Thread: 6.1 Samurai

I'm a Monk who only really dabbles in Samurai, but IMO taking out Kaiten isn't the play. It'd be better to just turn Hissatsu: Senei into an upgrade to Shinten, have Gurren be the de facto big damage Kenki skill with falloff, have Shoha just upgrade into Shoha 2 and gain a falloff component, and have Tsubame Gaeshi just slot into the existing Iaijutsu slot based on a gauge or something.

Even if it's just powering up the next skill and the only use case for it is using it on Iaijutsu/Ogi Namakiri, it was a button that felt good. For a game with hotbar combat it had the "feel" of sheathing your sword for the Iaijutsu that you were going to do after it, on top of it acting as a check on preventing you from just spamming Shinten.

I agree, please do not remove Kaiten.

Did this changed happened, cause JP-side hated the very idea of the channeling skills, Ogi Namikiri/Kaeshi: Namikiri, then thought that this was the perfect solution, was to remove Kaiten? Simplifying the job, on what makes the job unique, simply makes no sense.

I've played FF since ARR. I dont play a healer so I cant comment on their pruning or homogenization but what happened to tanks and many classes going into ShB appears to be the ongoing design philosophy: lower the skill ceiling and the skill floor as much as possible. Any friction felt by the player or any decisions they have to make that come from their class should be removed. Look at what happened to DRK or tanking in general. Aggro doesnt even exist anymore, its just something that happens while you do your very simple dps rotation.

Is Kaiten the most important ability in the game? Does it require incredible amounts of gameplay and planning to use? No not at all, but what makes gameplay fun or class design good is not simply the amount of buttons to press or the complexity involved, but the subjective feel of the overall kit itself. Kaiten requires some minor attention paid to the kenki bar that eventually becomes passive, as the rhythm of the overall rotation becomes second nature. Its main purpose (at least now that kenki is in surplus throughout the rotation) is to give you the feel of winding up for a big swing.

Many have argued that its simply a button thats pressed before every Iaijutsu/Namikiri but by that token, why do ANY damage buffs exist? Why not roll buffs into potency of other abilities. Heck, why do we have to press Hakaze to start every combo. We sure press that button a LOT, why not simply have one button for each sen and thats it. The value of a button press is not solely in its utility, because if utility is all that matters, then the perfect class design is a single button that plays your class for you or you can hold down. The very purpose of having a variety of skills and abilities that interact with eachother is for providing the player with "fun". If buttons feel bad to press for the majority of players its bad design, if they feel good it is good design. The evaluation need not be more complicated than that. The difficult part is in the class design.

As fun is subjective the best thing for the dev team to do is to make each class as unique as possible, give players as many different flavours of gameplay as possible. Try to raise skill ceilings as high as possible while lowering skill floors as low as possible. Does a casual player who doesnt research their class have fun? Do they feel rewarded playing the class? Does a player that puts time and practice and research in get rewarded with higher results proportionate to their skill? Do they get to make decisions in gameplay that feel good and improve outcomes?

Continued: Homogenization and simplification of classes addresses the skill floor, lowering it further and making the game more accessible. It does however lower the skill ceiling and in the case of skills like Kaiten, reduces the fun many players have while doing so. This is a product of classes being designed to have a single rotation - a single correct way to play them. Good class design has branched decision making and priority based gameplay. A more casual player can stick to a rotation and be rewarded, a better player can diverge from that and do more. Alas, FF designs dps classes to largely be played a single way. Hit your 1 2 3 rotation and use your oGCDs on CD or when they line up. Ultimately, I am not optimistic about there being more nuanced class design coming to the game in the future, it simply is not how they view design. I do however hope they dont remove whatever flavour already exists in favour of keeping the skill floor as close to the ground as possible.

Originally Posted by Aeryse

Did this changed happened, cause JP-side hated the very idea of the channeling skills, Ogi Namikiri/Kaeshi: Namikiri, then thought that this was the perfect solution, was to remove Kaiten? Simplifying the job, on what makes the job unique, simply makes no sense.

It seems JP is more concerned about guaranteed crits hurting SAM's synergy and viability. Kaiten's removal is divisive but isn't discussed much in the JP SAM megathread.

From what I've read on the official forum, the suggested SAM changes are generally disliked.

I've played SAM since it came out and XIV itself well before that, the direction this game is going with class design and identity is getting more disappointing as it goes on. It's hard to see the logic behind removing Kaiten, instead of consolidating other buttons that were added 4 months ago(!) so they can have AOE damage with falloff or combo from other actions (Shoha II, Ikishoten+Namikiri.) It mostly shows a lack of understanding. I don't personally know a single SAM player that wants this, and I would suggest to CBU3 to perhaps re-evaluate their thought process on melee job balance and changes.

tl;dr Removing Kaiten is a bad change and I'm unhappy with it. Don't touch it at all, or revert it.