6.1 Ninja Changes and My Thoughts

[Acepat_Leatherbee]

I've been playing NIN from minute 1 of starting this game. I loved every part of the job, from aesthetics to game feel to my overall role in the party. I grew to love the idea of being the "support" melee. Sure I don't provide the most damage, but I was the one providing the buffs to the party the most frequently.
When 6.0 rolled around, I didn't like the raijus and how NIN felt untested as a whole, and with that (+IRL internet issues) I decided to switch off the job temporarily until it got fixed. Come 6.05, I was still unable to play in savage content (my internet was baaad at the time) but I enjoyed the NIN we had at the time. Then I watched LL69.

When I understood the new changes, I got very upset and thought about posting here, but decided to wait and see how the job feels ingame. And I have to say: although there are some parts I enjoyed with the changes, some parts I really do not like.

Let's start with the positives.

• I found that the doton changes to be completely fine.
• I actually like the feel of how Ninja plays now

Now when I say the feel of Ninja, I mean it in a very specific way: I like the concept of having 2 debuffs to juggle, and when I first read the LL slides I thought mug was getting added as an extra party debuff and was really excited. I was all in for them pushing for a support melee to help it become more unique from the other melees. The way this was taken, however, was in the complete opposite direction and leads me to the negatives.

• Trick losing the party debuff rips a core part of NIN away.
• Mug is a terrible cooldown to attach a party buff to and causes priority conflicts.

Whenever you ask an ffxiv player what they think of for NIN, they would usually have 4 responses: Naruto, edgy, trick attack, and mudras. Trick has been a staple for so long and everyone loved it. It wasn't a "pain to keep aligned", it was fun and the party loved it. I don't think I can ever recall anyone complaining about trick being 1 minute, but every single NIN main I have spoken to after LL69 has said this change was unneeded and they disliked it. I even feel slighted whenever I use trick and see a debuff show up, but then suddenly remember that's only for me. Overall, the change for the sake of "synergy" was out of nowhere, uncalled for, and was not a pleasant surprise in the least. There's no need to make it fit for synergy when it already has synergy. 120s is divisible by 60s. And with it being 2 minutes now, it feels worse than many of the other two minute buffs. At least the others actually buff the players, so it works perfectly fine in 1 or 2+ target situations. Mug can only pick one target, AND it's two minutes. It's just a worse party buff.

As for mug, I feel that mug having a party buff attached to it is a terrible idea because of the ninki attached to it already. It can cause a form of conflict in which you want the extra ninki, but the buff is more important (this is especially important in the opener for bunshin).

CONTINUE BELOW FOR PROPOSALS

[Acepat_Leatherbee]

CONTINUED FROM TOP POST

As for my proposals, I have one that maybe not everyone may agree with, but I have thought of as a compromise of what we have now. This is a very abstract and "feel" only thing, I don't know how the balance would work for it.

• Revert trick to be how it originally was. Make it the 60s party blessing we all remember it to be
• Make mug a personal debuff on 2 minutes, which will help make your oomph with trick even stronger. (Or if you want to go insane, make it a buff you can target someone with (I honestly don't see this one happening, I'm just spitballing at this point))

I mention the first because I don't think anyone who plays NIN wants to become "yet another 2-minute buff job", especially when a lot of jobs *do* have 1 minute mini bursts that benefit from trick. The second, however, I mention because it can carry the feeling of still juggling the two debuffs, which I personally enjoyed, while still allowing NIN to be the support melee.

The list above is purely something I would enjoy and completely understand if nobody else does, that's fine. However, If there's only one thing that the dev team takes away from this, it's that we want trick attack to be reverted back to a 1 minute party buff. There was no need for the change, nobody even wanted it, and it doesn't help *anybody*.

[Haruka_R]

I just want Mug to go back to the way it was.

[Aelin_Ashryver]

Can't help but feel this is just a result from a lot of ninja complaining over lower dps vs other melee.

[Kolsykol]

If they're gonna turn us into just another DPS then can we get someone to share gear with?

NIN just feels more like a black sheep imo, Mug is just not as rewarding to use and it's just Brotherhood.
Only that Brotherhood is actually more interesting because it gives Chakra...

[Faafetai]

The change is fine for me as well, but I have to tell you my muscle memory is the enemy! Also it is funny being on discord now and people call out trick attack but that say 'trick attack, no new trick attack, mug buff thats the one now.' It is silly. It will take some getting use to and changing call outs but other than that it is not a bad change, just a strange change. I think they should have made the personal buff mug and trick stays the same honestly. At odd levels getting your personal buff is horrendous similar to how I feel when all I have to refresh my huton is an aoe when in dusk vigil. Some of it just feels bad though.

[Acepat_Leatherbee]

Can't help but feel this is just a result from a lot of ninja complaining over lower dps vs other melee.

I haven't really heard of that before, but I can believe it to be honest. I feel the offer I brought up can help with that with the personal for 2 mins, or honestly any other change that doesn't get rid of trick attack for no real reason. That just feels like tossing the baby out with the bathwater.

[Acepat_Leatherbee]

Mug is just not as rewarding to use and it's just Brotherhood.
Only that Brotherhood is actually more interesting because it gives Chakra...

Yea, mug does not feel satisfying at all and unlike brotherhood or battle litany, if the target with mug dies, mug is now gone. The other buffs last, and can be used for situations like AoE, because it buffs the players instead of debuffing the enemy. + Brotherhood doesn't have you deal with the weird ninki change. Overall just not a fun button to press, at least not as fun as trick or other party buffs

[Hasrat]

If they're gonna turn us into just another DPS then can we get someone to share gear with?

NIN just feels more like a black sheep imo, Mug is just not as rewarding to use and it's just Brotherhood.
Only that Brotherhood is actually more interesting because it gives Chakra...

Pure speculation, but I'd propose changing TA is actually the first step in giving us another Scouting job. In my mind, I've kinda suspected that any new job added will have to compete with NIN for a slot on the team, and how does any competition really stack up against TA? I've suspected TA was going to need nerfed for a while now if we're ever going to get new melee DEX jobs.