Is TP interesting as a mechanic?

[Atoli]

While I find some of Duelle's ideas interesting, I honestly don't see any need to change anything about the way TP work.
It works just fine, it gets the job done, isn't too invasive on the gameplay (like, for example, the stamina bar in early 1.x was) but still works as a limiting factor.

I just don't see any reason to spend resources and development time on a system that isn't broken (and, quite possibly, actually DO break it in the process)

[Ceasaria]

TP doesn't seem important to exist. Just a bar that drains slowly then gets restored by yourself or a party member. I don't really see why sprint need to cost it all either. They gave sprint no TP cost in pvp but not in pve.

At least MP has more impact on gameplay rotations such as controlling how often BLM needs to switch from astral fire to umbral ice and causing DRK to use attacks to maintain their MP.

I think, gameplay which involve MP are more interesting because it's not really static as gameplay TP and there are more various rotations. Furthermore, it's maybe me, but the rotation for each job related to mana are different from others in the way of thinking.

If SE can do changes in the overall gameplay, it should be the rework of TP.
For me, like Piety --> MP, TP need to be dependent of a secondary stat : Bravery --> TP.
It mean, we could have more than 1000 TP.
In fact, Tank have Parry, Healer have Piety, so Dps will have Bravery.
In that case, their gameplay should change drastically.

For me, Sprint should cost 500 TP and Healer should have skills which cost TP.
Tank would keep the same system (just need to rework Parry).
DPS would have a new type of rotation or new skills which would cost a huge amount of TP.

And in the end, bye bye Accuracy.

[Alistaire]

And in the end, bye bye Accuracy.

We need more stats, not less. You might not like dealing with acc, but removing it at this point would be bad. And nobody would want bravery as a stat as you describe it. Would be the same reason tanks never cared about vit accessories before the change; a higher max doesn't do much when most of what you use in a long fight comes from recovery, not your starting reserves. Except in this case it'd be worse, nothing is going to one-shot your tp, unless they also nerfed invigorate badly you wouldn't need a higher tp base.

[Duelle]

I feel like [1] would have significantly more change to gameplay than people are looking for.

This is understandable. I've always been a fan of resources being a way to differentiate classes from one another, and ideally I would like PLD, DRK, WAR and DRG to have their own unique takes on STR TP instead of being held to a universal system.

[2] If costs and regeneration rates are both increased, there's no real change made, I would think? I'm not sure what this is trying to accomplish.

The intent with my suggestion is to have DEX TP work similar to how Energy works in WoW. As you know, it's a resource that is spent quickly but regenerates quickly to reward the player learning how to pace themselves. Admittedly this is the intent behind the current iteration of TP, but it hasn't worked out due to several factors.

[3] To be honest, the only model I've really be fond of as an alternate to the current Greased Lightning system would be based on the Legion Shadow-priest, especially when it was still capable of stacking the Haste buffs from accrued Insanity of Voidform burst phases atop each other when played well (and with a bit of luck) even in entry-level gear. That said, that could as easily apply to a Chakra system (releasing the gates) instead.

What I was aiming for was for MNK building up momentum and then focus on keeping that momentum. It wouldn't be that different from what they currently have, except that instead of Greased Lightning dropping all three stacks once the timer hits 0, you just lose stacks over time.

Non-sequitur:

Chakra

Chakra as a whole is flawed and something I'd love to see scrapped and redesigned. The main flaws are that a) fifth chakra is the only one that matters and b) you have to spam a button to attain fifth chakra. I equate it to character dialogue that breaks the flow of gameplay in a platformer/action game. The system breaks the flow of gameplay for MNK.

Real-life Chakras all mean different things and have different properties. The 7th/final Chakra is not the only the only one that matters like in-game, and I think a MNK should have skills determined by what Chakra they've activated.

[Pixelmancer]

I don't understand why we have 2 mana bars. TP seems pointless.

