Just got wheeling thrust.... Can someone explain the point of it to me?

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Originally Posted by Seku

If you're claiming it's there due to "complexity" I pray you're not a main DRG, MNK, or NIN.

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Thats a bit presumptuous and/or rude. Jack is a great solid dragoon. Hes not saying its complexity is hard in any difficulty, he said its complexity is in difference.

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Originally Posted by JackFross

it doesn't make the class harder, it makes it different.

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Thats what he said ^

I think that was more along the lines of hostility he was talking about lol

Everyone has there own opinion and that's fine. Anything that can be improved should be, for sure. But, like Jack, I'm at a loss to find something we are missing with the current set of skills. If FC/WT had different effects it would disrupt the flow of the mechanic, being RNG there's times when you'll get stuck with multiple FCs or multiple WTs in a row, you wouldn't want to be in a situation where your stuck with one or the other if they each have different effects. For example, if one was a DoT and one was normal. The impact potency of the DoT attack is going to be less, as they tend to be, so if you got stuck over and over on the DoT attack you have a significant drop in damage for something you can't control. If they were different, like maybe one was a magic damage down and the other was physical (I know there are plenty of these, just using as example) then you'd ideally want these to have balanced uptime, you don't want to get stuck on one over and over. (the solution to these is obviously to get rid of the RNG element)

At least with them being the same attack, you don't have to worry about situations like that. So really, the complaint of them being the same is misguided (I believe, at least), you want them to be the same with the RNG element involved. If they were not tied to the RNG system and were still the same exact attack - this is when we'd all be complaining.

the thing I have problems with is maintaining blood of the dragon my best is 30 sec then it poofs cause I am not fast too keep it up then someone complains that I am not a good dragoon I wish blood of the dragon was something that could stay on but I don't think that will happen

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Originally Posted by Seku

If you're afk dpsing means you're using macros which iirc actually kills your DPS despite getting the rotations and positional correctly.

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Let me define for you what I mean when I say, and I quote:

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Originally Posted by JackFross

I could essentially AFK dps it.

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The keyword here is "essentially." Back in the height of 2.4-2.5 until HW launch, I was so comfortable with Dragoon that I could do any fight in the game - bar none - only looking at the screen at certain points, without losing any notable amount of dps. (Still gotta know if you should or shouldn't stack for Megaflares in T13!)

Every fight was rote. Memorized by muscles. Boring. I played the class to death and felt like I had nowhere to go. Now, to address your ludicrous jump to conclusions: I do not currently use any macros on Dragoon while raiding. The last time I did was back in like 2.1 when I was a babby dragoon and I thought a Life Surge > Full Thrust macro was cool and hip and not totally idiotic.

And then there's this:

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The rest of what you're saying is pure opinion. Moving 2 steps isn't complexity to me in the least and there are plenty of ways to move your hot bar around to get a clear visual of which skill is currently up, more so since they highlight. If any class is "complex" it's ninja if you don't macro your mudras. This skill serves no purpose. If you're claiming it's there due to "complexity" I pray you're not a main DRG, MNK, or NIN.

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Which woefully ignores all the points I made in favor of picking out the one sentence I dared to type that you seem to have gotten your panties in a bundle over, reproduced below:

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Originally Posted by JackFross

FaC and WT add a layer of complexity to an incredibly simple class.

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Since you opted to just hand-wave everything beyond that point as just being, like, my opinion, man, I don't really know what else to tell you.

The important thing to note here is that I call it a layer. I'll explain what I mean here, again.

Classes are like onions. If you leave 'em out in the sun too long, they get all brown and start sprouting little white hairs!

Wait, no... they have layers! Every class has what I like to refer to as the skill floor and the skill ceiling. The skill floor is the bare minimum you need to be doing in order to be playing your class "properly" according to the current meta. For dragoon, this skill floor is actually rather high - it's higher than either other melee class. I'll elaborate if you don't understand how.

This skill floor doesn't include:
- 3 gsk per minute
- hitting positionals
- properly managing other oGCD attacks
- optimal usage of Blood for Blood x Geirskogul
- etc.

See those, there? ^ Right there? Those are what I'm referring to as layers of complexity in a class. Now if we move on in my statement, we'll see that my pompous ass of a self called the layers up there that are NOT the RNG nature of WT/FaC "rote." It's stuff most dragoons learned in 2.x. We don't need to relearn it for 3.0*. The positionals on WT/FaC add complexity in that - if you want to MAXIMIZE your damage on any given fight - you should MINIMIZE how many times you miss those positionals. This isn't as easy as hitting 1-2-3. It's a positional you have to adjust to in 2.4 seconds if you want to get that bonus damage. You can plan out your positioning and rotation in a fight down to the letter on Monk or Ninja. You'll know exactly where you are at every point in every fight, knowing what the boss is doing and how you'll have to adjust 8-10 seconds ahead of time. But on Dragoon? HA. FaC/WT will *always* throw a wrench in your plans and force you to react to a non-optimal situation. That makes it complex.

I don't honestly care if you agree.


*Disclaimer: There are of course new things to learn regarding oGCDs and such in 3.0 - I'm slightly trivializing this point here to make a bigger, more important one. It still took me a solid week or two of running experts and such to really get the new skill rotation down solid, including oGCD management.

