Can anyone clearly explain "job homogenization" in this game?

[Carighan]

It just means the windows for the jobs line up, which means jobs are all viable picks for all levels of content unless you're going for world firsts.

Yeah but that's why "homogenization" isn't a single thing. As explained to you before. There are lot sof types of homogenization, and painting them universally as bad or to-be-avoided is not a good approach, too. It's not a binary system. It's a scale, and every design in every MMO falls somewhere onto it.

Too little homogenization, and balance is entirely impossible, not even close-to-balanced. This might be acceptable of course (depending on game) but most gamers nowadays expect some level of balance. This is sometimes intentionally done however in single-player games, because usually there we want classes to feel as diverse as possible.
Too much homogenization, and your design space collapses, it doesn't feel like you have, say, 20 options how to play, more like 4-5. The most common variant of this is that only your role matters any more, not your actual class. Melees are mostly there for example, tanks and healers are. PRanged and Casters mostly avoid this fate in FFXIV, at least so far. Might again be warranted, depending on your game. In games such as Counter Strike you want near-full homogenization, to keep the playing field as even as possible. In most MMORPGs you don't want tooooo much, because then people get bored as swapping to other classes adds little meaningful variety to their gameplay.

[HikariKurosawa]

Yeah but that's why "homogenization" isn't a single thing. As explained to you before. There are lot sof types of homogenization, and painting them universally as bad or to-be-avoided is not a good approach, too. It's not a binary system. It's a scale, and every design in every MMO falls somewhere onto it.

Too little homogenization, and balance is entirely impossible, not even close-to-balanced. This might be acceptable of course (depending on game) but most gamers nowadays expect some level of balance. This is sometimes intentionally done however in single-player games, because usually there we want classes to feel as diverse as possible.
Too much homogenization, and your design space collapses, it doesn't feel like you have, say, 20 options how to play, more like 4-5. The most common variant of this is that only your role matters any more, not your actual class. Melees are mostly there for example, tanks and healers are. PRanged and Casters mostly avoid this fate in FFXIV, at least so far. Might again be warranted, depending on your game. In games such as Counter Strike you want near-full homogenization, to keep the playing field as even as possible. In most MMORPGs you don't want tooooo much, because then people get bored as swapping to other classes adds little meaningful variety to their gameplay.

Counter strike doesn't have homogenization at all... I think you're confusing the word balance with homogenization at this point. It's like saying overwatch is homogenized because there is no stat differences on the same hero, also like saying that this game is not homogenized because gear exists. Tell me you have no clue about fps without telling me you have no clue about fps.

Melee in this game is the most unique, all 4 tanks are incredibly unique so again that point is fake, and all healers are also completely unique, even within barrier and pure healer types. Ast is nothing like whm, sage is nothing like sch. Even the dps rotations feel different, and the AoE absolutely feels different. Same with Phys ranged and casters. It's just a wild take to suggest the job gameplay has homogenization.

The burst moments of every job are also all unique, so I don't see it there.

The one thing I will say has been standardized like I already did, is the burst timing. And yeah? That's pretty normal. What do you think that having cooldowns longer than 2 minutes or at odd intervals would actually make the game feel better? All it would do is push jobs out of the meta in favor of those that align with 2 minute window lol. On top of doing nothing to make the game feel better.

[Namir]

I see this word thrown around a lot but I don't think you know what it means.

Please educate me on how jobs are homogenized in this game.

Make sure you are fully articulate and explain your reasoning clearly and thoroughly.

People need to let this thread die already. It’s obvious from the very first post that OP isn’t interested in “clarifying” or understanding, or even debating anything. Hence why he said “educate me on homogenization” while at the same time saying “I don’t think you know what it means”. Now why would you want to be educated about a subject by people you think don’t know what the subject means, pray tell?

Let the OP have his dose of validation thinking he did a good thing (he keeps repeating over and over how amazing of a thing it is that he made this thread so that single handedly this will let the devs and a ton of other people know… something) and move on. No use discussing anything with someone that is just looking to prove you wrong, not actually trying to understand anything outside himself.

[HikariKurosawa]

People need to let this thread die already. It’s obvious from the very first post that OP isn’t interested in “clarifying” or understanding, or even debating anything. Hence why he said “educate me on homogenization” while at the same time saying “I don’t think you know what it means”. Now why would you want to be educated about a subject by people you think don’t know what the subject means, pray tell?

