QoL and Other Small Changes Proposal

[TWOxACROSS]

I've been thinking about this for a little bit, and while I've been enjoying Stormblood, there are a few things that just seem like they would be enjoyable changes.

• Give us the option for more Favored Destinations. There are now potentially nearly ten different major locations, from city-states to the end-game towns (eg, Mor Dhona, Idyllshire), and yet we still only have the option for three. This should at least have been increased by one for each new expansion - especially with teleport costs reaching at most 999 gil; it seems like a pittance, but that not only adds up, but it also does nothing to help in-game economies whatsoever because that money is just thrown to the aether.

• Show quest objective and FATEs as the arrows when they are outside of view on our main map, as they are on our mini-map.

• Remove the periods at the end of available options in an aetheryte teleport list. It happened sometime back in ARR, and it always just look garish.

• Allow us to /soothe training dummies in order to drop their aggro and exit combat without having to stray far from their threat range, just to switch jobs or alter actions we would like to continuing testing

• Allow the Recommendations window to be closed on controller by pressing the cancel button. Every other window will close with the tap of the cancel key, and yet this window is the odd man out, and it's somewhat frustrating when using it for a quick reference.

• Add an additional element to gear info windows that outlines whether an item can be placed in the armoire or not.

• Separate the Company Actions Credit Exchange menu based on the level of the actions to be purchased. The list is long and somewhat overwhelming trying to find the right level I or level II actions.

• Increase the rewards of the Adventurer In Need bonus. It's difficult to want to join a duty expressly for that bonus when it feels like such a pittance. The daily bonus is about the only reason to do the roulettes. If we want to reduce queue times, giving players more incentive to keep queuing will certainly help with that.

• Similarly, create a notice that can tell us when a roulette's Adventurer In Need is our current job (when that necessity changes, and perhaps when we change jobs). I know I'd be more inclined to queue more if I knew what was in need without having to look.

• Reduce Sprint's cooldown to 30 seconds as it was originally, while keeping its duration at 20 seconds. We spend more time waiting for Sprint to come off of cooldown than we do actually being able to sprint. I still don't quite get while it was increased to begin with; is there some concern of potential exploits I'm not aware of?

• Change the animation of the Machinist's Gauss Round, possibly replacing it with (the now gone) Rend Mind animation of kneeling to take a shot. The animation for Gauss Round is incredibly drab and uninspired, since we just stand there and shoot, and the animation of Rend Mind had character to it, something a special attack should have.

• Add some sort of visual effect to the Red Mage's Balance meter to show the induction of Dualcast. Job meters were created so we aren't trying to find job-specific buffs from amidst our Status icons, and yet Dualcast, an integral part of a this job's design, is not given any sort of presentation. It might not be exactly hard to find out if you are under the effect of Dualcast, but it's not a change that would have an adverse effect.

• Show an Astrologian's cards that are ready in their Status bar in the party list, to help a party (and especially other Astrologian's) better understand what cards might be ready for play.

• Similarly, change the white mage's Confession stacks so that a white mage cannot see another fellow white mage's Confession stacks, or barring that, add some sort of differentiation between your Confession stacks and theirs.

• Give players the option to use the PvP single-Key combo attack function in PvE. It obviously works well enough in PvP, and while much was done to curb button bloat in the game, the lack of this option in PvE is one of the simplest ways to address it! As a dark knight, I can reduce my number of keys from six to two. Just an option to have single-key combos will help players on PS4/controllers further deal with button bloat. Of course, PvP itself has many combos and changes that don't apply directly to PvE very well, but in the case of legitimate weaponskill combos, this could be an extremely helpful option. The function already exists in the game, so consider bringing it PvE-side as well.
  
  Barring this, perhaps create a macro for /combo, allowing players to make their own combination macros how they might see fit to enhance their own play experience and ease the burden of a multitude of keys. If I were to then create a Power Slash combo of my own for my dark knight, I need only create something like...
  
  /combo
  /ac "Hard Slash"
  /ac "Spinning Slash"
  /ac "Power Slash"
  
  ...where everything following the /combo macro will follow down the command list, replacing the icons as it goes through. This function would be similar in constraints to the /macrolock that prevents other macros from being used until other commands are executed.

