Dawntrail could live to be an amazing expansion with one single huge flaw?

I've been thinking. The story arc can be great. The expansion can have more interesting encounters (which they're allegedly doing?), and the content features could be plentiful and fulfilling. Relic done properly again.

Even if all of those end up being true, as optimistic as it sounds, DT will be forever haunted by being the worst expansion for job design because it doubles down on the already bad EW design. I don't think anybody needs to actually play them tomorrow to guess this by now.

And not just for healers, the worst cases, but for DPSers too. I've been reading the job guides and what everybody ends up getting? Mostly an extra "follow up key press" that just do plain damage with AoE falloff.

If you're not into Pictomancer or Viper, there's literally nothing of relevance to look forward with most jobs, in face some like BLM are even dreading upon the changes chopping down gameplay diversity.

It's gonna suck to wait until what, late 2026? With this job design - assuming they'll really do somthing of substance then.

it's only a flaw if you are one of the few who aren't liking the direction SE is going in with the jobs.

DT doesn't really have a great big plot hook to draw you in, and the new stuff Jobs are getting seem quite underwhelming at best.

Literally the only thing the expansion has to stand on will be it's story.

For now the story hype kinda holds the fort for me, although it's more willingness to play through an expansion msq again more than actual hype like for EW.

But once that will be done? I dread this expansion. It's gonna be so miserable on job enjoyment... Will pvp be able to keep me sane for years to come? idk.

Content wise it will be hard to beat Stormblood.
Lore wise (and writing!) it will be hard to beat Shadowbringers.
It doubles down on Endwalkers job design.

Yeah, no. I'm keeping my expectations for Yawntrail in check.

I think your opinion is valid. Square-Enix has decided to go in a direction that tries to keep most jobs simple and well-tuned. I'm personally, pretty hyped with the changes I see. Tbh, sometimes it's okay not to "fix it if it isn't broken". The biggest changes seem to be for healers, and I'm actually pretty happy with the slight increase in complexity that I see for the jobs.

Edit: FFXIV for me is a very story-based game, and I'm looking forward to seeing what comes next. Plus, I think it's fun to see what new end game content SE might be thinking of adding next. I'm pretty happy with Variant Dungeons and would love to see more stuff like that that breaks the mold of other FFXIV content.

It's already a bad expansion in my book. No amount of Soken or story could save it, for the sole reason that gameplay is trash. A game without gameplay might as well not exist...

Personally I don't care too much for the story going forward. Endwalker I waited 10 years for, it was an alright conclusion. Venat was wonderful.

Going forward? They lost me the moment it became apparent we're very likely have the same cast. I just can't with the plot-armored Scions anymore. Ugh.

Range Tax will still most likely be a thing, so with that in mind, I can predict that the first savage tier will begin with what's already been an issue since they made Range Tax a thing: Strict meta parties in order to clear.
I hope there aren't any RDM mains who were wanting to clear within the first 4 weeks of Savage.

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Originally Posted by aquarys

The biggest changes seem to be for healers

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White Mage: Your party mitigation gets a party mitigation followup. Every 2 minutes you get to hit 3 three times instead of continuing to hit 1.
Scholar: 20 second heal spam mode every 3 minutes. You get another dot every 2 minutes.
Sage: 20 second heal spam mode every 3 minutes. You get an AoE dot, which would've been amazing except contrary to media tour it can not stack with the other dot making it trash/double boss use only. You get an oGCD nuke once a minute.

Only Astrologian is really getting anything that could be called real changes.

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Originally Posted by CaptainLagbeard

DT doesn't really have a great big plot hook to draw you in, and the new stuff Jobs are getting seem quite underwhelming at best.

Literally the only thing the expansion has to stand on will be it's story.

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And unfortunately have tempered expectations to the story since they have consistently opted to chop off the political drama of it, as well as ignoring side-quests cause they don't want another crystal tower situations... Even though that's one of the reasons we grew to love the story.

