Anyone else think caster has suffered this expansion? (hopes for the future)

[Lyth]

That's the entire point of the Melee role and why it has higher damage in the first place, and a lot of people actually LIKED fighting for uptime and positionals on the Jobs that offered it.

It's a caster main who has no melee jobs leveled doing the complaining here, so that should say it all. Giant hitboxes defeat the point of playing melee in the first place, and no melee worth their salt asked for that. Although if caster mains keep complaining about 'mobility disadvantages', the next step is going to be to just cut out all their cast bars entirely. Literally every time that players try to leverage 'difficulty' complaints to gain a dps advantage for themselves, the dev team always responds the same way. Monkey's paw.

[Valence]

1) Definitely true; as much as I meme about Bard, in terms of actual output there’s actually fairly good balance between ranged dps, and just all dps in general (give or take). There’s no job currently that ‘isn’t worth taking’ to any content. Still, there are a lot less Bard and Machinists than Dancers according to a certain website, so I do think there’s something there. Though it may be there’s less players for them purely because of the meme lol

My only explanation for this right now is twofold:
- DNC used to still be considered having an edge at very high level due to how skewed statistics turned for what amounted essentially to unicorn runs (DNC feeds heavily into those quadratically since not only it relies on procs and chance like BRD, but also relies on the partner's luck and skill). Probably still heavily anchored into people's mind even though for a reason I can't explain, DNC has dipped very recently.
- DNC has an absolutely stellar value for prog on the individual level (yeah it has value on the party level as well but that's nothing in comparison): it's extremely simplistic to play this expansion, and is probably only beaten by SMN right now. Players when progging tend to go for the path of least resistance because it significantly lowers prog time and difficulty.

Either way, they need to stop mixing up support with damage potential with the current battle system design, it doesn't mesh well at all (and is hypocritical to boot because MNK just has stood up there since the beginning of the expansion and it also has healing support).

[elioaiko]

Caster suffered a lot because we still for some reason have 3 caster dps as opposed to 5 melee dps.

Yes you could make the argument that melee has 2 spots in a raid party but caster role hasn't gotten a new dps since SB and no, BLU doesn't count because that's literally just side content.

Not only that but the power balance between the 3 has always been:

Is SMN or BLM the dps powerhouse?

Is RDM's rez mage good enough to justify lower dmg?

SMN being hit with several nerfs in ShB and then reworked with bare minimum effort in EW.

Really the role needs another job to balance out the selfish dps to support dps ratio.

A bigger argument would be that EW is the start of older job design is clashing with current design: the desire for more accessible and simplified gameplay. It's been happening to tanks and healers since SB and now it's trickled down to dps role which is why there's been posts after posts about questionable changes they've made to dps designs. The devs realize that the game has become more popular than ever and combined with having a tight schedule since covid has worn them out to the point of creative thinking being non-existant.

The dev team truly needs a seperate team for job and combat design, they just phone changes in and change jobs for the worst or leaving jobs to rot for an entire expansion.

[Turtledeluxe]

I'm not sure that caster has suffered independently but moreso that the game has suffered by becoming a zerg fest.

[Turtledeluxe]

It's a caster main who has no melee jobs leveled doing the complaining here, so that should say it all. Giant hitboxes defeat the point of playing melee in the first place, and no melee worth their salt asked for that. Although if caster mains keep complaining about 'mobility disadvantages', the next step is going to be to just cut out all their cast bars entirely. Literally every time that players try to leverage 'difficulty' complaints to gain a dps advantage for themselves, the dev team always responds the same way. Monkey's paw.

If you took away cast bars from a class like BLM it would just get nerfed to compensate so essentially all you'd be doing is making it easier to play. Hasn't this already happened to BLM itself anyway (by simplifying Enochian for example) and myriad other classes that are currently regarded as braindead? It seems to me making classes braindead just makes them very popular but also increases complaints on the forums.

[Lyth]

I don't think cast bars should be removed at all, but frequent complaints in here about how 'difficult' casters are to play compared to other jobs will simply accelerate the process by which they become vestigial. This is just common sense.

