Skill based fights..

[NefGP]

Well, let's compare it directly to XI since that was their previous, highly successful MMO.

In XI skill meant:

- Knowing what special attacks the enemy can use and being able to react accordingly, as they were generally done at random instead of a fixed rotation like in ARR
- Memorizing skillchains, magic bursts, and weaknesses/resistances to not just the 8 elements but enfeebling effects as well
- Having situational gear to maximize performance or adapt to a crisis situation, such as swapping out for an evasion set or -% damage taken gear.
- Having all applicable sub jobs at your disposal, for example Dark Knight for access to Stun on a Red Mage or Ninja for shadows.
- Some fights (mostly the CoP story fights) required advanced preparation generally involving farming special items to make the fight easier, like CCB Polymers for Omega Weapon.

More than anything though it came down simply knowing your role and being able to adapt to whatever gets thrown at you. There's really not a whole of that in ARR, it's largely just each player doing their own thing and only really paying attention to their rotations and AoE. A few fights now involve Tanks swapping hate vs certain mobs (Ultima HM, Garuda EX etc.) but otherwise the rule of thumb still applies. Limit Breaks honestly don't count either, and would be far more interesting if the LB effect actually changed with each individual job, for example DRG could have increased WS damage or TP regen for the party while MNK grants a large skill speed bonus, and BRD gives critical hit rate up instead of the stupid shared healing LB.


I honestly don't like that every fight is 100% scripted as it makes it dull and uninteresting over the long run. What if Titan were to skip doing a landslide or Tumult and fire off a second Mountain Buster after the 1st one? How many tanks do you know would be able to handle that? The RNG isn't always (though in most cases it is) a bad thing. A little randomness in the content, done right, keeps things interesting and helps weed out the truly good players from the bad.

Whereas Vana'diel felt like a world full of danger and wonder, Hydaelyn feels like a world on rails...