What would you guys think about getting more Dynamic, "Combo" abilities?

[LittleImp]

Pressing a bunch of unique buttons in a particular sequence and the muscle memory around being able to do it skillfully is a large part of what makes the gameplay appealing for me and many others. It's the same kind of satisfaction you get out of mastering a rhythm game or fighting game combos.

I do think accessibility is important, but there are ways to implement it without significantly altering what has been the core gameplay experience. Trusts, solo-duty difficulty settings, the lack of enrages in normal mode, and the availability of jobs that require less hotbar space for execution are all decent ways of tackling the problem.

[MariaArvana]

I've always been in favor of button condensing for one main reason: It opens up more button slots so the devs are less trigger happy with removing actually fun abilities each expansion to keep a job's button count within a certain range.

1-2-3 is just as mindless as 1-1-1. Anyone who's even paying the tiniest, sliver of modicrum of attention will never fail that sequence; made even more redundant with abilities like GNB where you can't even hit Gnashing Fang skills out of order by accident, as it literally locks each ability sequentially. It's the absolute smallest amount of depth you could ever possibly have. Compared to much more interesting options like extra OGCDs which are rotation changing and actually make jobs less dumbed down.

Gnashing Fang could literally be one whole button like Continuation and literally nothing is lost, except you gain 2 button slots.

Condense combos to open up room for actual interesting and depth-adding abilities next expansion while keeping everything we currently have. I've played oher MMOs that have roles/jobs/classes/etc with more depth with only like 7-8 buttons total in their kit, half of which are OGCDs.

[Frosthaven]

... Condense combos to open up room for actual interesting and depth-adding abilities.

This is exactly what I want. Unlike claims that condensing makes it braindead, I actively want more interesting and thoughtful options with what I consider braindead 1 2 3 combos taking less focus. Thank you.

[Valic]

This was something I never understood about FFXIV's design moving forward... Aion did a similar concept by creating combos that were either trees or simple 1-2-3's into one hotbar but this allowed them to branch out things and make more elaborate skills and rotations.

One idea I want to see FFXIV mimic is the "charge skill" thing they did too.

https://youtu.be/MFRCxc8-jSc?t=67

The concept was pretty simple. The GCD would continue from 1-2-3 time depending on how long you decided to hold the skill for. One press and you'd begin charging the skill, hitting it again and it would be used at the level you left it at. tapping it would just give the level 1 of it, pressing it again after a duration of one GCD would present it at a level 2 charge, and then pressing it after letting it go ANOTHER GCD would be the maximum. This allowed for a variety of options because not only did this mean you could invest skills in damage for burst or decide on just outright using skills for dps.... But different charges sometimes offered different abilities. One example was how a skill could change from a single target into an aoe going from charge 2 to 3, so you had reasons to actually use in between charges. Or another was changing the status ailment done by a charge, level 1 being a quick bind, level 2 being a slow, level 3 being an aoe sleep/silence. Each class had 2-3 of these but weren't necessarily considered a "staple" of the classes on every single class, just another thing you COULD do in certain circumstances. Mages for example typically wanted to charge everything to the max like a cast normally, but some physical classes may lose range if the target is running or maybe it just wasn't useful 100% of the time and limited to specific scenarios.

[Jin-]

I've always been in favor of button condensing for one main reason: It opens up more button slots so the devs are less trigger happy with removing actually fun abilities each expansion to keep a job's button count within a certain range.

1-2-3 is just as mindless as 1-1-1. Anyone who's even paying the tiniest, sliver of modicrum of attention will never fail that sequence; made even more redundant with abilities like GNB where you can't even hit Gnashing Fang skills out of order by accident, as it literally locks each ability sequentially. It's the absolute smallest amount of depth you could ever possibly have. Compared to much more interesting options like extra OGCDs which are rotation changing and actually make jobs less dumbed down.

Gnashing Fang could literally be one whole button like Continuation and literally nothing is lost, except you gain 2 button slots.

Condense combos to open up room for actual interesting and depth-adding abilities next expansion while keeping everything we currently have. I've played oher MMOs that have roles/jobs/classes/etc with more depth with only like 7-8 buttons total in their kit, half of which are OGCDs.

Yes it's ridiculous when people say that 1,2,3 is any different than 1,1,1 . GW2 does this and it has pretty complex combat system compared to ours.