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Originally Posted by chibaby

the thing I have problems with is maintaining blood of the dragon my best is 30 sec then it poofs cause I am not fast too keep it up then someone complains that I am not a good dragoon I wish blood of the dragon was something that could stay on but I don't think that will happen

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What sort of rotation are you using? You shouldn't run into issues like this unless you're spamming Geirskogul too much. I recommend doing the following on a Striking Dummy to practice:

Heavy Thrust
Impulse Drive
Disembowel
[Blood of the Dragon]
Chaos Thrust
Fang And Claw / Wheeling Thrust
Phlebotomize
True Thrust
Vorpal Thrust
Full Thrust
Fang And Claw / Wheeling Thrust

And then repeat that combo over and over again, without re-casting Blood of the Dragon. Don't hit any off-gcd skills, including Geirskogul. Go for as long as you need, as many times as you need until this rotation becomes second nature to you.

Once you feel comfortable with that rotation, you should start to learn the positionals while playing with Geirskogul to see when you can and can't use it to make sure you don't lose your Blood.


If you need more specific information, I've got a couple nice links for you:
How to Train Your Dragoon - a wonderfully organized thread with plenty of information and calculations to explain everything.
Visual Guide to Dragoon - made by yours truly because I'm not personally partial to having lots of text thrown at me, and I know others aren't, either.
(It's still wordy, but more bullet-point than wall-of-text)
(Also yes, I know, there's a typo pls don't point it out thank)

I have to agree one hundred percent with jack. I sometimes wonder if there is a sheer lack of comprehension here sometimes as it seems people just take things completely out of context or purposely fail to recognize a point so they can create a straw man to beat in order to keep their pride. It is rather amusing watching them chase their own tales.

Regardless the point of the rng proc is most definitely a layer of complexity and it's purpose is fairly obvious.

I too agree 100% with Jack. 2.4-2.55 DRG was so simple that it was honestly a bit boring at points, as much as I loved the class. I had more fun with the class before they took away the positional requirements, because at least that required me to be paying attention to the fight and reacting quickly or else I got hit with a major DPS loss. I feel like a lot of people forget that before 2.4 or so, if you didn't hit Heavy Thrust from the flank or Impulse Drive from the rear, the effects of those moves would not go off. You could completely screw over your rotation by missing a single positional.

But after they nerfed it? All you got was a potency loss, and honestly, it wasn't enough of one to make missing a positional hugely damaging to your DPS. I could put on Netflix while farming things and still pull top or near-top DPS because I was totally on autopilot. I loved the class, but there was no challenge or mental involvement in playing it.

Now it has that element of challenge back, and I'm loving it all over again because I can't just zone out while playing and still do well. I have to pay attention to what I'm doing, which I don't think is a bad thing at all.

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Originally Posted by JackFross

And, yeah. I was hoping it'd be TTT>FaC and IDC>WT, with each of the two skills being +15s on BotD along with special secondary effects depending which one it was. But once it was implemented the way it is, I prefer that to what I just explained. What secondary effects would we be hoping for, really, that we'd even want or need without it making Dragoon even MORE useful than it already is? Battle Litany + second-best standstill dps + 10% buff to BRD/MCH put us right at the top of the DPS totem pole as a class which is almost necessary in any raid group. What added effects could FaC and WT seriously have that would do anything other than propel us to the point where that "almost" fades away?

And that's the issue, which is why I prefer how it is~

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Yea and that is the issue that I'm put against when I want WT to be different or the FnC/WT to show differences, that Dragoon is a spot where you really cant add anymore to it because its already strong, perhaps this is the same position that the Devs were also in when they made this mechanic.What can you do to make these different but not over powering the job due to its already strong core.

The only small things that I could have thought of, were probably a slight higher potency on WT(310). Perhaps like I mentioned before, the animation of the two, relate them in some way, or have FNC have an animation and when you use WT it does the same animation but finishes it, like 2 pieces of a whole, something along those lines. The other one that I had thought of is maybe auras, while they are up, they buff (5-10%) a jump. One buffs jump, the other buffs the other jump, the randomness would also make it that theres a probability of your jumps not always getting the buff at the time you use it. At first I thought maybe just have 5% for jump and 10% for jump but the buffs jump gets already could pose that to be a bit much.

So, I thought maybe fnc(5%) and wt(10%) could have buffed Geirskogul. This would also make it feel like whenever your proc landed on WT, you felt rewarded(yes, alright WT!) or hey just have WT give the bonus, like 5%. This would keep its core still relevant to the whole core of fnc/wt with BoTD and Geirskogul. This would make Geir 210-220 potency. Sure a bit of a boost to it, but at that time one we probably wouldn't have known because wed still be saying "Drags very power right now", so nothing changes. I also wonder how this would have changed the dynamic of using Geir as well since its like "oh, WT proc, should I use geir more or keep it like I have it in my rotation" etc etc.


Like I said, I understand your points I can honestly agree with them since you defended them properly. I would have preferred WT be something better over FnC, but in order to say that one must also bring ideas to the table. So I hope with those ideas, I dont sound hypocritical in saying "well WT is does nothing fnc cant already do" and then be like "okay, so how do you change WT to be different" and respond with "I dont know....".

