Level Syncing isn't the best solution

[PyurBlue]

What about those that arent 70 yet?

Allowing the use of all your skills benefits them as well. With the proposed change, when they level up and unlock a new skill they'll be able to practice it regardless of where the roulette places them instead of forgetting about it and potentially skipping important knowledge about how their class works.

If youre bothered by not being able to use 70 spells...run 70 dungeons. problem solved.

The problem is that there are various reasons to run level synced content, but level sync is boring. The existence of level 70 dungeons is irrelevant.

I quite like losing spells/abilities personally. brings you back down to the basics which is never a bad thing.

Then we can make it optional like I proposed so that those who prefer the current system can still choose to sync. There isn't any real benefit to syncing and with the proper balancing of skills, having the full level 70 skill list won't make leveled players overpowered.

[SendohJin]

Then we can make it optional like I proposed so that those who prefer the current system can still choose to sync.

Unsync is already optional. you're asking to swap what the default is with what's optional, i don't see any overwhelming reason why.

There isn't any real benefit to syncing and with the proper balancing of skills, having the full level 70 skill list won't make leveled players overpowered.

i haven't been convinced of this "proper balancing of skills"

a SCH with Adlo and Excogitation is overpowered compared to a low level healer without them. how do you balance the shield? how do you balance Excogitation? does it shield for 1 HP and explode for 1 HP restored? why would anyone use anything balanced like that? how do you balance 3 aetherflow charges against a lower level SCH with just 1?

a WHM that can regen and apply Medica II is overpowered compared to a healer that can't. how do you balance the regen ticks? how do you balance instant cast Assize or Divine Benison?

[HyoMinPark]

Allowing the use of all your skills benefits them as well. With the proposed change, when they level up and unlock a new skill they'll be able to practice it regardless of where the roulette places them instead of forgetting about it and potentially skipping important knowledge about how their class works.

But they can already do this—when they unlock a new skill, they can queue into something at level and practice using it. This is the case for any level: 15, 30, 45, 50, 60, or 70. There are dungeons every 3 levels in ARR, and every 2 in HW/SB. They have options outside of Leveling Roulette, which is meant to be run once a day—if you need more levels/experience, you queue in for something at level.

The problem is that there are various reasons to run level synced content, but level sync is boring. The existence of level 70 dungeons is irrelevant.

Level sync and level 70 dungeons would be less boring if they would stop nerfing them every time a new expansion comes out. Things die so quickly in ARR and HW dungeons now because they were nerfed—ARR when HW was released, and HW when SB was released.

Then we can make it optional like I proposed so that those who prefer the current system can still choose to sync. There isn't any real benefit to syncing and with the proper balancing of skills, having the full level 70 skill list won't make leveled players overpowered.

Except they would have to basically completely redo how they do level syncing—as it stands currently, a level 70 DPS synced to level 15 for Sastasha is extremely overpowered; more so than an at-level player is in there thanks to the nerfs to mobs’/bosses’ HP. The time and resources spent on that could be spent elsewhere for something else: as I said in my last post, making a not-a-dumpster-fire Relic in 5.0 is one example; another would be to finally fix PvP.

This isn’t a necessary change.

[PyurBlue]

Unsync is already optional. you're asking to swap what the default is with what's optional, i don't see any overwhelming reason why.

Unsync is completely different though. That leaves you with level 70 stats, trivializing pretty much everything under level 50 and negating the need for a party.

What is being asked for is a more enjoyable way to participate in synced content where your abilities are balanced in order to provide some form of challenge.

i haven't been convinced of this "proper balancing of skills"


a SCH with Adlo and Excogitation is overpowered compared to a low level healer without them. how do you balance the shield? how do you balance Excogitation? does it shield for 1 HP and explode for 1 HP restored? why would anyone use anything balanced like that? how do you balance 3 aetherflow charges against a lower level SCH with just 1?

The simplest way to approach balancing is probably targeting a given amount of DPS/HPS. Say a level 15 does 100 HPS averaged over a few minutes while a level 70 can achieve 2000 HPS over that same time. To balance the healing between them, you would want to lower potencies so that the level 70 is also healing around 100 HPS. Maybe a little less because having more skills, especially OGCD, will allow for more burst.

