We Really Need To Talk About The State And Path Of FFXIV

[Magic-Mal]

By the time players start reaching Brayflox, they should be noticing that if the left side gear that you run across in treasure chest should have green numbers for their autos and defense, and that's what they should be aiming for. If they can't put 2 + 2 together by the point and instead choose to pick up left side gear that either doesn't provide extra numbers, or kami forbid red numbers, in ARR, then yes, you are right that there is a problem.

But the problem are those players who are ignoring an obvious upgrade. It's not rocket science. Feels like you're pointing out extreme examples, rather than uncommon ones.

Never said that players doing that aren't a problem. The game allowing them to wear the stuff is just another problem. If it's not a problem, why is Disciple of War gear marked "Disciple of War" to prevent magic-users, crafters, and gatherers from using it then? How curious is it that DoW gear is tagged "DoW" to prevent mistakes but DoM, DoL, and DoH are not tagged as such and instead tagged "All Classes".

Also, the Aetherial Linen Cowl at lv37 has higher defense and magic defense than the Infantry Shirt from Brayflox. As well as higher VIT and higher secondaries like Crit, Det, and Direct Hit(if it doesn't have Spell Speed on it since it's random). Easily enticing for a newbie looking to see green numbers.

Its not an extreme example. I guess you've never seen it happen then. Doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

[KaivaC]

Never said that players doing that aren't a problem. The game allowing them to wear the stuff is just another problem. If it's not a problem, why is Disciple of War gear marked "Disciple of War" to prevent magic-users, crafters, and gatherers from using it then? How curious is it that DoW gear is tagged "DoW" to prevent mistakes but DoM, DoL, and DoH are not tagged as such and instead tagged "All Classes".

Also, the Aetherial Linen Cowl at lv37 has higher defense and magic defense than the Infantry Shirt from Brayflox. As well as higher VIT and higher secondaries like Crit, Det, and Direct Hit(if it doesn't have Spell Speed on it since it's random). Easily enticing for a newbie looking to see green numbers.

Its not an extreme example. I guess you've never seen it happen then. Doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

I have seen it happen because I have gone through very early dungeons with some of that gear the first time I started.

I've never had a problem with that - if anything, I was spoken to about not doing my job properly. And again - it is not the major problem you are making it out to be, not until Brayflox, maybe Stone Vigil at the latest. And by that point, the problem is inherently on the players for not using basic knowledge to see that green means good, red means bad. Again, by the time you hit Brayflox, you should have some kind of working knowledge on what kind of gear you need to be getting - in fact, you'd have to go out of your way to pick the wrong gear, considering, again, MSQ showers you with gear just for progressing through it, with some cases, the HQ gear being able to last you for two or three dungeons or so.

[Reynhart]

Except I feel like you're missing the fact that since then, WARs have had a change themselves, which is how IR works.

IR effects on Direct Hits is the same as increasing your damage by a flat percentage, so, you remove DH, add basically the equivalent of FoF, and keep the Critical part.

Paladins are a strange job in which they do not benefit from crit as much as they would from direct hit.

It's been a long time since I haven't played my PLD. Why does it not benefit much from Crit ?

[HyoMinPark]

IR effects on Direct Hits is the same as increasing your damage by a flat percentage, so, you remove DH, add basically the equivalent of FoF, and keep the Critical part.

It's been a long time since I haven't played my PLD. Why does it not benefit much from Crit ?

According to some threads and posts I've read, it's just the current scaling of Direct Hit is better over Crit. So PLD substat priority is D.Hit > Crit > Det > SkSpeed (for accessories, STR > D.Hit > Crit > Det). This may change with 4.4 though and the new thresholds that can be reached, because Crit has already started taking over on some jobs (that aren't BRD or MNK). And it usually ends up the best at the end of an expansion because of how it scales.

[KaivaC]

IR effects on Direct Hits is the same as increasing your damage by a flat percentage, so, you remove DH, add basically the equivalent of FoF, and keep the Critical part.

It's been a long time since I haven't played my PLD. Why does it not benefit much from Crit ?

