Yoshi-P: "If you want more engaging content, go play Ultimate"

Hence a respectable base and an engaging ceiling. Problem is that WAR and EW SMN have the same base and ceiling and both are ridiculously over powered given how simplistic both its rotations are. It's very insulting

A video from a FFXIV player who "mostly" enjoyed the EW expansion but is very critical of the healer situation. His criticisms are very spot on. I recommend watching the video, or at least the healer section, to anyone who wants to understand the gravity of the situation with the Healer role.

Was Endwalker a Good Expansion by Rinon
https://youtu.be/-2x78A0f13Y?si=vdchKmWYiZDau3Ie

Healers are explained at 26:45.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by ty_taurus

What it boils down to with warrior and summoner isn’t that the average player feels that their job design is interesting or engaging, because the average player is not playing FFXIV for the combat system, and that’s the key distinguishing factor. Most people are here for the story and the aesthetic. Warrior and summoner just happen to be the paths of least resistance to experience those. It also helps that both are level 1 jobs. You don’t need to learn anything new at a later level like with red mage or dancer.

I just don’t think that’s a compelling argument for restricting jobs to that level. Because the average player doesn’t need a hyper simplistic job to get through all the core content of FFXIV. That same group of players had little difficulty getting through Heavensward core content despite jobs being a lot more technical. That’s why we should be seeking a happy medium where each job offers something to the players that are looking to engage with the game’s combat system at its level while still making it easy for the person not interested in the combat system to still cruise through core content smoothly. You know, what we had before Shadowbringers anyway.

---

Yes, we agree completely.

Well we got 15 days now until the live letter and with it the job action trailer. I'm hoping what I'm thinking doesn't come true but these guys are predictable.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by currentlemon

Was Endwalker a Good Expansion by Rinon
https://youtu.be/-2x78A0f13Y?si=vdchKmWYiZDau3Ie

---

I remember a Mogtalk episode where it was him and Momo discussing healing in endgame, and iirc the general feeling was one of 'we could do with a couple more buttons in our DPS rotation, because we're going to invariably end up with downtime where healing is not needed'. Effectively, 'Stormblood again' was what they seemed to be looking for in raiding, from what I could tell. Which I agree with completely, SB had the best balance of 'optional 'more work more reward'', while keeping the healing floor (of 'don't let the team die') very accessible. The main flaws with SB was Lilies (which we as players identified as being a bad system before it even launched, followed by SE refusing to overhaul them until the following expansion), the insistence on the 'Pure Healer' aesthetic for WHM (causing it to be left behind somewhat in raids due to its 'niche' of 'it heals harder' being mostly unrequired), and on the player side of things, using ADPS as our 'parsing metric' instead of RDPS, meaning that AST became what felt like 'industry standard' for any PF

Shorten Dia to 12s, add Water/Banish to WHM with a 15s CD.
Readd Miasma as a 24s DOT, Shadowflare as 'place ground AOE under target enemy' causing a 15s DOT zone. Upgrade Energy Drain into Bane, causing it to be AOE and spread your DOTs
Delete Combust, add damage effects to every card thematically suiting each card's effect (eg Bole, good for tanks because of the mit, make it reflect damage based on max HP)
Make Toxikon actually interesting instead of 'the Ruin2 you get from Wish.com'

Start with 'Stormblood Plus' as the base for healer damage kits and see if it is well received by the playerbase, and if it is then you (the devs) know the direction to go with healers (something similar to tanks, where they get maybe 1 new damage button per expansion, and the already packed and functional 'role kit' gets trait upgrades, eg Sheltron became Holy Sheltron, Raw Int became Bloodwhetting, etc). And if there's a MASSIVE outcry about how this was a terrible decision, then next expansion roll back to what we currently have and try a different thing, like increasing the speed raidwides hit the party in all content (yes even EX roulette) by 200%, so instead of a raidwide for 30% of our HP every 30s, it's now every 10s

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by currentlemon

A video from a FFXIV player who "mostly" enjoyed the EW expansion but is very critical of the healer situation. His criticisms are very spot on. I recommend watching the video, or at least the healer section, to anyone who wants to understand the gravity of the situation with the Healer role.