Adlo specifically isn't a huge problem. While the healing is split between HP recovery and shielding, it still works effectively the same as Cure/Physic when the tank is taking heavy damage. You just have to wait to reapply it so that you're not overwriting shields and thus wasting MP. You could argue that shields might be overpowered (but they're potency based and so can be tweaked) in very low level content, but all healing is. SCH doesn't even need Physic in some cases because Embrace is so strong.

Having a higher Aetherflow cap isn't much of an issue either if its related actions are weaker. If Energy drain restores less MP per use, you need to burn more AF to get the same MP restoration. You also have stronger heals that AF allows you to use, but they just get made weaker like everything else. Is there even any content where you can have only 1 AF stack and a cohealer?

a WHM that can regen and apply Medica II is overpowered compared to a healer that can't. how do you balance the regen ticks? how do you balance instant cast Assize or Divine Benison?

Total HPS as before. Regen + Medica II can be lowered to range anywhere from 0 HPS to their level 70 amounts. Rebalanced Assize won't be healing for thousands in a level 15 dungeon with adjusted potency. Benison is target HP based so it might not even need to be adjusted, but it's an effective HPS gain, so maybe lower the shielding to 5%?

Potency rebalancing isn't something that devs will finish in an afternoon, and I hope I'm not coming across as thinking it is . This suggestion might be the kind of change that comes with a new expansion, but I think it's worth the effort.

But they can already do this—when they unlock a new skill, they can queue into something at level and practice using it. This is the case for any level: 15, 30, 45, 50, 60, or 70. There are dungeons every 3 levels in ARR, and every 2 in HW/SB. They have options outside of Leveling Roulette, which is meant to be run once a day—if you need more levels/experience, you queue in for something at level.

There is the case of over leveling the story, especially with the Road to 60 bonus. Or players leveling an alt class just running roulettes for the bonuses and then switching classes to do something else like raiding.

Level sync and level 70 dungeons would be less boring if they would stop nerfing them every time a new expansion comes out. Things die so quickly in ARR and HW dungeons now because they were nerfed—ARR when HW was released, and HW when SB was released.

This is still a separate issue from class playability at low levels though. You could make low level dungeons harder, but I don't think I'll ever be distracted enough to forget that I don't have Total Eclipse on PLD below level~45, or Gravity on AST below 52.

Except they would have to basically completely redo how they do level syncing—as it stands currently, a level 70 DPS synced to level 15 for Sastasha is extremely overpowered; more so than an at-level player is in there thanks to the nerfs to mobs’/bosses’ HP. The time and resources spent on that could be spent elsewhere for something else: as I said in my last post, making a not-a-dumpster-fire Relic in 5.0 is one example; another would be to finally fix PvP.

This isn’t a necessary change.

You're not wrong, but the value of the change is subjective. Players that want the change will continue to ask for it. If the suggestion isn't popular enough then Square won't allocate any resources for it.

[HyoMinPark]

There is the case of over leveling the story, especially with the Road to 60 bonus. Or players leveling an alt class just running roulettes for the bonuses and then switching classes to do something else like raiding.

A player overlevels the story only on their first job that they take through it, and that’s due to the developers buffing the experience from the MSQ and from the dungeons that they participate in below the current expansion—plus 2.x and 3.x give EXP now. It’s even worse if you do Leveling Roulette consistently and all the sidequests (my alt reached level 60 on her BRD before she even finished 2.x). However, for people that level other jobs, they don’t have the MSQ/story to over-level—my original point with them having options in the form of dungeons catered to their leveling bracket still stands.

It may take less time now, what with the experience buffs and things like FC buffs, Road to 60, the Brand New Ring, the Ala Mhigan Earrings, and the Friendship Circlet, but the options are still there. That hasn’t changed; all that’s changed is “Well, now I only need to run Cutter’s Cry 5 times to reach level 41 for Stone Vigil as opposed to 8”, to give an example.

This is still a separate issue from class playability at low levels though. You could make low level dungeons harder, but I don't think I'll ever be distracted enough to forget that I don't have Total Eclipse on PLD below level~45, or Gravity on AST below 52.

It’s not so much about making them harder, but making them not fall over; stop nerfing them. When I first started back at the tail end of 3.0/start of 3.1, people still did the bubble mechanic in Sastasha for the final boss. Now? You burn him. He dies before the adds even have a chance to spawn.

