A QoL/Balance Shortlist for DPS (Tanks/Healers only as additional context)

[Shurrikhan]

The problem with this change has nothing to do with how it affects the target. I have few complaints there (imo it's not enough, but the idea is appreciated). The problem is you've ignored the cost to each caster, and that's the biggest issue here. BLM needs to use a Thundercloud proc during UI in order to use Mana Shift without clipping or a major damage loss, and that's basically unavoidable without changing T3 or B4 into instant-cast spells currently. And even with that, their AF/UI rotation artificially gates the cooldown for them, meaning they will never be on par with the other two using it on cooldown.

A caster of lesser MP now sees a % increase in Mana Shift effectiveness equal to the % difference in their maximum MP. Overtime, this does mean fewer necessary Mana Shift casts. Sure, a healer could mishandle their MP to ask their casters to drain themselves even further to further enable the healer, but overall, that is a buff which stretches to the caster as well. Yes, the caster is still penalized in that mana is shifted more than (or rather than) being created (though now there is some amount of something being generated from nothing), but without that I'd have to apply balance via a longer cooldown, which increases the chance of punishment for not holding MS for a rez, or some similar factor general or job-specific.

As BLM stands to lose no long-term throughput for using Mana Shift, as compared to those with combat-rez tools, I'm not sure the .5 seconds of clipping on BLM (now mitigated proportionately to one's GCD) is so detrimental as to require a change to Mana Shift as a whole either. I use Mana Shift within 5 seconds of its coming back on CD as is without issue. Sure, there's a space of clipping after B4 or T3, but I leave UI with full MP each time despite casting it and I doubt it wouldn't be worth casting even if I didn't.

And on that note, if the explicit goal is to compete with Refresh, I have to wonder why you aren't removing Refresh's AoE component and turning it into the MP equivalent of Goad and giving it to both the Ranged and Caster DPS respectively instead. If it's just for the Foes interaction, I'd actually argue that the mana spending on it should be removed, especially given the TP/MP consolidation that's coming anyways.

Because by "compete with Refresh" I mean that a composition that forgoes a Ranged should still be capable of similar effective mana generation per minute, or, more simply, that a composition without a Ranged should be feasible. That doesn't mean that a single caster should already be able to produce roughly the same amount of mana, as needed, to what a Ranged produces through Refresh, only that it should be sufficient via whatever composition replaces the Ranged, assuming everyone's playing well. It should compete with Refresh in that it should be able to be taken in place of it, not that it should necessarily have the same value.

I may well remove the MP interaction with Foe (now Battle Voice in these suggestions, and now on Hypercharge for MCH -- each with the purpose of offering more control to the rDPS timings). I don't like it. For now, I just hated that Bard gets to double-dip from double-Ranged while Machinist gets doubly shat on, and disliked that even if they were perfectly balanced you'd pretty well have to choose one or the other just due to their CD timings, which felt somehow wrong to me in that they are considered definitively "support" dps.

I'm not sure how I'd feel about single-target MP generation. Allowing for far broader changes, I'd like it, but so long as we've only one Ranged skill with access to MP generation functionality, I don't feel like I would. Bard, especially, feels like it ought to be affecting everyone with that kind of effect. That singing isn't some form of focused telepathy. Promotion, likewise, felt like an omnidirectional emission. And while Refresh feels, aesthetically, like a poor replacement for the original skills, I still want to consider its sources and what would be expected from as close as we get to "Support" jobs.

The problem with this is MP costs don't scale with anyone's base mana. They're based on their level 0 costs (which, yes, level 0 does exist) which is multiplied by a universal modifier that grows based on their level. This formula is different from their base MP growth formula, which unfortunately grows slower than the costs themselves and is what lead to the ARR/HW Piety breakpoints in the first place. BLM hasn't had the right numbers in place because the current formulas don't allow for that kind of granularity, which just tells me that it's a leftover from 1.0. SE has since 'fixed' the breakpoint issue by making Piety only affect healers and has repeatedly tuned BLM's MP costs down in order to support their ideal rotation, and I expect them to do so again next expansion in order to account for whatever new rotation they decide on. These MP cost changes are basically meaningless within that context, though I do support the idea you were going for.

I'm aware, but I think that would be the best solution. Consider there as being an Level 0 Max MP value. It must be large enough to allow for as many fractions as you will eventually need to differentiate your spells from each other with some remainder just less than two casts of your lowest cost requisite spell (e.g. Blizzard III). From there you apply a fractional (rounded from a factor rational enough to resolve to decimal-less values every 10 increments/levels) progression per level to both spell costs and the maximal MP.

My personal hope is that they address some of BLM's clipping and mobility issues in general regardless, and there are plenty of ways to do that while retaining BLM's status as a turret DPS.

Same hope, same belief. Though, I'm sure many would argue that the clipping is just a matter of skill-gap (every oGCD but TC should be within TC and TC should only ever follow F3) and just tell me to "get gud" for thinking as much. I'd like to eventually see animation breakpoints and layers so that we can clip a bit further and more naturally (in appearance), regardless of the job, but that's probably a pipedream of a very distant end.

Contre Sixte and Fleche and the dashes are already treated as generic physical damage, and are the only abilities in RDM's kit treated as such.

My apologies; I was not aware of this. In the current version of suggestions I... might(?) want to make them Piercing too, then.

Nonetheless, to answer your question as to whether Piercing belongs in the game at all beyond DRG itself -- I'm not certain. I've been testing the removal of Piercing on Bard and Machinist as is. It depends quite specifically on how much tDPS RDM's party, all else constant, would produce if paired with a DRG vs. other jobs. If Piercing stays as stale as it is now, I'd probably side with limiting it to DRG alone.

Displacement is already notoriously awful to use in certain fights and putting more weight on finding opportunities to use it is only going to be detrimental to their damage in the long run.