Was Endwalker a Good Expansion by Rinon
https://youtu.be/-2x78A0f13Y?si=vdchKmWYiZDau3Ie

Healers are explained at 26:45.

---

I've watched it, I agree with a lot of things, but do not share their optimism in the slightest, nor their obvious love for ultimates and artificially boosted difficulties, nor their agreements with designing easy jobs and hard jobs separately.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by currentlemon

A video from a FFXIV player who "mostly" enjoyed the EW expansion but is very critical of the healer situation. His criticisms are very spot on. I recommend watching the video, or at least the healer section, to anyone who wants to understand the gravity of the situation with the Healer role.

Was Endwalker a Good Expansion by Rinon
https://youtu.be/-2x78A0f13Y?si=vdchKmWYiZDau3Ie

Healers are explained at 26:45.

---

No, I wouldn't say that they're "spot on" , I would agree with some remarks I would also disagree with quite a few, as well as quite a few changes that he wants.

I also feel that he was commenting from the point of view of a raider, I would like to view changes from the point of view of players who want to be on their healer in multiple types of content without being told to switch to another job in order to have fun.

I think it's important to look at all--or at least as many forms of content that the game has to offer and craft and experience where every job can be as fun and interesting as possible for forms of content as possible, prioritizing the things encountered most frequently.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Tint

They look like potato sacks on Lalafell too.

I was looking for a nice dress to wear and being a WHM main it should be easy I thought.

But there actually are no dresses, just oversized robes.

---

Kinda late to the party but i do like Edengrace Robe of Healing on my WHM. At least it's a pretty potato sack.

The video is good but there probably a bit too much optimism on their part. I do agree that there needs to be a bit more job complexity than the current 20/80 split that is going between job and encounter design.

Has square ever acknowledged the fact that they have shifted the design overwhelmingly towards encounter over jobs at the expense of the jobs but a massive percentage of the raiding community doesn’t even like the modern encounter design anyway

Of course it’s an anecdote but I don’t know a single person who preferred panda to Eden and most people I know who saw all three prefer omegascape

I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm just as tired of the content he creates as the comments he makes. Fresh talent is needed. Healers were utterly broken (yes there are a small number of defenders out there) in 5.0 and it's NOT gotten better.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Supersnow845

Has square ever acknowledged the fact that they have shifted the design overwhelmingly towards encounter over jobs at the expense of the jobs but a massive percentage of the raiding community doesn’t even like the modern encounter design anyway

Of course it’s an anecdote but I don’t know a single person who preferred panda to Eden and most people I know who saw all three prefer omegascape

---

Personally, I do like P3S, P8S phase 1 and P10S, but the rest of the fights kind of sucked.

I think the only bad fight in the Omega raids was O10S, it's kind of slow and the bulwark passing is awkward.

I think the big thing out of all the stuff that Yoshi P has said over the years that really irked me was this article. https://twinfinite.net/features/ffxi...ers-interview/

In particular this section when I'm sure everyone remembers.

Quote:

---

Additionally, Yoshida-san described a scenario where White Mage and Scholar are paired up to heal. Scholar is primarily a barrier healer and lacks the ability to cure to the extent that a White Mage can. As a result, the White Mage is stuck doing most of the heals while the Scholar can DPS away.

---

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Maltothoris

I think the big thing out of all the stuff that Yoshi P has said over the years that really irked me was this article. https://twinfinite.net/features/ffxi...ers-interview/

In particular this section when I'm sure everyone remembers.

---

God please tell me this is in reference to ARR where this was at least somewhat how the healers worked

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Supersnow845

God please tell me this is in reference to ARR where this was at least somewhat how the healers worked

---

Pretty sure he was talking about SB.

You know, the expansion where Cleric Stance was axed and the fairy got nerfed.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Aravell

Pretty sure he was talking about SB.

You know, the expansion where Cleric Stance was axed and the fairy got nerfed.

