Dark Knight Megathread

[shao32]

Honesty I am not surprised.

I actually called August of last year:

Thread: https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...54#post5394754

I don't know why everyone here was holding out hope for us going back to a HW or StB type DRK when SE was clearly going to just make a ShB DRK 2.0.

The direction of the non-dps classes are simplification. Their goal is to keep those metric outputs at or above their targets. Apparently they saw success in ShB for tanks and healers. To SE, at the moment, DRK is right where they want it.

Well i personally have hope for better changes bcs i belive in Yoship words when fun comes first, always listen to the playerbase and that kind of coments that works for any job with the sole exception of DRK and SCH.

[Xtrasweettea]

Well i personally have hope for better changes bcs i belive in Yoship words when fun comes first, always listen to the playerbase and that kind of coments that works for any job with the sole exception of DRK and SCH.

This phrase, especially the bolded, is not what SE is saying when they say this. We are interpreting this incorrectly, bolded part mainly.

SE is always listening to us. They're not coming into the forums, Twitter, and Reddit and listening to us in those locations. They're listening to us all the time in the game.

Everything you do in that game is recorded and stored in multiple databases. There's multiple tables that are continuously updated with information. Information like: where you log in, where you log out, the time stamp you changing from one job to another, the job you queued for Leveling Roulette, all actions in combat, etc.

Every little thing is stored. This includes the current iLvl on the main hand for your DRK.

SE can query that data from across multiple tables to answer any question they can ask:

• "How many people did OS11 on September 18th of 2021?"
• "Give me the average usages of Circle of Scorn in Mayto this past month."
• "Give me the top three sources that people use to get Rock Salt."
• ETC.

They can also set Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and use that same data to measure and report on those KPIs:

• OS11 needs to be completed by 10% of the playerbase by patch 6.0
• The average iLevel Main Hand for DNC should be a minimal of 500 and expected of 515 for 75% of DNCs by the last day of September.
• ETC.

So anything that meets or beats a KPI target is a success. I can guarantee they have KPIs for DRK.

• % of DRKs with iLevel growth targets
• % of DRKs that participated in Ultimates within Y period of time.
• Average time aggregate players are on DRK.
• ETC.

As long as those KPIs are met. SE considers it a success. They start "listening" to players when those KPI targets are not met. SE might look at the forums, Twitter, Reddit, etc. to help them with their root cause analysis (RCA). More-than-likely they will not though.

SE will go to Mr. Happy, Xenos, MTQ, etc. and look at those people and their audiences for help on the RCA. Asmongold, the new guy in town, who doesn't even know there was a HW DRK and a StB DRK will be looked at.

Not you, the random person on the forum. Not Shao32, who has played much longer than Asmongold and has a deep appreciation for DRK. SE will go to Asmongold because Asmongold's influence and audience can cause changes to the data on a much larger scale than you... or me... or anyone else here.

SE wants those targets met every cycle (monthly, daily, etc.). So any changes will come from people who can change the data.

If you want "improvement", there has to be enough KPIs not met over a long period of time in order for SE to do anything. You better hope that whoever SE goes to has the same idea of improvement that you do.

So, yes, SE is always listening to the players. It's just not the way most people think it means.

[Lyth]

...

Like I said earlier, I don't have enough information to judge the upcoming iteration. I'm mainly worried about what they're going to do with the defensive actions.

I know that some people wanted a new combo. There's a few problems with this. First, with about three new abilities each expansion, that's your expansion worth of new abilities right there. Not terribly exciting. Second, there's an action budget for every job. If you look at the tanks, DRK and WAR have 23 job specific buttons, GNB has 25, and PLD has 26. (For reference, BLU's create your own job action list has 24 slots.) You can see that they've tried to further merge down some actions on GNB already by turning Gnashing Fang into a one button combo. I wouldn't be surprised if PLD had some button merges as well. The question is what do you give up to fit that extra combo in? Maybe Salted Earth? If we're going to be trading in new actions for old ones, I'd rather see something with a bit of synergy with existing actions, especially Living Shadow.

