Balance, Homogenisation and Encounter Design: The Problem.

[Shurrikhan]

If there was an easy solution to the homogenization issue, DEVs of multiple MMOs would have found it by now.

It's not a matter of all or none. It's a matter of how much. And plenty of MMOs have found ways to achieve tighter balance than our DPS have with less homogeneity among them. Homogeneous classes isn't a fundamental or inevitable issue. It's contextual, dependent upon implementation of the exact toolkits and in the tier's fights.

No one is arguing that there shouldn't be anything alike between jobs, only that most jobs should have more distinct, compelling, and cohesive kits than they currently have.

[RyuDragnier]

It's not a matter of all or none. It's a matter of how much. And plenty of MMOs have found ways to achieve tighter balance than our DPS have with less homogeneity among them. Homogeneous classes isn't a fundamental or inevitable issue. It's contextual, dependent upon implementation of the exact toolkits and in the tier's fights.

No one is arguing that there shouldn't be anything alike between jobs, only that most jobs should have more distinct, compelling, and cohesive kits than they currently have.

The problem is that it then makes the playerbase do the homogenizing. If you want to raid in GW2/ESO, and you want to be healer, but you're not using X class, Y build or Z gear? You're not getting in. Homogenization will happen one way or the other. Either the devs take a hand in this to limit it so most classes can be taken without fuss, or they don't and then the playerbase causes the fuss and the classes are not wanted or won't be allowed into the content, punishing a small subset of players just for playing their class a specific way, homogenizing everybody into specific builds.

[Shurrikhan]

The problem is that it then makes the playerbase do the homogenizing. If you want to raid in GW2/ESO, and you want to be healer, but you're not using X class, Y build or Z gear? You're not getting in. Homogenization will happen one way or the other. Either the devs take a hand in this to limit it so most classes can be taken without fuss, or they don't and then the playerbase causes the fuss and the classes are not wanted or won't be allowed into the content, punishing a small subset of players just for playing their class a specific way, homogenizing everybody into specific builds.

Except there is no such need when jobs are actually balanced decently.

"Taking a hand" only necessarily equates to balancing, not to homogenizing. Replace homogenization with any other action we'd normally rather avoid. Should the law "take a hand" in theft to ensure there's nothing left for the people to steal (thereby "ending theft")? That's effectively the argument you're using here: by providing the worst outcome automatically, we won't feel bad about making things worst for ourselves.

You're conflating homogeneity and balance. Again. You can have balance without homogenization. Is it as easy? No. But should we submit to having only 4 classes in the game -- 1 for each Role -- just because the devs want the easiest means of balancing? No.

[RyuDragnier]

Except there is no such need when jobs are actually balanced decently.

Nothing is ever balanced decently when it comes to raiding. There will always be one move, one skill, one setup, that will be greater than the others. Weaken it, and another will suddenly become better. It's a neverending cycle, you cannot stop the playerbase from creating its own meta, you'll only be playing Whack-A-Mole. Or you do what SE is doing, and homogenize them to begin with, and get things just balanced enough to where people don't care if you bring X or Y class (like how it is currently with tanks).

You're conflating homogeneity and balance. Again. You can have balance without homogenization. Is it as easy? No. But should we submit to having only 4 classes in the game -- 1 for each Role -- just because the devs want the easiest means of balancing? No.

They stand in tandem, quite a bit. Look at GW2 and ESO, classes are not homogenized, and you have the problem with the playerbase homogenizing the setups to do things. It's wildly unbalanced and will never be balanced. Look at the tanks right now in FF14. They're homogenized quite a bit, but they're balanced enough to where nobody is wanting one job more than the others.

[Shurrikhan]

Nothing is ever balanced decently when it comes to raiding. There will always be one move, one skill, one setup, that will be greater than the others. Weaken it, and another will suddenly become better. It's a neverending cycle, you cannot stop the playerbase from creating its own meta, you'll only be playing Whack-A-Mole. Or you do what SE is doing, and homogenize them to begin with, and get things just balanced enough to where people don't care if you bring X or Y class (like how it is currently with tanks).

A rotation between 4 choices according to some prioritized capacity by which one ends up faintly superior for a given fight >>>> only ever having 1 choice, period.

Otherwise, what's your complaint? Even in incredible imbalance you have as many choices as you have under complete homogeneity.

Your "solution" to the worst thing that could happen (one choice) is to enforce... the worst that could happen (one choice).

They didn't need to homogenize to reach balance. All but the tanks were MORE balanced previously, despite LESS homogenization.

