PvP Actions Design & How It Could Translate to PvE

After playing every job in PvP, I realized just how fluid and nice it was to play this game without all of the button bloat. It was an eye-opener as sometimes we don't know that we really don't like a way of doing something until we see a far better alternative.

Jobs that have a 1,2,3 combo, for example, feel like a breath of fresh air in PvP. Never, under any circumstance, have I ever started an opener with 2, or 3 and it is so nice not to have two unnecessary extra actions on my Hotbar, that it's hard for me to go back to the messy PvE action bloat.

in PvP, every job feels very engaging yet clean. So, how could this translate into PvE? I haven't a clue but I am hoping that the people who designed the PvP action system, expand their wisdom into PvE and help us with what I could only describe as action vomit.

I commend SE for a job well done with PvP, especially as it could be considered "early access" of sorts, and I hope that this new and fresh take on actions translates, somehow, into PvE.

Thoughts? Opinions? I'd like to know how the community feels about this.

If they did this to PVE I would quit the game instantly.

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Originally Posted by Darthgummibear

If they did this to PVE I would quit the game instantly.

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Care to elaborate?

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Originally Posted by Tenken7

Care to elaborate?

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Considering you think that they actually did a good job with pvp this time around, I would be wasting my breath.

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Originally Posted by Darthgummibear

Considering you think that they actually did a good job with pvp this time around, I would be wasting my breath.

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Yes, I think they did a great job with PvP, all things considered. I'm sorry you feel that way though. Thanks for sharing.

This system works because 5 human players are (generally) more engaging to fight than one giant boss with a completely scripted timeline. I don't think I'd ever want to see PvE kits stripped to this level, since encounter design simply doesn't make up for the loss in engagement and complexity. The new PvP kits do a great job of delivering on flavor and variety, though. A lot of this is because jobs don't have to be compared with other jobs in their "role", just an approximate ballpark of "how good is this at killing people and helping allies not die".

They'll never, ever do it, but I want walkcasting in PvE: give DNC its forced melee back, give BRD and MCH the PvP cast times on their filler, and then give all three roles caster damage to make up for their loss of mobility. Almost every fight in the game is designed around 100% uptime anyway, so it's time for the phys ranged "mobility tax" to go and I don't care how they get rid of it, LOL.

(Also, healers are already DPS in everything but name, so go ahead and remove filler heals. No one besides Netflix curebots were using them anyway—if SAM can have Kaiten removed for button bloat, Cure 1 and 2 are surely next on the list, right?)

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Originally Posted by GayRobot

This system works because 5 human players are (generally) more engaging to fight than one giant boss with a completely scripted timeline. I don't think I'd ever want to see PvE kits stripped to this level, since encounter design simply doesn't make up for the loss in engagement and complexity. The new PvP kits do a great job of delivering on flavor and variety, though. A lot of this is because jobs don't have to be compared with other jobs in their "role", just an approximate ballpark of "how good is this at killing people and helping allies not die".

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I agree with you 100% which is the reason why I wonder if there is a way to learn from PvP if only to alleviate the button bloat in PvE. A copy/paste would be disastrous for reasons you already mentioned but I wonder if some cleaning up would help. If anything, I would like to see the 1,2,3 combos reduced into one button since nobody ever starts with 2 or 3.

No, stop asking for this. It makes sense for the fast pace in pvp but that stuff does not belong in pve. Pressing 1 over and over for 10 minutes would be incredibly boring.

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Originally Posted by GayRobot

(Also, healers are already DPS in everything but name, so go ahead and remove filler heals. No one besides Netflix curebots were using them anyway—if SAM can have Kaiten removed for button bloat, Cure 1 and 2 are surely next on the list, right?)

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This might be an unpopular opinion but after playing Sage in pvp and not having to switch targets every two seconds, I really enjoyed it. I honestly wouldn't mind if we had a healer option that didn't require the constant target switching and healed/shielded purely through different damage actions. I would main that in a heartbeat. Granted, in a perfect static, you rarely have to hardcast a heal but, this is the exception, unfortunatly, and not the rule.

