Fight Designs & Class Balancement - Why everything is wrong and favors Melee Fantasy

[Aco505]

Very simple.

Melee combo is 12.7s. This is 5 GCDs. It's total 2990 Potency.
5 GCDs is 1800 potency at 12.4s.

What you lose is... let's take my party comp.
Arcane Circle 3% damage buff.
Embolden 5% Damage Buff.
Finale 6% Damage Buff.
Chain, 10% crit rate.
Battle Voice, 20% DH rate.
Litany, 10% Crit rate.
Wanderer's Minuit, 2% Crit rate.

Just on raw damage, this is 14.64%. So moving that melee combo means 1190 potency does not get a 14.64% damage buff. That's 174 Potency down the drain. I also didn't count the fact there's 22% Crit rate and 20% DH. Want better? You actually want to double melee combo and hit the verflare/scorch/resolution part because that's 2010 potency on 3 GCDs. I also didn't slap Manafication which adds an extra 5% Damage on 6 spells which is multiplicative. You absolutely do not want and must always avoid using your melee combo just for mobility. Because, yeah, it'll save your uptime but you're taking a significant damage loss and when you're the bottom of the barrel to begin with, you can't afford to lower your damage.

Yeah, so you're not losing 1190, you're losing less than 149.5 potency into your own buffs. How that affects the buffs of others is an entirely different question, because your rDPS is unaffected by it (even if you obviously want them in). But again, you can only fit 1 melee combo inside 15s and some of a 2nd inside 20s buffs.

If they buffed the melee combo, it'd still be the same deal mechanically wise. The job is designed around using it for movement, just like RPR has an extra Enshroud that they have to put somewhere between their 2-min bursts.

First, you play melee. It's fine to always want your job to be the strongest but you should consider the game is still unbalanced and favors you.
Second, you have no actual knowledge of caster and ranged physical. Like, maybe you know but maybe you don't but Saber Maxell actually uses Enchanted Reprise to keep his uptime and that cost Black/White Mana. This is quite a desperate option since it deals Jolt II DPS which is the worst DPS button. Like, I scouted your logs. You only play Dragoon and melee DPS. You have no log of any other jobs. (You can scout mine, you'll see I have indeed played Melee DPS during Stormblood when melee downtime was an actual thing)
Third, you do talk as if people who make comments that the current situation isn't balanced as if they don't know the game. Please, do check my logs. I do have the door boss down and I do have DSR cleared. I can check someone like SaberMaxwell and he has DSR cleared on RDM as well. To the very least, don't dismiss people who have actual better progression and experience.

The summary is very simple. Melee DPS just do more raw damage. Mechanics actually impact caster DPS a lot more than melee DPS. Casters are already doing less damage. We have no compensation to play this role. Res? Yeah, res won't save you an enrage timer or a death on Gorgon that triggers a domino effect. Also, I swear to God. All my 3 points seem to be valid to anyone who actually think this is ok and theres no melee favoritism.

I've never denied that the gap is too big, perhaps you are not reading what I'm writing? Saying that I want my job to be the best is an assumption, as is your claim of what I know or not.

If we're not going to have a debate and just resort to hyperbole, then it's pointless to discuss the state of the game.

[Aikaal]

Yeah, so you're not losing 1190, you're losing less than 149.5 potency into your own buffs. How that affects the buffs of others is an entirely different question, because your rDPS is unaffected by it (even if you obviously want them in). But again, you can only fit 1 melee combo inside 15s and some of a 2nd inside 20s buffs.

If they buffed the melee combo, it'd still be the same deal mechanically wise. The job is designed around using it for movement, just like RPR has an extra Enshroud that they have to put somewhere between their 2-min bursts.

I've never denied that the gap is too big, perhaps you are not reading what I'm writing? Saying that I want my job to be the best is an assumption, as is your claim of what I know or not.

If we're not going to have a debate and just resort to hyperbole, then it's pointless to discuss the state of the game.

No really because the topic I made was legit called "Fight Designs & Class Balancement - Why everything is wrong and favors Melee Fantasy" I'll just quote a few things where you are wrong.

As a DRG, you need 2 charges of TN or using one and greeding really hard to catch all your positionals during the Cthonic Vent part. It's not as free as you might think. Also playing as DRG often requires conscious TN planning and positional use due to how positional-intensive the job is.

