Thoughts of Samurai Changes

[Kazimere]

Almost all the new raids give damage down instead of a vuln up, its probably not going to be a problem.

I like the doom counter more, personally. I really hope they keep that one going forward in the other raids. Two for normal. One in savage, or none depending on the mechanic.

[Kazimere]

Overall thoughts put simply are:
Why Shoha 2?
Seigan was like a parry. It will be missed
"I am SAM, I specialize in double Iaijutsu, not flashy finishers." *sigh*
AF chest piece will clip my hair. Bummer.

What I got excited about the most was QoL changes with AoE, which is actually a pretty big deal as it was also my biggest gripe. Should still be a solid choice, and I will adapt to the changes.

Meh. There was no need for AoE Yuki, unless Fuga was just outright upgraded to a circular instead of a cone. AoE Yuki doesn't really serve a purpose. Better QoL would have been making Fuga>Oka>Mag a "1,2,3" instead of a "1,2,1,3." Get the necessary sen up one GCD earlier.

AoE Shoha should have just been tacked on to ST Shoha as a trait.

There isn't a doubt in my mind that they added these two buttons merely to replace the two they took away. Wasn't necessary at all.

[Gemina]

Meh. There was no need for AoE Yuki, unless Fuga was just outright upgraded to a circular instead of a cone. AoE Yuki doesn't really serve a purpose. Better QoL would have been making Fuga>Oka>Mag a "1,2,3" instead of a "1,2,1,3." Get the necessary sen up one GCD earlier.

AoE Shoha should have just been tacked on to ST Shoha as a trait.

There isn't a doubt in my mind that they added these two buttons merely to replace the two they took away. Wasn't necessary at all.

Gee thanks. I was excited. No cake for you party pooper.

Be that is it may, I still like that they went outside the box a bit instead of just a standard 1,2,3 AoE combo. Truth of the matter I see is that SAM's AoE is one of the weakest in game as far as engagement, being just a tad above healer AoE. They literally needed anything.

Issue with traited Shoha is losing an animation, and option on the spender. Again, this is something [animations] that is not strong with SAM, and they can use the help wherever they can get it. So I wouldn't want to lose Shoha for the sake of button bloat. It's also an earned skill much like MNKs forbidden chakra, so having ST and AoE spenders on such skills is pretty important imho. The reason why I said, "Why Shoha 2?" is because of the name. I really hope they change it to something more along the lines of SAM identity. Surely they have a cool sounding term that directly translates to "multiple cut technique" or something? It can't just be "Shoha 2" xD

[Duskane]

personally i think SAM is really fun in AOE,
especially when you turn into a blender Kyuten but adding separate AOE buttons are unneeded like a AOE yukikaze was not needed AOE shoha could have been upgraded to AOE from regular,
they upgraded spirits within and gave it AOE not sure why they couldnt do it for other jobs and it probably be much more interesting give buttons we use all the time a new animation then another button only for dungeons.

[Kazimere]

Gee thanks. I was excited. No cake for you party pooper.

Be that is it may, I still like that they went outside the box a bit instead of just a standard 1,2,3 AoE combo. Truth of the matter I see is that SAM's AoE is one of the weakest in game as far as engagement, being just a tad above healer AoE. They literally needed anything.

Issue with traited Shoha is losing an animation, and option on the spender. Again, this is something [animations] that is not strong with SAM, and they can use the help wherever they can get it. So I wouldn't want to lose Shoha for the sake of button bloat. It's also an earned skill much like MNKs forbidden chakra, so having ST and AoE spenders on such skills is pretty important imho. The reason why I said, "Why Shoha 2?" is because of the name. I really hope they change it to something more along the lines of SAM identity. Surely they have a cool sounding term that directly translates to "multiple cut technique" or something? It can't just be "Shoha 2" xD

The thought process doesn't change with two different buttons.

One to two targets, do Shoha 1; three plus, do Shoha 2 (as per the EW TTs). Shares a resource and will probably share CD.
One to two targets, do Shinten; three plus, do Kyuten (the potency difference is so small you'd probably just Kyuten at 2+ though). Shares a resource.
One target, do Senei; two plus, do Guren. Shares a resource and a CD.

