Just a heads up, this is just about having a discussion. It's not anyone's job to have solutions and it's not necessary for anyone try shutdown discussion or get defensive. The forums are here to trade ideas and discuss them!
As a game that started to help ease new players into the MMO genre, I think that this MMO need to grow with its players. We've seen the introduction of new skills and mechanics in 3.0 to add some further complexity into the game, but there's only so much more you can add before it gets too difficult or complicated. Since combat plays a significant part of this game, it's important to keep it interesting. The combat isn't necessarily bad - it still plays better than basically every other MMO in the market, but there is still something lacklustre about it. We don't have options to change our experiences, each class has the same way of playing (there are no points to improve certain spells or change the way they are used besides a handful of cases - e.g Astrologian).
I think we should consider elemental strengths/weaknesses somewhere in the future to enhance the combat in this game. Obviously that would require redesigning how some of the classes play, and it is definitely something that occurs (this game wouldn't exist without the intention of reimagining/redesigning aspects of the game).
Black Mage would obviously need to be redesigned, but I think that would be for the better. I actually applause SE for the current Black Mage, because they managed to subtly and somewhat incorporate the original design of Thaumaturge (being an umbral/astral caster) and the Final Fantasy Black Mage archetype we all love and know. The current rotational system for Black Mage works for now, but how many more layers can we add before it's not player friendly? I think SE has the creativity to redesign the class to fit a combat system with elemental strengths/weaknesses. What this would require is less vertical spell progression (e.g tier 1: Astral/umbral, tier 2: Enochian, tier 3: ???) but more horizontal progression (more situation spells and 'spell trees'). While the combat in 1.23 was very simplistic, I think it did a better job at encapsulating what a Black Mage is, especially when we look at what Black Mage has been in Final Fantasy. Perhaps if Black Mage gets redesigned, we can take the umbral/astral identity and create a new class/job from it (there is plenty of information on it with the original Thaumaturge pre-version 1.20).
I understand that in 2.0 Yoshi-P wanted to move away from the old system of building up your power over the course of a fight, so maybe that needs to be taken into account. I'm sure there are still ways something like this could be done without going against that principle, though.
I think elemental attributes also grants the opportunity to improve other classes and diversify the experience. If we take Monk for example - which originally was an elemental focused melee dps, it's now (as in, since 2.0) kind of similar to Dragoon with it's huge reliance on positionals. Perhaps the need for positionals can be changed/removed/traded for situational elemental rotations to bring back the old Monk identity that we once had, and give them more situational roles.
Elemental attributes also means new summon opportunities, and new ways in which unaspected/non-elemental abilities (as seen with Lancer, Arcanist, and Archer) can be utilised.
Reintroducing elemental attributes may only be one part of the changes this game may need. We may need other changes that the community feels is important. Maybe something that needs to be reevaluated is the notion of DPS/Tank/Healer, since the classes/jobs we have are much more than that niche role. There is a lot of room for expansion, maybe we need to reconsider what constitutes a party? Should it be 5 members to include an optional 'Support/Utility/Dps' slot?
This game still has so much potential. We've seen the uniqueness and creativity this game has once had and still has in many other aspects, so I have no doubt we can expect some interesting changes in the future.
Should we consider combat QOL improvements/changes ?
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11-28-2015, 05:47 PMYellowShould we consider combat QOL improvements/changes ?
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11-28-2015, 10:36 PMWinterLuna
Messing with elemental resistances etc etc would pretty much require Square to redesign the entire game, not just a few classes. They would have to implement this into every mob, every boss, and then completely redesign every class to enable them to fight with the resistances and strengths.
I don't mean to shoot down the idea, but it's just something I don't see happening, although of course there are many other QoL changes we could hope for. -
11-28-2015, 10:57 PMWellFooledI agree, I would like something in the game that allowed us to customize our gameplay. If you stand two Paladins next to each other in FFXIV you can be sure they have the same abilities, the same traits, the same armor, the same gameplay. I would like some system in the game that differentiates us from each other. Some MMO accomplish this with skill trees, sub jobs, merit points, or something else, but I think a great start would be to make the stats on gear more interesting and complex. If gear had bonus effects like "Increase movement speed by 5%", "Deals x amount of fire damage with every blocked attack", "Adds damage over time with x potency to Shield Swipe", and other such bonuses, we would very quickly distinguish our gameplay from one another just in our choice of gear.Quote:
Originally Posted by Yellow
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11-28-2015, 11:38 PMZojhaWe already have that: You can ditch your soul crystal in favor of more cross class skills.Quote:
Originally Posted by WellFooled
Why don't you do it? Note: That's a rhetorical question. We all know it's because it's less efficient than going with your soul crystal.
