Job feedback [pre-8.0 megathread]

[Rithy255]

Genuine question, what makes you see current paladin as warrior-like?

I only level PLD and WAR casually (and I haven't max level PLD now) so I don't really understand it. Requiescat combo so far feels the same like EW PLD to me.

Old paladin had a very rigid DOT timer based rotation, it was complex and there was actual variations on how to play it, it wasn't mind boggling hard to play at a decent level (I can attest to that as a mediocre player, but the job had skill expression). Pre 6.3 Paladin had multiple rotations, different openers ways to maximise damage and people may say "well i don't like that it's too difficult" but why can't Paladin have something different over other tanks?

All tanks follow the same basic formular of 1, 2, 3 and press burst theirs no real shake up in gcd expression in how they feel, Atonement & divine might aren't interesting filler when theirs nothing of substance to keep track of.

Current paladin is too basic streamlined and safe, it's funny how little room for error this job has now, Paladin is like warrior for the simple fact that all tanks are functionally the same job their filler rotation is builder spender, they have a 60s burst (some even have a super burst at 120s how wacky and creative), PLD used to be the DOT job, the job with two combo finishers (warrior does but warriors is a lot less rigid and doesn't really punish you much).

All tanks should get actual rotations instead of bloated defensive upgrades, tanks should be more about protecting the party and group instead of just invincible slow dps, they really need to improve tank design keeping paladin as it is, is just more doubling down on how much SE neglects Support roles in general in favour of new flashy dps which at this point i feel like they're running out of ideas or just ruining dps slowly what they've already done to tanks and healer.

[CaptainLagbeard]

Healers

-Increase the potency of their main attack spell.

-WHM, add in more ways to get to Afflatus Misery rather than wastingspending Lilies.

-SCH, replace Seraphism with something that thematically fits SCH, and boost the potency of Energy Drain.

-AST, rework the cards to have them all be useful. 10% more overhaling isn't good.



Also, remove the majority of healing from Tanks.

[Kozh]

Old paladin had a very rigid DOT timer based rotation, it was complex and there was actual variations on how to play it, it wasn't mind boggling hard to play at a decent level...

Ohhh, okay I see now. Thanks for the explanation. Now I remember my PLD friend did mention something about rigid rotation (and also you can spreadsheet it?? Not sure I remember correctly) back then.

Idk why CBU3 seems to be allergic to DOTs job. This is like old SMN situation again.

[MetaBoi]

While I agree with old Paladin, new Paladin feels like Gunbreaker more than Warrior or Dark Knight for me.
Atonement -> Gnashing Fang
Holy Spirit -> Burst Strike
Confiteor -> Double Down
Blade Combo -> Lionheart Combo

[Kisshu]

Gap closers.
DRK, DRG and GNB get their old gap closers back. All gap closers switch to a new "fixed potency" system. A "fixed potency" means that any damage increase / taken is ignored, so a 100 fixed potency will do the same damage in and out of burst.
Why: The reason to change the gap closers was because those jobs were to busy during the burst phase, as people would use all cooldowns there. This new system means that you can use the gap closer as you want without being forced to use it in burst. And the old gap closers were also much cooler in animation instead of these glides.

Overcharge.
Certain cooldowns that are used in rotation will have an overcharge mechanic. So if a 1 min cooldown is not used when ready, it will charge over for x seconds. Then when it's used these overcharged seconds will count for the cooldown. Not on abilities with stack counts.
Example: Fight or Flight gets off cooldown, over charges by 5 seconds, PLD uses FoF, cooldown is now 55 seconds.
So for a WAR they would have overcharge on Upheaval and Inner Release, but not Infuriate or Onslaught.
Why: Makes it easier for a player to not misalign themselves if they happen to not press a cooldown in time. For more experienced players, this will not have any effect on them.

[Connor]

Bard:
- Remove cool-downs on songs but give them cast timers (1.5). Just make it so each song can’t be cast twice consecutively to stop 100% Minuer uptime. Maybe give them prohibitive MP costs that are reduced after completing a song

- Let us use MP again. Add MP restoration to using repertoire procs, or maybe even turn Paeon into a dedicated ‘mp return’ song if they want it to keep being the ‘maintenance’ song.

