Ban Dragoon and DRK from Frontline or At least Nerf Drg's LB

It's wild to me that we are asking to ban these jobs from an entire mode, I thought as a community we only do that to blue mages /s

Neither of these classes should be banned by any stretch, and (to me) an unrealistic ask for SE.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Reinhardt_Azureheim

You wanna know how to fix Frontlines? Here, let me tell you:


1.) Change how Limit breaks charge, don't let them charge for free just because you exist while scratching your head.
2.) Take every single action with AOE damage in this game, reduce the damage past the 5th target by -80%/-90% (including the power of DRK's pull-in) and keep actions otherwise the same, because frankly Salted Earth is only as OP as the amount of players it is allowed to suck in.
3.) Change Macrocosmos' damage to 8000, make Gravity II (non-doublecast) 12000 to keep their burst potential roughly the same, slightly increase their 5y AOE damage output over time and nerf their 15y pseudo nuke.

---

IMO, this is a great start to addressing some repeat scenarios in FL. It finally dawned on me how eye-watering low the skill floor is to execute some of these combos. It doesn't take a whole lot to get into the middle of a group and cast Salted Earth (although some players are getting good at shutting down DRKs specifically), just like it doesn't take a whole lot to execute a Life of the Dragon Sky Shatter/ Elusive Jump to safety, or get your Astrologin within the 20 yalm Macrocosmos radius/ 25 yalm Gravity range.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Reinhardt_Azureheim

Anyhow I'll happily hear suggestions about Salted Earth.

---

Here's a wild one. I felt if I had just another second or two between the act of a DRK hitting plunge and the snapshot for the draw-in effect, I could more reliably access a solution to the onslaught of damage that follows. To that end, why doesn't SE swap the CC around between Salted Earth and Salt and Darkness? I would rather deal with a 10 yalm bind, followed by a 10 yalm draw-in effect with a short delay in the middle. If I'm still getting drawn in at that point, that's my skill issue.

Realistically if I'm getting killed by any of the above combos, it's a skill issue on my part. I don't think FL playing around a singular ability from a singular class is a thematically good thing.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Mekhana

I know you can only CC one person at a time in most cases but you only need the same numbers of team mates as there are DRKs on the enemy team to share the same braincell.

---

Ah yes, not only is the solution herding cats, but said cats just also need to be able to perform tricks on demand.

Like really, that is a solution to briefly handling DRKs on paper, but rarely works out in practice. Despite Frontlines oftentimes being oversaturated with BRDs, MCHs, RDMs, and WHMs, most of them suck and don't know how to use their crowd control, let alone function properly to keep themselves alive and only came as ranged DPS under the misbegotten notion they would just stay out of harm's way and pew-pew all game. And even then, you manage to silence a DRK once, then what? their LB or draw-in gets postponed for an extra second, they pop purify and proceed now with CC immunity - as if the rest of your team of randos could figure out what to do in that extra second you bought them.

Honestly, the most accessible and effective counter I've seen is... running your own DRK draw-in deathball and it becomes a game of chicken. Sad but true. Of course that depends on the competency of your own DRKs. I've seen teams with 4+ DRKs where none of them coordinate anything and spend the whole game being a gimped WAR instead.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Mekhana

So just mark all the enemy DRKs on the game or at least the trouble ones like a premade doomstacker, communicate with your team and hope for the best.

---

I mean, that's Frontlines in a nutshell. Hope that your team isn't the one that has the most "I'm just here for the tomes" crowd. 90% of every game has one team that is composed majority of them and that's usually the team in distant last.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Reinhardt_Azureheim

You wanna know how to fix Frontlines? Here, let me tell you:

1.) Change how Limit breaks charge, don't let them charge for free just because you exist while scratching your head.

---

This, and/or nerfing the rate of your LB gauge filling the higher your Battle High level is. By Battle High 5, your LB gauge should be taking at least twice as long to fill.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Reinhardt_Azureheim

2.) Take every single action with AOE damage in this game, reduce the damage past the 5th target by -80%/-90% (including the power of DRK's pull-in) and keep actions otherwise the same, because frankly Salted Earth is only as OP as the amount of players it is allowed to suck in.

