An idea to help roulette queue times

Hello! I had an idea that would hopefully improve dungeon queue times and wanted to see what you all think.

SE currently encourages non-tanks/healers to play the less-played roles through incentives like mounts achievements and the "Adventurer in Need" bonus. In Heavensward, they tried to draw more people to the tank role through the DRK job, but stated it wasn't very effective at producing new tanks.

Queue times for dps remain high because of the number of people queuing as DPS. In my opinion, this is the case for a few reasons:

• Some player just like the feel of a specific DPS job.
• Other players may not mind the idea of playing a tank/healer on paper, are not willing to commit to the responsibilities and social pressures of tanking/healing. They have absolutely 0 intention of playing one of these classes and having their potential failures or less-than-optimal playstyles become apparent to the rest of the party.
• Current tanks/healers dont really have much incentive to tank/heal lower-level stuff when their roles become max level.
• Current tanks/healer at max-level may want to level their remaining classes, which both increases the number of DPS classes in queue and reduces the number of tanks/healers queuing.

The thing is, it would be incredibly difficult to address the problem through the first 2 points. If a player finds a class they enjoy playing more than anything else, they should continue to play that class. Getting rid of the social pressures and responsibilities of tanking/healing changes the game entirely and could ruin those roles for current tanks / healers. And while I consider the ffxiv community to be a very good community in general, it only takes a few bad apples to ensure some players never touch tank/healer again.

However, SE could help address the issue from the last 2 points. In addition to attempts to convert players to the tank/healer roles, they could provide incentives to encourage existing tanks / healers to queue more often as tanks/healers. Not only should that help with queue times, but tank/healer mains would be playing the class they enjoy more often.

My idea is this:

• A new category of consumable items called "Roulette Scroll (<ROULETTE NAME>)" are created.
• When used, this item increases queue priorty (when queuing solo) and provides an XP multiplier of 2.2 to the player for the specific queue (if the role selected is not already the "Adventurer in Need").
• To obtain a specific roulette scroll, a max-level character must fulfill the "Adventurer in Need" bonus for a specific roulette.

A working example:
A tank main is at max-level and wants to level one of their dps classes. Currently, they might put themselves in queue as DPS instead of tank, lowering the number of tanks and increasing the number of dps. In a 4 man, you might think of it like this:

• 2 dps slots lost by not queuing as tank
• 1 dps slot lost by queuing as dps
• Total score: -3

However, if this idea were in place, they could level their dps alt roughly 20% faster (+ whatever is saved via queue priority) by queuing as "Adventurer in Need (Tank)", obtaining a roulette scroll, then queueing for the roulette as the dps class. In a similar 4 man scenario:

• 2 dps slots gained by queuing as tank
• 1 dps slot gained by not queuing as dps
• 2 dps slots lost by not queuing as tank
• 1 dps slot lost by queuing as dps
• Total score: 0

^ effectively neutralizing the negative impact that an "Adventurer in Need"'s DPS alt has on the dps queue time.


Good? Bad? Ugly? Suggestions & Feedback?
What do you guys think?


EDIT:

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Originally Posted by Keridwyn

Unfortunately this really wouldn't help. All the incentives in the world won't make me run extra roulettes.

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You wouldn't need to run any additional roulettes for this to be effective.

For example:

• Player X runs leveling roulette 4 times a week to level his classes.
• Player X has all tanks + healers at 70 and now wants to level DPS classes.

Currently, Player X would need to queue as DPS for all 4 times he runs leveling roulette. (taking 4 dps slots)

If this item were a thing, he could queue as the Adventure in Need 2 times (opening 4 dps slots), then as a DPS 2 times (taking 2 dps slots) without taking any XP losses (and actually making a net XP gain).

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Originally Posted by DeaconMoore

So you accomplish getting tank players out of the dps queue sooner but long term fail to keep tank players in the tank queue.