[Shurrikhan]

[a] This is understandable. I've always been a fan of resources being a way to differentiate classes from one another, and ideally I would like PLD, DRK, WAR and DRG to have their own unique takes on STR TP instead of being held to a universal system.
[b] The intent with my suggestion is to have DEX TP work similar to how Energy works in WoW. As you know, it's a resource that is spent quickly but regenerates quickly to reward the player learning how to pace themselves. Admittedly this is the intent behind the current iteration of TP, but it hasn't worked out due to several factors.
[c] What I was aiming for was for MNK building up momentum and then focus on keeping that momentum. It wouldn't be that different from what they currently have, except that instead of Greased Lightning dropping all three stacks once the timer hits 0, you just lose stacks over time.

Non-sequitur:

Chakra as a whole is flawed and something I'd love to see scrapped and redesigned. The main flaws are that a) fifth chakra is the only one that matters and b) you have to spam a button to attain fifth chakra. I equate it to character dialogue that breaks the flow of gameplay in a platformer/action game. The system breaks the flow of gameplay for MNK.

Real-life Chakras all mean different things and have different properties. The 7th/final Chakra is not the only the only one that matters like in-game, and I think a MNK should have skills determined by what Chakra they've activated.

[a] I get that too. I just want that resource system to work atop what we have now, rather than being a limiter for it, if that makes sense. If TP is going to prevent you from being able to use the rotations you know and maybe even enjoy, that seems unnecessarily problematic to me, especially if it's not almost entirely sure to produce a preferable result.

[b] Makes sense. I just wonder at that point how it'd be any different than the original stamina bar, except that the stamina bar at least toyed (for all of one beta build) with the idea of regeneration speeds decreasing with progress/fill, and damage dealt via TP-spending moves increasing with fill, so you had a haste vs. damage mechanic. If it were like stacking a skill speed resource to be used when you want, and otherwise rotations go on as normal, then it feels like augmentation rather than a limiter.

(I'm faintly reminded of the fatigue system, where you could potentially reach half or more level max level classes (if not for the obvious leve issues those days after skill-farming was removed) faster than when the system was replaced with bonus exp. Bonus exp felt faster, but unless you were disinterested in leveling more than a couple classes, that wasn't necessarily true; it just depends on the actual exp rates more than the system. Nonetheless, it was that feeling that condemned the first and praised the latter, more so even than people specifically wanting to focus on a single class.)

My only other potential issue here, and this is a stretch, is that an energy bar is basically a redundancy (with the simple GCD) unless it creates additional gameplay components as a result. Things like holding onto a GCD, and its variable energy costs, while waiting for a DoT to reach the brink of falling off (or the pandemic / roll-over) are things that require a energy system that ensures that the holding time won't go to waste. But at the same time, without a sense of compromise between the two system, it adds no more complexity than the GCD system alone does, especially once you attach issues like combos (wherein to take advantage of the filler space before refreshing a DoT, you might have to be even later in refreshing it) or preferred abilities and syncs (such that the DoT is worth waiting a half GCD, or to clip an oGCD into the GCD prior, to perfect). As long as energy always binds you, you will always wait that X duration remainder for the debuff's perfect refresh. There's no decision.

[c] (Non-sequitor) [RANT] Yeah, it's hard for me to really even envision where they were going with the Chakra system. Meditation's failure to scale with the GCD, even after having its recast reduced, means it would only be viable in combat if Tornado Kick and Forgotten Chakra were each buffed, at which point it would be usable after Tornado Kick used at the tail of your CD-window after refreshing all DoTs and unloading all oGCDs so that the amount time spent prepping damage in terms of a fifth each of a Forbidden Chakra would be a smaller portion of the GCD (1.4s of 2.38s or so, instead of 2.15 or less). And even then, it'd probably be more of a TP-efficiency alternative than the optimal choice... Purification being attached to that system would seem to make sense, except that it has a long cooldown, meaning that you can't use it for extended AoE any more than one would a Form Shift spam between Twin Snakes (or DK-TS-RB only if focusing a single target with all AAs). I get that they didn't want us to have unlimited TP by Purifying between every pull while our Bards are forced to Swiftsong instead of restore their own TP and Machinists only get mild contribution from tossing out and promoting their Rooks every 5s or 2 bonus ticks as we run, but it makes the ability feel more like a capacity change than any sort of job ability. During downtime, once per Invigorate period, you get 67% more Invigorate...

