2 minute meta: Rework or Remove?

[Lyth]

The old pld could not exist with the new 2 minute meta and was reworked to be in the image and likeness of practically all rotations.
All the classes that were designed to have a sustained damage output over time have been transformed like all the others into burst classes. There is no other way out with this system.

What you're describing isn't a raid buff issue. It's an issue of sustained damage output vs. burst, and it occurs even if you only have access to personal damage buffs.

Sustain and burst exist on a continuum. No job is truly 'sustain-only', because that means that all GCDs are equally weighted to deal the same amount of damage. Such a system would have no decision-making, because all actions have the same effect. It's better to think of each job as having a 'burst profile' that weights more of the total damage output on fewer GCDs. You haven't really changed the area under the dps curve, just the distribution. Some jobs just have more burst than others.

The problem with having large variations in burst profiles is that it becomes harder to tune job performance on a fight-specific basis in a way that's fair. If the jobs are balanced for a target dummy fight with full uptime, then a timer-driven burst job will pull ahead the instant that you have intermission phases where you can't hit the boss. Your timer still ticks down while you're in intermission, so a greater proportion of the 'active' fight is spent in burst. This sustain disadvantage was a big complaint about DRK during Stormblood, which is why it's moved to the other extreme over two expansions. The PLD changes this expansion boil down to the same issue, but it was likely exacerbated by how intermission-focused P8S P2 was.

The bottom line is that large discrepancies in burst profiles can result in performance differences within individual fights, especially if they have intermission phases. This creates a selection pressure for all jobs to become more burst-focused over time. Resource-based burst can be a mitigating factor in this, because you're not gaining resources if you can't hit the boss. But resource-based jobs also have an edge if there's an external buff that you can pool into (i.e. Everburn). It's actually quite difficult to balance fairly under different conditions unless you impose some constraints, either to the fight design or job design. Some variety is good, but when there are large differences you start to run into problems.

[RyuuZero]

In my Opinion the 2minute meta is not the Problem, but it's important that what you do within those 2 minutes is fun:
For Example 6.05 to 6.08 was the most Fun Samurai Gameplay, I've ever experienced since Kaiten also interacted with the 2 minute Buster. But without Kaiten, there is no flow state anymore, no Kenki and Weaponskill Interaction, just dull burst and no that isn't fun since Iaijutsu never changes and Ogi never changes, in fact no Weaponskill changes without Kaiten and that sucks!
Other Example would be Ninja, though I hate the Mug is now Trickattack rework (they should've switched Mug to boost personal damage and Trickattack unchanged) but even with that change they manage to make me able to play NIN without Macros, which is at least one Good Point and unlike Samurai, Ninja at least had no skill removed, just changed for the 2 minute meta.. but still playable and able to have fun.

The 2 Minute Meta works on some Jobs better than on other and they have to Bring Back Kaiten.

[Shurrikhan]

What you're describing isn't a raid buff issue. It's an issue of sustained damage output vs. burst, and it occurs even if you only have access to personal damage buffs.

I think what he was referring to is that burstier jobs naturally take more advantage of finite-duration raid buffs (so, almost all of them), and those difference in performance increase as the degree of overlap of those raid buffs increases.

The bottom line is that large discrepancies in burst profiles can result in performance differences within individual fights, especially if they have intermission phases. This creates a selection pressure for all jobs to become more burst-focused over time.

Yes, but to an extent, that'd be mitigatable by just letting the less bursty jobs also have faintly higher raw overall damage (and therefore roughly the same damage under a typical comp, even if still just faintly, faintly behind the burstier jobs' performance in the most stacked 15s raid buffs comp possible).

...a timer-driven burst job will pull ahead the instant that you have intermission phases where you can't hit the boss...
...Resource-based burst can be a mitigating factor in this, because you're not gaining resources if you can't hit the boss.

Aye.

Some variety is good, but when there are large differences you start to run into problems.

Pretty much this, though I suspect we could have a larger range than we currently do if there was at least some compensation for being less bursty.