Customization of stats and gameplay doesn't work out too well in MMOs, because people enforce optimization. You "can" customize your playstyle quite a bit, you can cross-class melee skills as ACN, equip STR accessories and melded gear and pummel people to death with your book. And chances are, people won't even care as long as you do that alone. As soon as you step into group content like that however...oh boy.
This is the core issue of customization in team based online games. The best you can do is to make the whole stat system so extremely convoluted, confusing, unclear and complex that even the smartest math-whiz just cannot possibly comprehend which choices are good and which are bad, so they can't judge others over it. Either that, or perfectly balance all the choices you can make. Good luck with that. -
11-29-2015, 12:49 AMSaccharinElemental or resists is just plan bad game play. It creates false depth. For bosses it leads to x class can't come because the boss is immune or takes less damage; in you example you used a BLM. For raid damage it means resist gear. Now some people see this as the nirvana of 'horizontal progression' but its just a long winded way to stretch out content for no legitimate reason. Resists is an archaic game design that ight work well in a single player RPG but not an MMO with group based fights.Quote:
Originally Posted by Yellow
I do feel that melée in particular feel very 'samey', it's down to the combo moves. It's not so bad at high level but I dont feel they get unique enough until you hit the level where you get the jobs.
BLM I think is fairly unique in this game, I dont care about any other FF games. As a caster it is unique, thankfully. Now you just said the 'h-word' an frankly having a spell for every occasion is just bad game design.
I think that was the original intention of the class job system but the class system hampers creativity of jobs. A level 60 class is just woefully incapable of serious participation with the emphasis on job skill at 30 plus. If you use arcanist as an example. During 2.x, the difference of a summoner and scholar were the few abilities that you got at level 30-50. Now we have additional jobs skills at 60 it feels more unique but it's telling that they didn't add anything at the class level. If it wasn't for arcanist I'm sure they would scrap the classes completely.Quote:
Originally Posted by Zojha
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11-29-2015, 12:50 AMAshkendor
I don't think anything that would require that massive of an overhaul can be called a QoL change.
QoL is minor interface changes, like allowing us to purchase 99 items at a time from the GC. -
11-29-2015, 01:40 AMdejavutwo
A good QoL change would be something like having all your cooldowns reset after wiping in a raid.
I am also against an elemental resist system. It always ends up being a system that only a few classes can participate in, and ends up being more of an annoyance than added depth. The few classes that can participate in it end up being either completely overpowered because the boss is weak to their abilities, or underpowered when the boss resists all their abilities. That sort of power swing is terrible for the person behind the class. This community is not above excluding people based on class for certain fights - Just look at all the "Ranged Only" Garuda Extreme fights when that was a new fight.
The alternative is having elemental damage on gear, at which point it just becomes a collection and inventory management nightmare. -
11-29-2015, 02:06 AMAshkendorYes please. This would be gorgeous all-around.Quote:
Originally Posted by dejavutwo
Also, your sig makes me giggle. :3 -
11-29-2015, 03:32 PMYellowWould they need to redesign every class? I don't think they would (since not every class utilises elemental attributes). I've actually had some very interesting discussions about changes for future patches.Quote:
Originally Posted by WinterLuna
The only reason I bring this up is because at some point they are going to have to make some pretty big changes to our classes. There's only so many spells we can incorporate into our rotations (without taking into account that we need to move around in every fight - that makes it very difficult for some classes that rely on hefty cast times). Are we more open to the idea of our classes not gaining new abilities after level 70? Or the amount being reduced to one or two situational buffs?
If we look at games like World of Warcraft, classes have been redesigned almost every expansion. It's definitely not something that is too difficult to do, especially in the case of FFXIV (the entire game was redesigned).
Edit: Is any of this possible or is SE going to consider any of this? Probably not, but it can be nice to see where the community sits on this particular topic. It's interesting to work out what people think and why they think the way they do! :) -
11-29-2015, 04:30 PMDragonSlayer45
Admittedly, I find it funny how we even have elemental resistances if they do jack all. Why are they even taking up space in the character screen?
I don't see changes to how the elemental wheel (or lack of) works in this game because it would require a complete overhaul of Black Mage and most likely the other Disciples of Magic jobs. They would also have to redesign fights both old and new to take on such a change. As Winter said, its a lot of work for a system a lot of people might not even like and I too am not shutting down the idea, but just looking at it from a realistic standpoint.
