Thoughts on PVP balancing - before nerfing war/rdm/drg/etc

[Tobias_Azuryon]

The rest really I just want buffs. Being one of the best jobs doesn't mean it should get nerfed. There will ALWAYS be a 'best job' and there will always be a dream team composition. Instead, just make sure each job feels strong in their own way and not too awful in comparison.

Really, if we can buff DNC, GNB, SCH, MNK, PLD, and RPR, maybe tweak some stuff here or there for QoL and consistency for the rest, I actually think the game would be in a good spot.
If you get extremely angry at job balance, or find yourself blaming the fact they picked a strong job instead of adapting, you'd odds are feel the same for the new 'best jobs' if WAR/WHM got nerfed. I think we shouldn't be wanting to many nerfs to anything, and instead focus on giving the player more options and interesting tools to use with every other job.

I can agree with this which is why my big talking points are always cc prevention (purify being broken) and class base kits. We have a mode that heavily incentivizes CC. Maybe the dev team didn't anticipate this, maybe they thought Purify would be more effective, maybe they didn't calculate the absolute zerg rush a 3 second stun could result in for a party of people somehow, I don't know. But with that knowledge we now have glaring gaps in the kits of several classes where they have to basically stay out of range and if anything breathes on them wrong they die. This is amplified by the lack of proper communication tools with the rest of your team and being able to do premades where some classes could shine if given the proper support.

SGE can do a ton of dps but I can barely shield my party half the time except for in bursts and it really sucks having zero way to assist the party with any CC or other skills when classes like WHM have so many passive damage/protection skills and cc curation and stun. Needless to say I don't think CC should be "removed" but the current iteration should not allow for a specific tank to just steam roll people because they can, at range, stun, leap in, and destroy and if the server eats the purify they'll get stunned again by the rest of the party. Focusing on targets and stuff I get, but if I were playing WHM not only coudl I purify I could divine veil myself on the retreat, giving a huge edge on pressuring that class at a basic level.

So at this point I just want more CC for more classes and/or balancing the CC to allow for more skill play instead of just zerg rushing everything with classes that can cc with reckless abandon.

When I sit down and think about it, if it wasn't for the cc spam, I probably wouldn't have much complaint about the systems outside of minor tweaks to classes. But man when you look at a GNB to a WAR, or a SCH to a WHM, it's very obvious which one will perform better. People see those big numbers on GNB and think it'll be OP or balanced because it has more burst but you can't burst when people can walk away from your LB, your biggest hitting skill is dependent on being on top of people, and you can't tank if there isn't a tank on the other team lol. Big dps means nothing if someone can literally just...lock you out of doing any dps for too long.

I"d argue you play the weakest by far

Having beat my head against the wall trying to find a way to make GNB work I agree. Especially when matchmaking (trying to anyways) puts one tank and one healer as much as it can which results in a GNB vs WAR and WAR can just roflstomp a GNB unless very specific conditions are met.

[Ransu]

Nerf warrior and whm into the ground and tanks and healers will just disappear from high level play.

WAR and WHM aren't pushing other healers and tanks out. There's no healer slot for teams, there's no tank slot either.

There's not supposed to be slots for them. The new system is intended to be role agnostic with slight flavors from each role.

Have you even looked at the WHM's LB descirption?

Deals unaspected damage with a potency of 18,000 to all enemies in a straight line before you.
Additional Effect: Stun
Duration: 3s
Additional Effect: Grants Temperance
Temperance Effect: Increases damage dealt and healing potency by 10%, and grants Regen to self and nearby party members within 30 yalms
Cure Potency: 4,000
Duration: 15s

That is insane for something that charges as fast as it does. I literally had a match last night where I get hit by whm LB before the crystal in mid even unlocked.

I wouldn't have a problem with it if it acted something like Moira's beam from overwatch where it damaged players and healed teammates, but this thing damages players, stuns them, gives regen to the team and increases damage done to enemies. I'm sorry, but that LB is outright broken.

[HalinFluffyBuns]

Do you really, honestly think SE is going to take their new, accessible "Let's get everyone we can to try pvp mode" and then go "nah, let's make it so half the playerbase can't participate"?

pvp forums need to touch grass... more than usual. lol

I mean if SE can't even have balanced classes for a 5v5 setting why should we the playerbase suck it up and deal with it? if we go against cc mgee WAR or exploiting Cure 2 WHMS

[Tobias_Azuryon]

There's not supposed to be slots for them. The new system is intended to be role agnostic with slight flavors from each role.

While it's "supposed" to be role agnostic, the matchmaking seems to disagree as 75% of the time it's almost always trying to aim for one tank and one healer in every match, until you end up with sometimes 3 healers vs two tanks and a healer, or three tanks vs 2 healers, etc. The issue is if we wanted to have that system it needs to be more clearly defined.

Right now there ARE roles in the pvp mode regardless of how it's intended to be whether based on their kit or based on current play.

1. Tanks - Harassment/CC of the crystal, the defender of the point to keep it just being ENTIRELY a zerg rush. Right now I judge most tanks by their ability to do this. They created this standard when they made Tank do what it does. Not only can it aoe stun (perfect for taking back a point or defending it) it can move players, meaning it can push people off/pull people off the crystal, allowing for battlefield management. Something I think only DRK has similarly. The ability to physically MOVE a player should not be understated as this could be the difference between a win and a loss when the crystal is on the opponent's doorstep.