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Originally Posted by EusisLandale

White Mage: Your party mitigation gets a party mitigation followup. Every 2 minutes you get to hit 3 three times instead of continuing to hit 1.
Scholar: 20 second heal spam mode every 3 minutes. You get another dot every 2 minutes.
Sage: 20 second heal spam mode every 3 minutes. You get an AoE dot, which would've been amazing except contrary to media tour it can not stack with the other dot making it trash/double boss use only. You get an oGCD nuke once a minute.

Only Astrologian is really getting anything that could be called real changes.

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yeah, HUGE changes. I feel like I have been to this dance before....

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Originally Posted by Venarius

Yeah, no. I'm keeping my expectations for Yawntrail in check.

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You're calling it 'Yawntrail' before it's even out. Your expectations are are far past being in check.

Honestly, I'm more excited for the upcoming thread of "What's the point with that quite lackluster story in Dawntrail?", followed by 900+ pages of lore enthusiasts bickering and comparing the characters they don't like to being the equivalent of a McDonald's Happy Meal.

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Originally Posted by Brightamethyst

You're calling it 'Yawntrail' before it's even out. Your expectations are are far past being in check.

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hey man, it'll be fun to enjoy more of exactly the same gameplay, unless that gameplay is itself soulcrushing or boring, especially for solo and story-centric fights

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Originally Posted by Musashidon

it's only a flaw if you are one of the few who aren't liking the direction SE is going in with the jobs.

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I am very concerned for this game's future if the majority are actually happy with getting one or two new buttons to hit once every two minutes.

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Originally Posted by KageTokage

I am very concerned for this game's future if the majority are actually happy with getting one or two new buttons to hit once every two minutes.

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why? we are steadily getting and keeping more and more players so it's not like the game is even close to being worried about dying or even hurting.

i will also say not all expansions are the same just because this one didn't add anything amazing and over the top doesnt mean we will never see something new or different in another.

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Originally Posted by aquarys

The biggest changes seem to be for healers

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What Healers actually got
WHM : A dash, and the a new spell they can use 3 times every 2 minutes.
SCH : A 15s DoT they can apply every 2 minutes
SGE : A new attack they can use once a minute.
AST: Guaranteed ability to get Lord of Crowns for a 400 Potency attack, a new attack with a 2min CD, their DPS boosting cards are on a 60s CD instead of the previous 30s and Astrodyne is removed.

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Originally Posted by Musashidon

why? we are steadily getting and keeping more and more players so it's not like the game is even close to being worried about dying or even hurting.

i will also say not all expansions are the same just because this one didn't add anything amazing and over the top doesnt mean we will never see something new or different in another.

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given that we're on year 4+ of a massive downgrade with little added in exchange, i'm seeing a historical pattern of not adding new or different things...
like, new players wont know the difference, but if next expac is more of the same spread thinner across another 10 levels? (or whatever secondary system they may be considering later, as obliquely mentioned in interviews about the level cap)
they'll be slightly disappointed, while existing players get to look forward to another 2 years of the same.
as long as new players keep getting in each time we'll have a nice conga line of people who dont know the difference, so is the end goal to just accept that the gameplay is bland for non-newbies and just focus on the story?

unless there's some sort of shakeup at some point it's going to be a rather unexciting time outside of the story at the very least.

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Originally Posted by Musashidon

it's only a flaw if you are one of the few who aren't liking the direction SE is going in with the jobs.

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One of the few thousands of people who hate the 2 minute meta that is literally the only thing JP agrees with us on lol?

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Originally Posted by Musashidon

why? we are steadily getting and keeping more and more players so it's not like the game is even close to being worried about dying or even hurting.

i will also say not all expansions are the same just because this one didn't add anything amazing and over the top doesnt mean we will never see something new or different in another.

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The issue is not a few buttons, but the fact that they are absolutely boring actions instead of new mechanics to play with... And that's to everybody sans AST and DRG, and even those are debatable.

BLM's Flare Star, to me, is the worst case of it all. It's just a plain 400 potency damage that you can only press at the end of your AF phase if you pressed 6 Fire IV's. It doesn't interact back with anything in the kit nor it has a flexible usage. In the end Flare Star could easily be a follow up action to Despair with very little difference. It's such a bland action that I hardly think that a gauge was even necessary.

