DRG still needs a rework

First off, I want to preface this post by saying that I'm not proposing any changes to fix the job. I'm simply addressing the issues from the Dawntrail changes to DRG.

Before talking about Dawntrail changes I need to bring up the issues from Endwalker.

Endwalker Issues
• Burst Window: DRG had issues with having a busy burst window during 2-minute bursts due to charges being added to Spineshatter Dive and Life Surge while having to use Wyrmwind Thrust before the next Raiden Thrust or you'd overcap scales.
• Weaving True North: These additions made DRG the only melee that could not weave True North during a 2-minute burst. Later job changes helped by allowing Dragonsight to act as True North, albeit lasting 20 seconds instead of the usual 10.

Dawntrail Changes
• With Dawntrail, DRG was supposed to receive its long-awaited rework, delayed in Endwalker due to feedback from SAM's Kaiten removal. However, this rework was ultimately canceled at Dawntrail's launch as the dev team changed their mind, although they reworked Life of the Dragon.

Pseudo-Rework
Life of the Dragon (LOTD):
• Endwalker: Activated by using Geirskogul upon having 2 eyes gained through Mirage Dive. This meant LOTD couldn't be used during the opener.
• Dawntrail: Triggered by Geirskogul without needing eyes to allow use in the opener alongside becoming a 15% damage buff. Nastrond’s recast was reduced from 10 to 2 seconds, allowing all 3 Nastronds to be used within 2-minute buffs when previously only 2 could be.

Current Issues
Alongside the LOTD changes, three actions were removed:
• 2 charges of Spineshatter Dive
• Dragonsight
Intended to reduce skill bloat during the 2-minute burst.

While this action removal helped reduce bloat, three actions were added to the burst window, making the removal redundant:
• Rise of the Dragon
• Starcross
• A third Nastrond
With these new actions and the ability to use a third Nastrond in buffs, the 2-minute burst window maintains the same number of actions as it did in Endwalker while still unable to weave in True North.

Problem Children
Life Surge
• DRG's "mitigation" tool that must be used offensively and doesn't provide mitigation adding to skill bloat. Highly restrictive due to both charges being optimally used on either Heavens' Thrust or Drakesbane in 2-minute bursts, requiring triple weaves to get min max gains on damage due to the number of actions in burst.

Starcross
• The only melee range oGCD in DRG's kit at 3 yalms when everything else is 20 yalms. Same issues as old GNB Continuation and VPR Death Rattle/Generations before range increases.

Piercing Talon
• Extremely weak compared to other melee equivalents.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by DrobotTech

With these new actions and the ability to use a third Nastrond in buffs, the 2-minute burst window maintains the same number of actions as it did in Endwalker while still unable to weave in True North.

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We are back to where we were before the Dragon Sight change in EW, yep. I'm torn. On the one hand, we should get True North status on either LC, GSK or BL (the JP player base is asking for this). On the other hand, it's fun trying to greed positionals during burst. I guess the best compromise is to apply the effect to BL since there are open weave slots in the 1-minute window.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by DrobotTech

Life Surge
• DRG's "mitigation" tool that must be used offensively and doesn't provide mitigation adding to skill bloat. Highly restrictive due to both charges being optimally used on either Heavens' Thrust or Drakesbane in 2-minute bursts, requiring triple weaves to get min max gains on damage due to the number of actions in burst.

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I find that LS is much more interesting right now than in EW but it's also been fully limited to burst windows. Each burst window changes a little precisely because of LS and while I agree that it can feel bad that the optimal way of using it requires triple weaving, which is not feasible for the vast majority of players without incurring in losses, the penalty for avoiding triple weaves is quite minor.

Still, LS is the only oGCD that affects GCDs with WWT being the other one that interacts with them. One solution for LS would be turning it into a GCD with two charges on something like a 20s cooldown. This GCD would provide a scale when used and perhaps be an automatic (direct) critical. This way we'd have a bit more on the GCD department but we'd lose one unique GCD/oGCD interaction, as we'd no longer buff a GCD. We need more interaction across the kit because our gauge is reduced to the scales now and our actions just deal damage with zero build up. Dying has gone from very punishing due to the loss of eyes to kind of irrelevant besides the damage debuff.

Introducing extra GCDs in the rotation would require some tweaking of the CS's DoT and Power Surge's duration though.