Fair enough. I don't dive deep into the numbers that much to say whether it's a good option or not to adjust DH that way. Could be an interesting discussion on reddit, let the theorycrafters there crunch those ideas and see what magic they'd be able to produce from this. I have no other further disagreement with you on that point.

For your other question, honestly, you'd have to ask the more knowledgeable raiders about the specific reasonings, because my info about PLD is from 4.1 when I was told to go straight DH. Again, I'm not really one to crunch numbers like that or dive too deeply into the deeper mechanics of the hows or whys But that was before I became an omnitank, where Crit was valued as the top stat because of gear sharing. If anybody could actually answer this question, that would be much appreciated. I just know that DH for PLDs have been the preferred top weight, and then Crit.

ninja edited: looks like Hyo got the answer.

[Reynhart]

According to some threads and posts I've read, it's just the current scaling of Direct Hit is better over Crit. So PLD substat priority is D.Hit > Crit > Det > SkSpeed (for accessories, STR > D.Hit > Crit > Det).

Ok, so in fact, we should say that WAR is the "strange job" that benefit less from stacking Direct Hit, since it already has a way of dealing them at will, souldn't we ?

[Hamada]

The reason why I don't think this is the whole/real reason is because they actually did fix it... for SB. In SB all accessories are role-locked, as it should be. But for some reason they didn't change the old ARR and HW jewelry. That's why I call it laziness, an oversight, or simply forgotten. Because they could've changed it with the release of SB... but they didn't. It's a common trend they have honestly. It's rare they ever go back and fix old stuff. I don't know why(Looking at you ARR story)

If they fully understood the problems here, it would been all fixed for HW, but it has not, and the ilevel skipping is still an issue. They also have not addressed wearing wrong gear or put a gate of ANY KIND for dungeons you do to level up in, i/e 15-69. So no, they do not understand the situation and clearly out of touch. They only did the jewelry because they got tired of tanks being too hard to heal from wearing str jewelry, has nothing to do with knowing how often the player base outside of japan cheese out DF requirements.

[Kallera]

This math and all is lovely but isn't the problem more about the game experience than the numbers?

[HyoMinPark]

Ok, so in fact, we should say that WAR is the "strange job" that benefit less from stacking Direct Hit, since it already has a way of dealing them at will, souldn't we ?

WARs don’t benefit as much from D.Hit anymore thanks to the changes they made to Berserk/IR, which guarantee D.Hit Crits every 90 seconds for its full duration. So they tend to stack Crit instead simply because it benefits them more (i.e., the D.Hit is “wasted” because of the way Berserk/IR function now). So you would probably say that they are the oddball tank with regards to the way they optimize substats.

[KaldeaSahaline]

Do I have hardcore facts no, but I do know he's not the big wig for SE which means he has to have a boss. Even if it's just the dudes in suits collecting a check not knowing how any of this works. But they aren't goign to randomly change the game cause a few fans want them too. Money has to stop to a point where they stop being happy with their amount. If we want REAL change.

Being reactive to the industry is necessary (i.e. big money loss prompting change), but it's also sub-optimal. You want to be proactive in that you drive trends and be flexible enough to be able pivot as the industry/climate changes.

If the stats “didn’t matter”, why is it that tank BiS for the last two tiers has chosen pentamelded crafted accessories over the Savage or Tomestone accessories? If they don’t matter, why do jobs like NIN and DRG avoid Skill Speed? Why does BRD favor Crit so much?

I can't speak for who you're responding too, but what I think they mean (and I could be wrong) is that the stats don't matter because there is no choice/decision.

I.e. BRDs only care about CRIT. Because they have synergy built into their kit off this. Because they lack that with other sub-stats it instantly makes the others useless. Thus making gearing binary and useless in general IMO.

I'm not sure what the solution is. I do know that more synergy between kits and stats would be welcomed though.

Melds do not cost " millions" as you said, TANK! you are not melding a crafter. This game hands you materia doing your experts and weekly 24 man, this is not an excuse.

Pentamelding my accs easily cost millions even with a healthy bank of them stored. probably near 3MM.

Regular gear melds? They're very reasonable, esp since you have a good chance of getting them back when removing them.