The live letter was a mistake.

[Garnix]

The expansion comes out in 2 months!
The way this live letter was done (or at least the first part of it) was a mistake. It is like that every 2 year, and I don't think it is really beneficial.

They reveal either too much or not enough information on how each job is changed, and people immediately jump to conclusion.
As if there was not enough complaints all the time about various job mechanics.


And we have to wait for a whole month for the embargo on the media tour to be lifted (they said mid-October)
One month!
One month with the forum and other places being flooded by "they ruined my job" comments, from players who did not play with the changes and know maybe a good half of the changes based on what Yoshida said and what we are seeing in the trailer.
And then we will see media tour information, and people will complain about potencies or other aspects of the game without playing it themselves for a whole other month.
(for sure some/most of the complaints will probably turn out to be true, but it is still way too early to judge)

I like that we are getting information, but since they don't go in depth on all the changes and just provide an explanation on the direction they chose, it leaves too much room for interpretation.

TLDR: please SE, if you really want to show the job actions this early, give us a job actions PTR after announcing the job changes. If not, then don't try to explain the job changes before the November live letter, because this helps no one.
It's fine if you just want to show the 2 new jobs a bit though. That's OK.

[ForteNightshade]

I would much prefer this current speculation both positive and negative than absolutely nothing. People have been utterly starved for information especially as we really didn't get a whole lot from the Fanfest. Now I don't disagree they should also release the tooltips just to let us have fun but I'd still rather this over nothing.

[Knot_D]

Also, having speculation discussion while waiting for the expansion is pretty fun IMO.

[Jeeqbit]

People would say their job was ruined even if they had the information, because some people don't like their job to change or evolve in any way at all.

The changes to astrologian in shadowbringers are a good example. The changes were good and the class was still fun, people just didn't like change so they didn't even give it a chance.

[Garnix]

People would say their job was ruined even if they had the information, because some people don't like their job to change or evolve in any way at all.

The changes to astrologian in shadowbringers are a good example. The changes were good and the class was still fun, people just didn't like change so they didn't even give it a chance.

True, opinions will always be opinions. But at least it would be based on actual facts.

[AnotherPerson]

It is beneficial to gauge reactions though. It helps them figure out what worked and what they misjudged what players want. Getting skills being displayed is a good thing. It gives hype for something to look forward to. That's the entire purpose of the live letter's job actions.

We're basically just enjoying how the new animations will imply and guessing how the new skills interact - this is part of the fun in a liveletter action trailer, to see how you can speculate your job evolving or changing.

We don't know how the specifics of how each skill works in its kit and how potent they are, so people jumping to conclusions are just people who are making speculations based on individual aspects without trying out the job in current content. It's like the equivalent of how DPS and tanks who never played healer expect healers to only heal because they only have one DPS attack skill, when in reality that's not how healers work at all in FFXIV due to encounter design allowing ample downtime (which only increases with better gear, which allows us to be DPSing even more than before). After people try out the jobs at a higher level, generally misconceptions either go away or get proven. This is basically what the media tour is for. Until then, just take those opinions with a grain of salt.

That being said, there are of course valid complaints in live letter job actions. For example, anyone who played SCH knows how terrible it is to use Dissipation vs. Aetherpact vs. Seraph because of how each skill either soft locks or hardlocks other skills. From our standpoint and from previous expansions, we can see Pet AI changing, but SE never really got full success on Pet AI as it felt clunky to use or didn't stop pets from ghosting. It's very difficult to expect something will change without seeing that change.

When the liveletter doesn't demonstrate the change of Pet AI without anything new other than a skill the player casts, it leaves players wondering 'what about all these other issues with the job currently?' We are assured they have adjusted changes for Pet AI, but if the liveletter doesn't demonstrate them in any notable fashion, that's not a good sign. All SCH did display was just one new skill centered on 'themselves' compared to other jobs which got adjusted or had new skills added. The devs tell us they haven't seen anything they felt they have to adjust on SCH, which it immediately tells us they may have misunderstood the issue, so it'd be natural to complain. Whether these complaints are right is still not known, but withholding that information until it's too late will leave people be even angrier since it'll be too late for feedback to adjust gameplay for an even longer period of time.

[Garnix]

That's exactly why I said they give either too much or not enough. Scholar is the best example. Like, they said they did not change things 'significantly'. Then they also said they made it more focused on its barriers instead of healing capacities. And they also briefly said that it will have a very good single target buff. So it says a lot, but it says nothing.

And if they really cared for players feedback before releasing, they would do some sort of PTR. Everything, aside potencies, is probably pretty much set in stone at this point.
Now they said that the media tour is bigger than usual thanks to the travel restrictions making it easier to have more people remotely. So maybe they will get enough feedback from that.

[Jeeqbit]

A PTR would allow people to spoil the patches before they happen. It's also not necessary because they employ hundreds of people to test it.

[Zanarkand-Ronso]

TLDR: please SE, if you really want to show the job actions this early, give us a job actions PTR after announcing the job changes. If not, then don't try to explain the job changes before the November live letter, because this helps no one.
It's fine if you just want to show the 2 new jobs a bit though. That's OK.

Its not even that early....and people have been waiting to see & hear this information.
Now we have a base of what to expect, with some information we wont know till the game is fully released.
This isn't a bad thing at all...people are just Drama Queens and will Doomsay their job is ruined no matter what. Even with a PTR

[Garnix]

Why would it? They don't need to put every single one of the game's asset on this PTR. It could be a very specific build just to allow players to play the jobs.