I suppose that another solution without removing or changing LS would be raising the duration of LotD to 25s and/or merging LC with GSK so that there's one free weave slot when using both GSK and BL.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by DrobotTech

Starcross
• The only melee range oGCD in DRG's kit at 3 yalms when everything else is 20 yalms. Same issues as old GNB Continuation and VPR Death Rattle/Generations before range increases.

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Agreed. Line abilities have a range of 15y right now with jumps being 20y. All our oGCDs should simply have 20y range.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by DrobotTech

Piercing Talon
• Extremely weak compared to other melee equivalents.

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It is curious how PT's potency has remained the same over the years. The relative loss of using it is lower in level 70 content and starts becoming terrible from level 76 and above after learning Raiden Thrust and particularly when acquiring the WWT gauge.

I think that, in order to try and find a more unique way of giving DRG ranged options or uptime, one possibility would be to increase the range of DRG's GCDs to 5-6y. This would be "lore accurate" due to the range of our weapon and help with disengages although it wouldn't necessarily fix the issue of downtime when the boss is too far (e. g. Barbarous Barrage KB towers in M3S).

Any other option I can think of would make it similar to other jobs. A Harvest Moon variant for PT available after using a specific action like MD, a Yatenpi-like combo after using EJ (this would be awful imho), a long range attack after using a specific cooldown a la Phantom Kamaitachi... The range increase is the more "unique" solution but it's still similar to SAM's Iaijutsu.


There's other issues with the job:

- The lack of a gauge and kit interaction are two that I already mentioned above. Mirage Dive should give one scale per use and deal AoE damage in order to fix the ability and have it interact with the gauge again. Our maximum number of scales should increase to 3 and WWT's damage should vary based on the number of scales available when used, normal for 2 and 220 more potency for 3, so that its usage is more flexible.

Mirage Dive's duration should also be raised to 20 or 30s. It's too tight during burst right now. A single mistake can force you to use it earlier over another oGCD like NAS, making you lose more potency in bursts. A 30s duration could allow for double MD under buffs, but it wouldn't fix the next problem.

- Our filler has become extremely hollow now that we don't use GSK every 30s and we have less positionals to hit.

- Winged Glide's cooldown should be 30s or at least 45s. 60s is just a carryover from Spineshatter.

- A perhaps minor personal gripe but STD's potency should be the highest due to its single weave property. STC and STD should swap potencies or be equal at the very least.

- If LC is staying, they should replace the icon and animation with Dragon Sight's for thematic purposes. They could also return DS as some kind of gauge generator CD.

- Other "minor" aesthetic issues: RT and Draconian Fury should permanently upgrade TT and DoS - scales would be granted by those weaponskills only under the effect of Draconian Fire; the blue BotD aura should return in some shape or form past level 70; and we should have more actions tied to the other great dragons we've had contact with like Hraesvelgr instead of being so focused on Nidhogg.

To conclude, my issue with the word "rework" is that the devs are likely to follow the idea of RPR or VPR. While fun jobs in their own right, making DRG like them would eliminate the latter's uniqueness by for instance turning some of our oGCDs into GCDs. In their intent to avoid reworking us for now, they made us similar to WAR instead. Being a 1-minute job is good but becoming some kind of WAR clone with even less gauge to manage is not.

I'm working on a longer post about this but in short, the Dawntrail DRG changes ruined the job for me. It's my favorite job and I tried really, really hard to power through it but the job just feels awful to play now. EW DRG was perfect and now it's a hollow imitation of its former self. The rotation had such a satisfying flow to it before and now it feels like you just hit your unearned burst button and roll your face on your keyboard. The new animations are very lackluster as well. The whole thing has me very disillusioned with the game in general.

Main changes I want to see:

• Move the damage bonus currently attached to Blood of the Dragon / Life of the Dragon (15%) back to Lance Charge (10% -> 25%), reducing the incentive to triple-weave Battle-Lance-Geir for full damage on the following GCD.
  
• Increase maximum Dragon Scale count to 3.
• Have Raiden Thrust and Draconian Fire replace True Thrust and Doom Spike outright. Grant Dragon Scales on combo completion, not combo start. This shifts Wyrmwind Thrust forward one GCD.
• Winged Glide, Elusive Jump, Dragonfire Dive, and Stardiver increase movement speed and melee range by 33% for 1.5 seconds after landing.
• Winged Glide CD reduced to that of Elusive Jump.