• On the subject of PvP, when reviewing our available skills in the PvP Profile, show in a PvP skill's help window that it will replace a skill in a combo. This might seem obvious to most, but for instance, take Red Mage, where things like Impact, Verholy, and Verflare replace Jolt, Verstone, and Verfire (respectively). It is not mentioned that they are a combo from something, or that they replace something when available for use, so it can be a bit confusing to locate where on a hotbar these skills will appear when they proc.

• Similarly, make more Action icons change depending on ability flow. For instance, a Warrior's Defiance and Deliverance will automatically change Inner Beast and Steel Cyclone appropriately depending on their stance; a Machinist's Gauss Barrel becomes Remove Barrel; but more skills could benefit from these replacements and help with button bloat, eg Wheeling Thrust and Fang and Claw;

• Could there be an option to use macro icons of actions without showing the cost of the ability, in situations where it is being used only as an icon - similar to an emote's motion option to only show the animation, not the text regarding it. If possible, while using a macro icon sans its cost, it not being grayed out because its unusable for whatever circumstances would be nice as well. If we're using it simply as an icon, and it's only for personal use anyway, this would nice.

• While being able to see most skills we will be able to learn, may we have the option of applying unlearned skills to our hotbars in order to better organize out skills, ensure we have the space where we might want, and to have them readily available for use upon learning them, without having to fiddle around in situations where it might be immediately useful to use them. Essentially, allowing us to use our downtime to frontload our skill organization. I've already done this by creating placeholder macros, but that takes more time and it would be so helpful to have the suggested alternative.

• Give players the option to change the size and position of the text boxes in the HUD Layout menu. Similarly, allow us to alter the size of floating text and the size of displayed names with greater ease and customization.

• Change the Mentor icon from a golden crown to a watering can. Mentors are meant to help the "sprouts" grow, and a watering can perfectly encompasses that intent. Oftentimes mentors are not seen as a helpful bunch, and many say they only put on the crown because it's a crown, which sort of implies dominance over others, without helping anyone. Making the icon a watering can will prevent people from being a mentor (or wearing the icon) simply because a crown looks cool. Also maybe do a little more to moderate the actions of mentors, especially those that are reported for their unhelpful behavior that runs counter to what being a mentor is supposedly all about.

• This may be a tall order, but remove the the loss of actions when level syncing. With the new changes to jobs, many of them feel awkward at in-between levels; for instance, the machinist gets the Gauss Barrel at 52, which as of Stormblood has a heat mechanic attached to its 5% damage increase. Over time, you'll reach 100 heat and go into Overheat for some extra damage, but then also locking out Gauss Barrel for ten seconds. Not until Lv62 (ten levels away!) does the machinist get a tool, Cooldown, to manage their rising heat when using Gauss Barrel. Then, it isn't until Lv64 that machinists actually benefit from any sort of increased heat with the Heated shots. There's an entire range of 10-12 levels of content where the machinist feels awkward and clunky because it lacks the utilities that the job ultimately makes use of. We've already gotten level syncs on our gear, why can we not at least get a sync on action potency, instead of losing them entirely.
  
  This also speaks to a larger problem, which was somewhat remedied with the changes to bard and machinist from Heavensward - back then, once you got Wanderer's Minuet and Gauss Barrel, your entire playstyle had to change to accommodate for the cast times, causing a stark difference between playing the jobs at high and low levels. Now, unfortunately, most other classes feel incomplete when mid-level, or level synced. Instead of feeling like we're gathering utilities that benefit our job and role, which all harmonize as we level up, we are building up to being a well-oiled machine at Lv70, but otherwise lack the harmony in a lot of ways.

• And this might be a grand request but seriously - bring back battlecraft leves for Stormblood! Levequests are (to me, at least) always a nice way to grab some experience while soloing for a bit, and the use of leveplates was unique in its own right, very nice for FFXIV lore and such. Now, in Heavensward, there was a dropoff in interest, which I would say was primarily due to the fact that you were not brought back to the levequest counter upon completion in order to turn quests in for rewards; it became a terrible inconvenience to not have ARR's previous warp-back mechanic, but please do not mistake the desire to avoid this inconvenience as disinterest in levequests as a whole!
  
  One of the best parts about FFXIV is the myriad ways that a player can choose to level themselves up and get stronger, don't leave the leves behind!

These are just the ones I can remember at the moment, not sure if there are any more worthwhile ones, or if they and even these are wishful thinking. Thanks for reading, and possibly thanks for consideration!(?)