Dragoons: A Rotation Reborn

[SolarMisae]

There was an argument in my FC tonight over NIN vs DRG and we had someone insisting that 10% buff to a very strong bard at all times beats out the 10% buff every minute and the utility of goad. I don't have any numbers to back up a claim one way or another, so I'm curious as to what y'all who have done testing think.

[Vodomir]

There was an argument in my FC tonight over NIN vs DRG and we had someone insisting that 10% buff to a very strong bard at all times beats out the 10% buff every minute and the utility of goad. I don't have any numbers to back up a claim one way or another, so I'm curious as to what y'all who have done testing think.

I'm just afraid that whatever miniscule advantage the Disembowel Debuff to a strong bard might have over the Ninja's 10% group DPS buff for 10 out of 60 seconds (if there is any advantage at all, just going of your assumptions here), it won't be enough to catch up the obvious DPS difference between the NIN and the DRG himself.

[Ricdeau]

There was an argument in my FC tonight over NIN vs DRG and we had someone insisting that 10% buff to a very strong bard at all times beats out the 10% buff every minute and the utility of goad. I don't have any numbers to back up a claim one way or another, so I'm curious as to what y'all who have done testing think.

Keep in mind that Disembowel does not effect all of bard's damage dealing abilities so it's not a straight 10% buff for them while the 10% damage increase for 10 seconds from ninja is for all attacks that are initiated during that 10 seconds. So whatever DOTs are refreshed during that 10 seconds will carry the 10% buff for it's duration something that Disembowel, Dragon Kick, and Dancing Edge/Storm's Eye don't do.

[beowulf81]

I played Dragoon for a long time ...

I have to say.... this, along with the posts from ricky, sleigh and others have really, really depressed me (in regards to this game of course). I've lurked this thread for a while, and drawn inspiration from the work you and others here have done; it has restored my belief in dragoon as a viable job whenever that belief has wavered, and i would give this thread and your work tremendous credit in me being one of, if not the the, top dps'ers in my static.

I cannot fault the reasons you and others have given for your switch, and begrudgingly, it is becoming more and more apparant that i will have to do the same. I simply cannot gimp my static and prevent progression by playing a job that, as it is becoming increasingly clear, will hinder our progression.

My only question; has anyone raised this concern with SquareEnix, the dev team, or Yoshi? I remember back when Warrior was found to be a gimp tank for endgame, they buffed the class in 2.2 to make it viable. Yet here we are in 2.4, Dragoons are gimped on jump roots, overall dps even if rotation and positionals are hit perfectly, and horrid, horrid mdef that results in ridiculous damage (i remember losing 6k in health and dying on a REX run where a blm ran into my thunderstruck with his). Dragoon is a gimp job for endgame, and given how quick the dev team have been in the past to address balance issues I am somewhat astounded that they have failed to address the weakness of the Dragoon job.

I really love this game; I really love the dragoon job. But I do not want to play that job, and to be honest, i will not want to play this game, if that job, the one that i feel the most affinity for, that i play the best, is going to remain an endgame progression joke, a drain on the rest of the team. I'm not saying this to make an ultimatum, its just how i really feel, and i cannot be alone on this.

Has anyone heard any feedback from the dev team that they will address this?

[SeraviEdalborez]

I honestly advise any DRG to just play MNK as well. If you're dedicated enough, play NIN and maybe BRD too. If this was a game where you couldn't change your job and DRGs were just statistically inferior, you'd have a problem. Right now you don't (well, you do but it's not un-fixable). Unless you bought a piece of DRG left side already, your accessories all transfer to MNK and i110 leftside is easily farmable now.

Our dedicated melee guy in our coil group swaps between DRG and MNK depending on his mood, and often goes DRG for learning and MNK for when he's got it learned.

[HulveinBlitz]

I think if this topic: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...30#post2565230 Keeps going, maybe they'll give some form of response, but I doubt they read here. But yeah, Hak, Yan, Sleigh etc, all make valid points.

[beowulf81]

i'm doing the same: the issue is, the other melee in our group is a monk/ninja as well. there's a weekly lockout on coil gear, meaning only one drop between the both of us, and a weekly restriction on poetics gear; meaning i will not be able to gear up dragoon if i choose to gear up ninja for final coil. I'm probably going to circumvent this by having nin on an alt.

after 2.5 the above likely won't be an issue, but if Yoshi and co. are content to let Dragoon remain a gimp job for endgame progression, i would think more and more players would just abandon the job and simply just play nin/mnk full time.

I find the idea that the dev team are aware of how gimped Dragoons are and are content to allow them to remain this way maddening. What is the point in having a job that is simply just not viable for endgame progression?

[SeraviEdalborez]

It's viable. It's just not optimal. Most groups progressing in Final Coil are not Lucrezia or DnT. They're going to be significantly better geared by the time they get to the later turns eventually. So the disparity between a good DRG and a good MNK, while it'll still be there, won't be a big deal. MNK+MNK is/was one of the best things you could bring DPS-wise and it didn't really make everyone bring it to everything in pickups (partially for loot reasons I imagine) or statics.

[Orlandeu]

Redundant.

[rickyguo]

What is the point in having a job that is simply just not viable for endgame progression?

honestly, it's viable for endgame progression but like.. just not as good. I will end up killing t13 on drg since I won't have time to level/gear another class until it's down and killed t10-t12 with drg fine. The problems are that during progression, a lot of mechanics force me to skip positionals since I don't know the timing on skills. I take a lot more damage from magic aoes like megaflare, tetraflare, twisters etc. We really miss the dragonkick debuff which is actually a big deal when you're undergeared and mantras nice too. Likewise, the 10% damage increase is better for adds than "drg burst", goad is nice and ninjas don't really require positionals or take more damage from aoe.

Unless you're hoping to kill t13 this week, I think that by the time you get to it, there really won't be that much of a difference between DRG and other classes that you could if you want, play the class you want.