This whole Meta Party thing is hurting me. x_x

[Lina_Slayer]

Level all jobs, play the job and gear up the current job that is meta at this current tier/patch, if you want to progress in the raiding content if you are running it effectively and within the current cycle before the next level comes out. That is the simplest answer I can give, next tier it might be something different. Jump ship and gear one of the new meta comps.

Or just level up a Ninja, SE will never allow something to happen to their dearest.

[Veliena]

Should an entire role be excluded from serious raiding though? It doesn't excuse the current situation.



Yes it does matter. It matters socially when looking for groups and it also matters performance wise - running meta comps leads to more raid dps which can be important to hit enrages in lower skilled groups. The old meta comp of MCH + BRD also provided much more mana to the party for lower skilled healers.

This whole "the meta doesn't matter for non world prog" needs to go back to /r/ffxiv and die in a fire because its one of the most idiotic statements to come out of this community.

The fact that you say "in lower skilled groups" backs up what the other have said about "meta" not mattering to most players. Sorry but if you have to have a meta comp to clear something, you shouldn't be clearing it. Not to mention if a player is simply better on a non meta job then a meta job, you would be hurting your chances of clearing the content by forcing them to switch due to the fact that they will be "less skilled" on the meta job.

[DGladius]

Meta does effect things outside of speed kills and world first particularly when you look to join pf groups for extreme and savage. It takes me longer to find a spot for samurai.

[Lina_Slayer]

Meta does effect things outside of speed kills and world first particularly when you look to join pf groups for extreme and savage. It takes me longer to find a spot for samurai.

To be fair Samurai is a very popular class so while the lockouts are a problem, they are not that common in my experience, I think most PFs are locking your class out because there is already one SAM and LB gain punishment can make or break a fight (especially something like Byakko EX that is LB cheesed by everyone and their mothers).

However I agree with you that meta makes alot of difference for us who are trying to clear the tier on PUGs, cleared OS6 with a BLM, a SAM and a RDM on my group, but we had problems with enrage and it was tight to the point where we could only afford one death (making RDM's res basically useless) or we hit enrage for sure, meta comps bring more DPS allowing for more mistakes in those scenarios.

[HaroldSaxon]

The fact that you say "in lower skilled groups" backs up what the other have said about "meta" not mattering to most players. Sorry but if you have to have a meta comp to clear something, you shouldn't be clearing it. Not to mention if a player is simply better on a non meta job then a meta job, you would be hurting your chances of clearing the content by forcing them to switch due to the fact that they will be "less skilled" on the meta job.

It doesn't at all. Maybe you should re-read my posts. I'm saying that by taking stronger classes you can bring more to your raid team no matter what the skill leve..

The ability to clear something doesn't make things balanced. There is the time taken to clear the fight - not just in the encounter itself, but during progression.

Don't get me wrong, to some extent its true that player comfort is important - but if a player is good with one job, then they can put in the time and get skilled with another job. And the social aspect of players looking for groups is silly at times (rejecting a high skilled BLM/SAM for a bad MCH for instance). But at the end of the day, that's going to happen whatever SE do.

But making sure an entire role is excluded, not just for one patch, but for years is absolutely unacceptable. And having NIN/BRD/MCH/DRG dominate for so long is unacceptable too.

[Veliena]

It doesn't at all. Maybe you should re-read my posts. I'm saying that by taking stronger classes you can bring more to your raid team no matter what the skill leve..

The ability to clear something doesn't make things balanced. There is the time taken to clear the fight - not just in the encounter itself, but during progression.

Don't get me wrong, to some extent its true that player comfort is important - but if a player is good with one job, then they can put in the time and get skilled with another job. And the social aspect of players looking for groups is silly at times (rejecting a high skilled BLM/SAM for a bad MCH for instance). But at the end of the day, that's going to happen whatever SE do.

But making sure an entire role is excluded, not just for one patch, but for years is absolutely unacceptable. And having NIN/BRD/MCH/DRG dominate for so long is unacceptable too.

Ok I do see what you're saying. There is a bigger issue with this then simply making things viable. If you move to make everything as viable as everything else, you lose class/job diversity. Currently no 2 jobs really play the same, and so what they can and cannot do is different. If we balance them more against each other we would most likely lose that diversity from every job.

I don't agree with how SE balances the jobs, only balancing them against the other jobs in their role, but I don't want them to try to achieve a great balance at the cost of diversity.

What I would suggest as a fix for this, is to make the raids larger. Say 12 man. a 3rd tank, 3rd healer, and 2 more dps. This may offset some of the issues. I could be wrong but I do know that with larger groups, generally, more mistakes can be made by individual players and you can still kill the boss. This may not be true in ffxiv but it might be.

[HaroldSaxon]

Ok I do see what you're saying. There is a bigger issue with this then simply making things viable. If you move to make everything as viable as everything else, you lose class/job diversity.

Currently no 2 jobs really play the same, and so what they can and cannot do is different. If we balance them more against each other we would most likely lose that diversity from every job.

