An open petition / discussion about Animation Lock and FFXIV

[Dreadnought]

Animation lock for high power weaponskills and abilities so that the usefullness of the skill is balanced in part, or in whole, by the period of vulnerability - fine.

Animation lock for normal moves and abilities that aren't that useful (especially when mobility is supposed to be a large part of a character's playstyle - see: Archer) - not fine.

i agree.

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[Dragonhaven]

How about calculating the damage you have done so far into a weapon skill before you move? So you do 3/6 hits it only does 3 hits of the dmg. If you think about it if I punch you in the head, kick you in the jaw and then move out of the way because I'm evading a punch, just because I was not able to finish the combo I was preforming on your doesn't mean it did nothing, your head still hurts and your jaw is still jacked!

As far as being locked for a short amount of time for a WS that would be fine, however, coupled with the lag from the server and the fact that you cant move after a WS is over for a few seconds (happens to me all the time) the animation lock should be removed or set to a fraction of what it is and the lag will take care of the rest. I think Iffrits ability timers should be increased as well to compensate for the lag issue.

[Krausus]

for the record i hated WoW and no SWTOR is not a WoW clone.

ok im not going to compare SWTOR with FFXIV but SWTOR is as close to a WoW clone as you can come aside from the skin and story. And yes I have played it.

[Shoopdadoopdoop]

what has been said about keeping position for a certain skill or set of skills seems nice.

personally, i am a player who viewed animation lock as something that needed to be completely removed before opening this thread, but the above posts have definitely opened my eyes. The is fact that when I start an attack like doomspike or chaos thrust, my damage appears roughly 1-3 seconds before I can select my next ability or move.

the solution to this problem isn't to allow me to move when i perform the weaponskill. the solution is to make my damage appear when I am able to cast again, thus accurately signaling the duration of this period of manditory idleness.

dev; give us some type of channeling bar, cast bar, or indicator on our action bar or in each skills description of time needed to perform each WS. chaos thrusts animation is.. what 2-3 seconds long? why not just use the current casting bar on all WSes?

[Dreadnought]

ok im not going to compare SWTOR with FFXIV but SWTOR is as close to a WoW clone as you can come aside from the skin and story. And yes I have played it.

lol its so not the closest. aion is closer as a wow clone. Rift is WoW. just because there are certain things that are quite standard for MMOs doesnt make it a WoW clone.
sure there are lots of things that fit in the WoW clone veriety but nothing compared to sooooo many other games out there.

[Krausus]

lol its so not the closest. aion is closer as a wow clone. Rift is WoW. just because there are certain things that are quite standard for MMOs doesnt make it a WoW clone.
sure there are lots of things that fit in the WoW clone veriety but nothing compared to sooooo many other games out there.

lol its ok to like WoW, no one will judge you.

[MegaMage]

Hi Mega Mage,

As a few others have mentioned, I think we need to make sure we're not confusing Animation Lock vs. Server Lag / Latency in the Ifrit fight. (BTW, I'm not saying you don't get it, just stating it for everyone.)

lackofwords' post brings up some very good examples of why real Animation Lock (remaining in place while your Attack is executing) is a valid part of many games.

Look at one of the most famous examples of this in games:

* Street Fighter's Dragon Punch (Shoryuken)

If you execute a Dragon Punch at the wrong time (too early or late), you are wide open to a counter attack from your opponent. That's the risk you take with executing this attack at any given time in battle.

Same here with Ifrit. If you choose to spam Chaos Thrust (long animation, powerful attack), then you have to be prepared to time it right. Ifrit's timing is something one can learn after fighting it a few times. You'll know when you can safely execute a Chaos Thrust, or when you can't.

If we ask the devs to completely remove any true Animation Lock, then people can spam any Spell or Ability or Weaponskill with complete abandon. I can imagine scenarios like this:

* During some major Boss Battle, you focus and cast the most powerful spell in the game (e.g., Ultima or Mega Flare or Fire IV, etc.). Or execute whatever Weaponskill you want.
* Boss starts Dangerous Attack.
* (With No Animation Lock) Move instantly and avoid the attack.
* Repeat.

At that point, all you have to do is just look for Visual Tells (Ground Glow), etc., and just move. The difficulty and danger is greatly nullified. Repeat.

There is a give-and-take in Combat. You can't just spam a Shinkuu Hadoken (Super Fireball) and move instantly on the next frame if you see an Opponent land next to you and start their Super or Ultra. It's about the player finding the right moments in battle to execute their attacks.

