Why is everyone anxious about a PLD Rework?

[Curisu]

I don't like "burst" classes.
I don't like the 2min buff system.
I don't like to rely on crits of the heavy hits.
I don't like 2000 potency skills and the frustration of them not criting.

And PLD is one of the last job's who don't have these things I don't like.
Really, I would rather play a underperforming job which has trouble getting into HC PF group's or statics, then playing a 20sec burst job that has nothing to do for the remaining 100 sec.

Also, these 2min buff windows are only important for savage and ultimate groups. And there only in the first few weeks.

Go into the PF for extreme trail or DF alliance raid and you will not see any buff alignment, not even at the opener.
Because "casuals" don't care about it, don't have to worry about it and they clear the content while having fun.

Current PLD brings variation in gameplay styles and variations is a good thing.

[Oizen]

Fill meter
Fell Cleave
Use Buff skill
Fell Cleave
Fell Cleave
Fell Cleave

welcome to your future.

[Lyth]

That sounds more like a description of early Stormblood WAR, which was changed because players complained that gauge management was too hard. Which is unfortunate, because resource management is usually the only interesting part of a job's base rotation.

[Gserpent]

I’d like to know people’s opinions on this since I’m noticing a lot of anxiety over changing their rotation* mid-expansion.

Short answer? I enjoyed ShB WAR well enough, thought it had *just* enough interaction with the class that it wasn't *completely* an AFK autopilot class, and most of all... it had relatively few buttons so I didn't have to add a bunch of extra keybinds. I guess I like simplicity. It was easier than I wanted, but then most ShB classes were "easy." It was kind of the design goal, for classes to be easy to play. Middle of the pack/lower end performance in exchange for lowest player investment, seemed fair. I enjoyed it.

Then come EW and they removed all but a very few bits of "player expression" in the class. Upheaval and Onslaught don't have a rage cost, so there's no more interactivity with the rage meter and needing to remember to pool rage at certain times; Inner Release was homogenized along with many other things to align with the new 2-minute paradigm, which removed an element from the class (particularly if you had a NIN), since now you don't have to think about when your raid's next burst cycle is and where it aligns with yours and the potion timer; Inner Release was changed to operate on charges rather than the oddball timer system, so precise timing of GCDs and oGCDs no longer mattered so much (this is a net positive, but it *is* removing an element from the gameplay); Upheaval and Onslaught no longer affected by Inner Release, so it's no longer possible to drift them other than drifting them *so* hard they actually fall outside of raid buffs (which is different from, for example, drifting them by a partial oGCD/GCD every cycle due to mismanagement until they either fall out of IR or you have to skip an entire use to reset their position); and then later they even changed Inner Release such that it *only* affects Fell Cleave and Decimate, so you don't even have to worry about losing damage due to being *so* asleep at the wheel you just kept mashing Heavy Swing accidentally out of habit or something.

As a result, while the class's performance is perfectly fine, it feels miserable to play. To the point that you might as well really just install a bot to play the game for you, because it's not like you're actually engaged anymore. After years of playing and gearing WAR as my first class each tier, I was forced to write off the class and try something else.

I ended up really enjoying PLD. I enjoyed that you're *allowed* to screw up and break combos by being too spam-happy with Atonement, that you can *absolutely* throw away your Confiteor by not paying attention (you actually need to *count how many GCDs you use during Req!* gasp!), that you can throw away your Blades combo by... again... not paying attention. And I am 110% convinced **ALL** of that is getting thrown out with this upcoming rework, because Square-Enix has apparently decided that they don't want players to be able to make major rotational mistakes anymore.

I'm not even convinced the class needs a rework. I don't see why they couldn't have sustained DPS classes and burst classes fit into the same system, even within the 2-minute paradigm, so long as the design for all classes is such that their biggest damage button(s) land during that window. They need some attention... Square-Enix needs to either make Cover actually useful or just delete it, block needs to apply to dots and the like, Clemency needs to be like a 10-25s oGCD to compensate for PLD not having a button like Equilibrium etc (Clemency is a big DPS loss to use)... but I don't think they need a "rework." And with how Square-Enix has approached class design, "rework" to me just means "sanding down all of the interesting bits."