Here's a trend I've noticed. Most higher tier and raiding Dragoon's seem to like it. Those that are leveling or dabble/don't main Dragoon don't. Take it with a grain of salt.

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Originally Posted by Hitoseijuro

Yea and that is the issue that I'm put against when I want WT to be different or the FnC/WT to show differences, that Dragoon is a spot where you really cant add anymore to it because its already strong, perhaps this is the same position that the Devs were also in when they made this mechanic.What can you do to make these different but not over powering the job due to its already strong core.

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Potency differences wouldn't bode well. It would make the class more of a slave to RNG than pre-3.0 BLM, whose only dps came from procs. I like the ideas, just don't think they'd work very well unless they were rigorously playtested - "in a situation where you get nothing but FaC for 2 minutes, how much would you lose/gain from not seeing any WTs?" is one important situation that comes to mind immediately.

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Originally Posted by RapBreon

Here's a trend I've noticed. Most higher tier and raiding Dragoon's seem to like it. Those that are leveling or dabble/don't main Dragoon don't. Take it with a grain of salt.

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Yeah. It's because of what I said - it adds a level of complexity. One extra thing to master to reach the class' ceiling. People who play casually think it's dumb and pointless while those who play the class seriously quite enjoy it. Makes sense. Both sides of the argument DO have merit.

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Originally Posted by JackFross

Yeah. It's because of what I said - it adds a level of complexity. One extra thing to master to reach the class' ceiling. People who play casually think it's dumb and pointless while those who play the class seriously quite enjoy it. Makes sense. Both sides of the argument DO have merit.

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Without getting into the specifics; I find the position of those against less than compelling. If we're to assume both options are mutually exclusive (based on SE's need to fulfill a pattern it appears to be so), I find long-term class depth (being a bit generous there) trumps 'how I feel when I hit 58, oops forgot about it hit 60, time to level something else/do a DRex!'. Their argument is fine - WC and FaC isn't great - it has merit, but their merit certainly isn't equal to ours; in my view. The position from which they argue is...dissuading because of their glaring lack of experience with the class. Not to mention how many people here are apparently professional game designers.

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Originally Posted by RapBreon

Not to mention how many people here are apparently professional game designers.

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Pretty much.

I dabbled lightly in game design a few years back, working as the lead developer on a forum's in-browser, text-based RPG. Keeping things balanced when new gear or skils are introduced is incredibly difficult, and I was working on a super small scale. I don't pretend to understand what this game's devs need to deal with when adding 5 new skills to every class, but it's pretty easy to see that, if FaC and WT were anything other than the exact same skill with positional differences, the class would feel awkward, assuming the RNG element was still present. And if it wasn't, levels 56-57 would feel awkward since you only have a fourth hit on one of two combos, and it just wouldn't play well with Blood of the Dragon.

It's really hard to argue that SE did anything other than the right thing with these two skills, especially judging from the way every dragoon who is raiding on the class seems to feel toward them.

I love these two skills by the way. It actually adds some dynamic and quick thinking to the class which is something I felt it severely lacked in 2.0 when compared to the other 2.

I can agree to an extent that actually obtaining Wheeling Thrust and Fang and Claw at different levels is a bit odd, and they could have maybe consolidated this into both skills at 56 and a new skill that we just don't have at 58, but once you get to 58, this doesn't matter.

3.0 dragoon was an exceptional design choice to append onto ARR dragoon, and I wouldn't change it at all (unless we just got some free extra button like the above example). Complaining about this is just lack of understanding the thoughtput for the 3.0 skills.

idk if this is brought up, but honestly, the progression makes sense to me.
Level 54, you get Blood of the Dragon. At this point, it's only used to empower your Jump and Spineshatter Dive during your opener.
Level 56, you get Fang and Claw. Introduce 4th combos the ability to extend your Blood of the Dragon timer, to keep it up basically forever.
Level 58, you get Wheeling Thrust. They're saying "okay, we've introduced this mechanic, and this 4th combo alone makes your DPS a bit higher essentially for free. Let's add a bit of challenge to the concept, to make it a bit harder to deal optimal DPS. Not too hard, you just have to pay attention."
Level 60, you get Geirskogul. This adds you having to manage Blood of the Dragon timers rather than having it be infinite with no need for you to pay attention or learn when you can get away with using a bit more time.

To me, honestly, learning to expect RNG wasn't the problem, my only problem was learning to use a 4th combo. The RNG was something that felt like a natural progression. I mean, in a slightly different way, Black Mage got the same exact thing. Introduction of concept, complication of concept, and adding a mastery level to the concept. Seems reasonable to me.

