The current job design system is not fit for purpose

[Morningstar1337]

When you think about it was also predecented on the game design itself, the game. I remember some people wanted horizontal gear progression and set bonuses like in XI only for that to never happen, and the dungeons became linear as early as 2.2. Would make sense that this kind of design was extended to the Jobs, in fact I think the diversity of BLU was a large factor in being a Limited Job beyond the usual gimmick associated with it, and development constraints.

[Shurrikhan]

Nobody wants a job with 50 buttons to map. Frankly I think the 30+ I have on most jobs is excessive. I'd be much happier having around 20 abilities.

20 job actions =/= 20 buttons. Heck, if it went the Dragoon route, 20 job actions would barely constitute the need for 10 buttons.

Also, the homogenization was necessary. It wasn't excessive. The "meta" being drg bard NIN, something" needed to stop.

That meta had nothing to do with job diversity and everything to do with parity. It could as easily be that today, if Bard were the best among its role instead of the worst among its role, and Ninja had even the output ceiling when including perfect teamplay that Samurai achieves on its own.

Also, people always have disagreements over how the jobs work. Remember bow mage? Lots hated it, but I knew people who enjoyed it.

The actual components rarely see tremendous difference in opinion, however. For instance, I preferred Bow Mage to Stormblood Bard, but I hated much of the same things about Bow Mage that most everyone else does; I simply weighed its consequent decision-making and games of chicken with AoEs a bit higher and was more annoyed by the inflexibility of SB Songs than were most. Now, I prefer Shadowbringers Bard over either but still have many of the same complaints I had about Stormblood's version and lament the lack of point-support.

The ast changes are fine, people just whine about "muh interesting card mechanics" because it was changed. Getting 15 boles wasn't fun. It was annoying.

This issue, too, has little to do with diversity and everything to do with tuning and the way the Royal Road mechanic worked. Because Royal Road was preemptive and its use one set obligatory (rather than retroactive and optional), it was always a gamble. Moreover, Expanded always overpowered Extended and especially Enhanced by up to some 80% effect.

Had Royal Road been balanced and made a keystroke to hit after card usage (affecting the remainder of the card duration), wasted cards would be far fewer and within the ability of Redraw to deal with. Any card with a wasted effect in itself could still be put to significant use on, simply, another card. It'd arguably be less annoying than the Seal system we have now.

Bards 2% flat damage buff is a lot. 2% doesn't "feel" like much, but it's party wide and they done have to do anything over than keep their songs rotating. 2% for people who know what they are doing is a lot.

That's the thing, though. Buffs are moving further and further into territory that is perceptible only with parsers. You can still notice a 10% buff. But 2%?

And the problem isn't just the percentiles on the raid buffs --- it's how narrowed into burst windows jobs have become by stacking more and more of their ppm into CDs, how standardly aligned those CDs have become (which helps for compositional flexibility, just as would gauge mechanics, but expands the power of indirect percentile contribution), and, less significantly, buff multiplicity.

[ForteNightshade]

There's a lot to unpack here. So lets start with:

Nobody wants a job with 50 buttons to map. Frankly I think the 30+ I have on most jobs is excessive. I'd be much happier having around 20 abilities.

To each their own, I suppose. But 20 abilities gets you current Machinist and Bard who barely fill two hotbars worth of abilities. While it worked out okay for Machinist, Bard has become incredibly dull imo.

Also, the homogenization was necessary. It wasn't excessive. The "meta" being drg bard NIN, something" needed to stop.

No, it was not. That meta existed purely due to Piercing being provided by a single job and how FFlogs factored in parses; pDPS was absolute king and nothing compared to Trick Attack. Some homogenization is needed, yes. But Bard was absolutely gutted, Monk still has practically no identity and the tanks and healers are near palette swaps of each other. Put another way, making Vengeance and friends all two minutes is an example of good homogenization. Making Delirium an edgier looking Inner Release was lazy.

Remember bow mage? Lots hated it, but I knew people who enjoyed it.

I have also heard that monk is not disliked for lacking utility. They don't like how the 4.x rotation was changed.

They weren't the majority. Hence why Bard was revamped in Stormblood; to near unanimous praise. The devs then, baffling, stripped away nearly all its utility.

You really ought to look at the DPS forums to see the myriad of problems Monk has. It goes far beyond the 4.0 rotation. Cliff notes version? The job has a ton of situational to downright worthless abilities, hasn't changed or evolved since ARR and complaints have been largely ignored.

The ast changes are fine, people just whine about "muh interesting card mechanics" because it was changed. Getting 15 boles wasn't fun. It was annoying.

Considering Astro is still played less than White Mage or Scholar by a sizable margin at the Savage level despite being objective stronger, begs to differ. As does nearly every thread, poll or census, be it from casual to hardcore players, all complaining over the card system. You could literally take away all six cards, keep just Lord/Lady and virtually nothing changes. That isn't a good design. Astro is very reminiscent of Bow Mage. Some liked it; most hated it.