So, yeah, plenty of anxiety about it. Sounds like they're about to kill off the only class left that I actually enjoy playing.

I don't like "burst" classes.
I don't like the 2min buff system.
I don't like to rely on crits of the heavy hits.
I don't like 2000 potency skills and the frustration of them not criting.

And PLD is one of the last job's who don't have these things I don't like.
Really, I would rather play a underperforming job which has trouble getting into HC PF group's or statics, then playing a 20sec burst job that has nothing to do for the remaining 100 sec.

Also, these 2min buff windows are only important for savage and ultimate groups. And there only in the first few weeks.

Go into the PF for extreme trail or DF alliance raid and you will not see any buff alignment, not even at the opener.
Because "casuals" don't care about it, don't have to worry about it and they clear the content while having fun.

Current PLD brings variation in gameplay styles and variations is a good thing.

Yeah, I don't even know who Square-Enix are designing the classes for. "Casual" players aren't paying attention to careful rotations or how much potency they are or aren't losing, they just want to be able to do enough damage/healing to make normals and maybe the occasional Ex go reasonably smoothly while seeing really gorgeous and flashy animations and stuff... that's not mutually exclusive with a design wherein not doing positionals, not managing cooldown drift, etc results in losing too much DPS to clear upper savage tiers.

I don't get who they're designing the game for, with excessive sanding-down of designs.

[ForsakenRoe]

I don't get who they're designing the game for, with excessive sanding-down of designs.

The people who couldn't complete the Hien instance, despite it being provably 99% afkable (you only need to do the line stack aoe at the end). The people who couldn't complete 'In From The Cold' despite it's generous 25min time limit. The people who ignore NPC's telling them what to do in a solo instance, then wonder why they failed it (eg 'Focus on X enemy, we'll handle the rest', then they ignore X enemy and X kills the allied NPCs because they weren't dealt with). List goes on

[Gserpent]

The people who couldn't complete the Hien instance, despite it being provably 99% afkable (you only need to do the line stack aoe at the end). The people who couldn't complete 'In From The Cold' despite it's generous 25min time limit. The people who ignore NPC's telling them what to do in a solo instance, then wonder why they failed it (eg 'Focus on X enemy, we'll handle the rest', then they ignore X enemy and X kills the allied NPCs because they weren't dealt with). List goes on

To be fair, that's why they added the very easy option. I disagree with the inclusion of such things, I think gentle knowledge checks are important for co-op multiplayer games like this... but maybe adding those difficulty options made it more accessible? Accessibility is good.

Regardless, those sorts of players aren't the ones that notice they're missing positionals, drifting Upheaval to all the way to Alberta and back, etc. Hell, they probably aren't even keeping the GCD rolling (just spamming Heavy Swing non-stop is more total DPS than leaving your GCD sitting 25% of the time.) For those kinds of players, it's just a fun flashy Final Fantasy theme park ride. They're the ones you make Story Mode for, so they don't have to worry about really understanding gameplay, they just want the story and flashy battles. And those players are *completely fine* doing so, don't get me wrong - I'm not going STOP HAVING BAD WRONG FUN GUYS here. I'm just saying... trying to design the gameplay systems around such players, when they weren't noticing them leaving 2/3 of their class's potential DPS on the floor in the first place, is kind of silly in my view. Especially since you don't even *need* that 2/3 to clear the content they're participating in, in the first place.

[FireMage]

The people who couldn't complete the Hien instance, despite it being provably 99% afkable (you only need to do the line stack aoe at the end). The people who couldn't complete 'In From The Cold' despite it's generous 25min time limit. The people who ignore NPC's telling them what to do in a solo instance, then wonder why they failed it (eg 'Focus on X enemy, we'll handle the rest', then they ignore X enemy and X kills the allied NPCs because they weren't dealt with). List goes on

You really have things wrong. 2 min window design was made for both sides of the player base

[ForsakenRoe]

To be fair, that's why they added the very easy option. I disagree with the inclusion of such things, I think gentle knowledge checks are important for co-op multiplayer games like this... but maybe adding those difficulty options made it more accessible? Accessibility is good.

