After 1 (arguably 2) expansions what is square trying to achieve with WAR (and PLD)?

[Supersnow845]

However skill speed being another victim of “the only ideas we ever have for new buttons is big new oGCD’s and big buffs that make it even more punishing to drift anything” is a problem that warrants discussing especially since WAR contributed to making crit even stronger because it now buffs damage of auto crits

There is really only 5 jobs stacking massive speed on is really viable (BLM and the 5 healers all because they are all exempt from large CD’s you can drift (WHM is exempt even though it has misery because misery builds off your healing gauge)) and all 5 still benefit from cut more anyway

[Absurdity]

However skill speed being another victim of “the only ideas we ever have for new buttons is big new oGCD’s and big buffs that make it even more punishing to drift anything” is a problem that warrants discussing especially since WAR contributed to making crit even stronger because it now buffs damage of auto crits

There is really only 5 jobs stacking massive speed on is really viable (BLM and the 5 healers all because they are all exempt from large CD’s you can drift (WHM is exempt even though it has misery because misery builds off your healing gauge)) and all 5 still benefit from cut more anyway

It will never be viable as long as they keep party buffs the way they are. When drifting is no longer the death of your DPS we might see a resurgence of skill/spell speed, but certainly not while you have the most inflexible burst windows imaginable and cooldown timings specifically designed around it.

[OdinelStarrei]

Yeah, that was my bad forgot about Dark for a moment but still Skill speed is an odd thing to get mad about in the context of WAR being OP.

It's not really that Skill Speed directly correlates to WAR specifically being OP, it's just yet another thing/option that WAR has that other jobs do not in the overall design. Another feather in the cap, so to speak, or how WAR gets to sidestep certain design failures for no understandable reason. When WAR was negatively affected by Critical Hit buffing on major skills, that was fixed, and that was something that wasn't even noticeable to people, because things like Direct Hit VS things like lack of Crit scaling with Chain Strat are just not explained by the game.

Meanwhile you have GNB, a job that straight up doesn't function rotationally at a high SkS, something you may not be able to avoid depending on SkS itemization especially if you don't raid, and DRK/PLD, jobs that have entire GCD combos that Skill Speed is effectively a dead stat on, both are something that WAR never has to deal with.

It's like, the principle of it. It's like when Shake It Off got the buff for the shield, which was good, but later got the buff for an instant heal AND a regen. On top of BW. I'm not saying there's conspiracy against other tanks, but I am saying that obviously someone is putting a lot more effort into WAR design than that of any other tank.

WAR literally warps certain parts of the game around it, and that's ridiculous.

[Absurdity]

It's not really that Skill Speed directly correlates to WAR specifically being OP, it's just yet another thing/option that WAR has that other jobs do not.

??? WAR doesn't want skill speed either because it causes Upheaval and Inner Release to drift. Can you still play the job with higher SKS? Sure, because warrior is incredibly basic, but none of the tanks currently want SKS if they can avoid it.
From 6.0 until 6.2 GnB was actually the tank that wanted the most skill speed out of all of them, 2.40-2.42 were needed to make your rotation work, and 2.40 actually still works out fine with cooldown alignment to this day...and honestly I preferred the old rotation to the current mess with forced 2-cart burst windows at 2.50 GCD.

[OdinelStarrei]

??? WAR doesn't want skill speed either because it causes Upheaval and Inner Release to drift. Can you still play the job with higher SKS? Sure, because warrior is incredibly basic, but none of the tanks currently want SKS if they can avoid it.
From 6.0 until 6.2 GnB was actually the tank that wanted the most skill speed out of all of them, 2.40-2.42 were needed to make your rotation work...and honestly I preferred the old rotation to the current mess with forced 2-cart burst windows.

I consider dead stats to be pretty bad, but I think you're more right in general, as active detriments such as drift are an objectively much worse evil, I concede. Upon further thought, my issue is probably SkS itself, being a comfort stat rather than a suitable alternative to more direct damage options like Crit and DH. The fact that it's null on Spells is just a twisting of the knife, tbh.

I just miss running 2.32 okay?

[Absurdity]

I consider dead stats to be worse than drift, but I think you're more right in general, I concede. Upon further thought, my issue is probably SkS itself, being a comfort stat rather than a suitable alternative to more direct damage alternatives like Crit and DH. The fact that it's null on Spells is just a twisting of the knife, tbh.

I just miss running 2.32 okay?

I would like to be able to run 2.34, that I ran in Alphascape, again as well.
But we basically had the stars align for those speeds to be useful in the first place.

On warrior for example 2.38 was required to make 5x FC IR work in the first place, 2.34 allowed you to get an extra GCD before forced downtime in a lot of fights, party buff timings were so varied that you didn't completely gimp your DPS with it and Eureka gear allowed us to get high skill speed without completely sacrificing crit.

[Reinhardt_Azureheim]

On warrior for example 2.38 was required to make 5x FC IR work in the first place

Actually (nerd glasses on) you were able to do it with a GCD as slow as 2.48s, if you had a low ping (10-20ms, stable), but it was VERY tight to time and I don't think we had "time modification tools" back then. But I would not recommend it. The general sweetspot was somewhere between 2.38 to 2.43, with 2.36s GCD and faster being a decent alternative.

Source: I played with it back then to prove a point.