Flexible DPS Limit Breaks

[Akava]

My raid group recently did a bit of restructuring and we found ourselves with no melee dps, so I changed jobs because I personally felt a lack of melee LB was a big deal. This got me thinking about the Limit break system from a dps point of view.

If in a future patch, the dev team added a way for dps to choose between Single Target, Line AoE or Circular AoE, would that be a positive change? What would it do to group compositions? Would some jobs suddenly be left out in the cold?

[Kabzy]

I'm not too sure this would ever happen, mainly because of the animations. Could you really see a BLMs Meteor doing ST damage? (They're definitely not going to create a bunch of new animations for all of the jobs, lets be real.)

If it were to be implemented, in most raid scenarios they would all just take the ST LB3, unless there's an add phase like in o3s. Then the user would be whoever it inconveniences the least. That would literally be the only change to the meta.

Edit: If you actually meant they had access to all three at the same time, then I would say it would make zero difference. No DPS jobs are selected based on their LB3, it's all down to utility and DPS numbers as usual.

[Avatre]

I don't think they would do it because button bloat. Have to have three separate buttons just for the LB if you have one being single target, one being line AoE, and one being the normal caster circle AoE. While it is a good idea, just not practical.

[FaileExperiment]

easiest option here is to just have ranged LB's do damage according to how many enemies they hit. So if a ranged LB only hits one target, it does damage as if it were a single target LB. if two or more targets are in range, it does it's current damage.

Easy to code, easy to understand, no animation changes needed. Certainly, I don't think we need to give melee LB's ranged damage type options, that's hardly ever an issue.

[Taika]

I think the developers want to keep the LBs separate because they try to encourage diverse party compositions. The only issue I have with LBs is that the ranged one is really useless - can't remember any other significant fight where we've ever used it than Sephirot ex.

[Riko_Futatabi]

They should rework limit breaks perhaps. I've always liked the idea of each party member having their own personal limit break 1, 2 and 3; and being able to select which one they'd like to use. I'd go into more detail, but I currently have a headache and want to go sleep. XD

[Lilseph]

I think the developers want to keep the LBs separate because they try to encourage diverse party compositions. The only issue I have with LBs is that the ranged one is really useless - can't remember any other significant fight where we've ever used it than Sephirot ex.

It was sometimes used as an oh-sh** LB when either the caster is down or when you don't have a caster in your group at all (DRG+NIN+MCH+BRD meta). The only advantage I can think of using the ranged LB, is the short animation lock compared to the caster one. But then again, it depends on the encounter and your composition.

As for the OP, I think we could have a system like the role actions, where you pick what kind of LB you can use: Either AoE, conal or single target. You can only pick one from the actions windows and you're locked until the encounter ends (wipe, clear, whatever)

[Ryaz]

I personally think the LB system needs an overhaul. The damage it does it nice, but in the end, all it does is shorten kill time by about 5-10 seconds. Heck, I've seen people refuse to LB because it hurts their personal dps.The only REALLY useful one is the healer one when you're failing hard.

[Raldo]

I'd rather just see the system we have in PvP (everyone's LBs are separate); it would solve a lot of problems. It doesn't directly address your issue, but having a single melee LB would no longer be make-or-break. If they went this route though, they'd really need to ease up on the animation lock of LBs since everyone would probably use them more often (or make the animation spawn a clone of the player to do the long animation, while the player is still free to continue moving and hitting). We'd probably lose the ability of healer LBs to raise everyone, but that's a sacrifice I'm willing to make.

[akaneakki]

I think the developers want to keep the LBs separate because they try to encourage diverse party compositions. The only issue I have with LBs is that the ranged one is really useless - can't remember any other significant fight where we've ever used it than Sephirot ex.

And v3s unless you skip add phase.