[dev1206] Class Reforms: why the 15/11 limit?

[Nagamaki]

I'll provide an example where the horizontal variety can make a real impact which is often discounted.

Replacing targeted -na spells will a universal has a significant negative effect on what the player can prioritize, in certain situations. Any time you only have 1 debuff on you the effect is more or less the same, although MP cost, casting time and recast time can't be set individually, but I wouldn't say that this is a huge loss as long as the catch-all spell has values towards the low end.

However if some attack (Bad Breath type attacks) or combination of attacks (a chain of WSs by a mob, or actions by different mobs in a group) happen to inflict a bunch of debuffs at the same time, being unable to target what you want to remove means being at the mercy of whatever mechanic is used to select what is removed.

The devs could design a priority order (silence is removed first, then para, then slow, then dots in a certain order) but that order wouldn't necessarily be optimal in every situation. Removing silence first makes a lot of sense for casters in most cases but is obviously useless for melees, except everyone can cast some spells (maybe not MNK DRG WAR depending what is excluded then, but all classes). Then in some fights a dot might do insane damage and be absolute priority while in another it does very little, etc.

Alternately they could use FIFO or LIFO (First In First Out, Last In First Out), ie remove the oldest or newest debuff respectively. Could also be based on remaining duration. Works, but a lot of the time the order in which you remove them won't be the order you might have wished for.

In XI you basically had a combination of the 2 types for white magic debuff removal (a range of -na for common debuffs and Erase as a catch-all for the rest, with Esuna being added later as an AoE version that could remove multiple debuffs and remove almost any type when certain conditions were met) but then dancer only had a catch-all with a ridiculously long recast and holy crap did it suck, especially when dealing with paralysis on you.

I suppose if the catch-all is nearly free, instacast with no recast none of those things matter, and almost any implementation would be better than Healing Waltz so we aren't doomed to something that bad, but combining the actions can make a real difference in this case, and there are situations where other common combinations being separatable can come into play such as with buffs and monsters with buff steal abilities, monsters that change element during battle, etc.

I'm eager to see how the class reform will play out in game but I think having concerns about some real losses in flexibility and the fate of the elemental wheel system is very legitimate given what we currently know.

[Monsalvato]

I'll provide an example where the horizontal variety can make a real impact which is often discounted.

Very good example.
As I said before, I wouldn't mind some solidification/homogeneization of -na spells. FFXI has a plethora, maybe too many, grouping them together in, say, 4 or 5 spells would be something I wouldn't mind, but releasing only a single spell for everything is really a loss in terms of game depth, imho.

P.S.
Are you the same Nagamaki from the Elemental Gorgets tests many years ago in FFXI?



@Orophinn
That's one hypothesys I came up with, which I could sum up with:
1) We have UI limits with the max number of actions
2) Balancing all these actions for all the classes/jobs will be quite a huge effort for the small team handling live FFXIV, which would have consequences on the amount of other things we can fix and content we can add
3) Why don't we set a simple 15 actions limit for every class? That will greatly reduce the load of work for us until 2.0 is out, at that point we'll do things the way we want them without having to accept these compromises
4) Win!

Were this true... I honestly wouldn't have any problem with it. And I can also understand why they can't clearly tell us it's that way, it wouldn't be right from a P.R. point of view, would it? Especially now that they're gonna start to charge people.
But really, if things were that way I wouldn't mind, I'd just consider it a necessary compromise to accept while 2.0 is on the way.
But if that's wrong and this is just the first signal of the new direction they want to game to go... then yes, I'm a bit sad.

P.S.
Are you Orophinn of Tribe LS, maybe?

[Nagamaki]

P.S.
Are you the same Nagamaki from the Elemental Gorgets tests many years ago in FFXI?

Yep, although I'd say my biggest contribution was figuring out, parsing and posting how accuracy and accuracy level correction worked (+2 = +1%, base % when acc == eva, etc). Still baffles me how long people had been arguing about gear without bothering to figure out something as basic as that.

[Orophin]

Very good example.
P.S.
Are you Orophinn of Tribe LS, maybe?

Newp, I'm the Orophin with one n on Figaro in Phoenix Order LS. I played on Gilgamesh in FF11.