Making Jobs Rotationally Easier in 4.0

[aleph_null]

Second, you could be creative with enmity so that you always want more of it. The fact that tanks are basically the only role when you can have "too much" of something is, for me, a design flaw.

How would you do it?

And by the way healers also deal with the same thing, overhealing isn't useful. More healing output is good because that allows you more time to dps by reducing the number of heals you need to cast, and fortunately in this game healer's dps scales together with healing output (thanks to cleric stance)

[Reynhart]

How would you do it?

I thought of an intimidate status. The more enmity you gain the more you reduce the ennemy stats (Attack, defense, etc...) You could also have different effects tied to enmity. For example, you could "spend" enmity to infuriate a boss, increasing its damage, but forcing it to only do auto-attack for a few seconds, allowing you to skip (or at least, delay) a particularly nasty special attack.

And by the way healers also deal with the same thing, overhealing isn't useful.

Except that more piety doesn't automatically means overhealing. The more you have, the more powerfull your spells are, allowing you to bring people up faster by having to cast less spells.

[Sarcatica]

Eh, all these discussions are useless. Let's just say that good tanks will be able to adjust to whatever SE has in mind for 4.0 and beyond. Amen to that.

[Brian_]

Then please, tell me how greatly designed tanks are when it comes to actually tanking...tell me how great it is when every fight can be translated to a spreadsheet with every timer (and the CD rotation applied to it) clearly displayed...

That's how every job in this game plays -- even the ones more based on procs. You have a general framework for a fight based around optimized windows and CD usage and the rest is how you execute, micromanage / maximize GCDs, and react to limited RNG. If that's not the game you want to play, then you're playing the wrong game. Instead of being a petulant child and crying that things need to change because they aren't how you want them to be, maybe it's time you realized that this game is what it is.

It's still the same jobs into the same game...so no, it's the same stair. And if you really tink it's a different stair, then what you call the "actual learning curve" is even more nonsense.

Tanks don't play the same between dungeons and raids. That's why your stairway is broken. If you want to teach a tank how to excel as a raider, you need to teach them how to raid, not how to be a dungeon hero.

That's exactly what I think this game lacks. It has taken every core aspect of tanking and made it absurdingly easy. No wonder people say that DPSing is where tank players can really improve...
What I don't understand is how people don't see the problem of making what is a tank only the floor skill.

It's because I find it boring that I stopped raiding...then reduced my tanking time, and then my playing time...

Your perception of tanking lacks depth and understanding.

Yes, things like enmity and mitigation are easy at the entry level. They should be. This game needs more functional tanks just to keep the DF traffic flowing. But, if you understood exactly how tanks scaled upwards when pushing DPS, then you'd realize that the reality is the more you push DPS, the more challenging enmity and mitigation become. For some strange reason, you try to separate the different aspects of end-game tanking but any tank with actual experience knows that it's a fine balance between aspects.

When you are trying to maximize your SwO / Deliverance / Grit-less up-time, precise and appropriately gauged CD usage becomes significantly more important than when you're sitting there turtling up in ShO / Defiance / Grit. Formulating a sufficient CD rotation is significantly harder when you're planning around low tank-stance up-time. Once you reach the point where you realize that too much mitigation is a thing, you begin to understand the precise and exact quantities of mitigation you can have and how to manipulate it for max efficiency. That's certainly a more measured and intelligent grasp of the idea of mitigation than a meta where it's all mitigation all the time.

When you are trying to do a SwO / Deliverance / Grit-less cold pick-up on an add when your healers are forced to spam AoE heals and your DPS are going full throttle with no QS, it takes real skill (or a ninja, but that's another issue) and planning to snap aggro and stick the add. When you're sitting in tank stance spamming PS, BB and RoH, enmity is a complete non-issue. When you are near 100% SwO / Deliverance / Grit-less with elite DPS players challenging content that demands a lot of AoE healing and you're trying to maximize your DA SE / Delirium / RA usage or are forced to rotate Path / Eye, you suddenly need to watch your enmity.

Even the finer nuances of positioning matter more when you are trying to push your DPS. Things like barely avoiding AoEs to prevent the boss from shifting or losing / clipping a GCD, anticipating and knowing exactly how to position and rotate a boss as it leaps around the arena and constantly forces movement only really matter when you are trying to maximize DPS.

So everything you think defines a tank still very much matters and happens and is enabled by the DPS meta you apparently despise. It's just your bias that blinds you.

SE has designed the tank-meta so that the things you view as central to tanking are easy to pick-up but increasingly complex and difficult as you get better at the game and strive for mastery. That is how things should be in an MMO where accessibility matters and the bulk of your players are casual.

[Reynhart]

Instead of being a petulant child and crying that things need to change because they aren't how you want them to be, maybe it's time you realized that this game is what it is.