I've been asking around with anyone who can so much as ponder an educated guess as to XIV's code as to whether it might be possible to use a mid-KB immunity/cancel, e.g. being able to end Elusive Jump, Displacement, and the like early. Most favor the idea that with XIV's positional unresponsiveness, such would be impossible. The alternative then would be to allow for a few different extents of movement, as I ultimately want to do for all dashes as well. For instance, holding S/<stick back> when triggering Displacement would launch you further (e.g. to the current amount), but the base length would be shorter.

In my opinion, none of the dashes should have potencies to begin with. Maybe just Corps-a-corps, but certainly not on Displacement. Shift the potency on that into Contre Sixte and Fleche, which don't have these issues.

I may well resort to that. I personally love having some reward to go pinging back and forth about the field (which is why I miss Repelling Shot potency, even if I find its removal totally understandable), but perhaps there would be a way to limit its obligatory use while still seeing similarly high potential use... Short of that, yeah, leaving it as purely a (usually really good) escape tool would be simple and effective.

(If I seem to be ignoring the obvious solution here, it's not usually because it hasn't caught my attention yet, but just because there are some things I'm weirdly comprehensive in inspecting the contexts of. This one on the other hand... equal parts bias, forgetfulness, and pipedreaming.)

I don't get why you're trying to preserve Embolden's decay by flipping it into a growth effect either. If anything, it actually makes it harder to use for the average player.

Simply put, because I enjoy that "timing tension", as do most people I've ever raided with. It would seem a disservice to the game, imo, to remove its sort of poster (or, problem) child.

Looking over any given average opener, likewise, it doesn't seem like it'd be any harder for those managing 50th percentile or better in Extreme trials or harder content. You... pop it at the start, and then basically on cooldown from there. It just happens to also sync better with your own actions. Frontloaded, aligning with TA means wasting recast time. Backloaded, it doesn't.

I like that kind of consideration and my slightest hint of an intent to trim anything like that -- strawmanned more often than not, as I do enjoy it as well -- usually lands me in very hot water.

I'll be honest, Wyrm Wave proccing off of oGCDs in general is a big problem to me. It's functionally easier to make it so he only considers your spells (or just the Ruin line, even) when making his attacks, and would go a long way to making him feel more fluid. The alternative would be to implement a pet hotbar, which I believe SE was trying to avoid in the first place.

Same story here. I will literally hear my SMN getting giddy over comms with "I've got Virus!!" when his oGCDs (purely incidental party survival tools included) are ready to go for Summon Bahamut.

Pets. Are. Garbage. And unfortunately, I can say that you didn't actually accomplish anything in that regard other than the usual signposting we get about it.

I don't doubt it. But I don't feel like I know the insides of XIV's code well enough to point out exactly which fixes should be made to make pets more responsive. Which is why I left it at "mutatis mutandi, pets be less shitty" for the time being. Obviously, Summon Bahamut himself needs far more work. He needs the standard controls and scripting, including hotbar (not to say those controls shouldn't then be improved upon; they must be). I've just been delaying to see what I can put together. Pet spell/ability/movement queuing is the most obvious general issue, but I wish I knew why they thought it okay to have it operate as it does right now. It's so bad that it feels like there has to be some absolute necessary reason... even if there's probably not. Back in ARR I'd made a plethora of suggestions offering small bits of mini-AI, increased pet movement speed only to hear "that's too complicated". I'd like to smooth them out a bit while still allowing them to be comprehensive. Sadly, most of the tools I'm used to relying on from WoW (like continuous generation or degeneration) just aren't possible in this game, and having over five times as long a delay between server polls and even less client trust certainly doesn't help. Pets are one of those areas where I wouldn't mind the risk of the occasional hacker making them damage-immune or allowing them to teleport around the arena -- as it's obvious enough in PvP for instant reporting and irrelevant in PvE so long as it doesn't actually affect their damage -- if it meant responsive checks.

Heavensward SMN was the best overall implementation of the job to date.

Their main pitfall at the time was in those nuances.

I agree that HW SMN needed button consolidation and specific changes to make using them easier back then, but not at the cost of their flow.

Agreed on all counts.

Need to head out for a bit. Will edit in the rest when I get back.

[Shurrikhan]

Given a choice, this the full list of things I would do to fix SMN:

- Aetherflow Gauge reworked. Aetherflow and Aethertrail are allowed to coexist again. Executing Aetherflow abilities still grants Aethertrail, surrounding each Aetherflow socket with a blue outline on the normal UI, and having three seperate nodes on the simplified UI to track Aethertrail.

Had been arguing for this myself for a long time, including on some threads we've both frequented. Though, iirc, I think we disagreed on how that'd best mesh with other SMN mechanics, especially DWT itself.

- Fester and Painflare reworked. Now share a cooldown of 2s. (This just tightens up Aetherflow usage in the opener without causing any issues elsewhere).

Not sure how I feel about this. The separate cooldowns gave it a sense of options in rushing expenditure, if necessary, at cost of ST/AoE potency that I actually enjoyed. I'd mostly just like to see Bane revised and also placed on a 5s CD. ...And ideally for all 3 to scale with Speed...

- Dreadwyrm Trance reworked. Now replaces Rouse via a new trait, Trance Mastery I. Increases Magic Damage Dealt by 10% for 20s. Also applies Rouse to pet, increasing healing magic potency and damage dealt by pet by 40%. While roused, pet will be immune to Stun, Sleep, Bind, and Heavy. Costs 3 Aethertrail to use, and has a 20s cooldown. (No longer prevents the execution of Aetherflow abilities while under its effects, reduces the cast time of Ruin III, or increases the potency of Tri-Bind)

I don't see why this would have any noticeable disbenefits, but it does feel like one of the less obvious or necessary consolidation choices. I'm sure this will make sense with further notes though?

