6.0 Both Tank and Healers Need Major Focus on Bringing Back Job Identity

[Shadotterdan]

As someone who recently came back as a PLd main I feel like putting in some two cents.

Imo while the loss of a number of my cooldowns took a while to get used to, I prefer the current system to having like, 6 versions of functionally the same skill. I'm not a really high level player and making sure to dodge attacks and deal with mechanics is enough on my plate without remembering which skills were on cooldown when things get hectic.

Another thing to think of is that at the end of stormblood I had a full 3 hotbars full of skills for combat. The extra skills from the next 10 levels would have not only raised the complexity of endgame even higher but also would have required another hotbar taking up space on my screen and requiring another set of key combinations so I feel that skill consolidation was basically a requirement.


Lastly in regards to the issue of the tank and healer jobs being the same nowadays, I blame the endgame community. It used to be that each of the tanks had the same goals but approached them in different ways. The problem is that while PUGs for mid range endgame would accept any tank, high end demanded whatever job was the current meta. At the time I had to take my hiatus the consensus seemed to be that if you weren't WAR you were crippling your party DPS. And anytime changes were made for balance it was always a source of drama. Can't blame them for making the jobs play the same. Far easier to keep things balanced and avoid complaints from whichever job got nerfed (or not buffed as hard) if they all have the same approach

[aodhan_ofinnegain]

As someone who recently came back as a PLd main I feel like putting in some two cents.

Imo while the loss of a number of my cooldowns took a while to get used to, I prefer the current system to having like, 6 versions of functionally the same skill. I'm not a really high level player and making sure to dodge attacks and deal with mechanics is enough on my plate without remembering which skills were on cooldown when things get hectic.

Another thing to think of is that at the end of stormblood I had a full 3 hotbars full of skills for combat. The extra skills from the next 10 levels would have not only raised the complexity of endgame even higher but also would have required another hotbar taking up space on my screen and requiring another set of key combinations so I feel that skill consolidation was basically a requirement.


Lastly in regards to the issue of the tank and healer jobs being the same nowadays, I blame the endgame community. It used to be that each of the tanks had the same goals but approached them in different ways. The problem is that while PUGs for mid range endgame would accept any tank, high end demanded whatever job was the current meta. At the time I had to take my hiatus the consensus seemed to be that if you weren't WAR you were crippling your party DPS. And anytime changes were made for balance it was always a source of drama. Can't blame them for making the jobs play the same. Far easier to keep things balanced and avoid complaints from whichever job got nerfed (or not buffed as hard) if they all have the same approach

I mean it is the end game community who are constantly given out how they oversimplified jobs and destroyed the skill ceiling, because casuals who cba to learn how to play their job cried about it being too difficult instead of getting good, also why Savage fights have become much more simple compared to HW. The diversity being removed from a lot of jobs can be boiled down to accommodating the casuals that make up 90% of the player base (give or take a few percent), to make it easier for casuals to play tank or healer. SE have made the introductory into each role less stressful and difficult while failing to increase the difficulty in end game, especially in the skill ceiling to keep thing interesting.

[BarretOblivion]

As someone who recently came back as a PLd main I feel like putting in some two cents.

Imo while the loss of a number of my cooldowns took a while to get used to, I prefer the current system to having like, 6 versions of functionally the same skill. I'm not a really high level player and making sure to dodge attacks and deal with mechanics is enough on my plate without remembering which skills were on cooldown when things get hectic.

Another thing to think of is that at the end of stormblood I had a full 3 hotbars full of skills for combat. The extra skills from the next 10 levels would have not only raised the complexity of endgame even higher but also would have required another hotbar taking up space on my screen and requiring another set of key combinations so I feel that skill consolidation was basically a requirement.


Lastly in regards to the issue of the tank and healer jobs being the same nowadays, I blame the endgame community. It used to be that each of the tanks had the same goals but approached them in different ways. The problem is that while PUGs for mid range endgame would accept any tank, high end demanded whatever job was the current meta. At the time I had to take my hiatus the consensus seemed to be that if you weren't WAR you were crippling your party DPS. And anytime changes were made for balance it was always a source of drama. Can't blame them for making the jobs play the same. Far easier to keep things balanced and avoid complaints from whichever job got nerfed (or not buffed as hard) if they all have the same approach

What did the end game community have anything to do with the over simplification. It's those players that gave feedback on issues with DRK last expansion. It was some of those that warned about the WAR rework not being very good. It was those that got world's first on UCOB on DRK because "I just enjoy the job". This statement is completely not true. It was the midcore PF PUGs that had actual role restrictions to joining PF. I couldn't join a single group for a long period of time in SB as a SAM because NO ONE WANTED ONE BECAUSE IT WASN'T 'META'.
Beginning of this expansion they were locking out RDM/DNC because they weren't 'meta.
This has 0 to do with end game/hardcore part of the community, it has 100% to do with PUGs attitudes and self imposed 'elitism' when it turned out they were trying to get carried by others helping thier own difficencies.

