Will we ever get PvP combos in PvE?

[ForteNightshade]

Also, we sort of know this is needed because modders see enough of a need to create ToS breaking addons to enable it. I think that SE has done a lot of good work on the UI to prevent the need for that horrible tank porthole mod nightmare that WoW was back in 2007-2012 era. You basically had DBM with DPS meters going while dealing with random hud elements, your node tracker for gatherers, and then the calendar apps that kept breaking all the time that your guild depended on for raids.

And yeah, I don't use these addons, but I hear about them and go "well, someone would only make it if there was a need for it by some part of the community."

This is quite the assumption. A custom made plug in doesn't denote a need so much as some players preferring it. That particular plug in doesn't even have much interest, though that's for more obvious ToS breaking reasons. Nevertheless, you're trying to draw a parallel with parses her when there isn't one. I don't use them either but I know those who do and there are several options, none of which never need to be put into the game itself.

In any case, I have always been against combo consolidation for no other reason than I little faith we'll actually get a slew of new abilities to compensate. Dragoon, for example, will lose five buttons (six if Jump and Mirage Dive are also combo'd) and gain maybe two oGCDs you press every 30-60s. And therein lies the issue. At least for many people who oppose this consolidation. On the flip side, I'd be far more open to it if they gave Dragoon a full third combo or made their current combo more interactive. Like Vorpol Thrust changes the effect of Chaos Thrust.

Alas, if Shadowbringers showed us anything. SE wants to make job design easy far more than they want to add interesting ideas which may be complex.

[MevariNavalo]

I think this could be a possibility for an entirely new class, but I wouldn't necessarily want this done to every combo-based class that already exists.

Additionally, I wouldn't just want a single button I spam to do my basic combo, I would want a few different combo buttons I could press to do different combos. A-A-A will be your basic single-target DPS, B-B-B will be your basic AOE DPS, but A-A-B will do something entirely different, like give you a buff or heal you a bit.

This could be a fun mechanic for a unique class, but since we MMO players like to optimize the fun out of everything, they'd have to give us a reason to occasionally do a combo that didn't just do the biggest DPS.

I don't think you could implement this system to EVERY class, though, that would completely change the dynamics of the entire game, and I doubt Square would want to do such a massive change at the height of their popularity.

[Dzian]

The combo skills have lost all identity and may as well not even be a combo, just one skill.

Thats been true for the longest time because of how the cobat in genral feels. it lacks weight and substance. it's just blandboring and lifeless. most of the skills jobs have serve no purpose other thanto keep players pressing buttons at a super fast rate even if they dont really do anything..

but most skills have no identity at all. I'll use sam as a na example a job i'm familer with.. one of its skill is a downward slash followed by a forward thrust.. but which one??? without out actually going to look most people wouldnt have a clue... another skill is a jumping up slash with a vertical down slash on the landing but again which one??

is gekko the skill wkill where you swipe from left to right and then follow with a diagonal slash? or is it the one where you swipe from left to right and then do a spinning right to left slash??

what is the animation for yukikaze?

without looking I'd wager most people wouldnt have a clue because the skills dont have any weight or impact that them noticable or recognisable..

other jobs are the same. Bard has its dots venemous bite and windbite... they get upgraded at times but i couldnt tell you what they're called at level 80 or even what difference if any exists in the animations between various versions..

it all just add up to weightless combat where your pressing buttons for the sake of pressing buttons not becuase they actually impact the fight in any real way..

[Mikey_R]

Thats been true for the longest time because of how the cobat in genral feels. it lacks weight and substance. it's just blandboring and lifeless. most of the skills jobs have serve no purpose other thanto keep players pressing buttons at a super fast rate even if they dont really do anything...

To keep the quote shorter, I'm going to trim it to the first line. However...

I am not a Samurai main, I do not know the names of every action Samurai has, however, after levelling it to 80, I am familiar with the action's icon, what they look like and what does. However, by your logic, just because I cannot name the action by it's proper name, it means it doesn't matter?

Gekko is one of the few I do know and I can picture it, same for Yukikaze. Jump, slash down, turn stab backwards with the ice effect.

For Bard's updated DoTs, they use the same character animation, it just has different visual effects.

You call all this weightlessness and that they don't impact the fight. I would disagree. DoTs are the primary way Bards gain their resource, every GCD action (except Hakaze) either buff the samurai, give it the sens for Iaijutsu or is an Iaijutsu itself. All of these impact the fight in one way or another, however, I cam interested to know what you class as an action that would be 'impactful to the fight'.

I will also add something here. If you make every action something 'special' then nothing is going to end up being special. You need the more basic actions to allow you to build up to the big hitter, that phase where you do loads of damage etc. This is why I am curious to know how you would interpret impactful actions.

[iVolke]

Hard no.
[Dislike]

[Colt47]

I actually understand exactly what Dzian is talking about. When they went from Stormblood into Shadowbringers they super simplified all the jobs down to strict doing damage and actions that either do damage, boost damage, or do the equivalent for healing. It could be a speed buff or something else like a temporary damage buff. The tanks obviously kept tank buster cooldowns but they also got hit with the same treatment.

