Curious on opinion. Smn or Mch. Which would you pick?

[RiceisNice]

..

You won't have TP depletion if you have those downtimes is what I'm saying. I've (shamefully) been in A1 runs where we'd go through the cycle at least eight times because of our low damage output. Neither mine (MCH) or the NIN's TP that I queued with ever dipped below comfortable amounts from invigorate. For all we know the fights probably won't be the same anyway and we'd probably be able to attack them even while jumping, but again this is only from a raid-standpoint.

I've accepted that we're on the lower end on the dps spectrum, but the matter of the question is why. I've never been able do more than the resident SMN, DRG or MNK in my group in FCoB, and it's certainly not the case now even with gauss barrel. If it's a matter of their mobility (which I will still disagree with to an extent but that's another subject) then it's more of a moot point with GB/WM. If it's because of the support, why even add on an additional damage penalty on top of their naturally low damage?

[Minorinz]

You won't have TP depletion if you have those downtimes is what I'm saying.

It'll take a while for those downtimes to happen in savage no doubt, also those downtimes you are talking about are literally 6-7 secs, a perfect time to play a song. There were downtimes in final coil especially on T12(aoe phase, adds phase) and T13(dives, teraflare) melee still needed tp and healers still needed mp. It's literally just a cycle in this game, everything is being repeated, so if that doesn't happen and BRD/MCH will not be needed for alex savage's progression then the dev team will be forced to up their damage and remove their utility all together.

As for why? Alright, let's break the current dps jobs down.

Melee is top dps, why? because they are supposed to suffer dps loss when:

1- The boss is not stationary. (extreme headache and dps loss)
2- Their gameplay is affected by downtime a little more than casters. Losing GL or BoTD etc..
3- Having to move in and out for AOE and mechanics.

So SE has them top dps depending on the occurrence of the above to average their total dps. IF the boss is moving 24/7 rip melee, kick pls, nobody wants those. Alright let's look at casters:

1- They are ranged so they don't suffer or gain when their target moves here and there unlike melee.
2- Their own movement heavily affects their dps, especially BLM. SMN suffers too in exchange for mana, so they are mobile by burning their mana with ruin 2.
3- Downtime hurts their dps, especially BLM, but it's not as painful as melee. SMNs care now because of their AA stacks.

So SE has them right after melee, on single target they will never be top dps especially when melee gets their dummy fight. Let's look at BRD/MCH:

1- Movement during fights does not affect them heavily as much as melee or casters, they can dance all they want- lose damage but they are still DEALING DAMAGE in the end, where every other class with constant movement(or when the target is moving) will fail to deliver combos and casts. The least punished job for consistent on going movement compared to ALL other DPS jobs.
2- Downtime may hurt their activated buffs but they do not have major damage stacks to keep up, only dots which is the case with every other dps.
3- Best utility offered to the WHOLE party which is unique. (Goad is awesome but it is single target.)
Also don't forget, they will be fixing Warden.

so SE gave these ranged physical guys a stationary buff, it's not that OP because if it is then it will make them mobile whenever, extremely rewarding when stationary and best utility to be offered. You know what let's all go bards and machinists!!!


Correct me if i'm wrong about the stacks that you need to keep up? Are there any? Maybe I'm missing something?

I still remember though, all those bards during T1-T5 because of their mobility and high damage. Why would anyone want to go caster/melee on annoying fights? There is a balance in this game and I truly feel like they should give bard/machinist some more space regarding their mobility accompanied with decent damage output.

[Aiselia]

the WHOLE party

Correction:

Bards do not offer utility to the whole party. They offer utility to a limited subset of the party.

MP regen will not affect tanks, melee, or BLMs. At best, the healers are affected and maybe SMN if they need to res people.

TP regen will not affect casters or healers.

Foe's will not affect melee (except limited ninja) or melee or healers for the most part.
On the other hand, Battle Litany helps everybody. Mantra can help everybody. Trick Attack helps every class that hits the mob. All three melees have utility skills that help more people than Bard.

Please, people, stop forgetting that raiding is not the entire game. You will not always have a caster to make Foe's useful. You will not always run things that require TP/MP regen. You will not always have complete control over your party setup. You will not always be in a fight where you constantly need to be moving. You will not even always be in a dungeon because you *need* to run around the outside world to even unlock things. Why should it take me longer to kill something while I'm questing to go through the story because in a dungeon where I'm not, I might maybe play a song if I happen to need to?

It is bad design to "balance" things around a minority of the game. It is also bad design to give any single class "a guaranteed space" in a raid because they bring "necessary utility". If you need a Bard otherwise you'll end up running out of resources, then that's just bad design. Classes should be taken because they're all equally viable, not because they need one.

