Just Nerf Picto

[Altera]

Given how quickly they changed VPR and the fact that they "buffed" the other dps "to meet" PCT, I think it's safe to say that PCT is absolutely intended to outshine all the other casters.

Sadly yeah. They've made sure they've buffed it beyond normal to make sure people choose it given they were probably afraid the noises and overall aesthetics wouldn't appeal to many players. To me I absolutely hate the noise effects on spells and the effects. But the overpoweredness has made me go from being ok with it, to hating the job.

I've always hated overpowered classes/specs/jobs in any mmorpgs I've played. But in those games, the Devs were not afraid to nerf if. I chose Unholy DK at work launch and saw it was OP, but the Devs nerfed it very quickly xD

[Lyth]

The dev team is incredibly wary of direct nerfs in general, and this has been going on for years now. The only time they'll dare do it is between expansions when players are unable to easily pick up on it.

The other issue is that they equate popularity with a successful job design. Bottom line is that you can make any job popular, no matter how poorly designed, simply by making it a mandatory pick. What they don't realize is that they ultimately drive players out of the game who want to play alternatives to that job. It's simply the wrong metric to assess job success. PCT's current design is detrimental to the game.

[Lilapop]

Oh no. PCT is unbalanced for one niche fight! FRU! Lets gut the class instead of change the Ultimate or just accept BLM isn't top dog!!

[HyperiusUltima]

The dev team is incredibly wary of direct nerfs in general, and this has been going on for years now. The only time they'll dare do it is between expansions when players are unable to easily pick up on it.

The other issue is that they equate popularity with a successful job design. Bottom line is that you can make any job popular, no matter how poorly designed, simply by making it a mandatory pick. What they don't realize is that they ultimately drive players out of the game who want to play alternatives to that job. It's simply the wrong metric to assess job success. PCT's current design is detrimental to the game.

I don't think it's necessarily PCT's current design, because you're conflating Job Design with Damage Metrics here, Lyth.

Just to play devil's advocate, PCT's Job Design is actually one of the best we've had in a while; do I agree it should have a little bit of everything? No. Should it be taxed for those things? 100% Yes.

As we've seen in the interview, they didn't want to make PCT look bad in raids. We already gave them a lot of feedback saying that PCT is broken in End-Game Content back before Arcadion even released in NORMAL MODE! The problem is not the Job Design, but the numbers that create this black hole. This shows more that PCT is heavily overtuned for all fights, rather than the job being overpowered in terms of job design on its own. This, again, points the finger at the Devs when they admitted that they undertuned Light-Heavyweight without considering how PCT may overperform.

They have ONE Major Patch to turn Dawntrail around before Casters become dead in the water in favor of OOPS! All PCT! groups that replace their Ranged for doubling up on a job. This was prevalent back during E4S when Ranged were underperforming by a whole 2-3% compared to the likes of BLM, which was a powerhouse in high-end when played at Max.

It also does not help that this community as a whole seeks the high-end trends that influencers and WF Raiders set without considering player skill.

[Nadda]

Why Nerf Picto? Why not Buff everyone else?

I got no horse in this race and iffin yer really sweating the difference you can always just play Pictomancer yourself.

This is one of the first times one job was significantly better than all the others but it's very similar to and reminds me of the conversations people had about the strength of Warrior or for a time strength of Summoner.

Is it really that big of a deal? You can play all jobs on one character. Luckily Picto requires almost no real time investment to get up and running because of its starting level... you could be using it right now if all you care about is the path of least resistance.

It's almost an irresistibly least resistible Job not to use it for that purpose.

If one Job is better and you're sweaty enough to push for the top you should go with the best choice.
If you really like your Job you should just play your Job no matter what people tell you

For all we know Pictomancer could be what the benchmark for future 8.0 jobs will be like. So it might just be better for the time being. That's why it's having an easier time in comparison outside of raw numbers.

If I was a sweaty gamer or even a mildly greasy one, I'd pick picto just so I could be better than everyone.

I really like Picto as it is it's fun to play and it's cute. So for me I play Picto just because I like how it looks. It's not my main I only have it at like 97 cuz I only play whitemage but I enjoy playing it when I do and I'd play it even if it was the worst cuz it feels fun. It's the first caster dps job that felt good to me. So I don't wanna see how it plays get ruined cuz it makes people envious.

My only thing is from a Final Fantasy Lore perspective - I'd say Black Mage should always be top caster DPS. Same as Samurai should always be top Melee DPS.

But even then, folk still play Ninja because they love the job. So in conclusion.

Love wins overall! >:0

[george357]

lmao one group trying to get job deleted and another trying to get it nerfed so many stupid people trying to destroy this new job.

[Lorika]

lmao one group trying to get job deleted and another trying to get it nerfed so many stupid people trying to destroy this new job.

except that Picto really need it's potency to be nerfed.

[Sequora]

All this does is show the way casters are treated vs melee. Caster has two distinct roles roles built in. As long as SMN/RDM has Rez and as long as Rez is used as a balancing tool, there’s always going to be an issue. Any caster that isn’t BLM should be dealing significantly less damage than any melee job. Right? FRU is a single fight, and honestly is more of the issue than the job. If you balance it around FRU, it’ll be weak in all other content. The only other option is to destroy its job identity, which would be tragic if they go that route. People hate PCT because it’s a perfectly designed job.

[Daralii]

Why Nerf Picto? Why not Buff everyone else?

They've done that at least twice so far. It resulted in DPS checks becoming very easy even for the day 1 bleeding edge raiders because the encounters weren't tuned around those potency buffs, and PCT is still ahead in the content where it matters most.

[FuturePastNow]

Why Nerf Picto? Why not Buff everyone else?

They can do that, but only up to a point. It exacerbates a couple other problems. First, increasing the potencies of various abilities can greatly upset the balance in lower level content, and while that content mostly "doesn't matter," it does impact the experience of new players when story trials just get obliterated before any mechanics happen. And there are old Ultimates.

The other problem is that they seemingly can't decide how they want to balance some roles vs. the others. RDM, SMN, and the Ranged jobs all pay a hefty DPS tax for their support abilities and I know players who favor those jobs are already unhappy with that. That will only get worse as SE isn't going to buff those jobs as much as their precious BLM and melees. They're also unlikely to buff tank damage- what happens when the DPS do 5x or 10x more damage than tanks? Will "Additional Effect: Increased Enmity" need to be added to every button a tank has?

Inadvertently making one slightly OP job and then buffing others to match it just creates a never ending cycle. It doesn't seem sustainable to me.