And you know what else isn't fun? Getting the same three seals in a Sleeve Draw window that will clip your GCD almost every time. That's far more annoying, and forces Lightspeed into babysitter role.

Bards 2% flat damage buff is a lot. 2% doesn't "feel" like much, but it's party wide and they done have to do anything over than keep their songs rotating. 2% for people who know what they are doing is a lot.

It isn't when accompanied by a 50 potency nerf to Bard's DoTs. Fun fact, that supposed "buff" actually wound up being a overall nerf which is why Bard now sits as the weakest job in the entire game except in fights with multiple targets. That 2% was worthless.

[Mindiori]

To be blunt, as these threads are two a penny;

The casual majority have no interest in challenge, depth, learning or working towards anything. Since they generate the most money, being the largest demographic - and taking into account the fact that such things are going to be exacerbated by the games age. Well it should be obvious shouldn't it. If anything, its going to get much worse. To be clear, I hate it as well. My interest hasn't been what it used to be in a very long time. But in the end? We won't be missed. Its half the reason I focus on my music production a ten-fold more now - they can't nerf it or dumb it down and the depth is punishingly endless.

I feel for you OP. I'd happily still juggle my 30+ keybinds with no gcd as I did in the so called 'mmo golden age'; but those times are past. Its only casualisation and homogenization all the way down from here. One last thing to some of the dismissive comments here though. Don't equate popularity to challenge and worth. The majority of people are lazy and self-gratuitous; and it shows. Thats not really a positive benchmark on anything - especially not from a different preference/point of view like the OP. It certainly doesn't render their opinion invalid either way.

[Edax]

The majority of people are lazy and self-gratuitous; and it shows.

I don't even know what that means... Self uncalled for? Self free of charge? Self unwarranted? Is this a fancy way of saying we're all worthless? I guess we're all lazy and that's a bad thing.

gra·tu·i·tous


adjective: gratuitous
1.
uncalled for; lacking good reason; unwarranted.

2.
given or done free of charge.

[Claire_Pendragon]

I don't even know what that means... Self uncalled for? Self free of charge? Self unwarranted? Is this a fancy way of saying we're all worthless? I guess we're all lazy and that's a bad thing.

gra·tu·i·tous


adjective: gratuitous
1.
uncalled for; lacking good reason; unwarranted.

2.
given or done free of charge.

my guess, is that they mean players are "wanting" to give themselves something thats unwarranted. But i honestly dont know. im grasping at straws with this one lol.

[Noira]

I'm assuming they meant self gratifying.

[Hazama999]

This kinda hurt to read, and it's cause it made me miss 3.0's Dark Knight.

[Imakun]

I will never forgive them for murdering AST like that. It was the perfect example of changing something just for sake of changing. It was fun, engaging and rewarding.

Fishing for the right seals to use on a 2 minute ridiculous ability while mindlessly spamming random cards is nowhere near as good as they think it is, making me feel like an automated bot.

WHM got a system that is both useful and rewarding with Misery and complements its role very well now, but AST and SCH had to die for it and that's hardly fair.




Waiting 2 years for major changes to jobs sucks but it is what it is, I just hope they drop the idea of "everything needs to look new at expansion launch" because that just doesn't work in the long run.

[Kleeya]

RDM's aoe bind was not useless. It did save my life numerous times in Eureka, and even in dungeons when the tank died, letting me get back the aggro of all the mobs. Now enjoy your even less crowd control based game after complaining so much to remove it.

That being said you forgot to say that the homogenisation you complain of has been asked by a big part of the players themselves, and still continue to this day. Some examples ? For my old and actual main job, people wanting to nerf RDM's verraise so that he become more like the other mages. Or nerf DRK's TBN so that this skill becomes another rampart, and so that the job lose his biggest gameplay difference with the other tanks.

And i am not even talking of how most people are obsessed with big dps numbers only, which lead to things like AST cards becoming all dps buffs because who cares of mitigation or mp regen cards, or aggro becoming a trivial thing to keep because nobody wanted to use these aggro stances and combo anymore. When i actually see how some healers begin to not care at all of healing or rezzing others because they want to dps so much, similar to when at the end of Stormblood more and more tanks weren't caring about keeping aggro anymore, it wouldn't surprise me if 6.0 healers changes were that :

- all healers healing/buff/rez gcd and ogcd skills have been removed ;
- all healers have been given a true dps rotation on par with dps jobs ;
- all healers have been given a lvl 1 passive skill : "you now heal, buff and rez yourself and other players for a part of the damages you inflict on the ennemies".

We hope that you will love these changes which solve the problem of 1 button dps cycle being boring, and allow you to concentrate on your dps without other players becoming worried for their survival anymore !

In short, isn't SE just giving us what most players want ? XD