4.3 Job Changes & Buffs - What do you expect? What should they be?

[Shurrikhan]

As per above.

Here is a reddit translation of the Live Letter info in regards to job adjustments.

Summary: DRK - No adjustments for Dark Arts, Potency increase, Defense portion increased, usability improved (8 items), Plunge buff, animation cooldown will be reduced.

MNK - Enmity supress skill will be added, though the trade off is firepower when used.

SAM - Potency increase. Basic combo potency increase. Adding enmity control in one of SAM's skills, also hints on some others.

NIN - DD based usability will be adjusted (DD is assumed to be Deep Dungeon in this context)

BLM - Aetherial Manipulation and Between the Lines animation adjustments.

SCH - Pet usability adjustments

AST - Attack based spells cast time reduced, Lightspeed MP reduction effect from 25% to 50%, but damage inflict down effect will be removed. Aspected Helios will be buffed.

For Japanese speakers, you can also peruse the 5/11 Nekokuma interview, though the information is nearly identical (a bit less vague in some points).

Here is my attempt at a translation for said interview:

Patch 4.3 Adjustments/Tuning:

• Consult the 4.3 patch notes for fine details.
• Provides tuning/balance adjustment for 7 jobs, DRK, MNK, NIN, BLM, SCH, AST.

DRK

• We were unable to make any fundamental changes with this patch, but we've tuned and fixed up as much as we can for now.
• Many have asked to make Dark Arts easier to use, but we'd like for you to continue using Dark Arts as Dark Arts.
• 8 actions have been adjusted through increased strength, defensive strength, or convenience.
• We've buffed Plunge. We've shortened the animation lock following its use.

MNK

• Since we've added a enmity-suppressing skill to Samurai, Monk will receive the same. However, we'd like for it to be one where the Monk must really consider where to use it.

NIN

• No [changes] related to actual power, only to ease of use. These [changes] should be fun to see in the context of the new Deep Dungeon.

SAM

• Purely and simply, Samurai's raw firepower has been increased. Basic combo weaponskills have been buffed. 5 actions strengthened in total.
• We've also added an enmity suppression effect somewhere into Samurai's toolkit.

BLM

• Movement speed caused by Ley Lines and Aetherial Manipulation increased.

SCH

• Pet independent/autonomous actions improved upon, but *["not by much" or "that's not all"]. (*Probably the prior.)

AST

• The cast times of attack spells have been shortened extremely.
• Light Speed MP cost decrease buffed by a further* 25% or 50%. Additionally, we've made adjustments like removing the damage penalty and causing it to also shorten recast times in addition to just the cast times themselves. (*Additive or multiplicative increase uncertain.)
• Aspected Helix buffed.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________

So, as for the purpose of the thread...

1. Where left vague, what exact changes do you predict?

2. Will these changes be sufficient for the balance and/or enjoyment of your class (where some ideal form of tuning or minor tweaks could have provided such)?

[Dualgunner]

If Plunge gets an enmity modifier that'd be pretty neato.

I kind of hope someday RDM will get some buffs to either its damage or its support kit. If BLM = SAM, SMN = MNK, and RDM = NIN, then RDM needs a bit more than Embolden imo.

[KageTokage]

No adjustments for Dark Arts really bothers me, because the fact that Syphon Strike consumes it is one of the biggest reasons for why DRK feels clunky right now.

As far as NIN goes, I'm not really sure how they intend to change it for PotD's sake, because the only thing it really has to worry about is positionals, and the enemies there lack facing specifically to avoid that issue.

[Shurrikhan]

I'll go ahead and throw out my two cents:

MNK - While I like the idea of trading firepower for enmity, as long as it is no greater an rDPS loss than that faced by the least affected (or most enmity-efficient) tank, I despise the idea of only one job having to deal with it. Even if the job were overtuned to compensate, it would only further increase the value of enmity-efficient tanks (e.g. WAR, mostly just pushing out more Onslaughts during any brief Defiance phases) and the already dominant Ninja. I suspect this will be a hefty enmity drop attached to, say, Purification?

DRK - Finally a Plunge that acts like most charges, rather than like Jump. Not sure what to expect from the usability/convenience adjustments. This seems to be proceeding in a good direction, but I wish we could at least hear a bit more about their thoughts on what they'd want to change for the next expansion, rather than stating only that no large, fundamental changes can be made in a given patch. I'm especially put off by the condescending tone of the 'let it be what it is' "ダークアーツを使いすぎではないかという声はあるが、ダークアーツはダークアーツで使ってもらう。" Isn't the very nature of what it is, as of Stormblood, and how it impacts the surrounding gameplay, what we've been complaining about? We're not asking for it to be "easier". We're asking for it to feel less shit.

BLM - Faster teleports. Okay. Sounds good.

SCH - Will we finally be seeing netcode and pet responsiveness improvements? By the sounds of it, it'll more likely have to do with how pets condition, inform, and execute scripts.

NIN - Can't make heads or tails of these, either, though I do hope we'll see TCJ turned into something more like Ley Lines, though ending instantly upon exiting its zone. The amount of times the server has counted me as still moving an instantly killed TCJ a good second or two after stopping... ugh.

SAM - Sounds like the enmity suppression will be baked in and basically free (such as on Hagakure), unlike Monk's. Honestly, I would have preferred to see it on Merciful Eyes, so that you're moving between burst and purge/lull phases and there is an element of decision involved, but that would face the same issue as Monk's. SpeedSAM remains a TP-hog, probably the only job in the game to actually need a Goad or Tactician atop Invigorate. Sounds like Speed>DHit will become further dominant as well.

AST - Massive overbuffs? Can we go one expansion without overbuffing AST? It needs help in reliable effective healing and Noct's competitiveness with SCH, not to its general throughput.

Overall - It's sad to see that many core issues such as oGCD clipping clunkiness and ping-to-throughput gaps, relative resource expenditure disparity, stat value and therefore gear optimization disparity, and disparity (especially for healers) in value over states of progression will all see zero improvements. But, it was advertised solely as a job balance change, so I suppose it's a mistake on my part to expect that combat would therefrom see meaningful improvement in any universal way.

[Kabooa]

Black Mage: Allows earlier casting of a spell to begin.

I say this primarily because it's already pretty zip zap zoom.

[Shurrikhan]

As far as NIN goes, I'm not really sure how they intend to change it for PotD's sake, because the only thing it really has to worry about is positionals, and the enemies there lack facing specifically to avoid that issue.

The only other guesses I can make are those to do with Huton, enemies detecting the Ninja through Hide, and the dependence of Ninjutsu average uses per minute on Hide.

[CreinCrein]

Reducing cast times for AST probably means their offensive spells behave like old bard/mch, 1.5s cast/2.5s rescast; helps a lot with the weaving issue.

[Ash_]

That translation makes me feel less apprehensive about NIN. So far each patch it's been -20 there, +20 there, -20 there again... Changes to make us more fun in DD must mean they're leaving our potencies alone at least. I hope.

[mosaicex]

For NIN's change(s?), I'm betting on just Ninki being kept between each floor and that's pretty much it.

[Remedi]

If the changes to lightspeed will include a shorter GCD than ye that'll be an overbuff