Note that Server Lag / Latency is something completely separate and hopefully they do resolve that (as promised with 2.0).

I agree with a lot of things you said, however my post was generally geared away from the removal of animation lock in Weapon Skills and more-to-do with abilities and certain types of spells. I agree that animation lock should most likely stay as is for weapon skills (besides scaling the level/power of a weapon skill to how long the animation lock lasts). However, this concept doesn't lend itself well to things like using abilities or curing.

As it stands healing utilities are already really low. Additionally, the way that animation lock causes you to lose control of your character for such an extended period of time makes it so that using no abilities is considered the best option. This means healing has come down to 1 or 2 spells and stoneskin. However, even this isn't enough to deal with the lag and animation lock endured while trying to keep a tank alive. When I am curing in almost anything that requires movement during the fight...I find myself trying to cancel a cure when I need to move urgently (nearly impossible once you gotten past the very short cast bar) and unfortunately being totally unable to. This may be due to the short cast time or server latency/lag but in any event it leads to the same outcome time and again. My character stops running away from eruption or ghosts, etc to cast a cure and ends up biting the dirt. All over an overly long cast animation lock and lag between casting spells and things that kill you displaying on the ground/around you.

Obviously, I've learned to deal with this and adapt for wins, but more times then not even adapting to the situation isn't enough. You can't predict when something will be too laggy to save yourself or when a cure you thought you cancelled ends up locking you in place 2 seconds later and killing you even though you had moved and tried to do your job to the best of your ability. This would be solved if animation lock wasn't in existence. Why do we have to wait for a new server structure when they are asking us to pay now? Even if it was laggy, as long as animation lock wasn't there I still wouldn't be dying.

I totally agree that lag/latency is also part of this issue and didn't glance over it for any other reason than I'd like to address one thing at a time. I believe if we narrow our questions down and petition for attention on a case to case basis we are more likely to receive direct answers.

[Buddhsie]

lol ok, cuz your opinion is infallible.
i happen to dissagree and so do soooooo many other people including the great reviews by other dev companies.
for the record i hated WoW and no SWTOR is not a WoW clone.

if you enjoy terrible features such as sub targets and animation lock on every. single. ability... then i guess im the one with the infallible opinion. i wouldnt be surprised if you want lame Gobbue mounts too.

Well friends of mine and myself must be wrong because they've played WoW for years and strongly agree with me that SWTOR is a reskinned WoW. I enjoy realism, not sliding along the ground during an ability, or using a powerful weapon skill that allows you to run around during (lol). It's funny how god awful all of the abilities in SWTOR look, be thankful we don't have to look at that shit when we play FFXIV.

[Vmage]

I'm glad animation lock is leaving... it really doesn't have a place outside of action RPGs, just a silly leftover idea of square's when they prioritized graphics over gameplay.

And honestly.. if you didn't realize animation lock was on the way out for spells/abilities/weaponskills when they completely removed it for sheathing/unsheathing your weapon.. you were just kidding yourself.

The majority of players want an active playstyle anymore, and waiting to push a button doesn't really cut it..

sure, it does add a certain element of difficulty to the fight... but it's so insignificant compared to what mainstream MMOs require their raiders to do now it's just silly...

[Dragon]

Please don't reference SWTOR, it sucks, like.. a lot.

This.

SWTOR has horrifying animation, both inside battle and outside (eg. cutscene animation), the graphics are PS2-era crap, and the questing is pathetic. Being the BioWare/KOTOR fan I am, I was utterly disgusted by it this past week.

I just want to know if the people here really are expecting to be able to cast spells and shoot bows without any sort of animation lock.

If you ask me, most of the animation lock in FFXIV makes sense. Yes, a person should stand still to shoot an arrow and cast a spell. Those kinds of things should require focus, which really isn't gonna happen when running around.

Or, are you guys arguing that there should be no animation lock in the sense that we should be able to move at all times, but doing so would cancel things like spell casts and shooting bows?

If its the latter, then I am fine with such an idea. If you guys want to be able to do anything without having to think about smart positioning and timing your actions, then I'd have to say you're just lazy and want a brainless way to win.

Exactly.

If you've no problems canceling an ability/move/spell/whatever, then yeah, you should be able to move. But simply being able to move during an animation without having to cancel whatever you're doing should never happen (except through ingame stats such as "Concentration").