4Gamer Interview with Yoshi-P!

[Eothas]

I don't think a skill tree or something similar would work in this game. Players would in fact find the most efficient build in no time. Don't get me wrong, I would love this to be possible and I know that this can be done in other games and that there is games that have done it and done it well (Ragnarok Online for example).

Sadly FFXIV is not one these games. Why? Because basically 99.9% of all skills in this game can be throw in a calculator and then is just a matter of time to find the "best" build. Since the only concern in this game is "How much DPS I can do in X amount of time?"

I want to be wrong, and I want them to try, but sadly its pretty clear that this won't work in FFXIV.

[Nektulos-Tuor]

I don't think a skill tree or something similar would work in this game. Players would in fact find the most efficient build in no time. Don't get me wrong, I would love this to be possible and I know that this can be done in other games and that there is games that have done it and done it well (Ragnarok Online for example).

Sadly FFXIV is not one these games. Why? Because basically 99.9% of all skills in this game can be throw in a calculator and then is just a matter of time to find the "best" build. Since the only concern in this game is "How much DPS I can do in X amount of time?"

I want to be wrong, and I want them to try, but sadly its pretty clear that this won't work in FFXIV.

Well, mostly because the combat system and engine are so boring. They kind of cornered themselves. They have really no need for Crowd Control at all, or cool classes.

Its pretty much just: "Get mobs hp to 0, win."

There is really no strategy involved in the combat, all the strategy is placed on the encounter. So, yeah your right. A system won't work for games like WoW, FFXIV because since its a numbers race there is always only ONE way to win.



In Everquest and older games you had to use Mana Drains, Healing and self healing spells, encounters would change the fight and make you use mezmorizes and crowd control effects and run around the room, or knock back certain mobs or restore the groups mana or use songs. Some fights even had you manage your own health and mana, or throttle DOWN dps to win.

There is a fight in EQ2 if you do TOO MUCH damage, your group wipes. You have to keep your damage under a certain point, and this was before parses. Just so many UNIQUE encounters.


Since this game is so simplified though, a trait system would do nothing for it really. Look how well they treated bard/machinist. They are pretty much DPS with very LITTLE support, (pretty worthless support in my opinion..)

[Dyvid]

I understand where Yoshi-P is coming from in terms of FFXIV skill trees won't work but I don't think that's what we are asking for. Furthermore he made the comment on new job rather than customizing the current ones, which is great except what is his plan to fill the two year void in the mean time? Past level cap we need something to do and clearly upping the ilvl just isn't as satisfy as he thinks. Personally I think something similar to FFXI merit system would fit better because it was augmenting current skills and traits rather then trying to reinvent a job.

[RiceisNice]

I feel the Armoury system could work beautifully to provide the customization aspect we'd like.

The soul stone things need to be reworked entirely if they want to diversify the current jobs, or they can opt with adding new jobs that perform the same role (melee dps, caster, ranged dps, tank, healer). The problem with soulstones right now is that they are not introduced until level 30, and your abilities from 1-50 are tied to your class, it really gives no room to work with when it comes to diversifying gameplay if they are all drawing from the same skill pool; think berserker being a marauder sub-job, with deliverance, fell cleave, decimate and tp regen. It doesn't play any different from warrior because they're still drawing the same BB and maim combos, as well as cooldowns such as berserk, and at best you make them play similar to each other.

As salty as I am with SE right now, he makes a point. I much rather have new jobs to play then making roles within a job. The point of the Job system in the first place is to make you excel in a certain aspect. If we were to go to a skill tree like system, it would basically be using the Class system again which we already have in the game. It did not work out as planned as you can see.

Regardless of what you're going to choose (job talents or more, diversed jobs), people will still ultimately try to go with the "best" to do cutting-edge progression. That's just the reality of it; why do you think every group runs with at least a WAR and DRG, while opting out on AST and PLD until the content is essentially "nerfed" due to overgearing? And it'll just become more evident once we add in more jobs, especially if it's in rhythm with a 8-man composition.

