An idea on how to improve early gameplay?

[ItMe]

I think it's largely an issue with our kits.
If all jobs had AoEs and at least 1 nice good to weave with at low level I think it would go a long way.

[Shurrikhan]

I think it's largely an issue with our kits.
If all jobs had AoEs and at least 1 nice good to weave with at low level I think it would go a long way.

Real quick:

Please forgive the devil's advocate here, but what if we instead went the opposite direction, to where things were dangerous enough that AoE would be something much more situationally applicable, and CC, focus targeting, and the like were brought back to the fore?

For instance, back in ARR's release, speedrun dungeon leveling among more veteran 1.x players wasn't just running to the end and AoEing everything, but was instead often a matter of your mass-DoTing, sleeping non-focused ranged enemies, and your bard or healer kiting a melee enemy while damage quickly focused down the remainder so that your party needed virtually no heals over a given fight. (That or it tended to involve abusing AST/SMN's long-as-heck Heavy effects and kiting the entire dungeon at once, so long as there was a way to wheel around the collected mobs, especially before Int/Mind split around level 41, until which time SMN was just a more efficient support --and that's more of what healers were in dungeons back then, rather than merely healers, even if everyone else was similarly more coordinated and cross-role-- than SCH because it offered more damage.)

Admittedly, I miss that, as short-lived as it may have been. I miss the quickest way to clear a 4-man dungeon varying with your comp, having more and broader means of engagement/impact in any role, and, despite mobs hitting harder, being able to clear with atypical comps if and only if there were a lot more coordination* (e.g. active dodging the breath attacks from Stone Vigil bosses--which I last night confirmed you can still do--or Stoneskin/Adlo beforehand and immediately Second Wind after while rotating Quelling Strikes to swap threat). *(Apart from the aforementioned cheese.)

[ItMe]

what if we instead went the opposite direction, to where things were dangerous enough that AoE would be something much more situationally applicable, and CC, focus targeting, and the like were brought back to the fore?

Adding in CCing, DPS peeling and kiting mobs, and more situational tactics?
Neat idea, there is content in FF14 that uses those skills (like deep dungeons & PVP), so having low level dungeons teach those skills doesn't sound bad on paper, but... if dungeons don't play that way at endgame I'm not sure it's a good idea. The early stuff should ideally reflect how we play later and unless later dungeons need those skills too it'll ultimately make the endgame feel more hollow as those elements fall away.

[Shurrikhan]

but... if dungeons don't play that way at endgame I'm not sure it's a good idea. The early stuff should ideally reflect how we play later and unless later dungeons need those skills too it'll ultimately make the endgame feel more hollow as those elements fall away.

Right, but is "run to end, spam AoE, run to end, spam AoE" exactly the content we want? Is that experience not already hollow?

If it's a matter of time constraint, note that the rewards can absolutely be increased in proportion to the additional time taken.

At present, though, any variety in playstyle is effectively just a trap that causes considerable tension between players. What if weren't? What if it weren't all just an illusion of depth or variety?

[ItMe]

Right, but is "run to end, spam AoE, run to end, spam AoE" exactly the content we want? Is that experience not already hollow?

If it's a matter of time constraint, note that the rewards can absolutely be increased in proportion to the additional time taken.

At present, though, any variety in playstyle is effectively just a trap that causes considerable tension between players. What if weren't? What if it weren't all just an illusion of depth or variety?

I think at that point this is going into a different topic.
Not "how to make the early game better," and more "what could be improved about FF14's gameplay."

[Shurrikhan]

I think at that point this is going into a different topic.
Not "how to make the early game better," and more "what could be improved about FF14's gameplay."

True, but early gameplay is still gameplay. If the limit of making early gameplay suck less is to make it suck exactly as much as the endgame experience (at relatively equal difficulty levels/types), that's both a narrow and not wholly necessary constraint.