Maybe in the far future if they ever decide to do a big redesign of the game like they did with 2.0, but not in 4.0 or any time soon. -
11-29-2015, 04:59 PMYellowFor sure, I wouldn't expect anything like this to happen soon. But something like this might have the opportunity to be considered in the future when we get to the point where we can't add more layers to what we already have. I really just wanted my suggestions to be something to start this conversation, rather than be the core of the discussion.Quote:
Originally Posted by DragonSlayer45
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11-29-2015, 06:16 PMAzazua_azura
Thing is, what your proposing doesn't fit the Duty finder and being all inclusive to do content as any class/job. FF11 has "special stats" on gear, and "special stat" customization with the merit point system. As well as elemental resistences and buffers. Thing is this ended up making jobs "flav of the month". Take example of the primals Ifrit is based in fire, meaning he would be highly resistent to fire. This would mean thm/blm wouldn't be viable as their main attack source is fire. And the way the classes and jobs work are interwoven in the lore. You would have to go back and change all the lore in the game. This would also make it hard to play as a cnj/whm as you would need to shift stone, aero, fluid aura over to thm recoin thm as an elementalist. and cnj as a pure healer. How would they fight??
Cnj would have to be recoined into some light based attacker, which doesn't fight the theme of the lore due to being in gridania.
I'm not shutting down the suggestion or conversation, I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with the suggestion. I'm just trying to bring up that this is stuff you have to consider when making these suggestions. And the reason WoW got away with this, is the game itself is based on an RTS. Blizzard can change (and have changed) Their lore on a whim. This is due inpart that the "story" Takes place after the third game. The classes in question on based on the type of infentry you can pick, and don't have too much effect on the story.
You see this with the fact that some races were given classes that they typically didn't have before, more so with out any reason other then "we could". -
11-29-2015, 06:18 PMCyrilLuciferThe mistake you're making here is assuming we don't have a flavor of the month in XIV now.Quote:
Originally Posted by Azazua_azura
We definitely do. In fact, the flavor of the month meta shifts far faster in XIV than it did in XI. -
11-29-2015, 06:31 PMAzazua_azuraWhich you only see in raiding, not the game over all. And I'm talking flavor of the month stuff in xi that prevented players from leveling certain classes. Like when Treasures was released and blm was not welcome in colibri parties due to the reflect, and tanks not using food due to the fact they ate it. I also wasn't done editing my post. :) Instead of taking a small snip read everything in full please. I'm speaking of over all content like class leveling and story content not raiding. As these changes people propose effect leveling as well as raidin and also effects lore as well.Quote:
Originally Posted by CyrilLucifer
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11-29-2015, 07:16 PMYellowMy original post was about the issue that our combat system is going to have to change at some point in the future because of reasons I've already listed multiple times. I used elemental strengths/weaknesses as a way to spice up the content and add some variety and differences, but it wasn't the full extent of the ideas I proposed (and really this discussion shouldn't be about what I proposed but rather what people think should happen to address this issue).Quote:
Originally Posted by Azazua_azura
Classes and jobs can be redesigned to work with an elemental system (since that was the way it worked in 1.0 albeit it wasn't done very well and no improvements were ever made to it because 2.0 was being made). If you do some research into previous versions of this game, you will see that there still exists the capability to give us a more complex system than what we have now without needing to add more skill layers (for lack of a better term - explained in my original post). -
11-29-2015, 11:06 PMWellFooledI see your point and balance is always a concern for sure, but no game is perfectly balanced. Even the biggest esports in the world can't achieve a perfectly fair playing field, and they have the most motivation to. Instead, the balance needs to fall within an acceptable margin (which, taking off our soul crystals does not fall into). It comes down to balance vs fun. I think most everyone would prefer a game that was fun, but slightly unbalanced, than a balanced boring game. When it comes to FFXIV, the gameplay of our jobs falls into the latter.Quote:
Originally Posted by Zojha
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11-30-2015, 02:21 AMButcherboy
The game has plenty of room for improvement, down to the armoury system to soul crystal. Armoury system change jobs on the fly with just a switch of weapon but that you lose identity. Soul Crystals can be open up for stat upgrades or skill upgrade, similar to how PvP skillls work were you can enchance each skill to make the more potent. Also lets go even further once certain amount of stats or skills are max to a limit you open up the potential of the crystal
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11-30-2015, 02:26 AMButcherboy
Soul crytal for monk when fully max may be unlock true skills that synergies with you other skill, like chakra were each stage gives you a bonus. A Dragon can become an actual Dragon from all the Dragon it slain. That's just few example that can be done to soul crystals. Magic burst could make a comeback. Or having 2 of the same jobs in party can bring a certain bonus to each other or party wide bonus.
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11-30-2015, 02:34 AMXanikk999
The global cooldown could be shortened to one second or a second and a half instead of the excruciatinly long 2.5 seconds. I play both WoW and this game and the drawback to this game is combat is so much slower and less fluid than WoW because the of the extremely long global cooldown.
They could easily adjust cast time on spells for casters to balance around having a shorter GCD. -
11-30-2015, 03:22 AMShyle
Removing skill bloat and shortening the GCD would go a LONG way in terms of combat. I've said this several times, but it's like SE is 5-7 years behind other MMO's when it comes to certain systems/mechanics/designs with XIV. Don't get me wrong, I like the game, but the combat leaves a lot to be desired in the end.