You are merely counting how many mobs are up, and using either ST or AoE. At least with a fall off ability, you may want to think about which target gets your big hit, as opposed to the splash. Guren is the only ability that has that thought process, and it is unfortunate that it will never get used outside of trash pulls in dungeons...probably.

That's three buttons that could either not exist, or be used for something that's more interactive to the job as a whole.

AoE Yuki serves absolutely no purpose. It would be one thing if any combination of Setsu and Getsu/ Ka would allow for AoE Higa, but they do not. Now, instead of 1,2,1,3, Tekka, repeat, it will be 1,2,1,4, Tekka, 1,3,1,4, Tekka, repeat.

It's AoE. It boggles my mind why people care so much about involved AoE rotations for dungeon trash.

I hear you on the animations. A cleave ability can get cool animations too. And, let's be real. How well are you really seeing those animations when you're in the middle of a trash pack trying to dodge AoE?

Ikishoten going to two minutes is annoying as well. Tying the capstone to meditation stacks would have been better than tying it to our low CD kenki generation ability. Shoha could have turned into whatever the new ability is called at: let's call it two Shoha uses, or however many you can get in a 90 to 120s period. Kinda like Geirskogul for Dragoon. That would have reinforced better play than "push this button every two minutes three times." Why? Because if you messed up you may not get your super midare inside buff window.

[Arkdra]

Gee thanks. I was excited. No cake for you party pooper.

Be that is it may, I still like that they went outside the box a bit instead of just a standard 1,2,3 AoE combo. Truth of the matter I see is that SAM's AoE is one of the weakest in game as far as engagement, being just a tad above healer AoE. They literally needed anything.

Issue with traited Shoha is losing an animation, and option on the spender. Again, this is something [animations] that is not strong with SAM, and they can use the help wherever they can get it. So I wouldn't want to lose Shoha for the sake of button bloat. It's also an earned skill much like MNKs forbidden chakra, so having ST and AoE spenders on such skills is pretty important imho. The reason why I said, "Why Shoha 2?" is because of the name. I really hope they change it to something more along the lines of SAM identity. Surely they have a cool sounding term that directly translates to "multiple cut technique" or something? It can't just be "Shoha 2" xD

I... what? Samurai is is one of the most engaging aoe jobs in the game. And how can you say they went outside the box when all they did was add another aoe move that is exactly the same as the other 2 ring aor's in terms of how it impacts you mechanically, and then an aoe version of a skill that already exists? Also a big midare for their final skill. It's super boring design and frankly kind of tedious. I don't want aoe versions of all of my dang skills. I would very much prefer for them to kill most of this split and just make the moves aoe to begin with so they can maybe give us some more interesting skills in their place. And they're probably going to have to since I am pretty sure my bars are going to be 35/36 slots filled after Endwalker so something's going to have to give.

Or at least have these dumb split skills do more than just be damage. I wouldn't grouse so much if Senei applied higenbana for example, or some other effect besides just gurren but single target.

[Kaedys]

I liked Ikishoten being on a 60s CD, but Senei/Guren being on a 120. It gave us a reliable source of Kenki throughout an encounter, and it let us have more Shinten/Kyuten when Senei/Guren was on CD. Personally, I'd have taken a 60s Ikishoten over a souped up midare anyday. That's just me though. They could have implemented the capstone a better way than tying it to Ikishoten. Tying it to meditation stacks and Shoha usage would have been ideal.

Definitely agree. There were plenty of ways of handling it that didn't involve doubling Ikishoten's cooldown. They could have tied it to Guren/Senei instead, tbh, and it would have the exact same usage pattern as now, without requiring Ikishoten to be 120s. In fact, I'm a bit astonished they didn't attach it to Guren/Senei, it seems like an obvious target for it.

They could instead make it work like Life of the Dragon, where each usage of Ikishoten or Tsubame granted a stack. Downside is that it wouldn't be available on the pull (and in fact, would desync, because you'd get the 2nd stack at the 60s mark), but they could fix that by having either the first usage in a given combat session grant 2 stacks, or have an ability like Reaper's Soulsow that's only realistically usable outside of combat and grants a stack, so the first usage would bump it to 2 stacks and thus allow usage.

