Viper Changes are good, actually

I actually think that this change was for the best in the long term because it's one of those things makes VPR awkward to play as you level or downsync because the ratio of Dread Fangs to Steel Fangs only starts evening out once it gets access to Reawakening and Uncoiled Fangs. From here, they're free to add in even more branching/alternate combo sequences without disrupting the flow of VPR's basic combo.

Of course, any goodwill towards the "wait till we get to the next expansion to flesh things out" excuse kind of died with SAM and Kaiten and no healer rework in sight.

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Originally Posted by roach777

Okay, so there's a potency difference between a good Viper and a bad Viper that doesn't know to not overcap gnash, I fail to see how this is a bad thing.

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There should be a potency difference between a good Viper and bad Viper anyway.

The most skilled Vipers will never lose an OGCD while also never drifting their GCD and also never getting hit by any boss mechanics while maintaining as much uptime as possible on the boss.

The less skilled Vipers will lose an OGCD, drift their GCD, or die to mechanics/fail to maintain uptime on the boss.

Viper is likely the most mechanically demanding job in the entire game. Even other jobs who need to double weave OGCDs like Machinist don't need to do it as frequently as Viper does, and failure to do so doesn't result in as much loss of potency. Machinist also has the benefit that they're a ranged DPS who doesn't need to worry about melee uptime. The tradeoff is that Viper's rotation is simple.

I already dropped the job because I know I don't have the dexterity to do what it needed me to do to play it optimally, I was already drifting my GCD on regular dungeon pulls trying to keep up with all of the mandatory double OGCD weaving.

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Originally Posted by Atmaweapon510

I actually think that this change was for the best in the long term because it's one of those things makes VPR awkward to play as you level or downsync because the ratio of Dread Fangs to Steel Fangs only starts evening out once it gets access to Reawakening and Uncoiled Fangs. From here, they're free to add in even more branching/alternate combo sequences without disrupting the flow of VPR's basic combo.

Of course, any goodwill towards the "wait till we get to the next expansion to flesh things out" excuse kind of died with SAM and Kaiten and no healer rework in sight.

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I honestly felt Viper's design choice since this expansion release been more focus on maybe being a bit too simple by design.

I was expecting a bit different when they talked about Viper's design is partly about switching "stances" in their combat.

Don't know what it is but it was not giving me the "feeling" people get when they are playing a job they naturally like playing.

In my opinion, I think they could have designed the job more towards emphasis on the whole Switch stance concept they had going instead of how they just treat it currently being a normal combo for dual sword form and burst combo for Twinblade form then Trance Mode for BIG burst.

Either way, I'm probably defaulting back to my old Main Job again being Machinists since current expansion jobs do not interests me gameplay wise after trying them out.

Without having to manage the debuff timers, Vicewinder (Dreadwinder) feels kind of purposeless outside the beginning of the fight when it gives you your buffs faster. Having to know when to hold a charge so as not to refresh the timer too early was cool and added just the right amount of thought to a job that's just hitting the lit-up buttons otherwise. It really doesn't matter if some people were using Dread Fangs combo too much; differences in skill/knowledge is just a reality of life, and removing it just because of that is silly. The potency buffs for the two combo starters is laughably bad because it defeats the purpose of the job having separate combo starters in the first place. I think learning how to manage Noxious Gnash was like the one aspect of the job that matches the difficulty of pretty much anything you could have played before picking it up at level 80

I honestly don't know how to feel about the change. It kinda feels the same, but it also feels super auto piloty now.

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Originally Posted by Zakon

Even other jobs who need to double weave OGCDs like Machinist don't need to do it as frequently as Viper does

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It gets 7 double weaves every 2 mins, 4 of which have extra long GCDs and all of which can be freely used at any point in the fight as long as you don't overcap. You press the same 2 buttons every time.

DRG has 6 consecutive forced double weaves in their 2 min + one extra long oGCD with animation lock, all on a normal 2.5 GCD. You press a total of 5-6 different buttons. Also, you're doing your 10-step GCD rotation at the same time.

Like, I'm not saying that Viper isn't somewhat mechanically demanding, it does have the highest APM in the game, it's just not nearly demanding enough relative to most of the other DPS to justify it's extremely simple rotation.