Basically what SilverEphraim said(I can't quote because I apparently have a character limit). If you still have a problem then 'git gud'. Seriously; so much complaining over nothing. It's really not that hard to figure out the process behind this design and how to use and apply it. You want something new at 58? We can already barely fit all these skills on active hotbars adding one more filler ability(Doomspike, Feint, Piercing Talon or whatever it's called) won't do anything

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Originally Posted by Moo_Cow

Basically what SilverEphraim said(I can't quote because I apparently have a character limit). If you still have a problem then 'git gud'. Seriously; so much complaining over nothing. It's really not that hard to figure out the process behind this design and how to use and apply it. You want something new at 58? We can already barely fit all these skills on active hotbars adding one more filler ability(Doomspike, Feint, Piercing Talon or whatever it's called) won't do anything

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Doomspike's not filler :(

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Originally Posted by Mayvee

Doomspike's not filler :(

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It's pretty worthless in both cost and effectiveness and really the same could be said for Ring of thorns. Both have very limited situations to actually be useful, like the first link pull on Fractal. No one looks to Dragoon for AOE damage outside of the occasional DFD or GK, which are the only ones that have any effect, and even DFD is on such a long cooldown that it still can't really be counted on for much. You want AOE, look to the ranged classes. It's more often than not a waste of both time and TP for a Dragoon to try filling that role. Nine out of ten times it's more effective to focus things down and actually kill something instead of getting five plus targets down a third of health before running out of TP and being worthless entirely and having to use invigorate on something stupid.

Doom Spike and Ring of Thorns are both really effective if you actually use them properly. Properly doesn't mean spamming them mindlessly until you blow through all of your TP.

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Level 54, you get Blood of the Dragon. At this point, it's only used to empower your Jump and Spineshatter Dive during your opener.
Level 56, you get Fang and Claw. Introduce 4th combos the ability to extend your Blood of the Dragon timer, to keep it up basically forever.
Level 58, you get Wheeling Thrust. They're saying "okay, we've introduced this mechanic, and this 4th combo alone makes your DPS a bit higher essentially for free. Let's add a bit of challenge to the concept, to make it a bit harder to deal optimal DPS. Not too hard, you just have to pay attention."
Level 60, you get Geirskogul. This adds you having to manage Blood of the Dragon timers rather than having it be infinite with no need for you to pay attention or learn when you can get away with using a bit more time.

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Stop your logic train right there and ask "how does leveling up to 58 and completing this job quest --ADD-- to the job? No other job completes a job quest and gains an ability that not only doesn't ADD anything, but it makes previous mechanics MORE ANNOYING.

BAD.

The other 12 jobs got 5 abilities/spells from 50-60, each unique and each adding potential to the job. DRG effectively learns 4 abilities, because F&C and WT have the same potency but just that at 56, WT is 100% guaranteed proc, but at 58 suddenly they compete for the same proc at the cost of NO ADDITIONAL BENEFIT. Add them at the same level (56), and give us a proper level 58 ability. There's a ton of really cool Lancer abilities from 1.0 they could add for a lv58 ability: Ferocity, Trammel, Moonrise, Speed Surge, Battle Regiment, Twisting Vice, etc...

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Originally Posted by Tilgung

Doom Spike and Ring of Thorns are both really effective if you actually use them properly. Properly doesn't mean spamming them mindlessly until you blow through all of your TP.

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It really doesn't matter since it's more often than not a overall DPS loss and horribly ineffective. You almost never see Dragoons doing AOE's outside of Geiroskogul and Dragon Fire Dive for exactly this reason. They excel in burning down targets one at a time and are much better suited doing that even on larger groups of enemies. It saves the whole party a lot of time and resources. Regardless this is getting off topic now.

Plain and simply; Dragoons never are or should be looked to for critical AOE damage. That's the strength of casters. Abilities like Ring of Thorns and Doom Spike are basically just filler that don't actually add any utility to the class overall and at best have very circumstantial moments where they'd be useful.

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Originally Posted by Moo_Cow

It's pretty worthless in both cost and effectiveness and really the same could be said for Ring of thorns. Both have very limited situations to actually be useful, like the first link pull on Fractal. No one looks to Dragoon for AOE damage outside of the occasional DFD or GK, which are the only ones that have any effect, and even DFD is on such a long cooldown that it still can't really be counted on for much. You want AOE, look to the ranged classes. It's more often than not a waste of both time and TP for a Dragoon to try filling that role. Nine out of ten times it's more effective to focus things down and actually kill something instead of getting five plus targets down a third of health before running out of TP and being worthless entirely and having to use invigorate on something stupid.

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You vastly underestimate the effectiveness of Dragoon AoE and are probably doing it wrong, like 90% of pug!DRGs I run into. I regularly out-parse everyone but the top BLMs and SMNs in AoE pulls in either of the two expert dungeons. I pull 2000-2500 on any pull of 5 or more mobs if I use my buffs for it. 160 potency AoE that's spammable is the strongest single AoE skill in the game that's on the global cooldown and not owned by a caster. Anything more than 3 mobs, you should be Doom Spiking.

Now, if you're referring to A2, then yeah. Doom Spike is dumb there, where you should just be doing HT>CT>CT with gsk mixed in as your main AoE damage. And yeah, Dragoons are firmly in bracket 3, beaten out by [SMN] and [BLM/MNK] for overall dps in that turn, but they slot in right there with [BRD/MCH/DRG] before [NIN] picks up the rear.

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Originally Posted by Jonnycbad

Stop your logic train right there and ask "how does leveling up to 58 and completing this job quest --ADD-- to the job? No other job completes a job quest and gains an ability that not only doesn't ADD anything, but it makes previous mechanics MORE ANNOYING.

