Ranged DPS role is about to be excluded from all content

[Vendalwind]

Sorry Wasn't as clear as I thought I was being. Lets see if i can make this make sense, or if my sleep post last night was just too incoherent to salvage.

I need you to define terms here. What exactly do you mean by "easy"?

ah okay,
What I mean by this is that picking up a mechanic doesn't actually make anyones job easier, as in less button pushes, more damage, etc. directly. The mechanic has to be done, that doesn't some how make other jobs easier to play when it's done, it just get completed and then the fight resumes. My way of looking at this is if you had a team of 4 melee, well 2 melee would still have to do the mechanics, but then the other two melee that got lucky with having no added responsibility still would just do their regular thing. the melee taking the mechanic makes his own life harder by doing so, but has no impact or change on the others beyond clearing the mechanic. So the idea that "ranged dps somehow make other jobs easier" doesn't work for me. Its the same way that a Melee user LB3ing doesn't make anyones life easier. It's a personally responsibility they take on that will interrupt their rotation and hold them still for a good while. It adds dps to the group, but its doesn't make anyone elses job easier, its just one of the self sacrifices expected in the fight.

Speaking as a caster, if I can have my DNC run a mechanic for me, it makes my life much easier to have her do it. Liquid hells, again, come to mind: they're a mechanic that as a caster, if I have to handle them I'm losing damage with no question about it. Having them run them for me means I get to stand still and keep casting while they enact an entire extra mechanic that I now don't have to think about.

That does make sense. So now I see what you are saying, and now realize im just arguing perspective/semantics. I look at that situation and say, "it sucks theres no one around that can take that responsibility I'll have to lose the dps" you look at it and say "Its easier for me if someone else takes that responsibility" so that makes sense.

Minor nitpick, but that's not what a skill ceiling is. They have a tool kit that allows this, but the skill ceiling itself isn't what allows the uptime. Terminology is important.

I more said that noting a piece of the 100% skill ceiling. Skill ceiling refers to the absolute farthest a class could be taken, IE even better likely than the 100th percentile player. So I am referring to the ability the player has to perform at that level. For melee players and casters our perfect play will still often have breaks in the rotation and flaws in uptime. E2 is the exception to this depending on some luck and perfect tank play as well. There is of course a lot more that goes into a ranged perfect run than just 100% uptime (optimizing for buff/raid dmg as one example, dealing with rng as another, properly managing dots for downtimes. etc.)

Whereas if a Ninja...snip

Again yeah were just looking at it differently. When I think of things making other peoples lives easier I think of direct effects. like tank using mitigation on an ally to save them from life makes healers have to do 1 less raise. Or ranged shield samba etc. means potentially less heals have to go out. etc. I don't think responsibilities make anyone's life easier because anyone could do them, they'd just suffer more drawbacks.

It's a unique take on the situation, although my question becomes: Why would casters be excluded from either baited meteors or Black Smokers, since they're expected to handle those mechanics for the melee as well? Actually if you wanted to be really cheeky, you can even have melees handle those mechanics with no downtime, you just have to be really quick about it.

Do you mean casters being excluded to my random idea counter-strike buff?
I dunno maybe they shouldn't be, but if they and phys ranged both shared the ability, im sure some gigabrain BLM would try to find every moment they could triple cast and line it up with some mechanic and then declare his dps is more important than the phys ranged. BLM's already have the privileged to command people around for their perfect numbers. Id prefer not to add more fuel to that fire. BLMs actually literally DO make other people's jobs harder in pursuit of their perfect dps.

Another example of something i would define with skill ceiling instead of difficulty.
Skills like trick, Embolden, tech step don't make peoples lives directly harder (difficult) but rather they raise the skill ceiling because now the player CAN adapt to fit in more dmg during it's window.

I hope that all made sense. If not oh well @_@

I am interested to know tho. The more I've thought about it the more I actually like the counterstrike buff ability idea. Give ranged direct role based incentive to handle the trickier mechanics, AND to maintain their rotation during those mechanics since mechanics would become an alternative buff window. It'd be very satisfying to play around.

[SaitoHikari]

I also feel that the support Dancer/hybrid Bard/selfish MCH experiment has utterly failed at this point. It was successful within the ranged role itself, but it fails when you take into account every class at once. When you really think about it, fight design appears to now be standardized around a 2 melee/1 caster/1 ranged composition, and the current balance promotes it even harder (if not replacing the 1 ranged with a second caster).

With that kind of design, there is literally no way the developers can give MCH enough damage to actually claim the mantle of being a selfish DPS without tossing Bard and Dancer into the dumpster, unless Bard and Dancer are given more meaningful support options to make up for it. And not just damage-wise, I mean more defensive utility as well. But considering how averse the developers are to the idea of party utility this expansion, the latter likely isn't going to happen for another couple of years either. They also can't buff MCH too high or else the advantage of being a ranged class shines through too much.