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Originally Posted by AddictedToWitches

I'm going to repeat what I'm saying in other threads on this issue:

Viper is literally much better now actually and here's why.
The low timer (20s) on noxious gash caused many vipers to fall into the bad habit of just rotating dread fangs combo to keep the debuff up instead of doing the better Steel Fangs starter for higher potency. When you go into reawakening, you also can't reapply noxious gash during it either meaning you had to play around making sure the debuff was up before you reawakened, making double reawakenings very annoying and the theoretical triple reawakening a near impossibility.
The other issue was when you needed to peel off a boss to deal with adds or another target etc. you HAD to just start a new combo to apply noxious gash or use dreadwinder on it. It felt very VERY bad for a job whose primary draw was getting into a constant flowing rhythm. The INTENT behind the debuff was it would fit into that constant flow but due to how the nature of it being a debuff works, it ended up feeling like hot ass (plus the duration sucked)
Viper was always an easy job. Noxious gash was just the biggest complaint because it's an annoyance (note: I don't like reaper's death's design either but the debuff timer on that is longer and fits better with reaper's comparatively slower GCD and rotation.
For all intents and purposes, Viper plays nearly the exact same, I'd say it plays even better without having to worry about the debuff falling off, and with the buff timers now at 60 seconds, you can maintain your flow past some lengthy phase transitions.
If you're crying about it you never played viper outside of leveling it 80-100 and brainlessly spamming roulettes.
Does the job feel like ass in low level content? Fuck yeah it does, but so does everything else and that's a fundamental issue with the game that's not gonna be solved anytime soon. Beg Yoshi P to let us keep all our skills when synced down

TL;DR it's the exact same and honestly better, you did not seriously play viper if you think the noxious gash change is bad. The job was not made easier, just less annoying, it was never hard, it was always easy.

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Gonna disagree. Not that Noxious Gnash was complicated, but it added a tiny bit of complexity to an otherwise simple job by requiring you to time double NGs before Double reawakens so the buff doesn't fall off mid burst. Now Viper is quite literally press the shiny buttons and nothing else. Your main combo stays lit up the entire fight now, it doesn't even require picking which button to start the combo on. All jobs are being dumbed down like crazy, but VPR is now the Summoner of melee.

This isn't a good sign for their 8.0 job redesigns.

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Originally Posted by mallleable

I honestly don't know how to feel about the change. It kinda feels the same, but it also feels super auto piloty now.

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This is a great way to describe it. I was having trouble explaining what feels different, and auto-pilot is a good term. It feels like it plays itself now.

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Originally Posted by Zakon

There should be a potency difference between a good Viper and bad Viper anyway.

The most skilled Vipers will never lose an OGCD while also never drifting their GCD and also never getting hit by any boss mechanics while maintaining as much uptime as possible on the boss.

The less skilled Vipers will lose an OGCD, drift their GCD, or die to mechanics/fail to maintain uptime on the boss.

Viper is likely the most mechanically demanding job in the entire game. Even other jobs who need to double weave OGCDs like Machinist don't need to do it as frequently as Viper does, and failure to do so doesn't result in as much loss of potency. Machinist also has the benefit that they're a ranged DPS who doesn't need to worry about melee uptime. The tradeoff is that Viper's rotation is simple.

I already dropped the job because I know I don't have the dexterity to do what it needed me to do to play it optimally, I was already drifting my GCD on regular dungeon pulls trying to keep up with all of the mandatory double OGCD weaving.

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I really don't think it is the most mechanically demanding job in the game. The OGCDs and the way the button swaps are designed is so elegant that even though on paper it has more button presses per min (not even by a lot by the way) it feels a lot less busy.

Also all those things you listed, how are those even Viper specific at all?
Good Vipers will get better DPS because they wont die to boss mechanics and have better uptime...
Yeah? This applies to every class in the game? Should every class only press 1 button and remove all rotational and job specific skill expression because there are already raid mechanics to express your skills in?

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Originally Posted by AddictedToWitches

TL;DR it's the exact same and honestly better, you did not seriously play viper if you think the noxious gash change is bad. The job was not made easier, just less annoying, it was never hard, it was always easy.

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Call me elitist, but we're supposed to listen to what you have to say?

You, who has 0 clears on Viper on EX (actually no EX clears at all) are supposed to tell us --- players that at least cleared EX with Viper --- that the changes are good and if not, we have not "played the job seriously"?

Utterly laughable.

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Originally Posted by AlgernonBlackwood

It gets 7 double weaves every 2 mins, 4 of which have extra long GCDs and all of which can be freely used at any point in the fight as long as you don't overcap. You press the same 2 buttons every time.

DRG has 6 consecutive forced double weaves in their 2 min + one extra long oGCD with animation lock, all on a normal 2.5 GCD. You press a total of 5-6 different buttons. Also, you're doing your 10-step GCD rotation at the same time.