You see DNC's Dance of the Dawn animation and think "Oh, cool, I wonder what the 100 capstone does!" - and then is just Saber Dance, but more damage.

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Originally Posted by SpiralMask

given that we're on year 4+ of a massive downgrade with little added in exchange, i'm seeing a historical pattern of not adding new or different things.

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you will need to tell me what you think a massive downgrade is specifically. i get all over endwalker but that is very vague.

i can think of two pretty big changes that came in endwalker alone not counting other jobs i don't pay much attention to.

that being blade of faith combo for pld and the whole summoner rework that changed them fundamentally.

sure over all blade of faith doesnt change base pld but it was a pretty big change from just using some spells or rotating through the normal 1/2/3 combo. i will say the summoner change speaks for itself.

once again this expansion was mild in changes well besides a few like blm and monk but SE does some pretty big changes often with expansions so saying nothing has changed in 4 years isn't correct as we have seen it.

i will say shaking things up when its not what people want is a bad move now it also is a what kind of shake up too as change isn't necessarily bad but it isn't always good either.

what kind of shake up do you want? when i see some of the thoughts on the forum people don't want something new and exciting they want the game to change in a way that isn't FF14, so a good question i like to ask is what is something new and exciting we can get that is still in the mind set of what FF14 wants.

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Originally Posted by Ramiee

One of the few thousands of people who hate the 2 minute meta that is literally the only thing JP agrees with us on lol?

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what is a few thousand people to a million subscription playerbase? i will say i dont personally care if they have or get rid of the 2 minute meta but what is the real number of players who dislike it compared to the number who like it?

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Originally Posted by Raikai

The issue is not a few buttons, but the fact that they are absolutely boring actions instead of new mechanics to play with

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i will say this is only 1 expansion with some mild changes i won't say next expansion will be revolutionary cause honestly i don't know but not all combat changes to expansions can be huge mechanic changes.

on that note what mechanic would you like added to your favorite job?

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Originally Posted by Raikai

I've been thinking. The story arc can be great. The expansion can have more interesting encounters (which they're allegedly doing?), and the content features could be plentiful and fulfilling. Relic done properly again.

Even if all of those end up being true, as optimistic as it sounds, DT will be forever haunted by being the worst expansion for job design because it doubles down on the already bad EW design. I don't think anybody needs to actually play them tomorrow to guess this by now.

And not just for healers, the worst cases, but for DPSers too. I've been reading the job guides and what everybody ends up getting? Mostly an extra "follow up key press" that just do plain damage with AoE falloff.

If you're not into Pictomancer or Viper, there's literally nothing of relevance to look forward with most jobs, in face some like BLM are even dreading upon the changes chopping down gameplay diversity.

It's gonna suck to wait until what, late 2026? With this job design - assuming they'll really do somthing of substance then.

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Shb basically ruined healers and added genderlocked incomplete races and it wasnt considered the worst expansion for job design purely cuz people liked the story so much nothing else mattered.

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Originally Posted by Minarisweet

Shb basically ruined healers and added genderlocked incomplete races and it wasnt considered the worst expansion for job design purely cuz people liked the story so much nothing else mattered.

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it is STILL weird to me that they apparently still haven't updated their baseline gear creation pipeline to... include two races at all.
like i understand not wanting to dive into the backlog of older helmets and refit them (even if modders knocked it out in a month or so?) because that's a ton of man-hours for the team to spend on that, but not updating your process going forward to include the new races is baffling--you're only making the pile of stuff you have to go back and fix larger!

like the answer to adding new helmets with viera and hrothgar in the game has just been "we have largely given up on making helmets for anyone, it's just glasses, visors, facemasks, and bandanas now" and half the time even those arent compatible.

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Originally Posted by Minarisweet

…it wasnt considered the worst expansion for job design purely cuz people liked the story so much nothing else mattered.

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EW had a pretty lackluster story and I don’t think DT will really be holding any candles, so we see a lot of people no longer giving SE a pass for bad job design philosophy.
I was hoping that they’d grow out of “Bad on purpose,” to where they’d go back to before ShB, but it seems they’re still sticking firmly to it.