BAD.

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Since I've gone into this at length multiple times in this thread and pointed to everything you've raised here as a counter argument, I'll just address each of those skills you mentioned.

Ferocity - Life Surge, but shitty.
Trammel - gimmicky move that will never be used. See: Freeze and/or Feint.
Moonrise - Enemies don't do TP regen. What would this do? Impact boss recast times? Let's make Dragoons even MORE attractive for raid groups.
Speed Surge - Basically Bloodbath, which is worthless. I'd rather not have another of those.
Twisting Vice - See: Moonrise.

Battle Regmen was a gameplay system which has no place in the meta of 3.0.


My main argument against giving Dragoons a "fifth" skill (since we already get 5...) is that we're ALREADY one of the highest DPS classes in the game AND we bring Battle Litany to the field, which is a huge gain for the party, believe it or not. If you gave us something else, it's gonna fall into one of these categories:
1. Messes with the current *beautiful* rotation, making things wonky and gross.
2. New utility move that makes Dragoons more attractive than they already are (90% of raid groups run one because BL+BRD/MCH buff).
3. New worthless skill like Feint that will *never* be used outside of certain situations which would actually still end up falling under 2 if it's *useful*.
4. New oGCD skill to boost our dps by a marginal amount we don't need to be boosted by while forcing us to squeeze YET ANOTHER skill into the first 24s of the fight.

None of those options are good. I want none of that.

Give me a legitimate thing we as Dragoons would WANT TO SEE as a fifth skill, and I'll maybe say your argument has merit. Every suggestion you made is either worthless or has no place in current meta. Sure they could be reworked for the current system, as I KNOW you'll argue, but how? Give me an idea that doesn't fall into one of the four shitty categories above and I'll listen.

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Originally Posted by Jonnycbad

Stop your logic train right there and ask "how does leveling up to 58 and completing this job quest --ADD-- to the job? No other job completes a job quest and gains an ability that not only doesn't ADD anything, but it makes previous mechanics MORE ANNOYING.

BAD.

The other 12 jobs got 5 abilities/spells from 50-60, each unique and each adding potential to the job.

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Wanderer's Minuet says hi.

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Originally Posted by JackFross

1. Messes with the current *beautiful* rotation, making things wonky and gross.

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What beautiful rotation? The one that clips CT every rotation? I for one would welcome some sort of 5th move that triggers the GCD that isnt complete crap and doesn't destroy our TP so our dots tick longer. I personally am not a big fan of how they assigned fang and w.thrust to 2 different levels. My biggest gripe is clipping my DoTs and the simplicity of our rotation compared to 2.0. After playing vanilla for so long, i kind of expected our rotation to be as challenging as before. Feels like its missing something. I still enjoy the heck out of DRG though so I won't complain too much.

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Originally Posted by Zeviand

What beautiful rotation? The one that clips CT every rotation?

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The rotation flows incredibly nicely. The only change I'd ever want to see is an extension of Disembowel and Chaos Thrust by ~6 seconds to make it worthwhile to go back to the old days again. In fact, that would actually be an interesting change. If we got an alternative third hit to the FT combo which can only be used under BotD and extends the duration of Disembowel and Chaos Thrust by x seconds at a somewhat lower potency than FT - say 310-320 so it'd still be a gain over hitting a CT combo. THAT is an adjustment I could get behind, though it would make the rotation fairly boring/trite, and if FaC continues to be at 56 as a flank skill, the new one would wanna be Rear, which wouldn't change anything, anyway, aside from slotting neatly into section 4 of the gross things I'd rather not see list (as a GCD, rather than oGCD, but the concept is the same).

That said, the rotation isn't as gorgeous as it was pre-3.0, sure, but you're only clipping 1-2 (1.8-ish) ticks of Chaos Thrust on each re-application. I think that, with the added complexity of Geirskogul (which a good majority of Dragoons I encounter in DF AND PF groups still are woefully bad with), the simpler rotation *is* really nice. Adding a tenth hit under each HT would produce a dead zone during which HT and Phlebotomize both would fall off just before re-applying them, even in standstill, unless you boost your skill speed to ungodly levels to account for this. And that's the real reasoning behind me saying it would ruin the beautiful rotation we have currently. If your skill speed is already low enough that HT isn't buffed by HT, injecting a new skill would cause you to have two hits every HT that don't get the 15% buff. That, to me, would be ugly.

I used to be very whiny about CT being clipped by the new rotation, too, until I hit 60 and got Geirskogul. Now I just whine about how tiny the difference is between two Dragoons who do everything the same aside from Geirskogul use. D;

The old rotation was beautiful because everything came off cooldown exactly when you wanted to use it again and all the DoTs lined up beautifully. That said, it was unforgiving as hell when mechanics became a thing. Kinda miss having a BiS mindset of "if it has skillspeed, don't use it" as well. I do agree that DRG AoE is very respectable though, and Doomspike in particular is incredibly useful in large pulls.