---

Lord help us

Indeed that was ticked me off the most. He's not wrong that it happened. He was wrong about when. Late ARR to Early HW, it was just main healer and the off healer was it was called back then. COme 3.3 or 3.4 though, and that was when groups figured out that both healers splitting the healing and both of them doing dps was a gain and everyone knows the story after that. This interview was during the media tour before Shadowbringers released and he made it sound like this was a heavy thing during StB which it wasn't.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Maltothoris

Indeed that was ticked me off the most. He's not wrong that it happened. He was wrong about when. Late ARR to Early HW, it was just main healer and the off healer was it was called back then. COme 3.3 or 3.4 though, and that was when groups figured out that both healers splitting the healing and both of them doing dps was a gain and everyone knows the story after that. This interview was during the media tour before Shadowbringers released and he made it sound like this was a heavy thing during StB which it wasn't.

---

Well I mean it was apparently how thr developer who made SB lilys thought it worked so same thing apparently

I just found the whole thing incredibly funny and sad.

At the end of HW:
"The fairy is too strong, nerf it."

At the end of SB:
"The SCH isn't healing enough."

Fairy healing was too strong? The only time it was actually strong in a good way was during ARR where Embrace under Rouse is slightly more powerful than Physick.

They could have capitalized on it and made the healing part of Adlo and Succor a bit weaker and made the barrier stronger.

Also slapping regen on Sacred Soil is just overkill.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by rawker

Fairy healing was too strong? The only time it was actually strong in a good way was during ARR where Embrace under Rouse is slightly more powerful than Physick.

They could have capitalized on it and made the healing part of Adlo and Succor a bit weaker and made the barrier stronger.

Also slapping regen on Sacred Soil is just overkill.

---

The fairy was actually kind of broken in HW. I managed to sit in Cleric Stance for almost all of SophiaEX because Rouse + Whispering Dawn was just so broken.

It was also very common to run entire dungeons in Cleric Stance on SCH back in HW. And we all know tanks weren't immortal back then.

I expected nerfs to come in SB, I did not expect (nor appreciate) the gutting of the kit that came with those nerfs.

I am one of those SCH from back then. But to be honest, i only had the courage to do so because i know i have a co-healer. And fairies heal that much because fairies also take that much.

It didn't change in EW where there will always be a time a healer can chad his cohealer just because the cohealer's kit is more suited to respond to the situation.

Just gonna leave this here. (◍´͈ꈊ`͈◍)

https://i.imgur.com/TCdZ11H.png

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Aravell

Personally, I do like P3S, P8S phase 1 and P10S, but the rest of the fights kind of sucked.

I think the only bad fight in the Omega raids was O10S, it's kind of slow and the bulwark passing is awkward.

---

Bulwark was really the only thing that broke O10S for me. Midgardsormr hit like a truck, at least on Warrior, and I didn't even mind the intermission because trying to not lose a single GCD during it was a fun minigame.
That bulwark tether however was just pure suffering due to how jank it was, but that's a problem with tether mechanics in general, the buster tethers in DSR P2 are also absolutely awful.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Absurdity

Bulwark was really the only thing that broke O10S for me. Midgardsormr hit like a truck, at least on Warrior, and I didn't even mind the intermission because trying to not lose a single GCD during it was a fun minigame.
That bulwark tether however was just pure suffering due to how jank it was, but that's a problem with tether mechanics in general, the buster tethers in DSR P2 are also absolutely awful.

---

Personally, I hated the fight because the pre-adds phase was so unbearably slow and boring. Plus, it takes so absurdly long to wipe and reset if bulwark was messed up due to the lack of a death wall.

That said, the fight had some fun moments, like the sheer terror of our WAR as he screamed for an Adlo when RNG made him take 5 Tail Ends in a row.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Aravell

Personally, I hated the fight because the pre-adds phase was so unbearably slow and boring. Plus, it takes so absurdly long to wipe and reset if bulwark was messed up due to the lack of a death wall.