Let the OP have his dose of validation thinking he did a good thing (he keeps repeating over and over how amazing of a thing it is that he made this thread so that single handedly this will let the devs and a ton of other people know… something) and move on. No use discussing anything with someone that is just looking to prove you wrong, not actually trying to understand anything outside himself.

I agree, this thread has served its purpose and yes, it did serve it well.

I never was looking to argue or debate anything. I wanted to hear the perspective clarified, and I did. It's to understand where people are coming from and have it out there for everyone to read.

Don't be upset that after understanding where you're coming from that I think your opinion is bad and invalid. At least I know where you're coming from when I didn't before.

[Wayfinder3]

Hikari was just here to argue, thats it

[Carighan]

I never was looking to argue or debate anything.

Thread was flamebaiting, got it. TY for confirming. Block it is.

[HikariKurosawa]

Thread was flamebaiting, got it. TY for confirming. Block it is.

I mean I couldn't care less about what you think. I made the thread for the reason I have been saying over and over: I didn't understand where the job homogenization angle was coming from since the jobs in this game are all wildly different, and I wanted clarity.

Every post you make is dog tier and I've never taken you seriously or respected your positions in or out of this thread, so good for you?

Fact is, 2 minute meta =/= problematic or even homogenization. It's just how balance works. You are out of touch with what is good for the game, so go ahead and block me little person.

[Mikey_R]

I mean I couldn't care less about what you think. I made the thread for the reason I have been saying over and over: I didn't understand where the job homogenization angle was coming from since the jobs in this game are all wildly different, and I wanted clarity.

...

Fact is, 2 minute meta =/= problematic or even homogenization. It's just how balance works. You are out of touch with what is good for the game, so go ahead and block me little person.

Whilst I agree with the first point, jobs do play differently, the thing people have an issue with is the fact they all follow the strict 2 minute meta, with the vast majority of jobs also having a smaller burst every odd minute.

However, this does not mean that it is the only way to balance jobs. In a 100% uptime fight, you can balance between a sustained DPS and a more burst centric DPS. The absolute easiest way to do this is to get rid of all raid damage cooldowns, essentially making all jobs selfish. Whilst this allows for all damage profiles to be viable, not everyone wants to have that, they want to feel they are contributing to the team in another way. This is why if you allow raid buffs, having them up 100% of the time is a good solution, as it doesn't favour one particular time for burst damage at all.

Another alternative is to weaken the raid buffs and make them line up less. In the past, all buffs only lined up every 6 minutes, mainly down to the 90 seconds and 180 seconds buffs that some jobs had. With fewer buff windows and them being weaker, you reduce the impact they have on the job's overall damage.

So, whilst you might not see the 2 minute meta as an issue, to many, it is and there are ways around it.

[HikariKurosawa]

Whilst I agree with the first point, jobs do play differently, the thing people have an issue with is the fact they all follow the strict 2 minute meta, with the vast majority of jobs also having a smaller burst every odd minute.

However, this does not mean that it is the only way to balance jobs. In a 100% uptime fight, you can balance between a sustained DPS and a more burst centric DPS. The absolute easiest way to do this is to get rid of all raid damage cooldowns, essentially making all jobs selfish. Whilst this allows for all damage profiles to be viable, not everyone wants to have that, they want to feel they are contributing to the team in another way. This is why if you allow raid buffs, having them up 100% of the time is a good solution, as it doesn't favour one particular time for burst damage at all.

Another alternative is to weaken the raid buffs and make them line up less. In the past, all buffs only lined up every 6 minutes, mainly down to the 90 seconds and 180 seconds buffs that some jobs had. With fewer buff windows and them being weaker, you reduce the impact they have on the job's overall damage.

So, whilst you might not see the 2 minute meta as an issue, to many, it is and there are ways around it.

There is almost nothing that would hurt the expression of skill and make this game more stale than removing raid buffs. The difference between groups that consistently line everything up and groups that do not is huge. Removing team play from an mmo is a really bad idea, just like the idea of making jobs without burst moments.

Since raid buffs are necessary to add real depth of optimization to the game, burst will always be prioritized over sustain. There is nothing unique or interesting about adding burst to odd cooldown timings. The whole idea of removing 2 minute burst timings must be rooted in people wanting to play with no regard for synchronizing with their team. Some people just want to do their own thing, but why play an mmo then?

[Exmo]

Thread was flamebaiting, got it. TY for confirming. Block it is.

Why do so many people in this forum do this - take something completely out of context and deliberately misinterpret it. Do people even know they're acting in bad faith or is it subconscious by this point?