No, this is what you try to make the game be, and what SE is trying to prevent step by step...Came 3.0, they decided to remove any accuracy from healer's gear, to reduce their DPS output. After that, they changed tank's AP calculation to make them focus more en Vitality...and nerf their damage. They also prevent main stat overmelding which, for the record, was only ever useful to tanks to increase their DPS. They also reduced the need for DPS checks, and even focused mainly on parry and skillspeed for the last tome tank set. Parry, which is also planned to be reworked to be more useful.
If you don't understand that all of this screams "Stop bothering us with your damage output", then you're just covering your ears.

Tanks don't play the same between dungeons and raids.

Yes, they do. That's why you see more and more "raid" mechanics making their way in storyline fights, like tankbusters, packing and gazing mechanics, etc...Normal raids are just...slightly less forgiving. And for the record, dungeons are also too easy...which will change in SB (Confirmed by SE during Fanfest)

When you are trying to maximize your SwO / Deliverance / Grit-less up-time, precise and appropriately gauged CD usage becomes significantly more important than when you're sitting there turtling up in ShO / Defiance / Grit.

Ok, so you have a boss fight with a tankbuster every 50-60 seconds...tell me how stance dancing make your CD management "more precise" for that.

[Brian_]

One of us is covering their ears and blind to the truth. It's not me, it's you.

Like I explained earlier, the tanking meta needed changing. You had tanks that didn't know how to play the job running around with less HP than melee DPS pulling entire dungeons and blaming healers when they're dead in 2 seconds. Then you had tanks who knew what they were doing and were pulling DPS numbers that rivaled actual DPS. It was not uncommon that a great tank would out DPS a good DPS. The gap between the top and bottom tiers of tank players was too large.

So how do you balance content when you have tank HP varying from 30k to 15k and high-end tank DPS quadrupling and sometimes quintupling the low-end tank DPS? You can't. How do you tune content when there is a substantial gap between tanks that pentameld STR / VIT and tanks that don't and raid groups force you to meld? You can't. What sense does it make that pentamelded accessories are BiS despite being 60 ilevels lower than raid drops? None. What about the fact that groups would just dumpster their fending accessories and the world first race depended on your group not getting fending right side drops? Pure lunacy. How counter intuitive is it that a new tank needed someone to tell them that they were gearing incorrectly after 60 levels and should not be using the gear designed for them? Best case scenario it's presented to them in a well explained and kind way. Worst case scenario VIT tanks were laughed out of EX roulettes and publicly shamed on forums.

And somehow SE changing all this is a sign that they support your idea of turtle tanks.

It takes a special kind of delusion to look at that reality and see what you have.

They fixed a broken situation. Yes, as a side effect tank DPS was nerfed a bit. That clearly was not their main concern as despite the changes, it did nothing to stop them from pushing DPS despite your horrendous reasoning. Healer ACC? Convenient that they addressed their self-admitted shortsightedness by dropping the ACC needed for dungeons and by adding materia slots to raid gear so that Healers could just meld the ACC they needed.

I've never seen someone be as frequently wrong and completely misinformed.

[Reynhart]

I've never seen someone be as frequently wrong and completely misinformed.

Of course you haven't. You have so much pride being in the very low high-end population that you can't fathom how wrong it is to build the meta around them while neglecting what makes a tank in the first place. The sad part is that I frequently said that both visions could work at the same time, you just need to make the tanks more unique in their design. Instead of that, you're only preaching the "one true tanks" over and over...while still avoiding explaining how mitigation CD need to be more precise when stance dancing...

And somehow SE changing all this is a sign that they support your idea of turtle tanks.

Yet, they still offer no challenge to a turtle tank.

by adding materia slots to raid gear so that Healers could just meld the ACC they needed

They didn't add materia slots so healers could "meld the ACC they needed". They added materia slots so that materias could be useful even if not wearing crafted gear. Melding Accuracy for healers is, again, a vision raiders try to enforce into the game...despite the fact that it has absolutely no effect on their healing capabilities...

[Brian_]

while still avoiding explaining how mitigation CD need to be more precise when stance dancing...

I didn't avoid explaining how more precise mitigation is needed when stance dancing. When you ninja edit your posts I need time to read it and respond.

And yea, I know how to play my role well enough to clear the hardest content. That's opposed to you who are so far removed from reality that you couldn't even comprehend that tanks are still very much tanks and that mitigation and enmity are still challenges we deal with.

Yes, they do. That's why you see more and more "raid" mechanics making their way in storyline fights, like tankbusters, packing and gazing mechanics, etc...Normal raids are just...slightly less forgiving. And for the record, dungeons are also too easy...which will change in SB (Confirmed by SE during Fanfest)

Your proposed "stairway" --

What we should have is easy dungeons, slighty harder expert dungeons, even harder raid and really challenging savage raid. That's a "curve".