---

This as well. If not this then they need to bring back the cc resistance that SB-ShB enjoyed where once you get hit by a particular type of cc, you were immune to it for the next 5-10 seconds. That included draw-ins and knockbacks. Instead, the PvP team person in charge of looking at Frontlines once a year thought reducing cc debuff time by 25% was sufficient.

Nerf the DRK to only be able to drag in max 3 people, and only have the full effect of the first DRG LB hitting the targets 100% rest forfeited damage...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Themarvin

Nerf the DRK to only be able to drag in max 3 people, and only have the full effect of the first DRG LB hitting the targets 100% rest forfeited damage...

---

Or press guard. You may not think it's that easy, but it is. Side effects include being forced to watch other people on your team refuse to hit guard and get blown up for it.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Naizakane

Or press guard. You may not think it's that easy, but it is. Side effects include being forced to watch other people on your team refuse to hit guard and get blown up for it.

---

It does not really work like that, best solution would be to remove LB entirely after the two first upgrades, so it comes down to core skill after that, it would be a better option due to it is heavy exploited now.

Yes, guard really does work like that. You get pulled in and you immediately begin to run away and usually dodge the bind that follows. If you don't a quick guard basically zeros any follow up damage because 90% of the time the DRG(s) is(are) already in their limit break and moving into the bound crowd using the speed boost off elusive jump. If you activate guard after a DRG activates their limit break it will still be up when they land. If you're in the front and you don't have guard up maybe you need the respawn timer to think over your decisions.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Reinhardt_Azureheim

Anyhow I'll happily hear suggestions about Salted Earth.

---

Thought on it, just make it more leaned into what it already does which is an empowering zone for DRK and a no go zone for others.

Biggest idea is making it where enemies do less damage to you outside of the zone while you stand in it, so something like 20%/40% or 25%/50%, keep the same 2000p DoT on enemies, maybe keep the draw-in effect still but nerf its pull range to the radius of Salted Earth itself, then on the cast of Salt and Darkness, make it where it:

1. Gives a stacking buff on the DRK for 2000p regen for 2 ticks per target hit maxing at 5 targets hit(theoretical 20k heal)
2. Gives a 3000p regen for 3 ticks, adding an extra tick for each target hit, also maxing at 5 (I have no idea how they'd code this, but like anything suggested will happen).
3. Applies Heavy to each target hit for 3s, also causing them to take more damage from the DRK themselves by maybe 10%/15% while in Salted Earth, debuff is persistent until Salted Earth ends or exiting the zone, causing said debuff to last 3s after walking out and does not reapply if reentered.
4. Purges Salted Earth, applying all the damage/regen at once to every target inside, additionally applying Heavy for 3 seconds and nullifying the use of Sprint for the duration to targets.

If 1 and 2 are to be considered, then the passive regen is removed, 3 and 4 keep it. Option 4 feels more interesting with the suggested changes at the beginning, trading a defensive option in your kit for burst damage and a debuff, or waiting on it to end to see if you can land the snare.

Mind you, numbers are always subjective, just felt like these numbers worked and if in some magical realm these were considered I'd bet they'd change.

From where I’m coming from (Chaos/Light)
It’s DRK, DRG, WAR and AST, Guard isn’t really helpful when you’re stunned before getting pulled, even if you survive and pop Guard after that spicy slap to the face (Sky Shatter/Eventide/Macrocosmos), the WAR will pop their LB and Guard is just gone and you’re left to get farmed by the rest. Now there are a lot of counter strategies and tactics for premades but you can’t clap with one hand, meaning as a solo player all you have to do is CC or Phalanx before it happens, or just stay away.

I’ve had some runs where premades were outclassed by good play and counter attacks but that’s kinda rare to see tbh.

