"A system that rewards effort and innovation" can't be buzzwords for imbalance-get

[Peregrine]

You don't have to see their results. Look at the game balance now. The only reason the grossly imbalanced classes aren't ruining the game is precisely because there's no pressure--no challenging content--to evolve it into the disaster it's getting ready to become.

Just like adding a rare, restricted, unreaplaceable sellable piece would destroy the economy--it'd sell for 200 million gil... adding challenging content will destroy any pretence of class balance. People already have mass-levelled their token thaumaturges and archers in anticipation that they'll be the 1st-class classes. Now they're just itching for an excuse to stack 6 of them.

The developers need to realize that unless they have new challenge and new difficulty design up their sleeves that go beyond the pathetic berserk modes, meleer-penalizing attacks, and things that the player base can't handle without resorting to cheap tactics...this is what they'll get. Glad, Archerx6, THM. Glad, THMx4, ARCx2. THMx8.

That's not innovation. And yet that's the solution to nearly any cliche challenge the devs are likely to throw out there.

Have faith in a player base you can't trust to not exclude players, and have faith in a developer who couldn't make a hit if their lives depended on it right now is what you're saying.

No. That's not very smart.

[DurtiMonkeyToe]

You don't have to see their results. Look at the game balance now. The only reason the grossly imbalanced classes aren't ruining the game is precisely because there's no pressure--no challenging content--to evolve it into the disaster it's getting ready to become.

Just like adding a rare, restricted, unreaplaceable sellable piece would destroy the economy--it'd sell for 200 million gil... adding challenging content will destroy any pretence of class balance. People already have mass-levelled their token thaumaturges and archers in anticipation that they'll be the 1st-class classes. Now they're just itching for an excuse to stack 6 of them.

The developers need to realize that unless they have new challenge and new difficulty design up their sleeves that go beyond the pathetic berserk modes, meleer-penalizing attacks, and things that the player base can't handle without resorting to cheap tactics...this is what they'll get. Glad, Archerx6, THM. Glad, THMx4, ARCx2. THMx8.

That's not innovation. And yet that's the solution to nearly any cliche challenge the devs are likely to throw out there.

Have faith in a player base you can't trust to not exclude players, and have faith in a developer who couldn't make a hit if their lives depended on it right now is what you're saying.

No. That's not very smart.

You have no way of knowing that they aren't going to be doing a lot of balancing as it stands in the next few patches.

[Peregrine]

You have no way of knowing that they aren't going to be doing a lot of balancing as it stands in the next few patches.

And you have no way of knowing they do. You have their 4-year start history in XI, where they didn't, and you have their 1-year FFXIV start history where they don't.

I'm not the one without any evidence when I say watch the class balance like a hawk. You actually have no evidence when you say ehhhhhhhhhh let's wait and see.

No, let's not.

[DurtiMonkeyToe]

And you have no way of knowing they do. You have their 4-year start history in XI, where they didn't, and you have their 1-year FFXIV start history where they don't.

I'm not the one without any evidence when I say watch the class balance like a hawk. You actually have no evidence when you say ehhhhhhhhhh let's wait and see.

No, let's not.

Unfortunately you're wrong, I do have evidence:

-Changes to actions for Disciplines of War & Magic classes
-Further changes to enhance class uniqueness
-NEW- Adjustment of certain action effects in line with the introduction of dungeons
-NEW- Adjustment of range of effect for actions (single target or area)
-NEW-Adjustment of recast time and MP consumption for actions
-Reexamination of stats

All pulled directly from the LFTP. Sounds a lot like 'balancing' to me.

[Lerris]

The best example I've seen of an encounter rewarding diversity was the first part of the Alexander fight in ToAU, where Raubahn developed resistances to the predominant damage types in his second and third incarnations, encouraging parties to have a melee DD, magic DD and a ranged DD. This of course forced the party to be balanced for the second part of the fight as well.

[Tsuga]

The best example I've seen of an encounter rewarding diversity was the first part of the Alexander fight in ToAU, where Raubahn developed resistances to the predominant damage types in his second and third incarnations, encouraging parties to have a melee DD, magic DD and a ranged DD. This of course forced the party to be balanced for the second part of the fight as well.

Things like that would be great, but then you have the issue of being forced to have a certain job type. What if nobody from your LS has levelled that job, or there's nobody free online from one of those jobs? It's the same issue that we had in XI where we couldn't even level unless we had a fairly specific setup for a party.

