Why do people care about potency so much?

[Amh_Wilzuun]

Current MCH is an insult to older players that used to enjoy it. Alongside DRK, they're the watered down precursors to SMN and BLM.

I did not play MCH back then so I can only judge it as it now in a vacuum. And as it is now is a job I really like to play especially in the current environment of jobs. I don’t think all reworks have been bad. I know there were some hold outs but EW MNK was pretty beloved actually

I do also know that MCH was considered to be extremely unpopular and often in dire straits in periods stormblood and HW so take that as you will. Doesn’t seem like it was well liked back then

[Mistress_Irika]

I need to get into raiding. From the outside, I don't exactly see how potency matters if the only things that everyone cares about are having efficient gear/buffs, doing your mechanics, and doing your burst at a set time to near perfection. I could have sworn that every class has that ability to clear...or is it like ranked pvp where people are only playing classes that does the highest damage in the quickest amount of time.

[ForteNightshade]

I think people are conditioned to care about balance due to how much it actually matters in other games like Marvel Rivals or LOL and takw that mindset into XIV even though you can clear all content with any job choice

Or because we have a website that specifically showcases the damage spread and profile of each job. Once you know MCH is pitifully underperforming relative to its counterparts, it's hard to simply ignore that. This is why, for example, Prange players on the whole hate how irrelevant their jobs feel because no matter how good a player they are, their existence is solely attributed to an arbitrary 1%.

Even though every job is, technically, viable. People don't like feeling underpowered. It's especially noticeable when you can push a phase or skip mechanics outright with a better comp. Look no further than FRU. Did you need Picto to clear? No. But not having one met a death in Shiva became significantly harder to overcome. More so if you also had Viper or Reaper who are severely hindered in the earlier phases. In other words, the extra DPS of Picto provides insurance. Which is why people care.

It's also simple frustration boiling over because Machinist players have been suffering for the better part of six years now. SE's handling of the job has been downright abysmal. There's no excuse after half a decade they still can't figure out how to make it not get curbed by Dancer or Bard.

[Rolder50]

In other MMOs you would have things like utility or different boss encounters favoring different classes and such.

In XIV, the literal only thing that matters is single target damage. So naturally people will focus on that.

[Doopliss]

Honestly I agree with OP in the grand scheme of things. Although lots of people bring up good points here, the average player is also abysmal with understanding balance that actually matters. Nobody mentions it because I guess the majority of the current playerbase wasn't actually there now and treat old expansions as some sort of boogeyman, but there were no jobs that were actually "unplayable" in HW or SB.

There were jobs that offered worse overall parses for scoreboards, lol, but could still clear endgame fights easily so long as you knew how to actually play the job. It's just that, unlike today, each separate job required learning different fundamentals, and people would rather point at numbers that barely matter than admit a skill issue.

A part of the reason healers are so braindead did start with the stupid, exaggerated claims about WHM being unplayable in HW because it didn't have a busted output like AST or SCH, so they kept sanding the other healers down until they all felt like a neutered WHM. With these type of players it never registered in their mind that WHM was a considerably easier job to heal with and probably shouldn't offer as much reward as the other two (I do agree that AST's 20% Balance was hilariously busted though, but that also came from a deluge of--again--middling-tiered raiders constantly complaining about the rng job having rng).

The constant potency increases we get in newer expansions suck, anyway, and to be honest I wish more jobs were brought down instead. Unless you think it's just fun not seeing most of the mechanics of a newly released 24 man. Really love current content feeling like Crystal Tower. This is certainly healthy for the overall state of the game.

[Jeeqbit]

The answer is because they are used to it from other games, and they are needlessly competitive (a common masculine trait). Perhaps being a competitive person serves them well in some cases, but it results in nonsense like this as well - being competitive for the sake of it.

I know some will claim jobs get locked of PF but I don’t think think that is an actual thing at all from my experience.

You're right, it's rarely ever been a thing in this game for an "average PF" to lock jobs out. Even back when we had damage vulns that made you want certain combinations of job, I never saw an "average PF" lock it. I wasn't even locked out of parties in Heavensward as a PLD (iykyk).

I did see complaints of it for P8S so it was probably the case for that since certain jobs had genuinely been given a stigma over what happened with it. And Endwalker did tighten the checks by scaling with buff alignment in mind, making selfish comps potentially a risk.

lock out jobs is because of the aforementioned discourse perpetuating the myth that “meta” jobs actually matter.

I mean you're right, it's all in their head. It's an easy game, as people like to say. There are good players that would get the most sub-optimal party comp and clear with it, just to prove it's possible for memes, but the people who care about metas will continue to do so, because they love to maximize damage and efficiency far beyond what even matters.

People seem to discuss fell cleave gaining 100 potency way more than actual changes to gameplay or skill ceilings.

You're also correct that amongst all the noise over "this job does more damage", there are lots of players that ignore all that discussion and just continue playing their favorite job - and clearing with it.

I’m just worried with all of the waffling about potency and what’s “meta” that the devs will get the wrong idea and hit MCH with the lobotomy beam.

MCH was already hit with that beam in ShB - it's very easy to play. But you're right, MCH is in a great spot and has been for a long time. It feels like a pew pew job like it should.

But many give it this poor reputation purely on the basis of its DPS output compared to other jobs/DPS roles.

[TakoyakiLala]

Only thing I want is for my jobs to feel good when I play them and not put me to sleep. It's the main reason why I play Black Mage, because out of all the DPS it keeps me mentally engaged the most.

As for potency, I just want Black Mage to be the highest hitting magic DPS and Machinst to be the highest physical ranged DPS.

*Throws spaghetti-O at the wall and runs away*

[Voryn]

I meant people who try and CLEAR a whole tier in one week, not just people progging week 1. People who actually get those first or second lockout full clears are an insanely small minority of players.

I’m not sure how your reasoning works. Balancing only sometimes matters, but that does mean that for some people it matters a lot. If you look in any savage recruitment discord in the months leading up to savage release you’ll see a lot of people aiming to do it all on week 1. And before an ultimate release many people are aiming to clear the ultimate on patch. I cleared light heavyweight savage on week 1 (although the balancing didn’t matter in it since its dps checks were easier than normal, lol), and I have many friends who cleared recent savage tiers on week 1 and cleared recent ultimates on patch.

When balancing is bad, there are people who don’t want to burden their statics and will instead switch over to playing the stronger job in their role. There are people in PF who will not allow the weaker jobs to join because they don’t trust strangers to press their buttons properly. And yes, there’s the unreasonable people who aren’t playing in the contexts where balancing matters but will complain anyway as they parrot other opinions they’ve heard. I’ve met a fair amount of those people. But that doesn’t diminish the problems when the balancing does matter.

[Amh_Wilzuun]

Snip.

I appreciate the good perspective on this and your willingness to engage with my point fellow WOL o7

[RedLolly]

FFXIV is multiplayer. Most try to be a team player and try to not suck. Picking jobs that are considered the strongest/easiest end up being the most appealing for that reason. Also, being "good" in FFXIV makes the grind go faster.

That's why meta always forms and why certain jobs rise up even if the game is designed for all job combinations to be able to complete everything.

Obviously we've all met a "you don't pay my sub" type, but I can count those instances on one hand verses the thousands of normal players that I've also encountered, and it's human nature to remember bad experiences as a means to protect ourselves.

Basically, it just kind of feels like a jerk move to ignore the fact some jobs are objectively superior to others depending on the situation.