You thought that transitioning tanks from dungeon content straight into hard raid content was a stairway. That's not how it works. I'll repeat myself again. You don't teach a tank how to raid by teaching them how to run a dungeon. You teach them how to raid by teaching them how to raid. As is, you have casual trials and raids that introduce a tank to concepts like OTing, tank swapping, contributing to raid mitigation, etc. Then you have more challenging content like Sophia EX and fights like A9S and A10S. Then you have the most challenging content at the top in A11S and A12S. There are real complaints that there is just simply not enough MC content or that the gap in raid progression steps is not fluid enough. Then there is you who is again foolishly trying to correlate real and serious issues with your clownish vision for how the game should change.

Ok, so you have a boss fight with a tankbuster every 50-60 seconds...tell me how stance dancing make your CD management "more precise" for that.

I'll use a personal example. A12S General's Might add. The tank busters are much faster than 50-60 seconds apart.

During early prog, I tanked the add in Defiance and just used IB and CDs on the busters. While the add hit hard, I was never at any real risk of dying. TBH, I just did whatever because in Defiance with IB, you have a surplus of mitigation.

These days, this is what I do --

Because I no longer snap aggro in Defiance, I need to prime a Skull Sunder off the last living Wing add before the Might spawns to ensure enmity. For the first buster I still have Raw Intuition rolling from the triple FC I used to help kill the Wing adds (I delay the RI until the end of the Berserk window in order to have it carry over to the Might add). For the second buster, I stay in Deliverance and use Foresight and put up Path. Before the third buster, Foresight is still running and I put up Conva to help buff the Adlo shield I get and help my healer with the recovery healing after the hit. Bloodbath is also off CD here so I throw that in. For the fourth buster I swap to Defiance and Unchained to sustain my DPS and rely on the healing and health buff from Defiance paired with Conva. For the fifth buster I use Thrill of Battle and Equilibrium to help healers re-top. For the sixth buster I dance back to Deliverance and use Vengeance. Vengeance + Thrill which is still up is enough eHP to make Defiance uneeded. For the seventh buster Vengeance is still running.

That's opposed to just sitting my turtling-butt there and watching my DPS drop into the gutter due to full Defiance up-time. So what's the point of this optimization? We skip the 8th buster and hopefully one day soon we'll skip the 7th. The sooner we kill the add and the less ramping tank busters we get, the happier my healers will be.

They didn't add materia slots so healers could "meld the ACC they needed". They added materia slots so that materias could be useful even if not wearing crafted gear. Melding Accuracy for healers is, again, a vision raiders try to enforce into the game...despite the fact that it has absolutely no effect on their healing capabilities...

Interviewer: You mentioned that healers will no longer need to worry about accuracy in instanced dungeons. Will this have any impact on raids?

Yoshida: It won't change. Raids are intended to be high difficulty, so if you want to rely on attack-based actions, the thought is that you'll need to stack accuracy.

Interviewer: Since the damage output of healers isn't connected with the clear conditions set for the raid, the idea is that you have to put on certain equipment if you want to focus on attacking.

Yoshida: If attacks would hit regardless of accuracy, things would lean towards healers feeling that they need to attack rather than having a choice. But as it is, if you're aiming for an early clear and the healer isn't putting out DPS, of course you won't be able to beat the boss. If the team decides to make the choice that the healer should be doing damage, the idea is that they will need to reduce their healing performance to gain accuracy.

Interviewer: I see.

Yoshida: On the other hand, we've seen a lot of feedback that accuracy itself is dull so we've talked about getting rid of it. Right now, items can't be designed without including accuracy to some extent. Players work to figure out the accuracy required, and it can be an interesting problem to balance the accuracy until you're always hitting the target, but the preference is divided. Moreover, there are players at the casual level who are not even aware of accuracy so it's gotten to the point where accuracy may not make sense as a parameter.

So, despite the truth that Yoshida just took a dump on your "argument" I'm sure you'll find a way to fit that into your delusions. Here he shows the design was not some "vision raiders try to enforce" but rather the dev's deliberate design and a choice they gave players with the idea that early clearing groups would need ACC. And, he echoes my constant reference to the reality that they are always concerned about closing the gap with casuals and accessibility. Here he considers removing ACC to make the system more intuitive. This is no different from what he said about the STR / VIT changes.

[Sarcatica]

Why are you so adamant about having SE change tanks to be turtles? Did 2.x give any challenge to tanks to be "useful"? No, they didn't. For years that FFXIV has remained as such and I don't see them changing how turtle tanks will work because they don't exist in this game in the first place. Parry was an illusion that most tanks saw as "good" and ofc people realized how shitty of a scaling the stat is.

