3.1 PLD Changes

**Yonanja** · 11-09-2015 08:50 PM

@Brian_: What you don't seem to have the intellect to be able to see, is how players work in an MMO. The first question that comes up when considering an encounter (from the players point of view) is, "which classes can survive this fight without having large issues with it that would slow us down? All of them? OK... which class would make the fight the shortest?" This is how the playerbase of an MMO works. Having classes that perform so differently during different situations only leads to "Flavor of the month" classes and compositions... this is NOT having balanced classes. Balanced classes would be pointing at any given encounter or dungeon and being able to say "It doesn't matter which of the 3 classes we bring, since they perform the same". Having encounters "cater" to specific classes is just plain dumb... unless the devs plan is having the players spend time lvling and gearing classes they might not enjoy playing, in which case, by all means continue... since it's working perfectly.

**Brian_** · 11-09-2015 10:04 PM

Originally Posted by Yonanja

@Brian_: What you don't seem to have the intellect to be able to see, is how players work in an MMO. The first question that comes up when considering an encounter (from the players point of view) is, "which classes can survive this fight without having large issues with it that would slow us down? All of them? OK... which class would make the fight the shortest?" This is how the playerbase of an MMO works. Having classes that perform so differently during different situations only leads to "Flavor of the month" classes and compositions... this is NOT having balanced classes. Balanced classes would be pointing at any given encounter or dungeon and being able to say "It doesn't matter which of the 3 classes we bring, since they perform the same". Having encounters "cater" to specific classes is just plain dumb... unless the devs plan is having the players spend time lvling and gearing classes they might not enjoy playing, in which case, by all means continue... since it's working perfectly.

How many times do I have to repeat the point?

All of what you said is only relevant to the current content and will only stay relevant if raid design does not change. The questions you have posed are only questions because raid design makes them the priority. They have said they are looking to change that. I'll be extreme in this example and hopefully you will finally get the point --

What if SE designed an encounter that was not dependent on DPS and was based solely on surviving until enrage?

The best classes and the best raid comp would be totally different from what we see now. The questions you ask when considering an encounter would also change.

It doesn't matter what type of raid you are designing, you will always be catering to specific classes. Even if classes have the same eHP, the same raid DPS contribution, and the same utility, you will still have to cater to specific classes because of the differences in how they reach those ends. Unless you are suggesting homogenization to the point that all DPS classes deal identical damage in identical ways, you will need to cater to a certain class. Again, I'll be extreme in this example --

What if SE designed an encounter that had an incredibly tight DPS check within a 2-3 GCD window?

While your tanks, healers, and DPS might contribute the same overall raid DPS, certain classes will have higher burst because that is their flavor. Unless you completely homogenize the classes, certain classes will be left out even if they are "balanced." Again, balance is relative to the content.

The point is raid design is always tuned to soften the differences between classes. It is about achieving class balance through raid tuning so that every class has their place within the content. That's not happening now because the tuning is off by SE's own admission.

**Yonanja** · 11-10-2015 12:22 AM

I'm going to stop argueing with you after this post, since you're obviously in favor of class inbalance and "flavor of the month", for some strange reason. It's made obvious by your examples, since nothing you've put forward would make the inbalance less, just shift it around.

Also, I don't think that I've ever once mentioned any particular raid and/or dungeon as far as I know. You're the one who's hung up on alex savage. I've been considering class balance (for the tankingclasses) as a whole, no matter what encounter in the game.

Fact remains that there can't be any balance among the three classes as long as their performance differ as much as the devs want them to. It'll only lead to certain classes being better for certain things, and as I've pointed out several times, damage output is what the vast majority of players care about the most, as long as the specific class can still survive the encounter and not cause severe issues for the rest of the group.

And even if for example PLD would turn out to be superior for some future content, it's still just as inbalanced as it is now.

But as you seem to only listen to the voice of YoshiP, who've said ALOT of things that turned out not to be even close to the real result, I don't think that there is any point in continuing to argue with you. Let's just agree to disagree, and you can keep enjoying your inbalanced classes and FotM, and I can keep on hating it.

**Brian_** · 11-10-2015 11:41 AM

Originally Posted by Yonanja

snip

When I played WoW from Vanilla through BC, they constantly adjusted classes to try and reach a point of balance. The result? FotM. The classes just played musical chairs every patch -- when the music stopped and the patch hit, there would be winners and losers. Why would it be any different in FFXIV? Just because they adjust classes instead of content doesn't mean it won't be FotM.

