Standardization of WS Damage Across All Delays

With some people disappointed in the potential damage output of Garuda's weapons (and any low delay/low damage weapon) I decided to propose a very simple solution that could make low delay weapons such as Garuda's on par with high delay weapons such as Ifrit's.

Problem:
TP gain is standardize against all weapon delays (fast weapons give less tp per hit than slow weapons) while WS damage is not. This means that regardless of what weapon you use, you will also be able to perform x WSs per minute, however, if you're using a slow weapon with high damage, each WS will deal more damage.

Currently there is some algorithm being used to determine the damage of WSs, and while I do not know this equation, I want to use an example equation as a reference. Let's assume WS damage is calculated according to this (simple) equation:

WS Damage = Weapon Damage + Attack

If a player uses a WS while wielding Ifrit's polearm, the damage of that WS would be 151 + attack. If the player uses the same WS with Gardua's polearm, the damage would be 127 + attack.

Solution:
Make the WS damage calculation based on weapon DPS instead of Damage. This can be done by replacing the Weapon Damage in the above equation with

((Weapon Damage / Delay) * StandardizedDelay)

Where the StandardizedDelay is a value chosen by the developers.

Result:
This section aims to show how this change would effect the damage output of existing weapons.

For my examples I will choose to make the StandardizedDelay=3.8, the delay of Ifrit's polearm. The damage of a WS using this modified equation would be

WS Damage = ((151 / 3.8) * 3.8) + attack = 151 + attack

This of course is the exact same damage as before the change, but if we do the same calculation for Garuda's polearm we get

WS Damage = ((127 / 3.1) * 3.8) + attack = 155.7 + attack

In this case, Garuda's weapon does very slightly more damage than Ifrit's because of its higher DPS

Any weapon with delay lower than the StandardizedDelay will have its WS damage buffed, while those with delay higher than the standard will see a damage decrease. I have chose 3.8 to be the standardized delay so that the weapon that is currently the strongest (Ifrit's) remains exactly as it is now.

Making a simple change such as this will make more weapons viable and will allow people to use weapons based on preference or situation instead of simply whichever has the highest damage value.

Seriously? Delay should have no part in the calculation for damage.

Current system makes you decide what is more important.
-Slower and harder hitting
-Faster and lighter hitting

Fast weapons build TP faster.
Slow weapons WS hit harder.

Throw delay in to the equation, faster one become more powerful, since they will build TP faster and hit hard. Making using a slower weapon pointless.

Making it the same was the problem with XIV initially. It works fine now as long as people get out of the mind set spike damage > best damage which isn't always the case in some situations.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Klive

Current system makes you decide what is more important.
-Slower and harder hitting
-Faster and lighter hitting

Fast weapons build TP faster.
Slow weapons WS hit harder.

Throw delay in to the equation, faster one become more powerful, since they will build TP faster and hit hard. Making using a slower weapon pointless.

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Because of too lazy to retype it myself, this is from the thread on Garuda weapons being weaker. I have also tested weapons with different delay and seen different tp returns.

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Originally Posted by Rydin

TP is always 100tp per second (TP/s) for every weapon of every type

So a delay of 4.2 would get you 420 TP per hit...
and a delay of 2.5 will get you 250 TP per hit....
So Each weapon will get you 1000TP in 10 seconds

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As stated in the OP, faster weapons do not give more tp over time. They give less tp per hit, and more frequent hits, but equal tp over time.

Thanks for the TP info. I was wrong and glad to be corrected.

hmmmm...... Maybe weapon delay could affect cooldown durations on weapon skills.

The big weapons run into issues when they miss, missing a hit on a slow weapon is supposed to seriously hinder your tp gain, lead to fewer ws's, and over all lower damage. With 90+% accuracy this shortcoming is never seen. I think that was the intended balance, but with effectively capped accuracy the difference that should appear between fast/slow weapons falls by the wayside.

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Originally Posted by Peptaru

The big weapons run into issues when they miss, missing a hit on a slow weapon is supposed to seriously hinder your tp gain, lead to fewer ws's, and over all lower damage. With 90+% accuracy this shortcoming is never seen. I think that was the intended balance, but with effectively capped accuracy the difference that should appear between fast/slow weapons falls by the wayside.