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Originally Posted by Tenken7

I agree with you 100% which is the reason why I wonder if there is a way to learn from PvP if only to alleviate the button bloat in PvE. A copy/paste would be disastrous for reasons you already mentioned but I wonder if some cleaning up would help. If anything, I would like to see the 1,2,3 combos reduced into one button since nobody ever starts with 2 or 3.

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I don't know if combo consolidation is ever going to happen—no one posting here is likely to care too much about low-level combat feel, but I can see new players being pretty whelmed if jobs like PLD had nothing to do but press 1 for the entirety of ARR.

I also personally know a surprising number of endgame players who constantly lose track of their combo during fights—for them, at least, combo is still mechanically relevant even at level 90. I get the vague feeling that this covers more players than you might expect, at least if the occasional 25-minute Expert roulette means anything. For those players, it's more than just QoL: it's a DPS increase that was out of their reach otherwise, which is a weird thing to think about.

I think it'd be cool if non-branching combos and boring oGCDs got removed/consolidated, so that hotbar space could make way for faster, more demanding jobs. Unfortunately, Square seems to like removing abilities and replacing them with nothing, so I guess I'm okay with manual combos for now.

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Originally Posted by Ransu

No, stop asking for this. It makes sense for the fast pace in pvp but that stuff does not belong in pve. Pressing 1 over and over for 10 minutes would be incredibly boring.

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That's not what I said and you know it, or at least you should if you read my post in its entirety. 1,2,3 combo is not the only tool in a job's kit. I'm not asking for extreme simplicity, I am, however, hoping for a cleaner hotbar. More buttons don't equate to difficulty at all. Messy and complex are not the same thing either.

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Originally Posted by GayRobot

I think it'd be cool if non-branching combos and boring oGCDs got removed/consolidated, so that hotbar space could make way for faster, more demanding jobs. Unfortunately, Square seems to like removing abilities and replacing them with nothing, so I guess I'm okay with manual combos for now.

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Yes! This! what you said right there is the crux of what I meant to say.

Instead of removing good abilities, consolidate the unnecessary clutter.

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Originally Posted by Tenken7

After playing every job in PvP, I realized just how fluid and nice it was to play this game without all of the button bloat. It was an eye-opener as sometimes we don't know that we really don't like a way of doing something until we see a far better alternative.

Jobs that have a 1,2,3 combo, for example, feel like a breath of fresh air in PvP. Never, under any circumstance, have I ever started an opener with 2, or 3 and it is so nice not to have two unnecessary extra actions on my Hotbar, that it's hard for me to go back to the messy PvE action bloat.

in PvP, every job feels very engaging yet clean. So, how could this translate into PvE? I haven't a clue but I am hoping that the people who designed the PvP action system, expand their wisdom into PvE and help us with what I could only describe as action vomit.

I commend SE for a job well done with PvP, especially as it could be considered "early access" of sorts, and I hope that this new and fresh take on actions translates, somehow, into PvE.

Thoughts? Opinions? I'd like to know how the community feels about this.

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I think the class redesigns for PvP were a huge success, but I don't feel like they translate to PvE at all.
PvE encounters are scripted, there's substantially less movement relative to PvP,
there's virtually zero target swapping, virtually zero counterplay, and your target is typically relatively stationary.
The complexity of your ability set is one of the things that keeps gameplay interesting in that environment.
PvP kits get by with their simplicity because the encounters themselves are so dynamic.
Go pound away for 5 minutes straight on a target dummy with one of the PvP kits and see how engaging it is.

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Originally Posted by Iyrnwaen

I think the class redesigns for PvP were a huge success, but I don't feel like they translate to PvE at all.
PvE encounters are scripted, there's substantially less movement relative to PvP,
there's virtually zero target swapping, virtually zero counterplay, and your target is typically relatively stationary.
The complexity of your ability set is one of the things that keeps gameplay interesting in that environment.
PvP kits get by with their simplicity because the encounters themselves are so dynamic.
Go pound away for 5 minutes straight on a target dummy with one of the PvP kits and see how engaging it is.