That said, the fight had some fun moments, like the sheer terror of our WAR as he screamed for an Adlo when RNG made him take 5 Tail Ends in a row.

---

WAR had it so easy in that fight, with Holmgang being 3min CD at the time. Now, as a DRK...

As for anecdotes, I have not played Tanks much since my stint maining them in SB. I have the 700 DRK duties achievement since the day it was added, because I played the content back then so much. For Omega/Eden/Panda comparisons, I also agree that the only truly 'awful' fight was O10S, because of Bulwark being a janky piece of crap, and it just being a generally very 'slow' fight. By contrast, I'd call E7S 'as awful as O10S', but for Panda, I'd call P6S, P7S, P8S p1, P12S p2, all 'as awful as O10S'. When the job design is simplified, the encounter design has to carry the burden of 'making the game fun', so when the encounter falls flat, it all feels bad. But with a stronger balance between job design complexity and encounter design complexity, even a sluggish fight can feel fun in its own right, because the job you're playing carries it. Yes I found O10S bad as a fight, but I didn't mind it so much back then, because I enjoyed my class. I enjoyed, as a tank, trying to maximize my damage by dropping tankstance, trying to get threat on the add (and position it around the arena correctly) without having to resort to tankstance, and having to ration out CDs because of the RNG chance that you're playing 'oops all Tail Ends'. I didn't heal harder content much in SB, only messing around with it once lockouts were removed, but that's because I trusted SE design with WHM, and got burned by it

One anecdotal thing though, I farmed out O12S for every chestpiece and every weapon while it was current content (ie no unsync). I haven't done that with any of the Eden or Panda fights. Not even Abyssos, with the crazy fire effects on stuff, because that'd require sitting through P8S phase 1 over and over. I'm sick of seeing those damn snakes

For encounter design though, one thing SE could do is to stop making every 4th Savage a doorboss. Vary it up more, Titan and Shiva being door-less was a welcome surprise

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by rawker

Also slapping regen on Sacred Soil is just overkill.

---

SE: We are splitting the healers into Pure and Barrier
Also SE: We are giving the barrier healers 50% uptime on a 100p per tick Regen effect. This is in contrast to the Pure healers, who will have to fight over who gets the 60s CD 10% mit effect (AST won the custody case)

So 12 more days until the job trailer. Then, we will see if our worse fears come to mind. Based on that reddit post, I wouldn't hold high hopes.

Bring back 4.0 Scholar and Summoner jobs. What we have no is a pale shadow of what we once enjoyed. I feel like an Ascian mourning Zodiac's shattering.

Doing EW leveling dungeons again, and I have to say, the damage output that occurs on those dungeons compared to max level or "Expert" dungeons is far better. To be fair, this is likely because the player doesn't have their entire Job kit yet and some players are under leveled in terms of gear, but there is a difference. And if I have to be honest, I am playing a BRD at the time and the healer (who was an AST) still spammed one button most of the time, but seeing him stop for a second or two and use more of his kit in mob pulls (and the bosses too to some extent) was refreshing to see.

"Expert" dungeons don't have a lot of incoming damage. There maybe some exceptions, but due to a lot of factors like gear and having your full kit, incoming damage just doesn't hit as hard. And don't get me started on the dungeon bosses. For God's sake, I have not seen a max level dungeon boss hit hard since "The Burn" back in Stormblood.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by currentlemon

Doing EW leveling dungeons again, and I have to say, the damage output that occurs on those dungeons compared to max level or "Expert" dungeons is far better. To be fair, this is likely because the player doesn't have their entire Job kit yet and some players are under leveled in terms of gear, but there is a difference. And if I have to be honest, I am playing a BRD at the time and the healer (who was an AST) still spammed one button most of the time, but seeing him stop for a second or two and use more of his kit in mob pulls (and the bosses too to some extent) was refreshing to see.

"Expert" dungeons don't have a lot of incoming damage. There maybe some exceptions, but due to a lot of factors like gear and having your full kit, incoming damage just doesn't hit as hard. And don't get me started on the dungeon bosses. For God's sake, I have not seen a max level dungeon boss hit hard since "The Burn" back in Stormblood.