- Tri-Bind Reworked: Now called Tri-Ruin. Deals unaspected damage with a potency of 60, with an MP cost of 720, the same as Bio III. (No longer inflicts Bind, but now counts as a Ruin spell for the purposes of Ruination)

The name seems a bit off, but sure, I guess? Generally, I'd like to see more CC returned to the game (along with the ability to make use of it) rather than more taken from it, but Tri-bind has always been lackluster at best to me.

- Bane Reworked: Spreads any debuffs you've inflicted on a target to nearby enemies. Potency of your damage over time effects is reduced by 20% for the second enemy, 40% for the third, and 60% for all remaining enemies. (Now spreads Tri-Disaster's third debuff in addition to Bio/Miasma III. Maximum damage drop off has effectively been doubled without changing the curve at all)

How has it been doubled? TR has only 10 potency less than TB, while Ruination spread increases that back to the full 70. Would the added 10 potency be applied before or after drop-off? At minimum, that seems like it would be equal to TB (70/56/42/28...), and if applies after: greater (70/58/46/34). Wait... what about Corruption/Radiant Flames, as well, now that they're DoTs? It does say any now, but would those be counted as yours?

- Summon Bahamut reworked. Now shares a cooldown with Dreadwyrm Trance. Increases magic damage dealt by 10% for 20s and summons Demi-Bahamut to fight by your side. Each time you use a spell on an enemy target, Demi-Bahamut will execute Wyrmwave on the same target. This action cannot be assigned to a hotbar. (Triggering from abilities removed. DWT's Damage bonus added. Deathflare, however, is not available during this period.)

Okay. I'm still worried about the loss of guaranteed instant casts, though...

- New Trait added: Trance Mastery II. Allows for the strengthening of Dreadwyrm Trance with Dreadwyrm Aether upon executing Deathflare during Dreadwyrm Trance, enabling the summoning of Demi-Bahamut. When your Dreadwyrm Aether is fully stored (2 units), Dreadwyrm Trance will change to Summon Bahamut. (Note: This results in Bahamut being summoned once every 3 minutes instead of 2.)

- That seems fine for the most part, but I don't like the even further increased resource risk from death.

- Wyrm Wave potency increased to 200. (This is there mostly to compensate for the damage nerf inside Trance, not the nerf to how often you can use it, which is an appropriate nerf, imo. Notably, as a result of the trigger changes, this ability actually gains value from from spell speed without needing a direct potency boost).

Fair enough.

- Enkindle Bahamut reworked. Shares a cooldown with Enkindle and replaces it during Dreadwyrm Trance. Cannot be assigned to a hotbar. (Sorry, less Akh Morns)

Hmm... Not sure how I feel about never seeing Inferno or Aerial Blast ever again. I think most Summoners would prefer this, though. Bigger boom. Though, it does seem like it would end up awfully redundant with Deathflare...

- Enhanced Enkindle reworked: Reduces Enkindle's cooldown to 1 minute. (Distributing the lost Akh Morn damage around to every DWT instead via this change, and removing the proc in the process, which really had no reason to exist in the first place.)

Yeah, I wasn't a fan of the proc.

- Tri-Disaster reworked. Now afflicts target with Bio III and Miasma III. If used while not under the effects of Dreadwyrm Trance or Summon Bahamut, also inflicts Ruination, increasing the potency of Ruin spells used against the target by 10 for 15s.

See, this, too, feels just a bit... off, to me. TD made sense when it applied... three debuffs. Now that there aren't three DoTs, it almost feels like it wants a third, pet-dependent effect at all times. Not sure what to make of it except that something feels lacking.

Summon Bahamut Effect: Afflicts target with Vulnerability Up, increasing all damage dealt to the target by 3% for 15s.

Do we really need more rDPS moments that aren't really noticeable or at all worth adjusting for?

Dreadwyrm Trance Effect: Afflicts target with an additional status effect depending on Egi you currently have out for 15s.
- Garuda: Increases target's magic damage taken by 10%.
- Ifrit: Increases target's physical damage taken by 5%.
- Titan: Decreases target's damage dealt by 5%.

I kind of like where you're going with this, but the thematics don't really seem to make sense, and it just moves the composition dependence from the (admittedly far clunkier, if they can't be fixed) pet skills to DWT, where that connection feels a real stretch. I do love the Bane implications, though, as that would be solidly within "any of your effects" now. I guess you could just say I've never been a fan of SMN as an rDPS bot and would prefer more visible utilities alongside more personal potency.

- Ruin I potency increased to 110.
- Ruin II potency reduced to 90. (Accounts for booksmacking at low levels and discourages overusing it for mobility. That's it).

Seems fair, though I suspect it will garner some hatred from others.

- Ruin Mastery reworked. Ruin I now grants Further Ruin I, enabling the use of Ruin III/IV. Further Ruin stacks up to 3 times.
- Ruin III reworked. Now deals unaspected damage with a potency of 200. Costs one Further Ruin stack. This cost is ignored while under effect of Dreadwyrm Trance or Summon Bahamut. (Ruin III no longer replaces Ruin I)
- Ruin IV reworked. Now deals unaspected damage with a potency of 200. Costs two Further Ruin stacks. Cost ignored while under effect of Dreadwyrm Trance or Summon Bahamut. This cost is ignored while under effect of Dreadwyrm Trance or Summon Bahamut. (Ruin IV no longer replaces Ruin II)
- Enhanced Ruin II Reworked. Now called Ruin Mastery II. Grants a 15% chance that a pet action will trigger Further Ruin I. Ruin I now grants Further Ruin II. Ruin II now grants Further Ruin I. Maximum Further Ruin stacks increased to 6.

I think I like this, though I'd want to see it for myself. I'm not too sold on taking so many keys for what don't appear distinct, either. And consuming 90-110 potency in the form of an FR stack just for an instant cast via R4 as compared to R3 seems a bit... much. I feel like this is an improvement, but not quite there?

