The Combat Suggestions Thread

[Teuciont]

While there are subforums dedicated to the topic of combat, I feel that a broad topic thread in the GD would be a good place to garner both thoughtful discussion and developer exposure. The combat system, as it stands, has several glaring problems and inconsistencies which, I feel, drastically detract from what could be a pleasant experience. Most of these problems are simply ingrained into the minds of players by the time that they hit 50 that they go largely ignored. This is by no means an attack on how players perceive the fun they might be having with the combat, but rather an attempt a discussion as to how we could have an even better experience overall.

I'll start with some points of discussion:

-Abilities are top-heavy, meaning that a player won't get to the "fun gimmick" of their job until very late into the leveling process.

-Awkward relation between player input and ability registration. Abilities are seemingly tied to their animations. To see what I mean, compare how long it takes for Rage of Halone to register its damage on a monster as opposed to Spinning Edge.

-Tying into above, the limited use of OGCD abilities between GCDs due to animation lock. This is especially both noticeable and painful for NIN.

-Class homogeneousness. It is nice to have a steady flow of always having a button to press every 1.8~-2.5 seconds, but this same flow leads to a very similar experience amongst melee. Perhaps the addition of more job-specific resources would assist in adding to variety.

-Underuse of resources. TP goes completely ignored by the battle system as anything other than a stamina bar. TP is also a completely moot point for casters, aside from sprinting. The same could be said for MP. Completely ignored by non-casters(excluding BRD, whose interaction with it is rather uninspired), BLM is the only notable job that has any unique interaction with this resource.

What are your thoughts? Please try to keep it civil and realize that opinions are subjective. What might be incredibly dull for you might be fun for someone else.