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Again, I never said do a copy/paste. I am talking about learning from the design aspect to clean up the clutter. I'm starting to think that people hear what they want to hear and not what's actually said.

Definitely wish they'd combine the combos of things like Fast Blade into Riot Blade; keep Rage of Halone and Goring Blade out of the chain. You're always going to start with Fast Blade and go into Riot Blade...always.

I'd also like to see something like, for BLM, Transpose switching Fire and Blizzard between each other. I can't even have Scathe on the main bars because there's simply no room.

PVP is stressful and hectic and doesn't give you time or need to do a rotation. The one button combos might as well just be one attack for how well they play. PVE is friendly to relaxed, slower game play, which to some players will be a vital feature, not a bug. There's a reason the series rewards have been calculated to give you Archfiend for losing one match per day till series end.

What works in pvp wont work in pve
Kills are short and sweet in pvp, a raid boss takes 10+ minutes
If i was spamming 1 button the entire figbht i would be bored out of my mind (hmmm... healers anyone?)

Having said that, i would like to see some of the job fantasy brought into pve. especially with drk and mch

I feel single button combo presses will feel monotonous over the course of an eight minute fight.

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Originally Posted by Reimmi

What works in pvp wont work in pve
Kills are short and sweet in pvp, a raid boss takes 10+ minutes
If i was spamming 1 button the entire figbht i would be bored out of my mind (hmmm... healers anyone?)

Having said that, i would like to see some of the job fantasy brought into pve. especially with drk and mch

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The job identity in PVP is pretty top notch and makes me wonder why the skills don't do the same things in pve at times.

An example: Anaylsis for MCH. It gives different skills different subabilities and because those abilities are on longer cooldowns you can kind of gauge when to use them and how. In AOE I'd use it on bioblaster, in opener I'd use it on chainsaw/drill, etc. The attempt to cut down on button bloat on PVE skills may be all surface level (Aka since everyone only cares about dps all skills are single buttons for more dps buttons like Reassemble), but the identity of the classes changes when you can do things like drop a turret that gives mitigation and shields (take out the shields in pve) and can feel like a true robotics class master with turret + automaton queen.

SCH having two charge deployment, adlo having damage buff(them being the tatcics/battle healer) and spreading its dot like it used to be able to, and being able to buff both dot OR heals with Recitation gives the SCH more unique feeling of being able to change your tactics to fit the situation. A good sch with this kit in PVE would be able to use recite more on Dot meaning more damage vs it's only purpose now being for raid wides and critlo spread when you have the time to group everyone up and spread it.

Part of the issue is in PVE content everything leaned so far towards "more dps" that one look at how aetherflow is used or how AST got reworked cards tells you that because the meta is "do more DPS" they stopped trying to balance around a lot of alternate abilities and skills. The reason we don't have Recite Biolysis is most likely because if we didn't have recitation only useable on excog and heals that sch would just use it on damage every single time at endgame. I'm not sure how to rectify that, but I feel like some of the other class changes are definitely worth taking a second look at aside from GNB and SGE.

I think WAR is a really great consolidation of its core kit into pvp, and I feel that AST having dual cast and RDM having "Shifts" are super cool too. If they wanted more skill ceiling back in the game it'd be cool to like "the more mana of one element you have the shift you're in" meaning you would want to spike black mana at first and then build up white to add more skill to the dual cast procs and management of mana to keep top dps but also providing some utility.

It'd take a lot more balancing in an already meaty set of class abilities, though. That being said I really love SOME of the new presentations here or presentations of things we had before that were taken. That "variety" is the spice of life.

Lmao how many people just read the title.
No, for a simple reason, you may think it is fluid others find it boring to have less buttons.
The lack of an AC allows you to acquire tools designing how you want to play the game by downgrading your required buttons but never upgrade.
I, for one have no issue of the bloat and find it quite more enjoyable to press a different button every time.

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Originally Posted by drtasteyummy

Lmao how many people just read the title.
No, for a simple reason, you may think it is fluid others find it boring to have less buttons.
The lack of an AC allows you to acquire tools designing how you want to play the game by downgrading your required buttons but never upgrade.
I, for one have no issue of the bloat and find it quite more enjoyable to press a different button every time.