On paper, WAR does more DPS than DRK. According to you, that's imbalance. So, they should buff DRK DPS to be on par with WAR or nerf WAR DPS down to DRK levels.

In practice, you have two scenarios. The first, which is basically Savage right now, has the DRK capable of tanking without Grit so that they get the DPS increase of Blood Weapon while also getting the procs for Reprisal and Low Blow. Their DPS ends up being higher than WAR.

The second has the DRK incapable of tanking without Grit and absolutely nothing to parry. Their DPS ends up being lower than WAR because they can't Blood Weapon and cannot get Reprisal / Low Blow procs.

Because of different content, you have different balance. Is this so hard to understand? While they might be balanced in theory, classes will always react differently to content because balance exists relative to content. Unless all the content in the game is identical until the end of time (which nobody wants), you will have variance. At which point you will have FotM again unless your classes are literally identical (which again, nobody wants). Like I said earlier, balance is always the result of some ratio of raid design and class design. It's not your black and white world where the two are separate entities. That they are prioritizing raid design over class design (but still adjusting classes) is perfectly fine.

Originally Posted by Dhex

Forcing more imbalance between tanks is bad; idiotic even.

Except they are not trying to force more imbalance, they are trying to force balance.

**Dhex** · 11-10-2015 12:02 PM

Originally Posted by Brian_

Except they are not trying to force more imbalance, they are trying to force balance.

They aren't forcing balance. They've got imbalance - an imbalance that is going to persist over an 8-month period. They've got a gaping hole between Paladin and the other two tanks. Warrior has a guaranteed raid slot.

I play all three in Savage AS1-3 regularly; Paladin's mitigation is inconsequential, it's utilities are poorly integrated to the point of being useless by design, and the producer really believes that spot-fixing "TP issues" without addressing the key deficiencies with their design is acceptable. Paladin is worse categorically across the board in practical situations.
You have rambling responses of what could be or what will be or how they intended this or how content can change this or that and it's all WORTHLESS WORDS because it doesn't address the current situation or the current oversights and the persisting design flaws that created the situation - you fail to see that all tanks need to be relevant in both tanking slots regardless of content. They aren't. It doesn't matter how much you polish a turd it's still a turd.

**Ashkendor** · 11-10-2015 03:23 PM

Originally Posted by Dhex

It doesn't matter how much you polish a turd it's still a turd.

This sums up Paladin pretty well right now. That's no knight; it's just a turd in shining armor. >:|

(I'm trying to laugh at this but I think it just hits too close to home atm.)

**Yonanja** · 11-11-2015 09:35 PM

Originally Posted by Brian_

When I played WoW from Vanilla through BC, they constantly adjusted classes to try and reach a point of balance. The result? FotM. The classes just played musical chairs every patch -- when the music stopped and the patch hit, there would be winners and losers. Why would it be any different in FFXIV? Just because they adjust classes instead of content doesn't mean it won't be FotM.

Comparing this game to WoW is stupid on so many levels. Blizzard have never been known for being able to balance classes well in their RPGs, be it WoW or Diablo. Also, every class in WoW is a hybrid, expected to be able to perfom more than one task, this makes balancing extremely harder. And as far as I know Blizz have never tried to rebalance a whole role (and all the classes in it) at one time, all they've done is having kneejerk reactions to the issues that have come up, very similar to how the devs do things currently in FF.

Balance is reached when there is no FotM classes, something that is impossible to achieve as long as the focus is on balancing the encounters around different classes with vastly different performances. What they need to do to reach a balanced state is to first balance the classes and then look at the encounters. But I don't think that will ever happens, since I doubt even the devs know what they want to do with this game.

**Ralvenom** · 11-12-2015 04:26 AM

Originally Posted by Yonanja

first balance the classes and then look at the encounters. But I don't think that will ever happens, since I doubt even the devs know what they want to do with this game.

You say this like it's freakin' easy. "Oh, yeah...they just need to do that". You're missing a few things:
1. Devs always have a well-defined idea of what they want a class/job to do. *This is software design 101. Figure out what everything does!*
2. You cannot always predict what players are going to do with the dev design. *You cannot test everything.*
3. The easiest way to conform to the original dev design without breaking the game completely is to make tweaks to certain abilities. *If people don't like the original dev design, there are other class/job options.*

Everyone always complains and says, "The devs have no idea what they're doing". Actually, they do. FFXIV is definitely one of the better games in terms of job design and balance. Each job has an intended role that it fits very well, on the whole. Yes, sometimes a job suffers here or there, but the adjustments made usually make up for that -- WHILE still allowing the job to conform to the intended design.