The issue I took with the changes is that I used to main paladin, and when they added the spell combo, I was at first happy, and then realized that it was a burst mode during a normal damage rotation and not something you just used when out of range of an opponent for melee. To me that is not very "paladin" like at all. When it was simply the goring blade and the base combo + weaving in a spell or something, that was when paladin felt the most like paladin. I mean the only job that really felt normal to me after a while when I got to end game was warrior, because they didn't really mess him up like some of the other jobs.

[Seraphor]

Thats been true for the longest time because of how the cobat in genral feels. it lacks weight and substance. it's just blandboring and lifeless. most of the skills jobs have serve no purpose other thanto keep players pressing buttons at a super fast rate even if they dont really do anything.........

Animations are an entirely different thing. I often don't see my animations at all because I'm so zoomed out and focusing on the boss' mechanics.

But I know what each attack does, and Gekko, Kasha and Yukikaze each give you a Sen, and a different one at that. So no you're not just hitting buttons without a care of what they do, you need to know what Sen you need so you know what attack to use. And you need to know what attack is going to give you that Sen, which specific attack, not which combo. Because if you're mashing the same button over and over to do your 'Gekko combo' it could be on the next GCD, it could be on the GCD after that, you're not going to know. That's 2.5 seconds, 5s, or 7.5s, and that kind of time discrepancy will destroy your rotation.

All of your skills aren't just 'more damage', they have specific effects that you need to chain in a certain order to achieve that damage, called a 'rotation'. Combo skills are just a part of your rotation that is made obvious by the skill procs, but ultimately, every skill that's a part of your rotation is contributing to it in the same way. Take something out or move it somewhere else and your dps goes down.
Other non-combo skills? They're just 'combo skills' that don't give you an overt indication by way of a flashing dotted line that they're next in the rotation.

Mashing the 'attack' button isn't going to work if skills within that combo have unique effects, because you won't be able to keep track of them without intensely focusing on your hotbars. Rotations will no longer be something you can learn, and then practice until you can do it without looking at hotbars, so that you can focus on mechanics. They'll require the focus of a burst window, but for your entire rotation, because you can no longer rely on the tactile feedback of having different physical buttons to track where you are in the rotation.
And when it gets to that stage, they will have to remove all of the unique effects, so that casuals can actually play the game to a decent standard, and it really will just be mashing one button over and over, just like Healers, but without anything else to do besides mash that one button over and over.

[Malmstrom]

GNB already has a consolidated combo button in Continuation,

I may or may not have a one button macro for this entire combo.

[Seraphor]

I may or may not have a one button macro for this entire combo.

That's going to be very inefficient, and leave no room for adjusting to forced movement, but if you're not taking it into Extreme or above then you do you.

[Dzian]

I actually understand exactly what Dzian is talking about. When they went from Stormblood into Shadowbringers they super simplified all the jobs down to strict doing damage and actions that either do damage, boost damage, or do the equivalent for healing. It could be a speed buff or something else like a temporary damage buff. The tanks obviously kept tank buster cooldowns but they also got hit with the same treatment.

The issue I took with the changes is that I used to main paladin, and when they added the spell combo, I was at first happy, and then realized that it was a burst mode during a normal damage rotation and not something you just used when out of range of an opponent for melee. To me that is not very "paladin" like at all. When it was simply the goring blade and the base combo + weaving in a spell or something, that was when paladin felt the most like paladin. I mean the only job that really felt normal to me after a while when I got to end game was warrior, because they didn't really mess him up like some of the other jobs.

In part yeah this.

but also just the overall lack of weight and power to skills... when you're biggest hardest hitting skills barely even tickle a bosses HP bar they just dont feel very powerfull or impactful. recently thats even transitioned into limit breaks... especially in the alliance raid scene where yo ucan see 3 LB3s go off and the bosses HP guae barely flickers..

samurai for example you can build up 3 sen do youre signature midare and while you may see nice big numbers the bosses HP guage barely moves..

this is partly where ive often said combat should be slower but your skills should hit harder... it wouldbe moreengagingi think if your biggest hardest hitting skill actually took noticable chunks off a bosses HP guageee.

same applies to healers. My scholar only has one nuke but when your pressing that button 200 times it doesnt feel like its accomplishing anyting.. hence it feels weightless... make the nuke him 10 times harder but only press the button 20 times a fight instead of 200 and it'd feel weightier because again you'd actually see chunks of hp fall off the boss when you pressed the button.

the other thing would just be make skills feel like the y actually connect with a boss... because once again when you hit a boss with your biggest most powerfull hits and he doesnt flinch or even bat an eyelid at you wonder did he even feel it??? just doesnt feel particularly satisfying i guess. hitting a boss for a million damage might sound a lot.. but when the boss has a billion hp. your strongest skill hitting for a million damage is nothing..

perhaps not the greatest way ofexplaining it but theres just a big feeling of disconnect and lack of oomph. quite a few people have said similar things recently.