Leveling & Player Skill in PotD - am I the odd one out?

[SilkaN]

The main problem with PotD and learning jobs is that some jobs play very differently in PotD than elsewhere. Monk is probably the best example. PotD has no positional requirements, and keeping your Greased Lightning stacks for very long is basically impossible. These are important skills for Monk and simple cannot be learned in PotD, no matter how long you spend in there.

I'd still say that this is the players' fault for not reading skill descriptions and trying to get used to them, not PotD's.

[alimdia]

I'd still say that this is the players' fault for not reading skill descriptions and trying to get used to them, not PotD's.

It is PotD's fault because not only it doesn't allow people to test out what they read from skill descriptions, it pretty much discourages even trying to learn, everything dies too fast.

PotD is the equivalent of getting to max level without leaving the tutorial, specially for tanks and melee DPS.

[SilkaN]

It is PotD's fault because not only it doesn't allow people to test out what they read from skill descriptions, it pretty much discourages even trying to learn, everything dies too fast.

I never understood this kind of attitude.
"Blame the tool, not the one who uses it."

I don't like comparing ingame mechanics to RL, but it's like you're saying it's alcohol's fault for people becoming alcoholics. Which is not true.

snip

Maybe it's because I hit level 60 on my first job during 3.3, but I did not notice a decrease in player skill.
Also, did you actually try to make use of all of Monk's skills / unique features in those dungeon runs?
If yes, then it proves my point. It's all about mentality. Even if enemies die too fast in PotD, if you try to apply what you've learned to normal content, you can still have "okay" dps.

It's the same for me, just because I basically melt everything in PotD as Summoner doesn't mean I don't try my best in normal content, too. If I were to suck in normal dungeons, it would be the fault of my own laziness, not some leveling tool.

[Faliandra]

Maybe it's because I hit level 60 on my first job during 3.3, but I did not notice a decrease in player skill.
Also, did you actually try to make use of all of Monk's skills / unique features in those dungeon runs?
If yes, then it proves my point. It's all about mentality. Even if enemies die too fast in PotD, if you try to apply what you've learned to normal content, you can still have "okay" dps.

It's the same for me, just because I basically melt everything in PotD as Summoner doesn't mean I don't try my best in normal content, too. If I were to suck in normal dungeons, it would be the fault of my own laziness, not some leveling tool.

Yes I have tried to make use of my skills, but there have been skills
that confused me even after reading the tooltips (again,I'm only talking about MNK here). So I had to ask my friends about it to grasp the idea behind it.
Maybe my MNK isnt a good example, because I was never interested enough to actually play that class seriously. So putting in extra effort into something you do not
enjoy is kind of a turn off (I still did it to some extend but wouldnt say I have succeeded very much, but I also am quite hard on myself in that matter)

But back to the learning curve of the game:

If the game is forcing you or guiding you towards using your tools by gradually introducing something new to you, its easier and more fun for many
people to learn as they play their class. If you just shove it into their face along with many skills at once like Palace of the Braindead does, you get away with everything
no matter how wrong you use your skills. A mob that dies in 2 seconds isnt a good way to practise skills on and it certainly isnt a good indicator
on whether you're doing a good job or not. I imagine it could be quite misleading to some people.
And I bet you, many people dont consider it fun to take a look at many skills at once, remembering what all of these skills do, figuring out the best possible
combinations/right order to use it to their fullest potential. They wanna PLAY the class in action.
The game is allowing this to happen without any penalties and the majority of people are known to always take the simplest road given to them.

Besides, many people also do NOT use a parser because they can't (PS4) or because they dont even know
about it, so they wouldnt even know if their rotation is improving dps or not.

Personally, I enjoy the normal dungeon lvling because to me, getting all these skills so quickly is overwhelming.
But I still care to be a good player, even on classes that might not be my cup of tea, so I avoid PotD.
I am better with getting 1 new skill at a time and using it as I play.

It isnt a good way for ME to learn and I realize that. Hence I don't do it.
A new player who basically grew up doing PotD may not realize that.

It's awesome if it worked out for you but I feel that you are a minority in this regard.
And IMHO this now reflects on the DF. Istarted playing in 3.1 and I have done roulettes on a daily basis (maybe taking a break for max a week sometimes) for
more than a year now. I feel the difference between back then and now is huge and judging from what other players I talked to say,
I'm not the only one thinking this way.