I'm One Of The Filthiests Of Casuals And Even I Can See How Dumbdown FF14 Has Become!

Whether you think the job is well or poorly designed you have to agree the job is barebones: the job doesn’t functionally change from level 50 to level 86 where it gets astral flow, you just a few upgrades to its skill appearance, the job has one of the least number of buttons and the highest proportion of its damage coming from the fewest buttons outside of the healers

So taking that idea if they had alot or ideas for what they wanted to do to make astral flow more complex why didn’t they do it at the current level; as we know from their job design they don’t rip out and make different parts of the levelling experience different at higher levels (for examples Raiden thirst replaces true thrust but changes nothing, paradox replaces fire 1 to reset astral fire but doesn’t really change the unless you get into weird optimisation): so from this we know it’s extremely unlikely the actual structure of the primals will change, from this having about 3-5 GCD’s to execute a mini phase is restrictive, especially when for something like titan astral flow already covers all of its GCD’s

The same can be said about the Demi’s, if the Demi’s are meant to have massive complex rotations then why don’t they have them now

The most realistic proposal people have is changing the pheonix primals to the other 3 which also really doesn’t change the job

So does that make it clearer what I mean, if the job had endless possibilities why don’t any of them currently exist, the job could have been a universally adored slam dunk if this was the progression to 90

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Originally Posted by Deceptus

It took them five expansions to figure out that Living Dead was the worst tank invulnerability, that it actively punished non WHM healers.

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Living Dead hasn't been around for five expansions. The main limitation around getting it changed was pushback from other tanks, who didn't want to risk DRK potentially getting ahead of them. There was a lot of false rhetoric tossed around ('Living Dead is 20 seconds of invulnerability,' 'Living Dead is fine' and so on).

When Holmgang was buffed even further in Endwalker such that it had a 10 second duration, there wasn't any defense of the situation left. But there's always an enormous amount of resistance and pushback that comes from this forum the instant you do anything that might even indirectly disadvantage the more popular jobs, like WAR.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

There was a lot of false rhetoric tossed around ('Living Dead is 20 seconds of invulnerability,' 'Living Dead is fine' and so on).

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Which was almost always coming from newish players who had only leveled DRK and wanted their pick to look the most special, not any player with a decent range of experience.

Meanwhile, mains of other tanks were suggesting the likes of a Purgatory mechanic (would-be overkill damage is stored, nullifying that amount of healing received, with the DRK just needing to have gotten rid of all Purgatory before Living Dead ran out), instead of needing healing equal to the DRK's max HP, so that it'd at least (unlike if the healing requirement were outright removed) be unique from Holmgang (outside of LD's being, at the time, 4s longer for its 1 minute higher CD) despite being made competitive.

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Originally Posted by Supersnow845

The most realistic proposal people have is changing the pheonix primals to the other 3 which also really doesn’t change the job

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Judging by prior ways they "expand" jobs, there's actually 3 ways I see this going:

1) They rip Phoenix out and replace it with another demi, they make Phoenix a utility summon that is SMN's answer to RDM's Magick Barrier.

2) They add the other 3 legos, which are carbon copies of the current legos. Leviathan has a long cast dropsy puddle, Ramuh has OGCD Shock Strikes, and Shiva has a Glacier Bash gapcloser into Icebrand follow-up.

3) They tack on a 3rd demi, reduce demis to 10s each and segment SMN into a rigid 40s loop (like BRD).

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Originally Posted by Renathras

let's keep a good discussion going

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Originally Posted by Supersnow845

Whether you think the job is well or poorly designed you have to agree the job is barebones: the job doesn’t functionally change from level 50 to level 86 where it gets astral flow,

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I disagree the Job is "barebones". I feel like it feels good at level cap. I do agree that it should get Astral flow WWAAAAAAYYY earlier, though.

I pitched ideas before, but they could have quite a few variations on the theme. For example, one Primal could give you the Eukrasia Diagnosis setup (1 sec GCD into 1.5 sec GCD) like Titan but not. Another could have a double weave oGCD instead of Titan's single. Another could have 1.5 sec casts (but actual casts) instead of instants. Another could have things that proc in some way (though I hate procs so don't really encourage that). There are a near infinite amount of variations on the theme, and that's if we just stick with one Gemshine and one Astral Flow. They could, in the future, have ACTUAL aspected Ruin 3 where the Ruin 3 ability changed (as it does for Baha and Phoe) and be part of that Primal's mini-phase.

"if the Demi's are meant to have massive complex rotations" - they aren't. I think it's clear SMN was designed to be streamlined and fun, not complex, and to appeal to people who want a simple and striaghtforward kit and rotation. The one oddity in my mind is why they didn't streamline SCH at the same time and just make them "the easy Jobs" as a one-stop-shop. It's weird to have such a disparity in complexity (SCH's healing kit is either the second most or the most complex of the Healer kits, depending on how you look at it) between them. I know SE hates them sharing a class, but at this point, they really should just run with it.

The other three Primals does change the Job because (a) they would likely have different Gemshine/Astral Flow mechanics (thus changing the feel) and (b) visuals DO have an impact on people. There are some people that say they're fine with WHM but wish it had the Stone and Aero animations on its attacks instead of Glare/Dia. Even a mere VFX change can be huge for some people.