- Contagion reworked. Now deals wind damage with a potency of 100 and inflicts wind damage over time with a potency of 100 to target for 15s.
- Radiant Shield reworked. Creates a barrier around self and nearby party members for 15s. When barrier is stuck, deals fire damage over time to striker with a potency of 30 for 9s. (This is comparatively minor damage compared to the old version, but still has a notable advantage in certain AoE situations compared to Contagion. Contagion's significantly stronger in single target situations specifically in order to help combat the extra damage Ifrit provides via auto attacks).

Does it matter that they compete over AoE / ST, though? You'll just go with whatever the composition requires, I would think? Actually, if the healers can DPS at all, wouldn't you just be stuck with Garuda at all times, given the doubly effective debuff over DWT for Magic, compared to Physical?

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Personally, I don't feel the way you're altering Bard even after these changes is all that meaningful to be honest. It's not for lack of forethought on your part either. There are things I like and things I dislike. Allowing WM to store PP stacks and making Bloodletter/Rain of Death affected by Skill Speed is a nice change for sure, but the cooldown doesn't really need to go on the former at all.

You've said this before, I think? What cooldown are you referring to, though? PP has no cooldown. Or do you mean the removal of the cooldown isn't necessary? If so, again, the it's just because it helps with EA and the last 2.9 seconds of WM.

Arrow Helix sounds like an implementation nightmare and I would not wish it on any intern.

Once I finish calculations I should be able to simplify it.

Twin Bolt is fine but I question why you're doing this when Barrage exists and I don't really want to think about how that specific interaction would work.

It's stated. If you Barrage (preemptive), the original skill hits 2 extra times. If you AH after, the original hits an extra single time (postactive). As for why, I just wanted something that felt like it was offering pace and control. Being able to chain-DoT in the oGCD space or get off an extra RA or, at the very worst, get off an extra HS to trigger an RA just felt like a very efficient way to offer that. I'd gone through about four other versions prior to this, including being able to draw from Sidewinder, Barrage, or a returned Flaming Arrow (revised, for synergy with weaponskills) at partial power despite their being on CD (or, without triggering their CD). This one... felt best.

Ballad doesn't really need to be any more busy, again for the same reason.

Fair enough. I just wanted to make it more balanced against WM, which will always have the advantage of less waste, without making it more WM. I figured, it if it's going to be wasteful, why not use that as it's own gimmick, rather than merely a shortcoming?

Dissonance's numbers worry me a lot too when you factor in just how good Ballad is for AoE already.

Yeah... it might well be a bit overkill at the moment. For now I just wanted to make it so that Bard AoE wasn't entirely limited to one song. With this, WM is the slight, slight best, with MB and AP both on its tail.

Overall the fact that you'd be pressing the same two buttons inbetween GCDs regardless of song ad-nauseum is what raises the biggest red flag to me. I get the point behind the consolidation but some of it is consolidation for consolidation's sake.

I think I get your concern, but at the same time, I'm not really seeing the cause for it. I don't see what's wrong with their being an ST and AoE variant of each song's spenders. It seems to increase cohesion and the depth of the core mechanic to me.

Refulgent Arrow doesn't need to be moved to Heavy Shot either, you just need to upgrade the Heavy Shot proc so it instead reapplies Straight Shot's buff immediately and grants the current RA proc instead. RA is something the player has to decide when to use and shouldn't be moved onto your main filler button, and that buff solves the problem of putting it on Straight Shot without that much of a DPS increase to Bard overall.

But then Straight Shot would be a non-button besides the 3rd GCD. Thereafter, it'd just be maintained by spamming HS.

I'd be fine with RA being a chosen nuke skill, but so long as the mechanic works anything like its present form the only way to delay it is to waste further chances to proc of it. Compared to that, sacrificing 10 potency to Straight Shot (decoupled from RA), down from the effective 30, seems rather sane. Ideally I'd want to rework all of that so that the Crit buff from Straight Shot is something you more than maintain -- that you gamble around and prep and spend in a sort of balance of Rate vs. Depth -- and that RA can use as a full spender skill, but I can't get create yet a system for that that would be simple, deeply capable of nuance, and cohesive. Not until we can get potency-to-percentile and roll-over mechanics.

And I don't think people realize just how good stacking crit rate is on Bard in terms of affecting their overall DPS.

I mean, there are certainly scary Google Sheets tables enough detailing the impact of all-else-equal Crit to Det exchanges.
Just by the nature of the class stacking Crit creates a positive feedback loop of more procs which leads to more oGCD spam which in term gives you more chances to crit again for even more damage. Between your oGCDs and your GCDs, your GCDs do hit harder and more often, but the more crit you have the more your oGCDs are able close that gap, to the point that they can be worth almost half of your damage contribution if not equal for two of your three songs. AST and SCH are already considered the best two healers and if the former draws a naked Spear Bard is hands down the best class to throw it on. Unlike other raid buffs, these stack additively. And that works in Bard's favor in this case. If Chain/Litany are both already up on the boss giving them a Single Target Spear is more likely to beat out spreading it than any other card on any other class. DRG and SCH's buffs both sync up with the potion timer in order to 30% Crit Chance for 45s every 6 minutes and 15% crit chance, which was more than you could get at the beginning of this expansion, and when you factor in snapshotting, that bonus is available for the majority of each Ballad afterward. I believe now with the current BiS gear you only require one of these two to push over the threshold where it's better to spam Pitch Perfect on cooldown in WM, while in Ballad you're already all but guaranteed to be spamming it repeatedly.

Removing Foes feels like a missed opportunity too, namely because adding a song specialized for AoE DPS specifically over single target DPS would actually change up your song rotation based on any significant AoE phase present in the fight that you could take advantage of. Ballad is your all-around good song, Paeon is filler when nothing else is better, WM is strictly single target DPS, so adding Foes as the go-to AoE song and toning down Ballad's AoE contributions while toning up Paeon makes perfect sense.