Some jobs it does suck to not have AOEs at a lower level—some of these could be rectified by either implanting the skills at a lower level (like what they did with Total Eclipse—that’s new to SB), or lowering the level in which you acquire them (AST should get Gravity at level 45 at the earliest because that’s when WHM gets Holy; SCH learns Miasma II at level 40~45 - somewhere around there; I know before it was level 42, but I think they changed it with SB and it’s a job reward now(?) - so it would be in line with them as well).

For PLDs, they could even give them Total Eclipse at level 15 to balance out with WAR and DRK, both of whom have AOE abilities at that level (Overpower and Unleash).

However, if they were to implement that change now, there would still probably be balance issues with the baby dungeons due to a combination of nerfs and the fact that the dungeons were not designed initially with these types of abilities in mind. SE has said in the past that they don’t like going back and fixing “old content” (see: Main Scenario and their lazy “fix” with it, or scaling ARR/HW Hunts ot level 70 so they aren’t just zerged down), so it’s doubtful that they would fix it in the first place.

Which brings me back to the first point I ever made in this thread: it would be a balance nightmare to give level 70 players their full level 70 rotation. Again, consider a level 70 BRD or DRG or SAM against a level 15 GLA or MRD.

You're not wrong, but the value of the change is subjective. Players that want the change will continue to ask for it. If the suggestion isn't popular enough then Square won't allocate any resources for it.

Based from complaints I’ve seen, the two examples I suggested would be addressed before something like this. If we want to go by “popularity”. This is not something I’ve ever seen a lot of people ask for—compared to the mess Eureka and PvP are.

[silverlunarfox]

This isn’t a necessary change.

You answered this perfectly, thank you.

Do you want 2 hour dungeon queues? Because that's how you get 2 hour dungeon queues.

Thats a tad exaggerated. But then again, I'm not so salty about losing abilities at low level and I run everything I can daily.

Not interested in being taken seriously by those who've already shown me their painted faces, oversized shoes, polka dot pants, and seltzer water.


Great community by the way.

People are allowed to have opinions and disagree. Even people like you.

[Deceptus]

Thats a tad exaggerated. But then again, I'm not so salty about losing abilities at low level and I run everything I can daily.

Not really. What I replied to was you saying that if you're 70 and you don't like losing your abilities don't queue into leveling roulette.

And you know what? Now that all my classes are 70, I haven't touched a leveling roulette or a 50/60 roulette. I primarily tank and heal. So that's one less queue for that content because I don't want to have to do old, boring content that I have done hundreds of times with gimped abilities. Without the experience bonus, there's no reason to do it at all. Clusters are easier gotten by A rank hunts.

It's the same reason people responded poorly to SE's decision to lock the cutscenes on the Story mode roulette. People don't want their time wasted and they do a cost benefit analysis for their time.

IMHO, very few can honestly claim that if you find lvl 70 content enjoyable that you find level 15 content enjoyable when your skills are removed. You don't enjoy it, you merely tolerate it. And like I said earlier, you probably won't find very many lvl 70's in leveling roulette or 50/60 roulette. Below level 70 simply do it for the exp bonus.

[Rhomagus]

Not really. What I replied to was you saying that if you're 70 and you don't like losing your abilities don't queue into leveling roulette.

And you know what? Know that all my classes are 70, I haven't touched a leveling roulette or a 50/60 roulette. I primarily tank and heal. So that's one less queue for that content because I don't want to have to do old, boring content that I have done hundreds of times with gimped abilities. Without the experience bonus, there's no reason to do it at all. Clusters are easier gotten by A rank hunts.

It's the same reason people responded poorly to SE's decision to lock the cutscenes on the Story mode roulette. People don't want their time wasted and they do a cost benefit analysis for their time.

IMHO, very few can honestly claim that if you find lvl 70 content enjoyable that you find level 15 content enjoyable when your skills are removed. You don't enjoy it, you merely tolerate it. And like I said earlier, you probably won't find very many lvl 70's in leveling roulette or 50/60 roulette. Below level 70 simply do it for the exp bonus.

This is a great post because the cons in this thread have effectively made this proposal as a solution, which is a gameplay behavior that you and a large part of the veteran populace are already displaying. And for good reason.

