Twinfinite Interview

[Naunet]

Look at other games with talents points and how people will kick you for not having the best build.

I can also look at games with talent-like systems that have managed to create something where there are multiple competitive builds. In WildStar, for example, the spellslinger class has 5+ perfectly viable builds that people can use depending on their familiarity with the class, the class runes they have available to them, or the buff/debuff needs of their raid group.

It's possible, but it takes a bit of effort on the part of the devs, as well as a less rigid community.

[Iromi]

That a issue I find with Meta and how hypocritical some people can be when asking for new and more options when they themselves will only use that new options when it can fit into a new Meta to replace old Meta.

Meta is like a disease that can ruin a game for anyone and puts a set up imaginary expectation on people to follow or they will become a outcast to the community.

My group, since 1.0 days (shoot, even in FFXI) has been doing fights waaaay outside the norm and we use all jobs. Meta is really sad I agree...way too much hive mind.

[Zojha]

That's why in well designed games that have customization on the player's scale, several situations calls for different builds that can coexist.

Followed by the ability to more or less conveniently swap builds so you can have the meta build for each situation >_>
Because those builds don't really "co-exist": They replace each other. In one situation one is better, in the other situation the other is better, so the best strategy is to switch to the currently better one every time. If you can't do that? You pick the one for the most common situation.

For two builds to truly co-exist, they need to be roughly equally good, i.e. balanced. That is the entire crux behind customization: It needs to be well balanced. Your choice essentially needs to be irrelevant to performance, it needs to be mostly an aesthetic or gameplay choice. I can tell you that even in this game, where the only customization you have is choosing a job to main, jobs will be left in the gutter if the team fails to balance them. Because that's what already happened with AST at the start of HW.

The same would naturally apply to builds within a job. If the choices are balanced? Great! Bring it on. Once performance deviates significantly, issues arise.

The degree of balance needed is decided by the tolerance threshold of the community for subpar choices. Some have higher, some have lower. You just have to guess that one when making decisions.

[Stanelis]

Followed by the ability to more or less conveniently swap builds so you can have the meta build for each situation >_>
Because those builds don't really "co-exist": They replace each other. In one situation one is better, in the other situation the other is better, so the best strategy is to switch to the currently better one every time. If you can't do that? You pick the one for the most common situation.For two builds to truly co-exist, they need to be roughly equally good, i.e. balanced. That is the entire crux behind customization: It needs to be well balanced. Your choice essentially needs to be irrelevant to performance, it needs to be mostly an aesthetic or gameplay choice. I can tell you that even in this game, where the only customization you have is choosing a job to main, jobs will be left in the gutter if the team fails to balance them. Because that's what already happened with AST at the start of HW.

You can perfectly imagine that the two builds can coexist together in the group if they have different purposes. If you were to give a dps spec to current tanks (for example), you could perfectly imagine a group with a war tank and a war DPS. You could also imagine a system where customization alter your rotation but not your output (it is something that blizzard does in the modern wow, some talents only purpose is to alter rotations).

Furthermore, don't forget that we pay SE to optimize and design their game. As such the fact it is hard to come up with isn't really my concern (especially when a) it is a matter solved by a blackboard and a piece of chalk, we re not talking about technical issues here and b) SE has decades of experience designing RPG battle systems).

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

You can perfectly imagine that the two builds can coexist together in the group. If you were to give a dps spec to current tanks (for example), you could perfectly imagine a group with a war tank and a war DPS.

Furthermore, don't forget that we pay SE to optimize and design their game. As such the fact it is hard isn't really my concern (especially when it is a matter solved by a blackboard and a piece of chalk).

But then what if you only have war dps, becuase most wars i see play it as dps anyway.

[Driavna]

...

I'm a ex wildstar player too (also GW/GW2) and those "viable" builds where more about adapting for each encounter and type of content, but yes, the illusion of choice and being able to try stuff for yourself is always nice. However I still remember an article (sadly I can't find it) explaining how people fail at raids mostly due bad talent choices for that type of content during vanilla WoW times. In reality "options" are more often than not a "stupidity test".

