DPS Poll

1)MOST FUN
a) 1-30
b) 30-50
c) 50-59
d) 60

2)EASIEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30
b) 30-50
c) 50-59
d) 60

3) HARDEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30
b) 30-50
c) 50-59
d) 60

4)HIGHEST DPS
a) 1-30
b) 30-50
c) 50-59
d) 60

Going to comment from my personal experiences at level 60.

MOST FUN:
Neither are fun. All DPS are stressful because if you slip up, your damage dips, and people point fingers.

EASIEST TO MASTER:
BRD would be easier to master. I'm not noticing any true rotations; just priorities on CDs and Heavy Shot, Iron Jaws, and Empyreal Arrow spams.

HARDEST TO MASTER:
While not Level 60, I'd give this award to MNK, from what I see. Not sure what it means, but they need to stress positionals for dps and keep Greased Lightning up.

HIGHEST DPS:
As a NIN main, I lost 100% of the time to DRG, BLM, SMN, and MNK. In many groups, I find an average of DRG > MNK > SMN > BLM having high dps.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Nezkeys79

1)MOST FUN
a) 1-30 Archer
b) 30-50 Black Mage
c) 50-59 Monk
d) 60 Monk

2)EASIEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 Thaumaturge
b) 30-50 Black Mage
c) 50-59 Monk
d) 60 Monk

3) HARDEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 Archer
b) 30-50 Machinist
c) 50-59 Machinist
d) 60 Machinist

4)HIGHEST DPS
This really depends on the scenario

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My opinions in bold

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Nezkeys79

1)MOST FUN
a) 1-30 ARC
b) 30-50 BLM (as of HW, before it was BRD ofc)
c) 50-59 NIN
d) 60 BRD

2)EASIEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 ARC
b) 30-50 BRD
c) 50-59 BLM
d) 60 BLM

3) HARDEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 none of them at this level haha
b) 30-50
c) 50-59 MCH
d) 60 MCH

4)HIGHEST DPS
a) 1-30 who cares
b) 30-50 who cares
c) 50-59 who cares
d) 60 depends

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Your quiz was sort of weird
Not a lot of these matter at levels below max. Like, who cares if it's "hard to master" at level 30? You have barely mastered anything at that point.

Also I think there is a master vs picking up. BRD is easy to pick up and be decent but it's sort of hard to "master".

1)MOST FUN
Dragoon

2)EASIEST TO MASTER
Monk

3) HARDEST TO MASTER
Black Mage

4)HIGHEST DPS
Depends
Assuming every Job with optimal circumstances:
BLM wins.


That said, this is a really peculiar questionnaire. I ignored everything sub-60. First one is obviously just my own preference. The mastering questions are weird without a similar question about skill floors.

Like, I define difficulty of "mastering" a Job how much additional effort you need once you reach what I call the Skill Floor. The Skill Floor is the point at which you're playing the Job correctly. Examples:
DRG: H>IDC4>P>TTT4>repeat with 3 gsk per minute.
BLM: 30s -> 25s -> 20s Eno rotations and then refresh.

Beyond this, there's micro-optimizations like holding procs for movement or 2 gsk per B4B and etc. The amount of these and difficulty of them determine how hard a Job is to master.

I say Monk is easiest, because its skill floor is insanely high. It's the hardest Job to pick up and play properly, because of the nuance of how the rotation works, with snap-snap-demo, rather than snap-demo coupled an awkward 30s dot and every hit besides ToD having a positional requirement. Once you're nailing positionals and doing ToD properly, you're actually at the floor for the Job. And going from there to mastery is a short walk based on opener and cooldown management.

Black Mage, conversely, I say is the hardest. Enochian is honestly very easy to do correctly. You can ignore procs and just use Enochian and be just fine, playing the Job totally fine. Mixing in procs and moving properly while maintaining dps, though, is incredibly difficult and takes a LOT of practice and finesse beyond the simplicity of the basic rotation.

I do think, though, that Bard and Machinist have the lowest skill floor. They're both pretty basic and don't require much aside from dot upkeep to be playing the Job properly.

