BLM Changes Are Fantastic. The timers were so annoying. Thanks FFXIV team ! :)

[Taranok]

Not to mention PCT feels so shit cause using your hammer at all is a dps loss after that "amazing update". When I was told that I basically dropped PCT asap.
I liked the hammer...

It's worth using now, but PCT is a half-baked class of 3 quarter-baked class ideas slapped together and then praying it all works. There's a reason a major UI element is completely ignored by most PCTs, and it's not because the class is well designed.

They need to better integrate paintings with the rest of the class, holy in white needs to be worth casting.. Oh, and it should probably be more of a caster than it is now. But that's a general complaint worth levying to every caster except red mage.

Honestly, seeing the numbers of PCTs in EX5 is distressing, the class is basically abandoned on the fight, and a new class shouldn't be made to feel unwelcome in any content because the devs don't understand how to make good content anymore.

[Supersnow845]

Holy in white doesn’t necessarily have to be more than an emergency movement tool. PCT’s awful playrate in EX5 relates to how it’s too rigid with its gaylines but that’s more fight specific

I’d say PCT is still the best post SB class from a design perspective it’s real downside is simply the fact that square just hates casters these days outside of making casters pseudo physical ranged they calling them casters

[Valence]

To be fair, everybody is a pseudo physical ranged those days, the only thing keeping them from being called full physical ranged being the damage output.

[Carighan]

Holy in white doesn’t necessarily have to be more than an emergency movement tool.

Yeah that's in fact smart design, movement tools that are a net DPS gain are in fact the bad design as that means you won't have them available for movement. This can be done intentionally, but only in very small measures, like if you have 10 DPS classes that work one way, and one inverts it and can only move at specific moments as it has to use its one movement tool rotationally every 8 seconds or so, so it's immobile except for a brief moment just about exactly every 8 seconds or so. Wouldn't work in FFXIV, but that's how you'd do it.

It's a bigger problem how way to many other jobs like RDM or BLM use their supposed movement tools nilly-willy as they gain them damage. Or like how tanks use gapclosers for damage. It's part of why fights can never expect these tools to be used for mechanics, which in turn lessens fight design.

[RedLolly]

Yeah that's in fact smart design, movement tools that are a net DPS gain are in fact the bad design as that means you won't have them available for movement. This can be done intentionally, but only in very small measures, like if you have 10 DPS classes that work one way, and one inverts it and can only move at specific moments as it has to use its one movement tool rotationally every 8 seconds or so, so it's immobile except for a brief moment just about exactly every 8 seconds or so. Wouldn't work in FFXIV, but that's how you'd do it.

It's a bigger problem how way to many other jobs like RDM or BLM use their supposed movement tools nilly-willy as they gain them damage. Or like how tanks use gapclosers for damage. It's part of why fights can never expect these tools to be used for mechanics, which in turn lessens fight design.

Then devs should just force a player's hands. Force us to ration skills. That's already a thing with LBs, as some fights force tank LB.

[CidHeiral]

Personally, the timers were a nuisance more than anything. It didn't add to job identity or complexity, it was just annoying, and clunky.

When people describe a job as "clunky" what they're actually saying is "I got filtered."

Since the BLM changes went live all the threads I've seen on the subject across social media (threads with hundreds upon hundreds of posts) have been overwhelmingly negative. The only people who seem to like the changes are the usual crowd that cheer every time a job gets lobotomized.

I used to love dabbling in BLM and now it's about as exciting as watching paint dry.

[Turtledeluxe]

I am not a job design expert but imo the job feels very much on rails now vs how it felt before, and I do not enjoy it. They did fix the issue with Flare Star potency though, which is nice.

I can see being a fan of new BLM if you enjoy routine, old BLM was better if you wanted to do your own thing and possibly even get more damage while doing it.

This is why I have no faith in 8.0 redesign. Because if the goal is to standardize every job so everyone likes it, then how is it supposed to feel unique, or allow for skill expression??

[Carighan]

When people describe a job as "clunky" what they're actually saying is "I got filtered."

You don't have to project, you know? :P

And if we go by the few times devs have talked about this, then listening to the vocal part of your MMO playerbase (as in: social media etc) is actually really dangerous, as it heavily skews. It's a tiny tiny percentage, and at the same time people need to be angry to speak up, so you naturally get the ones who don't like something, and it's a minority. But now you got no clue what the rest thinks! If say, 4% are angry and vocal about it and 1% are happy and vocal about it, what does this mean? That 96% like it? (and hence are quietly playing) That the entire playerbase is split 80% dislike : 1% like? That only 1% of players like it, everyone else is unhappy? You cannot know. You got stats that you need to form the base opinion on, you can then take exemplars of the "I disliked this, I stopped/quit/dropped XYZ" via the social media. But that only works for the unhappy ones.
Now say your stats show that 60% of existing BLM players dropped the job, but overall there are now 400% as many BLMs as before. You know that the 60% of the original population that quit are angry because say, you removed the timers and simplified the job. But they're only ~1/7th of the current playerbase, and for ~5/7th you know they only picked it up after those changes. Do you make those quit again (the overwhelming majority) by undoing the changes? Maybe. Maybe not.

[Turtledeluxe]

Yeah but let's assume 1/7 total players across all jobs are unsubbing or have unsubbed since every job has essentially been reworked at this point. Your total job participation is down, even though you might have 400% more "local" participation across all those jobs from people who are still subbed but playing multiple or all jobs.

The 1/7 figure is generous. Is it worth nuking the player base is what we should be asking.

[CidHeiral]

You don't have to project, you know? :P

Huh?

And if we go by the few times devs have talked about this, then listening to the vocal part of your MMO playerbase (as in: social media etc) is actually really dangerous, as it heavily skews. It's a tiny tiny percentage, and at the same time people need to be angry to speak up, so you naturally get the ones who don't like something, and it's a minority. But now you got no clue what the rest thinks! If say, 4% are angry and vocal about it and 1% are happy and vocal about it, what does this mean? That 96% like it? (and hence are quietly playing) That the entire playerbase is split 80% dislike : 1% like? That only 1% of players like it, everyone else is unhappy? You cannot know. You got stats that you need to form the base opinion on, you can then take exemplars of the "I disliked this, I stopped/quit/dropped XYZ" via the social media. But that only works for the unhappy ones.

It is reasonable to extrapolate general sentiment from trends across various sources and thousands of people even if that doesn't give you an exact breakdown of every single person's individual opinion. IRL polling does much the same thing.

Now say your stats show that 60% of existing BLM players dropped the job, but overall there are now 400% as many BLMs as before. You know that the 60% of the original population that quit are angry because say, you removed the timers and simplified the job. But they're only ~1/7th of the current playerbase, and for ~5/7th you know they only picked it up after those changes. Do you make those quit again (the overwhelming majority) by undoing the changes? Maybe. Maybe not.

Your 60% vs 400% example would be a net negative in subscribers. It's one group of people quitting the game entirely because there's nothing left for them vs another group of people just shuffling around from one simple job to another.

To think about it another way, suppose SE decided to rework Hrothgar entirely and replace them with another "cute" race like Miqo'te, Au Ra, etc. The cute races are extremely popular and this new version would almost certainly be way more popular than current Hrothgar, but the massive increase in player count would largely just be fans of the current cute options trying this new option as well. Meanwhile people who liked playing a beast race would have nowhere to go so they would quit the game en masse. Though it may appear at first glance that you've added an incredibly popular feature, in reality you've lost more than you've gained.