BLU for Duty Finder and Raids! Show your support!

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Originally Posted by Dualgunner

I feel like I'm missing some context, I apologize. I'd say XIV also strives for that same balance, with BLU fixing to be the black sheep.

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FFXIV's jobs are designed with solo play in mind, group play being an afterthought. FFXIV's job are mostly homogenized, where in FFXI two classes had very different purposes and usages. That's 2 different design.

Also, FFXI had issues not with balance but with the design of some jobs (that's 2 different problems). As an example, FFXI DRG lacked purpose (some relevant abilities were missing), but it was balanced, as its damage was on par with other melee jobs. Puppetmaster suffered the same problem (the class didn't have anything specific to bring to the table).

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Hence why I remarked with some sarcasm that people seemed to be "ok" with XI's lack of balance.

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I think nobody said that FFXI design shortcomings (but balance wasn't one of these issue, FFXI's battle system was actually incredibly well balanced at 75, especially considering the complexity of the batttle system, the amount of jobs and possible strategies) were ok though. Also, blu used to actually be a very well designed class in FFXI.

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If you weren't a part of that easy course of action (drg, mnk, smn that didn't want to heal, bst, war, nin's that didn't want to tank, sam's, drk's)

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I assume you're referring to XP parties, but even so your comment reveals your lack of knowledge regarding FFXI. DRG, MNK found Xp parties without any issues (they had to compete with other melees though and be well geared), SAM and DRK were actually very though melee jobs both in XP parties and endgame (they were skillchains initiator, and DRK could do some very high WS), BST could find spot in melee groups but it was generally more efficient to solo for xp (because soloing awarded a lot of XP as BST). NIN weren't competitive DPS before TOAU but were amazing and fun to play tanks, so everybody did play NIN as tank (after TOAU they could very well DPS). SMN was used as a Damage dealer in endgame but did have to XP in parties healing because the mana cost of abilities was very high, so DPSing wasn't very effective in a party, but that was ok (and I was a summoner) because nobody said SMN was meant to be only a DPS.

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Originally Posted by Stanelis

FFXIV's jobs are designed with solo play in mind, group play being an afterthought. FFXIV's job are mostly homogenized, where in FFXI two classes had very different purposes and usages. That's 2 different design.

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Considering that ffxiv jobs are balanced around endgame raiding which is not only primarily but *solely* team based content, I'll have to disagree.

Conversely if they were balanced with solo play in mind, why is only one job able to reach the end of solo deep dungeon? If they were designed for solo play, wouldn't there be more than one able to place in solo content?

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Originally Posted by Dualgunner

Considering that ffxiv jobs are balanced around endgame raiding which is not only primarily but *solely* team based content, I'll have to disagree.

Conversely if they were balanced with solo play in mind, why is only one job able to reach the end of solo deep dungeon? If they were designed for solo play, wouldn't there be more than one able to place in solo content?

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Jobs in FFXIV both tank, DPS and heal themselves to some extent while playing solo. That's something very different from FFXI (in which most jobs couldn't solo). As for the deep dungeons, considering it is a DPS check while requiring you to survive, it is only natural that only a few classes can complete the content solo (namely the one that can DPS the most while healing themselves the most and mitigating the most damage). Furthermore, aren't tanks and healers in FFXIv supposed to DPS in endgame ? That simply wasn't the case in FFXI.

If you take one player in any of FFXIV's job and take a look at what they can do, you d find that you would actually be needing 6 players in FFXI with different jobs (and relevant jobs combination) to do the same thing. That's what I meant by talking about "designed with group play in mind" : you cannot do anything relevant solo and aren't complete outside a group. In FFXIV, even as a tank you can deal a reasonable amount of damage and heal yourself. In FFXIV, while there is group balance, you're only talking about optimization here, but mostly you ll be dealing your damage solo, in a group. That's also why SE's need to implement such a large amount of mechanics to induce difficulty in FFXIV : the bosses would be very boring without (that's what happened in WOTLK, in wow, when blizzard invented this sort of design in 3.0, Naxxramas became a joke and everybody cleared the raid in a few weeks).

I'm talking about the design of the battle system here, if you d compare FFXI's class and battle system design and FFXIV's one, you d find them to be very different. If you take two different caster in FFXI, you d find them to be very different at their core, while in FFXIv two caster DPS (like SMN, BLM and RDM) basically only DPS and have a small amount of utility. Where in FFXI the utility the classes had access to made them very different (hence, they had different purposes), and way beyond a simple matter of DPS.