As for Salted Earth ideas, remove the pull and make it a mix of Dotun and Aether Mortar, that would be cool. heavy effect for stepping in the puddle while also shielding allies in the said puddle, a little extra potency as well for Salt and Darkness. personally I don’t mind Salted Earth the way it is but the animation lock when pulled is frustrating.

Add friendly fire for it...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by IvoryBadge

From where I’m coming from (Chaos/Light)
*snip* personally I don’t mind Salted Earth the way it is but the animation lock when pulled is frustrating.

---

This, it get obnoxious when the opposing alliance has 3+ DRKs. Christ, just bring back the CC resistance

Life would be so much better if we had the 10s CC Immunity than Purify, thankful I played when we still had it so I can have some good memories of PvP

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Reinhardt_Azureheim

I really want to hear a suggestion rather than another "uuuuugh DRK broken, ban it or delet Salted" what DRK should have in place of Salted Earth.

---

That is the only way to balance DRK for FL unless you want to make Salted Earth a 2 minute cooldown in that game mode, if not longer. You could do the reverse and have it root first instead of pull, but it would still do exactly the same thing as it is doing before, where we had DRK chain pulling entire groups into their team to kill instead of just rooting. The only reason DRK/AST exists is because the combination is braindead to play and does so much for frontline. And the root would still be an issue because AST still has it, so it's just shifting where the problem is instead of getting rid of the main issue.

They just need a different ability for FL compared to CC. And half of the problems with Frontline are likely why PvP is getting a full rework anyway.

DRK+AST+DRG would be a lot less bad if High wasn't as strong as it is right now. Plus High sort of makes people risk averse. People should be naturally as squishy to everyone what someone is without BH to someone with BH5 is right now without actually boosting dmg overall.

Objectives in general also need a rework. Its too RNG based atm. There should be a limit to how many times a single node can be a S across the entire game. At most it should be twice for those extremely long neck-and-neck games. Most of the time it should be once.

Besides that an easy fix is to not allow people to group queue for FL. Either that or give the option to party/full party queue only in a mode with fewer people on each team.

Or as a revolutinary idea: Have Frontlines and Crystal Conflict not be conjoined at the hips for PVP. That what affects a job in Frontlines does not affect the same job in Crystaline Conflict.

Like we could nerf aspects of Dark Knight for Frontlines, but it gets to be the way it currently is in Crystalline Conflict.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Chasingstars

Or as a revolutinary idea: Have Frontlines and Crystal Conflict not be conjoined at the hips for PVP. That what affects a job in Frontlines does not affect the same job in Crystaline Conflict.

Like we could nerf aspects of Dark Knight for Frontlines, but it gets to be the way it currently is in Crystalline Conflict.

---

The amount of dev attention needed for that would be a lot more if that was the case. Having to effectively balance two of the same PvP sandboxes for two different game modes is a lot of effort. Especially when FL already has its own modifiers on how much damage a job deals/takes. For what is effectively a mini-game side mode to the much more important PvE content, that is way to much to ask for. And for the player side of things, it would become incredibly confusing having to memorize the balancing for the same job in two different game modes.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Astralrisk

The amount of dev attention needed for that would be a lot more if that was the case. Having to effectively balance two of the same PvP sandboxes for two different game modes is a lot of effort. Especially when FL already has its own modifiers on how much damage a job deals/takes. For what is effectively a mini-game side mode to the much more important PvE content, that is way to much to ask for. And for the player side of things, it would become incredibly confusing having to memorize the balancing for the same job in two different game modes.

---

It would take work to implement two seperate versions. Then they would literally just need to have one guy doing balance tweaks.

Its not rocket science to be like: "Okay we are increasing the potency of this ability by 1000" or "decreasing the duration of this ability by 1 second." The only reason it would require more manpower would be implementing new features or doing more important things like limiting how many characters can be affected a Dark Knight's Salted Earth.