I don't agree with how SE balances the jobs, only balancing them against the other jobs in their role, but I don't want them to try to achieve a great balance at the cost of diversity.

What I would suggest as a fix for this, is to make the raids larger. Say 12 man. a 3rd tank, 3rd healer, and 2 more dps. This may offset some of the issues. I could be wrong but I do know that with larger groups, generally, more mistakes can be made by individual players and you can still kill the boss. This may not be true in ffxiv but it might be.[/QUOTE]

That is not what I have said. Please stop putting words into my mouth. I have always said that the aim SE should have is:

1) To have at least one class in every role as optimal
2) The optimal comp should change depending on the fight
3) The optimal comp should not stay as the same 4 classes for more than one patch, let alone for years.

You do not need to sacrifice class/job diversity to achieve that. You actually strengthen diverse classes, strengthen non meta playstyles and tinker with fight design.

[Aeliott]

What is REALLY hurting you (and everyone, for that matter) is just how drastic the difference between META and non-META comps really is.

But it's not drastic? Player skill is vastly more influential than meta, than gear, anything. A team of amazing players with like....I dunno, a 2x DRK 4x RDM team will still down a fight a hell of a lot faster than a team of average players in an "optimal" composition. Having desired jobs in your party doesn't automatically make everyone do more overall party damage than a team of less desired jobs. How many people do you think actively think about their buff-alignment optimised DPS rotation they copied from some elite guild web page and think "hang on, these randoms aren't getting those buffs up in a way that fits my opener/rotatoin, I'd better adjust it"? That's the tip of the iceberg, in most content people are only focused on what they're doing themselves. Hell, if anything low utility jobs like SAM and BLM are ideal if you're with such people since you generally don't care what that pug NIN and DRG are up to, you're an awesome damage machine that will leave them all in the dust more than you would on a meta job.

Of course there is discrepancy between jobs. Their personal damage is all in the same reasonable ballpark, which is great, but only the tactical management of utility escalates them; THAT is when "meta" tactics begins to make a noticeable difference. I still wouldn't call it drastic though, even though it's objectively optimal in an ideal scenario. So while yes, some jobs function better in optimised play than others, the community also needs to stop flailing their arms around going "omg SE/Yoshi don't know how to balance!!" and acting like the difference is...well, drastic. It's got a hell of a lot more balance than the vast majority of online games I've played in the last 20 years, that's for sure. That's not an excuse to say that people can't complain about how their job functions, but rather a reason for people not to overreact about playing with others who are on a job that offers 0.5% less RDPS than an alternative when their buffs (or lack of) are perfectly synced with others playing 100% optimally.

[Nominous]

By "it works" I don't mean "you can press buttons and it won't crash", I mean it by that it's a viable job to clear ANY content with.

And I mean what I said. It's not a goal, it's a requirement that any Job can clear any content in this game. If certain Jobs couldn't clear content, it'd be an insult to call them, "Working". All of that to say, it's the principle that you shouldn't applaud anyone for meeting, or going slightly past the bare-minimum expectations.

I feel it's fair to say all of the above, given WAR launch in 2.0, PLD in 3.0, and the continued dominance of NIN, DRG, and (arguably) BRD/MCH. It's not that the meta is "So much better" than other compositions. It's that most of those Jobs are given multiple strengths with no discernible weaknesses, while other Jobs are left in the dust, usually for an entire expansion.

It's not about viability. It's not about the 'meta' being broken, or too strong. It's about feeling rewarded for the Job you want to play. It's about feeling good for the strength and benefits you can offer to the party. Unfortunately, some Jobs just can't experience that right now, and I think it's fair that those Jobs feel burned by all of this.

[Trensharo]

Snipped...

META is about how you class falls on the spectrum of viability, and its effects on the gameplay of others. The classes highest up in the hierarchy within the roles they fit form a META group. For DPS classes, Utility is Key. The fact that all classes are viable doesn't matter - the classes don't all have equal viability - and META is the manifestation of this fact. It does matter - it's a clear indication of imbalances within the game - either in class balance, or in content design. Players make judgement calls based on those disparities, and it manifests in their group preferences. Having a requirement that any class be able to clear any content in the game is fairly useless, in the grand scheme of things.

It's why balance is such an important aspect of these games. You end up discriminating against certain classes if you get the class balance or content design wrong (using that term loosely).

META is a thing. It has a lot of implications on players' gameplay, and culture within the game. Players coming into the game may also choose classes to play based largely on their standing on the spectrum of viability. This is called "Flavor of the Month," and it's one of the biggest implications of content design or class balance issues in a game.

The fact that Class A is viable does not matter, at all, if Class B is seen as better by the community. People will naturally prefer Class B over Class A, and may even wait longer for a Class B to ask admission into their group/raid. The best way to mitigate this, is through better class balancing and content design. The community is as much at fault for this as the developers are, but you can't really blame them. It's normal human behavior.

As these games get more and more "competitive," this has actually generally worsened over the years.