Why the Viper Changes are Short-Sighted and Bad

A lot of people have been saying this doesn't really change anything to rotations or gameplay... so for anyone that hadn't given it a shot, or really dug deeper into optimization, I thought I would share how and why the removal of Noxious Gnash is a massive detriment to the job, why it isn't as simple as removing a traditional dot or even Reaper's Death's Design, and some unintentional side effects of its removal.

As a result of the 11 second awakening burst and shorter NG debuff timers, It was imperative to re-up NG just before beginning your burst using dread fangs, ESPECIALLY if you had the resources to double awakening, and also to save a single dreadwinder combo near burst phases to safely re-apply GN for the following coils near the end of buff phase (leveraging the interaction of coils being able to safely interrupt the dreadwinder combo). Removing the debuff means you no longer have to (intentionally) prep or save resources before your burst phase, like holding wyrmwind thrust when buffs were coming back up on DRG. The serpent offerings gauge manages itself easily and isn't really a guage you pay attention to, and your goal is to make sure you DON'T save too many coils for burst phase, as you were guaranteed to gain two charges every 2 minute burst, and at least 1 every other minute. Noxious Gnash was the only true fail point to pay attention to beyond pressing glowing buttons on a railroaded combo.

Furthermore, the change from using dread fangs to apply NG to needing to swap between the two combos has had the side effect of removing the dancing between combos. If you open with 1-1-1, the combo is now and repeating for eternity: 1-1-1, 2-2-2, 1-1-2, 2-2-1. Unless you mess up, you will not find yourself ever pressing 1-2-1, or 2-1-2, like you had to often when using dread fangs or steel fangs as they were. The free-flowingness of following the combo route has ripped out and replaced with Monk's Dragonkick-Bootshine, or DRG's combo cycles, and it is far less engaging than the process of "Do I need to re-apply dot with dreadwinder on cooldown" -> Alternate the second hit -> Hit the right finisher.

In addition to the NG issues, they also went overboard in increasing the length of the general GCD combo buffs, as with 40 seconds to hit the next finisher your 22 second double-awakening combo alongside refreshing NG using Dreadwinder and Spending your coils under buffs meant that you had to intentionally prep every 2 minute by re-applying your NG and prepping the finisher via dread fangs, so that you could use the finisher right on time! These are all not necessarily hard decisions, but the only true conscious decisions to be made given how absolutely free-flowing Viper is made by design. Viper was made free-flowing specifically to load the weight of engagement upon the interactions of abilities to apply NG at the right time, to interrupt each other safely for potency gains under buffs, and to prep finishers ahead of time.

Unlike some changes, this fundamentally changes the job from it's intended identity...!

I can't get over that they made a snake-themed dps job and removed the poison/venom debuff from it just one month in.

I agree, I was really enjoying this job, it was simple and easy but there was still a little bit you could do to optimize, and now that's gone. I find it ridiculous the job has barely been out and they already did a rework like this. It feels insulting having my favorite job in Endwalker, Monk, have every step of it's 1-2-3 combo turn into leaden fist and now when I moved on and was enjoying Viper, they do this.

Im still neutral to the job change. I don’t think anyone can change my mind on it. They could have kept it, extended it, or removed it like they did.

Still playing it. Good luck to everyone else who hates it now, I guess.

They should at least have something to switch it up. Like have Vicewinder switch which buff you have, so it's 111 221 112 222 Vicewinder 211 121 212 122

The job has lost none of its nuance or difficulty, the primary difficulty in Viper has always been managing your positionals and knowing when is the right time to use your reawakening and ranged combo
none of that has changed. The only thing Noxious gash had was a rather inconvenient debuff to manage. The decision was either extend the duration or remove it, and they chose to remove it.
The only weird change imo was with the base combos now being rather samey with the 111 222 111 222 stuff, which now it feels like why not just make the whole thing one button instead of 2, but it's such a minor gripe to have when the job plays pretty much the exact same.
Your rotation and priorities are basically identical, without the need to reset your debuff. You can still hold onto your resources/cooldowns for raids buffs and damage windows, there is nothing stopping you from doing that.
(personally I think we should move away from the 2 minute window garbage anyway)

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Originally Posted by AddictedToWitches

The job has lost none of its nuance or difficulty, the primary difficulty in Viper has always been managing your positionals and knowing when is the right time to use your reawakening and ranged combo

none of that has changed. The only thing Noxious gash had was a rather inconvenient debuff to manage. The decision was either extend the duration or remove it, and they chose to remove it.
The only weird change imo was with the base combos now being rather samey with the 111 222 111 222 stuff, which now it feels like why not just make the whole thing one button instead of 2, but it's such a minor gripe to have when the job plays pretty much the exact same.

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I shall stand with what I said in other threads - anyone who truly believes that Viper plays pretty much the exact same as before has not played Viper right in the past. This is not a bad thing, mind you, people are allowed to push buttons in the order they desire. But the fact of the matter is - while you thought NG was inconvenient to manage, it was still a gameplay element that increased the jobs skill ceiling, rewarding people with proper debuff management with more damage and more flexibility, as compared to now. (Also, please don't consolidate the Viper Combos into 1 button like in PVP).
Previously, you made a conscious decision whether to use Dread Fangs or Dreadwinder, now you just alternate the first step of your filler combo. The primary difficulty of Viper had been juggling all the Buffs and Debuffs while dancing around your enemies. This was, to many, engaging and fun, and was a core element of the job that was ripped out without any real reason, the plan for that had been made 6 days after early access.

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Your rotation and priorities are basically identical, without the need to reset your debuff. You can still hold onto your resources/cooldowns for raids buffs and damage windows, there is nothing stopping you from doing that.
(personally I think we should move away from the 2 minute window garbage anyway)

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While I agree that the 2 minute window is utter garbage, as stated above, no, the rotation has changed noticeably, and the priorities have shifted. Dreadwinder is now just a button to push instead of interacting meaningfully with your filler rotation. The class rotation is completely different to before (as long as you played it right, that is).

Honestly, this makes me wonder on if the developers released the job with a Noxious Gnash that gave 30 seconds instead of 20 seconds and capped it at 60 seconds on if the "feedback" would have been strong enough for them to consider the removal. Just something to think about.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by AddictedToWitches

The job has lost none of its nuance or difficulty, the primary difficulty in Viper has always been managing your positionals and knowing when is the right time to use your reawakening and ranged combo
none of that has changed. The only thing Noxious gash had was a rather inconvenient debuff to manage. The decision was either extend the duration or remove it, and they chose to remove it.
The only weird change imo was with the base combos now being rather samey with the 111 222 111 222 stuff, which now it feels like why not just make the whole thing one button instead of 2, but it's such a minor gripe to have when the job plays pretty much the exact same.
Your rotation and priorities are basically identical, without the need to reset your debuff. You can still hold onto your resources/cooldowns for raids buffs and damage windows, there is nothing stopping you from doing that.
(personally I think we should move away from the 2 minute window garbage anyway)

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You clearly never played viper correctly before the change if you think it's the same. You actually had to think about what buttons you press as one wrong step and you risk losing one of your buffs or your NG, or overcapping NG. Now it's all spelled out for you with 0 things to manage besides positionals and Uncoiled Fury stacks, which are not even that hard or challenging. You've got no chance of a buff wearing off now, you're almost always guaranteed to hit your positionals and you can always delay a hit with Uncoiled Fury. The job has so fundamentlally differed from where it was a few days ago; you should honestly truly understand what you're talking about before you try to speak on something.