---

I get the feeling that "expert" dungeons are the way they are because they are designed to be easily, and painlessly farmed for tomes. While I don't think that "expert" dungeons should be incredibly difficult, I do think they should have a lot more bite to them, and not sacrifice gameplay for convenience.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by mallleable

I get the feeling that "expert" dungeons are the way they are because they are designed to be easily, and painlessly farmed for tomes.

---

They never recovered from the Amdapor Keep 'Bees' incident I guess

sacrificing gameplay for convenience is an apt way to describe EW expert dungeons. I can't even bear to THINK about Lunar Subteranne because of how dreadfully boring it is. I got tired of it way faster than I did with Ghimlyt Dark or Paglth'an. at least a handful of ShB expert dungeons had a spicy pull here and there, but almost everything past Dead Ends just folds with no resistance.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by mallleable

I get the feeling that "expert" dungeons are the way they are because they are designed to be easily, and painlessly farmed for tomes. While I don't think that "expert" dungeons should be incredibly difficult, I do think they should have a lot more bite to them, and not sacrifice gameplay for convenience.

---

I am in favor in making changes to the roulette system for max level dungeons. Currently, we have two max level dungeon roulettes: one that plays a random dungeon from previous patches and the “Expert” dungeon that plays the latest dungeon.

The change I am requesting is this:

1) Have a standard max level dungeon roulette work the way it is now but it potentially selects any of the max level dungeon. The player plays the dungeon at whatever item level / gear they have.

2) The “Expert” dungeon will play any max level dungeon at minimum item level. It’s not that much, but playing at minimum item level can make some difference. This new “Expert” roulette will also provide slightly better rewards for the players too.

I had an undergeared alt that I used sometime ago through all the expert dungeons saves Lunar Subterrane. None of the dungeons saves Dead Ends were even threatening, and that's an awfully low bar. There just isn't any bite to them.

and ofc dead ends also garnered most amount of hate by DF pugs

Pretty much every expansion’s equivalent expert dungeons always had at least one standout either from a storytelling or an actual fun perspective but EW had nothing

ShB- hero’s gauntlet is arguably the best dungeon in the game from a storytelling perspective and its bosses are relatively interesting, both the anyder’s had interesting bosses and akademia is the most recent example of allowing us a triple pull, amurot also had a great visual storytelling and its bosses were dangerous

SB- the burn speaks for itself, the burn and holminster are the peak of dungeon design from a “fun perspective”, the ghimlyt dark was also a standout for its use of NPC’s without being intrusive

HW- we meme it for anima poetic hell but ARF is a genuinely well paced and interesting dungeon with a variety of pulls and mob design, sor khai also had strong boss design and the fracctal continuum was one of the few dungeons that let you freely pick pull size

ARR- Pharos Sirius is arguably the hardest dungeon ever on launch. Lost city and amdapor hard also had some great storytelling and mechanic interplay with their final bosses and the final trash stretch


EW has what………I mean dead ends isn’t terrible but dead ends is by far the best of the EW expert dungeons and it isn’t even good. Would we even agree on the second, they are all incredibly beige from a storytelling, mob and boss design. They are all just so thoroughly…..unmemorable

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Supersnow845

Pretty much every expansion’s equivalent expert dungeons always had at least one standout either from a storytelling or an actual fun perspective but EW had nothing

ShB- hero’s gauntlet is arguably the best dungeon in the game from a storytelling perspective and its bosses are relatively interesting, both the anyder’s had interesting bosses and akademia is the most recent example of allowing us a triple pull, amurot also had a great visual storytelling and its bosses were dangerous

SB- the burn speaks for itself, the burn and holminster are the peak of dungeon design from a “fun perspective”, the ghimlyt dark was also a standout for its use of NPC’s without being intrusive

HW- we meme it for anima poetic hell but ARF is a genuinely well paced and interesting dungeon with a variety of pulls and mob design, sor khai also had strong boss design and the fracctal continuum was one of the few dungeons that let you freely pick pull size