[Shadotterdan]

Right, okay, I was wrong. The casual retards have broken the game because their vegetative brains can't comprehend simple game mechanics. Heres a pld idea, bring back shield and sword stance. The stats for the relevant equipment only apply while in the proper stance. optimal play would revolve around switching to shield to block incoming attacks while switching to sword to deal damage with vuln debuffs applied for using the wrong one. Each stance would have an exclusive suite of 10 cooldowns to use with situational differences based on factors such as the time of day, the element of the attack and whether the target is humanoid. Further efforts to remove the cancer would be adding xp penalties for death and upgrading boss aoe to instakill fools who don't get out of the way

[Marxam]

The tank issue can be mitigated if OT stances were brought back and were the same 10 sec cd, and damage penalty removed, across the board for all tanks. Then tune the fights to have constant enmity resets like O4S and make the OT stance actually lose aggro (or at least revert it to 2.0 enmity generation) so you have to think twice about dealing damage over holding aggro. This would alleviate aggro fights in 24 mans but not entirely resolve it. They don't need to introduce enmity control for DPS and Healers so all the enmity falls strictly on the tanks and their job to control it. Fights should be tuned with tanks in their tank stance 100% of the time and the OT stance is for those in the endgame who want to maximize their limits or speed kills.

For newer players of those who enjoy the 5.0 tank changes just stay in tank stance. For veteran players like myself who enjoy the high stakes game of balancing damage and aggro pick the OT stance.
They should not introduce skills like Unchained for one tank exclusively. While I loved it as WAR it gave an unfair advantage to stay in the tank stance with no penalty and dealing more damage. This was one of the reasons why WAR was op, in addition to damage down and slashing debuff in 3.0. If one tank gets a skill like this all tanks need to get one like it too.

[BarretOblivion]

The tank issue can be mitigated if OT stances were brought back and were the same 10 sec cd, and damage penalty removed, across the board for all tanks. Then tune the fights to have constant enmity resets like O4S and make the OT stance actually lose aggro (or at least revert it to 2.0 enmity generation) so you have to think twice about dealing damage over holding aggro. This would alleviate aggro fights in 24 mans but not entirely resolve it. They don't need to introduce enmity control for DPS and Healers so all the enmity falls strictly on the tanks and their job to control it. Fights should be tuned with tanks in their tank stance 100% of the time and the OT stance is for those in the endgame who want to maximize their limits or speed kills.

For newer players of those who enjoy the 5.0 tank changes just stay in tank stance. For veteran players like myself who enjoy the high stakes game of balancing damage and aggro pick the OT stance.
They should not introduce skills like Unchained for one tank exclusively. While I loved it as WAR it gave an unfair advantage to stay in the tank stance with no penalty and dealing more damage. This was one of the reasons why WAR was op, in addition to damage down and slashing debuff in 3.0. If one tank gets a skill like this all tanks need to get one like it too.

We don't need to bring back annoyances like hate management to tanks, its so unpopular even all other MMOs have the party themselves watch their own hate, not the tanks. Its one thing to be voking on time and shirking, but forcing tanks to turn around and do aggro combos that were counterproductive to your job resources, or even flow is just a big "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO". If we bring back stances, bring back DPS/Heals hate reduction skills. If we make it to where one tank is 100% of the time in tank stance congrats, there is going to be more fighting over tanks wanting the OT role and less MT because "MY DEEPS!" Keep them both the same, period. The stance change was fine, what wasn't fine was the additional curtailing of all tank job skills, overhomoginization, taking away each tanks skill gap, and boss design taking positioning of boss/exclusive tank mechanics.
The unchained for WAR only mattered in 4.0 because WAR could have the best MT pull and establish aggro, after that you never really went back into tank stance after opener, thus Unchained would never be used afterwards. Though I do agree, it was one of the reasons WAR was problematic, but it was also its damage was too high with holmgang breaking too many fights. Those issues were fixed (though damage was hit too hard some would say, but since WAR is the easiest of all tanks to play this expansion it makes sense from a design standpoint.)

[Marxam]

We don't need to bring back annoyances like hate management to tanks

Im a bit confused by that statement but I always thought that the point to tanking was to make sure that you had the boss' attention and not just be a dps with higher hp and defense. The dps in OT stance was just a nice bonus and tested how well you could maintain said aggro and the payoff was higher damage. The fine line of losing aggro but keeping high uptime was exhilarating but I also value the control of aggro management and its why I love to tank. If I just wanted to hit things and go for damage then I'd play dps. Aggro combos are no longer counter productive to your job resource with the 5.0 changes because its tied directly to your stance and not the weaponskill and this is even exacerbated by the fact some tank jobs only have one combo path i.e. DRK, so its redundant to say that it hinders you job's play style when its literally the only combo they can do.

