Job Personalization: Can I Have It?

[zcrash970]

Bullcrap.

WoW style raids - where the whole group is punished for the failings of a few leading to exclusionary and toxic behavior - aren't the only type of group content possible.

No, it isn't. However, mmos are usually balanced with accordance to the hardest current content i.e. raids. Everything else is practically built around that.

[elemental10]

We're trapped in this predicament of wanting for balance and wanting for customization.

In my opinion, balance means that all jobs can have access to all content with the same chance of success. SE made this possible as the central of this game by limiting our choices in customizing our jobs. The most that we can get are cross-class skills that are already phased out in 3.0. That's why you don't see cross-class skills from either DRK or AST or MCH.

Customization destroys this harmony by putting in choices for players. I'm not against it, I'm just explaining the impact of this system. You put in choices, if SE still sticks to their core value, which is all content passable by all, they have to consider the extreme ends of choices. If you give a PLD the choice to be a DPS, there has to a room in all 8 men content to put in a PLD DPS and STILL have the same chance of success. This is how to preserve balance and that requires for you to take a look at lots of other combination of teams.

Can a team take a MNK, and then replace it with a PLD DPS, will they still have the same chance of success? This is why PLD right now is being discriminated from static groups because their extra defensive capabilities do not make the DPS checks bearable. Thus, balance is destroyed and SE do not stick with their main core value.

Customization on paper is great. It sounds awesome, you can have any kinds of playstyle and attracts players to experiment around. But the game is centered and balanced around the raids, Coils, Alexander Savage and so on. If one playstyle cannot make through the content, then people will not choose the class and therefore balance is destroyed. This is the dilemma we're in.

SE wants to have any combination of teams to have equal chance of success.

But I digress.

Job personalization sounds GREAT. It does, yes. But it has to be implemented across the board while abolishing DEPENDENCIES among classes and jobs. A PLD should be able to be swapped with a WAR with little to no impact on success rate. A NIN can easily be replaced by DRG and still has the same utility. A BRD and a MCH can easibly be exchanged with no compromise on their regeneration spells. By putting in variations of each class such as a PLD DPS, can a PLD DPS replace a DRG or NIN or a MNK? If it can, yes go ahead the idea works but if it cannot? The whole thing crashes down and we're all back on square one.

SE multiple times have said that they want all jobs and classes able to complete content. Customization may be possible if we keep them inside a restriction. Tanks have to act as tanks and get customizations accordingly. I support role customization instead of job customization. Give customization to traits and effects to skills and spells but they have to be able to have the same impact as the other customization on other class. We do not want a trait customization tree that gives WAR a higher advantage over the same trait customization tree on a PLD.

See the huge problem here? Discrimination. It's already happening with PLD, AST and the rangers. We all want the same damage, same defense, same things but we want customization as well that gives variations on those things too.

[DreadRabbit]

Bullcrap.

WoW style raids - where the whole group is punished for the failings of a few leading to exclusionary and toxic behavior - aren't the only type of group content possible.

The exact same thing is happening in DF by people not wanting to help the team by playing their role properly. To the point where even MSQ dungeons can't be cleared because of "I'll play how I want to play". Jerks exist at all levels, not just raids.


What does adding a spec to a class you already play really change in terms of customization other than control of numbers? The specs in WoW and other games really don't change how a class plays at a basic level. "I want an ice BLM or a thunder BLM" (for example). Okay...the ice spells would probably still induce slow and heavy and given the trend thunder spells would still be dots. So if you specialized in say thunder, you'd be specializing in dots. Oh wait, SMN already specializes in dots, so that spec is more "samey" to another job than BLM as it is now.

That's more what I'm getting at. What radical spec choices would you implement for classes that would keep their core gameplay but would actually be worth the time to insert the change?

snip

^This post x100000%

[Bishop81]

The exact same thing is happening in DF by people not wanting to help the team by playing their role properly. To the point where even MSQ dungeons can't be cleared because of "I'll play how I want to play". Jerks exist at all levels, not just raids.

Not quite my point ...

My point instead was, group content where everyone has to be an obedient little sheep and do it a specific way or everyone will suffer, isn't the only type of group content.

What does adding a spec to a class you already play really change in terms of customization other than control of numbers? The specs in WoW and other games really don't change how a class plays at a basic level. "I want an ice BLM or a thunder BLM" (for example). Okay...the ice spells would probably still induce slow and heavy and given the trend thunder spells would still be dots. So if you specialized in say thunder, you'd be specializing in dots. Oh wait, SMN already specializes in dots, so that spec is more "samey" to another job than BLM as it is now.

That's more what I'm getting at. What radical spec choices would you implement for classes that would keep their core gameplay but would actually be worth the time to insert the change?

It's not about adding "specs", it's about letting you pick and choose what abilities you want.

For example, if you don't like a mechanic say ... Enochian ... perhaps you can use some other alternative mechanic instead and reach roughly the same result. Perhaps said alternative mechanic has lower damage but has a crowd control component so the mob dies before you do all the same.

Such alternative mechanics will never exist so long as the game is designed around raiding. All mechanics will have to be tightly balanced and SE doesn't have time to balance so many things.

If tight balance isn't an issue ... the sky is the limit really.

They can implement cool new ability for Class A without worrying if that would make said class OPed and resulting in a sea of tears from raiders.

All the banality of the game is due to need to keep things ultra-balanced (thus boring).

Which brings me to my earlier post,

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...=1#post3217176

[DreadRabbit]

snip

Doesn't matter if that first bit wasn't your point. It's the exact same mentality just on the other side of the coin. "You will all have to change your play style and adapt to me just because I don't want to play my role the way it was designed." How is that any different from expecting people to play the way your raid group wants you to? You become the person trying to herd sheep with that mentality. The only way to truly avoid that drama is to do group content with friends only. Speaking of...