Personally, I'd prefer just tying it to Guren/Senei instead, though.

The filler GCDs in the rotation are a known annoyance. We don't know if that is going away either. I'm going to be pretty annoyed if I have to use Yaten>Enpi to maintain CD timers (I don't like using movement abilities for filler or a DPS increase at all). I use Yaki filler right now, and it's just meh as well. I really hope that was on their radar and this stuff aims to mitigate that.

Personally, I think Samurai could use a charge-based or resource-consuming GCD attack, similar to Sabre Dance for Dancers, which serves a very valuable role for aligning GCDs prior to Flourish. In the case of Samurai, it should probably be designed as something that's essentially a null DPS gain/loss, so it can be used or not used as needed.

If they added a new on GCD melee that did ~500 potency and cost 10 Kenki, it would land at the same potency as Yaten + Enhanced Enpi + Gyoten, and the same cost, without requiring the movement, and fill a similar role, delaying the GCD sequence to align better. Or alternatively, closer to ~370 potency (based on the potencies in the EW tooltips) and not have it cost Kenki. Maybe drop the potency slightly from a "null" potency level, so using it is a small potency loss, made back up by allowing the burst sequence to properly align, to prevent that new ability from simply being spammed (could also give it charges to help prevent that, though with a relatively short CD so it's generally readily available for its intended GCD-alignment purpose).

[Kaedys]

Actually, that highlights that, unless they changed it since the media demo, the Yaten + Enpi combo actually got pretty considerably buffed. Most of our abilities had a reduction of ~20% potency (ex. Gekko 480 -> 370, Yakikaze 360 -> 280, Midare 800 -> 660), while the Enpi combo potency didn't change. It's still 100 + 300 + 100, costing 10 Kenki. That means it got, in effect, a ~25% buff relative to most of our other abilities.

Now, our "standard" 9-GCD cycle, generating all 3 Sen and using Midare, currently does a total of 3360 potency, plus generates 60 Kenki. Assuming 20 of that is used on Kaiten for Midare, that's 3760 potency and +40 Kenki net. Kenki's "spammable" spender is Shinten, currently at 320 potency for 25 Kenki, or 12.8 potency per Kenki, which means 40 Kenki is equivalent to 512 potency. That's a net of 4272 potency, or 474.7 potency per GCD. The Enpi combo currently does 500 potency and costs 10 Kenki (though it could instead do 400 and cost no Kenki if you skip Gyoten and just run back in, resulting in slightly better efficiency). The 10 Kenki cost is equivalent to 128 potency lost from not being able to use it on Shinten, so the net for that GCD is 372, or 400 flat if you skip Gyoten and simply run back in during the Enpi GCD. In either case, a net loss.

However, with the reduced potency, we do only 2960 potency with our Sen combo, including Kaiten on Midare. Shinten is down to 270 potency, meaning each Kenki is worth 10.8 potency, so the 40 Kenki surplus is now only worth 432 potency. Total is 3392, or 376.9 potency per GCD (reminder that potencies are going down, but not really actual damage, because of the change to the damage formula in EW). That means that the Enpi combo with Gyoten is only barely a DPS loss, and without it is actually a DPS gain (~23 potency per GCD).

And that's a bit problematic. Because it means that optimal DPS for Samurai, outside of the raid buff window, is actually probably going to be spamming the Enpi combo (and running back in after each, so it's null cost on Kenki). I really hope they notice that and drop the potency of the Enpi combo to compensate.

[Kazimere]

Actually, that highlights that, unless they changed it since the media demo, the Yaten + Enpi combo actually got pretty considerably buffed. Most of our abilities had a reduction of ~20% potency (ex. Gekko 480 -> 370, Yakikaze 360 -> 280, Midare 800 -> 660), while the Enpi combo potency didn't change. It's still 100 + 300 + 100, costing 10 Kenki. That means it got, in effect, a ~25% buff relative to most of our other abilities.