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Typically, people that start off their argument 'for a simple reason" haven't really thought this issue through.

1- I don't believe that most people would intend that the current PVP design would be translated identically, skill by skill, for each job over to PVE
2- YOU may enjoy button bloat , many other people are not happy to see skills that do not synergize well, or are never used OR a lack of skills in one area and a bloated kit in another area - such as a bloated healing toolkit but a pathetic lack of DPS options for healers

I note that you posted from a reaper. I really haven't noticed complaints from reapers, however I don't main reaper. Personally I find that reaper has a very designed toolkit, skills flow together nicely, virtually every skill gets used and it is fairly intuitive, You will use multiple skill naturally in PVE. It's a lot of fun in PVE. It's quite possible that you could have very few changes in the the next few months or so- it's the bright and shiny new toy and it shows a lot of attention.

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Originally Posted by IDontPetLalas

1- I don't believe that most people would intend that the current PVP design would be translated identically, skill by skill, for each job over to PVE

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That was never the question nor my answer, I refered to "jobs that have a 1,2,3 combo, for example, feel like a breath of fresh air in PvP.[...]".

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Originally Posted by IDontPetLalas

2- YOU may enjoy button bloat , many other people are not happy to see skills that do not synergize well, or are never used OR a lack of skills in one area and a bloated kit in another area - such as a bloated healing toolkit but a pathetic lack of DPS options for healers

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He is directly talking about 1,2,3 combos, not perfect timing, not simplified abilities and that was my direct answer to that, there are enough tools to simplify this 1,2,3 combos but none to upgrade these. Arguably, you could talk about how this is unfair for console players but if you keep being realistic yoship will never simplify combos nor give an option to opt out, the backlash would be immense and the gain almost zero.

A bit condescending there. I don’t mind them tacking on combo to one if they give more buttons to fix in between lvl where you get passives that upgrade your attack dmg I find this to be dumb but I understand they want to control the output of players. McH gun mage been asking for that back would be fun to have again. Agree with not everything should be adapted into PvE but I can lie and say something wouldn’t be pretty cool to see

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Originally Posted by drtasteyummy

That was never the question nor my answer, I refered to "jobs that have a 1,2,3 combo, for example, feel like a breath of fresh air in PvP.[...]".



He is directly talking about 1,2,3 combos, not perfect timing, not simplified abilities and that was my direct answer to that, there are enough tools to simplify this 1,2,3 combos but none to upgrade these. Arguably, you could talk about how this is unfair for console players but if you keep being realistic yoship will never simplify combos nor give an option to opt out, the backlash would be immense and the gain almost zero.

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First of all, your answer never referred specifically to '1,2, 3" button combos. Secondly, OP referred to that as an example, however that was not the entire scope of OP's post. You may be correct regarding that specific point however this discussion is by no means limited to just that example.

One of the main points is that the changes in PVP design have been seen as positive to many players- could be many reasons- such as more engagement, better synergy, etc.

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Originally Posted by drtasteyummy

if you keep being realistic yoship will never simplify combos nor give an option to opt out, the backlash would be immense and the gain almost zero.

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Have you looked at the new SMN? Yoshi-P did exactly what you said he would never do. Literally. I mean SMN is word for word, what you said he would never do. So... yeah

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Originally Posted by drtasteyummy

He is directly talking about 1,2,3 combos, not perfect timing, not simplified abilities and that was my direct answer to that, there are enough tools to simplify this 1,2,3 combos but none to upgrade these.

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What are you talking about? I'm not being facetious; the above sentence doesn't make sense.

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Originally Posted by Tenken7

Have you looked at the new SMN? Yoshi-P did exactly what you said he would never do. Literally. I mean SMN is word for word, what you said he would never do. So... yeah



What are you talking about? I'm not being facetious; the above sentence doesn't make sense.

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Right and for the most part people consider new SMN incredibly boring.