If you don't like seeing your favorite jobs get dismantled, the solution is to stop raising 'job difficulty' as a problem.

[Turtledeluxe]

I don't think cast bars should be removed at all, but frequent complaints in here about how 'difficult' casters are to play compared to other jobs will simply accelerate the process by which they become vestigial. This is just common sense.

If you don't like seeing your favorite jobs get dismantled, the solution is to stop raising 'job difficulty' as a problem.

But isn't the only way of solving this issue in the current paradigm to make a class like BLM braindead? The problem with having classes that are harder to play that maintain too much similarity to other classes results wise (or are even less appealing without utility) is that players clearly go with the easier option. Imo the game over catering to raiders has sort of forced us into the position of making difficult to play not a thing for anyone.

All the player whining over the years has put us on a slow trajectory of every job's gameplay being streamrolled and DPS being brought more and more in line with one another overall to the point where we are arguing over % differences. Why not just call it a day, finish the job, and be done with it? Make every class do similar DPS and easy to play. And then the argument "Go play Ultimate for your class to be fun" can be everyone's consolation prize.

[Ggwppino]

But isn't the only way of solving this issue in the current paradigm to make a class like BLM braindead? The problem with having classes that are harder to play that maintain too much similarity to other classes results wise (or are even less appealing without utility) is that players clearly go with the easier option. Imo the game over catering to raiders has sort of forced us into the position of making difficult to play not a thing for anyone.

All the player whining over the years has put us on a slow trajectory of every job's gameplay being streamrolled and DPS being brought more and more in line with one another overall to the point where we are arguing over % differences. Why not just call it a day, finish the job, and be done with it? Make every class do similar DPS and easy to play. And then the argument "Go play Ultimate for your class to be fun" can be everyone's consolation prize.

I understand what you mean. They are making most of the classes a shadow of themselves that those who have still kept a modicum of their essence appear to be the underdogs instead. With shB but above all with EW we have reached the apex: they have made the classes stupid in everything, which do not exalt the player's skill and dedication in the slightest for an elusive search for "accessibility". But this instead turned into dullness. Accessibility should be simplicity in understanding a class, not simplicity in maxing dps, accessibility should be in perfect explanation of skills with tutorials during job-quests, and not lack of being able to optimize your class. I also understand the "reverse psychology" you use in saying that you want all the classes stupid, because it's the only way to make them really equal, also capturing the bitterness of the words. Actually the only sensible way is to have a change of course by making the classes interesting and fun to play and learn like in the old expansions. The game was successful because of this, not because of some classes that you can find in the gatchas. FF14 was the valid alternative to wow with an often higher degree of challenge thanks to both the exaltation of the skills of the classes and teamwork and the raid mechanics, but also a place where you can play peacefully with the normal contents, the story but also to the RP. Instead, for them, accessibility is synonymous with tasteless soups.

[Mikey_R]

Accessibility should be simplicity in understanding a class, not simplicity in maxing dps, accessibility should be in perfect explanation of skills with tutorials during job-quests, and not lack of being able to optimize your class.

1. What does it mean to 'understand a class/job'? AKA, what level of understanding of a class/job does it require for your performance to be deemed acceptable enough that you have grasped the basics of the class/job.

2. If you want it to be complex in maximising DPS, how much of a DPS disparity between basic understanding and max performance should there be? Are we talking about a small one or a relatively large one?

As a side note, even if you explain jobs, how they work and everything ingame, there is no guarantee that people will read them, let alone take the time to understand them. Hall of the Novice exists and people ignore it completely, despite there even being rewards for completing it, with a nice ring at the end as well.

For my last questions. Can you provide examples of where older expansions got it right? What jobs back then got it right? What is it about job design back then that you prefer?

[ElysiumDragon]

I think a major problem is that RDM's gimmick doesn't matter outside of prog, and BLM is cursed with a huge skill gap between your average BLM player being actively bad, and your cracked BLM player requiring entire groups to adjust around them.

So you're basically left with SMN, which is a glorified Phys Ranged and super easy to learn. If you're someone who's optimised playing the caster role, then there isn't really much space for you in the role at the moment.