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What? you do know acc is a problem for pld/gla war/mrd and lnc/drg and somewhat for pgl/mnk?

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Originally Posted by Firon

What? you do know acc is a problem for pld/gla war/mrd and lnc/drg and somewhat for pgl/mnk?

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Then, if i may.... you're doin it wrong. Fix your gear. If you refuse, then carry a bard so you don't have to regear.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Peptaru

The big weapons run into issues when they miss, missing a hit on a slow weapon is supposed to seriously hinder your tp gain, lead to fewer ws's, and over all lower damage. With 90+% accuracy this shortcoming is never seen. I think that was the intended balance, but with effectively capped accuracy the difference that should appear between fast/slow weapons falls by the wayside.

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While it's this is true in a sense, it doesn't hold when you look at misses over a period of time. A weapon that attacks twice as fast will, of course, generate twice as many swings per period of time. Because there are twice as many swings, there are going to be twice as many misses (if accuracy is consistant). Missing twice as often as the slow weapon will mean you miss out of the same amount of tp

Edit: Quoted wrong post

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Klive

Throw delay in to the equation, faster one become more powerful, since they will build TP faster and hit hard. Making using a slower weapon pointless.

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in reality, it's the opposite- because we're limited by WS cooldowns. if building faster TP meant we could net more total WSs through X minutes, yeah, the argument for the lower delay weapons is more convincing. except when you're doing a proper dps rotation every single WS should be on cooldown, meaning those faster attacks in between are netting you worthless extra TP.

might be good for soloing or low-manning stuff where you don't have access to paeon, and an argument could be made for their usefulness to tanks... but otherwise they're pretty awful.

Base damage also affects stat caps, which is kind of retarded.

I can see the problem with every job but monk. since is the one more relying on auto attack, low delay it's actually very good *tropical punches*

i just wish they would get rid of (or drastically reduce) WS timers.

how can you justify Ring of Talons 1min timer and Steel Cyclone 30 sec timer, and on top of that Steel Cyclone is a much superior WS.

and why should i be forced to use a WS that doesnt fit the situation just because the WS i actually want to use is on timer.

timers take away from the strategy of maximizing DPS.. what i mean is no matter what weapon or gear setup you use your only ever going to get so many of any one WS out in any given time frame.. because it is based around timers

It should be based on TP accumulation.. which is what TP is there for!

and while their at it change the ~''@#~# combo requirements... im messing up combos left and right cos the dam mob is moving/turning all over the place... while the dam BLM is throwing out nukes faster than my auto-attack LOL.

I realised this is somewhat off topic but just wanted to get that off my chest heh.

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Originally Posted by Rogue

i just wish they would get rid of (or drastically reduce) WS timers.

how can you justify Ring of Talons 1min timer and Steel Cyclone 30 sec timer, and on top of that Steel Cyclone is a much superior WS.

and why should i be forced to use a WS that doesnt fit the situation just because the WS i actually want to use is on timer.

timers take away from the strategy of maximizing DPS.. what i mean is no matter what weapon or gear setup you use your only ever going to get so many of any one WS out in any given time frame.. because it is based around timers

It should be based on TP accumulation.. which is what TP is there for!

and while their at it change the ~''@#~# combo requirements... im messing up combos left and right cos the dam mob is moving/turning all over the place... while the dam BLM is throwing out nukes faster than my auto-attack LOL.

I realised this is somewhat off topic but just wanted to get that off my chest heh.

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If the devs actually, god forbid, listened to you, the relative skill ceiling for every class would be ruined. No thanks.

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Originally Posted by carraway

If the devs actually, god forbid, listened to you, the relative skill ceiling for every class would be ruined. No thanks.

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i would think such a bold statement would be justified with a reason..

FFXI did fine without long timers, and it was integral part of being good at your job the accumulation and use of TP.. which is what im suggesting.. you dissagree with this from what i can make of your comment.

and it obvious that BLM damage is MUCH more efficient becouse of 1minute+ timers on WS and the requirements of combos (you cant screw up a combo on blm unless you resist.

and on top of that blm dont have to chase stuff down

see 3x BLM every single party.

so i dont think your "skill ceiling" really comes into play here

sorry but you cant convince me its ballanced- even if my suggestions wouldnt work.