I'm curious on what specific aspects from the PVP skills they would like to see translated. I haven't played every class but for the most part they all seem to play very similarly to their PVE counterparts just sped up to accommodate for it being PVP. Like PVP War is near 1-to-1 with it's PVE counterpart, PLD as well. DRK and GNB have unique mechanics in Draw and Junction and the HP cost for Shadowbringer which I guess would be interesting.

I feel like the biggest issue is that if they try to give the jobs more unique attributes/abilities it makes it much harder to keep them all close to each in other in terms of balance which seems to be more important for both the devs and the community.

Likewise what specific abilities would people want to see trimmed from the PVE skillsets? Like for Scholar the only ability I could really see getting trimmed is Emergency Tactics since I'm pretty sure it is one of it's least used skills. Everything else is used pretty regularly as the fights demand. I also don't see any abilities being able to be combined together on Scholars kit.

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Originally Posted by Tenken7

Have you looked at the new SMN? Yoshi-P did exactly what you said he would never do. Literally. I mean SMN is word for word, what you said he would never do. So... yeah



What are you talking about? I'm not being facetious; the above sentence doesn't make sense.

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Yeah and i don't want to see that again, my god summoner is boring

Some traits we see in PvP would be a great addition to PvE, like OP already mentioned the Combo actions into one Button (since Squeenix constantly complains about Button bloat, yet Jobs like SAM have 3 Combo's spread over 8 Buttons that just deal damage).

Another great thing would be if they translated a SIMILAR Job identity like in PvP into PvE, since that is the main thing Jobs lack in PvE content. Keep LB3 as it is, but turn every Jobs LB1 and LB2 into a unique Job specific action.

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Originally Posted by Ransu

Right and for the most part people consider new SMN incredibly boring.

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You said Yoshi-P would never do something-->I replied with an example of Yoshi-P doing exactly that "something"-->You come back and act as if I am praising said "something"

Reason and coherence aren't this forum's strong suit, are they?

Here I'll restate my point:
We could learn a thing or two from PvP action design in terms of action flow and lack of bloat.

No, I am not saying reduce the number of action
I am saying we should clean up the bloat and consolidate in favor of more interesting and engaging action.

It doesn't require any skill to push 1,2,3. None! Zero! Anyone who praises such design is buying into the illusion of complexity.

Asking for things to be clean and neat does not equate to asking for things to be dumbed down.

Again, you are hearing what you want to hear and not what is actually being said.

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Originally Posted by Reimmi

Yeah and i don't want to see that again, my god summoner is boring

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The same thing goes for you. read my reply to @Ransu above.

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Originally Posted by Tenken7

You said Yoshi-P would never do something-->I replied with an example of Yoshi-P doing exactly that "something"-->You come back and act as if I am praising said "something"

Reason and coherence aren't this forum's strong suit, are they?

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The irony of the insult considering I never claimed Yoshi-P would do anything of any nature in this thread. Maybe pay attention to who's replying to you.

As for the rest of your crap, no thanks. Things like meikyo would have to completely change with your idea. There are too many scenarios that requires the combo buttons to be their own buttons for it to ever work in the "pvp style." Introducing pvp combos into pve would literally ruin this game.

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Originally Posted by Ransu

As for the rest of your crap, no thanks.

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Very mature of you. When you're argument is weak, you resort to empty insults that only reflect poorly on you.

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Originally Posted by Ransu

There are too many scenarios that requires the combo buttons to be their own buttons for it to ever work in the "pvp style.

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Again, what are you talking about, and how does it relate to what I said? What examples, and what do they have to do with cleaning up button bloat in PvE?

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Originally Posted by Ransu

Introducing pvp combos into pve would literally ruin this game.

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You're a master at strawman arguments, aren't you? Never have I said that we should introduce PVP combos into PvE.

At this point, I feel like I'm arguing with a brick wall of emotions and not much reason.

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Originally Posted by Tenken7

Very mature of you. When you're argument is weak, you resort to empty insults that only reflect poorly on you.

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Says the one who literally posted an insult without even paying attention to who they were quoting lol.

I gave you an example of why it would be bad, but you didn't bother to read it. Also there is no button bloat, learn to keybind better.