DPS jobs lacking utility?

[Payadopa]

-snip-

That was a nice read. Ty. ^^

To be fair, I just wish we could escape the role trappings at least a bit more (without making every class be able to do anything). I find DNC a step in the right direction (pun intended). Or it's great that rezzmage can raise. But other than that we can't have anything since DF. Imagine a DPS that could tank. Do you queue as red or blue? How many of these hybrids could you throw into the game till the rigid dungeon/boss structure collapses? (The answer is 1 - BLU)

I love the Duty Finder since I'm not too keen on LFP for hours like in XI but we do pay a price to make the above design work. And instead of giving us at least some freedom, things become even more shallow. I'm not a game designer so I have a hard time suggesting what to fix (especially after so many years of systems stacked on systems), but as a player, all I can say is I really, really don't like the current design.

Fortunately there is plenty about the game that I love so I'll stick around but these forums are for feedback, so here are my 2 Gil.

[Shurrikhan]

And here is the heart of the matter. Your further references to kiting bring back memories of being a Hunter in BC. Were the mechanics engaging? Yes. Was that game based on the 'trinity'? Yes.

If we're to call words like "trinity-based" buzzwords, let's be clear here.

The ability to kite, as per "a Hunter in BC" is not, itself, trinity-based. No part of kiting relies on a tank; in fact, a tank cannot act in any "traditional" role of holding enemies in place... while kiting. Until Icy Trap (later Tar Trap) and Binding Shot, moreover, Hunter could do little to nothing with its kiting utility unless said Hunter was tanking. That requires that it's not just the tank doing the tanking. While the game as a whole might be trinity-based, that capacity is not.

What does this mean? I read a lot of buzzwords, but the substance of the sentence is, what exactly?

It's a one-sentence summary, tailored as response to the person I was quoting, of the over-700 words from my prior post to him. But, to simplify, the "buzzwords" merely follow from the basic definitions of each word.

Breadth - the distance or measurement from side to side of something; width; the extent or range of something, usually as opposite "depth".
Depth - the distance or measurement from the the distance from the top or surface to the bottom of something; the distance below the top or surface of something to which someone or something percolates or at which something happens.
Generalist - a person competent in several different fields or activities; one who has broad general knowledge and skills in several areas.

Since we're playing a trinity-based game, let us use "depth" to describe the amount of decision-making or other forms of engagement possible through a interaction or cohesive set of interactions available within a given role, and "breadth" as the access one has to those different interactions, whether in one's role or not. When the typical player character in a game tends to have broad skills and potential for engagement (more "breadth" in their kit), the design of that game is often called "generalist", as opposed to "trinity-based" (wherein roles tend to claim certain interactions as their exclusive domain).

What successful MMORPGs are out there that do not rely on the Trinity at this time? I know that question was asked before by another poster, but saw no response. You need living examples rather than theorycrafting.

I understand that, but unfortunately I've not had time to keep up on more than 2 MMOs (this and WoW, and both of those only for some scant hours per week), so I cannot say how many have since died down or out. Before I lost time to keep up in it, for instance, Blade and Soul offered some incredibly fun tag-teaming in undermanned dungeons. Is it still up and running, let alone successful? Heck, has it since increased the previously few and mild enmity modifiers available to follow a more rigidly trinity structure? I wouldn't know. It's been many years since the NA release, at which time the cap was a mere level 50.

If we judge every concept solely by the final results of the games they were included in, though, we quickly lose any perspective, let alone sample space. Was tBC bad simply because it ended up with/at Shadowlands? If XIV's next expansion somehow flops, or another contender emerges that players flock to as quickly as others have to here with WoW's fall, does that mean that cross-class actions, or BLU, or Exploration Missions, or relic grinds, etc., were a bad idea? Does the influx of players to XIV mean that massive job simplifications in the year prior were a good idea? No. We'd have to consider those concepts in and of themselves, for what opportunities they afforded or precluded for their game at the time, rather than letting our perception be jostled and buoyed by the whole.

[Shurrikhan]

DPS just stay lazy & pack in punches,

Why else require for more utilities when you have the biggest privilege to hardly worry anything at all & just do damage?

I think it's largely that exact imbalance in responsibility that makes many want visible and impactful utility. So long as one role has few responsibilities, it must be buoyed through other means of engagement, such as involved rotations. Even if those rotations are not actually any more complex in their decision-making, because there's so little else going on, attention is increasingly drawn to them. They benefit from a sort of positive/obsessive feedback loop. In time, the depth perceived in those rotations, etc. -- more complex in their number of steps more so than their decision-making -- become a "gold standard", of sorts.

From there, tanks and healers' preferences become stretched and/or split between wanting to approach that kind of ever-present depth of interaction -- through their own (noncontextual) kit -- and wanting not to be overloaded between said kit and their contextual modes of engagement (their further responsibilities to their party in a given fight).

