Please bring back Royal Road and Time dialation mechanic

[wereotter]

It doesn't really work with the current system... but after so many people complained that "if it's not Balance, it's useless!" and only ever fishing for spread balance despite jobs like monk and bard being able to get really good use out of the spear or monk and black mage getting good use out of the arrow.... the devs caved and just made every card balance with a build up to spread balance.

Sure, I'd prefer a more involved system where different cards had different buffs... but I don't think we'll ever be going back now that they've dumbed it down.

[Shurrikhan]

That would ruin the current system, where you work your way up to an AoE buff (Divination) that is more powerful if you used 3 unique symbols on the right roles.

It's a bit appalling that this is seen as such plentiful depth that we can't even consider far more nuance-capable reworks...

but after so many people complained that "if it's not Balance, it's useless!"

That was a problem of the cards being imbalanced, not the ability to sacrifice cards for bonus effects on a later card use.

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To be clear, RR carried problems of its own in its implementation (not its fundamental concept):

• Expand was balanced around roughly 6 people. In a light party, it was useless. In a full party, it was your only real choice for versatile throughput cards.

  This could have been easily fixed by scaling its multiplier with the number of allies (e.g. splitting a duration of [175+(12.5n)]% across the party).

• Extend was hamstrung by the fact that a player could not have two received cards effects active at the same time.

  This could have been easily fixed by simply removing that limitation.

• Empower had only half the relative strength of the other forms (a 50% bonus to the overall card effect, as compared to Extended's 100% or Expanded's up to 300%).

  This could have been easily fixed by just having it double the effect. Duh.

• Royal Road effects could not be saved, but instead always had to be used on the next card, which might not be worth, say, Expanding.

  This could have been easily fixed by having Royal Road instead affect your most recent cast, Extending its duration by the original duration, Empowering it by 100% for the remainder of its duration, or Extending that duration to all allies in range.

As for its interactions with Divination and the Seal system (each of which could otherwise be boons for the more varied card effects, as they'd bring a further balancing effect to each), consider:

• At present, Minor Arcana provides no Seal despite using (consuming) a Card.

  But why? While I can understand the choice in the present context, it is nonetheless an arbitrary and entirely reversible one.

• Royal Road likewise uses (consumes) a Card. Ought it, then, provide a Seal as would the (major) Arcana or no Seal as does the current Minor Arcana?

  In the end, it is a design choice we can easily toggle to fit its contexts.