The Balance

[Suggestion]

A balance, a scale, the never ending, ever changing line of complaints, nerfs, and buffs. A line so thin and complex that if ever blatantly crossed, it can spell the end of an era for even the greatest mmo games. Something that we as players, Game Companies, General Managers, Graphics designers, Producers and Gods of MMOs know all to well.

Yes, we are talking about what is fair what is going to far, why we cry out OVERPOWERED, weaksauce, or useless and even the in between "meh".

Bias, yes. This word describes a great enemy. And it is a tricky one, creeping up on the unsuspecting. Digging deep into our viewpoints and ideals as to what Roles and Classes should or shouldn't be, what their limitations are. Or how far they can reach to the heavens before crashing back down to the shadows and abysmal depths of complaints and despair.

Our bias views towards are own shinning stars, keep other classes from sharing the same night sky. We are stealing their essence and breaking their body's. We must change this. But, it will take all of us, be sure of this.

But this is not the end, we can defeat this fiend. We can overcome, through trial and error. Through the forging and reforging of swords, ideas not limited to one set class, job or role. By looking into the tantamount abilities and Grand design of all classes, of all roles! This word, the word that can counteract this obstacle is.

Uniqueness

This is one of the driving reasons we play any class at all. It is a force to be reckoned with, especially against our nemesis Bias. With this we can look at ideas that make classes special, what sets them apart. Why one is suited more than another, NAY i say! It defines what one class can CONTRIBUTE to the party! That is Uniqueness.

While we can use this to define and describe the strengths of classes, it works both ways. Weakness, yes i said weakness. This word should be etched in the very being of your class. Carved in the very soul of roles across Eorzea! Scream "We need weakness!" Give other classes a reason to be! A reason to exist!

We want to be able to stretch out our hands to fellow comrades, in our greatest battles and reassure them "Do not fear, we will lend you strength, as you have given purpose." We want to walk with our heads held high and march gloriously towards Titan and shout "It is our given differences Titan, that will crush you very heart!"

So i say, and we should say. "Define our strengths give us weakness, make us unique."

Bring us together, so we might share in our triumphs and revel in our differences. This, my friends is Eorzea...

(I totes was listening to Mitis and Mahi when i was writing this )

Posts like this is why the devs don't listen to the English forums.

On topic, I'd rather not get more unique than everyone already is. That opens up kicking and class discrimination because a person is playing a certain job that isn't "efficient" or "viable" enough for whatever that piece of content is, and one of the reasons I like this game is because I DON'T see that.

I wasn't looking to segregate the classes but only to hope that they could have roles that would support each other. Hopefully not to the point where 4 BLM or 4 SMN in 8 man parties are not accepted. But that first part of your comment was a little rude.

Like all the jobs have unique play styles the fact that you, or anyone, does’t see that means you haven't really tried. Focus on learning the benefits of your character and gearing it out running some end game stuff and you will see what I mean. Until then your argument is basely.

k thanks for you input.

Oh in case everyone was wondering why my topic post is so cheesy, its because i wanted people to read it not just the comments below and such.

And on a side note, My post was to convey the idea that when you edit one class we should look to see how it affects another and such. Not to fear change but look at it from a bigger picture. I know that sounds arrogant. SE thinks about it all the time I'm sure ^^

[HeroSamson]

In FF11 it wasn't like that, people found ways to become stronger than others, it was almost competitive who can do the best damage.

Of course if people found ways to exploit the damage they would patch it, though people always found ways to boost their damage and nobody was ever the same cause everyone had their own play styles.

Here in FFXIV its all the same, gear is the same, weapons do not out damage other weapons by a lot its balanced out so its not unfair.

nothing to set others apart from each other.

[Chambers]

I read it.

[Nutz]

Through all the flowery prose I think I see your point. This game, while very nicely balanced, can be quite bland. Really it's bland because the developers went to the trouble of devising systems to ensure that classes were all more or less equal in their output and then they basically give everyone equal access to equal equipment.

In FFXI and many other MMOs that I'm less experienced with, certain BiS items would come from the absolute most difficult content, while others were crafted, came from older content, or even quested and several levels below the level cap. In this game, everyone's best equipment is the newest tome/raid equipment (with so few exceptions it's not really worth mentioning and more of a fluke) and everyone has exactly the same skills and abilities. There's basically the optimal setup (all appropriate CC skills and best equipment) and everyone else working toward the optimal setup. No branching or differentiation at all.

I hope that they try to remedy this in Heavensward a bit, but it would be dangerous to be overly ambitious considering the balance they have currently. Trying to add more freedom often results in simply creating several 'wrong' ways of playing that eventually nobody will use.

[Natashio]

I like that you used the word "freedom" Nutz..which is exactly what this game has none of.

[KitanaiKoneko]

Its because of the Tank/Heal/DPS setup that this game enforces so harshly that all the jobs are expected to perform the same. If you can break away from it then you allow yourself to make classes/jobs more varied (such as having true support roles instead of lolbrd).
Also, in my opinion, a strong PvP system helps with balancing much more than people believe it to.

[Sapphic]

In FF11 it wasn't like that, people found ways to become stronger than others, it was almost competitive who can do the best damage.

Of course if people found ways to exploit the damage they would patch it, though people always found ways to boost their damage and nobody was ever the same cause everyone had their own play styles.

Here in FFXIV its all the same, gear is the same, weapons do not out damage other weapons by a lot its balanced out so its not unfair.

nothing to set others apart from each other.

Whereas in FFXIV all jobs are viable for content as opposed to FFXI due to the system they set up this way being much easier to balance, again, compared to FFXI. I prefer it continues like this than it ending up like FFXI where so many jobs where not wanted.

[Songi]

Its because of the Tank/Heal/DPS setup that this game enforces so harshly that all the jobs are expected to perform the same. If you can break away from it then you allow yourself to make classes/jobs more varied (such as having true support roles instead of lolbrd).

They could still use the archetype setup and allow us to have freedom to build/gear our jobs to do more extra duties outside of that role. Take EQ2 for example, tanks were able to dish out more damage than the dedicated dps jobs if they were geared using the right gear and skill trees to augment their dps. I'm sure they could allow the same thing to be done here if they'd just stop riding WoW's coattails and start by injecting some more unique gear and horizontal progression. Giving more choice to the players to pick and choose abilities would be a decent start as well. Stop babying us and allow us to have some say over how our character grows.

[Gramul]

Asymmetric balancing seems to be getting more and more popular. I wonder how they could approach it here.

[Suggestion]

I'm just hoping to inspire peoples desire to have there classes more defined and feel needed. And that players who play their class well feel a better sense of accomplishment. But not have have such a huge gap that casual players feel useless because, that is most of the player base id assume.

But do continue i like reading opinions