So after waiting for about 2 weeks to see the consequence of homogenization

[Connor]

Starting to get a bit tired of reiterating this tbh but the majority of people complaining about a job aren’t bothered about it being the top DPS . If anything nobody wants to be the top DPS because of the sacrifices to other parts of the job mechanics that would need to be cut to compensate. Only exception is in the case of jobs that are supposed to be at the top in the first place like Black Mage or Samurai (which are working as intended anyway)

People are complaining about Bard getting its support abilities removed (and there’s been more than just Requiem if you look beyond 4.0) because they were kinda the point of the job. Bard could be the bottom of the battle DPS with the worst support effects in the entire game and I’d still play it as much as I did before if it felt like a Bard that was supporting the party with songs in some way. Which is how the job is sold to new players .

I mean, imagine an entirely new player who levels Bard from 1 to 80 in Shadowbringers who doesn’t read the forums. They’d be doing quest after quest about how Bards sing in the heat of battle the help out their comrades, only to get to 80 and realise that’s still not how the job plays.

It’s the exact same with Astrologian, Red Mage and Ninja.

Astrologian is supposed to draw cards to empower party members by using the constellations to guide them. You’d think that would mean different effects depending on the card, but then you play it and it’s all the exact same card with a different background. If you hadn’t played it before 5.0, you’d be forgiven for thinking ‘but where are these constellation effects’ for each card. Nobody is interested in whether Astrologian is a guaranteed raid spot. They’re interested in making it fun again and to make it match what it claims to do

Red Mage, the offensive magic and sword fighting are just as crucial to the job as the healing potential. You’d be forgiven for thinking the job will be moving between Dualcasting and Swordplay to take down enemies whilst using its versatility to adjust as needed for the party. Then you play it, and the damage is underwhelming, the versatility is kind of useless and it’s like being a weaker version of the other two casters with a little bit more mobility. It being bottom of the barrel DPS is besides the point; just because a job has the lowest DPS doesn’t mean it needs to impotent relative to its competitors.

Could do the same for Dancer and Ninja but hopefully the point is clear. Being ‘bottom’ or ‘top’ DPS is besides the point for most people. If anything, I think the vast majority of posters are simply putting forward ideas to get the concept of what they’d like to see put across. Not for a literal port of their suggestions into the game without any care for balancing. And I mean, even if someone does make a ridiculous suggestion like ‘give Bard every support skill it ever had back including Stoneskin and Raise but with the same DPS’, is it really that big a deal? I don’t imagine the developers just sift through threads and go ‘hey this idea is crazy and game-breaking, lets do this!’

I mean, if someone on the forums is making an ‘illegitimate’ complaint (how does one define this exactly?), then I highly doubt the developers are going to take note of it, regardless of how much they (me) cry

Lastly:

Homogenisation is very important balance but that doesn’t mean it has to come at the cost of the things that make the job unique. It’s a topic for a different thread yet I think it’s just as relevant in this context.

Also, how come healers and tanks have to have extremely homogenised playstyles but DPS can never have any overlap in what they offer. Right now all three DPS roles use the same ‘sliding scale’ for balancing the job’s. Selfish DPS with no utility (Samurai / Machinist / Black Mage), middle ground (Dragoon/Bard/Summoner) low DPS with a little bit more utility (Ninja, Dancer, Red Mage). Why can’t Ninja be medium damage with more utility because Dragoon has that spot? Why does Machinist have to have next to no utility because Dancer has that spot? The sliding scale has made job decisions between roles feel a lot more binary. You aren’t playing the job for the job anymore, you’re playing the spot it matches on the sliding DPS scale.

Yes, unique jobs are exceptionally hard to balance. But honestly, I’d rather deal with some balancing issues (which we already have anyway) than have 17 jobs but only technically only three