Paladin doesn't suck, 2 minute rotations just ruined combat

[Hanayumi]

Not sure what they can do at this point though, even if they changed things or flat out got rid of 2min brust, folks will still build groups for those kinds of metas leaving even more jobs out of the loop. So yeah its why devs gave in, theyre trying to give all jobs a chance, sucks yeah, but its those are just pros n cons of "balance."

[Absurdity]

Not sure what they can do at this point though, even if they changed things or flat out got rid of 2min brust, folks will still build groups for those kinds of metas leaving even more jobs out of the loop. So yeah its why devs gave in, theyre trying to give all jobs a chance, sucks yeah, but its those are just pros n cons of "balance."

Going back to different cooldowns would already be a start.

Sure, optimized groups will still try to stack as many buffs as possible during certain burst windows but in-between those you will have more mini bursts again which lends itself better to jobs that aren't designed to pump all their damage into 15 seconds every 2 minutes.

You're probably not going to hold your 180 second battle litany for an entire minute every time just to stack it with technical step or embolden, that's gonna cost you a use over the entire fight.

[ForsakenRoe]

Not sure what they can do at this point though, even if they changed things or flat out got rid of 2min brust, folks will still build groups for those kinds of metas leaving even more jobs out of the loop. So yeah its why devs gave in, theyre trying to give all jobs a chance, sucks yeah, but its those are just pros n cons of "balance."

Emphasis mine, here's my potential hot take solution: just bloody let 'em.

If some 'hardcore raider' in PF locks their party to NIN DRG DNC BLM DRK GNB SCH AST and says 'speedrun party', then I just won't join that party because their intended goal does not match mine. So what if some tiny percentage of the playerbase decides that one specific comp is better than the rest, if 'the rest' is within acceptable bounds then who the heck cares? This tier was an absolute anomaly of balance so it's not the ideal situation to try and put this point forward in, but look at most previous tiers: any class could participate in any comp, and clear the content if you were good enough. Okay, maybe NIN is 1% ahead or 1% behind DRG on RDPS, but who does this affect if both can clear the content? Not the casuals, because they just play the class they enjoy and don't perceive the number differences. Not the hardcores, because they will just swap to whatever is 'the most optimal'. So it must be a tiny bracket of the midcore, who think they're hotshots, but are actually lukewarm-shots at best, who want THEIR class to be strong enough to be in the meta, presumably because they put the effort into learning that one. But the chances of 'your class' being meta are either equal (tanks/healers) or lower than equal to the chances of it being 'not meta' (the dps). Say you're a SMN main, the party wants one caster. If BLM or RDM are meta, you are not, meaning you have a 33% chance to be included in this prestigious 'meta'. However, instead of learning the other classes in their role, some 'hardcore raiders' (the aforementioned lukewarm-shots) decide that the best course of action is instead to complain about how their class is not meta and therefore needs buffs.

Some people in this game need to realize they hear someone say something, and then they parrot it ad nauseam without even thinking about the WHY of the statement. A great example was DRK in SB. Using a TBN back then and breaking it gave 50 blood, not this free Edge thing we have now. So you could either spend mana on Dark Arts (140p boost to next skill that eats the buff) or you could spend it on TBN for defense, convert it to blood, get a Bloodspiller. Now here's the weird part: People mathed out that it was both a DPS loss and a DPS gain, depending on which of your 123 combo got shoved off of the end of the fight timeline. If you ended on a Hard Slash, it worked out to be a gain. If you'd have ended on a Souleater, it'd be a loss compared to just using DA. So people heard the 'TBN is a DPS loss in very specific scenarios, and even then it's like 24 dps lost in the worst case' and truncated it to 'TBN is a DPS loss', leading to everyone avoiding the skill like the plague, and getting DRKs a reputation of 'wow they are so squishy wtf'. By 4.4 their damage was between PLD and WAR too, but that didn't stop people from banging on about 'how bad it's damage was'. The real reason it was supposedly 'bad' was a combo of PLD Cover being busted strong at the time (O11S tether memes) and not having a raid mitigation skill to help the healers save GCDs. Which is funny, because in HW they had two, Reprisal and the INT Down on Delirium. Then SE removed the latter entirely (fair) and moved Reprisal to Role Actions so every tank could use it (not so fair). That was all too much for a lot of people to understand though, so 'trash dmg' became the go-to reason. Which made it all the funnier when I did reclears on it, occasionally outdps'd the WAR and people asked with genuine astonishment 'how did you do that kind of damage I heard DRK was bad'

