Emergent gameplay design(Food for thought)

[Almalexia]

I understand where OP is coming from, but the mechanical expression of every job is unlikely to change. Everything is tuned in a way to preserve balance--or attempt to preserve balance--among roles. True emergent play would necessarily throw balance out the window, or subject us to an endless barrage of "fixes" in a vain attempt to strike a balance.

While all our cookies may be cut from the same dough, this doesn't mean there is no room for creativity:

In FF14, emergent gameplay is mostly restricted to circumventing or making certain mechanics easier: the Twintania Trench, single tank strat for Nael, soaking double Prey on Ravana Ex with a beefed-up Adlo, or the recent stuff Lucrezia did during their AS4 clear.

These are only a few examples - FFXIV is quite rich with creative solutions to game challenges that don't necessarily depend on job abilities. I would say almost every dungeon boss has some "trick" that only reveals itself through manipulation of their gimmick or environment.

The closest we could come to OP's version of emergent gameplay would be PvP.

[Wobi]

What you are asking for is more RNG to battles, which ultimately there are only so many abilities they can program in before it gets ridiculous and if a few of those attacks prove to be detrimental if they are not stopped the classes with the ability to do so will be favored thus tipping class balance for that particular instance. FFXI suffers from this to this day, a constant back and forth teetering of class balance and bandwaggoners.

Eventually people will figure out all of the particular of a fight and sit on the cooldowns for the abilities that prevent said attacks from going off and use them whenever said ability crops up. This means for some groups the fight could go spectacularly easy depending on what the boss decided to use and for others could be a nightmare. As there is no true AI you cannot possibly program infinite scenarios, just more random attacks/abilities to fire off.

[Sandpark]

Eventually people will figure out all of the particular of a fight and sit on the cooldowns for the abilities that prevent said attacks from going off and use them whenever said ability crops up. This means for some groups the fight could go spectacularly easy depending on what the boss decided to use and for others could be a nightmare. As there is no true AI you cannot possibly program infinite scenarios, just more random attacks/abilities to fire off.

Currently since the only option is dodge for most difficult fights. The main measure of skill is dodge which the video above describes. It brings no cleverness to the foray only twitch reflex.

"This means for some groups the fight could go spectacularly easy depending on what the boss decided to use and for others could be a nightmare."
This is exactly what I am getting at.

[Nadirah]

Sounds obnoxious from a raider point of view.

Part of learning the fight is learning the script.

And your complaint about Virus? Ok. Disable, then.

[Nadirah]

If they made stun work more reliably on bosses it'd break the damn game balance.

[Tyrial]

If they made stun work more reliably on bosses it'd break the damn game balance.

Ifrit HM eruptions come to mind pre-stun resist buff.

[hobostew]

I like buzzwords.

[Shurrikhan]

Anyways, to get back on topic, I'd very much like to see "emergent gameplay" in whatever ways that buzzword could actually be made applicable to this game. Because right now, emergent gameplay is solely optimization.

(One it could argue it always is; the only difference is the focus, or feel, of that optimization and the expected longevity or count of a particular instance of decision making.)

My question for you and anyone else reading this, is how do you make optimization feel creative, responsive, or fun — those things we associate with emergent gameplay.

It's a damn big question, and I'm struggling with it over here as well. I wouldn't expect to hit gold right away; that's what feedback is for.

My only clear impression right now is that is a matter entirely divorced from the GCD or most similar systems of pace control. I may yet be persuaded otherwise, but if what I've written above sounds cogent to you, I'd like to hear your thoughts as they'd apply to other possible solutions or interactions instead.

[Kosmos992k]

Emergant gameplay = metagames

Another form of emergent gameplay would be the Little Big Planet games.

Emergant gameplay is very much in the eye of the beholder. If you pay carful attention, there are examples of emegant gameplay in Eorzea already.

[Kurogaea]

14 doesn't really allow much of free reign of situations like battles and story. As much as I'd want it, "balance" is always a word they'd use. Though if the "balance" was the amount of PvE content in contrast with PvP content then they'd would know a lot less about that. Fairness in this game is similar to Life is Strange. You can change as many variables as you want, but the end will always be the same and you'd have to choose 1 of 2 options. Choices and skill are limited in the designs of our character. We're Warriors of Light.

The story calls us The Warrior of Light as if we're one entity where that's way far from the truth, as we're defenseless when placed in any situation on our own. We can't plan success where the game doesn't want to be completed in only one way. Items don't help much because the game wants you to rely on others leaving strategy to your teammates, in which there is no problem with that, but when players themselves are stuck in roles with predetermined stats, in situations involving no environmental interactions that was NOT scripted for immediate use or otherwise death, in battle mechanics guaranteeing death unless specific actions or needed but not in any way clear until the player(s) solve mostly cryptic mechanics till a strategy develops in which it is only one specific way to deal with them, the player is limited to what they are allowed to do. I call it psuedo freedom since your still doing it within very set rules.

People say you can do fights with different strats. Well in relation to this game, if I told someone they can make a dance performance on a stage with they're group but only allowed to use 3 dance moves and the entire stage. You can do plenty of patterns though each movement will look the same and eventually it becomes point A to point B.