High Materia: A concept to allow for some player agency, without destroying balance

[Aravell]

That means there will be players who expect other players to change their "high materia" constantly to match what calculated to be best for the specific boss.

This is just needless fearmongering, crit materia is king now, no one is demanding everyone meld crit or they're getting kicked. Healers and tanks require direct hit materia to even proc a direct hit, nobody is demanding that those roles meld direct hit or they're getting kicked. I've seen tanks with tenacity melds and healers with piety melds, nobody cared, we just clear the content and move on.

Literally nobody is in PF trying to micromanage someone's mitigation/heal usage despite there being an optimal solution. Literally no one is locking out RDM and SMN from PF despite BLM being the optimal caster. Kindly stop doing needless fearmongering.

[Supersnow845]

Every time I’m ready to make a post an think I have such a good point aravell comes in and makes it before me and words it better than I ever could

One day I’ll win

[ZiraZ]

PS: as mentioned previously, we don't see threads here saying 'BIS pick is BLM for caster slot, why so many play SMN/RDM??', and until such a time as we do (in a copious volume befitting the fact there's a 10% damage differential between them at the moment), I don't feel like anyone with the 'no support, we need to maintain perfect balance between the jobs' angle has a leg to stand on

Even when those threads actually get made (Week 1 pre-nerf P8S when MCH/PLD/WAR etc were bottom of the meters with tight enrage) it's all bullshit, in-game behavior is very different, I never saw a single gate boss clear or part 2 prog/clear PF in Aether barring those jobs from joining P8s, it seems like all the elitist boogeymen are not even raiders themselves, and that's always been a hilarious revelation to me.

[ForsakenRoe]

Even effects that aren't damage increases directly can result in increased damage. Melee DPS has an effect that allows them to move more quickly on proc? Damage increases if the proc coincidence with a "get away from the boss" mechanic because they're able to get out then back in faster. Tank has an effect that reduces damage taken by a party member? Healer has that much less to heal and so can deal more damage. Healer has a CD reduction on Rescue? Party can plan more times for the healer to use Rescue to get a party member back in attack range sooner (or allow them to stay in the danger zone for an extra GCD before pulling them out).

You're absolutely correct saying you don't have to be optimal to clear content. You're going to have a very hard time convincing the general player base of that. Most would rather stick to optimal hoping that will make up for any deficiency rather than take a chance on an unknown player using sub-optimal choices.

All of your examples of 'you could still get a damage increase from this' rely on player execution skill-level to capitalize on, and as I mentioned before, I see that as both a good thing and acceptable for balance. If you can gain a healer GCD by shifting your CDs around, it's considered a good thing. If you can gain a healer GCD by communicating with your cohealer and choosing a synergistic combo of these effects, it's 'imbalanced' and the whole idea has to be thrown out? Doesn't really make sense to me. And I don't see why we should limit design options for the game based on 'what if a very select bunch of bozos decide to be toxic to people about it, breaking the TOS in the process?' We already have the TOS in place to prevent this behaviour (or at least, to punish it if it does occur)

As for 'Most would rather stick to optimal hoping that will make up for any deficiency rather than take a chance on an unknown player using sub-optimal choices': Picture the scenario, you're doing TOP prog. You're a WHM. Which of the three example effects I cooked up for WHM is it more optimal to take in that fight, the 'more accessible Lilybell', the 'Benison giving Regen on break', or the 'Plenary gives it's effect as a Shield'? I don't think anyone, even people who have DONE the fight, could say which of the three are optimal or suboptimal, because throughout that fight there are places where all three shine. Again, maybe there's one that is 'better' in a certain setup/comp, with certain player skill levels, but then another might be 'better' in a different comp, with a different skill level. Do we have to have a flowchart on Icyveins/Balance, like this?

There are plenty more variables to include in the decision-making path, but there isn't enough space to show it all without using portals or something for the connecting lines

The 'difference' in damage gained from any of these effects (assuming SE is remotely competent at choosing effects that are roughly equal in power) would matter only to speedrunners, I can't make it any clearer. If people who aren't speedrunners want to parrot what is 'best' based on speedrunning, then that's their prerogative. I'm not even going to 'try to convince the general playerbase of that', because the general playerbase doesn't actually know what they're talking about. The difference between 'viable' and 'optimal' is lost on most players, you can clear with almost any comp (Abyssos being a weird exception), but again, I've seen someone say MCH bad and block a BIS MCH from a P5S prog party. The parroting of 'something they heard on Reddit/Balance' is not to be designed around, or we'll never have anything new again. Sorry, no new PhysRanged in 8.0, because it's either got more damage than the current ones and therefore can't be allowed (it breaks balance), or less damage than the current ones and is therefore DOA

[Burmecia]

As nice as it is to think that they could be balanced so there would be no superior choice, there always will be one. You can't balance them when not every fight is the same.

That means there will be players who expect other players to change their "high materia" constantly to match what calculated to be best for the specific boss. That's going to lead to players complaining that its even more expensive to raid and do EX trials because they would have to purchase stacks of these materia to switch out boss after boss, week after week.