Wait, so, you want a Foe Requiem that isn't a rDPS buff but instead some sort of AoE song or AoE augmentative bonus song? Could you describe this in a bit more detail?

Battle Voice, while handled better than Foes is currently, is unfortunately a flat out a mistake given the TP/MP merger coming in 5.0. Just make it into a standard, no nonsense raid cooldown and leave it at that.

While I hope we eventually see a more granular job resource that could play into this, true, such a suggestion will not survive the merger. Of course, we've been given very little information on what else may or may not apart from the obvious removal or replacement of Tactician, Goad, and Invigorate.

All you're really doing in effect with the Wide Volley/Grenado Shot changes is creating a needless and somewhat hidden punishment mechanism.

Yet people were glad for the option to AoE from afar despite its added cost in Heavensward. Given that it has literally no cost to implement now that we have stacked actions, I just didn't see the reason why not to return that functionality. Of course, if SE decides that Ranged don't have to be forced to be more expensive than melee or limited to the same ranges melee are then I can just replace them outright, though I'd still prefer the option of seeing both animations (and, heck, weaponskill names) based on proximity. Wide Volley looks awkward at point blank range, as does grenading yourself.

I'd be equally as fine with it if you wanted them to have the extended range period and simply replaced the original skills with them. My problem with it is they don't really add anything meaningful when it comes to their AoE rotations as it is.

That's fine by my. I don't want Bard to feel obliged to run back and forth from melee to max range between QN-WD-RoD as they did in 2.0.

There are alternative ways you could actually add them back in that actually do something other than drain TP faster.

I'm sure there are. I just hadn't come up with any entirely satisfying concepts; the old examples have all turned into examples of what not to do.

For example, Grenado Shot could be added back in on MCH specifically by using a toggle effect to alter their Single Target combo into an AoE one.

But I've just added that to Wildfire, and it seems to make more sense there. This is yet another area though where if I could do all I wanted... anything that looks like it could be an AoE would be and ST Shots across multiple targets would each be prepping Spread Shot against the same.

Wide Volley could easily be added back in while Quick Nock could be remade into an AoE version of Empyreal Arrow (Quick Nock has the better animation for being made into an oGCD, hence why I chose it over Wide Volley), existing independently from other weaponskills and having its own internal cooldown but gaining similar properties from its trait. That would help Bard's baseline proc management with minimal effect on their gameplay too.

What similar properties? And why have yet another oGCD pair, on the same timer as the original oGCD pair? And if the concern with the others is that it'd have minimal effect on their gameplay, then why is this minimal effect a good thing? I'm guessing you mean a mass-proc for instant max Repertoire stacks, as per EA-Arrow Helix? If so then you'd definitely want the Pitch Perfect CD removed, no, as not to waste it when DoTs are up?

I'm just gonna say this, when it comes to MCH, it isn't about the skill gap. Clunkiness. Is. Bad. Period.

Agreed. No matter how something "contributes" to skillgap and nuance, if it's outright clunky, it's bad.

People jumped ship from MCH because of how SE changed it in Stormblood, and while arguably it had a similar problem juggling so many cooldowns all at once in Heavensward, so did many of the other classes, and it was on a slow enough scale that it could be managed. MCH may be hard but it's not for the right reasons in Stormblood.

Again, agreed. I quite enjoyed it in HW, if a little less than Bow Mage.

Turrets should be affected by every buff except magic damage.

Agreed. I just opted to use an aura-copy from the Machinist himself because the turret disappears instantly upon your death anyways, but would have to remain out for the full duration of buffs once received to benefit full from them, where an aura-copy could be replaced.

Overdrive does not need a nerf, which by the sounds of what you've described is your intent, in order to make the skill something you only use before any downtime.

It's a buff, not a nerf... mostly. It just makes it so you don't waste buffs with Overdrive, but neither do you get the full effect of a buff for the 30 seconds worth of damage Overdrive deals off the last second of that buff. It admittedly takes the skill out of the decision somewhat, but mostly works towards increased flexibility and situational burst.

It should resummon the turret automatically after the debuff wears off, even I could see removing that penalty on it or removing the skill entirely before SE ever fixes snapshotting.

Shoot, I forgot to include that. I'm not sure what you mean by the latter clause, though. If you mean the suggestion above is impossible because of the necessity of snapshotting, note that this would still be (ratio'ed) snapshotting. 9 second left on TA would have affect 30 seconds of damage by an average of 3%. So, Overdrive's total damage would be 3% higher with 9 seconds of TA. It just also wouldn't be shit without TA, because it would now benefit from the MCH traits and anything else the MCH has on him. But alas, I may revert that too in order to maintain that skillgap element. I mostly just don't like what the interaction does to AoE on B-OD. On ST it's mostly fine.

Hypercharge does not need to be a copy of Foes. Same reasons as outlined above. The current Hypercharge is fine. Bard needs to be toned down anyways.

Bard's only parsing less than a percent tDPS over what it probably should be doing. My reasons are as described above: if possible, I'd prefer "Support" DPS not be forced into 90/120 compositions. I'd rather the unique parts of the Bard and MCH toolkits each have room to grow, rather than the decision being made solely by their CD timings.

Flamethrower will probably never get the changes you describe, because SE hates making anything tick at a rate higher than one second,

Sadly true.

and even with that I don't think the changes help with how Flamethrower is used. Right now it's the only thing that lets MCH enter overheat that's oGCD at all and I think one way you could solve the heat problem is by simply letting Flamethrower instantly put you in Overheat rather than all the awkward fiddling you did with its heat generation. Granularity does help but in a lot of ways in this case speed is the real issue.

Could you expound on this. It sounds as if there's something an oGCD can offer to Overheat more than just it's extra weaponskill within the OH window? I figured I'd just have Heat "100/100" but not actually Overheat until the first weaponskill thereafter to solve that more easily.

