Making Jobs Rotationally Easier in 4.0

[Shurrikhan]

I really don't believe Pld or Drk would be altered very much.

Consider this: the playstyles/rotations we have currently for Pld and Drk wouldn't change in the slightest if we got rid of Grit/Darkside/Oaths.

Unless you get the full benefits of each stance passively at all times, the rotations would most likely change. Not at all points in a fight, but they would adjusted across all places of marginally better or optional strings. Take Warrior for example: due to Defiance's enmity multiplier stacking multiplicatively with Butcher Block's, the difference in its enmity over time is far more impactful when in Defiance than the impact of its damage over time is in Deliverance, while all skills without an enmity modifier are much more evenly advantaged (150% more damage worth of enmity, or up to 30% more damage, rather than an extra 825% damage worth of enmity). Dark Knight and Paladin are actually cleaner examples still, seeing as their top enmity combos (most affected by tank stance) are distinct from their top damage combos (most affected by dps stance), though the added GCD cost makes the difference less easily applicable.

- I don't really see the point in dropping Deliverance yet retaining Defiance, given that the swapping between the two could as easily be done with a single button already, just as in toggling in and out of a single stance. It would merely reduce some aesthetic elements (namely the name of for non-Defiance). Nor do I see how that would streamline it so long as Defiance still has a 10-second "lock-in" cooldown like WM, GB, or Cleric Stance. It'd make absolutely no difference, compared to a trait increasing base damage, and allowing stacks to be held, outside of Defiance given at level 52. You just lose the name and animation, which seems a waste given zero actual effect. Alternatively, if you were to remove the cooldown / lock-in on Defiance / non-Defiance altogether, there would be an effect, but I don't think it'd be an especially positive one. I honestly like the risk/reward that comes with the swap, similar to but more so than that of Cleric Stance.

The resource systems as I imagined them would either replace or work within mana, or be given in a new bar, or something alike that can otherwise hold unequal currency contributions (not all skills give the same amount of it) and a high total number. That said, it doesn't need to actually look that different in its UI (e.g. stacking up to a max of 5, or 7, etc.) to function very differently. For instance, lets say that Sword Oath now causes crits, combos, abilities, or whatever, might be able to generate Zeal, which can be consumed to "duplicate" or "rush" combos, using the lesser cost of either with higher cost the higher combo tier the duplicated/rushed skill is. For instance, a double Goring Blade (duplicate, 3rd tier) would have a higher cost than a double Riot Blade (duplicate, 2nd tier), about equal to a Goring Blade - Savage Blade (rush 1), and less than a Goring Blade - Royal Authority / Rage of Halone (rush 2, 3rd tier). That'd create very distinct gameplay, nothing like the Wrath/Abandon spenders of WAR.

[SpookyGhost]

Stances just need to be more different from eachother.

Take Defiance/Deliverance. When you're in Defiance you have access to a high potency single target ability that mitigates damage for a short period, an AOE with a high enmity multiplier, and a buff that removes the damage penalty from the stance. When in Deliverance you have a high potency single target ability and an AOE. The only difference between IB/FC and SC/Decimate is that the Deliverance variants trade actual beneficial effects for more potency. IMO, that's super boring and honestly makes me feel like those skills don't even need to exist - I could just keep IB/SC and Deliverance would add a potency buff to them but remove the other effects. You'd even have Unchained which could work differently in Deliverance, so even with this minor thing you'd have the same stuff, less buttons, and an entire new skill that you already had with a different effect.

(Side note: Equilibrium is a good example of a skill changing in effectiveness based on stance - it can be used in 2 very distinct ways and your stance actually matters)

Darkside isn't even a DPS stance, it's just sort of a thing you have on all the time - though dropping Grit does give you access to Blood Weapon, which is cool and all but it's basically just a "do more DPS" button.

Sword Oath is the worst of them all because it changes nothing but makes you auto more - boring, pointless, zzzzz.

I hope that stances are something they look into in 4.0, there's a lot of potential with stances that weren't really explored in 3.0 that hopefully were just a result of time/budget/etc.