Accessibility is fine yes, but I've seen people, with regard to some instances like In from the Cold getting nerfed, proudly saying 'good, f*** forced solo instances, i purposely fail them asap so i can put it on very easy mode', which... yeh it's within their right to play the game how they want I guess? I guess some people don't want to have any modicum of challenge or barrier to entry stand in their way, because that would potentially tell them they're actually not good at the game, and that'd upset them. On the flip side of 'accessibility' though, I've also seen physically handicapped people not only play this game, but play certain aspects of it better than most of the able playerbase. Saw a gamer with no hands (played with their feet) nail the HW MCH opener better than most players at the time (including myself), seen tweets from a physically disabled player who has cleared Ultimates despite their supposed 'limitations'. So it's just odd to me that able people would choose the path of least resistance, but I guess, as the old saying goes, 'I dont pay their sub'

You really have things wrong. 2 min window design was made for both sides of the player base

Which 'both sides' is that?

[Gserpent]

You really have things wrong. 2 min window design was made for both sides of the player base

I don't know if I agree with that. I could agree with asserting that it was done to simplify raid design and management, and thus save the dev team work-hours over the course of a patch or expansion - that seems very plausible. But to make the game more accessible to casuals? I think that's incorrect.

And it's pretty simple to understand why - if you are designing the game such that all DPS and enrage checks are tuned around *absolutely everything* being pumped into a 15-20 second window every 120 seconds, missing that window absolutely *guts* your raid's DPS. If someone is dead, has weakness, or just plain screws up and fat fingers their buttons... or literally doesn't know which button to hit and when, which is far more likely to describe "casual" players than more skilled ones... when that 2 minute timer comes up, your raid just lost a huge portion of its total rDPS.

And not only that, it's lost that damage *PERMANENTLY*. The only way you fix that loss of rDPS is by literally delaying the next window by 60 or more seconds to allow for that person's cooldowns to be available, and for Weakness to have fallen off. And knowing whether or not you can afford to do that requires coordination and understanding of the encounter you simply are not going to find in a typical PF group or, frankly, even in most statics I've seen. Let alone players playing at the "casual" level.

No... if anything, shifting everything into a very rigid 2 minute paradigm makes DPS considerably *harder* for players the lower their personal skill level is, and especially for raid groups the more disorganized they are (so, most PF groups.) This is a significant element in why Abyssos clear rates have been and continue to be lower than previous clear rates - I think they're lower than Eden's Verse was, too, even accounting for P8 being overtuned on launch?

With the amount of extra balancing headaches this is going to cause them, I'm not even sure it will have ended up saving them work-hours. But I don't know how many work-hours actually go into determining who needs +10 potency and where - probably substantially less than designing and tuning encounters around "personal DPS"?

Accessibility is fine yes, but I've seen people, with regard to some instances like In from the Cold getting nerfed, proudly saying 'good, f*** forced solo instances, i purposely fail them asap so i can put it on very easy mode', which... yeh it's within their right to play the game how they want I guess? I guess some people don't want to have any modicum of challenge or barrier to entry stand in their way, because that would potentially tell them they're actually not good at the game, and that'd upset them. On the flip side of 'accessibility' though, I've also seen physically handicapped people not only play this game, but play certain aspects of it better than most of the able playerbase. Saw a gamer with no hands (played with their feet) nail the HW MCH opener better than most players at the time (including myself), seen tweets from a physically disabled player who has cleared Ultimates despite their supposed 'limitations'. So it's just odd to me that able people would choose the path of least resistance, but I guess, as the old saying goes, 'I dont pay their sub'