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Originally Posted by seekified

The old rotation was beautiful because everything came off cooldown exactly when you wanted to use it again and all the DoTs lined up beautifully. That said, it was unforgiving as hell when mechanics became a thing. Kinda miss having a BiS mindset of "if it has skillspeed, don't use it" as well. I do agree that DRG AoE is very respectable though, and Doomspike in particular is incredibly useful in large pulls.

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The bolded is still true, though I assume you're mostly referring to that sexy old beast of Life Surge, always refilling just before a third hit~ Everything else you just use on cooldown these days, no matter what, so it's not really different in that regard.

I am late to the thread but just want to share ideas:

"What if" Wheeling thrust also had a chance to refresh Dive cooldown and Fang and claw had a chance to refresh jump cooldown.

or

the combos would activate Fang and Claw 100% and Fang and claw would activate the use of "Wheeling Dive" which would be another ogcd jump move that had a timer on its activation.

keep positionals on the skills and either idea would be adding more jump action which some say and I agree with needs a little more and would take away the boring that currently the skills are practically the same thing.

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Originally Posted by Souleater13

I am late to the thread but just want to share ideas:

"What if" Wheeling thrust also had a chance to refresh Dive cooldown and Fang and claw had a chance to refresh jump cooldown.

or

the combos would activate Fang and Claw 100% and Fang and claw would activate the use of "Wheeling Dive" which would be another ogcd jump move that had a timer on its activation.

keep positionals on the skills and either idea would be adding more jump action which some say and I agree with needs a little more and would take away the boring that currently the skills are practically the same thing.

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Sure it could work but at the same point what would you like to give up to gain your new jump you can't just add something to dragoon right now without making it stronger then it already is and its already really strong in the dps department let alone utility

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Originally Posted by Souleater13

I am late to the thread but just want to share ideas:

"What if" Wheeling thrust also had a chance to refresh Dive cooldown and Fang and claw had a chance to refresh jump cooldown.

or

the combos would activate Fang and Claw 100% and Fang and claw would activate the use of "Wheeling Dive" which would be another ogcd jump move that had a timer on its activation.

keep positionals on the skills and either idea would be adding more jump action which some say and I agree with needs a little more and would take away the boring that currently the skills are practically the same thing.

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Why put more rng into the equation? Easiest solution is to give us another jump. It's blasphemy that NONE of the post-50 skills were jumps.

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Originally Posted by EnumeratingWishes

Why put more rng into the equation? Easiest solution is to give us another jump. It's blasphemy that NONE of the post-50 skills were jumps.

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One of the two fourth hit skills is a jumping attack animation, but I can't remember which one. I think it's Wheeling Thrust?

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Originally Posted by EnumeratingWishes

Why put more rng into the equation? Easiest solution is to give us another jump. It's blasphemy that NONE of the post-50 skills were jumps.

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No, thanks. We already have 7 jumping skills to use per every 2 minutes of encounter. What cooldown would you give the new jump? What potency? Where would we even fit it in the opener?

Also...
re: refreshing Jump/SSD cooldowns:
That would boost the dps of the class. We don't need our dps boosted. We're exactly where we should be.

re: new jump move
See: above.

re: SO BORING
No. What's boring is levels 56 and 57. I recently finished leveling my alt's Dragoon. The most awkward stretch of levels was 56-57. Having *only* Fang and Claw feels weird and wrong, like something is missing. Maybe because I've been playing 60 DRG for so long, but eh.


All of the people suggesting changes completely ignore the very important thing called game balance. Each jump skill is a significant portion of your overall DPS. Adding another one would boost us EVEN HIGHER and make the opener even MORE button-mashy than it already is. I'm all for injecting complexity into the job and making it fun to play. Which is why. I say people need to get over 3.0 DRG skills. We get an amazing utility skill to inject much-needed raid utility to the class. And then we get a new mechanic to inject life and fluidity to what was an incredibly rigid class in 2.x. The RNG nature of the fourth hit of the combo *adds* to this fluidity. It's part of the flair and flavor of the class.

My honest opinion is this:

If the RNG nature of FaC and WT is enough to make you so mad you need to complain about it in this thread, why are you still playing my class?

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Originally Posted by JackFross

If the RNG nature of FaC and WT is enough to make you so mad you need to complain about it in this thread, why are you still playing my class?

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Because it was a complete and utter waste of development time and money since it serves no purpose and should be re-worked to do something other than give artificial difficulty to the class and take up hot bar space.

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Originally Posted by Seku

Because it was a complete and utter waste of development time and money since it serves no purpose and should be re-worked to do something other than give artificial difficulty to the class and take up hot bar space.

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If they were to rework the ability now, they'd have to rework DRG in general so it's tuned properly. They wanted to add something dynamic to the job, and outside of that, DRG is pretty damn well off even if they are technically short one ability. Compared to say NIN or BRD who literally have abilties that have no regular practical use (not even to add dynamics or flow to their gameplay).

Would it have been better for them to make FnC at level 56 have only a 50% proc chance, thus giving WT at levle 58 a purpose where it'd be a 50% chance to proc one or the other?

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Originally Posted by RiceisNice

Wanderer's Minuet says hi.

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Except Wanderer's Minuet is a DPS gain and enables use of Empyreal Arrow.