ARR- Pharos Sirius is arguably the hardest dungeon ever on launch. Lost city and amdapor hard also had some great storytelling and mechanic interplay with their final bosses and the final trash stretch


EW has what………I mean dead ends isn’t terrible but dead ends is by far the best of the EW expert dungeons and it isn’t even good. Would we even agree on the second, they are all incredibly beige from a storytelling, mob and boss design. They are all just so thoroughly…..unmemorable

---

The leveling dungeons were a lot more memorable than the max level dungeons I have played (I quit playing at 6.2, so I haven’t played all of EW’s dungeons yet).

I think 'Expert Roulette' should just pick from any duty, that isn't tagged 'Extreme', 'Savage', 'Ultimate' or PVP related. Any Dungeon, any Trial, any Normal Raid, Alliance Raid, and yes, any Guildhest, all in the pool. People ragequit out because they didn't get a Guildhest, and the roulette run will take 20min instead of 3? That's what the '30min penalty for leaving mid-run' is for

A 'Minimum ILVL' Roulette could be interesting too

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Supersnow845

they are all incredibly beige from a storytelling, mob and boss design. They are all just so thoroughly…..unmemorable

---

Storytelling-wise, Dead Ends is cool IMO. Theme/appearance-wise, I also like Smileton's non-euclidean geometry, Ktisis' separate 'Minecraft Biome' structure, and Aitascope because 'haha remember funny Garlean shield man'. As far as actually 'play through the dungeon', the only one that comes to mind from EW that is 'actually hits hard enough to justify the addition of Bloodwhetting' is one particular pull in Vanaspati. Aitascope would be up there, but you get the crazy 'power of nostalgia' effects from Moenbryda/Haurchefant so they get downgraded to 'this is ez mode' pulls

EX dungeons have all been undeniably 'pushover' tier, each and every one. But that might be because we can go in with Savage gear, and be 60 ILVL higher than the 'SE-mandated minimum'. So maybe SE needs to look into clamping the ILVL swing possible in the dungeons a bit harder

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by currentlemon

The leveling dungeons were a lot more memorable than the max level dungeons I have played (I quit playing at 6.2, so I haven’t played all of EW’s dungeons yet).

---

I do think the comparisons are a tad unfair given that HW and SB also had a bunch "hard" dungeon variants that were quite underwhelming.

I don't think EW is *that* bad. I do agree that the wrap-up dungeons were pretty weak, but that is largely due to the second half of the story existing in these vague spaaaaaaace areas with very little to ground their story: Aitiascope, Dead Ends, Smileton, Stigma Dreamscape. They all had a conceptual setting, but that mostly felt like window-dressing and didn't feel as well-connected to the world the story is taking place in. However, I do think that both the leveling dungeons and patch dungeons are much stronger for being more grounded in more finite worldbuilding. Tower of Zot, Tower of Babil, and Vanaspati all logically relate back to and expand on Thavnair, Garlemald, and the moon towers. Fell Court, Lapis Manalis, and Lunar Subterrane all relate back to the history of the Thirteenth. Those were much better experiences, imo.

In sum, I think Endwalker's weakness was just getting far too abstracted and up its behind about this whole Endsinger/Ultima Thule business for too long. I think the expansion would have fared much better if it had broken down the act structure to spend all but the final act in Elpis/Space, and more time in Ilsabard/Sharlayan. Instead of the 50/50 split we got. Honestly I think Elpis should have just been an instance and not a full map, with the freed up map dedicated to fleshing out Garlemald. Elpis adds so little to the world map and ended up forcing a rush through Garlemald and a bloating of the second half of the story; the dungeon would have faired better as a patch dungeon than this weird time travel sidetracking business.

I think it would be great it if the devs pushed themselves a bit more with with dungeon design instead of just defaulting to the usual formulas. I think the bullet hell hallway from The Puppet's Bunker is one of the best unconventional trash "pulls" in the game, and we need more weird trash pulls like it.