Raiding's not for everybody. I know I don't raid because I don't like how strict it is. But MMOs, like it or not, need raiders to drive game development. They can't sustain a game by themselves, but they're the ones who complete content quickly and challenge the devs to make quality content faster. Games without raiding stagnate due to slow, if any, updates. Games that focus too much on raiding exclude too many people.

As for the actions thing, what good does adding another crowd control ability to a BLM toolkit where every other spell/attribute is already an AoE or assists in AoE? That's no different than adding a redundant spec. Every single skill that gets added needs to have a purpose and shouldn't be there just because someone wants choice. And we already have this with cross class skills. You can literally take off our soul stone and cross class just about any skill from any of the other classes to use. Play other classes and look at what skills can cross with yours to give a unique style. People are already doing it with their own groups and are having a good time.

"Implementing that cool new ability for Class A without worrying if that would make said class OPed" is called balancing. You're literally using what you claim to be the cause of this game being boring as your argument for why more skills could be added. And again, you're not suggesting anything new. We've got new skills, and people are chosing whether or not they wish to use them. Raiders will, obviously. But plenty of people are rebelling and aren't. That's their personal choice. Party with people that agree with those choices because there's plenty there.

[Bishop81]

Doesn't matter if that first bit wasn't your point. It's the exact same mentality just on the other side of the coin. "You will all have to change your play style and adapt to me just because I don't want to play my role the way it was designed." How is that any different from expecting people to play the way your raid group wants you to? You become the person trying to herd sheep with that mentality. The only way to truly avoid that drama is to do group content with friends only. Speaking of...

You didn't read the linked post did you.

I'm more than happy to let raiders raids (and tear into each other mercilessly).

Raiding's not for everybody. I know I don't raid because I don't like how strict it is. But MMOs, like it or not, need raiders to drive game development. They can't sustain a game by themselves, but they're the ones who complete content quickly and challenge the devs to make quality content faster. Games without raiding stagnate due to slow, if any, updates. Games that focus too much on raiding exclude too many people.

Citation needed.

Developers need raiders to challenge them? LOL.

Keep the attention of the majority casuals is more than enough challenge.

WoW just dropped to 5.6 million. A primarily raid focus game will no longer cut it. SE should take WoW's slow demise as a warning.

You're literally using what you claim to be the cause of this game being boring as your argument for why more skills could be added.

What?

Anyway my point is, the way raid balance constricts class design is the reason the game isn't as interesting as it could be. A lot can not be done because it would upset the precious "raid balance".

[erufufu]

"People will only pick the optimal" is completely untrue. If that was so, why do games like Diablo even exist?

How much do you play D3? Because it is a game very much about using what is the most optimal. Of course everything is achievable solo so you can use sub optimal builds without affecting others, it is a completely different genre to FFXIV and is a terrible comparison. MMO content is entrenched in team play, most of the content outside of leveling requires you to play with other people, and other people want you to use what is most optimal. You may notice how many posts are made about people being bad at DPS latley, and thats just a result about not using skills in the best order. If there is an Optimal way to play, and the game requires team play people will always use whats most optimal.

[Leshpar]

My 2 cents on this topic: Elder Scrolls Online tried this and failed hard. Sure leveling up is extremely fun. The quests are awesome and the customization you get is really nice. Once you hit veteran rank levels though your playstyle choices become severely limited. By that I don't mean the actual number of choices drop, but the number of effective choices drop significantly. If you don't play one of only a few accepted ways at end game you just won't get groups. Its why I don't play that MMO anymore.

FF14 is awesome the way it is. Don't change it anywhere near how the OP suggests.

[Bishop81]

My 2 cents on this topic: Elder Scrolls Online tried this and failed hard. Sure leveling up is extremely fun. The quests are awesome and the customization you get is really nice. Once you hit veteran rank levels though your playstyle choices become severely limited. By that I don't mean the actual number of choices drop, but the number of effective choices drop significantly. If you don't play one of only a few accepted ways at end game you just won't get groups. Its why I don't play that MMO anymore.

FF14 is awesome the way it is. Don't change it anywhere near how the OP suggests.

Again, it depends on the content. If the only worthwhile content is of the "punish the whole group for the failings of a few" variety ... ya, choice is non-existence. You will have to play how others want you to play. Personal choice cease to exist.

[Duelle]

This counts as argument number 1:“Choice is an Illusion.” Which my counter argument is:All of those players would chose to look up a premade optimal build to enhance their experience, effectively giving them but one choice. Nothing would change for them except the fact that they have made a decision. This is more of a hardcore player issue, but already we have no choice. What this does is let people who aren't hardcore have a choice.

Giving people the choice to be mediocre is no choice at all. We'd go back to the scenario of Souleater Recast merits vs Arcane Circle Recast merits. One is actually useful, the other one is a waste of code. All you'd be doing is inviting the type of problems that are known to work with "specs" (people getting ridiculed for not going the optimal route). This is why I'd push customization in the direction of aesthetics rather than gameplay. There's plenty of ways to do it without creating even bigger problems among the playerbase.

I would be happy to have a Spell Speed Mage with the Ability to have enough Movement or a Heavy Damage Dealing Mage with slowed Movement. *Does look at Nexus System from FFXIII*

Except the one that deals most damage will rule over the other.

I wish I could be either a Ice Mage or a Fire Mage....hell or even Lightning or something.
I honestly like the ice element better than fire. :/ I wish they could give us a choice but both be equal.

I'd go for somehow swapping particle effects and spell names around over changing BLM at the baseline. Granted, the job is built around it using all its elements.

XI tried what you're asking with elemental affinity merits, but that quickly became "spec into lightning or ice or GTFO".