Are MNK and VPR on autopilot? Is job design all about bursts?

[Lyth]

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You're completely contradicting your own points. All jobs exist on a continuum of sustained DPS and burst DPS. This happens the instant that you have actions with different potencies. In fact, even if you had a job where every action had the exact same potency, the very existence of raid buffs would give you a period of 'burst'. That's why I really wonder if you've actually played these jobs outside of levelling them (well, you hadn't levelled MNK yet at the time of this post, but let's leave that aside for the moment.) I think a big part of the reason why people like VPR is because the job is 'always on'. That's why it uses a four combo rotation with the highest positional and APM count in the game. This is no frills melee.

The funny thing is, I seem to recall you specifically campaigning against VPR having positionals. So I can only imagine the extent of your derision towards the job had you been successful. I also think that if you're at the point where you need guidance on what button to press next, then you aren't playing the job nearly at the point where you could describe it as being 'on autopilot' (or even at the point where you ought to be commenting on it at all).

It's great that you like proc-based jobs, but those aren't 'choice' either. Procs generally amount to pressing a flashing button when it lights up before going back to your set rotation. Part of the problem is that we're playing a game where they've had to remove crit variance from some jobs because people complained that it affected their optimal run. What are the chances that you're going to have a dynamically changing rotation where you get combos that branch off of procs (and no, spamming Split Shot to see if you get to proceed to Slug Shot doesn't count). Either way, there is generally one optimal way to play, modified to meet the specific uptime conditions of various fights. This is an MMO. Choice is an illusion.

[AlgernonBlackwood]

Either way, there is generally one optimal way to play, modified to meet the specific uptime conditions of various fights. This is an MMO. Choice is an illusion.

Technically, every game with a win condition is going to only have one or two optimal ways to play, it's just usually obscured by the "fog of war" (each actor only having access to partial, and often inaccurate, information).

The extremely predictable "groundhog day" nature of XIV's fights means that there's no real uncertainty in this regard, so all decision-making is eventually mapped out into a repeatable sequence. However, the "eventually" part is pretty important. Unless the player is just copying other players who already cleared, these decisions still had to be made at some point during prog. Once I realize I can maintain uptime by holding a Tsubame-gaeshi, it's no longer a decision, but it was a decision the first time I did it, uncertain if the increased range would be sufficient.

This makes jobs with greater degrees of flexibility (combined with meaningful constraints) like BLM or PCT feel different from mostly static jobs like MCH. Your optimal rotation isn't simply given to you, it's something you yourself have to develop over multiple iterations of a fight, much like a healer's healing/mit plan.

Proc-based jobs are a different category entirely and are usually more about attentiveness + pattern recognition, rather than muscle memory or decision making.

Returning to the original prompt, MNK does have an abnormally low amount of decision-making in its rotation. I can only think of a single example, which is when in the 15s window it's available you use Wind's Reply. It's approaches to disengagement are some of the more interesting ones, but the rotation itself is the most static in the game (yes, more than NIN, more than DRG, more than MCH). Does this make the job bad? I personally think the playstyle is dull and completely antithetical to the fantasy of a martial artist, but there's nothing inherently wrong with it.

VPR isn't really on rails at all, it actually has the most freedom out of any of the melee DPS, it's just that it mostly lacks interesting constrains in which to exercise this freedom. Yeah, the twinblade combo can be mildly inconvenient at times, but you have an extremely generous window to find an opportunity to use it (imagine if you could only use Uncoiled Fury for 10s after using Dre... Vicewinder, you'd have to think much more about when you pressed it). As a result, most of your choices comes down to vibes rather than any sort of strategic considerations. Again, this doesn't make the job objectively "bad", but it does result in a playstyle I personally don't find very engaging and wouldn't want to see applied to every other job.