[Llynethil]

Just a reminder that this 2 min meta is what people asked for.

People who hardcore raided in previous expansions wanted this, they gave them what they asked for and people are still whining.

FF14 has it's flaws, but goddamn does it have to be tiring to be a dev and see people react like this to things they said they wanted.

[Shurrikhan]

People who hardcore raided in previous expansions wanted this, they gave them what they asked for and people are still whining.

Find me the hardcore raiders who asked for this? Even Yoshida's interview frames the complaints as a matter of being "too hard" for more casual players, not for the actually "hardcore", to whom such was already customary.

[Kalaam]

Let's be real a second: Square has their own vision for the game, their own plans. Especially for stuff as big as how it's balanced and the overall fight/job design.
Apparently it is to make it the most balanced (and easy to balance) system that is the smoothest possible so anyone can go in and do decently.
The homogenization toward the 2 minute burst window goes toward that goal.
If just a few people asked stuff such as "make it easier to align for buffs" or "X mechanic is a bit too present" they can just use that as a justification: "The community asked for it" but "the community" can be 3 posts that got something way different to what they asked (DRKs wanted Dark Arts to be less spammed, not removed entirely) or a genuine demand that happened to align with their vision.

[Taranok]

I wouldn't remove buffs, but I'd try to intentionally desync buffs, or create odd pairs like 90s party buffs, 2m party buffs, 3m party buffs. People will always try to optimize, but fight design was a hell of a lot better in stormblood than it is now, and part of it was not having these godawful DPS checks in a burst meta where most of the party's damage happens during a 20s window every 2 minutes.

Hell, as much as I hated PLD's old design, I know some people liked it, clunky bloated jank and all. Aligning it to the 1/2m meta was positive for the class in general, but in specific is bad. Its rotation feels a lot less full of life than it was before despite the issues it had.

Likewise, classes like BLM or SAM, true over-time damage classes, waned heavily compared to classes that can burst. I want bursty classes like NIN, but I also want sustained damage classes.

The biggest change I want to see though, truly, is the removal of multiplicative buff stacking if nothing else, as well as, if it can be managed, the removal of snapshotting. This entire debacle is almost entirely caused by the insanity that is multiplicative buff stacking combined with snapshotting. It's what broke Summoner in HW, it's part of what made Bard/MCH/DRG/Nin? broken in SB, it's completely shattering the enjoyment of the game now when you have DPS variance high enough to fail a DPS check because you didn't stack buffs correctly.

Easier content with looser DPS checks, but with classes with more personality to them was vastly more fun than what we have now. I miss stormblood, even if I didn't like some classes like DRK because they were too busy in an annoying way.

[Ggwppino]

Again, though, Paladin could at the time literally could have been made fully competitive... by just being slightly buffed.

Heck, it still needed to be buffed twice more after its rehaul (6.4 and 6.5), so clearly just shuffling around when that damage was dealt was not enough.

Not when in the party you have 5 classes that buff ~4% of damage in which they go in stack where the more potency you vomit in that window and the more damage you do to the boss even reaching 20+% additional damage. without gcd potency 1000+ plus crit (statistic now too more significant than the others), you are not competitive. You really produce too much more damage during the phases where the buffs are activated, but because there are too many of them and therefore they become too significant for the dps check. And this in itself penalized him, then throw in the downtime phases where the boss is untargetable and the omelette is done.
It should have been heavily buffed.

If you remove the raid buffs from practically all the classes and give them to only a few and these are responsible due to their functioning to always keep up all the various buffs (raid and single target), the old pld can be always competitive, as can be all the classes that instead of having a mega burst every 2 minutes have a smaller one every 30 seconds, or perhaps others that work with dots, or others where the autoattack is a significant component of the damage, or for the classes that do incremental damage, or classes that do combo damage, or classes that do I don't know, other infinite possibilities. But no, everyone must respect the 2 minute meta. all jobs same with 15 seconds to vomit the big damage and then have all the rest filler.