[Minorinz]

The point I was getting across is that those downtimes exist to the extent that TP songs are not necessarily needed.

I'll leave this to savage then. I will undoubtedly hear our melee ask for tp or healers asking for mp and surely I will be asking for foes during the fight. In the case tp/mp refreshers become necessary from a bard/mch, would that help with your insecurity on how the community needs those 2 jobs for difficult content, for a better overall dps output and smooth progression?

One more thing, go on any melee job and ask a tank to move the target around, say a target who's hitbox is as large as bahamut's. You won't be able to get your rotation/combo across with the correct positionals. Would be nice if the melee community can vouch for how impossible it is to do so even if the movement is for 3-4 seconds every 2 mins. As for earthshakers/shriek, how will you justify their bad rng luck with those? Are you saying them getting shakers/shriek is almost the same as them not getting any? what will supplement with the dps loss? When SE decides to become innovative with their battle design on savage, they will not ignore melee completely. Also, let me refresh your memory. Back in T1-T5, how bad was it for the melee back then? People didn't even bother with 2 melee, it was just one and it was for the sake of the LB. T1's ADS AOE + snakes cleaves, T2's ADS AOE disco party. I still remember ranged doing the rot mechanic because even then ranged was equal to melee's damage with their eyes closed. T4's targets being spread everywhere and on the move. T5's positioning and adds popping on a different location every 2-3 mins. I can't blame SE for considering all of this crap to give melee some room to breathe. FCOB didn't have much of a challenge for melee but it was tp starving during progression which is why bard was 100% important for it. (that's not the only reason bards were brought.)

In 3.0, the dps curve is scaling correctly, comparing it to 2.0 it does sound about right with really good players. What you see in 3.0 is literally 2.0 x2. Everything is being amplified. Casters getting extreme burst damage and can sustain single target damage while being stationary, this is the trait they wanted to share with bard/mch but apparently it failed miserably due to people having issues trying something new. Let's be real, right now bards and machinists are expecting to be able to dance around, do the same damage a caster does and be 5%-10% bellow melee damage on a stationary target. Are you guys for real?

Correction:

Bards do not offer utility to the whole party. They offer utility to a limited subset of the party.

Are you seriously explaining to me how mp/tp regen works? Oh dear God. When all the songs are combined including foes will leave no party member not benefiting from them. Bottom point is, brd/mch do buff/assist anyone and anything in the party including pets. Is there any job that can do that? Jobs that can refresh your resources anytime that is required on a PARTY WIDE range? Does that make sense to you now?

When you compare, Battle litany that's a 15% crit rng buff and trick attack that doesn't even cross a total of 3% dps boost during the whole fight, do you consider healers that dps and require mana or foes, melee/tanks that get tp starved? The difference is obvious on long fights. Foes makes a difference for casters/healers in dungeons/silly content too.

I will ask you not to forget about the reason why brds/mchs are being overly dramatic across the forums as well. First off, they are being rejected from raiding content by ignorant people who think savage will give them some space to breathe with no support, and by support I mean utility including bard/mch's ability to move freely and still be able to deal damage. Also no offense, I've known bards who were capable of leveling up lightning fast and adjusting perfectly, these are the same bards who jump in to handle mechanics while perfecting their rotation. Much respect to these kind of players.

If all jobs become the same in terms of dps then why won't people go for ranged all day every day? They are mobile, they have lovely utility, can easily dodge and perform mechanics. By that logic no casters will be needed nor melee. If all the jobs are equal in terms of utility and gameplay. I doubt anyone would want to play this game anymore, there will be no synergy between the jobs at all.

[RiceisNice]

...

I don't have much else to add then on the discussion on savage, just that the roles should be clearly more defined imo (support or dps? Devs can't even keep this consistent. Break it down to ranged and melee or three different subgroups of dps?)

Let's be real, right now bards and machinists are expecting to be able to dance around, do the same damage a caster does and be 5%-10% bellow melee damage on a stationary target. Are you guys for real?

I can only speak for myself when I don't expect to outdamage a melee in the best circumstance, but it should be relatively close to that of summoner or BLM to an extent, especially regen isn't needed. The damage loss from mobility or mechanics...it's sound on paper but it's just not the case in meaningful content (such as melee being able to minimize their overall downtimes with earthshakers, otherwise they wouldn't be still pulling so far ahead of non-melees)

The amount of situational awareness and forecasting has definitely gone up from compared to 2.0 for both BRD and MCH (and is the case for pretty much every other class), but between devs saying "you will be able to use this ability to deal more damage", what is this supposed to mean? Are we giving up our freedom of movement to deal extra damage? Or is it to make up the damage difference that's naturally lower at the end of 2.x's cycle, either because of the inherent support abilities or because of said mobility? It's not more damage relative to how much we were doing at the end of 2.x's cycle to now in comparison to other DPS classes. Maybe it's in need of tweaks, maybe its not. I'm fine with either one; most of my posts here has been more on just figuring out why it's the case, whether or not its the support aspect or their freedom of uptime.