Wheeling Thrust does nothing but confound our 100% proc from level 54 while simultaneously adding no additional damage, it actually slows us down in a sense. WM adds 30% DPS and the abilities which are only used under WM makes BRD do more damage than pre-WM. As opposed to WT on DRG, we go from 100% side proc, to random 50% rear/50% side proc with no other benefit or purpose whatsoever. It is literally added skill bloat intended to slow us down in some sense. If we got WT and FC both at 54, it would be fine, but introducing it 2 levels later creates a sense that the skill is pointless and actually degrades us in some regard. Nothing like WM. Again, WM overall makes BRD stronger, albeit more annoying. WT makes DRG 'more annoying' but does not make them any stronger, instead it actually adds another element to pay attention to, AGAIN, with no added benefit. I'd rather have a risk/reward like WM, than a useless kill that is only risk and no reward.

They could EASILY move WT to level 54 since the abilities WT and FC are twins. Every other job gets 5 unique skills, we get 4 unique skill and a 5th skill that nerfs a previous skill and competes for a proc with no added benefit. It's strictly a cheap design.

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My honest opinion is this:

If the RNG nature of FaC and WT is enough to make you so mad you need to complain about it in this thread, why are you still playing my class?

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For the quadrillionth time, nobody is complaining about RNG of FaC and WT. We're complaining that at 54 it's 100% and at 56 it's now 50% but with no added damage boost. A new ability nerfs a previous ability with no other plus. It's not that the RNG is hard or difficult, it's that we go from having NO RNG, to having a RNG--but there isn't a boost in damage or ANYTHING. If WT came simultaneously with a trait for DRG at 56 that gave Action Damage+10% or something, then at least we could say leveling up to 56 makes DRG stronger, but leveling up to 56 makes DRG weaker.

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Originally Posted by Jonnycbad

They could EASILY move WT to level 54 since the abilities WT and FC are twins. Every other job gets 5 unique skills, we get 4 unique skill and a 5th skill that nerfs a previous skill and competes for a proc with no added benefit. It's strictly a cheap design.

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WM is a dps loss by itself, and was a dps loss throughout until the buff. WM only becomes a damage gain once you get empyreal arrow, which the same can be said for WT/FnC except they're strictly dps gains no matter how you slice it, and becomes more so when gerkisoul. Unfortunately what WM adds to BRD is essentially the same as what WT does for your class, cause they could have not implemented WM, but still give us empyreal arrow and ironjaws and it'd still be a DPS increase. It's only because they have to lock those skills behind WM is only then it becomes a gain (because otherwise it's a dps loss if those skills are not factored or otherwise restricted to WM)

As for "every other job giving 5 skills" does not matter much considering there are useless niches like clemecy, warden's paeon and smoke screen, unless you're happy to have one of those on your DRG and bloat your buttons even more (so you'd probably not even have it on your bar, and thus no difference to what it is now), and that DRG is already balanced between having those skills.

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Originally Posted by Jonnycbad

For the quadrillionth time, nobody is complaining about RNG of FaC and WT. We're complaining that at 54 it's 100% and at 56 it's now 50% but with no added damage boost. A new ability nerfs a previous ability with no other plus. It's not that the RNG is hard or difficult, it's that we go from having NO RNG, to having a RNG--but there isn't a boost in damage or ANYTHING. If WT came simultaneously with a trait for DRG at 56 that gave Action Damage+10% or something, then at least we could say leveling up to 56 makes DRG stronger, but leveling up to 56 makes DRG weaker.

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And again, this is also the case for classes like BRD, MCH and maybe NIN in the sense that skills do not even make them stronger (only for NIN), but infact make them weaker until you get more skills to supplement it.

If you're angry about the loss of a "fifth" skill (because this is what it seems with the point you're trying to get across, you'd be perfectly fine if they gave WT along with FnC), I'd say get over it because a handful of other classes have also obtained skills that are effectively useless in practical circumstances and might as well be only working with 4 and the fifth that quite literally does not add anything to their gameplay (not even to make it dynamic like WT does), unless you happen to want one of those skills anyway, then we'll probably be seeing how every job only gets 5 skills but DRG gets the special treatment with 6 skills, useless or not.

Oh, and you get FnC at level 56. You have no "100%" at level 54. Not to nitpick but it looks kind of bad if you don't even know what level you get your skills for what I assume is your main that you're speaking out for

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Originally Posted by Jonnycbad

but there isn't a boost in damage or ANYTHING

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If DRG wasn't The Best DPS by a significant margin, you could make this statement with more sincerity. The random nature of F&C/WT proc is annoying, but it isn't a flat penalty unless you're so dedicated to parking on the rear or flank that you're also throwing away HT/CT potency bonuses.

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WM is a dps loss by itself, and was a dps loss throughout until the buff. WM only becomes a damage gain once you get empyreal arrow, which the same can be said for WT/FnC except they're strictly dps gains no matter how you slice it, and becomes more so when gerkisoul. Unfortunately what WM adds to BRD is essentially the same as what WT does for your class, cause they could have not implemented WM, but still give us empyreal arrow and ironjaws and it'd still be a DPS increase. It's only because they have to lock those skills behind WM is only then it becomes a gain (because otherwise it's a dps loss if those skills are not factored or otherwise restricted to WM)

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Difference is: EA is gated behind WM. GK is not gated behind WT.