[Shurrikhan]

snip

Pretty much my thoughts, too. All but the adding an Unchained element to Deliverance could be done by simple button-matching (in Deliverance, Inner Beast turns into Fell Cleave, and Steel Cyclone into Decimate), which sometimes makes me wonder if they've been just purposely wasting button-space in order to make it look like they have a larger arsenal of abilities on hand than they really do. That said, I don't mind having one powerful ability (Unchained, Blood Weapon) that encourages a role-swap or a shift between offensive and defensive, etc., so I wouldn't be put off by Unchained remaining Defiance-only, in and of itself, only that there'd be obvious button waste half the time. At which point, I'd mostly just prefer that Defiance-Unchained seem the obviously stronger tool in most scenarios, much like Defiance-Equilibrium when you're not remotely capable of running out of TP anyways.

I want to hope that time/budget was the reason for, say, Sword Oath being as dull as it is, but I really doubt it, especially when it took an expansion and 3 tiers just to fix an obvious oversight (Sword Oath's varying contribution across different weapon speeds).

[Bourne_Endeavor]

That is correct. My point was to remove the MP drain component by removing darkside and having the main gameplay choice for Drk focus on managing MP for using Dark Arts as often as possible and weigh it against using a move now or saving it for later so moves like Blood Weapon and Blood Price still have a purpose. It would also have the added effect of removing the restriction on Blood Weapon which is something I feel should have been done a while ago. The cause of me thinking on this came from playing pld a lot more lately. I been tanking a whole bunch as drk the last few months and I decided to revisit pld again and I really noticed how there is basically no diversity in it's gameplay regardless of the stance you're in which lead me to thinking if they were even necessary in the first place.

Problem is, without the penalties of Grit and Darkside, maintaining MP on Dark Knight is laughably easy. Whenever I'm out of Grit, I'll practically be drowning in MP and can spam Dark Arts + Souleater for days. The only MP concerns I need to be mindful of is having enough to turn Grit back on once the DPS creep up on me. Assuming enmity generation was increased to accommodate the loss of tank stances, Dark Knight wouldn't have any challenge whatsoever.

[SpookyGhost]

Problem is, without the penalties of Grit and Darkside, maintaining MP on Dark Knight is laughably easy. Whenever I'm out of Grit, I'll practically be drowning in MP and can spam Dark Arts + Souleater for days. The only MP concerns I need to be mindful of is having enough to turn Grit back on once the DPS creep up on me. Assuming enmity generation was increased to accommodate the loss of tank stances, Dark Knight wouldn't have any challenge whatsoever.

Consider the following: instead of turning Grit back on, use Power Slash out of Grit. It is less of a DPS loss than turning on Grit and has the same effect, while also maintaining your ability to keep using Blood Weapon. There is a very particular reason that DRK has 0 MP problems ever, and this is it.

[Shurrikhan]

Consider the following: instead of turning Grit back on, use Power Slash out of Grit. It is less of a DPS loss than turning on Grit and has the same effect, while also maintaining your ability to keep using Blood Weapon. There is a very particular reason that DRK has 0 MP problems ever, and this is it.

With Grit giving as much bonus enmity as it does now, the balance between using PS out of Grit and using PS in Grit in order to make time for skipping PS when outside of Grit is actually really close. My DRK PS spamming outside of Grit actually gains far less margin against, say, a good Monk, than simply rotating into Grit with enough mana to PS through it to the next Blood Weapon, at which point I'm free to blow whatever I want, usually with higher rDPS as a result of smoother healing / damage taken dynamics.

Problem is, without the penalties of Grit and Darkside, maintaining MP on Dark Knight is laughably easy. Whenever I'm out of Grit, I'll practically be drowning in MP and can spam Dark Arts + Souleater for days. The only MP concerns I need to be mindful of is having enough to turn Grit back on once the DPS creep up on me. Assuming enmity generation was increased to accommodate the loss of tank stances, Dark Knight wouldn't have any challenge whatsoever.