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Originally Posted by Musashidon

on that note what mechanic would you like added to your favorite job?

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Black Mage?

First, not delete Thundercloud mechanic, and instead add a new thunder-themed spell that you can make use of the 'spare' procs you get without ruining your Thunder 3 refresh. Not delete the Paradox from Umbral Ice phase, and allow any spells cast during that to restore MP, so some alternative lines could still exist.

For a new mechanic... Flare Star! But let the charges carry through Umbral Ice. Let Paradox add charges to it, let you cast with less charges for a faster but weaker cast. Let Firestarter procs grant a charge. Basically make it a resource to manage and make it a flexible spell and there you have it. Just in one single spell a lot of engagement.

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Originally Posted by Musashidon

you will need to tell me what you think a massive downgrade is specifically. i get all over endwalker but that is very vague.

i can think of two pretty big changes that came in endwalker alone not counting other jobs i don't pay much attention to.

that being blade of faith combo for pld and the whole summoner rework that changed them fundamentally.

sure over all blade of faith doesnt change base pld but it was a pretty big change from just using some spells or rotating through the normal 1/2/3 combo. i will say the summoner change speaks for itself.

once again this expansion was mild in changes well besides a few like blm and monk but SE does some pretty big changes often with expansions so saying nothing has changed in 4 years isn't correct as we have seen it.

i will say shaking things up when its not what people want is a bad move now it also is a what kind of shake up too as change isn't necessarily bad but it isn't always good either.

what kind of shake up do you want? when i see some of the thoughts on the forum people don't want something new and exciting they want the game to change in a way that isn't FF14, so a good question i like to ask is what is something new and exciting we can get that is still in the mind set of what FF14 wants.

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i was referring to ShB (each expac is about 2 years, and we havent quite started the third of this trend yet, hence 4+ to account for a few weeks of wiggle room) and it's grand "streamlining", making many jobs much less interesting individually by making every combat class more or less have the same basic toolset of single and aoe combos, action removals that distracted from these, and so on (which intended and did accomplish patching a few of the "i dont have an aoe attack until level 43" holes in the earlygame, but not all of them), and replying to the prior several years' WHM questions of "hey i dont have much to do when healing isn't necessary, AST has cards to manage and SCH has DoTs, can i have something?" with completely gutting every healer in the game, including:
-WHM itself losing a shocking number of actions
-SCH losing it's entire DoT kit, leaving a class designed for strong OGCDs freeing up GCDs for damage with nothing
-AST got the worst of it, with a triple lobotomy of their [card effects and power/duration/aoe alterations and cash-outs] and all lore involved therein, every single time-magic-adjacent ability in their entire kit not named lightspeed (and then just recently confirming that time mage isn't on the consideration block for new classes, so just removed for no purpose whatsoever), and then literallt half of it's healing kit with the removal of nocturnal sect in the "pure- and shield-healer" split, which accomplished nothing since every healer has access to powerfuls shields and heals anyway, making the distinction meaningless outside sage and scholar infighting over shield overwrites.

SGE's addition in the following expac being an almost button-for-button copy of scholar, with worse GCDs than SCH gave up in ShB was just insulting, and rather sad that SGE has been a "dps" healer with the simple illusion of choice, since every damaging button is functionally identical and interchangeable regardless of single target or AoE (including their big fancy capstone laser!) with the sole exception being phlegma.

as an aside example from healers: pre-ShB DRK got wholesale cut from the game, and repackaged as an echo-fighter of WAR (with less defensive cooldowns and more OGCDs, but identical gameplan of using "inner release" for dps windows and it's new "infuriate"--and then later DRK got passed over for the "every tank's first defensive is getting a neat secondary bonus" where the other three did not)