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If DRG wasn't The Best DPS by a significant margin, you could make this statement with more sincerity. The random nature of F&C/WT proc is annoying, but it isn't a flat penalty unless you're so dedicated to parking on the rear or flank that you're also throwing away HT/CT potency bonuses.

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So poor design gets a handwave because the job is currently the best dps? So if one patch MNK becomes the new flavor of the month DPS, will then it be warranted to evaluate how WT is literally a worthless ability, not even a weak ability, or situational ability (Feint), or annoying to use ability (WM) but a WORTHLESS ability.

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The random nature of F&C/WT proc is annoying, but it isn't a flat penalty unless you're so dedicated to parking on the rear or flank that you're also throwing away HT/CT potency bonuses.

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100% a flat penalty. At 56 you have a 100% proc, unless you weren't paying attention. It was predictable and easy to plan for. At 58 now it's 50/50. It isn't hard, but there is now a larger margin for error meaning there a few fractions of a second to screw up. This isn't clever game design, it doesn't make DRG hard or more interesting to play, it makes DRG a chore. DRG may be the best DPS right now, but there is NO official statement from SE saying DRG was intended to be the best DPS. That's only what player-base came to after thorough theorycrafting and parsing. What if in 3.1 NIN becomes the best melee DPS? Would that then satisfy you? No other job has a guaranteed proc at one level, then a random branching proc system later. It would be fine if the random proc system meant better damage, but in reality it slows damage because there's actually more room for error. It makes no sense. I don't know why you guys are trying to justify it.

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handful of other classes have also obtained skills that are effectively useless in practical circumstances and might as well be only working with 4 and the fifth that quite literally does not add anything to their gameplay (not even to make it dynamic like WT does), unless you happen to want one of those skills anyway, then we'll probably be seeing how every job only gets 5 skills but DRG gets the special treatment with 6 skills, useless or not.

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Name one?
WT is literally FC just a different animation and a different position. It increases the BoTD timer, but so did FC and FC always proc'd 100% before you learn WT. There's no ability 52-60 I think think of that does literally nothing like WT does.

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Originally Posted by Jonnycbad

Difference is: EA is gated behind WM. GK is not gated behind WT.

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GK is gated by BotD which requires the utilization of both WT and FnC. Hell technically you need ot have WT to even use GK anyway because of the job quests. Would you be much more satisfied if FnC was only a 50% proc rate when you get it at lvl 56, and only then becomes a 100% proc rate for either FnC or WT at level 58?

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Originally Posted by Jonnycbad

Name one?
WT is literally FC just a different animation and a different position. It increases the BoTD timer, but so did FC and FC always proc'd 100% before you learn WT. There's no ability 52-60 I think think of that does literally nothing like WT does.

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Except WT does do something. You just don't like what it does when it adds a dynamic factor to your rotation, and it along with WT and BoTD are eventually required for using GK. Warden's Paeon is functionally useless in any practical circumstances, so is clemency especially as a paladin MT. Sure you could use these two skills, but it's actually detrimental to your overall performance that you wouldn't want to go out of your way to use it anyway. You keep saying its worthless because it's not. It serves a purpose, it has a functional use, and it certainly does not detriment your performance for trying to use it (unlike Paeon or Clemecy for a MT paladin)

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Originally Posted by Jonnycbad

So poor design gets a handwave because the job is currently the best dps?

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"Currently"? DRG has been the best DPS since they buffed hard positionals and magic defense ratings. It takes the least penalties for ignoring mechanics, has absurd burst damage, strong sustained damage, and can burn harder, longer with the F&C/WT extensions to its combos. Three of those things were true before Heavensward, and they're still true.

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Originally Posted by Jonnycbad

there is now a larger margin for error meaning there a few fractions of a second to screw up.

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As Yoshi-P put it in his live letter about this very topic, "Git gud." I was playing DRG in the days of hard positionals, this is an argument about nothing. Especially after SE reversed their position and buffed the penalty from 190 to 90 potency.

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Originally Posted by Jonnycbad

it makes DRG a chore.

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You don't want to do positionals, you just want to get showered in DPS for sticking to flank. DRG has literally one complicated thing to it: Making sure they hit positionals for maximum damage. That's it. F&C/WT force you to move a little, and it's really super trivial to do that thing--failure to move costs you a little potency, which is the "skill" part of the split chain.

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Originally Posted by Jonnycbad

It would be fine if the random proc system meant better damage, but in reality it slows damage because there's actually more room for error. It makes no sense. I don't know why you guys are trying to justify it.

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I could post a bunch of crunch, but functionally the thing is that the fourth hit dramatically improves your TP efficiency as DRG. Making WT a fifth hit makes your TP efficiency absurdly good, and Invigorate just makes that even more out of control. You're looking at F&C/WT as a way to increase DRG's dps, and it does--by making it take longer for a DRG to bottom out on TP. The random proc might buy you fractions of a second to reposition, which might knock you over to a new tick and buy you 30TP you wouldn't have gotten if you just pounded out F&C combos all day long.