• If noncontextual engagement (depth of merely dealing damage, etc.) is shorted, non-DPS can (rightly) point at DPS and claim unfairness -- "They have it! Why don't we?!"
• But also if contextual engagement is shorted, they can point at DPS and claim unfairness -- "Why are our roles being watered down while theirs aren't?!"
• Finally, if the sum of the two together exceeds what's faced by DPS: "We have all this responsibility! Why don't they?!

It's a tightwire for the devs, and one that all stems back to having essentially given DPS a form of free ride, in terms of responsibility, by having given them little to no modes of contextual engagement.

DPS have neither the tools nor need to engage with a fight in any way that'd be fundamentally different from any other fight (and even technically speaking, a PLD will probably have more fight-specific rotational considerations than even a SAM, SMN, or DRG), let alone partake in any tasks outside of just "decrease enemy HP to 0".

While admittedly, if every job required some further step into common responsibility, we might lose some players who would fray under the slightest load (granted, they then wouldn't likely do any content with an Enrage even as DPS), so long as there were decent variety in amount of responsibility and the form thereof, that semblance of parity would probably be a significant help for overall design, if only due to community dynamics between roles.

[Shurrikhan]

That was a nice read. Ty. ^^

To be fair, I just wish we could escape the role trappings at least a bit more (without making every class be able to do anything).

That's about where I stand, too, with a hefty side of "I want each job to feel more distinct."

I don't mind trinity-centric MMORPGs, but I do wish their roles weren't so narrowly defined. I prefer, for instance, the way Overwatch looks at Tanks, DPS, and Supports.

There's commonality among each role, sure, but no hero even from the same role will play quite the same, or give the same affordances, as another, and that makes playing as any 1 hero among the 6 feel variably different based on whom you're running with.

I could be a Ashe one-trick and still have rather different ways to play, just based on whom I'm playing with, between being mid-range threat (reducing openings by which enemies can dive), opener (poking enemies to initiable health), anti-dive (through knockback and heavy punishing burst damage), or cleaner (since I can also use my knockback to reposition rapidly and I've a perfectly accurate mid-range weapon by which to finish off enemies even through healing), etc.

Even with relatively few tools, there are thus more diverse and impactful uses. Any job, even just in one "role", may have many diverse and distinct applications.

Now, that probably wouldn't quite work as such for XIV. The closest analog I can imagine, with our netcode so badly restraining PvP, would be the likes of significant synergies (or, generic skills that previously differed merely in their appearance actually taking on undermechanics befitting those skins).

For instance, imagine if Shadow skills, as used by DRK and NIN, made use of actual shadows, and were thus affected by other skills that generate light. With that, you've suddenly got these rather specific comps by which to milk that aspect for all its worth: <Black and White> as a WHM, DRK, BLM, NIN or SCH, DRK/PLD, RDM, NIN comp by which to take advantage of (Ver)Flare into a brief AoE Bunshin, or use DRK's Shadowskin or SCH's Fey Light as a way to longer maintain Shadewalker on the tank or on particular enemies.

Of course, that's probably wonderfully fun, but the base concept were done in very particular ways as to allow for a sort of self-balancing, it'd create heavy upkeep costs and may constraint future encounter designs (even if, on average, it'd be allowing for more depth per fight).

For a moment, let's go back to the idea of "complexity that leverages visuals."

Let's start simply, with just two jobs of the same role. We've got Monk, and we've got DRG. Having no prior knowledge of them, a viewer might quickly notice that:

• The "Monk" attacks quickly, typically with blunt weapons.
• The "Dragoon" uses a longer-than-average weapon, mostly stabbing, and can... jump high??

Personally, my goal, and the basis for later "utility" would be to ensure that those basic differences matter.

For instance, maybe we could differentiate weapon types via a "Stagger" system, whereby the "blunt"-er the weapon (or strike), the more immediately and briefly it imparts that "stagger" (variably suppressing progress towards further actions). Thereby, comparatively, blunt attacks could better control mobs in the short term, while slashing and, increasingly, piercing attacks could better wind down or bleed out enemies. Or maybe there's a destructible armor system, to some similar effect.

Next, let's consider range. Maybe the longer your weapon, the slower, but also the longer your range. Thus a Dragoon could keep to some extent an enemy at bay out of that enemy's reach, while a Monk would instead have to rely on its attack speed to beat the enemy to the punch, so to speak. Whatever.

There are plenty of ways to cover this, and plenty of ways to go from there, but that's where I'd usually prefer to start.

Just my food for though / $0.02.

[VippidyP]

As somebody really getting into ffxiv this is something that concerns me greatly.
Very little utility, very little CC...
Seems like it's just "do the rotation and memorise the mechanics".
I wish there was far more reactive gameplay.

[RopeDrink]

I think it's largely that exact imbalance in responsibility that makes many want visible and impactful utility.