If all jobs become the same in terms of dps then why won't people go for ranged all day every day? They are mobile, they have lovely utility, can easily dodge and perform mechanics. By that logic no casters will be needed nor melee. If all the jobs are equal in terms of utility and gameplay. I doubt anyone would want to play this game anymore, there will be no synergy between the jobs at all.

This is where you'd want class diversity because of synergy or individual utility. But if every class has that, whats the next way to gauge who you want? Yo uonly get so much benefit from one class, that having a second one severely diminishes how much you get out of it (which was also why summoner was mediocre at best in 2.x since the usefulness of traited virus was incredibly diminished by a scholar). I didn't like the design of 2.x where bard was the only class with regen while being defined as a ranged dps class, and their slot pretty much went uncontested. It also didn't help that RoD initially had one of the best debuffs for progression and only made them much more desirable.

And on a side note, I apologize for how far this has gotten; I'm the sort of person that picks out arguments/debate out of the frustration of design with the classes and gameplay, but at least this one has gone a bit more civil compared to other BRD threads I've seen.

[Aiselia]

When all the songs are combined including foes will leave no party member not benefiting from them.

Sure. One subset at a time, since not all songs will be up at the same time and you will run out of MP singing.

Is there any job that can do that?

DRG has Battle Litany, NIN has Trick Attack. Both of those affect the entire party at once, rather than a couple people at a time.

If all jobs become the same in terms of dps then why won't people go for ranged all day every day?

Simple. For utility other classes bring.

Bards can't buff each others' damage. DRG can. Bring a DRG to increase your piercing damage.

Ninjas can buff slash damage if you don't have a WAR. Bring a NIN to increase the damage your tanks put out, plus Trick Attack for everybody.

SMN can revive the healers if the healers die. They're the only DPS that can do that now. Bring them along for the cushion. And bonus, they get a benefit from Foes!

Why would you give up all that "lovely utility" just because Bards might be able to put out equal damage under optimal situations?

[Minorinz]

Sure. One subset at a time, since not all songs will be up at the same time and you will run out of MP singing.

Which is why the brd/mch will have to communicate with the party members and think on how to utilize their songs correctly. Communication is key, friend.

DRG has Battle Litany, NIN has Trick Attack. Both of those affect the entire party at once, rather than a couple people at a time.

They do not have the same impact as tp/mp/foes. They are also situational meaning not everyone times their buffs with them other than their opener due to the short duration. Foes last longer and can be communicated and timed. Also like I said, battle litany is literally a 15% rng buff, trick attack is worth more.

Simple. For utility other classes bring.

Bards can't buff each others' damage. DRG can. Bring a DRG to increase your piercing damage.

Ninjas can buff slash damage if you don't have a WAR. Bring a NIN to increase the damage your tanks put out, plus Trick Attack for everybody.

SMN can revive the healers if the healers die. They're the only DPS that can do that now. Bring them along for the cushion. And bonus, they get a benefit from Foes!

You do realize drgs buff bards/machinists and not any other job right? So if im bringing a drg instead of a bard what good will that do? lol
Smn has a nice res but it eats their mana but why would anyone jump off a cliff to begin with?
Nins goad/slashing buff/trick attack is lovely but guess what? drgs and monks are on top of it (dps) and I don't see nins complaining about it. That's because it's balanced. Also nins buffs are not make it or break it like bard's utility. whats the use of a nin if monks/tanks run out of tp while the slashing buff is out? they can't dps anyway. Goad can only target one person at a time so that won't help. Nin is very limited, dear.


Sorry for the double post, had to clarify!

[Aiselia]

They do not have the same impact as tp/mp/foes.

You asked which other classes can buff the entire party. I answered. Your subjective opinion on how useful they are doesn't really affect the question.

So if im bringing a drg instead of a bard what good will that do?

Shall I do some simple math for you? You asked why anyone would bring anything but BRD/MCH if they were equal in damage.
If 4 BRDs do 1000 DPS each, they will do 4000 DPS together.
If 1 DRG is doing 1000 DPS and 3 BRDs are doing 1000 DPS and the DRG can buff all their damage by 10%, then they're all ending up doing 1100 DPS, for a total of 4400 DPS.

I'd have thought that should be obvious.

why would anyone jump off a cliff to begin with?

Things happen.

Nin is very limited, dear.

Which is why I didn't say to bring 4 NIN. I said A NIN. For its utility.

You shouldn't try to be condescending. It doesn't work when you're missing simple concepts.