Raid buffs and combo actions should go.

[Jeeqbit]

I have no interest in comparing this game's total players to other games' total player. But to say that this game is somehow dying or has nobody playing is wrong.

Of course, SE's revenue from this game has continued to increase while other parts of their company has declined. Lucky Bancho's statistics show that we have hundred of thousands more active players than during the same patch timeframe in Shadowbringers and this is well over a year after it went viral among streamers and a year after Endwalker release.

Concurrent players is different because it means the number of people who are logged in at any given moment rather than how many login over a period of time (such as a month). Obviously, it's highest in the evening, at weekends and after a patch.

For this game, concurrent is not relevant to any part of the debate except how easy it is to find people to play with. Most of the time, it's easy to do that except on the new data centers or when people are sleeping but it's always been like that. It's not relevant because the game is designed to be casual and allow people to login for 20 minutes to do a roulette or a seasonal event and then logout. It's not designed to hold most people in a raid for 4-8 hours or to pressure them to grind all day except for people who inflict that on themselves with achievement and item collecting.

[R041]

...

I like how everything you're saying is just as baseless if we're going by all the same shitty data. lol

You know I was talking about concurrent players right? Not Active Subscriptions. Imagine if we reviewed Active Subscriptions for WoW vs XIV. It's easily 3-4x XIV.
You can have 1mil Subscriptions while also only having 70k concurrent players - Even though I don't believe we're even hitting 1mil subs. Maybe 300k? (Actually, we can't even determine that. Too many Free Trial)

I'm not saying we don't have a good amount of subs, if you read what I'm actually saying - I'm talking about how we don't actually retain player activity. So our concurrent numbers are really poor. People hop on, do their dailies for an hour then hop off. That's not very retentive gameplay.

So reviewing even the Steam Chart shows how shifted the percentages are for patch/expac release cycles, regardless of hard numbers. We can't honestly say the Chart's movement doesn't relatively reflect cross-platform. Do you believe we've retained activity steadily?

We're also not talking about the return SE gets on assets and consumables from the CASH SHOP and other stores.

[Atelier-Bagur]

There have been plenty of people in this thread who disagree with the ideas I've presented. Should they just not voice their dissention? How does that help with discussing various aspects of the game? You can go on and not engage with debate all you want but when something happens that you don't like and you never even voiced your opposition then you will have no right to complain about it later. Letting someone know that you don't agree with their opinion and why is a very healthy thing to do, especially when it comes to video games.

disagreeing but not downplaying it. There's been a lot of R041's opinions while well formulated its very easy to tell that they're frustrated at those that disagree and it lets it cloud judgement and leads to clear exaggerated claims that are taken as fact, especially during the short bursts of rage Ive seen lately. Here's the thing, I totally do this too sometimes but its also clearly unhealthy and not overall helping with bringing a sound discussion.

[Ransu]

I like how everything you're saying is just as baseless if we're going by all the same shitty data. lol

You know I was talking about concurrent players right? Not Active Subscriptions. Imagine if we reviewed Active Subscriptions for WoW vs XIV. It's easily 3-4x XIV.
You can have 1mil Subscriptions while also only having 70k concurrent players - Even though I don't believe we're even hitting 1mil subs. Maybe 300k? (Actually, we can't even determine that. Too many Free Trial)

I'm not saying we don't have a good amount of subs, if you read what I'm actually saying - I'm talking about how we don't actually retain player activity. So our concurrent numbers are really poor. People hop on, do their dailies for an hour then hop off. That's not very retentive gameplay.

So reviewing even the Steam Chart shows how shifted the percentages are for patch/expac release cycles, regardless of hard numbers. We can't honestly say the Chart's movement doesn't relatively reflect cross-platform. Do you believe we've retained activity steadily?

We're also not talking about the return SE gets on assets and consumables from the CASH SHOP and other stores.

ForteNightshade is pointing to actual data from lucky bancho which is widely viewed as accurate census. You on the other hand are talking completely out of your ass.

[Azlith]

It seems the discussion is getting a bit off track. While I do think talking about player retention is related to the topic at hand it seems you guys are just arguing about whos right or wrong about speculative data on sub counts. If you're not going to bring the argument back to the topic of the thread could you please take it to another thread that would be more appropriate?