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Good feedback, and definitely true. Even though this would more than double the lifespan of existing tanks, eventually, these tanks will stop tanking low level.

There is 1 permanent and lasting advantage here though:
Currently, tanks lose incentive to tank low level after maxing their tanks. They then queue as dps, which increases the queue time for dps classes. With the proposed feature, they lose their incentive to tank at low level at the same time they lose their incentive to queue as dps at low level, which will have a lasting and positive impact on dps queue times.

tl;dr you want to make queue times shorter by making queue times longer for other people. The only dps who'll actually hit roulettes will be those who already run tanks and therefore enjoy faster queues to begin with.
Also, with how painful dps queues will still be, no one's going to spend time running a roulette on a class they don't want to level, and then hitting the dps queue which likely will still be painful. Not everyone has that sort of time.

Unfortunately this really wouldn't help. All the incentives in the world won't make me run extra roulettes. Eventually you just burn out and want to do something different. Plus have you tried healing in the current climate? Folks are out for blood making it even less fun.

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Originally Posted by Keridwyn

Plus have you tried healing in the current climate?

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I am actually healing my roulettes for the quicker queues. It's usually quite relaxing.

I only heal expert, tho'. I've stopped going into 50/60s because there are too many tanks doing small pulls lately, which degrades me to malefic spamming decor. I don't have a parser, but if I had, I'd have uploaded that one Amdapor Keep log where I literally only used Essential Dignity and an Aspected Helios on the Demon Wall for healing spells because that sufficed >_>

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Originally Posted by Zojha

I am actually healing my roulettes for the quicker queues. It's usually quite relaxing.

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Fair enough, I just ran into a rash of runs where if I did dps I was a bad healer but if I didn't I was also a bad healer. After a month of that no win situation I am finding that RDM comes with no stress. I don't care if queues are long, not being the focus of frustration is infinitely more worth it.

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Originally Posted by Keridwyn

Unfortunately this really wouldn't help. All the incentives in the world won't make me run extra roulettes. Eventually you just burn out and want to do something different.

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^This. I main as tanks. I don't enjoy doing lower dungeons because I lose all my abilities and I've done them hundreds of times. Next patch we get one dungeon, so we can get "more content". This content pulls my tank from the que. if they really wanted more tanks to que the would add more to the roulette. Like a hidden dungeon that can only be accessed through roulette or something. (Yeah it can be abused but they should know how to design around it.)

Even the incentives like tomes and cracked cluster have diminishing returns. My tanks share gear and I have one dps leveled (drg). I have 17 cracked clusters on me waiting for a gear upgrade that I can't buy till next week. The rewards are nice but only players that want to gear, meld, and lvl all jobs see the most benefit. For players like me that don't need poetics and have no intention on lvling all the jobs. I have no reason to run ex roulette more than once a day, and no reason to run the lower roulettes at all.

Only thing I could think of is adding something super shiny for tanks AND healers (Healers don't even get mounts to encourage them to do things as healer) that can ONLY be earned by doing specific roulettes a number of times. But it would need to be separated, like 200 leveling roulettes, 200 50/60 roulettes, etc to earn the item.

Now, the problem then becomes, people farm for the item, get it, and we're back at square one. Maybe you add tiers, like do 200 more of each and now said item gets a glow or something. Another 200, a bigger effect, another 200, you can CUSTOMIZE the effect.

Maybe this item is a new mount. Maybe it's just the ability to add these glows or other effects to the mount or piece of gear of your choosing, even DPS weapons/gear. This would keep tanks and healers queuing for those roulettes for the long haul. The only thing is, you have to make the rewards juicy or you still won't encourage enough people to tank and heal.

That's my idea, anyways, but would be a lot of work to implement. But we need SOMETHING to get these godawful queue times to lower.

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Originally Posted by BillyKaplan

tl;dr you want to make queue times shorter by making queue times longer for other people.

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No cigar.