When I first heard about the Chakra system coming into play, I imagined it either be gradual gates of release or a series of gameplay-affecting mechanical additions, each adding a higher priority mechanic that effectively or entirely replaces the last. Instead its a stack charge system used only for an opening oGCD and then more Invigorate or another opening oGCD during each encounter break thereafter.

But hey, I still dislike that Form Shift doesn't even have any uptime single target uses. It has AoE TP efficiency implications as long as you absolutely would bottom out and clear the AoE pack more slowly without it (rarely the case). It has downtime uses, for returning to Coeurl or Coeurl minus whatever GCDs' worth of duration of GL remains and you'd rather open with something else. But never uptime single target.

[Shurrikhan]

And in the end, bye bye Accuracy.

We need more stats, not less. You might not like dealing with acc, but removing it at this point would be bad. And nobody would want bravery as a stat as you describe it. Would be the same reason tanks never cared about vit accessories before the change; a higher max doesn't do much when most of what you use in a long fight comes from recovery, not your starting reserves. Except in this case it'd be worse, nothing is going to one-shot your tp, unless they also nerfed invigorate badly you wouldn't need a higher tp base.

Just my own two cents on accuracy:
*My apologies if I use melee and physical interchangeably here. I always mean physical, including ranged dps, as are all bound to higher accuracy requirements than casters and healers.

As long as a stat brings in a gearing decision that allows you (and/or your raid) to play in a new way, it can be interesting. Accuracy is definitionally one of those stats... for physical* DPS. The idea that you can stack with the MT or defend yourself against a locked-on add without a punishing chance to drop your combos, short your key skills, etc., is individually pretty neat. What isn't interesting in my opinion is that of the some 380 bonus accuracy you'd need for a raid fight to stack there or defend yourself at full hit chance, only some 20 of that stat actually made that difference. The rest was obligatory. At that point, it does nothing more than curtail output growth when the numbers themselves could have done that anyways. Final result: where possible you have two sets for the same ilvl, one casual (low-acc) and one raider (raid-acc). The closest things to advantages to come out of all this is that people may have to spend time (to many an annoyance) trying to keep their accuracy as close as possible to the raid requirements while making space for potential drops and a very, very weak form of horizontal progression. (And that's not even going into the issue wherein casters only needing back-capping (rather than flank-capping) gives them a small, but in those situations noticeable enough increase to their secondary stat pool. Whereas melee would always be at a large DPS loss going from flank-capped to back-cap, and a noticeable loss going from front-capped to flank-capped when mechanics call for a frontal cap, they also take no advantage from sticking with only a back-cap and taking other secondary stats instead relative to a caster.)

My personal preferences would be to scrap those latter two. Accuracy requirements should only increase in so far as the damage they save, in terms of the damage produceable by other secondary stats. Roughly. That means that, for starters, as long as we stick with the idea that melee dps should never be tanking anyways and therefore have no regular use for frontal-capping, that the transition from back cap to flank cap should be larger than for flank to front. Tanks can get that bonus amount for free with their tank stances as before, and spend into that extra Accuracy to ensure accuracy in OT stances as well.