The only real pattern that gets you is if you need to go north. That's 1 in a 6 chance. Otherwise with proper planning, you can always assign south positions to melee DPS. So there's a good chance you won't miss any positional. There is RNG involved.

RDM having to plan their resources for movement is something that happens in every fight because they are the least mobile caster. Healers have it worse, since they're quite the turrets now if they want to avoid dealing less damage.

Yeah, like you plan your resources to fit as much damage buttons in your buff windows as a Dragoon, Red Mage plans their resources to do the same. Preparing a melee combo for movement is the equivalent of you using Percing Talon.

Fun fact; from the balance Discord, your tether priority should go to DRK over SMN/RDM

Some fights are going to favor casters and some others melees, but this common idea that I see in this thread about how ranged don't have freedom of movement is not true to reality.

And which fight exactly do we see caster DPS that isn't a Black Mage or a ranged physical that outperforms a melee in Endwalker? You mentioned P4S and yeah. https://www.fflogs.com/zone/statistics/44/#timespan=60 My spies tell me that Black Mage was only able to outperform Reaper so I don't see where this fight favors Caster or Ranged Physical if I don't see them ahead.

Melee uptime often requires active effort, even if it may have required more in past fights.

I have 2 pictures to show you.



Neo Exdeath was during Stormblood. I played melee during Stormblood. Back then, taxes weren't a thing so I didn't get compensated for my piercing debuff, litany or dragon sight but I had legitimate downtime. I was still doing good. https://www.fflogs.com/reports/qHMtQ...pe=damage-done

It's great and all you're saying you're saying the gap shouldn't be this big because you are right. But saying that melee requires very advanced techniques to optimize melee uptime is putting too much sugar on the cake. Just look at the hitbox I had to hit Neo Exdeath and look at the hitbox to hit Hephaistos. It is much easier to optimize and play melee. It is much more easier than playing caster DPS and Square do want us to only play melee DPS. They moved on from inflicting melee with unfun mechanics like downtime and struggles. That's perfectly fine. What's not fine is to say that Melee is the hardest to play now. That's just not true.

[Aco505]

The only real pattern that gets you is if you need to go north. That's 1 in a 6 chance. Otherwise with proper planning, you can always assign south positions to melee DPS. So there's a good chance you won't miss any positional. There is RNG involved

The boss looks at the MT as this is happening and the Cthonic Vent safespots are either a cardinal or two opposite intercardinals. You have to use True North once or twice no matter what.

Yeah, like you plan your resources to fit as much damage buttons in your buff windows as a Dragoon, Red Mage plans their resources to do the same. Preparing a melee combo for movement is the equivalent of you using Percing Talon.

This sentence tells me you know nothing about DRG, yet you accused me of something similar before. RDM is designed to use its melee combo for mobility. It works similarly to RPR because it's a job that gives you certain freedom on how to use your resources.

DRG is a strict job that has to keep everything on hard cooldown. The only thing RDM and DRG have in common is that RDM has to avoid drifting Fleche/CS.

Not using a 2nd melee combo under buffs is a loss of less than 150 potency, as we checked earlier.

Using Piercing Talon is a loss of around 200 potency for the GCD (the average potency of a DRG's GCD is 350-ish), and delaying WWT by one GCD, which can push a 2nd out of buffs during odd-minute windows, and this can translate to around 42 extra potency per PT used, and 420 if a whole use is missed by the end of the fight. These delays can also push HT or a 5th positional to a point where LS gets out of buffs during bursts. Hardly the same.

Fun fact; from the balance Discord, your tether priority should go to DRK over SMN/RDM

And I would love to be able to tether a caster without issue. Ask SE to change it; we still can't tether SMNs due to DS not affecting pets. This is not unique to DRG however, DNC works the same, as do cards.

And which fight exactly do we see caster DPS that isn't a Black Mage or a ranged physical that outperforms a melee in Endwalker? You mentioned P4S and yeah. https://www.fflogs.com/zone/statistics/44/#timespan=60 My spies tell me that Black Mage was only able to outperform Reaper so I don't see where this fight favors Caster or Ranged Physical if I don't see them ahead.

nDPS wise BLM is the top DPS on that fight at the and P4-2S as well according to the link you provided.

Edit: at the 99th and 95th/99th percentile respectively. P4-1S also shows BLM basically equal at the 95th percentile. Percentiles are relevant here due to the job's skill ceiling.

