Letter from the Producer LXII

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Exactly that. Those saying that it's a simple job to fit the gear on all races just because they share the same mesh, have no idea of what else is done for each race specifically. I've seen some modded gear pics where the dye color breaks at certain locations on the mesh from a very small modification.

Ahh, my mistake. So used to people saying "look, modders can do it and they don't even get paid/it's just a hobby!" due to ignorance haha...

[Astarotha]

i think this picture sums up very well the reason they have to go through every piece of gear and QA it and adds context to what yoship was talking about with gear meshes.

look at livias wrist.

this very small motion causes extreme stretch in her texture even though shes a single character with a single model and a 'single' texture with a fixed set of character sliders. now imagine them using a bulk algorithm to process gear, theyd STILL have to go through and manually check each and every gear piece (this could be done by set, with a secondary piece by piece check to make sure a piece of transition texture doesnt end up halfway down a meshes leg, but even with an efficient process its still a lot of stuff to look through) to make sure something like this doesnt happen during movement or that a prim doesnt stretch wierd with the height slider or something (imagine getting a butt slider and any value other than the default causes livia wrist).

[Vahlnir]

i think this picture sums up very well the reason they have to go through every piece of gear and QA it and adds context to what yoship was talking about with gear meshes.

Yeah, I don't think most people doubt how much work it takes to do what they do. I believe them when they say it takes a lot of time and money. I just think that, considering the size of the company, they should be hiring more people and upgrading the equipment required to run this game. They want experienced people. Every company does. But sometimes it's best to bite the bullet and hire someone who may need a little training, especially when doing so would lead to making more money in the long run. It's about common sense as much as it is good business sense. But I guess they need to fund their other projects somehow...and to be completely fair, what I've seen of the FF VII remake so far looks decent enough. Most of the time they put their money to good use. FF XIV just tends to suffer for it.

[Coltvoyance]

Mh. We don't really get much new information from this letter other than the Headgear update on Viera and Hrothgar... (shout out to the overtime devs for that) A majority of the letter though is verbatim language used after or during the FanFests.

Unfortunately, these responses have done little to reassure me of their efforts to "Rebalance Healers". I'm fine with their explanation on why a new healer wasn't added, that's not my beef; it's really their lack of response on how healers will be fixed that worries me.

Their reasoning for adding a new tank to create, essentially, two MT classes and two OT classes is sound in terms of "This is how we'll balance them". I can wrap my head around that. It's a plan of action; a structure to cling to; a methodology to follow. It informs and at least gives me an inkling of an expectation.

But "Healers are a complex situation and we decided to focus on rebalancing them" does nothing to inform me of what's actually happening; what their plan is. It really only tells me "Somethings wrong. Something will change".

As someone who mains the games most maligned healer (WHM) this really just makes me nervous about the whole thing. What is the something that's wrong? Are they even looking at the same problems with the role that I am? How are they fixing it? Are they moving in a direction that makes sense to me or are they completely missing the point? "What will my class look like when all is said and done?" is not a question I can even speculate about because there's literally nothing to go on. At least a Tank player can think "Well they'll either make me like this so I can MT. Or they'll do something like this so I'm an OT.

Information on healer changes is just a big void at this point. And when you acknowledge that an entire role is broken and needs fixing, and then say nothing else... people get a little ancy... Imagine if they just said "DPS is broken in FFXIV. We're changing how all of them work. That is all." and then left everyone in the dark for 5 months. There'd be SO much panic and people making posts going "PLEASE DON'T CHANGE [X] SKILL / [Y] CLASS!"

Just trying to keep my optimism up until the next Live Letter....

[Vahlnir]

Just trying to keep my optimism up until the next Live Letter....

This letter was meant to address some of the more pressing matters, and Yoshi P did that for better or worse. The next letter is supposedly about the battle system changes so if they are going to discuss healer changes at all, it'll probably be in that LL.

[Coltvoyance]

This letter was meant to address some of the more pressing matters, and Yoshi P did that for better or worse. The next letter is supposedly about the battle system changes so if they are going to discuss healer changes at all, it'll probably be in that LL.

Oh I know. With all the information that came out during the FanFests and the fervor that followed, many of their answers to questions got lost or buried for most players. This letter is essentially a compilation of statements to help set the record straight on their position to these matters in an effort to calm the player base.

My post was more to just draw attention that their lack of communication on Healers has had a negative effect and that it hasn't really been acknowledged. Since y'know, everything's been drowned out by all the gender/race chants.

[savageink]

Imagine if they just said "DPS is broken in FFXIV. We're changing how all of them work. That is all." and then left everyone in the dark for 5 months. There'd be SO much panic and people making posts going "PLEASE DON'T CHANGE [X] SKILL / [Y] CLASS!"

Lol! I think that happened with Bard and Machinist when Stormblood started. Totally grey hotbars on log in are not an exaggeration. They did warn us a little right before the expansion came out. I'd expect the same thing for healers this time.

[Alucard135]

Ahh, my mistake. So used to people saying "look, modders can do it and they don't even get paid/it's just a hobby!" due to ignorance haha...

No worries lol. And you're right, I've seen that argument being thrown around by people that don't even know how it works.

Wow... White Knights are out in full force in this thread, talking down anyone that don't praise the devs cause of this "Live Letter". And why do you always have to use the word entitlement too? Like you think you're entitled to get what you're getting in the new expansion is funny stuff...

Proud to be a white knight if it's for giving credit when it's due rather than being an entitled brat throwing false accusations because I didn't get the toy I wanted or expect the dev team to work 24/7 because I pay them 15$/month.

[LiteBrite]

Proud to be a white knight if it's for giving credit when it's due rather than being an entitled brat throwing false accusations because I didn't get the toy I wanted or expect the dev team to work 24/7 because I pay them 15$/month.

Another person that has proven my point. But don't let me stop you from chasing people away from this game....

[Alucard135]

Another person that has proven my point. But don't let me stop you from chasing people away from this game....

That's a good thing. The less entitled players we have the better lol. At least the dev team won't waste resources trying to please them.