Many older players who played in 2.0-3.0 WAR knows how smooth the stance dance was and Unchained has always been important with berserk because Defiance was a 25% dmg reduction and to mitigate that and increase your attack power by 50% was how WAR dominated the first two expansions though it was toned down in 4.0. Regardless the tanking in 5.0 is just put up tank stance then forget about it as opposed to earlier expansions where you walked the fine line.

Applying that same stance dance to all tanks would even the playing field to a degree and teach players how important aggro management is to your job as a tank and what your role entails in a party especially with how easy it is to gain enmity. That said, OT stance is for those who have mastered the job and want something extra. I'm not gonna deny that there will be elitists but every online endgame has a reason to min-max and this is for those players who have the skill to push a job further which is something FFXIV has been lacking since 3.0. The players ability to push a job to the limit.

[millktea]

I agree. However, I disagree that we should be waiting for 5.0. This should be fixed in shadowbringers. SE still being paid during ShB duration. A sub is required to play.

Barret, telling us Warrior is the easiest tank to play this expansion. That's not how you spell, GUNBREAKER

Hate management was stupid, yes, but babysitting enmity stance is just as dumb if not more. tomahawk, equilibrium, deliverance and then did circleshirk with my cotank (which is what tanking mechanics used "well"). Needing to constantly click my stance on and off just because of a tank swap, that's stupid. Especially with a 10s cd on it, wtf? Enmity management isn't fun. Get rid of it. While I did enjoy the reward holding it even in tank stance, you still needed your partys support.

Also, barret, holmgang didn't break too many fights. Stop exaggerating. Only ONE fight was holmgang overpowered, and that was Sigmascape 4.0 (Savage), God Kefka. One fight, barret. Be chill. Very circumstantial. I can legitimately go over every fight with you and show that holmgang wasn't overpowered in any fight other than O8S. Stop regurgitating empty rhetoric from bad players. You know what was overpowered? COVER. Often hallowed was more overpowered than holmgang. Yes, an invulnerability on a 3m cd is great, but unless the circumstances of something like O8S is consistent, its not op. Not to mention it wasnt the best in dungeons. Paladin utility of cover and hallowed as well as intervention beats holmgang.

War wasnt too high in SB. Warrior wasnt even the best tank in SB. Paladin was.

I dont care that much about getting tank/dps stance on tank, I rather them make our dps stance our stance now as those are the real ones (except dark, as DS was a buff tbh...), what I DO care about is removing tank mastery. Removing universal defiance off the tanks and give us our damage back (and I just want deliverance.. better animation, better stance).

[BarretOblivion]

Im a bit confused by that statement but I always thought that the point to tanking was to make sure that you had the boss' attention and not just be a dps with higher hp and defense. The dps in OT stance was just a nice bonus and tested how well you could maintain said aggro and the payoff was higher damage. The fine line of losing aggro but keeping high uptime was exhilarating but I also value the control of aggro management and its why I love to tank. If I just wanted to hit things and go for damage then I'd play dps. Aggro combos are no longer counter productive to your job resource with the 5.0 changes because its tied directly to your stance and not the weaponskill and this is even exacerbated by the fact some tank jobs only have one combo path i.e. DRK, so its redundant to say that it hinders you job's play style when its literally the only combo they can do.

You would think that but all MMOs with the Tank/Heal/DPS aspect either don't have a focus on Tanks keeping control of hate because they focus on other things... like focus on the tank trying to stay alive... or they have the group focus on thier own hate, like even going so far as to STOP ATTACKING like in WoW. It's an annoyance, that adds nothing to 'tanking' when the focus of tanking is you are the one getting yoru face beat in so the squishes don't. We are basically walking masochists at the end of the day.

[BarretOblivion]

Barret, telling us Warrior is the easiest tank to play this expansion. That's not how you spell, GUNBREAKER

...
Out of all the ... WHAT???!!!???
GNB has the worst mitigation of all the tanks. GNB is the 2nd least played tank yet has the highest feedback of the community of how it plays. WAR litteraly is 45% of the time "MAASSH MY FELLL CLEAAAAVE!!"
Let me break down the rules of WAR:
Keep Storm's eye up.
Don't Infuraite during IR.
Hit upheavel on cooldown unless IR is about to come up.
Congrats, I just simplified all you need to know about WAR in 3 sentances.
GNB is:
Watch your charges so you don't use Bloodfest on cooldown overcapping.
Only weave one of the OGCDs during continuation combo if available (not counting the continuation OGCD proc)
Know your timing of the fight so you know to prioritize continuing your base combo after continuation so you don't drop that combo. Sometimes you have to start continuation early like in Shiva icelit 1 so you don't drop your standard combo progression during the knockback.
Look, GNB is still easy to play, but its no where near as braindead as WAR.