Isn't this class trinity a bit dated now?

[StouterTaru]

It could have worked in the class/job system if they had worked out the giant kinks in it. The biggest issue is making a support job's dps and support skills justifiable to take up a dps spot in a 4 man instance, yet weak enough to not make it overpowered in an 8 man.

[Mikedizzy]

I think that support classes would make the game worse. Some support job would be determined to be the "best" and all the rest would be left out. With the way they made this game I also don't think it would work without a complete change to the entire system they have created. Maybe one day in the future if they go to 5 and 10 man parties they will have 1 supports in the 5 and 2 in the 10 and that will solve some of it. I would not hold my breathe though.
I don think that they should up the Bard and Machinist dps a bit further...say 100 more and good.

[Cynfael]

Ya but that is sort of Semantics tbh, sure it might increase que times because it is another variable, but it could reduce the time because, the same could be said of a healer waiting on a Tank, or a Tank waiting on a healer...

Adding more conditions to fill DFs will invariably make them take longer to fill on average. This is arguably a big reason why the 24-man raids after Labyrinth were designed with the requirement of only 1 tank per party within the alliance.

Requiring a fourth slot (Support Role) to fill up with the requirement of one of a specific role would unquestionably increase queue times.

Also, the downside to introducing the support role is that such classes are extremely difficult to balance, both within the game and against each other. Unless you make them all functionally about the same, it almost always happens that one or more support classes gets kicked to the ghetto since their abilities end up being too niche.

Support Role sounds like a good idea at first, but if you consider most other MMOs with classes in this category, it usually ends up creating yet more tedium when it comes to the formation of parties. It's even worse when the Support Role is so amazing that no one will step foot into anything without their Swordsinger/Bladedancer/Overlord/Hierophant/etc., etc., etc.

[fm_fenrir]

So, the trinity is "dated", but the quadrilateral is "new" and "fresh"? MMOs stopped having dedicated buffbot classes after FFXI's generation because they don't have large player counts relative to the DPS/heal/tank roles, but they're required for any DF-type algorithm and their abilities are pivotal to any content. If you balance content with the assumption support doesn't exist, then you may as well not have them because most people will just stack DPS instead--it's more fun to play on the whole, with more visible results in the "I'm helping by doing X" metric.

Balancing with strong support in mind just means you'll have an Optimal Setup with a Useful DPS and the Only Support That Matters, and every other class can get out forever. This was extremely common in FFXI, where you'd see groups refusing to do anything without a BRD or RDM nearby (ideally both).

[Duelle]

To add my voice to the fray, adding more roles screws with party dynamics. Queues would take a lot longer because, unsurprisingly, support ends up being a role less popular than tanks or heals. Games with a support role has groups being held hostage by them. Conversely, they aren't worth a damn if not powerful enough. Hence why it is known that support tends to be either overpowered to the point of being mandatory, or underpowered and an effective waste of game assets. That's not even going into classes/jobs that get shafted as a result of the existence of support. *points to signature*

-----------------------------------

We have "Support" BRD and MCH falling in some grey zone that justifies their lack of DPS output

Except it doesn't, and implementation of BRD and MCH has backed them into a corner because they're trying to insert a paradigm inside another design paradigm (DPS). It was cute at 50 when BRD was the only job built around that, and I figured they would take steps to make it fall in line with the other DPS instead of further segregating it.

WAR on the other hand is on the opposite side of the argument, that it can pretty well fulfill DPS and Tank and out DPS common players on specialized classes.

WAR isn't a good example of anything other than a bunch of undealt oversights that need to be addressed in a way that a) maintains the tanks balanced with each other and b) doesn't compromise the design of the other tanks.

We've ended up where we are with WAR because they're desperate to give tanks diversity in the wrong places, and it's blown up in their faces (considering Deliverance is there for off-tanking WARs just like Clemency is there for off-tanking PLDs; I highly doubt WAR was meant to swap back and forth and using back to back Fell Cleaves when tanking).

[Alahra]

This would in fact hurt queue times quite a bit as others have said. If they added an official support role, BRD and MCH would almost certainly have their damage retuned (downward) while their support abilities would be increased, and the content development focus would undoubtedly change as well, no longer taking the support class's DPS into account the way it is now.

This would likely cause a number of BRDs and MCHs to switch over to other DPS jobs, increasing the number of DPS players in the DF pool and reducing the number of support players (as others have noted, support roles are generally not much more popular, or even less popular, than tanks and healers).

While I'm not a fan of the Trinity generally (I greatly preferred the setup in FFXI myself, where classes were designed with various strengths but could be used creatively outside of their intended functionality), it is the simplest way to ensure that all classes are relevant in content. The more class design deviates from it, the more likely you are to see classes sitting out or completely ignored.

[Drtoxicmedica]

I feel if they allowed a true support only kinda class it would have to be limited to one per DF party and it would essentially allow the rest of the party to make up for its lack of overall dps through its buffs and raid uitility. However there same spot could be taken up by a dps as well. So df would have a support/dps slot when using df. Obviously if support turned into a major role they could always bump party size up a bit and have it become an integral part of raids and dungeons

[Lilith_Merquise]

@Duellie ya I have to agree with that, I still think that the perspective on introducing another category is subjective, but yes on paper what you say is true on that. As for the WAR, I completely agree but the problem is that Yoshi has already openly stated that WAR is functioning as intended and which really makes it doubtful they will change how the class functions, even though it really should be nerfed. Yet if there is one thing SE is scared of, its nerfing WAR players that are still carrying their frustrations of 1.0 and DRG players griping about having to use positionals. Why SE feels they need to constantly pander to these players at the detriment of the entire game, I just don't know.

[Tint]

i really don't like that they are moving away from the trinity. why can tanks do that much damage? and i am a healer who has nothing to heal but has to do damage... all the tanks in DPS gear and still plenty of time for healer dps? why? and then the whole unsynced option... who needs a second healer when one alone is more than enough?

either give me something to heal or give me enough acc and more dmg output and a better mana regeneration that i am able to dps -.-

the situation right now is just stupid.

[Eloah]

There are currently 4 "support" jobs in the game right now, 3 DPS and 1 healer: Bard, Machinist, Summoner, and Astrologian. But all of them, Bard being the only exception, usually function as a damage or healing job in other FF games. While I am not sure about whether they will adjust future jobs to be strictly support or not, I would love to see some more support jobs, Red Mages feel like they would fit this nicely. Also, Red Mages could give us another in combat raise like Summoner.