1 tank's dps alt's queue would be faster after they push 2 dps through the queue.
In other words, the tank opens 2 dps slots and then closes 1

Currently, I have no reason to send my max level tank through less than Expert roulette.
In other words, the tank opens 0 dps slots and then closes 1

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Originally Posted by Keridwyn

Unfortunately this really wouldn't help. All the incentives in the world won't make me run extra roulettes.

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You wouldn't need to run any additional roulettes for this to be effective.

For example:

• Player X runs leveling roulette 4 times a week to level his classes.
• Player X has all tanks + healers at 70 and now wants to level DPS classes.

Currently, Player X would need to queue as DPS for all 4 times he runs leveling roulette. (taking 4 dps slots)

If this item were a thing, he could queue as the Adventure in Need 2 times (opening 4 dps slots), then as a DPS 2 times (taking 2 dps slots) without taking any XP losses (and actually making a net XP gain).

I don't get it, you said we wouldn't have to run extra roulettes but then say I have to run a dungeon on my already maxed tank to get an item to run one dungeon on my dps? And I'll get more xp than running my dps through 2 dungeons without the item?

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Originally Posted by Gravton

I don't get it, you said we wouldn't have to run extra roulettes but then say I have to run a dungeon on my already maxed tank to get an item to run one dungeon on my dps? And I'll get more xp than running my dps through 2 dungeons without the item?

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correct, the item would provide an XP bonus that would give your dps alt a little more than double the XP when he goes through the roulette.
So essentially running your max-tank once on tuesday and your dps once on wednesday would be more effective than running the roulette on your dps both tuesday and wednesday

I would rather the item just give me xp on the current job (swap jobs and use) so I wouldn't even need to que as dps. But your way works too.

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Originally Posted by winsock

1 tank's dps alt's queue would be faster after they push 2 dps through the queue.

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You're looking at pure numbers and ignoring how the system actually works. Also far too small a sample group. Let's say I'm dps #10. Our tank queues and gets #1 and #2 out of the queue. I'm #8 now. By the time I'm #6 our tank has finished their run and queues up again as dps. Suddenly I'm #7. Now you might say, sure, no one's going to run the leveling roulette twice in a single day, you lose the bonus. Ok. So that's not our hypothetical tank, it's a tank who's using their scroll from yesterday. Oh and here comes another one, and another, and before I know it I'm #15. How is that not making my queue longer? Any other way of this priority queue working would make it not worth it because even with the scroll you'll still wait in queue despite running it as a tank so why bother? Just take the queue.

On top of hurting queues, you're also asking players to run roulettes on something they don't want to run on to reach the same results as had they ran something they do want to play. The benefits would have to be much higher than just that x2.2 exp bonus. I'm still going to run 4 leveling roulettes, right? I wanna play on my RDM which I am leveling. Why do I have to tank two of them to eventually reach the same end-result? A lot of people will take the queue over being forced to play a class they finished leveling.

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Originally Posted by BillyKaplan

You're looking at pure numbers and ignoring how the system actually works. Also far too small a sample group.

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I'm not. I don't think you understand why sample sizes are important.

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Originally Posted by BillyKaplan

Let's say I'm dps #10. Our tank queues and gets #1 and #2 out of the queue. I'm #8 now. By the time I'm #6 our tank has finished their run and queues up again as dps. Suddenly I'm #7. Now you might say, sure, no one's going to run the leveling roulette twice in a single day, you lose the bonus. Ok. So that's not our hypothetical tank, it's a tank who's using their scroll from yesterday. Oh and here comes another one, and another, and before I know it I'm #15. How is that not making my queue longer?

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In an ironic twist, this is a case of the sample size being too small. What you are describing could happen (i.e. seeing your position jump up); however, your position in queue is irrelavant if the average time you spend waiting decreases. The reason you your queue will not be longer on average is because there are far fewer tanks than dps, and each tank creates more dps slots than they take.

