MCH Overheat should activate automatically

[Shurrikhan]

The GCD that triggers overheat could also be a different one that then transforms into Heatblast.

I don't see why we'd want to spend a button just for that, though? If it had a big bursty hit to start things off and we could later reuse it for a less efficient but burstier use of stacks, sure, but otherwise we may as well leave it on the same key.

Plus, the animation is kinda weird, you make your lunchbox sparks then it makes your gun shot faster?

Agreed. Stormblood Overheat never had enough visual or auditory feedback prior to actually hitting max to make it feel like it was heating up the gun, either, but at least it made some sort of sense.

[CKNovel]

I don't see why we'd want to spend a button just for that, though? If it had a big bursty hit to start things off and we could later reuse it for a less efficient but burstier use of stacks, sure, but otherwise we may as well leave it on the same key.

Think of it as Gnashing Fang that starts the cartridge combo.
Instead of being Gnashing Fang -> Savage Claw -> Wicked Talon, it would be:
Heatburst -> Heatblast -> Heatblast -> Heatblast -> Heatblast.

All of it on the same button. Yes, that's mainly fluff.
In my opinion, the best of world would have an Overheat starter -> Heatblast*3 -> Overheat Finisher.

[Duskane]

this is a very good idea honestly
also be nice if hyper charge was a battery gain as a replacement
the name would make more sense imho

[Seraphor]

I'm 100% down for this. It would make activating Wildfire and Overheat so much smoother.

[Cabalabob]

While at max level yes you will never spend it on anything but heat blast and auto crossbow, do keep in mind it’s easy to forget that hypercharge is actually a CD with its own effects.

You obtain hypercharge at level 30 and it increases your weaponskill potencies. You don’t get heat blast until 35 and auto crossbow doesn’t come until 52. This change may help at max level but for the levelling process it would be a nerf to both single target level 30-34 and AoE from 30-52.

[LeonKeyh]

-Edit-: Just so it isn't harped on, talking this through more I don't really think this anymore. I don't want to remove the post because it makes the follow-up messages not make sense -Edit-

The only real problem with this is that it's not intuitive. It's not something that can be explained well to the average user because it would be the only place where something like this exists. In a vacuum it would be nice to clean up/streamline the class, but it's likely to
cause confusion; too much to consider this based off the small amount of value it would give.

[Shurrikhan]

In my opinion, the best of world would have an Overheat starter -> Heatblast*3 -> Overheat Finisher.

I dig it.

Ideally, I might like the option of sacrificing a further button on having that Finisher separately available, such that we can blow all remaining stacks on an early Finisher (and ideally, have it be enhanced slightly by those consumed stacks, just not to the point of being an overall increase potency-over-time), but in that case I'd still turn Heatblast into said Finisher automatically upon reaching that final stack.

The only real problem with this is that it's not intuitive. It's not something that can be explained well to the average user because it would be the only place where something like this exists. In a vacuum it would be nice to clean up/streamline the class, but it's likely to cause confusion; too much to consider this based off the small amount of value it would give.

Wait, what? This is already in game on other jobs. Have you not played Dragoon since Stormblood?

[LeonKeyh]

Wait, what? This is already in game on other jobs. Have you not played Dragoon since Stormblood?

Eh, I guess Life of the Dragon is somewhat similar. Replacing an OGCD with a different OGCD for 30 seconds that refreshes quicker is a little different from the expectation of spamming a GCD for 8 seconds. Pressing available OGCDs as they come up is part of normal DRG rotation, it just gives you a different OGCD to press. Pressing the same GCD for 8 seconds isn't part of "normal" MCH rotation. I'll concede that it isn't completely different, though 1 or 2 other jobs still doesn't make it a common occurrence (Gnashing Fang could be considered similar I suppose)

From a programming aspect it is completely different, because the use of Geirskogul puts you into Life of the Dragon and then is replaced with the ability that can only be used in Life of the Dragon. It would be more difficult to program this with MCH unless you had 2 separate abilities (One that ate 50 heat gauge and put you into overheat and one that can only be used in overheat), unless you just make it "This ability costs 50 heat gauge and grants 'Overheat'" and have Overheat be "abilities that cost heat gauge are free for the duration".

[IronIngot]

From a programming aspect it is completely different, because the use of Geirskogul puts you into Life of the Dragon and then is replaced with the ability that can only be used in Life of the Dragon. It would be more difficult to program this with MCH unless you had 2 separate abilities (One that ate 50 heat gauge and put you into overheat and one that can only be used in overheat), unless you just make it "This ability costs 50 heat gauge and grants 'Overheat'" and have Overheat be "abilities that cost heat gauge are free for the duration".

Ninja has a ton of gcd swaps that are conditional, and summoner also has gcd swaps that change back to normal on timer. Warrior has Fell Cleave which costs 50 to use but is free during Inner Release. They already have the code for it. They might have to add or remove couple of lines.

[Rongway]

From a programming aspect it is completely different, because the use of Geirskogul puts you into Life of the Dragon and then is replaced with the ability that can only be used in Life of the Dragon. It would be more difficult to program this with MCH unless you had 2 separate abilities (One that ate 50 heat gauge and put you into overheat and one that can only be used in overheat), unless you just make it "This ability costs 50 heat gauge and grants 'Overheat'" and have Overheat be "abilities that cost heat gauge are free for the duration".

I think you're overestimating how difficult this would be. The game has plenty of examples of action mechanics that can be applied to this.

• Actions can grant a status effect.
• Actions can silently upgrade while under the effect of a status (Fire) or after satisfying some condition (Wheeling Thrust, Fang and Claw).
• Actions can explicitly upgrade to other actions while under the effect of a status (Raiden Thrust).
• Actions with different cooldowns can share a button (Geirskogul & Nastrond).
• Actions with different types can share a button (Standard Step & Standard Finish).
• Actions of a type other than Weaponskill can trigger the cooldown of weaponskills (DNC steps and NIN jutsus).

These are all things that are already in the game and it should be a trivial matter to implement something like the following:


Action: Heat Blast (icon version A)
Type: Weaponskill
Cast/Recast: Instant/8s
Range/Radius: 25y/0y
Deals damage with a potency of 190. Releases the energy building in your firearm, granting 5 stacks of Overheated.
Overheated Effect: Increases the potency of all single-target weaponskills by 20.
Duration: 15s.
Heat Gauge Cost: 50
Additional Effect: Reduces the recast time of both Gauss Round and Ricochet by 15s.
(Hidden details: Potency is 190 to account for not being affected by its own Overheat effect. Triggers a 1.5s cooldown on all weaponskills. Upgrades Heat Blast (icon version A) to Heat Blast (icon version B) and Auto Crossbow (icon version A) to Auto Crossbow (icon version B) while under the effect of Overheated. Recast timer is always 8s.)


Action: Heat Blast (icon version B)
Type: Weaponskill
Cast/Recast: Instant/1.5s
Range/Radius: 25y/0y
Deals damage with a potency of 170.
Additional Effect: Reduces the recast time of both Gauss Round and Ricochet by 15s.
Recast timer cannot be affected by status effects or gear attributes.


Then do the same with Auto Crossbow. The two icon versions are necessary indicators for the player so they don't unintentionally start a second Overheat at the end of the first. The version A actions could also be Abilities, but then you'd have to add "Triggers the cooldown of weaponskills upon execution," and they wouldn't work with buffs that grant buddy gauge from weaponskills.