The problem is, everyone wants to sit there and have it their way. Well, sorry...YOUR WAY isn't really what the devs are going to do. (If you're lucky, they'll do it "close" to your way.) If you always want it your way in a game, then go develop your own dang game!

**Reynhart** · 11-15-2015 12:59 AM

Originally Posted by Ralvenom

1. Devs always have a well-defined idea of what they want a class/job to do.

That's exactly what we doubt.
When you see content specifically designed for heavy DPS check, and a tank whose focus is officialy "mitigation", it's expected to mix...not very well

**Shurrikhan** · 11-10-2015 12:08 PM

Originally Posted by Yonanja

I'm going to stop argueing with you after this post, since you're obviously in favor of class inbalance and "flavor of the month", for some strange reason. It's made obvious by your examples, since nothing you've put forward would make the inbalance less, just shift it around.

But as you seem to only listen to the voice of YoshiP, who've said ALOT of things that turned out not to be even close to the real result, I don't think that there is any point in continuing to argue with you. Let's just agree to disagree, and you can keep enjoying your inbalanced classes and FotM, and I can keep on hating it.

Brian has mentioned constantly a lack of content-based balancing in game; the examples that can be given from in-game, therefore, lack overall balance, even if certain parts of those examples point at possible better designs. Individually, these examples, each taken from a small part of existent encounters might imply FotM choices. But if the overall balance of each encounter were improved, such that each tank would have a relatively equal value across (all parts of) the encounter through their various, different advantages, leaving no clear FotM choice. This seems pretty clear. It's just a different way of balancing the jobs (and, frankly, accessory choice) without having to homogenize them. Nor is it mutually exclusive with class changes. It is simply another avenue for providing balance, and one that SE has actually admitted their faults in with this last tier. True balance will likely still take a bit of tuning on the job side as well. But to design content that actually makes use of their differences, as in entirely unique strengths rather than just difference in strengths in common among all three, increases the ways we have to retain tank identity without leaving one or more behind.

Not trying to be defensive, especially in regards to a post that is not my own, but it seems unreasonable to push aside what, as far as I can see, is a very valid main point, and with it the entire other half of job design (the environments they work in).

Originally Posted by Dhex

They aren't forcing balance. They've got imbalance - an imbalance that is going to persist over an 8-month period. They've got a gaping hole between Paladin and the other two tanks. Warrior has a guaranteed raid slot.

Originally Posted by Brian_

Except they are not trying to force more imbalance, they are trying to force balance.

We've established that the current meta stinks and most likely these changes will do little to fix it. The point is what they could do. But can we really say that even if PLD is given as much MT (assuming Grit/Def/Shield) dps as DRK or WAR, and if it somehow gained DRK or WAR-level AoE, it would be taken? It would still ultimately be burdened with abilities that see little to no use in most situations. If we are to follow the general assuption (e.g. in Bards/MCHs) that having these utility options will have cost you elsewhere, however faintly, but should improve the situation of the raid as a whole through their/your being present and able, then those abilities cannot just go unused. PLD abilities may well need changes to cast and recast times, CDs, range, and costs, but they'll also likely need places where they provide a noticeable benefit, rather than just just a slightly greater raid healing/mitigation output, etc. (and whatever opportunities that gives), than they could put out personal dps for the time being, especially given that they've been stuck in a least favored position for months.

For instance, I'd like to see SB's enmity mod and RoH's potency boosted slightly for more enmity output. Due to personal preference, I'd have preferred to see Shield Swipe boosted to 220 potency rather than being made an oGCD, and for Shield Oath to no longer reduce Shield-based damage (as an oGCD, our TP problems will merely have worsened in a few cases, and dungeon runs just got a lot more annoying without Swipe's refresh component). For the purpose of some goddamn AoE damage, I'd have liked to see some other change to our "Shield" abilities (be it Oath, Swipe, and/or Bash) to provide that AoE at least in MT position. I'd like for Flash to remain relevant (for more than just enmity). But even after all those changes might go out and PLD is arguably "not shit", even if each of its abilities were individually worthy, whether a PLD gets to go in depends on the fight itself. Even if I were to try my hardest to balance PLD and fill its needs, I won't actually know what needs those are (beyond general competence, while hopefully retaining uniqueness/identity) until the next tier of content (partly because I don't know whether SE will be able to really balance said tier, and suspect that if they do more or less manage to 'balance' it, that balance will rely on general measures and by avoiding challenges that would make any differences apparent, rather than simply trying to present a near-equal total of uniquely advantageous situations).

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