Whether its more jobs or additional talents, something should be done to make the game at the player characters feel like there is some sort of variety, whether it be end game or general gameplay. Espesically since the current state of sub-stats, and even primary stats, do nothing but boost your numbers slightly; there's no sense of empowerment when you get that gear piece upgrade. More jobs can do it just fine provided they don't screw that up (see BRD/MCH)

[Kosmos992k]

Sadly FFXIV is not one these games. Why? Because basically 99.9% of all skills in this game can be throw in a calculator and then is just a matter of time to find the "best" build. Since the only concern in this game is "How much DPS I can do in X amount of time?"

If the game were deeper than everything coming down to DPS, I think that people would complain less because then secondary stats and slightly different builds would have more relevance.

[Kosmos992k]

I feel the Armoury system could work beautifully to provide the customization aspect we'd like. That said, I think that two things need to accompany that:
1. Less restrictions on gearing multiple jobs
2. More flavour in secondary stats, more horizontal gear choices and more reason to choose something other than your base stat with your 35 attribute points (I don't even see why give us this choice in the current design)

I agree with the above. How about throwing in a leveling mechanic that allows you to retrain your job (drop to level 1 in the primary class for your job and re-level) and the primary class it is based on and receive an extra cross class skill slot for it. Retrain a 2nd time and get one more slot, retrain a 3rd time and you can combine cross class skills from a third class. It would take a hell of a lot of leveling, but it would enhance and deepen your main class by giving you an additional 2 cross class skill slots and a third class to select skills from.

My mind boggles at the prospect of retraining multiple jobs in this manner, but it would be a pretty good boost in the arm to have more cross class skills to work with. Perhaps if you retrain a 2nd, 3rd or more jobs on one character to the maximum, all their cross class skills open up to each other at level 60?

Such a leveling mechanic would surely bring life back to the early leveling areas as well as giving crafted gear a major shot in the arm.

[Velhart]

snip

I agree. I am always in favor of making a simplistic system with a lot of depth, which I think the game delivers for the most part. People still even talk or experiment today on how to best approach a job. It is not to say that improvements shouldn't be made, but SE is on the right track with how they set it up. A better step actually cutting out classes for the new jobs.

[RiceisNice]

I agree. I am always in favor of making a simplistic system with a lot of depth, which I think the game delivers for the most part. People still even talk or experiment today on how to best approach a job. It is not to say that improvements shouldn't be made, but SE is on the right track with how they set it up. A better step actually cutting out classes for the new jobs.

The classes by themselves add almost no depth to the game though, not unless they actually rework it from the ground up. All it's really done is made you require XYZ levleed up for cross skills, rather than baking in those "essential" cross skills (things like provoke, invigorate) to the individual jobs.

Come 4.x though, I think it would be ideal to do the job overhaul alongside new abilties and traits. There's too many buttons for most jobs to be able to add anymore, and traits by themselves are "meh" and have very limited framework. Jobs like BRD (if they intend on keeping WM) and SMN (for the "pet" aspect, unless they intend on doing that for MCH, but that's a long road with what we have now) need to be given another look before they continue on adding new abilties.

[Shyle]

I don't agree with his views on skill systems, but it's his game, and I've (among many others) talked over and over about ways to individualize the characters. But with the simplistic design of the game (based on an early version of Wow, which had talents btw) and combat system (simple rotation/tab target), and the fact they're already having problems with basic balance as it is. I couldn't imagine this dev team to even contemplate how to do a proper talent system given the small size of the team and the amount of work to balance them. Plus they really need to focus on player retention and work on a plan to bring content that keeps players happy and busy (not grinding). The game has (or had, depending on your view) a lot of potential, but I think that they dug themselves in a hole with the overall scheme of design. Maybe the next expansion will do something new, but I'm not holding my breath.

[Kaurie]

Sorry for the long post, but this forum limit is so frustrating. In order to keep myself within that limit, I am consolidating to a single post

I don't agree with his views on skill systems, but it's his game, and I've (among many others) talked over and over about ways to individualize the characters. But with the simplistic design of the game (based on an early version of Wow, which had talents btw) and combat system (simple rotation/tab target), and the fact they're already having problems with basic balance as it is. I couldn't imagine this dev team to even contemplate how to do a proper talent system given the small size of the team and the amount of work to balance them. Plus they really need to focus on player retention and work on a plan to bring content that keeps players happy and busy (not grinding). The game has (or had, depending on your view) a lot of potential, but I think that they dug themselves in a hole with the overall scheme of design. Maybe the next expansion will do something new, but I'm not holding my breath.