Like, I'm not saying that Viper isn't somewhat mechanically demanding, it does have the highest APM in the game, it's just not nearly demanding enough relative to most of the other DPS to justify it's extremely simple rotation.

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I haven't played DRG to 100 yet, but are you sure those are forced double weaves in the same way Viper's is?

If you don't double weave as Viper, you straight up lose the ability. If you don't do it as DRG, you drift the OGCD's cooldown slightly but that's it. You also bring raid buffs as DRG where Viper does not.

Additionally, I was challenging the notion that there is no way to tell the difference between a good VPR and a bad VPR just because Noxious Gnash was lost. That is just incorrect.

Eh, works for me either way. Keeping up DoTs, buffs and debuffs is one of the lamest parts of any kit for me (I say this as a casual obviously), but at least Viper's was weaved nicely into his regular 1-2-3 combos unlike Reaper's nasty, clunky Shadow of Death. I understand that there's ton of '' skill expression '' involved with managing debuffs and DoTs even in a simple kit, but I don't need it for Viper (or any class for that matter).

I am though a bit weirded out by the lack of poison-theming now for a job that calls itself the Viper and even makes a reference to snake fangs in it's job icon. All snakes aren't venomous, but vipers are. So what gives? Where is the damn poison?

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Originally Posted by LunaCelestiaXIV

Call me elitist, but we're supposed to listen to what you have to say?

You, who has 0 clears on Viper on EX (actually no EX clears at all) are supposed to tell us --- players that at least cleared EX with Viper --- that the changes are good and if not, we have not "played the job seriously"?

Utterly laughable.

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Oh yeah EX need you to be very skilled *look at Bismarck*.... Yeah very very skilled *cough*
Yeah, what i just did is unfair but, seriously, not all the EX are hard, and, most of them don't ask perfect individual play, but a good party with people knowing what they are doing.

So, what is utterly laughable, is your answer and the way you assess someone skill.
There is a lot of very good player that don't or rarelly do EX because they don't want or, are not interested.
So your comment is completly out of the line and has nothing to do here

If you want to play at "who have the biggest", the official forum for a certain number one MMO is made for you.

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Originally Posted by Tehmon

Eh, works for me either way. Keeping up DoTs, buffs and debuffs is one of the lamest parts of any kit for me (I say this as a casual obviously), but at least Viper's was weaved nicely into his regular 1-2-3 combos unlike Reaper's nasty, clunky Shadow of Death. I understand that there's ton of '' skill expression '' involved with managing debuffs and DoTs even in a simple kit, but I don't need it for Viper (or any class for that matter).

I am though a bit weirded out by the lack of poison-theming now for a job that calls itself the Viper and even makes a reference to snake fangs in it's job icon. All snakes aren't venomous, but vipers are. So what gives? Where is the damn poison?

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The Job is mostly just Zidane gameplay style but they name it Viper seem to be something they chosen to reflect the whole twin sword being snake fangs.

I do not think they really mean it to be a "Viper" but just to give it a name that can provide some lore behind the Job for FF14 world that fights like Zidane since there is no real name for certain FF Character Specific jobs in their other FF games or they were just very modified versions of a existing FF game job.

I will not be surprised at this point if they introduce another Character based FF job like Zack job and call it SOLDIER Job

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Originally Posted by Lorika

Oh yeah EX need you to be very skilled *look at Bismarck*.... Yeah very very skilled *cough*
Yeah, what i just did is unfair but, seriously, not all the EX are hard, and, most of them don't ask perfect individual play, but a good party with people knowing what they are doing.

So, what is utterly laughable, is your answer and the way you assess someone skill.
There is a lot of very good player that don't or rarelly do EX because they don't want or, are not interested.
So your comment is completly out of the line and has nothing to do here

If you want to play at "who have the biggest", the official forum for a certain number one MMO is made for you.

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You clearly have 0 context comprehension skills if this is your response to my post.

Again, another utterly laughable response.

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

The Job is mostly just Zidane gameplay style but they name Viper seem to be something they chosen to reflect the whole twin sword being snake fangs.

I do not think they really mean it to be a "Viper" but just to give it a name that can provide some lore behind the Job for FF14 world since there is no real name for certain FF Character Specific jobs in their other FF games.

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Honestly, the twin swords just doesn't elicit any kind of snake fang metaphor for me in this case lol. Could've called it Blademaster or Hunter or Serpent if they are hellbent on snake references, but vipers are specifically the venomous group of the snake family.