I'm not against choices, as I said try stuff for yourself is fun, but there is always going to be a better option and a lot of bad ones.

[Stanelis]

But then what if you only have war dps, becuase most wars i see play it as dps anyway.

Please note I m only using this as an example of something functional that has been in wow since 2010 or so. If you were to ask me I'd say FFXIV is sorely in need of a support role and a party size increase to allow for more depths to be added in the group battle system.

Even though a specialization system could be really interesting in FFXIV, especially when a job such as red mage is being released.

[Bourne_Endeavor]

You can perfectly imagine that the two builds can coexist together in the group if they have different purposes. If you were to give a dps spec to current tanks (for example), you could perfectly imagine a group with a war tank and a war DPS. You could also imagine a system where customization alter your rotation but not your output (it is something that blizzard does in the modern wow, some talents only purpose is to alter rotations).

Furthermore, don't forget that we pay SE to optimize and design their game. As such the fact it is hard to come up with isn't really my concern (especially when a) it is a matter solved by a blackboard and a piece of chalk, we re not talking about technical issues here and b) SE has decades of experience designing RPG battle systems).

By doing that you have effective doubled the amount of balancing required. You disagreed earlier, but the fact remains FFXIV uses being able to swap jobs on the fly as its diversity. Instead of having Warrior be a tank or DPS, you can play any Dragoon, Monk or Bard. Yes, they all play functionally different but that is how XIV wants to differentiate itself. There is never going to be an instance where jobs hybrid into another role. The closest equivalent we have is Arcanist, which the devs have flatout said they despise because it's a nightmare to balance Summoner and Scholar. None of this attributes to better design. Okay, Warrior is a DPS and Dragoon can play tank. If they aren't properly balanced, one or both builds will be sidelined.

Making the rotation a bit less rigid could be something to touch on. Even if it's merely altering damage, you could perhaps move certain abilities around to your preferred method of pressing them. It's something at least.

[Ririta]

The closest equivalent we have is Arcanist, which the devs have flatout said they despise because it's a nightmare to balance Summoner and Scholar.

I bet it's salt over 2.0, 2.1 and 2.2 and how black mages were inferior to summoners even after they removed Thunder.

[Zojha]

You can perfectly imagine that the two builds can coexist together in the group if they have different purposes. If you were to give a dps spec to current tanks (for example), you could perfectly imagine a group with a war tank and a war DPS.

Yes, you would no longer compete with your DPS spec in that case. You would, however, now compete with the tank specs of other jobs. Feral druids had that issue in Classic WoW: Nobody wanted a Feral tank, because Feral tank sucked. I can still remember the whispers at the time:"You heal?" "Sorry, nope." "Then spec it." End of conversation.

I can only repeat: As long as the choices perform within the communities tolerance threshold, it's all fun and games. You can do "anything" as long as that condition is met - Builds, Augments, New Jobs, Roles... let your mind run free. There are numerous examples that you don't need 'perfect' balance to allow people to choose: White mages are currently suboptimal, but people aren't mass booting them. Outside of EX/Savage, most people don't even care whether you choose to meld or not, let alone which melds you choose. There is a margin in which customization can, in fact, happen.

But I do not trust SE to hit that margin, truth be told. They're already struggling as is and they have most experience with single-player games that don't have to consider balance in the first place, because nobody cares how you play your single-player games. Insta-killing a boss with fenix down is almost a staple in the series, but it's just not viable design in MMORPG. Likewise, your characters will never complain because they're walled out of certain jobs in your playthrough - Players will. There's a world of difference and their lack of experience with that shows.

So yeah, I think if SE really did more customization, I'm quite sure they'd do it wrong and just create a mass of non-choices that serve no purpose but to confuse people. Feel free to be more optimistic than I.