FFXIV Job Design Feedback

[Renathras]

A thread and discussion about a SCH proposal that addresses some/many of the issues raised by SCH feedback to the survey:

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...e-Proposal-SCH

Summary:

Ruin II replaced with Miasma: Instant cast, 400 MP cost, GCD that deals 200 Potency on initial hit (down 20 from current Ruin II), but has a 30 potency DoT for 15 seconds (5 ticks for 150 more, a total of 350 Potency or 55 gain over Broil IV), generates 5 Faerie Gauge per tick (for use on Aetherflow mini-Lustrates or Energy Drains). Useful as a movement tool for a relatively low DPS loss, useful as an upkeep DoT for a marginal gain over Broil IV spam, ideal 4x per min refresh.

Physic upgrades to Adlo: New Adlo has 450 Potency of healing, 120% shield (same 540 size as today), 700 MP cost (same cost as alternating Adlo/Physic casts today) [OPTIONAL: Reduce cast time to 1.5 sec to match Physic.]

Lustrate upgrades into Excogitation, Excogitation CD removed: Excog is now an AF dump and general use spot healing tool, in addition to its delayed use tool, opening it up for a lot of uses.

Dissipation: No longer dismisses Eos/Selene. That's it, and is the most fantastic change in the history of changes.

Aetherpact: Now a mini-Lustrate single target direct heal. Shares Faerie Gauge with Energy Drain, allowing a trade-off between damage and healing, and doesn't lock your Faerie out of other uses. Useable under Seraph now.

Energy Drain decoupled from Aetehrflow: Now costs Faerie Gauge, having a trade-off with the mini-Lustrate Aetherpact instead of locking players out of Soil, Excog, and Indom. More uses with good Miasma uptime, especially in AOE situations.

Whispering Dawn upgrades to Fey Blessing: All this does is add Blessing's AOE heal onto the front of Whispering Dawn's HoT. Simple change. Fey Blessing is now usable under Seraph as well in this new form. (OR combine Illumination with Blessing, but I think Whispering/Blessing is better...)

Broil IV now spreads DoTs from its target to enemy targets within 5y, giving SCH some cleave potential as well as making the AOE rotation even less Art-centric.

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By combining Physic/Adlo, Lustrate/Excog, and Whispering Dawn/Fey Blessing, it frees up a total of 3 Hotbar slots (not a ton, but it's something to fight the scourge of button bloat), it also makes the DPS rotation in both single target and AOE FAR more active than it is today, since you'll be generating a lot more Energy Drains (especially with good Miasma use), actually using Miasma (where Ruin II is often unused), and even mix up the AOE rotation by adding in Biolysis, Miasma, and Broil IV before returning you to your regularly scheduled Art of War spam. Energy Drain becomes a pseudo Thundercloud-ish proc (generated faster by DoT uptime on Miasma) that still trades off with healing (Aetherpact) while not cutting players off from Soil/Excog/Indom. Aetherpact becomes more generally useful. Faerie Gauge becomes a thing you won't just sit on 100 of all the time. And Excogitation becomes a useful AF dump in addition to its general use as a strong spot heal option.

The changes don't significantly change much, and add no new buttons/abilities (other than converting Ruin II into Miasma), but leave SCH with the same general playstyle it has now, but with small additions to make some of its abilities slightly more usable (mainly Aetherpact and Lustrate/Excogitation, Soil and Indom by not having to compete with ED, Adlo to an extent), give a slightly higher skill ceiling (good Miasma uptime might actually lead to a somewhat significant DPS increase if it's kept up all the time and the Faerie Gauge funneled into Energy Drains, but in a general sense, Energy Drain isn't a HUGE damage gain, and Miasma not a HUGE damage gain over Broil, so this doesn't highly gimp players not optimizing those tools while still allowing those that do some room for skill expression), a more engaging single target rotation, a MUCH more engaging AOE rotation, and consolidates some abilities to tamp down on button bloat.

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EDIT2:

Just think about it the way I do: Endwalker's message was 'never give up, even when all hope seems lost', and that one person can be enough. He seems rather ambivalent, and completely fine with 'the Final Days' destroying things re: Jobs, possibly because it's not happened to a job he mains. As soon as DNC and MNK get obliterated by godawful design decisions, maybe he'd start paying attention more. Or maybe he'd just hop mains to something else

Least Serenaya was willing to look at the responses, even if he disagreed with... basically everybody's suggestions. But that's what surveys are for I guess, finding everyone's responses and finding the gems in the dirtpile

A trueism of game design:

Players are VERY good at spotting problems with games.
Players are also VERY bad at coming up with solutions to those problems.

Feedback is useful for finding problems that need addressed, but the reason Devs rarely do what players ask for specifically is because those are usually (not always, but very often) bad ideas. Devs try to take the good ones, or the "good enough" ones and massage them into something workable, but there are as many or more bad ideas for solutions as there are good ones.

That doesn't mean the Devs shouldn't (or don't) listen, it just means the best solution isn't always what players think it should be. Heck, most of the reason MMOs get homogenization - a thing players then complain endlessly about - is because players ASKED for it, either directly or indirectly, over and over again.

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And to be fair, though his initial response was kind of...borderline callous, his point was correct. Not the it being worthless part, but his "the loudest group of people" and how few people are going to go to the forums/that it won't be an accurate representation. He's right about those things.

[ForsakenRoe]

Feedback is useful for finding problems that need addressed, but the reason Devs rarely do what players ask for specifically is because those are usually (not always, but very often) bad ideas. Devs try to take the good ones, or the "good enough" ones and massage them into something workable, but there are as many or more bad ideas for solutions as there are good ones.

They straight up said 'we didn't really know what to do with SCH'. So if people give ideas for SCH and 90% of the ideas are bad and 10% are good, that's still better than what the devs have got, which by their own admission is 'idk lmao'. If what they came up with when 'they didn't really know what to do with SCH' is a partywide sprint/mit, and whatever Protraction is trying to be, then 7.0 will likely have even less to go with because the few passable ideas they did have, were added in with 6.0. Even if the 'bad ideas' here make them think 'this is such a bad idea, in fact it is so bad we should do X instead', then the bad idea prompted that 'good idea' from the devs and that's still a win indirectly caused by someone giving their feedback