Nobody used the 'branching combo' in 4.0. It's not like you were adding in a bit of variety with Power Slash. The addition of Shirk meant that you just didn't have to use it. I'll accept that 4.0 removed a dps combo that may have provided a bit of variation in your rotation. But the one-combo job meme actually dates back to Stormblood's launch, used mostly by other tanks who wanted to prove that the job wasn't as complex as it once was. I think a lot of the drive to add on more combos stems from a reaction to those taunts. So none of this sentiment is new, and the overwhelming majority of DRK mains hated the Stormblood iteration with a passion when it was out. Most of the actions that people wax nostalgic about were actually removed during the job changes at Stormblood's launch. Shadowbringers just streamlined and added quality of life changes to what was left over of the job after Stormblood.

...

We can't comment on their internal decision-making process, but I've seen plenty of changes previously suggested here or on reddit before they get implemented in game. They just don't always acknowledge that they're looking at something before they do it. The 4.3 revision pretty much came straight from the forum feedback, as did the removal of Dark Arts. The removal of tank stances followed after a series of discussions here as well. Reworks to Raw Intuition as well as the upcoming Onslaught change were things that I've seen players specifically ask for before being brought in. The movement towards MCH being more Edgar themed to bring in some series nostalgia was also something that I've seen asked for on these forums dating back to Stormblood. We've had multiple discussions in these forums more recently about rewarding timed mitigation moves, so it'll be interesting to see what comes out of that as well.

I don't think the issue is their awareness of feedback, it's more that you can't tell what's being looked at and how they're processing that information, because there just isn't that two way back and forth. And sometimes things get implemented with good intentions in a less than ideal way.

[shao32]

snip

I know they look at our feedback in a way on aonther, idk about the influencers part bcs if that's true it would be extremly unfair that my fav job changes depend of the WAR fanboy xenoxys vex.

To be more precise i have with SE a constant feeling that DRK feedback it's never taken in to real consideration due how they decide to make changes on the job, you can look at any other job in the game and see they get way more accurate ajustments and reworks, look at summoner how finally get those good loocking primals attacks that ppl have been asking but when DRK spend 2 years complaing for example about Inner delirium that even the JP forum hate and request changes on the skill bcs Bloodspiller is not fun to spam what they do? keep it of course, i don't know who they operate from inside but for me is they have something against DRK, im so tiring to fight for this job and don't even get the most fair and justificable complains that can be solve easily like Delirium or living dead, they have zero consideration specially when they say they don't want to bring HW complexity and such and then proceed to show PLD new fantastic magic swrod combo on top of what they have.

Probably im just to burn right now of dealing with this for so long but i just wanted the same dedicated treatment other jobs get, i guess thats was just much to ask.

[Shin96]

-snip-

Well a streamer brings in new players, which translates into profit for SE. The gaming market has opened up to all kinds of people, and the majority of them are casuals. It's debatable that alot of people we have today will stick around after Endwalker, some of them may quit earlier, but regardless, that company is going to rake in massive profits. Every company nowadays is getting greedier progressively. FFXIV is definitely an exception to the rule as SE is offering a solid product here for the most part.

The reason we are on the losing side is because your average FFXIV player doesn't necessarily care all that much about gameplay. On average, you're not going to find an expert on rotational experience. It's incredibly easy to satisfy a person with lower standards; they just want to have fun. Dumb it down, make it easy. The fact that alot of players wanted Male Viera more than a Deep Dungeon or gameplay changes speaks volumes for itself. That's your core demographic and any company's blessing in terms of a customer base.

I think we got disappointed so much by ShB that we ended up with a jaded view on future aspects involving this job. Wait it out, see what happens. If it's anything like 5.0.. At least Scholars are joining us, that's something.