Your Opinion on the Current State of Job Identity/Balance in 6.4?

[Absurdity]

Even were the game to turn into the likes of GW2, though, how would simply removing 4 jobs in a tantrum, DPS or otherwise, be healthier for the game than revamping those 4 jobs to better fit that context?

Funny thing about that, GW2 back-pedaled quite a bit on that whole "no trinity" design.

And even more funny things, GW2, the mmo that didn't have any healers initially, has vastly more interesting healer gameplay now than XIV does. I'd play Quickness Heal Herald over any of the XIV healers any day.

Exactly because they're not designed to just mindlessly fill health bars, you're primarily a support. You provide damage reduction, attack speed, cooldown reduction, crit chance, attack power and your weapon skills provide even more support on top of dealing damage.

Personally it's also about how little the combat has changed/evolved for the majority of classes from SHB to EW.

That's the big thing people tend to forget, it wasn't Endwalker that brought us this incredibly boring job design, Endwalker just continued what Shadowbringers had started. Endwalker's biggest sin is simply doubling down on it.

[Kisshu]

Personally it's also about how little the combat has changed/evolved for the majority of classes from SHB to EW.

Depending on class, going from ARR to HW to SB to SHB saw a decently big addition. Some classes like BRD was basicly 3 different jobs from ARR to SB, while job gauges added to each job, for better or worse.

But from SHB to EW it seems most jobs only got perhaps 1 GCD, 1 oGCD and some ability-upgrade (like DRG GCDs). It honestly still feels like I'm playing SHB some 3.5 years after it launched, really hope 7.0 isn't just a continuation of it so we end up with 6-7 years of the same combat.

*This is written in general terms, some jobs did get a more impactfull change from SHB to EW, but a lot of jobs got very little*

[Shurrikhan]

Funny thing about that, GW2 back-pedaled quite a bit on that whole "no trinity" design.

And even more funny things, GW2, the mmo that didn't have any healers initially, has vastly more interesting healer gameplay now than XIV does. I'd play Quickness Heal Herald over any of the XIV healers any day.

Exactly because they're not designed to just mindlessly fill health bars, you're primarily a support. You provide damage reduction, attack speed, cooldown reduction, crit chance, attack power and your weapon skills provide even more support on top of dealing damage.

Aye. But I chose that particular reference because it still comes from a pretty generalist/non-trinity-intensive place/intent... and still manages more integral support play. >.>

Like, if that is the terror at the end of the slippery slope that abandons those healers 'who just want to heal' (or, want nothing more complex offensively than Glare spam)...

[Tanis_Ebonhart]

Funny thing about that, GW2 back-pedaled quite a bit on that whole "no trinity" design.

And even more funny things, GW2, the mmo that didn't have any healers initially, has vastly more interesting healer gameplay now than XIV does. I'd play Quickness Heal Herald over any of the XIV healers any day.

Exactly because they're not designed to just mindlessly fill health bars, you're primarily a support. You provide damage reduction, attack speed, cooldown reduction, crit chance, attack power and your weapon skills provide even more support on top of dealing damage.



That's the big thing people tend to forget, it wasn't Endwalker that brought us this incredibly boring job design, Endwalker just continued what Shadowbringers had started. Endwalker's biggest sin is simply doubling down on it.

I mean, if it's so great and free... Why aren't more playing GW2?

[Shougun]

I mean, if it's so great and free... Why aren't more playing GW2?

I don't have a great answer, and could probably write a very long guess but, I would say that GW2 has a surprisingly large amount of really fun systems. I think my greatest annoyance is how delayed mounts were (which they fixed semi recently). Maybe most generically they don't tie and clean up things as well such that progression can be confusing.. I mean like must read a guide in order to make even half decent choices for many different things. Some of their shops are bewildering as a new player, with so many different currencies and items to do who knows what. Some items with INSANE ROI and then some with insanely terrible ROI lol. There are a few cash shop items that are huge reasons to why I had access to a lot of fun... unfortunately.

The combat visuals are meh but the feeling and building is pretty good, some of the jobs are insanely fun and feel like FFXIV's pvp but with build and customization mechanics. Mounts destroy other mmos in gameplay. FATEs / events are way better. The horizontal gearing is easy to catch up but has a lot of long term value- it is however insanely convoluted as a new player where you should do what. A lot of really nice QoL is cash shopped too though, and also convoluted. The seasonal events are also awesome. Account wide systems. Much better open world encouragement. Insane zone scale. Zone sync also makes it so you don't have a boring kit in early content.

Somethings off the top of my head.. I still prefer FFXIV for other reasons but if we somehow stole from GW2.. probably would be nice. For the next mmo it would be cool if they can take the best of FFXIV, GW2, ESO for some sort of action very rpg mmo. As FFXII (12) was used for some testing bed of the next mmo I hope FFXVII will be as too. Also helpful to be such so that FFXIV can exist without the next one taking too much space (entirely different combat style is a big difference).

[Absurdity]

I mean, if it's so great and free... Why aren't more playing GW2?

I don't know if this is supposed to be some kind of gotcha, but that is exactly what I'm doing when I want to have a fun open world or play interesting classes.

[Raikai]

I mean, if it's so great and free... Why aren't more playing GW2?

To me is a combination of loving the FF IP and knowing that XIV is highly referential to other titles, plus GW2 player graphics aren't very... good to my taste. They look kinda plastic-y and lifeless - not even mentioning how most of the cool armor sets are store bought and 1-piece ensembles. And somehow GW2 as a game system is even more unfriendly to roleplaying than XIV, which heavies a lot as well.

[Tanis_Ebonhart]

I don't know if this is supposed to be some kind of gotcha, but that is exactly what I'm doing when I want to have a fun open world or play interesting classes.

Nah, it's an honest question. I see GW2 praised every so often, yet despite being free and supposedly so good... Not a lot play it nowadays.

I'm surprised that they didn't already make a GW3. Would have made a lot of sense since WoW's star is dying (thanks to Blizzard and a dated game that takes forever for basic QoL changes).

[Oizen]

I would say that the job design of this game has become its biggest flaw, and these jobs and how they are do not get me excited to level others nor gets me looking forward to future inclusions as all they end up being is bloat with a new coat of paint.

[Raikai]

I kinda wonder what is the general opinion of the JP community about the job design, since they might be a big voice as well there, but from the auto-translator in their forums I couldn't really see a lot about this subject. Are they happy with the 120s meta, or how jobs are homogenized, or the state of healers...