Thread: 4.0 abilities

Originally Posted by Lemuria

Odd choice in Summoner, since that one arguably requires more effort than most other DPS jobs. You have to manage your pet, use Dreadwyrm reliably, keep your MP topped up (BLM has practically endless MP), maintain DoT's etc.

No, you just have to use Tri-Disaster, Bane and put your pet on Sic and twiddle thumbs/throw a few Ruins. That'll make it look like you're trying enough for people not to notice.

Personally, I think some jobs have far to little to do (PLD being the main one). I enjoy DRG and SCH because there's always something to do, something to optimize. Having a few more skills wouldn't hurt, as long as they're implemented in a sensible way.

What will probably be needed to reduce skill bloat is to change the way we get skills.

Take Whm for example and the stone spells. You get stone 1 2 and 3 all seperate from one another. What should happen is for stone 2 and 3 to be changed to traits that replace the previous stone spell. You get high enough and stone 2 replaces stone 1 and the same for stone 3. This would not only fold 3 skills into 1 but free up space.

This could also work for new skills. What happens is you get a trait that replaces an earlier skill with the new one. This would both prevent skill bloat and allow for upgrades of skills without needing to change hotbars too.

I could see both of these happening witj future skills as even tho I play with a g13 which allows me to set up to 36 abilities at once even thats full on me and Ive no room for more. Hell I had to drop a skill from my NIN cos Ive no room for it.

Please look at condensing abilities SE :O! Don't do what Blizzard did with WoW for years before their stat squish :O!

There are definitely a few abilities that could stand to be removed (heavy thrust and hot shot come to mind immediately) as they don't really add much to game play and are more of a chore than anything to maintain.

I believe the cross class system could stand to be revised or eliminated entirely. Give each Job the 2-3 cross critical abilities it needs as a baseline (provoke, blood for blood, invigorate, raging strikes, etc.) as well. That would save some bloat. As far as traits go, I've posted it in another thread but I'll add it here, I'd want the traits to be more than just a slight increase to a stat or ability, I would want them to add some really meaningful interactions and adjustments to gameplay, just a few examples:

Paladin- Enhanced Bulwark, for the duration each shield block resets the cooldown on shield swipe, each shield swipe does 50% more damage and ignores the damage penalty of shield oath.

Dark Knight- Enhanced Dark Passenger, using Dark Passenger makes the next Dark Arts free.

White Mage- Enhanced Spells, each Cure 1-3 has a 50% chance of reducing the cooldown of Presence of Mind by 10 seconds, cannot occur more than once every ten seconds.

That's what *I* personally want with any new traits we get, we could use some abilities to shake up the current playstyles without adding even more abilities to the rotations.

the thing is actualy that there isn't much left to add at this point.

you could always add longer and/or more complex combos, but that would make the game overall harder for quite a few ppl I guess. same happens with more stances and buffs you need to keep up.
for tanks you could probably add more damage potential but i you give one of them a new defensive cd, the other will need a similar skill aswell. and more def cds would just trivialize tank busters.

though new skills will very likely mean a change in your rotation so some older skills are probably not be used anymore.

new traits is probably the better option but that means less fun compared to new skills since you are basically playing the same game you did before

Less maintaining of passive buffs and more actual skill interactions.

They can fix button bloat by pruning useless skills and adding them to existing skills. For example, put heavy thrust's buff into the impulse drive chain.

Make chain skills take the place of the previous skill used, like 1 is true thrust, then when you use it it becomes vorpal thrust, then when you use that it becomes full thrust, then resets back to true thrust. Sure it is pressing 1 button the same time, but positionals can make it a little more engaging. and not to mention that there will be lots of room for new skills

Im happy on getting new and more skills but the PS4 HOTBAR is getting (if not already) crowded. I understand that we have 4 by pressing R2 but some of us like to have all our main skills + CD + combos in the same hot bar.

I'm playing on PC, on a 3-4 year old screen so it's not that big. With party members left, mini map right top, chat bottom left, my hp left top and boss hp mid top, my skills are mid bottom, 3 rows, and its starting to get cluttered. I love the option to hide Duty lists while in a duty, gives me a lot more space to look right/re-position myself, but more skills would end up being click for me, as my 1 till = are full, as are my shift+1-5 and ctrl+1-5....