But the real issue is everything leading up to back-cap. As it stands, the gameplay-producing range of Accuracy quickly falls under 10% of the total Accuracy expenditure. In my opinion, at least 40% of Accuracy expenditure should be its effective range, regardless of depth into an expansion. As the Accuracy floor increases, so too should the flank and frontal steps, in direct proportion. I imagine that this would be done by first reducing the total amount you have to spend on accuracy by about 50%. Next, of the remaining amount, only ~60% is needed to reach back-cap. ~86% reaches flank cap. 100% reaches frontal cap. In this way, Accuracy should be a real decision, potentially, against other stats within the confines of a given encounter. Casters now use the flank-cap instead of the back-cap, removing their tiny but universal bonus

As for TP starvation and the Bravery (TP pool-enlarging stat) idea:

There's simply very little reason to TP starve in recent raid design unless using a high Skill Speed build. Ideally, I'd like to remove that uneven disadvantage, even. And with the recent Bard buffs such that they only lose about 10% DPS depending on CD lineup (MCHs about 13%, iirc) to keep a raid going infinitely (unless, again, high Skill Speed), there's no real thought involved in the solutions. That said, extending the TP pool via a stat like Bravery, or even a stat granting greater TP restoration directly (assuming the TP tick might increase as the pool size increases, at the same 6% of max TP per 3 seconds instead of just a flat 60 TP per 3s, though this would give some really funky TP values), all this would really do is create a new stat similar to accuracy, but without the mathematical advantage to compel its use. A fight lasting X minutes of uptime would demand X Bravery. Any shorter, and that Bravery is wasted. And at a mere 10% of the Bard's dps for a mere part of the fight, you could have avoided that stat entirely (much like using Rain of Death to avoid 10% of the accuracy requirement). Worse yet, this becomes a stat that, atop Accuracy, only physical dps have to deal with, while BLMs and SMNs have no absolute need for Piety. It either becomes a gearing cluster**** for all physical dps, or just a dead stat.

Please don't feel like I'm trying to put down anyone's ideas. I very much appreciate them. I'm just trying to extend the ideas to a envisioned result, as best I can, as to provide useful feedback for your further consideration.

[Duelle]

[a] I get that too. I just want that resource system to work atop what we have now, rather than being a limiter for it, if that makes sense. If TP is going to prevent you from being able to use the rotations you know and maybe even enjoy, that seems unnecessarily problematic to me, especially if it's not almost entirely sure to produce a preferable result.

I personally don't think it's possible to do anything to TP without major changes to either gameplay or ability structure. The system is literally entrenched between how TP currently works along with the combo system. If you increase ability costs you thus make BRDs and MCHs that much more desired. If you decrease ability costs you further trivialize TP as a resource. You can't really "empower" moves via TP because you then have to design two sets of abilities and balance them.

Moving to my STR TP suggestion, the idea behind locking abilities behind TP does several things. For one it gives the "baseline" rotations additional weight in the combat model. Secondly it would justify making certain TP-consuming abilities stronger and possibly allow for more variety in abilities (specially in the case of tanks; WAR in particular could get defensive abilities that consume TP). Thirdly it leads to a sort of stagger in strict rotations (DRG comes to mind), which means memorizing a rotation written on a piece of paper is no longer the way best way to play. Lastly, it gets rid of certain superfluous systems while keeping certain concepts intact.

PLD: An idea here would be causing Sheltron to cost TP while entirely removing its cooldown. If you want to ease the burden this places on damage dealing abilities, you could make the block from Sheltron partially refund the TP spent. You could also justify giving PLD more than just Circle of Scorn for AoE with TP cost as a limiting factor.

WAR: Entirely remove Wrath/Abandon and make abilities like Inner Beast cost a good chunk of TP. Additional abilities along this theme that benefit WAR defensively. You could tie a Wrath-like theme to the job by causing these abilities to enrage/infuriate the WAR, benefiting the WAR (placeholder idea for this is that certain abilities' true potential doesn't unlock unless the WAR is enraged/infuriated) and encouraging the WAR to remain enraged/infuriated as part of its gameplay.

DRK: Tying Souleater to TP is a no-brainer, and would justify making it stronger than it currently is. You could also add reactive abilities that consume TP. Not to mention that you could remove Reprisal's cooldown and have it cost a lot of TP.