Limit the player to a single permanent choice and everyone will pick the one that offers some benefit in every type of fight at the same time they complain about not being allowed any real choice since they can't change when they want.

Even effects that aren't damage increases directly can result in increased damage. Melee DPS has an effect that allows them to move more quickly on proc? Damage increases if the proc coincidence with a "get away from the boss" mechanic because they're able to get out then back in faster. Tank has an effect that reduces damage taken by a party member? Healer has that much less to heal and so can deal more damage. Healer has a CD reduction on Rescue? Party can plan more times for the healer to use Rescue to get a party member back in attack range sooner (or allow them to stay in the danger zone for an extra GCD before pulling them out).

You're absolutely correct saying you don't have to be optimal to clear content. You're going to have a very hard time convincing the general player base of that. Most would rather stick to optimal hoping that will make up for any deficiency rather than take a chance on an unknown player using sub-optimal choices.

I don't disagree with you at all. OP's idea is fun, I think they mean well, but the idea it's not without flaws. That's what people are commenting about + alternative and arguably better ways to arrive to same/similar effects. I think.
Multitude of factors play into DPS total already. And people would absolutely look at feature like from pov: but how will we make this make us do more damage. Like, the first thing in the morning.

I think top % players are decent and often lovely. I encounter s#itty attitude in context of raiding from medium-casual side. This is just my experience, of course. Let's just say pleasant people are pleasant and humanturd people are humanturds, whatever their raiding bracket

[ForsakenRoe]

I don't disagree with you at all. OP's idea is fun, I think they mean well, but the idea it's not without flaws. That's what people are commenting about + alternative and arguably better ways to arrive to same/similar effects. I think.
Multitude of factors play into DPS total already. And people would absolutely look at feature like from pov: but how will we make this make us do more damage. Like, the first thing in the morning.

No idea is 'without flaws', its up to the designer of an idea to try and mitigate those flaws as best they can. I have tried to do so by keeping the effects from being damage related. It would be so much easier to work with if I were to just say 'yeh it affects damage too' because I'd have so many more buttons I could modify, eg 'Gibbet and Gallows have a 50% chance to proc Soulsow' or something. I'd be able to make effects that completely alter rotations, so much design space would open up. But it'd also lead to insane damage swing (like, difference between A and B is 30% more damage kind of swings, etc). I kept the effects as 'non-damage utility' to avoid that, eg 'Arcane Crest is now partywide', and yet people still cannot see past 'damage', even if it's as small as 'you gain one healer GCD over the course of a 10min fight'. I'm not sure 'people will look at this from the POV of 'how does this get us more damage'' in numbers forumgoers like yourself imply, at least, with regards to the whole playerbase, all skill levels and all different types of content enjoyed. If anyone's asking 'how does this get us more damage', it's mostly going to be people who insist the idea cannot work 'because people will focus on what gives more damage', ironically. The people who would actually 'focus on what gives more damage' would be too busy doing speedrun attempts using the system to complain about it's supposed 'imbalance'

The 'alternative and arguably better ways' to have similar/same effects that I've seen thus far are 'just give us all of them at once, via levelling traits', which removes the agency the system is designed to grant the player. We'd be back exactly where we are now, where everyone playing a specific job has the exact same gameplay as anyone else playing that same job. Re-Melding could be a pain, sure, I'll agree with that, but there could be ways around that. For example, if it were possible to unlock the effect on the Soul Crystal rather than on the weapon, maybe a new menu could be added where you can freely swap effect so long as you're not in combat?

Again, until the day where BLM is the only caster allowed in farm parties 'because it does more damage' and SMN/RDM are locked out/kicked/asked to change to BLM, any wishcasting of 'but the potential discrepancy in damage this would cause...!' is just silly to me

edit: just had a thought in relation to this:

That means there will be players who expect other players to change their "high materia" constantly to match what calculated to be best for the specific boss. That's going to lead to players complaining that its even more expensive to raid and do EX trials because they would have to purchase stacks of these materia to switch out boss after boss, week after week.

It's possible for Materia retrieval chance to be set to 100%. It is, in fact, for any non-current Materia grade. So the chance on these new Materia could also be set to 100%. If they cannot be 'lost', then they can be made more 'special'. Instead of just finding them wherever (as we do with current Materia, like from hunts etc), perhaps we could have small questlines to find them. I've been playing WOW Season of Discovery recently, and something quite nice about it is the small questlines that some Runes have you go on. So maybe we could have these Materia be similar, where you'd have a job-thematic task or quest to unlock the effect. Maybe a PLD gets the Cover one by participating in certain FATEs, seeing an NPC is about to get whacked by an orange AOE, and Covering them to save them from the damage. Maybe the WHM gets their Benison one by using Benison on that same FATE NPC to save them, but the Plenary one comes from somewhere else. If the effects aren't found in super obvious locations, like with WOW-SOD, it could lead to an ARG of sorts, where the community shares their info on where to get the effects. People could collaborate to discover where to find these effects, and those who don't care for that kind of thing, can just do what most are doing with WOW, wait for others to do the legwork and just do what the wiki says once it's all discovered. We already see this with Big Fishing, people sharing info on 'what time' or 'what weather' it was when they caught/had a bite from the newest fish.