Spamming the best weaponskill as soon as you hit 100% TP was pretty terrible as far as gameplay goes in FFXI. This is how FFXIV was before personal combos, and it was pretty terrible back then too. Although the positional requirements are frustrating, they (and the rest of the combo system) force players to make more choices and react faster to those choices. The more choices you have to make, and the faster you have to push buttons, the higher the skill ceiling gets. If the only choice is "always hit X" instead of "do I start X to hit Y and Z, or do I hit A then B then Keen Flurry my C so I can do C again within this three-minute fight, or do I hit X then Y and Z, then X and Y, then A then B then C", the element of choice is removed, and only the element of player response time and server latency remains.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by carraway

Spamming the best weaponskill as soon as you hit 100% TP was pretty terrible as far as gameplay goes in FFXI. This is how FFXIV was before personal combos, and it was pretty terrible back then too. Although the positional requirements are frustrating, they (and the rest of the combo system) forces players to make more choices and react faster to those choices. The more choices you have to make, and the faster you have to push buttons, the higher the skill ceiling gets. If the only choice is "always hit X" instead of "do I start X to hit Y and Z, or do I hit A then B then Keen Flurry my C so I can do C again within this three-minute fight, or do I hit X then Y and Z, then X and Y, then A then B then C", the element of choice is removed, and only the element of player response time and server latency remains.

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I agree with what you are saying.

BUT i think your forgetting that BLM (and BRD) dont have the same requirements so if you accept that how can you then justify saying that DRG and MNK should be have their hands tied in this way.

you can either tie the hands of BLM and BRD or take the cuffs off melee.. tbh im not bothered which.

BLM and DRG are both essentially DPS correct? then why is it very common to see 3,4 blm in a party? it is because of the reasons i have stated.

i see your in BG so im quite sure you are very aware of this.

BRD has range requirements that already negatively affect its DPS ceiling.
MNK has as high or a higher DPS ceiling than BLM, but a commensurately higher skill ceiling due to positional requirements.
DRG admittedly needs some upward tuning; the devs have acknowledged that.

Rather than rip out the fundamental system that encourages a higher level of player performance, there are better ways to go about balancing things.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Rogue

i just wish they would get rid of (or drastically reduce) WS timers.

how can you justify Ring of Talons 1min timer and Steel Cyclone 30 sec timer, and on top of that Steel Cyclone is a much superior WS.

and why should i be forced to use a WS that doesnt fit the situation just because the WS i actually want to use is on timer.

timers take away from the strategy of maximizing DPS.. what i mean is no matter what weapon or gear setup you use your only ever going to get so many of any one WS out in any given time frame.. because it is based around timers

It should be based on TP accumulation.. which is what TP is there for!

and while their at it change the ~''@#~# combo requirements... im messing up combos left and right cos the dam mob is moving/turning all over the place... while the dam BLM is throwing out nukes faster than my auto-attack LOL.

I realised this is somewhat off topic but just wanted to get that off my chest heh.

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As for your timers comment, what the WS's need is balancing, not timers abolishing, for Ring of Talons Vs Steel Cyclone, for one steel cyclone is getting nerfed in 1.22a/b and after that if one out performs the other its easy to slightly alter the timers.

If every job can spam thier high damage combos mobs will need buffing or they will go down too fast, my DRG's high damage combos do alot of damage to mobs (sometimes more than BLM) if we are allowed to spam them DDs will be too over powered. I am for timers on weapon skills they just need balancing more.

And while I agree that combos can be anoying when the mob suddenly moves, if you are having such a problem with it moving, you should be asking is your tank good at keeping hate, are your DDs/BLMs using abilities to dump hate, are they even watching hate? When I am in a good party the mob (asside from Garuda teleport, Ifrit jumps etc) never moves and I'm comboing from all directions, I have problems when the tank cannot keep hate.