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Originally Posted by roach777

I really don't think it is the most mechanically demanding job in the game. The OGCDs and the way the button swaps are designed is so elegant that even though on paper it has more button presses per min (not even by a lot by the way) it feels a lot less busy.

Also all those things you listed, how are those even Viper specific at all?
Good Vipers will get better DPS because they wont die to boss mechanics and have better uptime...
Yeah? This applies to every class in the game? Should every class only press 1 button and remove all rotational and job specific skill expression because there are already raid mechanics to express your skills in?

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Viper is unique in that if you don't double weave you lose the ability.

I never said it doesn't apply to every class in the game, I was pointing out it's nonsense to say that there will be 0 difference between a good Viper and bad Viper now.

APM = mechanically demanding. If your job has a complex rotation but not a high APM requirement, it doesn't have mechanical difficulty, it has difficulty in the complexity of its rotation or in the decisions it has to make. Viper is the highest APM job in the game and it's also melee, which means it needs to maintain melee uptime on top of having the fastest buttons to press, which by necessity makes it the most mechanically demanding.

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Originally Posted by Tehmon

Honestly, the twin swords just doesn't elicit any kind of snake fang metaphor for me in this case lol. Could've called it Blademaster or Hunter or Serpent if they are hellbent on snake references, but vipers are specifically the venomous group of the snake family.

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I think they may have something originally planned for Viper to relation to Serpent due to how it was mentioned in the Viper story quest about the Job's origin being related to Snakes and there is maybe something about the Twin Adder's origin for the organizations name related to it but they never followed up on it in the Viper Job story quest due to the 10 level limit they have now with newer jobs for their Job story.

Either way naming a Character specific Job from a FF game that did not have a name for the specific character's unique job seem to be more related to giving a job lore reason to exists rather than a reflection of their gameplay or simply to just reflect their gameplay without needing much lore reason for their name.

They done this with Gunbreaker as well since this is a combination of Squall, Seifer, and Lightning gameplay style and they explain the name for this job was created because the "job" for Gunbreakers was to rush into combat with defensive skills that makes them temporary immune to Gun fire so they can get close and break the enemy's guns. Thus the name Gun-Breaker.

I think only Reaper is named after its gameplay rather than lore since it is just FF11 Scythe Dark Knight but they cannot use the Dark Knight name so they named it Reaper to reflect the whole Grim Reaper theme with certain mechanics and scythe attacks.

I'm going to repeat what I'm saying in other threads on this issue:
Viper is literally much worse now and here's why.

The short but easily reapply-able 20s debuff (With a 40s max) gave vipers something to optimize, as the other two buffs require almost no thought other than when coming out of your 2/6/8/10 min window.
Before going into your reawakening its its fun to plan how you're going to ensure you go in with atleast 22+seconds of this debuff. Also if you set it up correctly its very easy to just apply a single gcd of gnash inbetween the two reawakens should you have miscalculated the timer! Beyond this I have to wonder if anyone who is saying these changes are good ever played reaper, as reaper's triple enshroud was almost always not worth the effort and very clunky.

Dealing with EX1 Vali and optimizing when the boss disengages you for the application of gnash on the needles (first hit of 3 hit combo on needle one, then use dreadwinder on needle two) then spacing out snaps to allow the timing of the first returning gcd on vali to be gnash was a ton of fun to optimize, and even when it was difficult to do, it was not a big deal as you still had 16-8 seconds till reawaken! Enough time to apply the debuff twice!

Viper was always an easy job. Noxious gash was just the one thing other than uptime and positional you could optimize.
Gnash feels truly like a better version of reapers death's design. It almost makes me wish they would make it a alternate combo for RPR rather than being a single button.

For all intents and purposes, Viper plays very similarly. But the few plates that you had to spin have fallen and all you have now is uptime, and positionals.
If you're saying its better I doubt you've ever tried to optimize it in any content whatsoever, let alone EX+ content.

TL;DR it's the worse and honestly more boring, you did not seriously play viper if you think the noxious gash change is good.

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

The Job is mostly just Zidane gameplay style but they name it Viper seem to be something they chosen to reflect the whole twin sword being snake fangs.

I do not think they really mean it to be a "Viper" but just to give it a name that can provide some lore behind the Job for FF14 world that fights like Zidane since there is no real name for certain FF Character Specific jobs in their other FF games or they were just very modified versions of a existing FF game job.