I don't think any Job is quite as high of a floor as Monk, aside from /maybe/ Ninja, since those mudras are tough to manage properly.

Most fun DPS: WHM

Easiest DPS to master: WHM

Hardest DPS to master: WHM cleric stance dancing with a bad tank

Highest DPS: WHM in aoe (Foe requiem please!)

1)MOST FUN
MNK

2)EASIEST TO MASTER
BRD

3) HARDEST TO MASTER
SMN

4)HIGHEST DPS
Single target MNK
AoE SMN

Quote:

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Originally Posted by AskaRay

Your quiz was sort of weird
Not a lot of these matter at levels below max. Like, who cares if it's "hard to master" at level 30? You have barely mastered anything at that point.

Also I think there is a master vs picking up. BRD is easy to pick up and be decent but it's sort of hard to "master".

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Because it saves me time in figuring out what job I may want to spend all my time levelling. If it's boring, or really hard to master then that might sway my choice

Quote:

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Originally Posted by CGMidlander

My opinions in bold

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Thanks for the reply! this is gonna help me a lot in figuring out what dps job to start with

I know I only just started FFXIV a week ago - so my view in this specific game is worth nothing. However I've been playing a ton of MMO's (EQ, GW 1/2, DAoC, LineAge, WoW, Aion, Tera, Skyforge - just to name some of them).

The easiest to master and also best class (be it DPS, tank, healer or support) is always the one you like playing the most.
In my experience you're willing to go the extra mile in learning your class if you enjoy playing it.
If you play a "flavor of the week" class, then it seems more like a job to go for numbers and the joy of playing is gone for many players. This make their performance drop and they become tired of the class and/or game.

When it comes down to it... for me at least

1) MOST FUN
SMN for me. It's the one dps job I've had fun on so far. I have tried other ones but just keep coming back to SMN

2) Easiest to master

Give I've only mastered one... I don't think I'm qualified to answer this

3) Hardest to master

You are evil for this one... I can't decide. I personally think BLM can be hard to master given the rotation being pretty strict(in my eyes) but I will not deny that SMN is difficult as well due to the amount of variables you need to keep track of.

4) Highest DPS

Hmmm... Yeah I got nothing, I can't really answer this.

1)MOST FUN (purely subjective, of course)
a) 1-30 Arcanist
b) 30-50 Summoner
c) 50-59 Monk
d) 60 Machinist

2)EASIEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 Rogue/Lancer
b) 30-50 Bard
c) 50-59 Black Mage (honestly barely changes until Fire IV)
d) 60 - I don't really want to answer this...

3) HARDEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 Uhh....Arcanist with dedicated pet management?
b) 30-50 [shrug]
c) 50-59 Dragoon? Their timers don't gel very well without the last 3 skills
d) 60 - Oh gawsh. A lot of them...BLM for adaptability, MCH/BRD for tunnel vision when having to deal with mechanics, MNK for complete perfection (simple "rotation", not many buffs to juggle, but Twin Snakes and DK drop so much more easily than GL which is all anyone ever talks about (n.b. don't always shift straight to coeurl on down time!), also missed positionals).

4)HIGHEST DPS
a) 1-30 probably Archer/Thaumaturge
b) 30-50 No idea, maybe Dragoon or Black Mage
c) 50-59 Monk
d) 60 Monk

I'm still torn between mnk blm drg brd lol

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Nezkeys79

I'm still torn between mnk blm drg brd lol

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Obviously the answer is the Best Job in the game
Which is Bard

(this may or may not be a biased opinion)

Most fun: BARD

EASIEST TO MASTER: DRG

3) HARDEST TO MASTER: SMN

4)HIGHEST DPS: BLM (my main) ENOCHAIN +Raging strikes = +25% damage. Highest burst damage in the game, plus spell speed is easily enhanced to put yourself at the top of the list. Bad part about BLM is hate control and eno upkeep. You mess up eno and it throws off an entire fight. Good thing is that once you get the cast count down, it becomes a lot easier.

I have enjoyed monk immensely. The basic rotation is pretty easy and watching positionals forces your head into the fight. Which is quite enjoyable to me. I'm not watching a lot of cooldown timers and can really focus on the fight at hand.