After all if its just a "mini-game side mode" like you claim, then why did we have the rework in 6.0 that also applied to Front Lines? Why have a complete overhaul of the jobs in a "one shoe fits all manner"? Or implementing Crystalline Conflict? Or the PVP milestone rewards? Or the overhaul that Shatter went through? Oh wait, I remember, because everyone was mocking FFXIV for having one of the worst PVP experiences imaginable.

Also this statement:

Quote:

---

it would become incredibly confusing having to memorize the balancing for the same job in two different game modes.

---

Gee its a good thing I don't have to memorize the differences between the PVE and PVP versions of a given job....oh wait.

Acting like having separate balance for two different pvp modes is saying that SE is a poor indie company, one worth 4 billion dollars, that can't handle the workload, that would take one paid intern to monitor the pvp feedback and implement those changes in the code, and you only need more people temporarily to rework things that isn't simple number tweaking.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Chasingstars

It would take work to implement two separate versions. Then they would literally just need to have one guy doing balance tweaks.

---

It would also take like one guy to put hats on Viera/Hroth(proven by one dedicated modder), make healers feel better, and update the textures but here we are. I'd be surprised if they even had more than one person on the PvP balance team, just assuming its one person who plays fighting games too much since PvP when doing 1-1s actually is kinda fun and interesting.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DendrielConcade

It would also take like one guy to put hats on Viera/Hroth(proven by one dedicated modder), make healers feel better, and update the textures but here we are. I'd be surprised if they even had more than one person on the PvP balance team, just assuming its one person who plays fighting games too much since PvP when doing 1-1s actually is kinda fun and interesting.

---

Oh that is certainly true. Like when Riot Games claims "It would be too hard to implement a winter holiday version of Summoner's Rift" meanwhile one modder does it in their free time and then later on made another mod of the same map for halloween.

The reason this goes on is the work culture has become sluggish, because they have to keep asking each person at the workplace for approval and comments about if they can do that, and how expensive that would be for the company's budget.

God don't get me started on Riot, "We can't implement the fun game modes a lot of players enjoy but here's the 27th Lux Skin and 14th Kai'sa Skin". Frankly I just think its cost/care issues, why would they do anything unless its that big of a contentious topic. You would think that letting Viera/Hroth wear every hat in the game and have every hairstyle in the game would realistically increase the sale of Online Store products but apparently that's not good enough. Same reason me bitching on these forums is just putting it out there as a vent because actually asking and suggesting viable and reasonable changes will never be seen by the Devs for whatever branch I'm bitching about.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DendrielConcade

God don't get me started on Riot, "We can't implement the fun game modes a lot of players enjoy but here's the 27th Lux Skin and 14th Kai'sa Skin". Frankly I just think its cost/care issues, why would they do anything unless its that big of a contentious topic. You would think that letting Viera/Hroth wear every hat in the game and have every hairstyle in the game would realistically increase the sale of Online Store products but apparently that's not good enough. Same reason me bitching on these forums is just putting it out there as a vent because actually asking and suggesting viable and reasonable changes will never be seen by the Devs for whatever branch I'm bitching about.

---

Fair about Riot, as one could easily have a thread that locks from just the sheer number of things.

But back to FFXIV, right, like for the viera/hrothgar aspect, one would think this would be part of the new development process so they don't have to spend later man hours to fix something that would have been done as part of the original development of a hairstyle or a hat. Just like how one would have assumed with 6.0 that with this big step forward they were doing with PvP they were going to take a more proactive approach in tending to PvP. Instead it feels half-hearted, as the balance changes come out a snails pace. Like it would be one thing if Crystalline Conflict and Rival Wings were also part of the duty roulette just as Frontlines is, but they are not, Frontlines is the defacto game mode for the average player. It would be like you can't queue for Normal Raids or Trials using the duty roulette, but you can for Alliance Raids.