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I guess my point is it DOES have endless possibilities. I think your critique would be better worded as "Will they actually be capitalized on or not?", not it doesn't have them. Though I think they will probably want to keep SMN simple going forward, since that seems to be "what the people want" (at least by numbers of how many play it...)

^ I guess that comes down to the distinction of “they have massive potential but they probably won’t capitalise on it” and “it has no potential” are they really different in a practical sense, like we could say SMN has the potential to be another BLM but if that isn’t really their design philosophy does it really have that potential

Like for example if they want to keep the job consistent and simple then there is a limit to where they can go, the Demi’s are supposed to stay roughly the same and the current primals are staying roughly similar then the other 3 primals after pheonix and maybe an oGCD or two would be about the job can realistically do without making the current phases more complex or significantly different

So with 3/4 of the rotation locked down (mostly except for an oGCD or two maybe) and the remaining 1/4 still having to have the gemshine spam baseline I really would say the job is too locked down

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Originally Posted by Renathras

Though I think they will probably want to keep SMN simple going forward, since that seems to be "what the people want" (at least by numbers of how many play it...)

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Is not that conflated, though? You may as well call being overpowered an "identity".

Without having other jobs of similar theme/gameplay and/or relative output-per-effort within that same role, we have little way of knowing whether people play the given job because for its overpowered-ness/advantages or for its theme/gameplay.

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Originally Posted by Supersnow845

are they really different in a practical sense,

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Yes.

Setting aside one is abjectly false while the other is abjectly true...

...the former notes that there is a possibility for it to be used. This is the first iteration, and we don't know what they'll do going forward yet, meaning we cannot use it t draw that trend line. I very much suspect they will use the flexibility of this design going forward since it makes for easy additions. It's super modular, and that makes it very easy to make some VFX swaps or minor variations on the theme using what other types of cast spells exist in the game (short stacking buffs like BLU's Ravana, long casts, short casts, instant casts, oGCDs, GCDs...), and as certain people are fond of pointing out, no Job remains unchanged in expansions as they get at the least some potency upgrades and VFX changes for spells.

Now, whether what they do will satisfy you personal or not is another question entirely. I suspect it will not. But that's not what potential or possibilities is defined by.

I think this is more a case of what you don't like vs what word you're using to describe it. I absolutely suspect they won't do things you like with it...but that's not what possibilities or potential means. There are a lot of things they could do that you personally may not enjoy, but those are all valid topics under the header of possibility.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Is not that conflated, though? You may as well call being overpowered an "identity".

Without having other jobs of similar theme/gameplay and/or relative output-per-effort within that same role, we have little way of knowing whether people play the given job because for its overpowered-ness/advantages or for its theme/gameplay.

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SMN isn't overpowered by any definition of the term, though.

Here's the thing, as much as people who dislike SMN want to come up with any reason for it to be popular other than it being simple to play...the reality is it had the same basic aesthetics (summoning magical entities to fight with you) before as it does now, similar utility (combat raise, party buff, and rotation dependent party healing; it had Phoenix in ShB) before. It also did MORE damage than then it does now - in several of the ShB patches, SMN did comparable damage to BLM, and I think in one patch (or maybe two) it actually did more. The only thing that changed is that it's far easier to play now, and its damage reduced to around RDM levels. And 5.5 SMN also shared a Job with SCH, meaning the "people only play it so much because it levels with SCH" argument is clearly incorrect.

So we can compare 5.5 SMN to EW SMN and see that the former, despite having similar aesthetic, similar utility (raise, party buff, healing), also sharing leveling with SCH, and actually doing more damage...was less played than current SMN.

So what is the explanation for this that isn't "because it's straightforward to play now, and people like that"? If people are only rushing to it now for its utility, why weren't they in ShB when it had the same utility? If people like more complex Jobs, why wasn't it one of the most played in ShB? If it's only because it levels with SCH, why wasn't it leveled with SCH in ShB?

All the arguments for SMN numbers being higher now other than people enjoy/prize simpler things don't hold up when you realize ShB SMN had those things (and even better damage), yet it was played less then. The most logical answer seems to be: People do, indeed, prefer simpler things.

^first of all I’m going to ignore your “I feel like you (insert baseless speculation)” comments because I know despite how often you discuss wanting fair discussion what you really mean is you want us to be nice while you are free to fling around any insult and hyperbole you want

and again I’m saying that your examples of basically adding 3 new primals that have swapped out VFX and maybe a different astral flow does not constitute an evolution of the design of the job in a meaningful sense as you are functionally playing the same rigid locked design but a part of your rotations appearance is slightly different l, something like you partially controlling the summoned primals or the primals having a core mini rotation that builds towards something would be a valid example of evolution of the modular primal format. Summoning shiva after pheonix when you would have summoned Garuda after Bahamut when both are just “summon casts aerial blast/diamond dust then 2-4 casts of gemshine + one slightly different astral flow”. The other example of a potential evolution IF they fixed the samey modularity would be allowing us to decide between 2 Demi’s and what primals they summon rather than a locked rotation

So basically evolution in a meaningful sense of the word would only occur through reconstruction of the jobs core job loop and the structure of its filler which we know from the way they design jobs they won’t do (except to make them easier with things like the healers, ergo the job; based on the way square changes jobs from expansion to expansion is functionally already at a dead end