The dps output is outstanding and I find it easy in comparison to my SMN or MCH. This is not a bad thing as I feel like I can enjoy the fights more this way.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Nezkeys79

1)MOST FUN
a) 1-30 NONE, all classes suck below 30.
b) 30-50 Bard
c) 50-59 Ninja
d) 60 Blackmage

2)EASIEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 Lancer
b) 30-50 Dragoon
c) 50-59 Blackmage
d) 60 Bard

3) HARDEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 Thaumaturge...no seriously, you wouldn't believe how many people have the hardest time understanding that they need to deplete their MP before switching back to umbral ice.
b) 30-50 Monk
c) 50-59 ..Monk?
d) 60 probably Monk. I don't get that class at all.

4)HIGHEST DPS
Completely depends on the scenario. If you can pull 30 opponents together and I can freely burn them down, top DPS would of course be SMN, BLM, BRD and so on.
In a fight which barely requires any movement, I can win against other DPS easily on BLM even in single target fights. But generally, against 1 boss, MNK is probably best.

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This is super subjective though.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Nezkeys79

I'm still torn between mnk blm drg brd lol

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then the next question should be, close or range?

blm can be a pita, if you have to evade aoe etc, but I love the blm so far.

for some people, fashion also matters alot when considering a class.
personally, I don't give a rat's ass about fashion. (pardon the language)

1)MOST FUN
a) 1-30 NONE, all classes suck below 30.
b) 30-50 Black Mage
c) 50-59 Dragoon
d) 60 Dragoon

2)EASIEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 Lancer
b) 30-50 Ninja
c) 50-59 Bard
d) 60 Bard

3) HARDEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 Monk
b) 30-50 Dragoon
c) 50-59 Dragoon
d) 60 Dragoon

4)HIGHEST DPS
BLM --> Monk --> Dragoon --> Ninja --> Sum --> Bard. Sum king of AOE

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Nezkeys79

1)MOST FUN
a) 1-30 Maurader :cool:
b) 30-50 Bard
c) 50-59 Summoner
d) 60 AOE Summoner / Full Cleric Scholar

2)EASIEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 Thaumaturge
b) 30-50 Black Mage / Bard / Cleric Scholar
c) 50-59 [Insense Shrugging] Cleric Astrologian / Cleric Scholar
d) 60 Cleric Scholar / AOE Black Mage

3) HARDEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 Obey Arcanist
b) 30-50 Obey Summoner / Actual Monk / Actual Dragoon / Machinist
c) 50-59 Machinist / Bard post 54 / Dragoon post 58 / Dark Knight
d) 60 Anything

4)HIGHEST DPS
a) 1-30 Thaumaturge
b) 30-50 Black Mage / any Melee / Bard
c) 50-59 Black Mage / any Melee
d) 60 Fight dependant

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./opinions ofc
./only in terms of doing dps stuff
./take seriously at own risk

Can you describe "Actual Dragoon?"

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Tsilyi

Can you describe "Actual Dragoon?"

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lol, a joke and a minor dig from back in the 2.x series where more people started to use and level drg because it got good and also those who would use jumps at the wrong time and suffer the loldrg effect, and thus you ended up with 2 types

those who tunnel visioned the rotation and maybe threw in buffs and jumps, who tought that was ok because their dps was good enough aka bandwagoners
and those who actually did it, ya know properly and actually tried but suffered a new wave of stigma due to above.

like i said
take my post seriously at your own risk

I can't really say as far as lvl 50+ goes. My highest DPSers are monk and summoner (45), and summoner I only really played until I got scholar, after which it got shelved.

1)MOST FUN
a) 1-30 Any but lancer
b) 30-50 monk
c) 50-59
d) 60

2)EASIEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 lancer
b) 30-50 lancer (level 33 dragoon)
c) 50-59
d) 60

3) HARDEST TO MASTER
a) 1-30 pugilist and rogue
b) 30-50 monk
c) 50-59
d) 60

4)HIGHEST DPS
a) 1-30 probably monk and scholar (faerie does all of the healing)
b) 30-50 monk, especially when running with a tank
c) 50-59
d) 60