have been thinking about the issue from the prism of a melee player. Spicyryan estimated around ~ 300 less evasion on Maju, and a Summoner could almost cap hit rate with their avatar's 1586 acc. So Acc cap may be around 1600~1650. That is definitely something a Ranger could reach, but might still be a stretch for several melee jobs excluding maybe mythic dancers and blue mages. They would need exceptionally good accuracy augments and a lot of help from acc buffs and eva down. Maybe even a relic or mythic as well.

The lower level content is faring much better for people. They're saying it takes about ~100 less accuracy to cap on lvl 130 Apex mobs now, which will make a lot of people happy. It's still going to be the biggest deciding factor on what jobs are viable for T3 fights though.

But that's how it should be. To some extent, the tradeoff should be safety vs speed of kill.

Although in a 6(or 7) man setup of melee, melee, tank, healer, geo, blm(maybe another blm), you run into the question of who you'll buff. An Immanence-oriented group still sidesteps that problem.

Very good point as well. A mixed alliance would probably work, but it would mean taking more people and increasing the level scaling. The melees alone would likely need multiple supports. If a group wanted to use melee for Maju while keeping the group size low, They could bring one extra Idris GEO for Torpor and Precision for about 190 effective accuracy assuming capped potency. However, the melees would still need at least about 1310~1360 unbuffed accuracy to cap. That's still pretty demanding without superb augments, not even mentioning the other offensive stats they might have to sacrifice. Realistically though, it would probably mean mixed parties would need at least 2 support jobs buffing the melees, in addition to what they are using for the mages. A full melee party would probably work better than mixed assuming they have sufficient support, though it might make the healer murder a Stark. Mage burn parties still have the clear advantage from almost every angle.

So Immanence still seems to be the overwhelmingly easier and more practical route. It doesn't require additional mixed support, it has far less demanding gear requirements, it works at a safe range, and it doesn't miss.

[Mookies75]

If enemy evasion has been reduced such that melee can hit high tier mobs without as much difficulty, I would think the real follow-up question would be, "So wouldn't that make RNGs, CORs, and maybe SAM/RNGs the preferred skillchainers now? They can pull off the damage and still be at a range."

EDIT: On top of that, RNG and COR have three magic WSs between them that never miss.

Perhaps.

I think fixing ACC was a good start but the underlying issue is Enfeeble / TP spam. Maybe they could give MNK, NIN, SAM a trait that gives them a chance on hit to inhibit TP gain. It would give people a reason to bring said Jobs as well as improve survivability for melee. If they don't want to mess with how often enfeebles can hit, perhaps they need to buff diminishing returns on players?

People may still opt to bring SCH for SC on fights where the enfeebles/TP moves are too much for melee.