The system, in its current state, is already discouraging people like you, me, and the OP from doing the leveling roulette and this post is proof of that.

The fact they don't see that as a problem and that the ramifications of such actually hurts new players going through the content rather than help those going through the game for the first time is further proof of their disingenuous intent.

You are a problem because you keep insulting people, perhaps the reason no one wants to play together with you is due to your personality, not because they lose skills upon being synched down.

In any case, I'm done talking to you. Even the lightest of criticism towards you is met with comparisons to flat-earthers or calling people elitists. I'll be adding you to my ignore list and I expect others have already done so too.

Where did I mention that I'm concerned with "being a problem". Where did I mention that "I want people to play with me". I remember giving reasoning as to why I want people to play together, not necessarily with me. You're arguing from a perspective of emotion not from logic. This post is clear proof of that and it's clouding your judgement. People aren't playing with other people because they lose skills upon being synced down. That's the entire premise of the thread to begin with. Do me and yourself a favor, read the entire thread. Read every post. Absorb it's message. Then come back and offer constructive feedback, because so far, from you, it's been nothing but emotional appeals.

See my previous post for further info.

[HyoMinPark]

WARNING: Long post because I ran out of posts and was unable to respond to the things that I wanted to respond to thanks to that. I didn’t answer everything I wanted to to avoid making this longer than it already is. Points do not necessarily address the opening post, and are more so counterarguments to other things that have been said, so I apologize to those who find this information irrelevant.



Ignoring the vague ad hominem on people that disagree with you simply because they disagree with you...

If you show them how it is indeed possible, they just counter with "that's stupid". If you show them how it's not stupid and it's actually a fairly common sense implementation they now suddenly become software engineers and veteran programmers that have direct access to SE's source code and they'll tell you, "with how the system is built, it's impossible."

But your specific suggestion to make skills that were above the level of the instance you’re currently running do “nearly 0 damage” or “start missing” literally is a pointless and stupid system. Why use the skills if they’re doing 0 damage or missing? They are pointless buttons then. Same with if at-level skills are not “synced” but above-level ones are damage-wise. Or your entire rotation is penalized to balance against the lowest denominator (that is how balancing is done in this game).

Why used synced skills suffering a damage nerf/penalty due to sync when you can just use your at-level rotation and do appropriate damage for that level? Why should a level 70 DPS do a level 70 rotation in Sastasha or Brayflox when their baby co-DPS does just as much with a level 15 or level 30 rotation? Again, inb4 “for practice”, there is at-level content for that. I don’t consider it very strong evidence for a system like this.

This isn’t something a bunch of people are advocating for, nor something that is necessary to the game, and the time and resources would be better spent on something else—be it implementing a not-trash Relic grind in 5.0, fixing the mess PvP is, fixing the jobs that need help (i.e., MCH, DRK—that one is overdue for some TLC even though it’s better now than it was at 4.0 launch), fixing the mess that this game’s Housing system is (by far a popular request, probably the most popular), or even making 5.0 not a HW copy-paste with regards to content.

There is far more outrage and hubbub about all of the above compared to “I don’t have my level 70 rotation when I get Sastasha in the leveling roulette that I willingly queued for, and knew I could possibly end up here in this very situation “. Just because you disagree with that doesn’t mean it’s an invalid point.

Not interested in being taken seriously by those who've already shown me their painted faces, oversized shoes, polka dot pants, and seltzer water.

Communicative Skills 101 — if you want people to hear your proposal, it’s probably best not to insult them just because they disagree with you or offer counterpoints. It’s also worth it to not seem like an angry child when presenting an idea, too.

So in the first instance, having a high level rotation is useless because things die too quickly. In the second instance, things wouldn't be dying fast enough so therefore you should be kicked even over an ice mage who is actually less productive.

Momomi’s comment about kicking a level 70 player doing their full rotation was literally in response to your suggestion that synced skills miss or do 0 damage—in something like Sastasha or Halatali or Brayflox, that’s a significant portion of your kit just doing zero damage so that....what? You can “practice it”? The point she is making is that the level 70 player wouldn’t be contributing (you can’t contribute when your damage is 0 or your skills are all missing the targets), therefore she would replace you with someone who will (by actually using the skills that do damage, if we’re looking at your absurd suggestion). Don’t remove context; it makes you look disingenuous.