ACC was a huge reason why healers were complaining they kept missing hence was changed, also a huge reason why Creator Savage eased the ACC for raiders, Midas to Creator have about the same ACC cap. People aren't dumb, they will use whatever they can get whenever they can. People who are stuck at "tanks only tank, healers only heal" are dumb because you aren't using your toolkit properly and optimally. You are welcomed to argue the raiders VS casuals but as long as tanks and healers are given damaging skills, nothing will be changed.

Active defensive CDs have more impact when you are in DPS stance naturally because you take more damage. Precised timing is needed to mitigate the hard hitting damages. Like let's say in Nidhogg EX, you can stay in tank stance and take most of the damage EVEN without any CDs rolled in to mitigate, sure it helps to mitigate but healers can top you up just fine. Compare this to the optimal play where you are in DPS stance most of the encounter, you want to start assigning CDs to each hard hitting damage, you also need to be conscious of how many CDs you are left to actually continue being in DPS stance. It takes more finesse to realize if you will survive or not, whereas tanks in tank stance rarely have to sweat because it's all too easy to turtle up and not dying. People are free to disagree and all that, but this right here is a very important part because you want to push your limit, much like how all DPS try to get as much damage as they can. If you want to argue tanks shouldn't do DPS, then likewise DPS shouldn't be allowed to push more DPS, because you know, you can still clear anything just fine, why improve then? This is what I don't get, "improve only when you have to" is always almost too late when you need it. Why not improve as much as you can? Or is pushing DPS as a tank too hard for people? "It offers no challenge", right?

Or maybe, you can try to clear A12S as a tank doing 500dps, because you know you take way less damage than these DPS centric tanks so you deserve to clear more than them? As long as you play optimally, you can still get decent DPS as a tank even in tank stance to clear contents and you can't negotiate.

How do you point "flaws in design" when you aren't even decent in something? It's like a Bronze telling a Master/Challenger how to play LoL or a 2k MMR telling 7k MMR how to play. Doesn't make sense.

[Reynhart]

When you ninja edit your posts I need time to read it and respond.

Funny, because this :

Ok, so you have a boss fight with a tankbuster every 50-60 seconds...tell me how stance dancing make your CD management "more precise" for that.

was never edited...

You thought that transitioning tanks from dungeon content straight into hard raid content was a stairway. That's not how it works. I'll repeat myself again. You don't teach a tank how to raid by teaching them how to run a dungeon.

Yes, you do. You just have to stop doing facerolling dungeons. Seriously, "raid" is a pretty word for just saying "8-man dungeon".

For the first buster I still have Raw Intuition rolling from the triple FC I used to help kill the Wing adds (I delay the RI until the end of the Berserk window in order to have it carry over to the Might add). For the second buster, I stay in Deliverance and use Foresight and put up Path. Before the third buster, Foresight is still running and I put up Conva to help buff the Adlo shield I get and help my healer with the recovery healing after the hit. Bloodbath is also off CD here so I throw that in. For the fourth buster I swap to Defiance and Unchained to sustain my DPS and rely on the healing and health buff from Defiance paired with Conva. For the fifth buster I use Thrill of Battle. For the sixth buster I dance back to Deliverance and use Vengeance. Vengeance + Thrill which is still up is enough eHP to make Defiance uneeded. For the seventh buster Vengeance is still running.

Great and precise explanation (Honestly). But, let me ask you something, if you stayed in Defiance, would you use your CD differently ? For the sixth and seven busters, would you refrain from using Vengeance ?

The sooner we kill the add and the less ramping tank busters we get, the happier my healers will be.

So, out of seven TB, you took five out of Defiance, yet you think it's better for healers to heal than skipping one, or maybe two further TB that would hit you in Defiance ? I'd say they have much more healing to do in your configuration.

Yeah, sure my delusions...

Interviewer: You mentioned that healers will no longer need to worry about accuracy in instanced dungeons. Will this have any impact on raids?

Yoshida: It won't change. Raids are intended to be high difficulty, so if you want to rely on attack-based actions, the thought is that you'll need to stack accuracy.

Interviewer: Since the damage output of healers isn't connected with the clear conditions set for the raid, the idea is that you have to put on certain equipment if you want to focus on attacking.

Yoshida: If attacks would hit regardless of accuracy, things would lean towards healers feeling that they need to attack rather than having a choice. But as it is, if you're aiming for an early clear and the healer isn't putting out DPS, of course you won't be able to beat the boss. If the team decides to make the choice that the healer should be doing damage, the idea is that they will need to reduce their healing performance to gain accuracy.

Toooooooooootally not a player based meta...totally.

Why are you so adamant about having SE change tanks to be turtles? Did 2.x give any challenge to tanks to be "useful"?

I don't want SE change tanks to be turtles. I want them to make one turtle for players who like this kind of tanking, and provides challenges to them too. The game is still young and if they keep relyng on only one type of stategy, they'll end into a corner really fast.

I never said that pushing DPS was not a challenge...