I would suggest reverting heat to the old system and adding heat reduction options to Gauss Round/Ricochet and potentially removing the heat generation from Clean Shot.

I'm probably going to revert to a faster heat generation system soon. I'm thinking of removing Hot Shot as a maintenance buff and instead moving into the position of a pure Heat generator. But that process would involve an almost from-scratch rework of the Heat system.

Something still needs to be done about Overheat as well but personally I hope SE actually increases the duration of Wildfire and Overheat to make them easier to use. You do this to some extent but not enough imo. The window is already super tight and anything you can do to widen it more than the bare minimum to accommodate your Rapidfire change helps high ping players out a ton specifically.

My main concern is simply that with the suggested change, you're looking at (from a base 2.5 GCD) 9.5 seconds to complete 5 GCDs of actions. At, say, a 10.5 seconds total duration (appears to be 10 seconds, making it just a pleasant surprise when the last one counts -- fair enough), you've 2 to 3 clip-spaces. At a 2.4 GCD, you've ended at 9.12 seconds, with space for the 3 clips to fit even at ~120 ms more ping. By the time you extend that to 12 seconds, though, now you're looking at another possible weaponskill within the effect, but at a far, far tighter fit. Give enough space for anyone to take advantage of and it can become obligatory. So, I'm still trying to figure out the perfect amount. And I'm not above tricking the player to make something feel better, just as GL has often done in the past, vanishing completely for a full second just to be reapplied at 3 stacks when the snapshotted effect finally reveals itself, or as AF/UI will do to a lesser degree now.

I'd argue that Hot Shot should carry the piercing debuff instead of a damage bonus and grant 50 Heat (with ammo bypassing it as usual), which eliminates that DRG dependency and the heat bonus helps with most of MCH's problems in a much better way.

50 Heat seems mechanics-destructive, but I like the idea of using it as a piercer. I guess if that were the case, Straight Shot would turn into Bard's? At that point, though, Bard would be the one enabling both MCH and DRG, lol...

Barrel Stabilizer doesn't really have a purpose outside of deaths or as a mid-cycle heat managment tool as a result of that.

Ehh, it seems decently useful to me. Rapidly returning to 30 additional potency per standard shot is awfully nice. I'm not sure what exactly I want from it yet, but I think I can make something quite useful out of it without making the system feel dependent on it.

Overheat itself really needs to be changed to only begin its timer once you've used a weaponskill at 100 heat. Reaching 100 Heat in any manner, including using Flamethrower, still puts you in that Overheated state, meaning you can't use Cooldown to exit out of it, but the timer doesn't start until you use another weaponskill. It seems unnecessary, but it would also help alleviate the currrent skill speed issue a bit as well, and if don't want to mess with the current Heat mechanics at all, I'd recommend it over any of my other suggestions precisely because it and the Flamethrower change solve most of these problems.

Heh, there we go. Agreed. And nah, that doesn't seem unnecessary or overcomplicated at all. It's a solid change, I think.

I do have some thoughts on Monk specifically, but mostly under the general opinion that positionals need rethinking on melee DPS, and it's the class that needs the most work in that regard. What I'm suggesting is relatively minor, however. I'm tossing it out mostly because of mentioning Deep Meditation earlier, as I have a proposed rework for that trait, Meditation, and a couple weaponskills. The weaponskills in question are simply the Coeurl Form single target skills. Drop the positional requirements on those, and only those.

I've got to admit, I don't much like the idea of dropping any positional requirements on Monk... I like my position-weaving, even mid colors-wheel in Suzaku.

My idea for Deep Meditation is to split up the Chakra Gauge into two halves, light and shadow. Making a flank attack would fill up the guage with Light Chakra, and back attacks would fill up with Shadow Chakra.

Oh, well in that case... It's not how I'd approach Light/Dark Chakra (which I've been raving about since the SB Monk Quests), but... hmm. Hmmm.

This would be true regardless of the positional requirements of the attacks themselves, but for flexibility's sake, the positional requirements on the Coeurl Form skills have to be removed to facilitate this, bare minimum. With that in mind, Deep Meditation also alters Meditation, which now essentially grants 1.5 Chakra with each use, prioritizing whichever half is lower, and picking randomly between them if they're equal. This is a buff, but it also removes the scaling factor from MNK's crit rate from the equation.

So let me review:
- Crit Scaling is gone. With it, RNG is gone.
- Instead it requires more hits per # of Chakra necessary for a move to compensate for the at-least-doubled bonus-potency generation rate?
- Meditation plays on this RDM-ness by feeding the less developed half. I don't wholly get what you mean by 1.5 Chakra, though, unless... each strike gives 2 Chakra and Meditation gives 3 or it's a 50% chance of a 2nd Chakra?

If a balance is required between Light and Dark, I'll be honest: I'll hate this. If not, I'd probably love it. But no matter how I think about it it does seems a bit restrictive without offering any additional nuance.

I'm still working on a rendition of Monk for the "Your job in 12 buttons or less" that centers around exactly this (Light/Dark Chakra) in addition to the elements and a significant reboot of the positionals. I'll be able to give a more vivid illustration of any of my own hopes/opinions once I finish.

[Aomine1992]

I like these ideas especially SMN gosh these pets have some annoyance to them!!

I still feel as though MCH just needs a complete overhaul again unfortunately the whole heating system thing just isn't fun at all.

[Dzian]

I'm kinda sure that as of today, Diversion is one of the best use of the actual Role Action system, both MCH and BRD should have access to it, because the agro drop of Tactician an Refresh are clunky. Especially if the Bard uses refresh to milk a bit of Foe's Requiem. (In my former team, we had BRD and MCH, MCH used refresh on its opener so the BRD had the two songs available, and she kept ripping aggro anyway). Aggro management is part of playing this game and I don't mind. But I'd rather have all proper tools to do so, and it's a bit unfair for BRD and MCH.
If we are to keep the system as it is, I think having the aggro drop being changed to the same effect of Diversion (less aggro generated) on both songs would be perfect. And include an aggro drop on Repelling shot for BRD, Blank on MCH (and Fluid Aura or Assize on WHM).

