The Illusion of Choice

[Kaurie]

Hi All, I wanted to take some time to chat about the Illusion of Choice.

I see this term thrown around a lot against the idea of having specializations, skill builds and stat builds. I personally find this argument to be rather limiting and doesn't really capture an appropriate argument against the above proposals. Fundamentally, I disagree that choice is an illusion, despite there (perhaps) being a best choice.


I'll start to frame why I personally like having choice, and why I (sort-of) accept the premise of there being a best choice and why that is OK. Part of an RPG to me, more specifically in MMO's and less in single player games, is building my character. I enjoy taking time trying out different stats and skill builds, while I determine what works best for me. It's very much like a game of Sudoku, where there is one correct answer, but the time taken to find that answer is itself a game. The time taken to theorycraft, test theories and create a build that works best for you is indeed very fun. It gets even more fun when you take these builds and compare them with others. You may choose to fully adopt their build as superior, or maybe you'll take a tip from their's and merge it into your own. I particularly enjoy doing this every patch as new gear levels are added and new encounters are added.

That said, I do not think that there is always ONE correct choice. Often there are builds which are better for different situations. You'll have a build that is best for AoE, for single target, for raids, for dungeons, for open world, for pvp and so on. You'll have a build that works well when in combination with certain jobs (this one drains MP but if I have a bard it will work better etc.) In this sense, for a given encounter and group composition, there is a best option, but there is not an overall best option for the entire game. That is the inherent beauty of mixed encounters with varied mechanics.

The best is the only way. Yet it isn't. In this game, I always see people say "any job can clear content, play what you find fun." So, if a MNK is going to bring your raid DPS up by 100 over a NIN, why take a NIN? Because it's fun. In this sense, having fun is more important than being optimal. The same could be said for builds, perhaps there is a build that will make you do 100 more DPS. For example, say a Fire Mage caps at 1800 DPS and an Ice Mage caps at 1700 DPS; however, that doesn't mean the Ice Mage is not viable and it may be more fun for certain players. A very small percentage of players actually take part in end-game raiding, so the need for min-maxing to that extent is not 100% necessary. However, even in end-game raiding, fun precedes optimization (however, they do generally converge in this context).

I'd like to offer what I think makes a good analogy. Say you went to the grocery store and saw several blocks of cheese. One cheese is clearly cheaper per gram than the rest, and it is the obvious choice. There is an illusion of choice, because clearly the cheapest is the best. However, let's say that one of the more expensive cheeses makes for a better grilled cheese. In this case, you may opt for this instead. This is similar to say using an AoE build vs a Single Target build for select encounters. However, maybe you just like brand X more than the cheap brand, and opt for that instead. This is similar to someone opting for Ice Mage over Fire Mage (example above), even though Fire Mage technically is superior, but the preference is for Ice. Finally, a chef may enjoy taking the time to experiment with various recipes. Most of the public will simply go online and find a recipe and opt for the cheapest brand, but other Chefs will experiment with various cheeses to see what is best for them. This most corresponds to my own preference of testing out builds.

Despite the fact that the majority may go online to find the optimal build, there is still a lot of enjoyment for others who would take part in the building process.

I am going to take a second and contrast this to crafting. As I see it, crafting is worthless. It's not fun, and you get nothing out of it. The only useful things are food/potions; however, they could easily have this sold by vendors or simply tune content around these not being in the game. That said, many people enjoy crafting. Despite the fact that I see no value in crafting and do not find it fun, I do respect that others enjoy it. In this sense, even though you may find skill/stat building not fun and would just look online for your builds, others (such as myself) find it fun, and we ask that you respect that we play differently than yourself.

[SendohJin]

switching jobs is the choice in this game.

the devs already have so many problems balancing jobs that they slap the same casting mechanic on non-casting ranged DPS. they put positionals on every melee DPS. they will not balance the game for multiple job builds.

[Pence]

No one is denying you to play how you want. You do you and roll that ice mage bae. It's your $15. But remember: it's the parties $45. If you don't play optimally because of your own enjoyment? Expect to be kicked. You're potentially ruining it for them.

I couldn't care less about your enjoyment. I find mine in clearing content and not taking 25m in a 15m dungeon.

Illusion of choice is real...Yoshi acknowledges it, WOW has acknowledged it, everyone with half a brain has. Get on our level plx.

[WellFooled]

No one is denying you to play how you want. You do you and roll that ice mage bae.If you don't play optimally because of your own enjoyment? Expect to be kicked. You're potentially ruining it for them.

I couldn't care less about your enjoyment. Get on our level plx.

The OP isn't trying to justify ice mages (or any other build) in the current game, they're defending the concept of customizing our battle gameplay with features like talent tress, sub jobs, merit points, etc which FFXIV is lacking. You're making a valid argument, but you're in the wrong discussion.