Maybe for the third expansion in a row, the devs still don't know what they actually want to do with Machinist.

[Vendalwind]

So in case anyone hasn't noticed, the #1 ranked speedrun for e2s is currently held by a group forgoing ranged in lieu of double black mage. Now that we're past week 8 it looks like people are finally able to gear up their alt jobs (aka: getting a second set of blm gear), so we should start seeing a lot more experimentation with these compositions soon. I think it's safe to say the predictions the OP of the thread made have now been bourne out.

This disgusts me. being able to take in two of the same class, especially omitting an entire role, is absolutely a sign of terrible design. And people say BLM is in a "good place" *cough*

[Kabooa]

Maybe for the third expansion in a row, the devs still don't know what they actually want to do with Machinist.

Something about Heavensward jobs, man.

[ForteNightshade]

This disgusts me. being able to take in two of the same class, especially omitting an entire role, is absolutely a sign of terrible design. And people say BLM is in a "good place" *cough*

And the unfortunate part is I half expect the dev team won't acknowledge the massive discrepancy nearly enough because "everything can clear!!!!"

I legitimately want to see a double Caster or triple melee Ultimate kill when it releases, just to shine a massive beacon on how bad job balance is. This assumes, of course, they don't buff the Range enough by 5.1.

[Kabooa]

This disgusts me. being able to take in two of the same class, especially omitting an entire role, is absolutely a sign of terrible design. And people say BLM is in a "good place" *cough*

And the unfortunate part is I half expect the dev team won't acknowledge the massive discrepancy nearly enough because "everything can clear!!!!"

I legitimately want to see a double Caster or triple melee Ultimate kill when it releases, just to shine a massive beacon on how bad job balance is. This assumes, of course, they don't buff the Range enough by 5.1.

The first ultimate kill is going to be Melee, Ranged, Summoner, and either a second melee or Black mage.

Assuming no significant changes.

I'll go as far to say it'll be Monk, Bard, Summoner, and Dragoon/Black Mage.

[lulunami]

Did groups even take triple melees for Ultimate UCoB/UwU clears? Also, who is going to do mechanics with 2 melees and 2 black mages? Making both healers do all the mechanics might not be an option.

[CKNovel]

Did groups even take triple melees for Ultimate UCoB/UwU clears? Also, who is going to do mechanics with 2 melees and 2 black mages? Making both healers do all the mechanics might not be an option.

UCOB and UWU were during Stormblood, not Shadowbringers.
Back then Bard/MCH were almost mandatory due to their utility, with an insane popularity for the Bards (Wasn't it the most played job in SB?).

Bard gave 2% crit to all its teammates when breathing. MCH would increase the party damage by 5% for 30s every 120s
MCH could reduce by 10% damage dealt by a boss every 60 seconds. Bard had a longer cooldown (4.X Troubadour) basically lasting longer every 120s.
Ranged had a fair tax, melee were not as broken as we currently know and we didn't had a way to know the rDPS

[Akiudo]

UCOB and UWU were during Stormblood, not Shadowbringers.
Back then Bard/MCH were almost mandatory due to their utility, with an insane popularity for the Bards (Wasn't it the most played job in SB?).

Bard gave 2% crit to all its teammates when breathing. MCH would increase the party damage by 5% for 30s every 120s
MCH could reduce by 10% damage dealt by a boss every 60 seconds. Bard had a longer cooldown (4.X Troubadour) basically lasting longer every 120s.
Ranged had a fair tax, melee were not as broken as we currently know and we didn't had a way to know the rDPS

theres also the fact that the very notion of "tripple melee" is something that should be burned for even being brought up, that would literally mean giving 75% of the available spots to 40% of jobs. If we really go by "take the player, not the job" we would aim for 1/1/1 +the last dps spot being able to be filled by any class.

Now lets for once not discuss the whole "but if phys ranged where good enough the sky would fall and no one would take melee anymore" and lets simply take 2/1/1 as working as intendet and the best that will ever be done, at this point melee are allready overrepresented compared to the other roles, so the allready accepted overrepresantation getting worse even being something thought up as possible if unlikely is bad enough.

Also,

who is going to do mechanics with 2 melees and 2 black mages? Making both healers do all the mechanics might not be an option.

i dunno, the blackmages ? you know, the casters that at this point have the most on demand free movement of them all and still get cited as the turret class that can't move worth **** ?i mean if there is a mechanic for 2 people at least one of them would do it either way, no ? unless you think taking 2 physical ranged is anywhere in the range of viable right now

[lulunami]

Lets be honest. Black mages do not want to mechanics unless they are forced to. Even with the addition of Xenoglossy and the 30 sec Sharpcast.