Yeah. The friction only comes from when these two disparate groups of players (the players who tend to bite into their games and try to master them, the "hardcore" types; and the kind of players who want minimal challenges or even gameplay, and who mostly want to participate in a story... they aren't "casual," but something even farther down the line... "story" players?) interact. And the way XIV is designed, it's guaranteed to happen. Duty Finder is a core part of the PvE gameplay loop, it's *required* to complete some MSQ tasks still, and Yoshida himself has said in interviews that they design the game such that... "more skilled players can assist (read: carry) less skilled players through content." It's a setup that is *GUARANTEED* to result in sour grapes all around, and it's maybe a credit to the typical player of this game that this toxicity only ever really seems to leak out in places that are outside of the game. I've been playing for several years and I can still count on fingers and toes the number of times I've seen genuine toxic behavior out of people in Duty Finder... unless you count Frontlines, but that's a different can of worms...

But it's grating, the idea that some people will effectively just freeload while effectively demanding others carry them to the same rewards. I don't think it's a good setup. But I guess it's functional enough that trying to explore alternatives wouldn't be worth the trouble.

Incidentally, it's one issue that *other* game largely avoids, as the "hardcore" players and the "story" players tend to self-segregate themselves by nature of its gameplay content and setup. The "hardcore" players are off in their own regulated area that has its own separate ratings and trackers and tend to only interact and play with others of that same mindset. There, of course, is plenty of toxicity within that area... as anyone who has participated in that content can probably attest to... but I've found it interesting that you don't usually see the different groups of players quipping at each other. It seems like that other development team tripped over the solution to that particular problem.

[HyperiusUltima]

I think I'm starting to understand why with the responses I've read throughout the thread. The irritability comes from the battle team attempting to fix PLD into the 2m Burst Window compared to the other tanks that do, and it comes with the belief that they're going to remove crucial parts of what make Paladin Paladin. Same with the anxiety; I can relate this with the removal of Kaiten from Samurai. Core Gameplay mechanics being removed for less complexity in a job's rotation.

It makes sense. If I had to name one thing I think they'd attempt to remove, it's probably Fight or Flight being removed and pushed into potency for PLD's Goring Blade and Royal Authority. Just staring at PLD's rotation tells me that their GCD Rotation for FoF is too long(11 GCDs) compared to Requiescat(8 GCDs) to the point where they are forced to Atonement drift if FoF doesn't line up perfectly. That deviation isn't present in the other tank's kits due to the fact that no other tank has two burst phases like PLD does - and that's what creates that complexity and deviation in PLD's damage. Breaking it down, every buff optimally is up by the 4th GCD. PLD has to go out of its way to waste 18s worth of FoF in order to line up their damage for the buff window before the pull starts. Other tanks don't have to do that. When PLD comes out of a phase transition, they go straight into their FoF window since you have slightly more damage there than Requiescat; or they go into Requiescat if they can't fit all 11 GCDs into the buff window(spoiler: THEY CAN'T). However, the damage difference between the rotations is very slight, by about 15 potency.

FoF Rotation: 5,525 potency total(after FoF calculated into rotation)
Requiescat Rotation: 5,510 potency total

Removing FoF would get rid of the complexity that PLD has currently, though the question is is this complexity needed or is it needless? It's something to think about, since I can't make heads or tails of whether it's needed or not due to PLD's current nature. The main thing holding back PLD is the fact it has a 11 GCD rotation in FoF while Req has 8. When you're doing the general rotation, there is bound to be some desync between that and your FoF coming up due to Atonements in the "filler" phase after Requiescat as I mentioned before; the question I'll leave at the end here is how would PLD feel for you if FoF didn't exist?

If it didn't exist for me, I'd still be following the 2 Atonements during filler to keep things going without having an extra layer of complexity to worry about during the filler phase. Whether I should give up an Atonement or not. Whether I should hold a GCD for FoF to line up perfectly. It can be determined as skill expression, but it feels like it's a constraint at times during fights that don't have 100% uptime.