I will not be surprised at this point if they introduce another Character based FF job like Zack job and call it SOLDIER Job

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Viper doesn't play anything like Zidane, that would have been Rogue before it changed to Ninja (Honestly I wish Rogue and Ninja were split apart really liked that class ;~; )

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Originally Posted by KazumaFaemura

Viper doesn't play anything like Zidane, that would have been Rogue before it changed to Ninja (Honestly I wish Rogue and Ninja were split apart really liked that class ;~; )

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You're think about his RPG turn base combat game play which was a normal Rogue class/job.

They based Viper's design on Zidane style more from his Dissidia games involving how he separates and fuse his daggers together.

They obviously modified certain aspects since they cannot use daggers and to avoid having the battle stance looking too much like Rogue/Ninja battle stance.

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

You're think about his RPG turn base combat game play which was a normal Rogue class/job.

They based Viper's design on Zidane style more from his Dissidia games involving how he separates and fuse his daggers together.

They obviously modified certain aspects since they cannot use daggers and to avoid having the battle stance looking too much like Rogue/Ninja battle stance.

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Oh right I completely forgot about Dissidia's existence. That's fair enough then.

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

They based Viper's design on Zidane style more from his Dissidia games involving how he separates and fuse his daggers together.

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They've never stated Zidane as an inspiration, they added a double sword job because that's the most requested weapon they've been asked for, they even name dropped Sword Art Online as the inspiration for most of the abilities/moves, which checks out, Viper is basically the anime swordsman class.

This is in contrast with Gunbreaker, which was very clearly based on Squall, borrowing the moves and stances from both his original and Dissidia appearances (and borrowing a little from Seifer) whereas Viper has no such thing from Zidane, with no moves or similar stances being borrowed. The only thing that suggests inspiration from Zidane is the Twinblade.

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Originally Posted by Tizzy_Tormentor

They've never stated Zidane as an inspiration, they added a double sword job because that's the most requested weapon they've been asked for, they even name dropped Sword Art Online as the inspiration for most of the abilities/moves, which checks out, Viper is basically the anime swordsman class.

This is in contrast with Gunbreaker, which was very clearly based on Squall, borrowing the moves and stances from both his original and Dissidia appearances (and borrowing a little from Seifer) whereas Viper has no such thing from Zidane, with no moves or similar stances being borrowed. The only thing that suggests inspiration from Zidane is the Twinblade.

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I feel like in the context that this is the xpac that borrowed the most from FFIX and the two forms of Viper's weapon both mimic the weapons of the MC of FFIX, it's not off base for them to think Viper was inspired by Zidane. It might not be a 1:1 representation like GNB, but inspiration? No shot it wasn't.

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Originally Posted by AddictedToWitches

due to its low timer (20s) noxious gash was incredibly bad to maintain, the timer itself had an awkward duration
It was either extend noxious gash's timer, or get rid of it. I think getting rid of it was the best choice.
The intent behind the two combos was to rotate them anyway, now you actually do that instead of doing dread fangs once, steel fangs twice (during the downtime windows where that happens)
The theoretical triple reawakening is a bit of a meme but it allows more damage into a specific burst window you can use to line up with raids buffs.
Also double reawakening was pushing the dread fangs timer, note that unless you popped one dread fangs (not even the full combo) you'd still have not enough time to do two full reawakenings back to back. Tighter window than GNB's no mercy

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No, it wasn't. You just sucked at the job. People who enjoyed how it was shouldn't suffer a boring job due to your incompetence.

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Originally Posted by Higashikata

It was the one single thing viper had to think about at any point, now it's just an auto pilot job

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You are supposed to think about boss mechanics, not how to play your class.

I hope they remove Death's Design on reaper as well, it completly breaks the flow of the job and feels very annoying to use.

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Originally Posted by Arohk

You are supposed to think about boss mechanics, not how to play your class.

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Why can it not be both? Both interesting class gameplay AND interesting boss mechanics?
or
Why can we not have some classes where you don't have to think about how to play your class, and some classes where you do? Would that really be such an awful situation?
or
It is indefinitely more difficult to design interesting boss encounters every time, especially when you have to factor in different difficulties depending on what content you play, than interesting classes. Making classes fun works in every combat content, no matter where.

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Originally Posted by Lamarcy2699

No, it wasn't. You just sucked at the job. People who enjoyed how it was shouldn't suffer a boring job due to your incompetence.

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To also add to my own comment, if you REALLY struggle managing something (as in you're just physically incapable) then just take the damage loss. I'm not saying drop the buff entirely but if you struggled maintaining it then just do it to the best of your ability. There should always be a skill expressions that allows for people to show their competence at a job. I don't want the only difference between a competent and incompetent player at the same job to be just crit and maybe positionals since the job plays itself now. This goes for more things than FFXIV but if you truly struggle at something you really want to do then you should always either strive to do better, understand compromises for what you can/can't do, or accept that maybe this just isn't for you. Don't expect things to shape around what you can and cannot do and always try your fullest to improve and better yourself in areas you think you're lacking. If you never had an interest in it and only did it "just because" then maybe you shouldn't be talking about removing the fun those who do care about it are having.