Spicier Takes:

• At level 45, Elusive Jump gains a second charge, but Winged Glide now shares charges with Elusive Jump. Both gain a third charge at level 84, with the Winged Lancer trait (formerly Enhanced Winged Glide).
• Wyrmwind Thrust potency reduced by 40, but Heavens' Thrust potency increased by 40 (to 480) and Sonic Thrust potency increased to by 15 (to 135).
• Doom Spike, Draconian Fury, Sonic Thrust, and Coerthan Tempest skills' potency doubled (to 220, 260, 270, 300) but deal 50% reduced damage after striking their first enemy.
• A new dragon skill (alike to Fang and Claw and Wheeling Thrust) has been added, Crushing Tail, which deals 280 potency and 40% less to additional enemies in a wide line.
• Dragoon combos replaced with "stages", which allow for mixing and matching between the former combos. E.g., one may now progress from Doomspike to Disembowel to Heavens' Thrust to Wheeling Thrust, or from True Thrust to Sonic Thrust to Chaotic Spring to Crushing Tail, etc., if they so wish.
• Lance Mastery restored to its previous form, allowing for a second use of Dragon skills, with the last in the 5-step combo being empowered by a further 100 potency.
  
  
• Starcross potency reduced from 900 to 780 and Rise of the Dragon from 550 to 500. Lance Mastery damage bonus increased from 100 to 140 under Lance Mastery IV (to 480 total for an appropriately positioned Fang and Claw or Wheeling Thrust used last in combo, mirroring Heavens' Thrust).
• Life Surge now also causes your next Dragon skill to be replaced with Drakesbane, a 340-potency attack which progresses your combo and benefits from Lance Mastery (will deal 480 if used as a combo-ender). I.e., it can be used to guarantee positionals.
• True/Raiden Thrust, Vorpal Thrust / Lance Barrage, Full/Heavens' Thrust, and Fang and Claw now all use the same hotkey by default, called the Thrust action. This consolidation may be turned off.
• Impulse Drive has been returned, and it, Disembowel / Spiral Blow, Chaos Thrust / Chaotic Spring, / Lance Barrage, Full/Heavens' Thrust, and Fang and Claw now all use the same hotkey by default, called the Drive action. Chaos Thrust renamed to Chaos Drive and Wheeling Thrust renamed to Whirling Wyrm. This consolidation may be turned off.
• Doom Spike / Draconian Fury, Sonic Thrust, Coerthan Tempest, and Crushing Tail now all use the same hotkey by default, called the Surge action. Sonic Thrust renamed to Spear Surge. This consolidation may be turned off.

Want But Not Sure How:

• Far more Jump/Dive interaction.
• Some way to empower/bank Dragonfire Dive, centered on / building from a faster average use-frequency.
• A tiny bit more Lancer-like natural mobility.
• For the weaponskills to provide unique benefits more in keeping with their animations.

Accordant Extra Spicy Spitball:

• Dragonfire Dive removed as a separate CD. Jump itself now solely launches you into the air, consuming 40% of your current MP, to a minimum of 2000 MP and maximum of 4000, increasing movement speed by 40%, the damage of your next combo action by up to 400 potency, and allowing you to charge up to 20 yards to an enemy.
• High Jump increases this to 60% (2000-6000 MP) and up to 600 bonus potency and allows you to stay in the air for up to 1 GCD, further increasing the damage by 450 potency. This latter bonus for a delayed return is separate and cannot benefit from Life Surge.
• Each weaponskill type (Thrust, Drive, or Surge) has a unique animation, replacing that of the normal combo action. All potency, positionals, and additional effects (including combo/stage progression) from the original skill are retained.
• MP spent in this fashion is converted into Dragon's Blood, which can then be spent on Geirskogul. Dragon's Blood spent, in turn, empowers your jumps. In this way you still open with a Jump, as was traditional (just fewer and hitting far more like a truck), spend Geirskoguls, and then end with an empowered hit.
• Obvious WIP is WIP.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Move the damage bonus currently attached to Blood of the Dragon / Life of the Dragon (15%) back to Lance Charge (10% -> 25%), reducing the incentive to triple-weave Battle-Lance-Geir for full damage on the following GCD.

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Triple weaves are not done with the three buffing actions at the same time. Triple weaves are only an actual gain when you have to use Wyrmwind Thrust or Life Surge on the specific GCD in which BL and GSK are used, and when you have to use True North during the 2-minute burst. LC is always used alone one GCD before the other two actions.

The premise is right but I think that the only short-term solution to remove "optimal" triple weaves would be to just bake LC into GSK and make LotD last 25s, but that'd remove an action. LC is kind of redundant right now though.