Now, our "standard" 9-GCD cycle, generating all 3 Sen and using Midare, currently does a total of 3360 potency, plus generates 60 Kenki. Assuming 20 of that is used on Kaiten for Midare, that's 3760 potency and +40 Kenki net. Kenki's "spammable" spender is Shinten, currently at 320 potency for 25 Kenki, or 12.8 potency per Kenki, which means 40 Kenki is equivalent to 512 potency. That's a net of 4272 potency, or 474.7 potency per GCD. The Enpi combo currently does 500 potency and costs 10 Kenki (though it could instead do 400 and cost no Kenki if you skip Gyoten and just run back in, resulting in slightly better efficiency). The 10 Kenki cost is equivalent to 128 potency lost from not being able to use it on Shinten, so the net for that GCD is 372, or 400 flat if you skip Gyoten and simply run back in during the Enpi GCD. In either case, a net loss.

However, with the reduced potency, we do only 2960 potency with our Sen combo, including Kaiten on Midare. Shinten is down to 270 potency, meaning each Kenki is worth 10.8 potency, so the 40 Kenki surplus is now only worth 432 potency. Total is 3392, or 376.9 potency per GCD (reminder that potencies are going down, but not really actual damage, because of the change to the damage formula in EW). That means that the Enpi combo with Gyoten is only barely a DPS loss, and without it is actually a DPS gain (~23 potency per GCD).

And that's a bit problematic. Because it means that optimal DPS for Samurai, outside of the raid buff window, is actually probably going to be spamming the Enpi combo (and running back in after each, so it's null cost on Kenki). I really hope they notice that and drop the potency of the Enpi combo to compensate.

Yeah, I read that as well. If that is the case, I assume that they will hit Enpi with a nerf. I'd like to see it get hit so hard that it is taken out of the rotation as a filler entirely. Not a fan of using my movement utility for anything but movement. Sam is lucky on that front, since it's tied to our gauge and is weak enough compared to the others that it doesn't get used for anything but movement.

[Kazimere]

Definitely agree. There were plenty of ways of handling it that didn't involve doubling Ikishoten's cooldown. They could have tied it to Guren/Senei instead, tbh, and it would have the exact same usage pattern as now, without requiring Ikishoten to be 120s. In fact, I'm a bit astonished they didn't attach it to Guren/Senei, it seems like an obvious target for it.

They could instead make it work like Life of the Dragon, where each usage of Ikishoten or Tsubame granted a stack. Downside is that it wouldn't be available on the pull (and in fact, would desync, because you'd get the 2nd stack at the 60s mark), but they could fix that by having either the first usage in a given combat session grant 2 stacks, or have an ability like Reaper's Soulsow that's only realistically usable outside of combat and grants a stack, so the first usage would bump it to 2 stacks and thus allow usage.

Personally, I'd prefer just tying it to Guren/Senei instead, though.



Personally, I think Samurai could use a charge-based or resource-consuming GCD attack, similar to Sabre Dance for Dancers, which serves a very valuable role for aligning GCDs prior to Flourish. In the case of Samurai, it should probably be designed as something that's essentially a null DPS gain/loss, so it can be used or not used as needed.

If they added a new on GCD melee that did ~500 potency and cost 10 Kenki, it would land at the same potency as Yaten + Enhanced Enpi + Gyoten, and the same cost, without requiring the movement, and fill a similar role, delaying the GCD sequence to align better. Or alternatively, closer to ~370 potency (based on the potencies in the EW tooltips) and not have it cost Kenki. Maybe drop the potency slightly from a "null" potency level, so using it is a small potency loss, made back up by allowing the burst sequence to properly align, to prevent that new ability from simply being spammed (could also give it charges to help prevent that, though with a relatively short CD so it's generally readily available for its intended GCD-alignment purpose).

I like the idea of a GCD attack that is dps nuetral, uses resource, and provides filler. This is all provided that filler is still necessary come EW. Another one sen hit that wasn't a DoT would be nice as well, but I don't know if they can swing that. I don't see why not though, since they do it for ninja with its mudras.

Whatever the capstone was tied to is irrelevant at this point. I'd have personally preferred meditation stacks, but Senei/Guren works as well. Anything but Ikishoten. It's lazy and hurts our Kenki generation for no reason.