Frankly, I think that the combat system relying so heavily on hard rotations is a crutch. Most classes are basically the same (although some *minor* differences). They all have some form of buff or "form" to watch and keep up at all times, of course they have a debuff/bleed or two to watch on the mobs, and they have standard "1-2-3" combos. Rotations aren't 'bad' as long as they're not so hard-lined and restricting. I always preferred priority based skill rotations, not "RNG" skill (e.g. mch procs) where there's still a loose structure but you're given more freedom.
While not combat related, I'd like to see an overhaul of the glamour system. Just make it a wardrobe system like every other modern MMO, change the dye system where you just unlock the colors, I know it's supposed to be some form of GIL dump, but let's be honest, it's not expensive, but it's just inconvenient overall. -
11-30-2015, 03:36 AMSpecialKK
SE will need to make a dramatic choice for 4.0 as they cannot simply add more skills to the existing ones. But elemental? I think we're past that point
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11-30-2015, 03:37 AMVeerne
I actually like the 2.5 sec global cooldown in this game. It makes the fight a lot more visually appealing and each ability feels more important. In games like WoW and SWTOR where the GCD is 1.5 seconds or less, the combat start feeling spammy and uninteresting. 2 sec GCD could still work, but going much lower just breaks the animations.
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11-30-2015, 04:37 AMXanikk999To each his own. I like the fast paced combat and really don't care to watch my characters animations play out entirely every time.Quote:
Originally Posted by Veerne
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11-30-2015, 08:38 AMAzazua_azura
i did play 1.0 and wasn't to fond of that. What your proposing effects a lot more then just combat, that was what i was trying to say. by lore cnj has earth air water spells and thm has fire ice thunder spells. what ur proposing would have to change that to make either viable in all content. And its alot more work then most think. Wows classes had lil to no lies to lore. So not really a good idea to compare. And ff11 had this stuff and it made certain jobs viable in different content. Which made it un-fun if ur main job was not the flav of the mnth. all classes/jobs need to be viable in the df system due to it being all inclusive.
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11-30-2015, 09:40 AMGamer3427
While I disagree with most of the posts in this thread, I would like to see some sort of "specialist" skills implemented that work off of a more traditional leveling tree with branches that lock each other out, with you perhaps picking one or two skills that work in a separate slot from your normal skills or cross class skills. If this was implemented of course, it would need to have a way that you can reset your progress to level up the skill differently, though perhaps at a cost of so much gil/tomestones.....
These skills ideally would be balanced to have decent benefits from doing one leveling path compared to another, such as drastically changing the skill's effect. Mass Effect is one of the better examples I have of this, where the same basic skill had a few upgrade options that could result in drastically different end results. Of course, there will always be an "ideal" set up for each class for end game content no matter what, as no matter what there is an "ideal" set up players will devise in any game, whether or not it's truly ideal, or just what one popular group decided was best. What matters though is that players can decide whether they want to be using the "ideal" set up, or the one that works best for them and their group. Players in different statics will also be able to figure out their own best set up for their particular composition based on their members.....
EDIT: I also have another idea for an improvement for combat in general, but I made a separate thread since this one has mostly become a discussion about elemental attributes.....
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...24#post3456824 -
11-30-2015, 10:27 AMWinterLuna
@Yellow, I do think every class would have to change as they would become a lot less powerful than those with elemental attributes against bosses with weaknesses and strengths etc. Of course this happens already, but I see a very large imbalance if this were to happen.
And of course, discussion is always good. ^^ -
11-30-2015, 10:30 AMNoahArks
I would love to see the elemental resistances ingame. The elemental resistances don't really appear to do anything atm. They would have to redesign black mage in a way, considering only uses fire/ice spells and mostly fire...
They could introduce stances that make use of the main element and the opposing like it does currently, but you'll have Fire/Ice, Ice/fire, Earth/Wind, Wind/Earth, Water/Thunder, Thunder/Water. Or introduce a new way to replendish MP with CD's or Skills like the Dark Knight uses to replendish HP/MP. It could work like soul eater. It would only be able to cast it after the second level spell and it would replendish 50%+ of the damage done to mp. -
11-30-2015, 10:35 AMShyle
I've been playing Blade and Soul a lot (KR/CN beta and now the NA beta), and one thing I find that's interesting is that each *skill* has it's own talent/skill tree. You can change/alter how the skill works. Like for Force master (mage type) a fireball can either do more damage, or aoe burst damage, then further down the tree it may add a burning effect, or a debuff and depending on what you want to do with your class, you can build it a certain way based on your playstyle (whether it's pvp, aoe, direct damage, or control, etc). of course there's optimal builds as there will be with any form of skill/talent tree, but it still gives a fair amount of customization and play style differences.