[Rolder50]

I agree. Back on topic, raid buffs are boring crutches for class design. I would like it if each class was unique and able to do good damage on their own. OR! I would like it if the raid buffs actually did something interesting. Having a buff that is just "Group does 5% more damage for 20 seconds" is just so unbelievably boring.

[R041]

It seems the discussion is getting a bit off track. While I do think talking about player retention is related to the topic at hand it seems you guys are just arguing about whos right or wrong about speculative data on sub counts. If you're not going to bring the argument back to the topic of the thread could you please take it to another thread that would be more appropriate?

Sorry - That's fair, I think I got carried away. Most of the data we're going off of is super rough anyway, so nobody's really correct.

Anyway, I don't agree with removing buff individuality because it's exactly the type of removal that got us into this position in the first place. Removing individual buffs would put us further into 'samey', that we may as well get rid of DPS altogether and we can just play DDR. I think you're right about combos though.

We need to be adding way more diversity, and giving classes more separation by adding in more variety for each class so that it can bring multiple things to the table if 1 isn't particularly in meta at that moment. (I think WoW understands this) The problem is that SE is so focused on putting each class in their own strict pocket of utility, that whole classes getting shafted is just par for the course and is inevitable. Like AST, I used to say.. "Okay, what do we need from me this fight - I can focus on certain cards and go Nocturnal" - But now I'd go, "Should I bring AST or SGE?", which also means I don't even get the luxury of changing strategy mid-fight or between pulls. Your choices are typically just "Who do I use this on now?"

We haven't been given new classes, we've been gift-wrapped old class specs in new glam.

SE can't force the meta 100%, and I think they need to realize that, how they haven't in the past decade is beyond me. They were probably thinking the same thing as you are here, every expac "If we just removed ####, it'll help us adjust #### to ####!" then kept chopping, and chopping, and chopping.

Now we're stuck in the position of everything always having a Meta + feeling awfully samey.

So we never really gained anything these past 8 years outside of the general Quality of Life changes like ability reset on wipe and the fights themselves getting cleaner mechanically.

[Jeeqbit]

SE can't force the meta 100%, and I think they need to realize that, how they haven't in the past decade is beyond me. They were probably thinking the same thing as you are here, every expac "If we just removed ####, it'll help us adjust #### to ####!" then kept chopping, and chopping, and chopping.

I think that SE do force the meta, whether on purpose or not, by buffing certain jobs higher, then other jobs higher than that a patch later so people can't rely on their job staying meta for long and that helps to make people not bother with metas as often.

I think you are simplying SE's intentions too much with this though. It wasn't all done to control metas. Removing damage types such as piercing and slashing was but a lot of the abilities that were removed were to make them easier to get into and easier to play for a casual player.

Like AST, I used to say.. "Okay, what do we need from me this fight - I can focus on certain cards and go Nocturnal" - But now I'd go, "Should I bring AST or SGE?", which also means I don't even get the luxury of changing strategy mid-fight or between pulls. Your choices are typically just "Who do I use this on now?"

We have to consider how useless certain cards were or would be now though.

TP was removed and we no longer control eachother's MP (plus I always saw these as useless and put them into Royal Road anyway). Spear and Arrow messed up rotations, some players wouldn't be able to adjust their rotation to the new timings and it would probably do that even worse now with how strictly everything needs to line up for 2min bursts. Bole's mitigation was liked and used by a lot of Astrologians, but so is Cure and just like there are people who spam their attack button instead of Cure, there were people who just kept fishing for the balance or spear/arrow as second prize instead of bole.

[HyperiusUltima]

Anyway, I don't agree with removing buff individuality because it's exactly the type of removal that got us into this position in the first place. Removing individual buffs would put us further into 'samey', that we may as well get rid of DPS altogether and we can just play DDR. I think you're right about combos though.

Removing individual buffs...how would you replace them then? Because there are a lot of jobs that rely on their individual buffs to function. Melee and Tank especially due to the nature of providing damage in those individual buffs, with all Healers(except SGE) having some sort of damage buff or individual buff to provide either higher damage or faster casting. BRD has their own individual damage buff for Wanderer's Minuet. DNC has a ton of party buffs, but has to keep up Standard Step for itself to function. MCH...doesn't have any buffs for itself, and is probably the only exception here as Casters have their self-buffs to make them go faster or deal more damage at a given time.