Let's say for the sake of example, that I join 50/60 roulette and you join shortly after as dps. Currently, I will not join this queue on my max level tank as there is no real benefit. Instead, I queue on my dps in position #40, so your position is #41.

If the scroll existed and I didnt have one, I would queue on my tank. I join as tank instead of dps + clear #1 and #2 out of the dps queue. This means your position when you enter the queue is #38 instead of #41. I pushed you up 3 positions by queuing as tank. Even if i pushed you back 1 position the next day, it is a net gain for you overall. In your example you are pushed from position #6 to position #15, this is only possible if ppl pushed u from say, position #40 to position #13-#22 the day before. Now granted, it probably wont work out perfectly like that from day to day, but your average wait time overall will go down.

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Originally Posted by BillyKaplan

you're also asking players to run roulettes on something they don't want to run on to reach the same results as had they ran something they do want to play. The benefits would have to be much higher than just that x2.2 exp bonus. I'm still going to run 4 leveling roulettes, right? I wanna play on my RDM which I am leveling. Why do I have to tank two of them to eventually reach the same end-result? A lot of people will take the queue over being forced to play a class they finished leveling.

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I'm not asking that at all. It's the opposite. I am a tank main and enjoy tanking, I get to tank more while still being able alt a dps every now and again. I would be playing more of the role I enjoy most. At the same time, I am also decreasing the average wait time for other roles, so that DPS classes dont wait so long to play what they enjoy.

So you want tanks to level faster over all dps classes & cut in line so they can do that even faster. And when said tanks finish leveling what they want, then what?

Sure the tank isn't queuing and using dps slots while cutting in line but your incentive to tank is gone again.

So you accomplish getting tank players out of the dps queue sooner but long term fail to keep tank players in the tank queue.

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Originally Posted by DeaconMoore

So you accomplish getting tank players out of the dps queue sooner but long term fail to keep tank players in the tank queue.

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Good feedback, and definitely true. Even though this would more than double the lifespan of existing tanks, eventually, these tanks will stop tanking low level.

There is 1 permanent and lasting advantage here though:
Currently, tanks lose incentive to tank low level after maxing their tanks. They then queue as dps, which increases the queue time for dps classes. With the proposed feature, they lose their incentive to tank at low level at the same time they lose their incentive to queue as dps at low level, which will have a lasting and positive impact on dps queue times.

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Originally Posted by winsock

Good feedback, and definitely true. Even though this would more than double the lifespan of existing tanks, eventually, these tanks will stop tanking low level.

There is 1 permanent and lasting advantage here though:
Currently, tanks lose incentive to tank low level after maxing their tanks. They then queue as dps, which increases the queue time for dps classes. With the proposed feature, they lose their incentive to tank at low level at the same time they lose their incentive to queue as dps at low level, which will have a lasting and positive impact on dps queue times.

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Not really.

Fewer and fewer tanks in the queue as the expansion drags on isn't ever going to be positive for dps queue times. And it's further compounded when you consider you'll have groups of tank players tanking for each other with your "I played a tank priority dps queue" leaving dps that don't tank in the dust early in the expansion.

IF they let XP to an alt job be an incentive, it'd be better as a token to be redeemed and have nothing to do with the queues.

A bit convoluted but it's not a bad idea. The easiest solution would just to design dungeons with 3 DPS instead of 2, or go back and retroactively allow 3 DPS in older dungeons.

Honestly it might be better to just focus on the Adventurer in Need bonus. Sweeten the drops and gil by particular increments if a scarcity of a particular measure has persisted over a particular period (SE can figure out the specifics), and incrementally undo the sweetening on the affected class rewards as the scarcity eases up, and we might have equilibrium.

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A bit convoluted but it's not a bad idea. The easiest solution would just to design dungeons with 3 DPS instead of 2, or go back and retroactively allow 3 DPS in older dungeons.

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This is a superb idea.

this won't help. There are 2 issues. the DPS queue is simply solved by increasing party size to 5, added an additional DPS slot to clear out the dps queues.

