Caster Changes in 4.2 (RIP Casters)

[EllieShadeflare]

I'm gonna pretend all buffs and nerfs are in a vacuum and will only compare everything to the most exact and comparable form. I will pretend that nothing but the pure potency matters while everything surrounding the spell has no effect on the spell's usefulness or end result, even if in the end it turns out to be better than the original base form. I will also do this in a passive aggressive manner and pretend to be the intellectually superior individual for I am skilled at creating strawmen and I am skilled at destroying them. This is how I debate.

This is why I generally avoid the forums.

And yes, that was crass, but... perhaps you shouldn't have resorted to that as your response. I'm just gonna back out.

[Tommyhawk]

Can SE just STOP with the balancing and step back and ask if these changes will make the "job" fun or not
SMN 4.1 was fun
This SMN 4.2 garbage does not look fun
Why is SE being fun kryptonite?
In what universe does making a "job" less fun considered a good idea?

[Leukka]

Balancing Casters against each other only works if that slot is reserved for Casters only. Because we live in a world (thankfully) where groups are open to pick their own compositions, each and every caster falls behind to each and every ranged physical dps class and each Melee dps class with the only exception being Samurai.

It's because of this fact that it has never been optimal to run a Caster since 3.3

Personally, I wish we'd have the personal dps or group utility to make us feel desired. However, knowing SE's tendency for bandaid fixes it wouldn't surprise me if in the future at some point they nerf LB acquisition further for not having a specified group comp or just hard lock that slot for Casters only because it'd take a radical tuning pass to balance things out at this point.

[wereotter]

Can SE just STOP with the balancing and step back and ask if these changes will make the "job" fun or not
SMN 4.1 was fun
This SMN 4.2 garbage does not look fun
Why is SE being fun kryptonite?
In what universe does making a "job" less fun considered a good idea?

Summoner's only change was potency reductions that, frankly, are warranted. Look at the DPS parsing for the top 75th percentile in Omega savage, and the top performing job on literally every floor is summoner. Add to those numbers that summoner adds raid utility in the form of Devotion and raises, and their mobility of play compared to jobs its outperforming, and the job was in need of a nerf in power. They can't simply just make other jobs stronger, sometimes balance means an already powerful job needs to be tweaked down too.

[Karshan]

SMN isn't seeing any gameplay change from 4.1 it's simple potency nerf. So I don't understand what "fun" has to do with it : it will be the same just a little less powerful (2%). Oh but maybe that's what you mean by fun : OP ?
If big numbers or shonen kinda powers are what you seek for fun, you will end up disappointed on a mmo, where everything has to be balanced (or trying to and failing as of here) and changes happen within % or hundreth.
It's no offense, just advice on your choice of words.

For War you could say the new gameplay can affect fun. SMN and BLM are not changing, just adjusting potencies.

Fun on mmos lies not in how powerful you are, cause at max skill in a given role you're supposed to achieve similar results regardless of the class, as opposed to solo games. Fun on mmos lies within "how you achieve max skill" ie gameplay and "flow" of the classes.

[Tsurayu]

After having an afternoon to stew on it all, I'm rather indifferent to the changes to the casters.

It does feel like their attempt at balancing was menial at best. Black Mages did not get a particularly useful buff, nor did Summoner's get a particularly strict nerf - both attempts seem like they will fail to balance the casters much. As for Red Mage, I thought they were fine where they were, and continue to be. However, I admit I'm not a raider, so I'm not taking that particular aspect of the game in mind, so I suppose my opinion isn't worth much considering.

Besides, people seem to be forgetting that these are preliminary notes, and changes to classes have been made at the last minute, and there is nothing preventing a change again come 4.21 or 4.25. Everyone really needs to calm down a bit and see how these changes play out before being too up-in-arms.

[wereotter]

Now take those parses and plug them into http://xivrdps.herokuapp.com

I think every SMN would love to take a hit to personal dps if it meant a raid dps contribution equal to Ninjas, Dragoons, Bards and Machinists.

The original statement from the devs not only mentioned utility, which SMN has in the form of devotion and raises, but also in mobility and how impacted the job is by mechanics. Considering DOTs and pet damage continue through most mechanics and movement phases, added with general summoner mobility, and the job outperforms on personal DPS and ought to be sitting just above RDM, not at the top.

[HaroldSaxon]

What you refer is small changes on the numbers of their Cds/potency, we need more than that to be optimal, which is not happening during an expansion.

And quite frankly until I can test them for myself WAR changes to me are a nerf for the moment, won't comment on mnk because I don't play it

If you buffed BLM's F4 to a large enough value, that would be optimal. Sure there are QoL changes and reworks I would like to see and I agree that those won't be seen, but it is entirely possible for SE to make BLM optimal.

They just choose not to.

Remember they released BLM in 4.0 in an unplayable state and remember the large scale changes that were made in 4.05. And we're still bottom of the pack. Hell, the changes they made today SHOULD have happened in 4.1 - but nothing was done.

[HaroldSaxon]

Summoner's only change was potency reductions that, frankly, are warranted. Look at the DPS parsing for the top 75th percentile in Omega savage, and the top performing job on literally every floor is summoner. Add to those numbers that summoner adds raid utility in the form of Devotion and raises, and their mobility of play compared to jobs its outperforming, and the job was in need of a nerf in power. They can't simply just make other jobs stronger, sometimes balance means an already powerful job needs to be tweaked down too.

FFlogs overestimates SMN'er damage in a number of ways. It was absolutely not overpowered - Bard, Ninja, Dragoon and Machinist were all better.

[Remedi]

If you buffed BLM's F4 to a large enough value, that would be optimal. Sure there are QoL changes and reworks I would like to see and I agree that those won't be seen, but it is entirely possible for SE to make BLM optimal.

They just choose not to.

Remember they released BLM in 4.0 in an unplayable state and remember the large scale changes that were made in 4.05. And we're still bottom of the pack. Hell, the changes they made today SHOULD have happened in 4.1 - but nothing was done.

Maybe we have a different opinion of what unplayable means, but no jobs in this game is/was unplayable, there are different grades of optimal, but not unplayable.

That said, you know as much as me that the only way to bandaid fix us to be somewhat relevant in a meta composition without ANY synergy is by overbuffing our dmg which as you have stated in another topic it was not going to happen.