DRG: Invigorate could be turned into a cooldown that reduces TP cost of non-"main" combo attacks. Blood of the Dragon could be turned into a DPS cooldown that would consume your full TP bar but increases damage dealt and removes TP cost from all skills for a set duration while still giving you access to Wheeling Thrust/Fang & Claw.

These are just stuff off the top of my head. I'd probably have to do a full design write-up to flesh it out and balance it.

[Claire_Pendragon]

TP is only part of a whole mechanic.
Just as MP, Stacks of X, DoTs, Buffs, Debuffs, etc.

But currently, I feel it's not being fully utilized to its fullest potential.

Lets look at BLM, it uses MP differently.

Essentially its either low MP (blizzard), or high MP (fire)
Similar can be done with TP, a class that alternates its playstyle based on raising the TP bar (low dmg) and draining it with burst dmg.

But copying BLM completely would be a waste, so we'd need a class that can do thinsg BLm cant do.

Such as instant attacks, and weaving in off the GCD attacks. (Most likely a melee)

It would be the 1st melee that doesnt use a 1, 2, 3 combo of some sort.

[Shurrikhan]

I personally don't think it's possible to do anything to TP without major changes to either gameplay or ability structure. The system is literally entrenched between how TP currently works along with the combo system. If you increase ability costs you thus make BRDs and MCHs that much more desired. If you decrease ability costs you further trivialize TP as a resource. You can't really "empower" moves via TP because you then have to design two sets of abilities and balance them.

In the end it comes down to how soon you want a BRD or MCH, or anyone else supplying X resource, to be able to affect the party (with the support that resource gives). Foe Requiem and Hypercharge can work instantly. Ballad, Paeon, and Promoted turrets only have an effect if you would otherwise exhaust their respective resources. At which point the question becomes, do we want utilities and mechanics that have importance only after a given length of uptime?

As long as TP is a generated resource, it has no effect on immediate burst. It would be the damage-dynamic equivalent of Wildfire or, at quickest, Sidewinder. There's setup (resource build), and then you get to utilize additional mechanics that average into your theoretical maximum dps. That wouldn't necessarily create two designs for each ability, nor would it necessarily require individual balancing. It may require overall balancing, both because you've removed an exhaustion mechanic and added to average dps, but that component itself needs only to supply a level of damage that doesn't overemphasize TP bonuses from NIN, BRD, AST, and MCH.

The spenders for such could be anything like 'Multistrike' on command, duplicating a previous attack on the oGCD for % effect at TP cost (cost scaling with effect deployed), or baked into class mechanics themselves (Life Surge, Power Surge, Internal Release, Straighter Shot, and so forth). All that really matters is the final overall balance, and that gameplay is somehow improved as a result in the minds of most players. Beyond that it's just a matter of how much additional control or potential burst you want (as in the Multistrike example), and whether you want to introduce a shared limiter between certain toolkit skills (as in the latter example), where if either, or their combination, isn't gameplay compelling, the resource is pointless.

To be honest, the only role for which I could see TP as becoming truly troublesome to balance is the tanks, especially if there are ever both offensive and defensive TP spenders. Granted, that's something I'd kind of really like to see, but I can easily imagine why others would not, and how that additional control atop our already prominent dual tank/dps stance options might seem a bit much.

Moving to my STR TP suggestion, the idea behind locking abilities behind TP does several things. For one it gives the "baseline" rotations additional weight in the combat model. Secondly it would justify making certain TP-consuming abilities stronger and possibly allow for more variety in abilities (specially in the case of tanks; WAR in particular could get defensive abilities that consume TP). Thirdly it leads to a sort of stagger in strict rotations (DRG comes to mind), which means memorizing a rotation written on a piece of paper is no longer the way best way to play. Lastly, it gets rid of certain superfluous systems while keeping certain concepts intact.

These are just stuff off the top of my head. I'd probably have to do a full design write-up to flesh it out and balance it.

I might need the full write-up, sorry. Even with the Examples, apart from Shelltron and Warror examples, I'm having trouble visualizing what you're really going for.