The second issue is the Adventurer in Need bonus itself. Giving XP bonus to jobs that are in need makes the problem worse.
because:
#1: with fewer number, they get instant queue already.
#2: bonus xp means they need less dungeon runs to get to top level.

The people in need of the bonus are the dps that have to wait longer to do content. Meaning they have less access to doing content, where the current bonus is going to jobs that can do more content because they get instant or near instant queues.

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Originally Posted by Firesped

this won't help. There are 2 issues. the DPS queue is simply solved by increasing party size to 5, added an additional DPS slot to clear out the dps queues.

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Unfortunately there is nothing simple about this suggestion, they would have re-tune every single dungeon for this to work and there is no evidence that this would provide a long term fix, even after increasing party size and re-tuning the dungeons there would still be an imbalance and if trends continue that imbalance would increase the same way it does now.

Also the exp bonus argument is only really relevant while levelling, I as a max level tank don't care about XP bonuses, I run roulette for the tokens so i can upgrade my gear if there is no token reward (or if the reward is a token I don't require) than I don't run that roulette.

I think the only real fix for the issue is the one that is the most difficult to implement and that is to make the tanking and healing classes more desirable. They already tried this in a way with DK but I think they will need to go further than that if they want to deal with the imbalance.

Frankly I have no idea what SE were thinking relasing 2 DPS classes at once, while DK and AST didn't fix the problem long term I still remember when I was levelling my DK and I saw Adventurer in need DPS.

Honestly this is not an easy fix but it's the only one that will sort out the issue long term.

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Originally Posted by Dortharl

Frankly I have no idea what SE were thinking relasing 2 DPS classes at once, while DK and AST didn't fix the problem long term I still remember when I was levelling my DK and I saw Adventurer in need DPS.

Honestly this is not an easy fix but it's the only one that will sort out the issue long term.

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And that shows that even throwing out new tanks and healers won't change a thing about what is in demand on Roulettes, as playing a DPS is the most fun role with the least responsibility.
So, yeah - Wanna play the 'most fun role' in the dungeon, like the other ~60% of players? Then you have to wait.

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Originally Posted by Dortharl

Unfortunately there is nothing simple about this suggestion[...]

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Actually, adding DPS to a party is very simple: You just up the HP of the mobs. It's possible to do that with a blanket script - You essentially just give the mobs the Echo buff, rather than the players, if there are additional DPS in the group. In a good code, it would be a non-issue. In SE's spaghetti code, it might not be as trivial, but I doubt it would be impossible.

Adding tanks and healers is hard: Aggro is binary, hence why offtanks are usually just DPS until that one gimmick they are needed for happens. Similarly, inflating incoming damage for healers is not a sustainable concept, at some point people just flat die before a cast can go off.

As for how lasting the fix would be, that depends entirely on how the role ratio develops. The basic issue is that the ratio at which roles are preferably played does not equal the ratio the game demands for groups. Whenever the two fail to meet, queues ensue. If as a result from bearable queues more people start to play DPS, then the ratio would shift again and you'd need to add even more slots until either an equilibrium is reached or literally everyone is playing DPS, in which case you'd need to start questioning the trinity as such (Which, at that point, would likely no longer be controversial, as everyone would already be playing DPS anyway).

The main issue with that arises in less populated content - When you up the player count, it requires more players to play at all. Hence, simply retroactively adjusting every dungeon one by one to be fixed on a 5 man party isn't a good idea in the first place, you want to keep the option for groups to start with less DPS and thus less players in case there aren't any waiting in line. It's why the 24 man frontline option is still valuable, even if it isn't played much right now. Dynamically adjusting it is the way to go.

Attempting to make tanks and healers appealing can in theory fix the issue as well. In practice, people try it out, realize a tank is still a tank, get sad that such a cool class got "wasted" by giving it to tanks and then roll a DPS again. Gee, just looking at the popular first names in that census thread makes me think DRK was perfect for popularity in the western market and it still didn't manage to produce a lasting effect.