2. Healers - Obviously heal and utility to the party. Something that isn't super balanced at the moment. SGE has a metric ton of dps but little utility outside of Pnuema and picking at people from the back of the fight. Zero CC skills to utilize and no way to punish anyone being in their face due to small hp pool without kardia'ing them selves which means they are providing nothing to the rest of the party. A WHM has several methods to deal with this like CC/Stun/Divine Veil, etc. If Purify worked better this might be less of a problem but it doesn't. AST can heavy bind people with dual cast in a blink, buff their party with cards, and/or burst four heals back to back if absolutely necessary.

3. Ranged DPS - MCH is very clearly designed like its pve equivalent as a sniper/crit monster, but BRD and DNC are clearly designed around utility due to their low damage output and other buff skills. The issue is without premade they underperform at this role and are therefore a detriment in the current "meta" of Zerg Rush + CC stun spam.

4. Magical DPS - Tactical Nukes. BLM a little underpowered unless the party helps keep them alive, but RDM and SMN can absolutely wreck you if you let them and deal with you at range so you have to plan around either pushing past the opponents front line to get to them or dealing with the immediate threat of tank+DPS zergs before pushing through to them, maintaining sustain throughout.

5. Melee DPS - Get in and burst/Harass players defending crystal or trying to stay at range. If they're allowed to go unchecked can wreck you.

[Tobias_Azuryon]

Part 2

The issue is they have several exceptions to these "roles" that feel like they designed some classes with this in mind and then "forgot" or didn't think further about how having some classes absolutely excel at certain things would affect the game mode. If a DRG and SAM have more dps and more defense and more sustain, what place is there for a GNB who is slow to adapt due to Junction and not nearly as much burst as those dps can provide?

If they wanted to make it where some DPS could "serve" as tanks (which I believe the matchmaking agrees with due to almost always if I don't have a tank ending up with a DRG or SAM on my team but I could be reading into it too much) they needed to be more clear about that role as well as right now there's a huge kit disparity. If it's intended to be agnostic then why despite not having THAT Much more HP than melee dps is GNB given zero mitigation tools where DPS classes like SAM have more mitigation and more dps to provide the party? If your (usually) one "tank" spot is filled in with a GNB or PLD you're already at a disadvantage. This has to be balanced around and currently isn't.

It's not to say these other classes don't have things they COULD bring to the party, but they pale in comparison with the current random matchmaking and inability to deal with or dish out CC.

[Risvertasashi]

There's not supposed to be slots for them. The new system is intended to be role agnostic with slight flavors from each role.

Have you even looked at the WHM's LB descirption?



That is insane for something that charges as fast as it does. I literally had a match last night where I get hit by whm LB before the crystal in mid even unlocked.

I wouldn't have a problem with it if it acted something like Moira's beam from overwatch where it damaged players and healed teammates, but this thing damages players, stuns them, gives regen to the team and increases damage done to enemies. I'm sorry, but that LB is outright broken.

It's not that insane when you look at what other classes can do. Also a common fallacy in pvp games. Say "Look at what this ability does! How can it not be OP?" but when you look at other classes they're all similar.

And, I know there's not slots for healers or tanks. That's my point. WHM and WAR get chosen because they're competitive with DPS. AST, SCH, DRK, and GNB disappear from high ranks because they're not competitive with DPS.

Thus, if you bring down WAR and WHM to the level of other tanks and healers, you have a mode that effectively becomes DPS-only (if you want to rise above gold). I mean, DPS-only matches already happen anyways.

[Velnora]

It's not that insane when you look at what other classes can do. Also a common fallacy in pvp games. Say "Look at what this ability does! How can it not be OP?" but when you look at other classes they're all similar.

And, I know there's not slots for healers or tanks. That's my point. WHM and WAR get chosen because they're competitive with DPS. AST, SCH, DRK, and GNB disappear from high ranks because they're not competitive with DPS.

Thus, if you bring down WAR and WHM to the level of other tanks and healers, you have a mode that effectively becomes DPS-only (if you want to rise above gold). I mean, DPS-only matches already happen anyways.

WAR gets chosen because of Primal Rend. Don't be disingenous. It isn't over represented for no reason.

[Risvertasashi]

WAR gets chosen because of Primal Rend. Don't be disingenous.

That's a big part of why it's competitive with DPS and other tanks are not, yes. Take away primal rend and WHM LB and you don't get a sudden appearance of gunbreakers and astros - you get DPS-only matches.

[Tobias_Azuryon]

It's not that insane when you look at what other classes can do.

While I get your general perspective, it's not applicable in this case.

Please provide me an example of another class, specifically in the healer groups (because they seem to try and put a healer and tank in every match they can) or even outside of it that can use an AOE stun nuke dps mitigation regen every 60s (that isn't a WAR with a 15s AOE stun lol) that can be followed up with a single button press to do another 12k plus damage with little effort at range.

I'll wait.

[Risvertasashi]

While I get your general perspective, it's not applicable in this case.

Please provide me an example of another class, specifically in the healer groups (because they seem to try and put a healer and tank in every match they can) or even outside of it that can use an AOE stun dps mitigation regen every 60s (that isn't a WAR with a 15s AOE stun lol).

I'll wait.

There isn't one. That's why they can't compete with DPS for a slot.