As for the topic at hand, delay should not have a say in WS damage, if it doesn't cause too much inballance they should just change the algorithms to one hit = xxx TP (with slight alterations for MNK or they would be really broken)

One thing they could do for MNK is change H2H weapons to take up main hand and off hand slots, then they could make it like dual wield from FFXI, one hit = xxx TP, but if an off hand hit lands theres a TP reduction to the off hand strike, this would still make MNK get tp fast, but it wouldn't be too broken.

Or just count MNK hits as one hit calculating TP. W/e works best.

I was farming seals to buy Flame Sergeant's Spear(http://mooglebox.com/entries/flame-sergeant's-spear.php) but after read this topic i think it will be a bad weapon and u lose sanction if u die. Did someone test stats cap on low delay weapons?

I ogree wif da op. I'm pretty sure at one point WoW did something like this for its instant-attack damage calculations.

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Originally Posted by Klive

Current system makes you decide what is more important.
-Slower and harder hitting
-Faster and lighter hitting
...(omitted intentionally)...

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The part of that that was a bit wrong aside, this still proves very true, on some jobs, where WSs provide the majority of your DPS having a lower delay weapon with slightly lower damage decrease your DPS, but for a job where AA provides a significant amount of dmg the difference in dmg/hit will be far less and the added hits over time will actually boost your DPS, mostly this can/would benefit MNK and PLD while WAR and DRG would certainly want to stay with the Ifrit weapons for WS dmg since that's really all their DPS base.

Scaling back TP generation while reducing timers, nothing over a minute maybe, or don't scale TP generation, but rather don't make combos negate costs just reduce them so that TP management is more important. Yeah a Doom Spike combo every 15 secs would be insane, but it still wouldn't match a thm/blm who's truly going all out.

The positioning thing being poor mechanics is not wrong, melee having to run laps around a mob while arc/brd and mages just stay at a distance and fire off spells/arrows is not balanced. Tanks having 1/2 their WSs pushed over to the dust collection corner because, let's be honest, if your tanking and you spin a mob around as my Chaos Thrust goes off cause you wanted to Riot Blade or something, I'm not gonna be super happy. If on the positioning all they did was make tanks more able to use the WSs they have I'd be happy, if they went so far as to make it possible for me to not run in front of a mob w/ frontal AoE spam, or behind a mob that AoE spams when hit in the back that'd be awesome. Seriously again the reasons DRG and MNK come second when forming a pt to BLMs is that they can't hit from the places that are required for half their WSs, obviously this isn't the only reason, and it's not true on all mobs but it's true often enough to make a difference.

Those that have a mage that's thunder>thundara every 15 secs, I've nothing on that dmg output on any job, if you have a thm/blm floating around that's falling behind in DPS to a melee they're holding back or not great at their job.

Edit: There was a post I really meant to quote there, but I just realized that I have to be at work 15 mins ago, so no time to find it again.

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Originally Posted by carraway

BRD has range requirements that already negatively affect its DPS ceiling.
MNK has as high or a higher DPS ceiling than BLM, but a commensurately higher skill ceiling due to positional requirements.
DRG admittedly needs some upward tuning; the devs have acknowledged that.

Rather than rip out the fundamental system that encourages a higher level of player performance, there are better ways to go about balancing things.

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Really? Please enlighten us. Its easy to make statements like this, but I havent seen anyone come up with a good idea as to how to ballance the melee vs ranged problem. Believe me, I agree with the heart of what you are saying about creating choices and making players think on their feet and what not. Yeah I get it. Dont allow players to spam skills and zerg things to death with out restriction.

However, I think the positional requirements are the wrong way to go about it. It wastes too much of your limited time in the big boss battles. Ifrit and Garuda are always jumping around all over the place, or there are other things going on in the battle that cause frequent disengaugement from the enemy. With things like this in place, positional requirements go beyond just a simple "frustrating" comment. It can completely destroy good dps from the melees, giving a huge advantage to ranged. Maybe after 2.0 when there isnt so much UI delay, dungeon lag, and lack of animation lock, it will work better. But as for now its bad enough melees have to put up with animation lock, and combo timers, and positional requirements; but what really sucks is dungeon lag slowing them down, and UI delay making you press actions 2-4 times before they actually go off.