Of course ice mages, as the game is now, are terrible, but if the game were designed around the idea of customizing your gameplay between ice mages, fire, lightning, or whatever, even if ice mages were slightly less practical many of us would still enjoy having the choice.

[Pence]

snip.

Maybe you're in the wrong genre? Because regardless of what anyone does it'll ALWAYS come down to 1 build. Be ice for this, be fire for this, be thunder for this. You can give 1000 options but they'll all be pushed aside for 1. Taking away these options is a GOOD thing for the game. You don't have the ice mages running around doing 400 DPS on Bismark. Customization is fun until you shake ya noggin.

[TheUltimateSeph]

No one is denying you to play how you want. You do you and roll that ice mage bae. It's your $15. But remember: it's the parties $45. If you don't play optimally because of your own enjoyment? Expect to be kicked. You're potentially ruining it for them.

I couldn't care less about your enjoyment. I find mine in clearing content and not taking 25m in a 15m dungeon.

Illusion of choice is real...Yoshi acknowledges it, WOW has acknowledged it, everyone with half a brain has. Get on our level plx.

You are rude and totally missed the point.

The OP isn't trying to justify ice mages (or any other build) in the current game, they're defending the concept of customizing our battle gameplay with features like talent tress, sub jobs, merit points, etc which FFXIV is lacking. You're making a valid argument, but you're in the wrong discussion.

Of course ice mages, as the game is now, are terrible, but if the game were designed around the idea of customizing your gameplay between ice mages, fire, lightning, or whatever, even if ice mages were slightly less practical many of us would still enjoy having the choice.

Maybe you're in the wrong genre? Because regardless of what anyone does it'll ALWAYS come down to 1 build. Be ice for this, be fire for this, be thunder for this. You can give 1000 options but they'll all be pushed aside for 1. Taking away these options is a GOOD thing for the game. You don't have the ice mages running around doing 400 DPS on Bismark. Customization is fun until you shake ya noggin.

And since when is taking away options in a game EVER a good thing that adds substance to the experience? If there is only ever one way to do it things will get real stale real fast. People like you just....ugh.

Also again with the ice mage thing, totally missing the point OP was trying to make.

[WellFooled]

Maybe you're in the wrong genre?

If anything, it's the other way around. Many MMORPG are very heavy in customization. I've played about half a dozen MMOs, which is a small sample size I admit, but FFXIV is the only one to offer no way to customize your job. Can you think of any MMORPG that offer as few choices as FFXIV?

Because regardless of what anyone does it'll ALWAYS come down to 1 build. Be ice for this, be fire for this, be thunder for this. You can give 1000 options but they'll all be pushed aside for 1. Taking away these options is a GOOD thing for the game.

In bleeding edge end game raiding, you're absolutely right, but for most of the game's playerbase it wouldn't work like this nor has it ever. In those other MMOs I've played with skill trees you would always encounter huge varieties of play styles. In WoW I was a Feral Druid, leaning toward tanking, but all over the world there were caster Druids, healing Druids, dps druids, druids that focused on mobility for PvP, or those that focused on crowd control. There were dozens of good options for how to play that one class and all of them were played.

We're all the same for balance reasons. Very simple. So so simple.

Perfect balance is an impossible goal. Even by taking away most choices it's still impossible to obtain. Even the most hardcore of esport games can't achieve perfect balance. So since balance is impossible I would prefer imbalance that's filled with fun choices to imbalance that is nothing but rigid uniformity.

Perfect balance is impossible, all that is needed for balance in an MMO is a reasonable margin

[SendohJin]

If anything, it's the other way around. Many MMORPG are very heavy in customization. I've played about half a dozen MMOs, which is a small sample size I admit, but FFXIV is the only one to offer no way to customize your job. Can you think of any MMORPG that offer as few choices as FFXIV?

which of those let's you change class/job on the same character?

[Nominous]

Maybe you're in the wrong genre? Because regardless of what anyone does it'll ALWAYS come down to 1 build.

Not exactly. Even in the current state of the game we see this proven wrong. There IS a best raid/group comp, yet it's far from true that everyone only abides by the one. I'm kind of just reiterating what OP said, but that's a very legitimate thing to take away from the conversation.

Also, there's definitely a couple MMO's that have implemented multiple builds and maintained some semblance of balance, without "Illusion of choice". It's all about how much the developer puts into it.

[Zojha]

Even in the current state of the game we see this proven wrong. There IS a best raid/group comp, yet it's far from true that everyone only abides by the one.

There is also a best rotation/playstyle which far from everyone abides to - much to the dismay of many people. I would not at all be surprised however if even our lovely ice mages had friends that take them into group content, regardless of how suboptimal their setup or play is.

I find that argument fairly weak, because it leads to the conclusion that our playstyle already is very much customizable, you only need to find people to endure your suboptimal decisions.