To shorten it, basically if you remove individual buffs, then you upend entire job's functions and disrupt gameplay flow.

We need to be adding way more diversity, and giving classes more separation by adding in more variety for each class so that it can bring multiple things to the table if 1 isn't particularly in meta at that moment. (I think WoW understands this) The problem is that SE is so focused on putting each class in their own strict pocket of utility, that whole classes getting shafted is just par for the course and is inevitable.

The last time I heard the word diversity was when Stormblood was current. After that all I heard was homogenization and fear-mongering of it. We have class diversity, but if we're going to talk about kit diversity, you need to determine what factors are required to achieve the level of diversity you're asking for - because I can imagine it's different between everyone here. Ask the question about your job as a SGE: "What makes my job stand out, and what is it missing?" Since I've played SGE myself the past tier, I know it's missing engagement, as are all healers. The solution to that is to provide more damage buttons to keep the player engaged while in healing downtime compared to actual downtime on the target - and it's something that the Battle Team needs to consider.

By looking at each individual job and determining its flaws, how it compares to other jobs, and also its critical issues for the role as a whole, you can find what is lacking in their 'diversity'.

SE can't force the meta 100%, and I think they need to realize that, how they haven't in the past decade is beyond me. They were probably thinking the same thing as you are here, every expac "If we just removed ####, it'll help us adjust #### to ####!" then kept chopping, and chopping, and chopping.

In Heavensward the fear was struck in them about a whole role being locked out, along with certain jobs being locked out(MNK, Casters) in favor of higher damage. This was heavily prevalent after the 3rd part of Alexander was released and in Stormblood; moreso by a Piercing Debuff provided by DRG. It was the sole reason they got rid of Piercing/Slashing/Blunt Debuffs - to prevent jobs from being locked out. Yet, scroll over to Early Shadowbringers in P4S, and you find that double Caster has started to take over Ranged, except by a decent margin compared to it being buff-related. It wound up being damage related, which they've always fallen short on when balancing, so they implemented the 1% Buff per Role to incentivize they keep a static set of roles involved in all content as a band-aid for a problem that would be exacerbated in Endwalker for a singular Ranged - MCH. This drives us back to our main problem: The 2 Minute Buff Window.

In order to subvert this window, I do agree with what was said earlier: Critical Hit needs to be reduced in impact, as Critical Hit determines your Critical Rate and Critical Damage increase. This dual-use has made Critical Hit a monster since it became very prevalent in Stormblood, and once more exacerbated by the 2-min. Window for Critical Hit Variance.

[R041]

...

I mostly agree to an extent, but what I was getting at is that SE can't force meta 100%. They can get a good idea, but they'll probably fail to capture it, and you know what? They shouldn't be the deciders of Meta, that takes the fun out of everything. They pre-plan way too much for us, and that just means SE is attempting to play the game for us before we even get to play it. Be a little more adventurous. They need to give classes more types of utility overall so that they can shift gears when necessary, not decide that the class itself should be a specific way by threading a needle.

I think the big problem is we're focusing on pigeonholing all of this into Raid scenarios, when these things were all relatively useful and fun in FATEs, Open World, Dungeons, and other Normal tier. I get that these abilities can mess up precision, but you could really say the same thing for WoW utility - Those should be discussed and put into the engagement plan. Not thrown away entirely.

So I don't think they were necessarily useless, I do agree that it was a horrible method of obtaining said modifiers though. Making it completely random felt pretty horrible, but getting rid of the option altogether I think was a terrible idea and just pigeonholes us more. It's kinda like saying Jump is useless. Just because we don't jump in raid content, doesn't mean it shouldn't exist. (Rough example, 1.0 reference)

I also agree with the TP statement mostly, but that was also because the abilities themselves and Sprint were designed poorly around it. You could say the same thing for Mana honestly. If our Sprint was tied to Mana we'd think Mana was shit too.

...

I think you misinterpreted what I said, not your fault. I said I wouldn't get rid of it. I would add more to offset the possibility of classes being locked out of content due to that utility pigeonhole. You basically agreed with me, but aggressively. lol

Also I think job engagement is a totally different issue I didn't even discuss. That's a problem within itself, just as the 500ms / low tick rate is. Because once job diversity and reactive abilities are out the window, we realize that there's very little fun to be had with each class. It's like playing the same DDR song a hundred times a day. That doesn't sound fun at all.