.
funnily enough, i did like the PLD change to the ebb-and-flow between melee and magical dps capping with the blades combo, as well as the SMN rework to be a more iconic "summoner" (even if it's gotten pretty stale with the lack of meaningful additions after that, that's a problem of current design process at SE not initial implementation)

as for a shake-up i'd like to see? classes having their uniqueness restored via some older actions returning or newer thematic options being added and encounter design to accommodate all three roles:
tanks get reasons to use their absolutely massive mitigations and sustain--they should get to feel like they're protecting themselves and the party, not just the guy standing in front of the boss with the occaisional buster marker thrown at them
dps get more interesting mechanics and rotations for their classes and more reasons to use their odd party support abilities (personally i'd say dps classes should find more of their difficulty inward than in fights, since spinning your class-specific plates while also dealing with fight mechanics and positioning is already plenty, which the other two roles largely lack)
healers get a reason to use their massively redundant and overtuned healing kits via spiky damage both regular and irregular (especially spread around the party, so the tanks can feel good with their sustain while the healer is addressing others who lack it), a return of cleanse-able debuffs in real content (esuna is more of a suggestion at this point, as all debuffs are generally ignorable if cleansable, not cleansed by esuna (healing-doom, etc), or not cleansable at all and just kill everyone or instantly fail the fight anyway), actual healer mechanics designed and considered in fights in general (maybe Bad Things happen in a phase if you overheal, or if players fall below X threshold during a heavy party DoT, or cleansable debuffs that swap between different types when cleansed and are checked for certain positional mechanics during the fight, or have to be cleansed at certain times, or only become cleansable under certain circumstances and need to be dealt with until then)

with Bad Things serving to ramp up the difficulty of the fight until it's eventually unsustainable, rather than the current punitive/dismissive of the entire fight design (currently if anyone messes up it's more or less just instant death/failure, no recovery possible just wall it). slap people with debuffs or DoTs that need to be babysat by the healers, or the two-touch-death mechanics to telegraph when someone's next mistake will need more attention to course-correct the fight, or just more opportunities TO course-correct a fight in general on the part of the tanks or healers (using their sustain or party mitigation options and their massive redundant healing/shielding/mitigation/ressing/etc toolkits respectively). mechanics that can be squeaked by if you're down a man or two if the party uses their various support options (this lack of resources might be trading survival now for a bit more difficulty while those are on CD, but that's kind of the point of these kinds of decisions)

and the smallest ask possible: goddamn something to do when healers dont need to heal (if the team is already topped up, if they're experienced with a fight and successfully doing mechanics and not taking unnecessary damage). i dont care what it is, as long as its not pressing the same damn button the entire time you're not on-call.
it'd go a ways to making leveling a healer through story feel more engaging as well, since i can only imagine how awful it must be for WHM--when you're dramatically fighting your rival at the edge of creation and all you get to do is press glare the entire time, that'll really pull you out of things.

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Originally Posted by Raikai

Black Mage?

First, not delete Thundercloud mechanic, and instead add a new thunder-themed spell that you can make use of the 'spare' procs you get without ruining your Thunder 3 refresh. Not delete the Paradox from Umbral Ice phase, and allow any spells cast during that to restore MP, so some alternative lines could still exist.

For a new mechanic... Flare Star! But let the charges carry through Umbral Ice. Let Paradox add charges to it, let you cast with less charges for a faster but weaker cast. Let Firestarter procs grant a charge. Basically make it a resource to manage and make it a flexible spell and there you have it. Just in one single spell a lot of engagement.

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i will say i had no idea what your favorite job was but i know as a pld main i can easily say what i would personally want on pld added vs a job i dont liek as much. that's why i said favorite and not just a random job.

so like adding adding thundercloud back which will proc a buff that lets you use OGCD (this way it doesn't directly interfere with rotation) that's on a 5 second cooldown. giving an extra button and leaving you with the feeling of gaining and using a proc. it also wouldn't change what they have done to thunder so no real change on that front.

adding in a trait that lets you keep flare star charges permanently and another trait that lets you use flare star at different lvls maybe not every but like 2 4 6 it could also only use the amount you need for that lvl.

i know some people dislike traits but it also helps build the as you get stronger you use a skill better. (that bit is really just a what i like thing)

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Originally Posted by SpiralMask

i was referring to ShB [SIZE="1"](each expac is about 2 years.