[Lerris]

Since Raubahn only developed a 50% immunity each time, it was very manageable with only two of the three damage types. And the three damage types were broad enough to allow a lot of leeway in jobs.

[Peregrine]

Things like that would be great, but then you have the issue of being forced to have a certain job type. What if nobody from your LS has levelled that job, or there's nobody free online from one of those jobs? It's the same issue that we had in XI where we couldn't even level unless we had a fairly specific setup for a party.

If your LS is made of a bunch of thaumaturges and archers, maybe you should think more about game balance and playing fairly and less about conveniently levelling the imbalance in the game. I'm not going to pretend that there isn't a large group here who only levels and only plays the imbalanced jobs because they like how the imbalance makes them feel and like how it gets them treated. I'm saying it's not very admirable and should be developed against.

If there are not enough of the other jobs, then the developers are already too late and have already failed to balance the jobs for so long that they've quit like they did in FFXI. In FFXI, meleers got massive enhancements to the point where black mage and ranger almost went extinct because the devs had a choice. Either enhance meleers and piss off the spoiled ranged attackers...or lose 70% of the game's population who refuse to "just level black mage if you want to be useful."

FFXI was so Darwinistic against meleers that everyone and their brother already knew instinctively to level archer and mages in this game. That lancer was going to be a bad investment from the start. The developers evolved and encouraged players to be like this.

How FFXI treated dragoons, thieves, and dark knights for 4 years was the reason it never got half of WoW's subscriptions. The game was a playland for rangers and mages, and the meleers paid to keep their lights on.

Now that the "just doesn't get it" is being fixed, there are two massive threats to this game assuming they can actually develop 8/10 content like they promise. The first is RMT and cheating. The second is class balance.

Right now they get a D in both. This game could never have worked as-designed, because the jobs are poorly constructed in comparison to each other. It is a fundamental weakness that most players were too busy screaming about chocobos to notice, and it's a huge issue.

None of Yoshida's to-do boxes addresses the 2nd most, arguably most important going concern for the game where it's grossly failing. Class/Job imbalance and poor design.

Whoever designed thaumaturges and archers should not be let near the new system, because that person fundamentally does not understand the consequences of their decisions.

[Peregrine]

Unfortunately you're wrong, I do have evidence:

-Changes to actions for Disciplines of War & Magic classes
-Further changes to enhance class uniqueness
-NEW- Adjustment of certain action effects in line with the introduction of dungeons
-NEW- Adjustment of range of effect for actions (single target or area)
-NEW-Adjustment of recast time and MP consumption for actions
-Reexamination of stats

All pulled directly from the LFTP. Sounds a lot like 'balancing' to me.

Clean your ears.
Everything in the game is changing. There is zero indication of job balancing in anything you mentioned. Balancing isn't simple change to accomodate auto attack and stat redesign. It's a fundamental decision to alter how jobs view other jobs.

If change isn't accompanied by balance, you're the first one left in town. If I were you, I wouldn't put my eggs in that basket you're holding. It has no bottom.

[Teknoman]

Clean your ears.
Everything in the game is changing. There is zero indication of job balancing in anything you mentioned. Balancing isn't simple change to accomodate auto attack and stat redesign. It's a fundamental decision to alter how jobs view other jobs.

If change isn't accompanied by balance, you're the first one left in town. If I were you, I wouldn't put my eggs in that basket you're holding. It has no bottom.

Doesnt general adjustment count as balancing? Sure its not explicitly saying "We are balancing ___" but adjustments to most of the fundamental parts of the system as well as implementing a different battle system, and even changing up the stats/ distribution of enemies goes towards an attempt to balance things.

Besides, i'm sure things will be a little different, especially since it's the XI director, and i'd like to think he's learned from his past mistakes. Along with the fact that alot of servers were different back then. Even now...when I recently played on the Fairy/Sylph server, I really didnt see THAT many rangers 24/7, and on Midgardsormr, as a Paladin from NA launch until 2004, I really didnt have that much of a problem getting parties.

Always made sure I had a fairly balanced party (coming straight from standard FF titles to XI), and Dark Knights/Samurai seemed to be in decent demand with one ranger every now and then. After reading the OP again, I see where you are coming from, however, people are still going to figure out ways to "cheese" things in video games no matter what.