- Empyreal charges would help

- Battle Voice. It’s just…there? Having played Bard since 1.0 I’d hate to see something that’s been part of the kit for so long just go, but at the same time it barely has any reason to exist as an individual skill anymore. Maybe they could put the direct hit rate increase somewhere else and let Battle Voice interact with songs again? Idk lol

- Paeon still kinda sucks. I don’t like a song whose entire purpose is not to be sung for the full duration; why even give it a full duration? Switching songs should be a decision the player actively makes and not ‘welp conveyor belt says it time for the boring one’ lol. Maybe it could change Burst Shot into ‘Burstier Shot’ (lol) which has a walking cast (can’t remember the PvP skill name). Best of both worlds? People who enjoy that kinda style could experience it in PvE but those who don’t could minimise time singing it? In an ideal world

- Minne and Warden’s Paean are functionally redundant - nobody needs an extra 10% heal outside of making meme shields, and Esuna simply does not show up in enough content to warrant giving Bard a support Esuna ( on a goddamn 45 second cool-down lol ). I think it’d be cool if they became actual spells with MP costs, like 1000/2000 for Minne and 500-1000 for Warden’s. Since Bards can’t restore MP naturally 100% uptime would be impossible (and entirely useless anyway). If they did as above and retooled Bard to use it’d MP, the simple fact that repeated use would cause dps loss would be balance enough I’d say. Like, if the effect is gonna be pointless at least let us use it when we want. And I’m honestly so bloody sick of everything support-related being a cool-downs. Alternatively give them additional effects, maybe based on song. Like Minne could restore MP during Ballad, HP during Paeon and an Improvisation-style mini shield during Minuet.

- I want my Foe Requiem back . No, I don’t care that it’s useless/unnecessary/impossible to balance/ w/e/requires an mp system that barely exists anymore/ give it back Yoshiiii *flailing arms like a baby*. And I swear in my life if it comes back as instant 120s cool-down I will- *is carried off by Moogles*

- More Radiant Encore , maybe one after each song with increasing potency for each seal, resetting after max with 3 seals. Though that would require decoupling with Radiant Finale too since it would reset seals and Encore would permanently be at minimum potency lol.

- Troubadour needs to be made distinct from the other phys ranged (and likewise for them). There’s absolutely no reason why they need to be literally identical skills. For Bard maybe it could go back to the original version with different defensive effects based on current song? Maybe HP Regen for Paeon, HP shield for Ballad and movement speed increase for Minuet?

- Some new ability ideas:
> An Iron Jaws ‘spellcaster in trench coat’ type weaponskill that applies an AoE DoT. When used, it grants a proc that makes the next Iron Jaws spread -bite (not you, Ladonsbite) DoTs to all nearby enemies. Maybe a bit convoluted over just making the AoE DoT also spread them I guess.
> HP Regen song (lower mp cost), MP regen song (higher mp cost), to complement Foe Requiem for when defensive/recovery stuff isn’t needed (purely in theory lol.)
> Final Fantasia, the PvP LB, would be amazing as a really strong cool-down; I’d even accept 120-180s (or more?). Maybe like Hero’s Rime or something instead. Though maybe it’s a bit much for a normal ability lol. Maybe it could increase ‘everything’ by like 1-2%, i.e all substats, or simultaneously boosting damage, healing taken/given, reducing damage taken and increasing crit rate. I just think it’d be cool if Bard was mostly managing its own support effects while still having something ‘bankable’ for whatever burst meta would emerge in a post-120s-meta world lol.

That’s all for now thank you for coming to my Bard talk. May also do one for Scholar

[Zairava]

Going to put my own input in here regarding tanks as well.

General thoughts

Please, Please stop with the combo every 60 seconds on every tank job and the only reason this semi gets spared from Gunbreaker is because it's every 2 minutes with Lionheart and every 30 seconds with Gnashing Fang.

I'm tired of BIG BOOM every minute or two with nothing but boring tedium in between. I'm sure you can design something else. If there is no substance to the kits they rapidly get stale even after months away from the game.

It's like when you settled on Warrior (and to an extend Paladin) in Stormblood that was just all you cared to implement into the tank jobs. "Just give them all their own version of an Inner Release window". I don't care if it's easier to balance. It's horrendously unfun and tiresome after years of it now.

At least in Stormblood there was other stuff to keep you engaged and immersed with your tank job with stances. Moreso if abilities required being in a certain stance.

You have gauges that you can use as an oyster, you don't have to keep them as boring as you do.

CC was more prominent (which isn't a high bar considering we barely if ever need or use them) and so was CC resist/cleanse abilities.

DRK

I've already made many posts regarding this job (probably too many) but lets go for another. Now's a better time than ever.

How did we go from HW/SB to this absolute dumpster fire? Probably the first or second most mechanically involved tank within the role, job to this boring and uninspired mess?

We burst and then we spam our 1-2-3 until our eyes roll out of their sockets or until we fall asleep.

