On the "Deficiencies" of Hybrids

Lately I've been catching the "create new thread" bug, so I thought I'd shift to another topic that I have been thinking about for most of my gaming life. I'd like to address the perceived "problems" with so-called Hybrid classes. The most common saying you'll hear in regards to these is the infamous "jack of all trades, master of none" clause; unfortunately, in a min-max culture dominated by quantitative efficiency, this phrase alone is enough to come to the supposedly obvious conclusion that hybrid classes suck. Indeed, when thrust into party situations they tend to underperform against jobs that specialize in that role.

In all honesty, the reason hybrids suck is because people don't know how to play them properly. It would even be more accurate to say that they refuse to play them properly. After all, the brain loves specialization. There's a reason why the class system has endured for ages; human brains love for things to be specialized. These classes are DPS, these classes are Heals, these classes are Tanks, and everything that doesn't fit an existing category will be given a very specific one (see FFXI RDM). Even when not enforced by the community, however, the individual will still make these kind of choices. When presented with a class that can melee, heal, and dish out magic dmg, the usual choice is to focus on your "favorite". Why? I have no idea. But its probably because of the brain's love of simplicity, in addition to the dominant kind of scientific classification system we have been exposed to since we were children.


Specializing as a "Hybrid" makes the hybrid suck. Thats all there is to it. Specializing in magic just makes a hybrid a sucky version of a class that solely focus on that role. The trick with Hybrids is to, well, actually play them like Hybrids. Instead of thinking of them as classes with multiple options, think of all those multiple options as *one* option. And that is the hybrid option. A simple way of saying this is that if youre not doing everything, you are simply doing it wrong. One must look at the Hybrid's skills and *find* the synergy. In most cases its rather obvious, in some cases not so much. But theres no reason why you can't melee, while buffing party members, enfeebling your enemy, and using spells to take advantage of any elemental weaknesses. Thats the beauty of a hybrid, they are the "glue" of a team.

If we are graced with a hybrid class in FFXIV, I say to all enthusiasts: Do NOT let yourself be piegeonholed. You have abilities so that you use them all, ignoring them wont do you or your party any good, no matter what they might have to say about it. Find a way to do what they ask, while contributing other things. You can already see it in classes like Bard, where people would rather you be a ballad bitch than do anything else. Or you'll see some Bards so obsessed with DPS they dont bother to sing songs. Blasphemy! You're a bard! You sing and string your bow. Not just one song, two songs! Give your melees paeon, give your mages ballad, AND do your dps. Do it all I say!

So let us remember that its not Hybrids that suck, but the players that suck. In a world dominated by numbers and efficiency, many will come to the conclusion that it is inefficient to focus on all of the skills a Hybrid has. It may sound counter-intuitive, but all of those abilities used together are what makes Hybrid classes viable in the first place.

Good read. One thing to consider though is whether or not anyone else has access to those abilities. Using RDM from XI again as an example, nothing else could really reach that level of enfeebling-- it made it very easy to stuff it into the magic niche, and gear swaps made it hard for it to do everything at once.

Guild Wars 2 is comprised entirely of hybrids. It will be interesting to see how the world responds to that.

i also have to agree that was a good post. you are 100% right that ppl will play a hybrid to their liking(aka whats their favorite aspect) when the class/job whatever you want to call it can do this,that or the other. Yeah you will have some ppl play the hybrid to a defined role from the community standard but thats still wont stop ppl from doing what they see fit.

just like you pointed out with bard currently. a brd has to dps, heal, buff if they decide to just dps and forget the rest then you are better of having them as archer instead since its a pure dps. same goes if they decide to heal and stoneskin the party is better off with a whm or cnj for that matter. and finally if they decide to buff only they really arent too much of a benefit besides the songs, some would rather you going whm.

this is a perfect example what will happen with rdm. it can heal,nuke,buff,debuff, dd. if a player decides to only do one role/duty then its better off having a class/job thats a pure whatever that thier trying to mimic, since rdm is a hybrid it will always be SECOND to the pure class/job.( because if not then whats the point of using a pure class/job)

adding onto that rdm would probably be the hardest class/job to actually play, since they do this,that, and the other. many ppl will be drawn to the class/job since they see if can do all this stuff, but when they go in the field and use it they will have another thing coming. most ppl will then realize shit! i have to heal, nuke, buff, debuff and dd when ever a situation calls for it, and just to make a flat out statement most ppl will not have the skill and thought process to actually use rdm accordding to its design.

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Originally Posted by Priya

Good read. One thing to consider though is whether or not anyone else has access to those abilities. Using RDM from XI again as an example, nothing else could really reach that level of enfeebling-- it made it very easy to stuff it into the magic niche, and gear swaps made it hard for it to do everything at once.

Guild Wars 2 is comprised entirely of hybrids. It will be interesting to see how the world responds to that.

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Very true, RDM in XI was a victim of very bad circumstances lol. It just so happened to have something it was better at than any other class. I'm currently playing GW2 so im excited to see it all shapes up.

