I say no to homogenization!

[GDFletcher]

Think the devs and Yoshi have made a substantial change to the game to clear the "meta" instead of blaming tanks for being much of the same, which when it comes to the latent tank abilities they should be with PLD being a brick wall, and DRK being able to be the gap between Warrior and Paladin.

I totally agree with the guys above two Warrior tanks in a party in the current "meta" would need a shit ton of healing, what players need to do is forget the old and adapt to the new, every "meta" as its day and you move on from it and get on to the next way of playing.

You will hear no complaint from Paladins now that much needed TLC as been done to the class to make them viable again properly, the WHM certainly have some cause to complain that they could use a little more utility on the tool belt but without seeing the 4.0 changes in the flesh we can only go by what we saw.

[bswpayton]

Tank should have area's of expertise where they excel in, we should not be pushing for normalization. I do not and you should not want a war, dk, or pld to tank the same way and have the same kinda mitigation and cooldowns.

Im with you 100 percent and pali just basicly gets their same skills back this was a bad system when they could have simply just unlocked all cross class abilities

[aleph_null]

This new role skill sharing system actually gives more real options for us compared to the current cross class system. Right now you pretty much have like 4-5 mandatory cross class skills for every job (maybe except pld), so that's just an illusion of having freedom to choose.

For example if you're a war right now you only have one option for cross class skills: provoke, convalescence, awareness, second wind, internal release. Everything else is either completely or nearly useless.

With the new role skill system you can take provoke, rampart, shirk (if it's some sort of aggro control), which are generally useful everywhere. For the remaining slots you can take reprisal, convalescence, stun or silence, depending on whether the dungeon/trial/raid you're doing needs them. There's also anticipation which we don't know anything about yet.

I honestly can't see where the aoe provoke could be (more) useful than the other skills though, unless the devs design new encounters which make it absolutely necessary (adds spawning with huge aggro on random non tank party members).

I think those role skills are meant to differentiate main tank and off tank playstyle. like the off tank can choose low blow instead of rampart, and majn tank would take provoke and aoe provoke together. If that's so we could find two same jobs with different tools, in the case of 2 pld in the same df party they can just switch role skills inside of duty decide from the start who perform mt role. not optimal, but atleast better than current df.

Full time MT/OT separation is a bad mentality, both tanks should actively split the tanking burden to utilize their defensive cds. By doing several tank swaps you can concentrate your cds and mitigate more dmg while maintaining low tank stance uptime on both tanks.

Same thing as MH/OH mentality, with whm/ast full time healing and sch almost full time dpsing, it's terribly inefficient.

[Shurrikhan]

Full time MT/OT separation is a bad mentality, both tanks should actively split the tanking burden to utilize their defensive cds. By doing several tank swaps you can concentrate your cds and mitigate more dmg while maintaining low tank stance uptime on both tanks.

Same thing as MH/OH mentality, with whm/ast full time healing and sch almost full time dpsing, it's terribly inefficient.

This. I don't know why people are happy to "streamline" or "detail" roles by literally just refusing to make best use of their toolkits. Both healers should have DoTs and any efficient HoTs running. They should have as high a combined raid DPS as possible, not just OH dps. A Warrior can still make use of his CDs he's popping for Fel Cleave chains by simply swapping in for their durations, especially given that the MT should hopefully be running in DPS stance by that point anyways.

And the split doesn't reduce homogenization in any way either. It just allows finer shades by which each job must rival another even more closely, creating 5 utterly homogenized roles, rather than 3 less homogenized.

If you think DRKs Brutul swing clone and shield swipe/storm's path hybrid are what made it unique you need to get your priorities straight.

While I'm not sure what you think was a Pacify/DMG done hybrid, given that DRK only has an (on-parry) DMG-mitigator in the form of a CD and its weaponskill is only an INT-reducer, Low Blow's refresh component was at least unique. Its loss won't break the job, but consider:

Would DRK be broken if its X-role 20% mitigation skill were still themed for its job (Shadowskin)?
Would WAR be broken if its X-role 20% mitigation skill were themed for its job (new name and animation)?
Would WAR be broken if its 5s stun still made use of its axe (Brutal Swing)?