[Quri]

They stand in tandem, quite a bit. Look at GW2 and ESO, classes are not homogenized, and you have the problem with the playerbase homogenizing the setups to do things. It's wildly unbalanced and will never be balanced. Look at the tanks right now in FF14. They're homogenized quite a bit, but they're balanced enough to where nobody is wanting one job more than the others.

Tanks had the same mitigation kit since 2.0. Tanks are upset now because DRK is WAR right now. DRK also lost their aoe synergy. Three of the skills are sentinel cloned, despite the fact they could have differentiate them in a similar way to WAR. Infuriate should had a trait that also gives FC and Decimate (chaos version including) inner beast heal and 20% dog reduction(FC/IC) and steel cyclone heal per hit (Decimate/ CC).

PLD remains to be the most popular tank because not only did it not change, but instead skills were added to improve from before. GNB and PLD are the two popular tanks and they're not clones. Infact tank players don't want another Resquiat clone. Inner release and Delirium being a Resquiat clone is frustrating, and while I personally was fine with Inner Release being a Resquiat clone, because WAR still different from SB PLD and DRK.

The changes made in ShB for tank went a step to far. Two classes should not be cloned of each other. Role skills are for giving the tanks a basic kit they all have. Three of the tanks should not have the same skill. Vengeance is a spike, so DRK should have mana regen on hit. PLD is 40% an GNB gets a HoT, increase duration for 15 seconds for all of them and boosts Vengeance potency a bit.

Besides those changes I think the biggest issue for tanks is having DRK be revamped again. Three changes and it's apparent Square has no idea what the identity for DRK is.

[Hatstand]

The problem is that it then makes the playerbase do the homogenizing. If you want to raid in GW2/ESO, and you want to be healer, but you're not using X class, Y build or Z gear? You're not getting in. Homogenization will happen one way or the other. Either the devs take a hand in this to limit it so most classes can be taken without fuss, or they don't and then the playerbase causes the fuss and the classes are not wanted or won't be allowed into the content, punishing a small subset of players just for playing their class a specific way, homogenizing everybody into specific builds.

I'd rather have to play GNB/BLM/MNK/WHM or whatever the most powerful jobs in each role are for raiding and be able to mess around with other jobs which have fun and distinct identities outside of raids (and maybe even raid with those jobs in groups that can accept being 5 seconds slower to finish the raid, or clearing a day or two later) than have a choice between GNB1,GNB2,GNB3,GNB4/BLM1,BLM2... etc. If the jobs don't each offer something unique and worthwhile (and I don't consider different animations or weapons unique and worthwhile) then there's no point in having multiple of them.

That's not to say that balance isn't good, and that we shouldn't try to make sure all jobs are close enough to the same effectiveness to be able to be taken by whatever group, but there have to be limits.

[linay]

I'd rather have to play GNB/BLM/MNK/WHM or whatever the most powerful jobs in each role are for raiding and be able to mess around with other jobs which have fun and distinct identities outside of raids (and maybe even raid with those jobs in groups that can accept being 5 seconds slower to finish the raid, or clearing a day or two later) than have a choice between GNB1,GNB2,GNB3,GNB4/BLM1,BLM2... etc. If the jobs don't each offer something unique and worthwhile (and I don't consider different animations or weapons unique and worthwhile) then there's no point in having multiple of them.

That's not to say that balance isn't good, and that we shouldn't try to make sure all jobs are close enough to the same effectiveness to be able to be taken by whatever group, but there have to be limits.

Instead of there being no point in having multiple jobs, I think the point is to not require you to level multiple jobs. At least in FFXIV it's easier to try another job as you can do all of them with one character, unlike with some other MMORPG. But even then, unless you're someone who like to level all jobs and can switch at will whenever the balance changes, it's still easier for people if they can stick to one job and know that it's always viable. Of course being viable doesn't necessarily mean having to be the same as another job, but depending on how developers decide to approach the matter, I would prefer they err toward all jobs being viable rather than to all jobs being different.

[Hatstand]

Instead of there being no point in having multiple jobs, I think the point is to not require you to level multiple jobs. At least in FFXIV it's easier to try another job as you can do all of them with one character, unlike with some other MMORPG. But even then, unless you're someone who like to level all jobs and can switch at will whenever the balance changes, it's still easier for people if they can stick to one job and know that it's always viable. Of course being viable doesn't necessarily mean having to be the same as another job, but depending on how developers decide to approach the matter, I would prefer they err toward all jobs being viable rather than to all jobs being different.

I meant there's no point in there being multiple jobs of the same role in the game. If the jobs are "Tank", "Healer", "Caster", "Melee dps", and "Physical ranged dps" then no one needs to level multiple jobs to be able to participate in top content either. And if the differences between the jobs are only cosmetic, then they may as well condense it down to that level.