I'm assuming all other spenders would be proportionately increased. But I always assume that unless there was a fundamental change mentioned, none was suggested; in this case, keeping things the same would require obvious rescaling.
Design idea — relative changes mentioned, absent if not mentioned. Patch notes — flat changes mentioned, relative changes possible by consequence of not balancing flat changes being mentioned.

[MoarLegion]

Consider the following: instead of turning Grit back on, use Power Slash out of Grit. It is less of a DPS loss than turning on Grit and has the same effect, while also maintaining your ability to keep using Blood Weapon. There is a very particular reason that DRK has 0 MP problems ever, and this is it.

When they nerfed tank DPS they also increased enmity modifiers on stance across the board. What it worked out to was enmity in stance was basically unaffected, while out of stance was nerfed too. If you're just picking up adds, that's one thing, but if you're MT and you need the threat; you're better off putting Grit back on and doing a PS combo or two.

[SpookyGhost]

When they nerfed tank DPS they also increased enmity modifiers on stance across the board. What it worked out to was enmity in stance was basically unaffected, while out of stance was nerfed too. If you're just picking up adds, that's one thing, but if you're MT and you need the threat; you're better off putting Grit back on and doing a PS combo or two.

Depends on how much threat you actually need, though. Grit means using MP (which could otherwise be spent on DA or DP), wasting a GCD of damage, and then 2-3 follow up GCDs all nerfed in damage. If PS out of Grit is enough, then there's no reason to turn on Grit.

However even in the scenario where you do turn on Grit and PS, you'll still have BW when you turn it back off so you'll still have infinite mana.

[Brian_]

I'm not really going to go into the detailed math since I don't care enough to do that much work but just at a quick glance, the average Gritless GCD of a DRK is probably around ~250 potency (assuming 100% delirium up-time) without PS.

The average potency of a PS combo is ~223.

Ignoring the MP calculations (grit activation MP cost vs. MP loss from using PS instead of DASE / Delirium rotation since I don't want to do all that math), you'd have to be forced to PS ~3 times before you'd make up the lost potency of single Grit activation. I remember Grit having a 2.7x enmity modifier but with a 0.8x damage modifier so it's clearly not worth it to switch to Grit for PS. Yea, after multiple Grit PS combos, you'd eventually overtake Gritless PS spam in enmity but at a huge potency cost. In Grit, just looking at GCDs, you're losing ~45+ potency per GCD.

I don't really think you ever need enmity that desperately in this game under normal circumstances. Even in your opener as a sad DRK without a NIN or WAR, you aren't suffering the GCD cost of activating Grit, just the potency per GCD penalty, so while it still sucks to be in Grit, it's not as bad as having to activate Grit.

[Brian_]

Regarding stances, the problem is quite simple.

A GCD in this game has too much value and tank stances have very little value (if any positive value at all).

As we've seen in basically all the math, a GCD of 0 potency is simply too big of a trade-off given the other penalties of tank-stance and the benefits just aren't impactful enough. Even for a job with an oGCD stance swap and 2 very strong abilities locked to their tank stance, they still avoid tank-stance like the plague.

Why? Balance. The gains you get from Deliverance dwarf the gains you get from Defiance. If the gap wasn't so titanic, tank stance would be used more.

I don't think the solution is to just remove stances altogether. That's like saying the solution to job balance is to just completely homogenize jobs. Different but equal is a hard idea to execute especially when you have a player-base with a few at the top who really analyze efficiency and create norms that others emulate but I don't think you need perfect balance in this case. Tank stance just needs something to give it value regardless of meta because enmity and eHP clearly aren't enough. Stuff like Unchained and Equilibrium are a step in the right direction and give tank stance real value when a WAR pulls but they aren't enough to keep the stance relevant outside of initial enmity. Just look at the blatant imbalance when you compare those to DPS-stance incentives like Fell Cleave, Decimate, Sword Oath, and Blood Weapon.

I also think it's a bad thing to remove stances because they give tanks a real spectrum of skill progression. Tank stance acts as training wheels for newer tanks that can't effectively snap aggro or use dCDs appropriately and SwO / Gritless / Deliverance gives tanks room to grow and an outlet for their ability to read a situation. Giving a tank everything by default just means they'll never have to really understand why they have it.