And you are correct. We lose skills each expansion since there is literally no room anymore for new abilities so they have to remove or combine old skills.

[kaynide]

I was just going to mention GuildWars 2. They do this, and keep it interesting... but that is mostly because you are limited to what goes in your hot bar based on equipment or limited slots.

For FFXIV, I hope that they consider condensing, but then making sub rotations more interesting or streamlined. Or more intuitive/less busywork.
As an example, Dancer Is fun, but even there you have to start dance and look at the next required steps. Ideally I shouldn’t have to look away from the battle.

IMO it should have just been a colored icon over your head to indicate what the next step should be (so, if the next step is green, show a green leaf over my head similar to fireworks). Make them only visible to the dancer for less self-conscious worry-worting.

Glancing around the HUD is fine of course, but if it can just float over the character, why not? Things like the Nin’s pinwheel or Sam’s katana could just be a bar under HP over your head.

[Jirah]

I've always been in favor of button condensing for one main reason: It opens up more button slots so the devs are less trigger happy with removing actually fun abilities each expansion to keep a job's button count within a certain range.

1-2-3 is just as mindless as 1-1-1. Anyone who's even paying the tiniest, sliver of modicrum of attention will never fail that sequence; made even more redundant with abilities like GNB where you can't even hit Gnashing Fang skills out of order by accident, as it literally locks each ability sequentially. It's the absolute smallest amount of depth you could ever possibly have. Compared to much more interesting options like extra OGCDs which are rotation changing and actually make jobs less dumbed down.

Gnashing Fang could literally be one whole button like Continuation and literally nothing is lost, except you gain 2 button slots.

Condense combos to open up room for actual interesting and depth-adding abilities next expansion while keeping everything we currently have. I've played oher MMOs that have roles/jobs/classes/etc with more depth with only like 7-8 buttons total in their kit, half of which are OGCDs.

Some Jobs are more complex then others, I cant imagine playing MCh this way as its already a bore to play, it absolutely required they make the job complex in the process...all 11 of them that utilize rotations disregarding casters which most wont be effected too much besides like RDM. some would be odd like SAM technically has 3 rotations and DNC would drastically be condensed due to flourishes and would lack liberty finish the rotation. idk its a messy fix and i doubt the devs will do it

[jetfire117]

I would be fine with it if they actually would add more skills but we all know they won't. I wouldn't mind at all if they just give players the choice of condensing or not, that way everyone is happy. I like GNB having a lot of buttons because it feels like you're actually doing something (illusion or not). Most of the game is already a droolfest and I feel like condensing combos would only make it worse since they never add more than they take away.

[Gemina]

Honestly, I would *ADORE* an addition like that. Especially on my DRK; between his core rotation, and his AoE 2-button combo, that's 5 freaking buttons I have to have bound. Imagine condensing that to only 2!!!

I'm imagining a game that is super lame to play. There is nothing "dynamic" about a system that consolidates your skills into a single button.

If you play on a controller, depending on the job and how you have your X bars set up, your opener can cause you to move your fingers about its inputs like its a musical instrument. Those whose gaming experiences are exclusively with a KB+mouse, or limited in their controller experience are likely some of the peeps who will make comments such as, "I have no idea how you can play this job on a controller."

However, this isn't really due to amount of skills per se; it has more to do with how intricate and "dynamic" the controller inputs are set up. For players like me, who have been doing it since the dawn of time; it's no big deal, but try explaining this system to someone who is looking for 'X' on the controller when you tell them to push 'X'.

That being said, is it ok that controller users are required to have developed their hand to eye coordination to super human levels just to play the game?

When questions like this enters a dev mind, what we get are results similar to your suggestion and the dev team will increase accessibility through simplification. While this can be a good thing for new players, it takes away a level of engagement for the current players. This opens up the debates about whether or not such things are good for the health of the game overall.

For me personally, I do not want this game simplified any further. I firmly believe that even if simplification is a good thing, it can and will have diminishing returns that ultimately compromise the game's overall longevity.

tl;dr? nopeeeee!

[Sylve]

This would dumb things down too much, it's not exactly all the difficult as it is.

1234 is not harder than 1111, it just eats 3 more keybinds for literally no reason. They really should make it an option for us to bind combos and mutually exclusive skills into a single button if we want to.

Fewer keybinds, same number of button presses.