The above would be aimed at fixing WWT and LS. True North would still need to be triple weaved, so the effect could be baked into BL to avoid this.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Grant Dragon Scales on combo completion, not combo start. This shifts Wyrmwind Thrust forward one GCD.

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I agree but at the same time, I feel like each GCD has a function now and changing this would make Raiden Thrust lose it:

Raiden Thrust is the gauge provider.

Spiral Blow gives us Power Surge.

Chaotic Spring is our highest potency GCD. Heavens' Thrust is its counterpart on the second half of the loop.

Fang and Claw and Wheeling Thrust are the positionals.

Drakesbane is the combo finisher and the action that deals the most damage due to its frequency.

Lance Barrage is a Life Surge candidate in 2-minute bursts, alongside the other 340 potency GCDs, when HT and DB are not possible.

Lance Barrage has the weakest role but it still has one.

My only problem with DRG so far is that when I press Fang and Claw it doesn't become Drakesbane, Wheeling Thrust does. I'd really like it if when I pressed Fang and Claw IT became Drakesbane and same for Wheeling Thrust.

Also if Life Surge / Lance Surge got baked into the one ability you use it on I wouldn't mind.

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Originally Posted by Aco505

LC is always used alone one GCD before the other two actions.

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I'm aware. My point is that the entirely needless shift from leaving the modifier solely on LC to now instead be (more potently) on LotD (which is now just a 1-minute CD) has given GCDs a window constraint that did not exist before.

Axing LS entirely in favor of LotD would also work, but I would prefer not to lose even more APM to consolidations. The only thing particularly ill-affected by needing the BL, LC, and LotD buffs together is our first or last weaponskill in window (since it misses one at end or two at front), so just having LotD again just grant it's bonus actions and LC provide the full bonus damage has solely the cost of Stardiver missing about half a GCD's banking time (while still getting it in under even-minuge LCs).

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Aco505

I agree but at the same time, I feel like each GCD has a function now and changing this would make Raiden Thrust lose it:

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To me, the benefit of each weaponskill is solely their relative potency provided, and I don't see a reason to make key GCDs less leverageable (less rewarded for fitting into window) just to prop up our would-be weakest GCD (i.e., to reduce the penalty of having more of them than necessary in the window). Being unable to, say, fit both an initial Chaotic Spring and the first Wyrmwind into the same LC window makes LC, and imo DRG burst as a whole, feel less impactful or thematic more so than it makes our combo opener feel interesting. As such, I'd prefer the lower ppgcd lows, higher ppgcd highs, lower window-utilization lows for failure, higher window utilization highs for perfecting said window, etc.

I hope the actual Dragoon rework involves more iconic jumping and drastically less standing on the ground doing combos.

My hot take is that if they're bent on LC and LotD both having damage buffs, they might as well combine them. Such an idea would be learning Lance Charge at 30, which gets upgraded into Geirskogul at 60 (casting it would grant the buff from LC for the duration). At 70 Geirskogul turns into Nastrod when cast along with the LC buff being upgraded into LotD with an increased damage buff. Just one less oGCD to cast and makes the two abilites that grant damage buffs just one buff. Afterall LC and LotD both are on 60s cd really and last 20s.

I think I get why they did it, but it feels weird for High Jump/Mirage Dive to not be connected to Geirskogul/Nastrond.

I agree if for no other reason than drg was one of 2 jobs I levelled this expansion where I could not wait to get it over with. I truly hated drg the entire time I was playing it. The other was brd, but it still wasn't as bad as drg was.

Dragoon needs changes, but I feel starting at the job-level would just miss the point.

FFIXV needs changes. To get to actual Dragoon changes, it'd need:

1. A core rethinking of its entire combat system and combat design to move things away from forcibly needing jobs to be fixed-rotation-cycle-only. It should be one type of damage dealer who does that, not all of them + the tanks + the healers.
2. After that, going back to the drawing board and rethinking melee DPS as a whole role, in regards to how it works both in contrast to physical ranged and magical ranged, and how it works internally, how jobs inside the role can differentiate themselves from one another vs what elements they all share.
3. After that, then going back to the drawing board again and rethinking what class fantasy Dragoon is even meant to realize. Clearly it's not airborne jumping, as that was continuously toned down in favor of ease of play, instead of just increasing the payoffs.
4. Only after that can actual changes to the job be realized.

Really, the issues with melee DPS (and DPS as a whole and FFXIV combat as a whole) run too deep to make changes to any particular job very useful. It'd be a new paintjob over the same rusty chassis.