I am serious though, I would like to see good alternative suggestions that would help level the playing field on ranged vs melee. Maybe someone out there can think outside the box, and come up with somhing great. Cause Im all ears. And if not, then it gets back to having to endure it til 2.0, and hope the faster server response and lack of animation lock fixes the problem and makes it even out more. Or greatly reducing WS timers (keep combos, combos can stay). Also, at the very least get rid of stupid directional combos, like tanks attacking from back or side, and melee attacking from front........ /sigh.

As to the person that was saying that positional requirements arent an issue if you have a good tank, GTFO. We all know that certain enemies (Moogles come to mind) do whatever they want regardless of if tank has hate, and there is a glitchyness to alot of Boss mobs that makes them shift or turn slightly for no reason. In my mind, if the tank has enmity, then the mob should ALWAYS be directly facing the tank. Unfortunately, this simply isnt the way it is. In a game where positioning is so important, you'd think they could get mobs to face the tank directly or at least to not slide sideways, and not implement retarded things like the way they did moogles.

Full disclosure: I am only a tank, so the first part about ballancing melee vs ranged is fairly objective. I dont really have an agenda because I am neither a melee or a ranged dps player ever. I dont really care from a tanks point of view, but if I am honest, I have to call it as I see it. On the other hand, the other issues with moving/sliding/turning mobs really pisses me off as a tank.

Yes, and we should all have 999 of every stat, regardless of gear, and we should all have every job at 50 the first time we log in. Also, every synth should be +3 regardless of quality. Also, all of us should have 9999 HP/MP and all our WSs should do 9999 damage, just to be sure EVERYTHING is completely standardized.

Are you people even serious anymore, or are you just trying to out-retard each other now?

At one point in this games past, TP was based off of how much damage you did, and not the delay... (Because there was no auto-attack and no delay)
Im surprised I haven't seen anyone bring that up....

If TP were still based on damage done instead of Delay though... then high defense bosses (Like Ifrit) would make it almost impossible to build TP (Because your damage is so low) unless these bosses had a modifier that increased your TP gain to damage ratio....

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Originally Posted by Amsai

Really? Please enlighten us. Its easy to make statements like this, but I havent seen anyone come up with a good idea as to how to ballance the melee vs ranged problem. Believe me, I agree with the heart of what you are saying about creating choices and making players think on their feet and what not. Yeah I get it. Dont allow players to spam skills and zerg things to death with out restriction.

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There's entirely too many people that want to knock others thoughts and ideas and suggest nothing, it's kind of sad really, nay saying just for the sake of being negative.

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Originally Posted by Amsai

However, I think the positional requirements are the wrong way to go about it. It wastes too much of your limited time in the big boss battles. Ifrit and Garuda are always jumping around all over the place, or there are other things going on in the battle that cause frequent disengaugement from the enemy. With things like this in place, positional requirements go beyond just a simple "frustrating" comment. It can completely destroy good dps from the melees, giving a huge advantage to ranged. Maybe after 2.0 when there isnt so much UI delay, dungeon lag, and lack of animation lock, it will work better. But as for now its bad enough melees have to put up with animation lock, and combo timers, and positional requirements; but what really sucks is dungeon lag slowing them down, and UI delay making you press actions 2-4 times before they actually go off.

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There are certainly some flaws in the positional thing, and having some jobs that can just stand in place and spam skills while others have to run wind sprints around a mob is obnoxious.

I'm still of the opinion that TP gain adjustments(reductions) would be enough to cause people to limit their WS spam and focus more on TP managment, as it is what we do is literally move WS move WS move WS move WS the only part that requires any thought is ...... I can't think of it. That doesn't show skilled play it's crazy easy to run around in circles and w/ 10~15 seconds between WSs you can run from one side of the map to the other and back again and still get your combo in. Planning which WSs and when to use them to maximum effect is far more challenging than moving around. Reduced TP gain, Combos not negating TP costs but reducing them 50% maybe, Combos having more potent effects or maybe just increasing the potency of the current effects, dmg increases WSs rarely add more than a couple percent, make it more like 50%, of course to make it happen you'd have to get to first WS_TP + enough that you won't run down the timer before you get enough for the next attack if there's a 3rd you need to factor that in also.

I'm not against WSs from positions to have greater effect, but having that as a requirement for combos seems a little weak.