And then once the effect is 'unlocked' it could be made easily reclaimable, eg from the Calamity Salvager, in case someone throws the Materia away for more inventory space. Lots of ways to avoid/mitigate the problem of 'makes raiding more expensive'

Though, with us moving from 'job quests' to 'role quests' maybe the ARG thing is too big an ask dev-time wise

[Aravell]

No idea is 'without flaws', its up to the designer of an idea to try and mitigate those flaws as best they can. I have tried to do so by keeping the effects from being damage related. It would be so much easier to work with if I were to just say 'yeh it affects damage too' because I'd have so many more buttons I could modify, eg 'Gibbet and Gallows have a 50% chance to proc Soulsow' or something. I'd be able to make effects that completely alter rotations, so much design space would open up. But it'd also lead to insane damage swing (like, difference between A and B is 30% more damage kind of swings, etc). I kept the effects as 'non-damage utility' to avoid that, eg 'Arcane Crest is now partywide', and yet people still cannot see past 'damage', even if it's as small as 'you gain one healer GCD over the course of a 10min fight'. I'm not sure 'people will look at this from the POV of 'how does this get us more damage'' in numbers forumgoers like yourself imply, at least, with regards to the whole playerbase, all skill levels and all different types of content enjoyed. If anyone's asking 'how does this get us more damage', it's mostly going to be people who insist the idea cannot work 'because people will focus on what gives more damage', ironically. The people who would actually 'focus on what gives more damage' would be too busy doing speedrun attempts using the system to complain about it's supposed 'imbalance'

It's really interesting that the people who will cry out "but my perfect balance!" first rarely (if ever) participate in the content that requires that perfect tuning.

But let's be real for a moment, perfect balance is completely unattainable in current design. If you want a world where there is no percentage of damage difference at all between every job in a role, then you'd need to have only 1 job per role and the rest are just turned into skill glamours, also you're not allowed to meld anything and crit/dh are removed, there's your perfect world where everything is completely balanced.

[ForsakenRoe]

But let's be real for a moment, perfect balance is completely unattainable in current design. If you want a world where there is no percentage of damage difference at all between every job in a role, then you'd need to have only 1 job per role and the rest are just turned into skill glamours, also you're not allowed to meld anything and crit/dh are removed, there's your perfect world where everything is completely balanced.

"Everyone is the same class, with the same stats, and the same skills and the same rotation. The only difference is the VFX of the skills. Now everyone can have the same damage!"



"Actually, my class skin is better, because I got a few more high-rolls on my skills and therefore got more damage, entirely via skill and not pure luck!"

[Musashidon]

This is just needless fearmongering.

you are talking about small materia vs a giant change to the system which would fundamentally change how people play the game.

heck before they changed it so adding main stats have a cap on gear people expected tanks to use str instead of vit cause more hp was useless things like this have already happened before if you change the system to have thing that can actually give you a hefty boost people will expect it.

[IvoryHawk]

Instead, I'd like to see something along the lines of this, an idea I've had for a while that I'll refer to as High Materia. I've recently heard that the term is already used in JP, so a different name might be required. Perhaps 'Fireforged/Levinforged/etc Materia' to reference elements, or Astralblighted/Umbralblighted for Light/Darkness. Anyway, these materia would be extra special, allowing only ONE of them to be melded, either on your weapon, or to your soul crystal, if that's possible to program. Either way, it'd be specific to the job, thanks to the gear slot it is melded to, meaning no re-melding concerns for 'omni-tank', 'omni-healer' etc. players if they want to swap jobs within their role.

The effect of these High Materia would be based on the job, and effectively function as a choice for the player between several passive effects, akin to traits we get from levelling up. These would ALL be non-damage related, so as not to cause one Materia to be 'the correct choice' (because it provides more damage and the others do not), instead, any 'damage gains' possible through the system would be entirely indirect, and based on capitalizing on the opportunities the extra effects provide, rather than a direct 'This skill is now stronger' effect.

That'd be cool, but it's clear they don't want this theme park MMO to have anything really thought provoking, I was thinking about it the other day, how we have some sets with set bonus's for wearing pieces, for instance the Loyal Housemaid's Uniform/Loyal Butler's Uniform/Far Eastern Schoolgirl's Uniform they're paid sets now but they all have the bonus (5 Equipped: Intelligence +5 under level 30) I don't see why we can't have either:
A) Materia set bonuses or additional effects
B) Gear set bonuses+additional effects for 2-3-4-5-10 piece bonus or something

But it's gonna be the same thing every expansion till specifically stated, and when it is, it'll be stated as an expansion "feature" and will have resourses taken from elsewhere, but i expect us to be stuck with the same "get to max level, and grind ilvl gear" for at least 2 more expansions, with Crit/DH being the go to materia till as per because they don't have to balance anything outside of buffing/nerfing skill potency.