People may think they want it, but it leads to something that FFXIV has (intentionally or otherwise) gone out of its way to avoid -- which has pros and cons.

I can enter the dungeon roulette right now and there's a high chance I'll encounter healers who don't even know Stone or Holy exist, nevermind their dispel sometimes. Meanwhile, as a Resto Shaman pushing 20's and the likes in M+, I'm expected to spew damage every available opportunity, am probably there for lust and/or covenant specifics, hex, slows, stuns, dispel, purge, etcetera, all while dealing with far more sporadic and reactive style of combat compared to FFXIV's more methodical and preemptive dance. That wasn't a complaint by the way. M+ is my main interest in WoW and I love the fact that there's much more to consider than health bars - but there's something to be said for focusing more on encounters and light utility, especially in a more bullet-hell style of encounter that (in higher difficulties) can go on for 10-20 minutes and involve full wipes over marginal errors.

The classes themselves may not have extremely complex responsibilities, but later fights certainly do have mechanical responsibilities for practically everyone, all while maintaining their uptimes, give or take said utility to help with it all. I love both styles, personally.

For those with a bigger preference for WoW who may not be sure if the game is for them - especially the hardcore - I recall a video which might give a little added perspective:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96KtLjdlaRw

[Shurrikhan]

For those with a bigger preference for WoW who may not be sure if the game is for them - especially the hardcore - I recall a video which might give a little added perspective:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96KtLjdlaRw

How does 20-man raiding at Ultimate-equivalent difficulty draw any perspective on dungeon utility (predominantly the likes of CC)?

[RopeDrink]

Regardless of the video, I'm merely pointing out that (at least in the higher end) responsibilities are more mechanical, in a game where people with certain WoW-like expectations probably pine for a bit more responsibilities within the trinity, which doesn't really happen outside of that higher end. Stuns, slows, interrupts and the likes are, at best, handy to have for the most part but not exactly mandatory (give or take a few outliers), whereas people absolutely will pine for specific classes with specific tools for specific things in specific content in WoW, giving a greater sense of responsibility, value, identity, or whatnot.

I'm hazarding a guess that people pining for such a thing will likely not be basic WoW casuals (in which case you really don't have to think of those things there either) and would probably benefit more from seeing responsibilities at the higher end rather than the lower. That is an assumption, of course. Either way, I doubt anyone is ever going to see a time in FFXIV where, say, certain classes or utility bundles are desired in specific dungeons, nevermind raids. Most sense of responsibility comes from harder stuff, and rarely for class-specifics -- rather, more mechanical ones.

[Stepjam]

They did have more utility pre-Shadowbringers, but they were deliberately cut down on to try cut down on "meta" comps being heavily wanted. In Shadowbringers, BLM and Samurai being "selfish" isn't really considered a big deal but in Stormblood that was considered a bigger problem because basically every other class brought something unique that helped the party's DPS in a noticeable way. For instance Dragoon boosted the damage of physical ranged classes (along with itself), Ninja and Warrior boosted the damage of all slashing weapons (samurai did too, but that's basically ALL it brought, while NIN also brought agro manipulation tools and the allmighty Trick Attack), etc etc. BLM's only real utility was that it was the best use for mana shift since it could quickly regen it's mana while other classes struggled more to.

Anyway, point is that because of the class synergies, certain party comps became heavily desired and certain classes were generally looked down on. And the devs made it clear that they didn't want players to feel obligated to play classes they didn't want to play, that everyone should be able to play the class that most appeals to them. So they cut down on synergies a lot in Shadowbringers. And say what you will about how the classes are now, it largely worked. All the classes are 100% viable for all content and no class really sticks out as truly better than another class (Yes, some do more damage than others at max level play, but it's close enough that player skill generally matters more than the class).

[ItMe]

My intent was more to show that

• Payadoya isn't wrong to think that there's a correlation between trinity-centric design and shallowed out party play. Historically, there is. More so than in generalist (less trinity-based) games.

He isn't wrong to think that, but he isn't right to think that either.
You say historically there is a correlation.
I say there isn't.
Unless one of us makes an impossible comprehensive master list of RPGs with and without a trinity system and sort them by which are "shallow," I don't think we can go any further with this part of our conversation.
You must have simply played more games where this is the case, where as I must have simply played more where it is not.

Or, in a very basic example pertinent to tanking, mobs' auto-attacks having a seemingly accurate range and their skills checking range at time of (would-be) release instead of via early snapshot, so you can better judge distances for kiting, and all the stringing, microkiting, or kite-cycling you can do as a result, ideally in an environment tuned as to make those feel like distinct and deliberate choices.

For this to happen dungeons would need to be more difficult, not for class/role expression to change.
Despite the awkward snap shoting we can still kite and avoid auto attacks, and I often do in Deep Dungeons where something like that is relevant.