Like here is an image from a match of Onsal yesterday. The result was a first place victory. Lots of Dark Knights, Dragoons, and even some Astros.
https://i.imgur.com/lzdJscC.png

There are so many factors for PvP to be fixed that it would be so hard to actually hit a point of content. General issues like every class being on the same level which means ranged classes have a massive advantage over melee especially since sprint cannot be broken from being hit, then they just hide in a corner and use their infinite no cooldown Standard-Issue Elixir immediately getting back into the fight like there was no issue. Even with every class kind of being on the same level, DRG is tankier than most of the tanks, better at burst damage than most of the other classes, and has a massive amount of mobility. DRK frankly doesn't feel that grand in CC unless your team is on the same wavelength as you, targeting whoever you Plunge'd at so you can keep pace with you constantly dealing damage to yourself and honestly as a defensive option Salted Earth sucks immensely, no wonder its only real use is to pull people and eat their Purify for the rest of your team loaded in Crowd Control options. I'd be content if they just gave Standard-Issue Elixir a 30s/45s/60s cooldown(whatever works better), Make it where sprint goes on a 5s timer and a 10s reactivate if you get hit during it(5 whole seconds to throw hands with someone at normal speed till they're allowed to sprint briefly again), remove Battle High entirely or remove the Healing Received portion, then modify DRG and some others values in Frontline so instead of the current -50% Damage taken, its like -25% like they already have a massively strong MIT ability and a free out button with Backflip, make them more susceptible to getting smeared for bad plays.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Chasingstars

Snip

---

Most of my issues do just come from how it would be implemented for just changing out abilities are effected outright and not just potencies. I personally think the potencies on every ability are fine, even when applied in FL. Personally, they should just touch on LBs, as not only are they incredibly strong in FL but also enable things like Salted Earth to be that strong with how it can easily group enemies up for bursts.

Also just because its a popular mini-game that got a whole revamp because it had an audience does not make it any less of a minigame. Its still popular and I am glad that people do play it, but saying its as important to the game as raiding at level 90 would just be laughable. I love the PvP in this game, the rework is the best thing in this entire expansion imo. But I wouldn't say its just as important as the PvE in this game, that would be completely delusional.

Having different toolkits in PvE vs PvP is fine, it becomes annoying when PvP begins to have different toolkits for separate game modes. How far would these different balancing changes go? Would it just be different numbers or like you were saying abilities just behaving differently? What if we get to the point where they just decide to rework a whole job for one game mode to another? At that point it would just become incredibly annoying to figure out.

And its not just because I don't think SE can afford to hire someone to balance between the two modes, but have you heard of any video game that would just balance the game around two different styles of game modes? At worst, you just have certain characters/jobs preform better in certain game modes over others, which you can currently say right now with how well DRK is preforming. Again, I still think most of the issues with FL is just limit breaks coming back, and Salted Earth being able to enable those LBs to do better, so finding a way to lower the rate at which players can get them in FL would just fix the issue. I know this is a FL specific balancing thing, but its a solution that doesn't require them to having a guy/team just working on a separate balancing sandbox for a separate game mode.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Astralrisk

Also just because its a popular mini-game that got a whole revamp because it had an audience does not make it any less of a minigame.

---

More popular than bozja/eureka style minigame content. After all pvp got all these changes from 6.0 onward. But I am not seeing a eureka/bozja style zone in endwalker.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Astralrisk

But I wouldn't say its just as important as the PvE in this game, that would be completely delusional.

---

And it would be delusional to say that level 90 raiding is the most important thing in this game. Sure its part of the story content for the normal difficulty versions, and sure there is extreme/savage/unreal/ultimate but not everyone does it. The most important content at the end of the day is whatever the player feels like playing at that time.

So honestly I think a lot of players in this game really think too highly of the “premade” notion and that players coordinate so well in this game to make this an issue. First off, drk and drg are easy to avoid. No guard needed. I don’t even put guard on my hot bar. But if there are any devs reading this ancient post, before you all nerf the crap outta the game again and further ruin pvp (simplifying the controls for the “casual player” was just a stupid decision) I got one word for you to all look at do some research on before you nerf the game into the ground… again… MMOMINION. I’ll just leave it at that.