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Originally Posted by Zojha

Actually, adding DPS to a party is very simple: You just up the HP of the mobs.

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It's really not as simple as just increasing HP of mobs since you aren't taking into consideration any mechanics these mobs might have which have been designed with 4 players in mind. I can think of a number of dungeon bosses which have mechanics which rely on having 4 member parties.


And to clarify my point on making Tank classes more desirable I'm not suggesting only creating new tank jobs, my suggestion was to make tank / healer roles more desirable that includes existing tank / Healer jobs. Otherwise all that will happen is existing Tanks / Healers will re-roll to the new jobs as was the case with DRK / ASTs

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Originally Posted by Dortharl

I can think of a number of dungeon bosses which have mechanics which rely on having 4 member parties.

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I can't think of many where it would be an issue. Lemme recap... Sastasha, Tam-Tara, Copperbell, Halatali, Toto-Rak, Haukke, Brayflox, Quarn, Cutter's Cry, Stone Vigil and Dzemael are all fine, Aurum Vale would need another fruit spawn. Wanderer's Palace, Pharos Sirius, Amdapor Keep, Brayflox HM, Quarn HM, Wanderer's Palace HM, Amdapor Keep HM, Lost City of Amdapor, Keeper of the Lake, Hullbreaker, Tam-Tara HM, Haukke HM... those would all be fine as well. Halatali HM would need a fifth orb, Stone Vigil HM a 5th cannon. Dusk Vigil, Sohm Al, Aery, Vault and Gubal also work, Aetherochemical needs that 5th Rift at the end. HW endgame dungeons look similar.
Yeah, overall, I don't think it's a big issue. I mean, dungeon difficulty might slightly vary as you have to dodge one more or less AoE, but dungeon difficulty isn't exactly high in the first place, so I don't think that matters much. Charibert is the only one I could think of where people might cry because of the additional Heavensflame drop - apparently, some people already have major issues with him as is.

That aside: Yes, I get that. Hence why I said - In the end, people notice a tank is still a tank, the core gameplay of the role remains, no matter how cool the job seems. And it has to remain, because it's what defines the role. You get aggro, you get hit and you mitigate, the specifics of that have changed through the expansions (And more importantly, over the different games that offer the role), but that core remains. DRK was nice and active and very DPS focused especially in the STR meta, the line to a regular DPS was highly blurred. Similar goes for WAR. Their off-tank gameplay was largely on par with that of a regular DPS, the issue was that they still had to actually tank in light parties.
To make it more appealing, you essentially need to make a tank less of a tank. And worse - to appeal to DPS players, and you have to appeal to DPS players because your tank and healer players are already playing those roles, you essentially need to offer them a better DPS job than they can get from DPS jobs.

The underlying issue with the approach is that the people you are trying to make tanking/healing more appealing for are people who don't really care about tanking/healing in the first place. You will have to compromise the core of what the role is to achieve something with it, which in turn is likely to alienate your existing playerbase of those roles, a lot.

They need to add something to the previous things. I only ever do Expert Roulette as my Tank/DPS. The cluster is great from leveling. but i have no need to do any of the others. Doing Expert every day i'll hit the cap

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Originally Posted by Zojha

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Changing Tank / Healer roles so that are more appealing may well alienate some of the current players who choose those roles but it is the only long term fix to the issue, as I have said in my early posts even if they were to add one more dps to dungeons this would only be a stop-gap, one that would require extensive re balancing and some re-design of existing content.

I don't envy SE as someone who both Tanked and Healed to max level I gave up healing because for me it was completely uninteresting once you had the basics down there was wasn't really anywhere to go. I'm getting bored of Tanking for the same reason, it's strange because I am yet to bored of playing my BLM despite that being my main and the job I play the most. I think SE really struggle to make Tanking and Healing roles interesting and engaging to the same degree as they are with DPS roles.