We had Dark Arts (which was replaced by, who would've guessed, a boring damage ogcd). This boring damage ogcd, mind, which was supposed to alleviate the high apm, didn't actually alleviate the high apm because it functionally just replaced your casts of Dark Arts. Before there was some intrinsic value because you were actively managing your mp, now you just try not to go below 3k for The Blackest Night. Invigorating.

On the top of managing mp, Darkside, amongst most other things regarding this job since Shadowbringers launch, was also handled poorly. You never even need to think about it and yet it has a gauge that displays it's timer. It sustains itself rotationally. Boring damage button that replaced DA is what grants this (somehow). So boring which leads to "??? oh yeah Darkside exists"

MP management is virtually non-existent when the only thing there is is just making sure you will have mp for tbn (3k). It is the absolute most bottom barrel requirement of mp management and doesn't serve to actually fulfill that purpose meaningfully.

Another point I don't see anyone bring up is how awkward starting combat is as DRK because we don't actually have a non-offensive or solo tank mp spender to use while we're initiating combat. If you're solo tanking you just have to awkwardly use Edge of Shadow I guess? It feels weird and out of place and makes initiating combat feel off every time. There is no guarantee you will get your TBN shield to break if you use it before your opener because of how strict you make every boss encounter intro sequence, especially since TBN gets stronger the higher our item level is.

You removed honestly everything that made the job enjoyable to play on a play-to-play basis. Right now my saving graces is the apm while bursting and combining Edge of Shadow with the final strike of Torcleaver does things to my chimp brain.

So, what can be done?

In a general sense...

I'll ruffle some feathers at even mentioning aggro management so just listen before you start mashing the keyboard.

Just bake in the enmity generation and make the management strictly on the tanks. Give us an ability that reduces or negates threat generation for large-scale content like alliance raids and field zones and we have shirk for normal raids and trials already. Or just bake the effect for both cases into shirk, that way there's less button bloat.

What that does is open up the stances to be more creative than just "turn on enmity stance, everything hates you now". It permits to have more ability interactions with both dps and defensive stances. No, this doesn't mean make defensive stance reduce damage dealt. It simply means you swap to it when the situation demands it. We are the tank, after all. Just a random spitball, maybe every defensive ability is more potent under say, Grit, including Dark Missionary, Shadow Wall/Shadowed Vigil, etc. And under Darkside it opens up more offensive options.

Hell this even opens up the possibility of having two separate dps stances. The creative possibilities have a WIDE door to flow there. (Personally, I like this idea more.) You can merge them into one button, just make Darkside replace Grit if Grit is active and vice versa.

Regarding Dark Knight in particular.

>Bring back active mp management. (this is a BIG ONE) You could potentially revamp Blood Price if you don't want it to strictly stay a MT tool. Obligatory "give me back Dark Arts" here.

>Do something else with the Blood Gauge that doesn't make it just a copy paste of Warrior's beast gauge. In Stormblood Delirium costed 50 and it gave us MP in return, this is just an example. Not only did Blood Gauge have a bigger purpose than a Bloodspiller/Quietus dump, it served to forward MP management.

>As a "feels good to press", in my opinion. Bring back Power Slash and Scourge.

>This is also more of my own opinion, but you could cut one of our current defensives in place of having access to Sole Survivor. Revamp it to be more consistent in HP and MP returns if you will, even if it requires renaming. Maybe it can siphon HP and MP from the enemy.

>Regarding my above stated with stances. Make Darkside AND grit actually relevant mechanically (wink wink, nudge nudge. MP and Blood Gauge are right there). I wouldn't want Grit just erased because enmity gets baked in.

>Not that I expect it to return, but give us back our haste with Blood Weapon too. Speed DRK was fun lol

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

Ohhh, okay I see now. Thanks for the explanation. Now I remember my PLD friend did mention something about rigid rotation (and also you can spreadsheet it?? Not sure I remember correctly) back then.

Idk why CBU3 seems to be allergic to DOTs job. This is like old SMN situation again.

Along with ShB SMN, PLD was also the 'spreadsheeter'-the job that people often meme'd back then. The damage graph for PLD back then would look flatter when compared to its burst sibling like say... WAR. But this 'uniqueness' made them a victim to another wave of homogenization back in 6.3 because to SE's logic, it meant that they couldn't take advantage of buff-heavy windows like other tanks did and we couldn't have that.

[seolhyun]

delete 2 min raid buffs

[Aviatorhead]

I want healing to actually matter and for healers to be a fun role to play again. They are very flat and held back by the tank role's overabundance of healing/mit currently, among other things.