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Originally Posted by stanleyyoung

i also have to agree that was a good post. you are 100% right that ppl will play a hybrid to their liking(aka whats their favorite aspect) when the class/job whatever you want to call it can do this,that or the other. Yeah you will have some ppl play the hybrid to a defined role from the community standard but thats still wont stop ppl from doing what they see fit.

just like you pointed out with bard currently. a brd has to dps, heal, buff if they decide to just dps and forget the rest then you are better of having them as archer instead since its a pure dps. same goes if they decide to heal and stoneskin the party is better off with a whm or cnj for that matter. and finally if they decide to buff only they really arent too much of a benefit besides the songs, some would rather you going whm.

this is a perfect example what will happen with rdm. it can heal,nuke,buff,debuff, dd. if a player decides to only do one role/duty then its better off having a class/job thats a pure whatever that thier trying to mimic, since rdm is a hybrid it will always be SECOND to the pure class/job.( because if not then whats the point of using a pure class/job)

adding onto that rdm would probably be the hardest class/job to actually play, since they do this,that, and the other. many ppl will be drawn to the class/job since they see if can do all this stuff, but when they go in the field and use it they will have another thing coming. most ppl will then realize shit! i have to heal, nuke, buff, debuff and dd when ever a situation calls for it, and just to make a flat out statement most ppl will not have the skill and thought process to actually use rdm accordding to its design.

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I'm glad you enjoyed it! I completely agree in that RDM will be very difficult in FFXIV. Just as you said a lot of ppl are going to get in over their head lol. Its a looot to process when you have so many options, and I know on Bard I sometimes feel overwhelmed by stuff I have to do rofl. I remember I was doing Hamlet and decided to Swiftsong the DOL's as part of my rotation. Was going well until I looked down and noticed I had no mp. Oh shit, mages need ballad. Needless to say I had to recover first. But balancing all that crap is really hard. I'm afraid that RDM wont be like it was in XI and have something its better at than any other class. Because if that happens, it just wont flat-out be wanted at all :(

to point out even further no matter what hybrid SE adds it will always draw many ppl towards it for whatever reason it could be style, skills, abilities, lore, gear, looks, multi uses etc. ppl just dont realize that hybrids are expected to do it all at any time when needed when they are a combination of heal,buff,debuff,nuke,dd & are two three four or even five of those in one class/job.

when you have ppl play these hybrids they get in over thier heads/overwhelmed and do not peform their role/duty along with playing the hybrid as they see fit or was their favorite aspect of the class/job. then this causes a chain reaction by the communtity to exploit a few things the hybrid is decent/good at then conforms the class/job to a bot-bitch for whatever its half good at. exactly what happened in xi with rdm... and we all know its true.

even if SE added green mage, red mage, blue mage, dark knight, dancer, summoner, and all the hybrids out thier they all have some multi use to them. then ppl see Hey i like rdm cause it does it all or they like summoner because it can do this and that or dancer cause it dd, heal, buff along with debuff. those ppl dont realize that the hybrids are gonna be responsible for whatever goes wrong in the party if someone dies from lack of assist cure/stoneskin, or not enough melee was done to bring mob down before mega attack, or party was not buffed before a barrage of attacks or mob regen too much hp since it wasnt enfleebled...shit always roles down hill as we all know.

the hybrids are always gonna be responsible in a party if something goes south since they are the ones to /assist, backup or pick up slack if you will. like you said ppl need to play the hybrid as a hybrid not as a mimic pure class/job. hybrids will always have a hard time since most ppl will not have skill level/experince/talent etc to use it correctly anyways.

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Originally Posted by Lux_Rayna

In all honesty, the reason hybrids suck is because people don't know how to play them properly. It would even be more accurate to say that they refuse to play them properly. After all, the brain loves specialization. There's a reason why the class system has endured for ages; human brains love for things to be specialized. These classes are DPS, these classes are Heals, these classes are Tanks, and everything that doesn't fit an existing category will be given a very specific one (see FFXI RDM).

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Yes and no. XI's RDM easily proved that in a game where everyone is efficiency-driven, you can't afford to be a generalist. Has nothing to do with playing properly, and all about exploiting what little you could with that particular job. Curing and buffs had no stat penalties the way melee and nuking did. That's why people used RDM the way they did.

Conversely, WoW's Paladin proved that you can have a hybrid that works, but you need to put the time to give the class mechanics that make its multiple facets interact. Of course, that also means you have to help them lean towards a particular role chosen by the player to make that transition easier to bear.

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When presented with a class that can melee, heal, and dish out magic dmg, the usual choice is to focus on your "favorite". Why? I have no idea.

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Rather than why, you should be asking "why not?". Game mechanics, class balance, inventory limitations and stat scaling are good reasons why the focus on the favorite makes sense.

I don't know how much experience you have playing hybrids, and how much ire, discrimination and ridicule you've had to stand (from both the playerbase AND the developers) for liking a class or job that is composed of several aspects, but RDM and Paladin's treatment in their respective games shaped my view on hybrids. I've yet to see another model for hybrids that works and makes them part of the rule rather than the exception, so...

I absolutely agree with OP. It's NOT that Hybrids are bad at all. Bard is the perfect example. Bard is not supposed to be the TOP damage dealer as the future specialization of Ranger will be better to pick that up. Bard was given the ability to be a proficient enhancing magician as well as a damage dealer. Bard takes a lot more tact to play than simply being the Ballad b***h. Positioning is one of the most important things. It is a nessesity to get your party members to position themselves so that there is a fine line between frontline jobs and backline jobs. Ensure that your mage's and probably your paladin have Ballad, but then after collecting TP position your self so that the Damage Dealers can have Paeon. This maximizes Bard's use and then leaves them ready for battle mode as they will have Paeon on themselves. Also casting stoneskin where you can is a necessity to help white mages so they can pop an AoE regen every once in a while.

Of course these instructions are a lot more difficult than simply healing, tanking, or damage dealing but this is how a hybrid works; on spare mechanics that make you have to go the extra mile.

NO Red mage does NOT suck. EVER. /ragequitthread