SE seems to treat these X-role skills like some sort of ultimatum between job-specific aesthetics and role-wide applicability. But there is ultimatum. You can have BOTH. And I can't imagine we'd be any worse for it.

Each tank gets, let's say:

• a 20s 20% mitigation ability, 90s CD
• a single target peak-enmity ability, 40s CD
• an AoE peak-enmity ability, 90s CD
• a 20% healing taken increase ability, 90s CD
• critical hit taken prevention for 20 seconds, 90s CD
• etc., etc.

What you choose to call each for each job, or what animation you attach to the same effect, is irrelevant.
It will not shatter the X-role dream for DRKs to retain a Rampart animation, icon, and name that actually fits them. So why are we removing it?

[Okamimaru]

This is assuming that the Dev team wants the current meta the way it stands... for all we know trying to hold agro while in dps stance may no longer be a thing... it feels to me like they want classes to stick closer to their roles than the current DPS or GTFO mentality... most of the complaints in all the threads now are about the disruption to the current meta... which may be a good thing

[YitharV2]

What you choose to call each for each job, or what animation you attach to the same effect, is irrelevant.
It will not shatter the X-role dream for DRKs to retain a Rampart animation, icon, and name that actually fits them. So why are we removing it?

I agree 100% with you. My guess is they are possibly planning on adding more tank classes and making it cross role makes it easier for them. I'm not quite a fan of that because I see it as really only benefiting the developers. I consider the name and animation to be part of the uniqueness of a class.

[Alise]

I agree thought. I know that some job would be more favorable in some situation if they were not equal. But that is how FF should be anyway. It would be weird to have a job with shield and sword doing the same damage as one with huge ass axe lol...

[aleph_null]

I agree thought. I know that some job would be more favorable in some situation if they were not equal. But that is how FF should be anyway. It would be weird to have a job with shield and sword doing the same damage as one with huge ass axe lol...

You don't have to balance them around having the same personal dps, you can look at their raid dps contribution. Maybe tank A can do more dps than tank B and tank C, but tank B has offensive utilities that help physical dps in the group, tank C has defensive utilities that allow them to have less tank stance uptime or require less heals so the healers can contribute more. Of course they still won't be perfectly balanced, in certain fights some of them will still be preferred over the other, but the devs can definitely improve from what we currently have: drk + war (and also ast + sch, drg + nin + mch + brd) being ideal for every single floor in this raid tier.

According to some players this is actually still better than the balance in previous tiers, like war in 2.0, drg in 2.4-2.5, pld in 3.0-3.1, so the devs are definitely improving over time. I'm looking forward to how they'll balance the jobs in 4.0.

[Alise]

Tbh, FFXIV class description is just sooo wrong.

Let's says Dark Knight always be the high DPS in exchange for his own life, now become somewhat solid tank class where he barely need to spend his own life, and being so bulky, while doing so-so DPS.

Let's says Red Mage that has barely any support white spells, and doing equal damage to Black Mage and Summoner =_=

Let's says a guy in shinny armor with shield has similar DPS and HP to the guy with huge Axe...

agh, this is probably more WoW than FF. I think it is okay for job to be differentiate, if anything needed to be done, it is to let players gain access to multiple role/job gear easily so they can keep changing depend on favorable situation!

There was a time in 1.0 when players had access to top gear of every job. It was much more fun that way, I learn Pld until it get bored then change to learn Mnk next, then Blm, and so on.. And whenever party require any class, someone will change to it. So happy, and peaceful, no bias nor hate between jobs/classes. Easy to find party!

[Ultimatecalibur]

Let's says Dark Knight always be the high DPS in exchange for his own life, now become somewhat solid tank class where he barely need to spend his own life, and being so bulky, while doing so-so DPS.

Wrong. It was only post FFXI that they have been a dps. Prior to that they were a heavy frontline fighter same as Knights, Paladins, Fighters and Berserkers. Darkness was less a DpS increase than a fight shortener, you still ended up taking roughly the same amount of damage as you would if you had just attacked normally.

FFXI made it a dps.