Do 1 hour abilities have a place in ARR?

[vax]

I'll like to see a 1 hour ability, and maybe something like this: "Damage and recast varies with TP ". An 1 hour ability that consume 1/2 of your current TP. More TP you have more damage and recast. With 1000 TP, it consumes 500 TP, doing full damage of the ability and a recast of 1 hour. With 500 TP, it consules 250, doing 1/2 of the damage and recast of 30 min.

[Hulan]

As much as I sort of like the idea of a tactical "uh-oh" button. From a game design perspective it's a huge miss-step. I remember SE commenting to the effect buried way back in the annals of FFXI official comments.

Any end-game content has to be designed under the assumption that every party member will have access to their 2-hour, as to do otherwise would trivialize the content with the use of 2-hours. But by balancing in that manner, you make all content have a unintentional mandatory 2-hour cool down. It can be worked around by artificially extending the length of the battle (longer battles reduce the relative effect of any single action). But it effectively tied SE's hands and forced them to do much more work per encounter than was necessary.

Before people jump on me saying that it wasn't that way at all. I was speaking about very early on in the game's life. SE "solved" the problem by slowly trivializing the 2-hours to the point where they were rarely worth the time it took to use them, which kind of defeated the purpose of them.

I think this Limit Break system is a much better approach to the same idea. They can balance battles around the assumption that eventually any given party will be able to shoot off a LB without the same temporal restrictions.

[Pseudopsia]

I prefer big abilities to have a short cooldown. I recall going constantly afk in FFXI waiting for our 2 hours to reset before we attempt a boss battle.

[HamHam]

I seem to have completely misunderstood the thread. I thought the OP meant a buff that lasts for one or two hours like in other games not a move that last one or two hours. Honestly I don't like that idea because what if you use that against a boss like the chimera to finish it off and the caster dced or someone in your party dced while waiting for the move to finish.... they would lose the loot from the chimera and possibly have to redo the dungeon if it was a part of a mission

It seems you didn't play FFXI... so, it's nothing like what you are imagining.

[Linkurrra]

I agree with Linkurrra epic 2 hr movies are acceptable I am quite partial to Gladiator with Russell Crowe. But even though a 2hr ability can fit into the scheme I don't think it should be the rule. As we all know from FFXI some 2hr abilities are quite lacking so instead of having them for every class they go case by case basis. Plus there are other limitations they can tag on instead of extended timer for very strong abilities. Like pre reqs where you must be at this % of HP or MP or the enemy is at % HP. There are also the extra payment for abilities such as along with TP you pay MP or HP but to go even further with statistical debuffs beyond just stances. All can be used for balancing purposes instead of just timers.

LOL I hope you guys didn't seriously think I was asking for 2hr long moves! I only meant the animations for a 1/2hr ability should last 1min or less. I was just trying to emphasis how they should make it be EPIC! lol

I believe you can consider our 1 hr, 2hr ability to be our limit breaks to be coming. You build them up and then release them for awesomeness - the longer build ups making higher tier awesome.

I believe it was a build up at least.. and some relation to parties (like in that one trailer everyone helped the BLM call down a meteor), though I dont know if it was said if you can or can't do one by your self.

I completely agree that 2hr ability options are pretty much just like Limitbreaks except they are without the time restriction. and maybe this is a better solution!

However, I still say that a good CS in combat that would involve the entire party would be interesting. Now I understand that I am comparing an MMO to a singleplayer FF game. However, it is part of Final Fantasy.

I also understand the concern that somebody might DC and not get the loot when the mob dies. but quite honestly there isn't even a solution for this in 1.0. If you DC you leave the instance and have to run back from the beginining. If everybody leaves the instance before the player gets back they just miss out on the loot! Especially on bind on pickup items that can't be shared by other party members. Although I think they did make a change to that where within a X amount of time you could trade the items within your party before bind on pickup was permanent. but only with party members.

The nature of instances, cause these problems and can't really be avoided. Except by don't get disconnected if you can help it.

With that out of the way, adding a CS on a Limit Break or 1 or 2hr ability won't really change looting from DC'ing, its going to happen either way. Why not have a movie to watch?

One other thing they could do is not initiate the CS unless it is the killing blow! That way you won't have to worry about sync issues if other players skip the CS. Or make the movies unskippable and just make it part of the ability!

[Kirito]

I'll like to see a 1 hour ability, and maybe something like this: "Damage and recast varies with TP ". An 1 hour ability that consume 1/2 of your current TP. More TP you have more damage and recast. With 1000 TP, it consumes 500 TP, doing full damage of the ability and a recast of 1 hour. With 500 TP, it consules 250, doing 1/2 of the damage and recast of 30 min.

I can see why you'd want that for 1.0 since you build up TP but in 2.0, from the looks of the videos, the TP starts at 1000 TP

[Ksenia]

The Strength of Man unlock from LotRO. It was a human racial that healed 2200 to 3000 morale and at 50, that was pretty much all of it. It was a reset skill, 1hr cool down. I would use it to solo rare world Signature spawns. Others could do that without their racial but my Captain wasn't suited for solo stuff and he needed that one off. The cool down was never an issue because it was a once a day thing to see them and that assumed you stayed in the same area the entire time and knew where they spawned.

I don't know if there is a place for stuff like that in FF14. Everything I encountered in FF14 was either I-Win or I-Lose and a one off wouldn't have been an influence.

[Aela]

These have existed since the first MMOs. (EQ1 had Lay of Hands [full heal] for Paladins.) Back in the day, they really were game changers, and could be used to "turn the tide" of battle.

I think they can (and should) exist any nearly any MMO. Specifically tuned to the mechanics of that game. In more recent games, a LOH (full heal) type of ability is just not as substantial compared to older MMOs (for example, the "Full Heal" of the Cleric in EQ1 was a big deal. In current MMOs a single healer can get a tank from nearly dead to full HPs in moments. Combat in MMOs have changed over time, and because of this "epic" abilities have changed as well.)

It doesn't mean the abilites have no place in the game, but it does mean they need to be tailored to the game directly in order to really make a difference.

[Sakasa]

LOL I hope you guys didn't seriously think I was asking for 2hr long moves! I only meant the animations for a 1/2hr ability should last 1min or less. I was just trying to emphasis how they should make it be EPIC! lol

Oh no I just really like Gladiator and like to plug it any chance i get

[SidRheingold]

I'd say why not?

That said, there's probably a balancing issue. To adress this would take a serious amount of time . . .