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Originally Posted by Arohk

You are supposed to think about boss mechanics, not how to play your class.

I hope they remove Death's Design on reaper as well, it completly breaks the flow of the job and feels very annoying to use.

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This is gonna be a bit of a shock but you could be doing both. Crazy I know. Previous expansions had both job expressions AND fight difficulty! Just cutting out one element of that makes the game far too easy unless they overcompensate in a particular area. They tried this in Endwalker (with Endwalkers simplification of jobs) with Pandaemonium Savage where there was such an over-reliance on body checks that it just introduced a lot of tedium into progging the fights, then reclears just becoming dull because rotations were not interesting and you didn't have the thoughts going on the same as you did in prog. I'm not opposed to body checks but over reliance creates a sense of artificial difficulty.

As for current VPR, in my honest opinion, it just feels awful to play in anything that isn't savage. If a job requires the current hardest content to be "tolerable" then that's just an indication that it's not a well thought out job. Removing Noxious Gas has removed almost all of the "rush" that VPR once had. It requires 0 skill and brainwork to do well on now. It's pitifully boring.

I can't say I noticed a difference. I don't do the harder stuff so maybe that's why I didn't notice.

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Originally Posted by Lamarcy2699

No, it wasn't. You just sucked at the job. People who enjoyed how it was shouldn't suffer a boring job due to your incompetence.

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Don't worry. In a little over a month it will have been 'this' way longer than it was the 'old' way and then the people who like it as it is now will have had more time with their version and you will be the ones asking for changes to a job other people enjoy and the cycle will continue.

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Originally Posted by PeppermintBrown

Don't worry. In a little over a month it will have been 'this' way longer than it was the 'old' way and then the people who like it as it is now will have had more time with their version and you will be the ones asking for changes to a job other people enjoy and the cycle will continue.

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I am surprised most people are not prepared for changes towards a Job they will obviously not like at this point. It is probably why I am more cautious with new expansion changes all the time.

Each expansion has a tendency to completely change a job towards a way certain players will not like. Certain ones greater than others due to how a Job may end up completely changing their gameplay style.

Machinist Job seem to be the only Job they have not changed much since they established the gameplay style in 5.0 after going through the constant changes it had through 3.0 to 4.X era. They've only been adding on to that foundation each expansion for MCH since then.

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Originally Posted by Lamarcy2699

This is gonna be a bit of a shock but you could be doing both. Crazy I know.

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and thats how you end up with people complaining about difficulty of normal content, they hyperfocus on their hotbar because of too many buttons and can't see whats going on in the fight.

I have played an MMO before FFXIV that had much harder bosses, even though i had maybe 10 hotkeys instead of 30.

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

Machinist Job seem to be the only Job they have not changed much since they established the gameplay style in 5.0 after going through the constant changes it had through 3.0 to 4.X era. They've only been adding on to that foundation each expansion for MCH since then.

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MCH just feels awful to play to me, i only use it in PVP, i would completly overhaul this job.

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Originally Posted by Nathavin

I'm going to repeat what I'm saying in other threads on this issue:
Viper is literally much worse now and here's why.

The short but easily reapply-able 20s debuff (With a 40s max) gave vipers something to optimize, as the other two buffs require almost no thought other than when coming out of your 2/6/8/10 min window.
Before going into your reawakening its its fun to plan how you're going to ensure you go in with atleast 22+seconds of this debuff. Also if you set it up correctly its very easy to just apply a single gcd of gnash inbetween the two reawakens should you have miscalculated the timer! Beyond this I have to wonder if anyone who is saying these changes are good ever played reaper, as reaper's triple enshroud was almost always not worth the effort and very clunky.

Dealing with EX1 Vali and optimizing when the boss disengages you for the application of gnash on the needles (first hit of 3 hit combo on needle one, then use dreadwinder on needle two) then spacing out snaps to allow the timing of the first returning gcd on vali to be gnash was a ton of fun to optimize, and even when it was difficult to do, it was not a big deal as you still had 16-8 seconds till reawaken! Enough time to apply the debuff twice!

Viper was always an easy job. Noxious gash was just the one thing other than uptime and positional you could optimize.
Gnash feels truly like a better version of reapers death's design. It almost makes me wish they would make it a alternate combo for RPR rather than being a single button.

