What can the dev team do to satisfy the critics of 1.18?

[Reaujien]

I want people to understand what's behind the changes in this patch. In design, there are trade-offs. For instance, when a developer changes one thing, but creates a bug somewhere else, this is an instance of a trade off. The new thing works in the build, but the trade-off is that the old thing doesn't.

I'm sorry, but that's not called a "trade-off" - that's simply called a bug, or an unintended side-effect. A bug is when something is not working as designed or not at all, whereas a trade-off is knowingly making a change that affects two things (one negative while the other positive) but both are still working and working as designed.

Let's take a look at the anecdotal evidence here on the boards..

It should be obvious to people putting the facts together:

Wait a tick - how can something be anecdotal but at the same time factual as well?

Let's take a look at some of the (unintended) consequences of patch 1.18:

-Looking for members Darkhold GLA/CON/CON/CON/CON/ARC/ARC/ARC, leaving out other classes

That's because players either a) aren't good, or b) simply have separation anxiety from pre-1.18 and don't want to rework and rethink their play strategies. Trust me, as a game developer, we play-test changes/new content for it's "playability" before releasing to the players; and if the SE dev play-testers were only able to play Darkhold with the party setup that you asserted above then we all may as well quit the game. However, I've seen some good changes from this new dev team and I'm confident they were able to play Darkhold with a much different setup.

-Leveled Thaumaturge for months just for healing, but now have to set the whole class aside and level the healer class du jour

Beginning description from official THM description : "In the hands of a skilled practitioner, thaumaturgy can be a force of terrifying destruction." ... WHOOPS! And you (or whomever you're referring to above) thought this would be the best class to level just for healing? Interesting choice - to each their own I suppose.

-Running out of MP while soloing guildleves

This can't mean everyone because I only run out of MP while soloing guildleves if I rush and forget to pause for a few seconds between each kill and let my MP auto-refresh itself a number of ticks (not to mention running while in combat-mode).

-Baffling hate spikes throughout the game - need a R30 Lancer ability for tanking?

Maybe - why not? In FFXI you needed /WHM to get any regularly available AoE healing abilities, let alone the -na spells. (And before anyone rages out and goes "THIS IS FFXIV NOT FFXI" you'd do well to remember that EVERY FF game in the series has been influenced by past FF titles). So, to be a "good" tank you may need to swap out a few abilities, or maybe it would be worth-while to make sure to include a certain class/role in your pt to help with whatever it may be. I mean, after all, didn't Yoshi (or some dev post on a forum) mention that holding threat isn't always going to be 100% on the tank's shoulders? I think so but I can't recall the specific letter/post/etc.

-Offensive build Conjurers in low demand

And this is the dev's fault that players/groups can't see the benefits of an offensive CNJ? Or is it just that a good offensive CNJ just doesn't exist yet because he or she is getting re-acclimated to the overall changes to the DoM classes? So in that "GLA/CON/CON/CON/CON/ARC/ARC/ARC" setup that you mentioned above, not ONE of those CNJ is equipped for an offensive role?

-Hybrid Conjurers with less abilities to contribute in battle because resources shifted toward healing

Shouldn't you only have "hybrid" makeups when you're already solid on the roles that make up the "hybrid" in the first place? That is, assuming you mean a "hybrid CNJ" both nukes, debuffs, and heals, wouldn't that only work if you had a dedicated healer or dedicated nuker or dedicated debuffer already in the party/group? Seems to me that it's simply a bad role setup for the group/situation. Afterall, the hybrid DoW player would probably have some sort of a cure/sacrifice/protect/shell/etc. spell on them while they are soloing, but would set abilities specifically for say tanking or DD while in a group and ignore the other "hybrid" spells/abilities.

-Archers upset with their recast times

If someone took away the cocaine from drug addicts and replaced it with apples I'm sure they would would be upset too.

So we've seen that the trade-off for the above issues is the rewarding gameplay in Darkhold. Now ask yourself, is 1 dungeon's gameplay significant enough to throw the balance of the entire remaining game off? I'd say: the dev team got carried away in the rush to make a competent dungeon. They forgot about the rest of the game because they had too much riding on it. They were already nervous about releasing it before the battle changes were finished but they were embarrassed by releasing nothing for over 3 months straight. They were backed into a corner and they panicked. They balanced recast timers and ability changes around Darkhold -

Do you watch Glen Beck? Or do you follow Michelle Bauchmann on Twitter?

I'm not sure where you're getting the information that would support your suggestion that the dev team got "carried away" while making Darkhold and so they "forgot" about the rest of the game because I'm seeing a lot of content in this patch that has nearly nothing to do with the battle system or either of the two dungeons.

As far as the battle changes, it's been well-communicated that all the changes weren't going to be in just one single patch, but instead they wer going to span multiple patches. Are you sure you want to go as far as to suggest that they temporarily "balanced recast timers and ability changes" just so they could "nervously" release some sort of end-game content such as Darkhold? So does that mean, then, when they finish all the changes to the battle system that these "recast timers and ability changes" which you speak of will be ... re-changed/balanced again around whatever future content is added?

but the question is: is this arbitrary fact enough to justify going further down this path?

Actually, before anyone thinks about attempting to ponder that question I have an honest question: What do you mean by this? I mean, respectfully, I'm confused by this, and I'm thinking it's your word usage. What is an "arbitrary fact"? It sounds as if you're contradicting yourself because for something to be arbitrary (e.g., a decision) it is based purely on one's subjective perspective in that no context at all suggests nor guarantees the existence of any factual information.

Should the dev team reverse course on some of the unpopular changes and find another way to balance gameplay in Darkhold? Yes.

I might be missing something, but was there another survey that was sent out to the entire player [active/inactive] community related to the changes of 1.18 wherein the results provided empirical evidence to suggest that the changes you've mentioned were unpopular overall?

What are the dev team's options?

-Continue down the same path of balancing classes around dungeons
-Or balance battle in all situations, including dungeons

The dev team should take into account all battle situations: solo, party, guildleve, low-tier NM, world NM, dungeon, enthusiast soloing

I'm pretty sure the New Years survey suggested that the majority of players wanted to participate and group/party gameplay whether doing missions or quests or whatever; and I'm equally as sure that the majority of players also wanted more class/role uniqueness and less of a "melting pot". Why, then, should the battle system be geared in such a way to give special accommodations for any class/role to engage in solo battles and yet still be able to perform at the capacity that is required to fill a specific role during group/party battles?

MP costs should be balanced to take into account soloing, or it should be left as is and MP regen food should be added and MP restoring mana drinks between fights

First off, you can't formulate MP costs in favor of solo-play without unbalancing party-play. It's like wanting to pay less taxes and wanting a bigger social security check - ebb and flow. Also, isn't "Ether" a word to describe "MP restoring mana drinks"? The game has these already. And how do you know future patches won't contain MP-regen food/drinks?

Enmity needs to be tested thoroughly in all situations before being patched.

Actually, only non-solo, battle situations need to be "tested thoroughly" (which I'm willing to bet they already are) because enmity doesn't even matter when you're in solo-battle.