But saying that melee requires very advanced techniques to optimize melee uptime is putting too much sugar on the cake. It is much easier to optimize and play melee. It is much more easier than playing caster DPS and Square do want us to only play melee DPS. They moved on from inflicting melee with unfun mechanics like downtime and struggles. That's perfectly fine. What's not fine is to say that Melee is the hardest to play now. That's just not true.

I never said that we require very advanced techniques, and once again you resort to hyperbole and assumptions.

Since there seems to be no indication of you wanting a serious debate, I won't waste my time anymore.

[Aikaal]

nDPS wise BLM is the top DPS on that fight and P4-2S as well according to the link you provided.

The link I provided still shows Samurai on top of BLM and nDPS removes all buffs so it does make sense a selfish DPS would be ahead right? Still behind a selfish Melee. Still, nice try, I don't really know why you brought this up. nDPS only helps to show if you've done your rotation properly without relying on having a good party that maximize your buffs. rDPS still remains the best metric to look.

Not using a 2nd melee combo under buffs is a loss of less than 150 potency, as we checked earlier.

That's also pretty wrong and you're jsut trying to gaslight. Raw firepower it's 150 potency. You still haven't added that I have 22% more crit rate and 20% more DH. You do know the whole concept of wanting to DH Crit all your big hit potencies? It'd be very convenient to have that 2010 3 GCD, to the very least, have 22% more crit chance and 20% more DH.

No, I haven't played DRG in Endwalker. You'd never use Piercing Talon because its awful unless you absolutely must use it and you have no choice aka you've disengaged from the boss. If you had a way to not use it, you would do it and yet you're saying RDM should use their melee combo for mobility when it's straight up a damage loss to move it away from the bust window because you have no clue how RDM works. Not to mention melees will always take priority over RDM if you do a mechanic.

To sum up, I'm not sure you can provide proper evidence that this current expansion don't favor Melees which was the whole point. The whole point if you have full uptime in every fight and RDM/BLM end up saccing damage to keep uptime. You don't as a Dragoon. I'm fairly confident you can keep all your positional during vents and if not, you might lose one. You still do about 10% more DPS than RDM, I think you can take this one L on that and still do 10% more DPS because Melee is easy.

Edit; You can continue to reply if you want but really and I do appreciate you put your input but here's the reality. The worst melee still outperform the entire ranged physical and caster cast. This game is designed for melees. I'm not sure you can understand because you've only played Dragoon. You know nothing else. I don't think I'll be replying to you anymore.

[remiff]

Anyway, a lot of people are talking about it, whether on this forum or on social networks and youtube,
there is a big problem with the game balance, and it got worse with the changes to the autocrits spell,
Melee DPS are too strong compared to other roles, they must reduce the gap from 10% to 5-7%.

Mainly Casters need adjustement, as well as Machinist, Bard also needs a little buff, however Dancer is currently relatively strong, as it synergizes better with melee and even better from the autocrit buff which is insane.

the PLD/WAR also need a small adjustement.

and the gap between PST/DRK and WAR-PLD should not exceed 250 DPS.

[Atmaweapon510]

People need to stop putting BLM/SAM at the top of these rdps lists. Being top in rdps on a selfish job means that you bring that job because it's superior in every team composition. You want the synergy jobs (DRG and NIN in particular) to be top theoretical rdps because that's contingent on them being paired with the selfish jobs (BLM/SAM) to essentially leech rdps off of.

[Naizakane]

Is this really where the FFXIV playerbase has descended?

The amount of toxicity your are displaying towards your fellow player is astounding.
Make your arguments, but mind your manners.

Extremely wild that this is toxic to you. Do you play any other multiplayer games?

[Supersnow845]

People need to stop putting BLM/SAM at the top of these rdps lists. Being top in rdps on a selfish job means that you bring that job because it's superior in every team composition. You want the synergy jobs (DRG and NIN in particular) to be top theoretical rdps because that's contingent on them being paired with the selfish jobs (BLM/SAM) to essentially leech rdps off of.

So many people don’t seem to understand that rDPS also leeches DPS from the person getting buffed

So the closest comparison to making the classes roughly equal is rDPS of the buffing classes should equal aDPS of the non buffing classes with some give for left eye devilment and cards

[momokami]

[remiff]

Extremely wild that this is toxic to you. Do you play any other multiplayer games?

what is perceived as toxic for you is certainly not perceived in the same way by others.

Calling someone a clown because you don't have the same opinion isn't very respectful.