Not all opinions stay equal once new and accurate information is introduced. See flat earth theory.

Okay, and you haven’t provided any accurate information or quantifiable data to make your opinion “matter more” that anyone else’s in this thread; all you’re providing is personal feelings, assumptions, and anecdotes at best.

Elitists calling lower leveled people elitists is a privilege only available to elitists. Calling that out should be a given. This community is full of that.

No, it’s not. Players that aren’t high-level can show their own brand of elitism, just like non-raiders can be elitist. You are a prime example of the former. Or did you forget that you basically insinuated above that your opinions hold more weight than anyone else’s despite offering no facts to even give it credence?

rhetorical terrorists

Literally no reason to make comments like this just because people aren’t bowing at your feet saying your idea is amazing and as revolutionary as sliced bread.

I have also said that when I get to that level I would like to display said high level rotation to those who are low level and gave a first hand example of when both rookie and veteran player were better served as having such but the con side is not interested in reading the whole thread.

Okay, and others have said they aren’t interested in a system like this. Again, this isn’t a fact; it’s how you personally feel.

The con side is only interested in quote mining and straw manning.

The irony of you talking about others using fallacies when your posts are riddled with ad hominem and strawmans of their own.

Duty Roulette is not just a system to randomly put you in a dungeon. It's a queue system that incentivizes you to do runs you've already done in order to help players, veteran and rookie alike, match a party for the content.

And your incentives are hefty amounts of EXP if leveling, tomestones, and cracked clusters if you’re a tank/healer and labeled as the “adventurer in need”. Your incentives do not include “the ability to practice your level 70 rotation in Copperbell Mines”.

Veteran looking to finally obtain that glamour from that one dungeon you already completed years ago? Good news, you have a populace that can fill the slots you need in order to complete that dungeon due to the incentive structures present in the Duty Roulette.

Or they can literally unsync it if it’s a dungeon from a previous expansion, which is what veterans would do. That way they get it done faster, and they’re guaranteed loot if doing it solo or with a friend.

I am not obligated to show you or anyone else here respect that they have not offered anyone else.

But your blatant disrespect towards anyone who has disagreed with you also has a negative impact on people just reading the thread. I’ve only responded to you once, and before I even did that I had lost any respect for your arguments or your position due to your tone. That probably wouldn’t have happened if you had maintained a semblance of respect, despite criticism.

People aren't playing with other people because they lose skills upon being synced down. That's the entire premise of the thread to begin with.

There’s no evidence you can provide of this aside from anecdotes. The premise of the thread is the OP wanting to practice his level 70 rotation regardless of what duty he gets in a roulette—level 15, level 30, level 50, level 60, whatever. It’s not because “people aren’t queuing up for Leveling Roulette because this isn’t a thing, so it should be made a thing so that people will queue”. That’s your argument; not the original premise as presented by the opening post.

This is a great post because the cons in this thread have effectively made this proposal as a solution, which is a gameplay behavior that you and a large part of the veteran populace are already displaying. And for good reason.

The system, in its current state, is already discouraging people like you, me, and the OP from doing the leveling roulette and this post is proof of that.

The fact they don't see that as a problem and that the ramifications of such actually hurts new players going through the content rather than help those going through the game for the first time is further proof of their disingenuous intent.

No, people aren’t running Leveling Roulette as a level 70 job because they simply don’t want to—if they aren’t leveling or don’t need tomestones or don’t want cracked clusters, they skip it and do other things. It’s not because they lose skills when they’re synced down, and you’re being disingenuous by insinuating that, because the OP wants his skills regardless of sync or because you want your skills regardless of sync, that everyone feels this way.

[Penthea]

No, people aren’t running Leveling Roulette as a level 70 job because they simply don’t want to—if they aren’t leveling or don’t need tomestones or don’t want cracked clusters, they skip it and do other things. It’s not because they lose skills when they’re synced down, and you’re being disingenuous by insinuating that, because the OP wants his skills regardless of sync or because you want your skills regardless of sync, that everyone feels this way.

Can confirm that this is at least the case for myself and my fc. No one in my fc complains much about being in low lvl content as long as it's not Sastasha or Totorak. I don't hate the low lvl content, I simply have no need to run them on my main. However I still do them on my alts and I enjoy them as they are.