For all intents and purposes, Viper plays very similarly. But the few plates that you had to spin have fallen and all you have now is uptime, and positionals.
If you're saying its better I doubt you've ever tried to optimize it in any content whatsoever, let alone EX+ content.

TL;DR it's the worse and honestly more boring, you did not seriously play viper if you think the noxious gash change is good.

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i try to optimize but at the same time, the change doesn't bother me because you can still optimize… just not around NG. Pretending you still cant optimize is disingenuous. People mostly want something to separate themselves from the players they consider mediocre/average/below average and challenge themseleves (even jf artificially). Thats the true basis of the anger and angst.

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Originally Posted by Arohk

MCH just feels awful to play to me, i only use it in PVP, i would completly overhaul this job.

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I still think they can bring some elements from the PvP skills into the PvE gameplay.

If they wanted to increase damage for attack skills but are concern about mobility then they can implament the slow walk style the PvP mode has for a new combat stance for MCH that focus on Higher damage but lower moblilty so the mobility is still kept but players just need to be more self aware about their slower movement when attacking

The Sniper Rifle is ripe for a Very High Damage Sniper Rifle mechanic that is normally in most Gun Jobs for RPGs and MMOs. It is a matter of how to implement it though I think they can make use of the old Ammo system for the Sniper Rifle skills. Setting it as a skill about performing High Damage attacks but must account for the risk where the MCH cannot move when firing the Sniper Rifle with their Sniper Rifle skills similar to how it is in PvP as a PvP Limit break.

They can use the Ammo system to determine what kind of attacks the Sniper Rifle performs based on which Ammo the Sniper rifle will fire.

Vpr was already a very simple job. The skill expression of not overlapping their debuff turned out to be quite fun to me. Made it simple but satisfying. Now without it the combo just alternates and the winders take no thought just press it. They've taken an already easy job and removed the only skill expression from the rotation. I've been pretty locked in playing vpr this expansion but after playing the rework it just feels so boring. I'm probably not going to continue playing it in this state. I'm very disappointed

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Originally Posted by Arohk

and thats how you end up with people complaining about difficulty of normal content, they hyperfocus on their hotbar because of too many buttons and can't see whats going on in the fight.

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That gives an excuse to take it away from people who enjoy it because? Removing skill ceilings is a surefire way to make your game boring and anger every single person who did enjoy it. You only need to see all the pushback against the VPR changes, and SAM when Kaiten got taken, to notice. It's also not like damage matters in 99% of casual content but matters in 100% of high end content. If someone truly struggles don't design a job around them, encourage them to get better. People will always struggle and complain so give a reason to improve. Doing good damage should be the reward for hard work and dedication to a job, not the expected norm for people to just do. A game should not be forced to be boring because some people struggle.

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Originally Posted by Arohk

I have played an MMO before FFXIV that had much harder bosses, even though i had maybe 10 hotkeys instead of 30.

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Cool, but this isn't that other MMO is it? This is FFXIV. The way the game fundamentally works is that it cannot create insane fights with tight snapshots or insane movement. The server tick speed is too slow. So to compensate it needs to have a balance of job design with fight design and ever since Endwalker that balance has been shifted too much since jobs got so much easier and fights not that much harder (barring ultimates).

I'll echo a sentiment that I relayed elsewhere. I hate the changes and it took me doing Expert roulette for a second time (specifically Strayborough Deadwalk) just now to understand why.

Noxious Gnash was not only an ability that required skill and a good sense of timing to naturally upkeep with good muscle memory and practice, but more importantly it served as an additional visual queue that you also had control over.

Previously, when entering the 1-2-3 combo, you have to start with 1 or 2; 1 if you had Noxious Gnash up and 2 if you didn't. However, two important factors were 1. You had full control when to re-apply that buff and how (thanks to Dreadwinder or choosing to double-up on the debuff timer instead of continuously alternating), and 2. You only had to worry about 2 glowing buttons to follow for optimal damage maintenance after every starter. It meant that I spent a lot less time looking at the hotbar and letting the debuff timer help me plan ahead. I can deliberately set myself up to start with 1 several times in a row and that's a choice I got to make and set up for myself based on my needs and the fight I'm getting into.