True, though ultimately, it's statements such as these which may drive players like myself away. I'd have unsubbed already, after reading the interview and previous live letter, if I wasn't a leader of a static.

I do still have fun in the game, but ugh.. this just seems like such an annoying stance. We'll see if I am still aggravated when Legion nears release. If so, I may be gone.

Kosmos is my main character, she's stuck at level 53 PLD because I put the main story on hold and stopped leveling PLD when my wife had to stop playing due to a medical problem. When she is able to return to playing again, she won't have been left behind in the story because I waited. My character will still match her level, so we can go through the game together. I've primarily worked on other jobs and gathering/crafting. Depending on how long it takes for her to return, I may get all my crafters and gatherers to 50-60, and my other jobs are rising as well. It's proven to be a great opportunity to level all my other jobs/classes.

It's also why I have to observe so much content from the sidelines. A lot of people make assumptions about my ability to play based on lvl 53 PLD. Their assumptions are generally quite wrong, but having missed almost 6 months of play time and spending another 6 months avoiding MSQ progress, it's difficult to prove people wrong. It's not like you can look at my lodestone page and see any of that though. So I try not to take it too personally, I don't always succeed at that, it becomes difficult to ignore after a while.

For sure, I didn't mean any offense and was just legit curious. I remembered you being a 53 paladin from a debate we had way back in the summer, and to see it again i was just confused. I'm sorry to hear about your wife, and hope that she is doing well.

I agree to some extent with that, but I also think that some of the problem is the vitriolic nature of much of the feedback. But, yes, they could do better with their interpretation, perhaps the cultural differences and differing expectations between JPN, EU and NA gamers are part of the problem too?

I think cultural differences and language barriers may be a huge issue. It's possible there is a lot 'lost in translation'. However, based off most of his live letters/interviews, it mostly seems that he just has a vision and wants to stick to it. He then listens to the feedback and tries to incorporate that feedback into his vision, and then things get distorted through to implementation.

Job balance is mostly done on the mind set of end game, especially on the hardest content. Developers don't take as high consideration for people who don't take on the full potential of their job.

I get that from a design perspective end-game is often the focus of job balance, but I don't think that the majority of players will be impacted from imbalance. Therefore, I don't think that small imbalances will be game-breaking.

Again, that is way too much to ask out of developers. They have to try to balance out all skill trees the best they can. If you want to go on a solo mode, they give you abilities and sub abilities already that let you do that. Everyone also has some form of raid utility they can bring to the table, rather if it is big or small.

I really don't think it is asking too much of the developers at all. A lot of games work on balance consistently. There are games which are F2P or B2P which constantly put out balance patches. FFXIV has a sub and a cash shop, and I am sure they could have the resources for it. Further to that, I personally would rather them use dev time to create more interesting variability and balance changes than to add fluff content like Gold Saucer and LoV.

Only really holds water for AF gear and weapons. Most gear now except a few share with other jobs. SMN/BLM, WHM/SCH/AST, DRK/PLD/WAR, MCH/BRD. For the most part, I geared out my MCH and BRD almost simultaneously. If you want to go as something different, that is fine. On a raid level, and this isn't just FFXIV, people want you to go as what you are most optimal in. Putting a skill tree on that will change nothing.

This is precisely the point. I have a BLM and a SMN. My SMN is 210 and my BLM is 197. I'd love to be able to do both SMN/BLM but can't. Further to that, what if I wanted to do SMN/BRD? or whatever. It's severely limiting.

Just imagine being a developer and you got to balance 2-3 specs within a job out of the many this game is going to have. Games like WoW still have a very limited amount of classes to play in comparison, which makes it easier to balance three specs within a class. Wouldn't want to be that guy.

I can't say. I've never programed or balanced a class. If it's anything like working out what job is the best and theory-crafting/testing, then I'd probably love it.

I think ultimately our thing is you and I come from different games. I come from Guild Wars 1 which offered a crazy amount of build customization, and I loved that game so much. You come from WoW which is renown for having horrible class balance (never mind spec balance).