Aggro has more tools than there really needs to be. adding even more aggro dumps as stuff just makes tanking even more laughable.. tanks already barely ever touch aggro combos or skills as is. that alone kinda higlights how much of a joke aggro and emnity is..

butchers block / rage of halone combos are basically never touched these days.

Jobs dont need even more aggro dumps. tanks just need to learn to use the aggro tools they have available...

If tanks used these tools and dps jobs still had aggro problem then i might agree on adding or buffing some dumps. but i think any aggro problems that exist stem from tanks not using there tools rather than dps not having dumps

[Cetonis]

I don't remotely consider this a backdoor approach to talents. I don't like talents. I just one stat that I've been willing to test at every amount possible under i390 despite some throughput loss as having genuine gameplay appeal and find it more than a little disappointing that it's only permitted to two jobs.

This seems like a contradiction to me. What you want, effectively, is to have an alternate gameplay dynamic available to each job (in this case, faster GCDs in particular, but I presume you wouldn't hate other gameplay-impactful options). If that is the goal, then a talent-like system is the better way to achieve it. It's direct, it's clear, and it's flexible from a design and balancing perspective.

I'm actually not very familiar with other games' models, but one could imagine something as simple as selectable traits a la PvP (but more impactful). The number of slots could be flat, it could be something you gain over the course of the endgame, it could be on gear, whatever. Or it could be trees, or sets of talents, or some other model. And balancing such traits need not be all that difficult, depending on how they're designed. It's really a wide open space, there's no reason at all to limit one's thinking to the way talents have been done in this game or that game in the past.

[Mansion]

Aggro has more tools than there really needs to be. adding even more aggro dumps as stuff just makes tanking even more laughable.. tanks already barely ever touch aggro combos or skills as is. that alone kinda higlights how much of a joke aggro and emnity is..

butchers block / rage of halone combos are basically never touched these days.

Jobs dont need even more aggro dumps. tanks just need to learn to use the aggro tools they have available...

If tanks used these tools and dps jobs still had aggro problem then i might agree on adding or buffing some dumps. but i think any aggro problems that exist stem from tanks not using there tools rather than dps not having dumps

Not convinced. It actually takes nothing to almost all DPS to pop Diversion before the opener and then on cooldown. Lucid dreaming for casters is different because the Mana regen effect is to be considered, but it essentially works the same.
AST sects give them agro reduction, and SCH works like SMN; the agro is split with the pet.
Then you have each melee's agro drop that are most likely emergency tools if you need to sacrifice DPS to use them. But these tools are there.
For me, these are just clear in game indications that agro is teamwork, not just a tank's job. Once again I repeat : it takes nothing for DPS to use these tools, so that the tanks can do more DPS, just like self heals/Mantra/Nature's Minne are a way to reduce the burden on healers in a collective effort to put out higher raid DPS.

My point was that WHM, BRD (and MCH to some degree) don't have efficient ways to control their agro while all other jobs have some, and it's something that should be adressed if the game remains how it is on that aspect.

[Rongway]

My point was that WHM, BRD (and MCH to some degree) don't have efficient ways to control their agro while all other jobs have some, and it's something that should be adressed if the game remains how it is on that aspect.

BRD And MCH can drop, on average, half their enmity every 90s. If they start dropping enmity at around 30s in, their enmity at a given time would look something like this:

00m30s: drop from 30s worth of unmitigated enmity generation to 15s worth
02m00s: drop from 1m45s worth to 53s worth
03m30s: drop from 2m23s worth to 1m12s worth
05m00s: drop from 2m42s worth to 1m21s worth
06m30s: drop from 2m51s worth to 1m26s worth
08m00s: drop from 2m56s worth to 1m27s worth
09m30s: drop from 2m58s worth to 1m29s worth
11m00s: drop from 2m59s worth to 1m30s worth


Compare to caster enmity. Assume Diversion only once at the beginning (enmity generation -90% for 30s), and Dreaming (drop half) every two minutes starting 60s in:
00m30s: accumulate only 3s worth of enmity
01m00s: drop from 33s worth to 17s worth
03m00s: drop from 2m17s worth to 1m9s worth
05m00s: drop from 3m09s worth to 1m35s worth
07m00s: drop from 3m35s worth to 1m48s worth
09m00s: drop from 3m48s worth to 1m54s worth
11m00s: drop from 3m54s worth to 1m57s worth

Bolded values for comparison.

And while a caster could Divert every two minutes, it's not necessary unless the tanks die or the tanks are just sitting there not generating enmity. And if just Dreaming every two minutes is enough for a caster, BRD and MCH shouldn't have any problems because they actually better enmity curves than casters.

[Shurrikhan]

This seems like a contradiction to me. What you want, effectively, is to have an alternate gameplay dynamic available to each job (in this case, faster GCDs in particular, but I presume you wouldn't hate other gameplay-impactful options). If that is the goal, then a talent-like system is the better way to achieve it. It's direct, it's clear, and it's flexible from a design and balancing perspective.

I'm actually not very familiar with other games' models, but one could imagine something as simple as selectable traits a la PvP (but more impactful). The number of slots could be flat, it could be something you gain over the course of the endgame, it could be on gear, whatever. Or it could be trees, or sets of talents, or some other model. And balancing such traits need not be all that difficult, depending on how they're designed. It's really a wide open space, there's no reason at all to limit one's thinking to the way talents have been done in this game or that game in the past.

