Concerns about " Getting rid of unused and ineffective actions"

[Pondera]

This is my first time posting to these boards, but I've been playing the game for a few months now. I came over to this after being just disgusted with the way Blizzard had handled WoW, a game I played since 2008. Chief among my grievances was the concept of class pruning. I could never ditch that feeling of "I sure miss being able to do that cool thing" or get over how much weaker my characters felt afterward. One of the things I love so dearly about FF14 is its complexity. Every class is able to do so much, and I love juggling rotations and staggering cooldowns while tanking 12 mobs at once. It's fun to do, and being awesome isn't supposed to be easy or simple. If it was, everyone would be Bruce Lee or a 5 star general or Dean Winchester. So, you can see how talk of " Getting rid of unused and ineffective actions" is absolutely terrifying to me, even with Stormblood being so far away.

Okay, sure, I can understand the idea of doing away with some of the things like Conjurer's tiers of stone, or having the spell itself increase in power once you pass a certain level threshold. Same thing with the Black Mage's thunder. They're unused actions that, once you have Thunder 3, you never use 2 again. So, if you feel you really must cram them together, have at it. But I've also heard talk of trimming the amount of cooldowns tanks have. First of all, this is not a good idea. The CDs don't all do the same thing. A CD with 20% mitigation and 90s cooldown is different from a 30% one with 120s cooldown, and is used for a different purpose. Similarly, a CD increasing block chance or preventing critical hits entirely is vastly different from the previous 2 I just mentioned, but they are all absolutely necessary. A tank SHOULD feel involved. They should feel like they're a rock standing against the tide, not just some fool pressing a button and getting smacked around while DPS enjoys themselves. What's next? Are we going to start trimming the amount of summons summoners can conjure? Maybe we should trim the amount of abilities bards have on principle because there's only so many ways you can use an arrow. It's a slippery slope, isn't it?

Another reason I would object to such a thing is that, for some classes, previous spells are very involved with the current style of play. Try taking away a Black Mage's fire 1 and see how much of a twist they get into. With no fire 1, no fire starter, and it's harder to keep Astral Fire 3 refreshed during Enochian for optimal DPS. And, if I recall correctly, White Mages casting cure 2 can see benefits in cure 3's cast time and speed. How about the combos that tanks possess? A gladiator starts with fast slash and is just mindlessly bashing critters, then they get savage blade, learning about aggro, and then Rage of Halone, learning about how important debuffs are to damage mitigation. Every step was necessary to master before understanding the next. The point of all this is, if you're operating on the criteria of unused and ineffective actions, you're going to swiftly find out that there are very few of them in this game. It's not nearly as broken as what some people may say. I understand that a significant chunk of FF14's player base plays on consoles, and, rather than limit this wonderful game for the sake of the limitations of a controller, maybe we should just implement macro tutorials and show them how to make the most of what button real estate they have available to them? Just like everything else I've touched on in my little essay here, it's just another skill to be mastered.

[Lambdafish]

I believe what they meant was getting rid of skills that are literally useless. Ones where players on the forums have asked "why does this exist?" Examples are: Featherfoot, fracture, haymaker, thunder 2, stone 2, feint etc.

Tank cooldowns will not be removed but I can see quite a few being shifted into role specific rather than job specific (awareness, forsight etc.), which I will be waiting to see in action, because the idea of foresight no longer being a WAR skill is an odd concept.

[Norleas]

I believe what they meant was getting rid of skills that are literally useless. Ones where players on the forums have asked "why does this exist?" Examples are: Featherfoot, haymaker

Haymaker and featherfoot are useful, though haymaker I think should be similar to DRK's ability after parrying and be off GCD.

[Felis]

Haymaker and featherfoot are useful, though haymaker I think should be similar to DRK's ability after parrying and be off GCD.

The only problem with Haymaker is the Slow effect.
Never liked the Slow effect since ARR day 1, I miss the Stun effect Haymaker had during 1.x

Feather Feet + Taunt (1.x PGL skill, that make the enemy to attack the PGL 1 time before attacking his primal target again) + Haymaker was a nice combo I used during 1.x.

[Shurrikhan]

The only problem with Haymaker is the Slow effect.
Never liked the Slow effect since ARR day 1, I miss the Stun effect Haymaker had during 1.x

Feather Feet + Taunt (1.x PGL skill, that make the enemy to attack the PGL 1 time before attacking his primal target again) + Haymaker was a nice combo I used during 1.x.

Technically that was Jarring Blow. Haymaker just dealt cheesily serious damage.

And being able to use both while dodging ranged attacks against us on Archer — stun, air-punch for massive damage, stun again...

[Gardes]

The only problem with Haymaker is the Slow effect.
Never liked the Slow effect since ARR day 1, I miss the Stun effect Haymaker had during 1.x

Always thought that haymaker should have been bind effect. If we're gonna have the back/flank mechanic I mean.

[Alistaire]

Always thought that haymaker should have been bind effect. If we're gonna have the back/flank mechanic I mean.

Why not give it pacification? That'd be more useful and make more sense. You're not really stuck after getting hit like that, just dazed.

And apparently in 1.0 it had a bonus hitting from the front, which also makese sense and would be nice to have back.

[Lokier]

snip

Stone 2 is great in raids and parties... I can buff everyone at once, not one person at a time. It's a time saver, for me anyway. Stone 2... I dunno that might be okay to get rid of.
Thunder 2 is useful for me because I do a lot of leveling roulette, and if I'm nerfed down to a certain level that I can't use thunder 3, but I'm able to use thunder 2, I'm using thunder 2...

[Norleas]

Thunder 2 is useful for me because I do a lot of leveling roulette, and if I'm nerfed down to a certain level that I can't use thunder 3, but I'm able to use thunder 2, I'm using thunder 2...

Thunder 2 should just be converted into a trait instead for thunder 1, and thunder 3 should just be called thunder 2.

[Talraen]

Instead of removing sleep, I'd like to see them make it a cross-class spell for the healer role. That way, you can guarantee every dungeon party has access to it, which would let them actually make it relevant.