As an example, the main point of SMN in FFXI's endgame was to provide enmity free damage on HNM. Where BLM's main goal was to burn adds quickly with fellow BLM, to provide crowd control and to stun the bosses. In FFXIV, both BLM and SMN goal is to deal damage, regardless of the encounter. If we go back to the poor DRG in FFXI, his issue wasn't that it wasn't balanced (because his DPS was on par with other jobs), it was because it didn't bring anything to the group beside his DPS (even though DRG were used in melee groups in FFXI, but these weren't very common by design in endgame because they required a lot of endgame gear to be functional).

That's also why the blu could easily be balanced in FFXIV : if you were to analyze each skill and spell in FFXIV you d find you can split them into 3 categories : healing, damage, and mitigation. If you take this into account you ll notice there are way less possible effects and way to interact with the mobs that you d think. A damaging weapon skill is a damaging weapon skill, no matter what its skin is : number aside, it is the same effect (damage, and possibly healing or mitigation depending on added effects on said WS).

You're going to need to find new terms to describe what you are trying to describe. In relevant FFXIV content, soloing isn't possible. You can make an argument XIV is very single minded with its endgame--dps is the name of the game, and the group synergizes to deal as much damage as possible.

Communicating burst windows with the party, discussing mitigation and healing strategies and positioning is all for increased damage output, but it's still very group-focused.

Perhaps you could say that they are balanced to accomplish different needed goals for a group compared to XIV which encourages high dps play.

While I won't say I'm, perfectly fine with the way BLU is, I want to stay optimistic. That being said if there was a chance that we could get BLU with a rotation and a GCD for raids it would make the slog of playing through 4.5 a lot better for me.

My hype for Shadowbringer is still there, and I can't wait to play the new jobs that we get (Hopefully 3) but again I can't say I'm not a little disappointed with how BLU's looking so far. So yes I'd rather it be duty ready, that or I'd rather they just cap it at 70 and completely make it so that we can't enter duties besides the carnival or primals etc etc.

I really just want BLU for the story aspect of it, I've dreamed of Thavnarian BLU's for so long.

Bumping up to show my support again for the day. Keep on keeping on.

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Originally Posted by Luxyn

Yes, and only being able to go in with preformed parties is EXTREMELY limiting. It's unacceptable.

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Why? Because you don't have many friends and can't be bothered enough to socialize and interact with other players longer than it takes to say "hello" and "gr"? Sit down, child.

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Originally Posted by Istaro

Why? Because you don't have many friends and can't be bothered enough to socialize and interact with other players longer than it takes to say "hello" and "gr"? Sit down, child.

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Think you're getting a bit too heated friend, i can understand where he's coming from. Preformed parties don't require a large amount of socializing in and of itself, the issue becomes if the content becomes dead (Similar to older Eureka's) grinding skills becomes more of a hassle than it's worth. That being said I don't really think anyone (I know I wouldn't) would get on one of their alt jobs that weren't already low leveled, to help out a BLU, and say a majority of people do end up doing what you say, forming groups to grind content what's the incentive for a high level BLU to help lower level ones to get their skills?

There's always incentive to go and do older hunts for various reasons, the issue is the finality of BLU as a whole in this state, you either spend eons grinding for skills or you get all of your skills and then have nothing to do. Again we don't have the job so we can't possibly know the benefit's that the masked carnival or BLU as a whole. Heck BLU could probably solo a bunch of instances once you have the right skills from the over world, negating pretty much everything I just said about needing others for progression.

Only time will tell, but we should speak openly and understandingly to each other, we all play the game and want to have fun together even if we disagree on the definition of fun. I'm sure the Devs, if they even look at these forums would appreciate clear discussion rather than needless name flinging.

The comparison with XI is unfair as it is a very different game with a different set of gameplay.

But even there, any job can reach max level and play the new content. NO EXCEPTIONS.

Yes. I understand that its too late to do anything for 5.0, but doesnt mean we have to like it and accept it.
I want to play the game like everyone else (as BLU) i want to do the NEW solo stuff there! Not in black shroud not in east la noscea! In the new areas and new stuff! Not in 5.4, not in 5.5 before next expansion, at Shadowbringers release!

I think that at least is an acceptable point of view by everyone. Those who want it to stay like this, and those that want to play in duties.

Not really, no. Blue mage is a lousy job. It's been a hodge podge mix of skills with no rhyme or reason, all but a handful of which are worse than the usual magic you can use and whose practitioners are, with like 1 exception, F tier characters in the series. I am fine with them making this werid thing with it because I have absolutely zero love for the job, so them going in this weird direction with it excites me more than another ranged caster dps, except this time it has no coherent theme because literally nothing ties blue mages together across the series other than learning monster skills.

If it were a bog standard job, then I would be pissed off about blue getting this fancy solo content. Because blue sucks. Where is the cool solo content for <insert pet job here>? And if it were a standard job, then the solo instances immediately become incapable of being anything more compelling than the usual solo instances. Which are fine, but not what I am (foolishly) optimistically hoping they turn out to be.