With the current changes you're now forced to follow a strictly linear combo and it feels clunky and is ultimately making me watch the hotbar even more since the buttons change (unlike other classes where you just hit 1-2-3 to achieve a similar result) and it becomes easier to lose track of where you are in the combo if you stop paying attention to, say, avoid a boss mechanic and/or go into Reawaken which covers up where you were in the combo or DreadwinderVicewinder that can force your attention/focus elsewhere on the hotbar to hit GCD's/oGCD's. This was especially noticeable on Deadwalk's second boss, where I'd be paying too much attention to not getting hit and then losing which part of 1-1-2-2-1-2-1-1-2-2-2-2 I was on without looking down and watching, especially if I was trying to squeeze a Reawaken in which obscures where I was in the combo.

Noxious Gnash was the thread that tied things like DreadwinderVicewinder and Reawaken in and out of the combo. For instance, setting yourself up with 40 seconds with well-planned Dreadwinder management or utilizing Dread Fang gave your Reawaken far more punch, and plus you could weave a Dread Fang in between if you absolutely needed more time. Dreadwinder was also incentivized too since it was able to apply so many buffs and debuffs all in one chain ability, which helped a lot of the flow of the job.

By cutting that thread and simultaneously forcing us to follow a strictly linear longer combo we can't get any breaks out of but can also lose track of thanks to transforming buttons and a confusing gauge, the job now simultaneously has less room for error by forcing me to follow directions more strictly, and is made more boring by removing choice and expression from the job. Brainless and spammy button mashing is not what drew me to the job in the first place.

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

I am surprised most people are not prepared for changes towards a Job they will obviously not like at this point. It is probably why I am more cautious with new expansion changes all the time.

Each expansion has a tendency to completely change a job towards a way certain players will not like. Certain ones greater than others due to how a Job may end up completely changing their gameplay style.

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They have only ever changed potencies for the brand new job they released, they have never altered the kit of a brand new job so heavily before, at least to my knowledge. That's why people feel blindsided, that and the lack of communication. They may add QoL but they never have changed core mechanics this heavily for a job that's been out less than a month. They also rarely if ever change the way a job works completely right before savage. They mentioned changing positionals but got a lot of negativity from it and instead of learning to leave it alone like so many asked for instead we get changes almost no one asked for, all these new threads are evidence enough of that.

The main crux of why the changes to VPR are an issue falls into two main categories:

1) There is a distinct lack of communication between the playerbase and the development team behind job changes. Players voices are very rarely heard and it creates a sense of frustration. People take it to the right places (these forums, the leave a suggestion feature) but rarely if ever is action taken, even when the consensus feels pretty overwhelming like VPR right now. They also don't give job change details beforehand and just push it to live test every other patch and pray it goes over well. Changes being made to jobs are far too sparsed out, so if they mess up their maths (which is very common for them, see PLD 6.3 on how it was weaker than before it was changed) and it needs further adjustments youre just out of luck for a few weeks to months.

2) The oversimplification of jobs was already going too far and this made it worse. It really cannot continue. It started with healers becoming homogenized, then the tanks started becoming more simplified, and now we're seeing DPS become simplified to the extremes. MNK just spells your roation out for you now, as does VPR after the changes. Phys range is a joke of a role (MCH the selfish DPS that can't be too selfish, the DNC changes being awful, the lack of variety in jobs to pick from compared to other roles) and magical DPS are all over the place in terms of balancing. Not to mention what they did to SMN. They stripped a lot of optimizations from jobs people enjoyed (BLM and SAM being notable ones), and they continue to erode away job identity with each update they make to the game. Even Yoshi P himself has gone on record to say the game is becoming too easy and regrets it, but that's about all the communication we got so far about what they're planning to do to alleviate it.

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Originally Posted by Lamarcy2699

1) There is a distinct lack of communication between the playerbase and the development team behind job changes. Players voices are very rarely heard and it creates a sense of frustration. People take it to the right places (these forums, the leave a suggestion feature) but rarely if ever is action taken, even when the consensus feels pretty overhelming like VPR right now. They also don't give job change details beforehand and just push it to live test every other patch and pray it goes over well. Changes being made to jobs are far too sparsed out, so if they mess up their maths (which is very common for them, see PLD 6.3 on how it was weaker than before it was changed) and it needs further adjustments youre just out of luck for a few weeks to months.

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THANK YOU for taking the time to emphasize this part. Even if these changes were less controversial -- hell, they could be the bomb dot com -- it's STILL stupid to have pushed them with no prior communication with the playerbase, on SAVAGE LAUNCH DAY no less. Even though they seem well received, I think the BLM and SAM reworks ALSO should have come either later or earlier, this was such a dumb time to change anything. Whether you love or hate the changes, they were objectively handled awfully.

(and for what it's worth i hate the changes)