Former WoW player: Suggested changes to FFXIV Raiding end-game

[Yagrush]

I think there's something about #4 that I feel many people miss the most important point about it. While I get the people that talk against it because of the issues that widely different and unique stats on gear and set bonuses can create, I think the essence of it is something useful that could be extracted.

Itemization that impacts gameplay meaningfully

I think XIV has always lacked a bit in this department. Yes, accuracy was a thing. Yes, skill speed is a thing. But I feel that the way skill speed impacted rotation is not the kind of impact that I would be looking for. It's far too small and not
obvious enough how much impact is doing.

I'm talking about stats that will actually impact gameplay. Change which buttons you click. Change your rotation. Etc.

I think a happy medium between keeping the simplicity of itemization right now and the spice of WoW itemization could be something like the Mastery stat. I feel it would be worth exploring. It's technically only 1 new stat to be added to gear across the board, but obviously the impact it would have on each job would be completely different and, ideally, interesting. It could be increasing how much their gauge is increased by weaponskills (I.E Gauge numbers increased by WSs, for jobs like Warrior, Dark Knight. A very simple example).

It's something I miss from XI too. Gear with stuff like <Job Ability> + 1 was so cool.

So yeah. A single stat that impacted job specific gameplay for a job would be awesome.

[Almagnus1]

I think XIV has always lacked a bit in this department. Yes, accuracy was a thing. Yes, skill speed is a thing. But I feel that the way skill speed impacted rotation is not the kind of impact that I would be looking for. It's far too small and not obvious enough how much impact is doing.

As one of the few WHMs that have a Sindri Lux with Direct Hit/Piety on it (because DH was once accuracy), I'd rather not have to return to stacking a skill that's not natively on my gear just so I can hit the broad side of a barn. The problem with set gear in FFXIV is that we're basically fighting against the armory chest, and too much class specific gear is not a good thing, the primary weapon chest shows that to be an issue.

[DPZ2]

So yeah. A single stat that impacted job specific gameplay for a job would be awesome.

Strength. Tenacity. Dexterity. Intelligence. Mind.

These are already built into the game and are 'job specific'. Gear for a particular job swims in these stats. The stats change depending on which job you're currently playing.

TL;DR The game already has what you're requesting.

[Yagrush]

Strength. Tenacity. Dexterity. Intelligence. Mind.

These are already built into the game and are 'job specific'. Gear for a particular job swims in these stats. The stats change depending on which job you're currently playing.

TL;DR The game already has what you're requesting.

They change numbers, not gameplay. Making my fell cleave do 10k instead of 1k doesn't change the gameplay. So no, the game doesn't have it.

I already talked about skill speed/spell speed. Making the rotation line up slightly by a few decimals of seconds that is barely noticeable doesn't fit what I'm talking about.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

They change numbers, not gameplay. Making my fell cleave do 10k instead of 1k doesn't change the gameplay. So no, the game doesn't have it.

I already talked about skill speed/spell speed. Making the rotation line up slightly by a few decimals of seconds that is barely noticeable doesn't fit what I'm talking about.

Change job. That changes the gameplay entirely, and you don't even need to make a new character!


And we get slight gameplay changes every expansion. Having to relearn jobs twice or more per expansion depending on gear would be dumb.

[DPZ2]

...snip...

Face it, there isn't a single stat that changes gameplay for a specific job to such an extent that it matters in this MMO or any other that I've ever played (and that list is pretty long, and includes 10 years of WoW). In WoW, your talents affect gameplay not your stats. This game doesn't use a talent system.

Players ignore skill and spell speed in this game because the meta for raw DPS regards it to be way below MAIN STAT, CRIT, DH or DET in rank of importance when choosing gear.

[Shurrikhan]

Strength. Tenacity. Dexterity. Intelligence. Mind.

These are already built into the game and are 'job specific'. Gear for a particular job swims in these stats. The stats change depending on which job you're currently playing.

TL;DR The game already has what you're requesting.

No, the game has nothing like what was being requested.

The example was Mastery, a stat available to every spec and useful to every spec, but the effects of which varies by spec. That has nothing to do with Power-but-for-melee-other-than-Ninja, Power-but-for-Ninja-and-Ranged, Power-but-for-DPS-Casters, and Power-but-for-healers. Those aren't job-specific effects. They're the same effect. They're just convoluted to extend time spent grinding.

A closer example here would be if, say, you had a stat which increased proc rates or resource generation by a job-specific percentage (as to leave it balanced near Crit and DHit), or which added a variably intense mechanic to one's playflow.

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Personally, I'd be cool with just having actual choice in secondary stats and a bit more % effectiveness per stat point. But that requires some further polish.

Jobs vary pretty significantly in the portion of their damage that stems from oGCDs. That's a whole portion on which SkS/SpS (which should be consolidated into simple Haste rather than continuing to uniquely screw over PLD and DRK) has no contribution. So either Haste needs to be scaled differently per job, to provide equal value to the stat, or there needs to at least be a compensatory mechanic. I'd say the latter will probably be the worse option, though, as most compensatory mechanic concepts can only function by watering down the distinction between stats. There's also the imbalance in MP efficiency, though that could be easily solved by placing MP ticks on a rate equal to player GCD, rather than on a 3-second server tick.

Similarly, increase both the peaks of secondary stats and the between-expansion valleys. That's not to say the maximum Crit chance we can achieve by the final patch should increase from expansion to expansion, but merely that we should both be able to hit some significant peak in %Haste or %Crit, etc., by each final patch and that those percentiles shouldn't dive so sharply with the new expansion. In the end, secondary stats are at least as much about having some sense of impactful choice by which to play a bit more in the style we want (i.e., about the actual percentages in play) as the sense of power progression for a given expansion's endgame (i.e., the increase in percentages or, more importantly, the damage thus provided).

Heck, I wouldn't even mind losing Materia as it stands presently. For how much it bloats our inventory, it provides little more than a constant, dull gil-sink. I'd far sooner rather have a single, separate slot by which to just drop in just one customizable, any-job Materia for an oversided dollop of secondary stat of my choice -- say, adding Haste until X, and then Crit. Voila, rather than micromanaging gear to be able to play with the rotation I want, I can just choose it then and there. Choiceful, impactful, convenient.

[VelKallor]

it provides little more than a constant, dull gil-sink.

Um...you DO know you can get clusters to buy materia?

by a reboot of the original game that's turned out to be more popular than what the game has become.

WOW classic has failed, the servers are deserted, and even their TBC remake has been a flop.

[Shurrikhan]

Um...you DO know you can get clusters to buy materia?

You realize there is a gil fee for non-80-crafters to actually attach said materia?

And adding a scaling challenge mode to dungeons, where the only reward is extra tomestones, titles, or cosmetics, doesn't affect the casual playerbase. It'd solely be an optional challenge, providing more end-game content to those that want to partake in it, and NOT at the expense of casuals missing out on gear/story. If people don't care for it, that's perfectly fine. They can simply ignore it, just as I ignore crafting or mahjong cause it's not my cup of tea. Why deny the option of having challenge modes to other players?

They could, but that'd be far too efficient and accessible. We here at XIV would much rather split any further development towards casual and non-casual players, as if they were some strict binary, with the likes of quickly-dead minigames like Mahjong and barely-touched (though still quite lucrative, and actually more done than the full BLU experience, for instance) Ultimate encounters, respectively. /s