Now, thematically, if I were to make just one of them a buff job, and knowing what I do of their history in this game (had I known nothing of how XIV planned to implement each or seen only their ability names across the multiple languages, I would likely have gone with making SCH the buffer instead, but w/e), yeah, I'd make AST the buffer over SCH. But...

At the same time... does Chain Stratagem harm SCH's identity through its inclusion? Is it mutually exclusive with some other, more "XIV SCH-like" action that SCH would/likely could otherwise have had? Does it harm AST's, WHM's, and SGE's by association? I am not convinced it does any of those things.

Well one has its core based on managing damage/healing with aetherflow, the other has a core based on buffing teammates. Who should be the buffer?
The fact Is that there are too many selfish classes that have given a buff to the entire party that, if it doesn't exist, literally changes nothing because the core absolutely doesn't take it into account.

Why would the mnk have a buff that buffs damage to everyone? Why doesn't he buff himself but the entire party? Given that its core doesn't suggest at all that the mnk is a class that provides support, but more of an ace to carry? But the same can be said for the rpr, the drg, the nin. But also to the rdm, the smn (since they introduced it as a personal raid buff and not the pet's) and the sch. They are all classes that buffing is not part of their core, it is not their essence, and I don't see why they should have it, especially if it limits the design of new jobs and reworks.

Agreed. As long as there's sufficient context for them without also obliging them.

Absolutely agree.
Take the sch with "Expedient": it is a skill that buffs the speed of other players. If this skill is not used it does not change anyone's life, if it is used it can simplify the movement of the players by giving them a little breathing room, perhaps even making them extremely optimize some GCDs for the casters.

A mana regen example: how many times does it happen that someone dies in a raid, the healer ress him and then maybe has difficulty keeping someone alive because has no longer mana. Mana regen it's a skill that helps the party, in this precisely case helps the healer not to drown. Its to be avoided, however, to design jobs in such a way that everyone at some point can't continue without this mana regen being used.

[Valence]

BRD and MCH have never been broken in SB, DRG was. BRD and MCH without its piercing debuff were subpar, and even with it they still had that ranged tax already, and were not competitive with melees already (except perhaps bard when it got out of hand from crit itemization in alphascape). HW was a different story due to cast times, but it was counterbalanced by losing damage when MP/TP supporting the party, which could be mandatory.

I do agree that the battle system was better and more intricate and flavorful in SB, but let's not fall into the rose tinted glasses syndrome either.

[Taranok]

BRD and MCH have never been broken in SB, DRG was. BRD and MCH without its piercing debuff were subpar, and even with it they still had that ranged tax already, and were not competitive with melees already (except perhaps bard when it got out of hand from crit itemization in alphascape). HW was a different story due to cast times, but it was counterbalanced by losing damage when MP/TP supporting the party, which could be mandatory.

I do agree that the battle system was better and more intricate and flavorful in SB, but let's not fall into the rose tinted glasses syndrome either.

To be fair, Machinist was literally completely broken, or do we not remember the fiasco that was the heat bar and its extremely technical, extremely limited burst rotation that required a 10ms ping and a ton of finger walking to execute correctly? The joke for MCH was that there were dozens of MCHs playing. DOZENS! It is one of only 3 examples of truly broken classes. AST from HW was also broken (couldn't heal content, literally dead on launch,) and SMN (hw and SB, buff stacking and buff snapshotting let it do so much more damage than intended combined with a rotation so hard for most people to merely approach made it impossible to balance. Esp. since so many skills were shared with Scholar at the time. For SB+, using oGCDs to get more wyrmwaves out of bahamut.)

Also, if I remember correctly, the meta comp for much of stormblood was, actually, drg+mch+brd+smn with war/drk and AST/SCH as the final picks. The buff stacking was actually bonkers, ranged tax or no. And with the buff gods aligned, MCH could put out absolutely ridiculous wildfires due to just how, exactly, it was broken in that expansion.