So uhh yeh, boomer tangent aside, if people want to make a meta, let them. They're always going to anyway, even if Class A does 1 dps more than Class B, then 'Class A is optimal' is a true statement. The issue isn't the meta. The issue is people who aren't skilled enough to have the meta apply to them, thinking the meta applies to them. No-one gives a damn if you play 'the meta class' in your EX trial farm, your Savage reclears, heck even Ultimate prog is often 'bring whatever you're more comfortable on' because mechanics > damage in there. The ONLY place this meta applies is speedruns, and if you aren't speedrunning, you can play whatever tf you like and it'll be fine. Well, if SE can actually balance the fights right next tier

Going back to different cooldowns would already be a start.

Sure, optimized groups will still try to stack as many buffs as possible during certain burst windows but in-between those you will have more mini bursts again which lends itself better to jobs that aren't designed to pump all their damage into 15 seconds every 2 minutes.

You're probably not going to hold your 180 second battle litany for an entire minute every time just to stack it with technical step or embolden, that's gonna cost you a use over the entire fight.

Being able to decide 'OK the fight is ending soon, I'm only getting one more use out of my 90s and my 120s. They're currently staggered, but I'll hold my 90s until the 120s is ready to burst harder, and won't lose a use because the fight is ending soon' was a nice thing to be able to think about, to squeeze more damage out. Now everything is so jammed into the square hole of 'everything at 2min' that you can't delay stuff like this. 60s can't be delayed until the 120s, because they naturally line up anyway. Also, forcing everyone into a 2min burst meta just means that if they release a new class (lets say it's a Caster), it'll have one of two designs. A: it's selfish and has no raidbuffs. B: it is not selfish, and has a raidbuff, that has a 120s CD. Because EVERY raidbuff is now a 120s CD. Bland. In the Olde Days meta, we'd see the class announced and be able to speculate 'Is the raidbuff a 2min, 3min, 1min, 90s', heck WHM's Presence of Mind was 150s for some reason (This one changing to 2min is probably the only change I'd want to keep). Classes felt a lot different due to their power spikes coming up at different times. In SB, WAR was a 2min cycle, with a mini burst at 1min. PLD was a 1min cycle. DRK was a 'sustained damage' profile, with CDs like 40s, 80s, 90s, 45s, 60s and 120s. Now 'sustained damage' as a design doesn't conform to the 'square hole' they want to force every class into, so it's getting adjusted. This will not make the game better, I think, only serve to stifle design room. After all, how many ways are there to make a class feel different, when they HAVE to burst at 2min? The only potential design to change that is 'it bursts at a time that lines up with 2min sometimes' such as having a 60s selfbuff for a miniburst. But even then, what's the difference between Lance Charge and Riddle of Fire? They're both 60s CDs, they both last 20s. I guess ROF is 5% stronger, but functionally they're the same. Press em at 60s for more damage. Why doesn't MNK have, idk, a selfbuff for Crit Rate (cough Internal Release), to synergize with the fact it wants to crit for Chakra, why does DRG have more access to 'buffing it's own crit rate' than MNK, the only class in the game at this point that has a direct reliance on it's crit stat as part of it's design?

And the best part is, the people this is meant to address, the players who can't keep raidbuffs aligned, will STILL drift their 2mins for whatever reason. I see it a lot in P8S, some people drop raidbuffs at the start of Manifold Flames before we spread out, some people use it after. Great, now the buffs are drifted from each other.

[Marxam]

And the best part is, the people this is meant to address, the players who can't keep raidbuffs aligned, will STILL drift their 2mins for whatever reason. I see it a lot in P8S, some people drop raidbuffs at the start of Manifold Flames before we spread out, some people use it after. Great, now the buffs are drifted from each other.

Thankfully in 6.3 with the UI updates you can finally call out ppl in your party since you can see their timers. I doubt PF will improve because of this but it will make spotting potential trap parties much easier when you can see their timers in-game and if they are using it at the appropriate times.

[Mithron]

The ONLY place this meta applies is speedruns, and if you aren't speedrunning, you can play whatever tf you like and it'll be fine. Well, if SE can actually balance the fights right next tier

Normally I would 100% agree with this and back the statement "The meta is whatever you want to play so long as you play it well," but given how bad balance was for P8s specifically, we really do have to focus on "if SE can actually balance the fights right next tier." There really shouldn't be 15%~ DPS disparity difference in any scenario. That goes beyond just fight design failure.