Wait. So if stats affect gameplay even in the most obvious spectrum their supposed to control, to some real effect, that's somehow harmful and convoluted? All I'm asking for is that the one gameplay-affecting choice dangled in front of us, but with a pit of spikes beneath it for all but two jobs, become a viable choice. That's it. There are many cases where a job or class or profession in whatever game can feel great or disgusting just based on the rate of action available to it. Allowing Speed as an option allows control over that. But that's not asking for talent choices. It's already a stat. It's already in the game. This alternate gameplay dynamic has been here since the start. It just happens to be a trap in the majority of cases.

Now, I wouldn't necessarily be opposed to something that simply allows you to select a breakpoint for your playstyle and be done with it, but at that point... what merit exists in stats? They then would be nothing more than a global damage bump, with no discussion except to stack A or avoid D. One wouldn't need to keep a balance with anything. They just... float around, and create items that are equivalently a couple ilvls higher or lower than others of their same nominal ilvl, with Power being all there is to any of it.

Again, I'm not homogenizing gameplay by balancing the stats. The diversifying components of Speed isn't in its damage. But when balanced its permitted to diversify gameplay as intended, rather than merely gear value.

I've played through about 7 different talent systems of some sort. WoW from vanilla to now, SWTOR, GW, GW2, BDO, ESO, Rift, and PoE. I'm familiar to some degree also with SWG, RO, and AA. My issue with them is a mix of a consistent four issues, with only PoE creating any real outlier:

1. They have too few real choices, especially compared to what all is presented as such or how many opportunities seem like they ought to have been allowed.

   This is most often due to raid content being too shallow to make use of anything but the dullest skills at maximal efficiency; skills related to survival, out-world activities, PvP, or almost anything but script-fit burst of speed and striking-dummy-damage, tend to be dismissed. (Admittedly, not a failing of talent systems so much as a lack of commitment to making them a real part of the game through maintaining the value of all parts and sectors of combat in the much fewer core content areas actually rewarded.)

2. Choice is merely several clicks of a menu.

   Any real decisions are forfeited in favor of cash shop or market items to allow you to swap over those choices before any given fight, leading simply to gold sinks, gameplay time wasted in menus, and conflict among parties. At the worst, imagine the whole "skip cutscene" fiasco with each pull. At the minimum, expect all choices to just feel like a begrudging choice between spending the time and money to properly equip oneself again for each different scenario, from pull to pull, vs. taking a build simply mediocre at everything.

3. The choices are based more on capacity and things that sound different from their competing choices rather than on ways to actually diversify play.

   Far too often they apply no real change in gameplay, be it by the buttons pressed or the tactical considerations raised. Instead, you just get different trade-offs between AoE and cleave and single-target (to swap between fights) or between dealing the same 123 spam with lightning element or with wind (for the preferred graphics at best, if balanced, or according to elemental resistances on a fight-by-fight or instance-by-instance basis at worst).

4. The system isn't grounded in the elements of the game or the needs of the jobs/classes they're applied to.

   This one, though the most subtle, is also the most integral; all other derive from this, or at least show symptoms, where failing, of this disease. There are only two real goals possible to customization: to expand your world through its interactions with the player or to increase the breadth of attraction of the game's existing (class) designs without sacrificing their depth -- in other words, to allow more people to like what you've made without betraying those who already like those (class) designs. (Though, this can apply also to content mutations or whatever else.) The second goal is difficult to manage, but far less so than the first. When the first is truly accomplished, all player interactions are born organically from a very real basis of content interaction and thus have no choice but to be relevant to what players already enjoy doing, but such systems also tend to naturally tunnel players into what they like to do among those with similar interests, separated by the zones of content they've pursued and progressed in. Think of the first like meeting someone at work or on an adventure, though limited therein, while the second --if accomplished alone-- is more like online dating, choosing according to your preferences where those preferences might not much be tested or formed by the application of or experiences within those preferences.

That's not to say that a great customization system can't exist. But there are no comprehensive examples of one. And I do not at all expect one to be born so late in a game. A world-grounded one certainly cannot. And given our typical community-development miscommunications, in what little occurs at all, a needs-grounded one is unlikely as well. 1.x's was in some ways the closest to a viable trajectory, but it failed from the start too because it skimped pitifully, and largely through the way stats work. Grounded talent systems tie very, very closely to precise and interconnected stat systems, especially those we're often eager to streamline out once gameplay is packaged up for ease (things more like our Primary Stats, so to speak, than our Secondary ones).

[Shurrikhan]

I'm kinda sure that as of today, Diversion is one of the best use of the actual Role Action system, both MCH and BRD should have access to it, because the agro drop of Tactician an Refresh are clunky. Especially if the Bard uses refresh to milk a bit of Foe's Requiem. (In my former team, we had BRD and MCH, MCH used refresh on its opener so the BRD had the two songs available, and she kept ripping aggro anyway). Aggro management is part of playing this game and I don't mind. But I'd rather have all proper tools to do so, and it's a bit unfair for BRD and MCH.
If we are to keep the system as it is, I think having the aggro drop being changed to the same effect of Diversion (less aggro generated) on both songs would be perfect. And include an aggro drop on Repelling shot for BRD, Blank on MCH (and Fluid Aura or Assize on WHM).

I feel like it's worth pointing out the difference between something being designed to be strong in its context or situation, and the context or situation itself being well designed.

If your character opened combat each time with an incurable Poisoned status that would kill you within 15 seconds if not expensively healed, but a single Role Action could uniquely cleanse it, that would design would be contextually strong, but its situation would point to very poor design overall.

I feel Diversion is much the same, just as Invigorate or, in the majority of cases, Lucid Dreaming. Each can be used to fully sufficient results by an auto-clicker activated with the start of combat. And neither enmity or TP nor MP need be designed to be dependent on two-minute cooldowns to function.
(Heck, just an expansion ago, only a ranged class had Diversion, instead of the other way around.)

[iLyrica-sama]

As a BLM main, I also wouldn't mind seeing Convert get a reduced recast time.