Thread: Dancer 6.0 Speculation

Another thing I've been thinking about is Improvisation. As it stands, it kinda feels like an empty skill. It's not useless per say, but it's a totally unnecessary button. We dancers don't need some kind of phase transition button since we don't manage some kind of important buff prone to falling off. I suppose you could maybe make an argument for Standard Finish, Esprit, and Technical Finish. Maybe Improvisation could put those buffs on all party members in range on hold during a transition, which could be very useful, but I also don't think that's where we really need to go as Dancers, not to mention it could possibly be exploitable with certain timings.

So when I think of the term "Improvisation," what I think of is breaking choreography and improvising based on the circumstances, and something that could be interesting would be to have Improvisation be something that could replace your usage of Standard Finish after beginning Standard Step. Functionally, it would do the same damage, however instead of following the Simon Says minigame, you improvise and do a different combination to yield a different effect for you and your Dance Partner.

This concept would make Improvisation a bit similar to Mudras, but I think it would be best to keep it simple--The first step doesn't matter, but the second step will determine one of 4 effects you'll get instead of the normal Standard Step and Esprit. This wouldn't be bad thing for DPS necessarily because those buffs last for 60 seconds, and we use Standard Step on CD as dancers. There might be a slight issue with Standard Step and Esprit dropping off briefly before the next Standard Step after, but we could also make Improvisation extend those effects by 5-10 seconds for smoothness.

As for the effects themselves, I'm thinking that these would be forms of utility designed when something bad happens, much like why a real Dancer would feel the need to improvise. Here are some ideas.
If your second step was...
Emboite (Red) - You perform Shield Improvisation, decreasing the damage taken by yourself and your dance partner by 20% for 10 seconds
Entrechat (Blue) - You Perform Mana Improvisation, restoring 1000 MP to you and your dance partner
Jete (Green) - You Perform Curing Improvisation, healing you and your dance partner with 400 potency heal
Pirouette (Yellow) - You Perform Cleansing Improvisation, removing a debuff from you and your dance partner

It doesn't have to be this literally, but something like this would I think add a cool layer of complexity and make the Standard Finish and Esprit buff durations actually matter.

Espirit as a whole needs fleshing out I think. It currently has an AOE dump, so it's open to gain a Single Target dump and other actions on longer cooldowns that are more than just filler.

Originally Posted by SpeckledBurd

Espirit as a whole needs fleshing out I think. It currently has an AOE dump, so it's open to gain a Single Target dump and other actions on longer cooldowns that are more than just filler.

...Why spend an extra button on a mechanic that amounts only to whether we can count if our enemy is singular or plural?

I'll agree that Espirit needs to be more than just a pseudo-cooldown convoluted by a linked party member's presence, but if it's ultimately just going from firing on readiness (or damage window near enough to readiness) to firing on readiness in priority order, each with no further interaction, and correctly hitting A for one enemy or B for two or more... is that a meaningful improvement?


Aside:

In general, what of things that actually make us feel like... a Dancer, or our gameplay to feel more like... a dance? There's so much more we could do by which to make the job feel more iconic in its actual gameplay, rather than being just a skin to a generic Ranged DPS with further dependence upon a single party member's throughput.

On how DNC works right now, my biggest gripe is having to constantly pool 3 feathers for the next burst phase... I literally have to rely on just 1-point combo system. For that regard, I really wish Flourish would guarantee feathers from its proc'd abilities. This way, you would have a much more flexible Feather usage during your regular phases, and as the TS phase approaches, you'd be able to use Flourish beforehand to 100% fish for feathers you miss.

Another thing is Fan Dance III. I really think that ability stands in a really weird spot. I know it was probably designed to be that bonus feeling, but being the "proc of the proc" feels weirdly unreliable. I don't really have a suggestion for this, just this personal remark.

Improvisation still is a really bad ability. The healing bonus is not impactful, since there is a lot of overhealing. The esprit gains are not big enough to warranty such a long time doing nothing... There are only a couple of situations where you can do this. A fix would be either change the healing bonus to something more useful for everyone like crit or dh AND buff the esprit meter gains.

My expectations for DNC 6.0:
Improved Curing Waltz trait that makes it leave a regen effect on you and your partner;
Emperor's New Chakrams, an invisible weapon for DNC
An actual Bladed Fan as a weapon for DNC (this could happen anytime now tbh)

Three elemental dances in the Astral aspects: Fire, Lightning and Wind . They would be OGCD buttons that are available on your standard or technical step phases and share a cooldown. They add a special effect (and added visuals) to your combo buttons and to your dance partner's attacks:
Burning Polka - Each attack leaves a burning dot that can be stacked.
Bolero of Wind - Increase on movement speed and Direct Hit.
Levin Swing - Each attack can cause paralysis and increases Determination.

Also:
- Saber Dance changed to being a single target Esprit spender
- Pirouette, new weaponskill meant to be a multi-target Esprit spender

Definitely would be nice to see more options behind Esprit, but the trick ultimately is about making something that has a viable use. We're a pretty aggressive community of min/maxers when it comes to end game content, so we would need some kind of damage to come out of Esprit that wouldn't just usurp Sabre Dance. If I'm getting "Not Sabre Dance," then what exactly is going to encourage me to use that and Sabre Dance at different points in the fight. It can be tricky to get the right balance between the actions, and if the option option isn't damage, it would need to have some pretty powerful form of utility that would outperform the Sabre Dance.

Originally Posted by ty_taurus

Definitely would be nice to see more options behind Esprit, but the trick ultimately is about making something that has a viable use. We're a pretty aggressive community of min/maxers when it comes to end game content, so we would need some kind of damage to come out of Esprit that wouldn't just usurp Sabre Dance. If I'm getting "Not Sabre Dance," then what exactly is going to encourage me to use that and Sabre Dance at different points in the fight. It can be tricky to get the right balance between the actions, and if the option option isn't damage, it would need to have some pretty powerful form of utility that would outperform the Sabre Dance.

Single target Sabre Dance essentially 800 potency 50 espirit nuke and viola Sabre is for 2 or more targets , new skill is for single target bosses, if give new skill a buff where next Sabre is 850 potency base for 1st target that lasts 60s then both skills will be used regularly in a raid fight.

Originally Posted by Jirah

Playing Dancer It feels too easy, givin the room for error is way to large with the dance steps and the finish buff being 60 second. Its also boring as hell for many many levels until you get flourish or Technic step. But Supporting for it is fun and unique choosing a Mate for close position and raining on all ur support onto them with Finish, Devilment, waltz ect

My issues with Dancer as not only its difficulty as a mindless job but gives me MCH 4.0 Flashbacks of spamming 1 attack praying for RNG to give u a proc, While MCH has 2 skills at that time that guaranteed it being reload (15) and quick reload (30) DNC has only flourish a 60 second CD which results in...well i hope ur a fan of ciara cuz youll do alot of 1-2 Step until flourish procs

DNC desperately needs a other layer of depth, appreciate it if its sooner in the progression rather than 81+ as the core of DNC doesnt change much if at all for 10 levels at a time. But a good start is to do something with Bland ass Shield samba, aka the ranged role action.

There is depth for Dancer, about on par, if not more than the other ranged in optimized play. There's a lot of nuance, much like other jobs, but it is definitely an easy job to pickup. The problem is, it's also RNG dependent, so even if you do everything right, having better RNG will win, always, unless you play right AND have better RNG.