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well i mentioned endwalker cause it was the one we were in but i get that people bunch shb and ew together for homogenization of jobs.

i feel the easiest curable stuff to add to the game is blind lots of stuff is just ignorable besides doom and lets be honest just doom is lame.
i say blind cause it directly affects dps which is what most players care about meaning it makes it hard to teams who want to do the most damage ignore it. i also know that blind is in the game just almost no enemy uses it.

how much damage increase do you think would make you feel at least a bit better on healer? if we add too much it's no fun anymore if we don't add any the healers who want more damage to heal won't be happy. as a start if anything i would say if we increased overall damage 20% it would be a good start to see how it affects the overall healer player base in dungeons and content.

The devs aren't miracle workers, whatever they fix or change is always going to have polarizing effects on a certain portion of the community, it sucks feeling like someone's favorite job feels gutted but this is what balance looks like.

Whatever a job loses, they are probably gaining in some other form because of the number scaling with those additional 10 levels. And then older skills might be adjusted if what their intended target task is no longer performing well with the current changes.

However folk may feel about what is going to happen to their jobs, or what has already happened or hasn't happened, that can change. Heck; patch 7.x.x could end up being some overhaul or adjustment to a job people get excited about, but then it will absolutely piss off another group of people. But there is always room for iteration in future patches.

Balance, it's not something that pleases everyone, it brings joy to some and alienates others, but it's necessary, nothing is perfect.

Except for Perfect Balance.
https://i.imgur.com/fKjDxvC.png

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Originally Posted by KageTokage

I am very concerned for this game's future if the majority are actually happy with getting one or two new buttons to hit once every two minutes.

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Yoshida has been saying all the time "yes I'm a gamer too and I understand we went too far etc etc", yet they do proceed into doing even more of it with the release of this expansion...

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Originally Posted by Musashidon

you will need to tell me what you think a massive downgrade is specifically. i get all over endwalker but that is very vague.

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The massive downgrade happened in ShB when they gutted the whole battle system.

The rest is merely a series of follow ups and consequences trickling down from it.

oof reading this forum, especially in 2 days maintenance, is getting worse by any minute.

1) graphic update: shit - 'my character isn't looking 1:1'
2) DT expansion: boring - 'story isn't good enough'
3) job changes: too easy, healerstrike - 'make them jobs great again'

..

shit isn't even online, peeps just doing mimimi for 2 months in advance.
maybe just give it a minute? u fantasizing about the story and changes in 8.0.

or, another tip, cancel ur abo. u're just 1000 of 1000000.

AMEN.

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Originally Posted by JokoCGN

oof reading this forum, especially in 2 days maintenance, is getting worse by any minute.

1) graphic update: shit - 'my character isn't looking 1:1'
2) DT expansion: boring - 'story isn't good enough'
3) job changes: too easy, healerstrike - 'make them jobs great again'

..

shit isn't even online, peeps just doing mimimi for 2 months in advance.
maybe just give it a minute? u fantasizing about the story and changes in 8.0.

or, another tip, cancel ur abo. u're just 1000 of 1000000.

AMEN.

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F off, we've known exactly what to expect for 2 months, ie 0 gameplay change, especially for the most mind numbing jobs. There is zero need to wait for it to be online to say that it's garb already.

In fact, now that it's online, I've skimmed through a few jobs already to just remind myself that it's all supercial visual upgrades.

Found one thing that kind of makes me forgive the expansion a little bit... Looked around on the Market Board as you can see the crafted/vendor gear through it and the Level 96 sets are most definitely a thing...
Took images of two of them
The tank set
https://i.ibb.co/GcbFVQD/gear2.png
Striking Set
https://i.ibb.co/TTPWn3Z/gear1.png


Who's ready to rule the wastelands?

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Originally Posted by Musashidon

why? we are steadily getting and keeping more and more players so it's not like the game is even close to being worried about dying or even hurting.

i will also say not all expansions are the same just because this one didn't add anything amazing and over the top doesnt mean we will never see something new or different in another.

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I don’t know. Log-in queue is surprisingly fast for me. This wasn’t the case in EW, and even ShB.

Yeah...all the new stuff on the AH is incredibly uninspired. Nothing really evokes a need for me to get any of it. The spikey leather jackets I'm here for, but it's like they went berserk with spikes and straps to an almost comical level.