Bring Back Kaiten

[BelegErkhten]

The solution to the Kaiten problem is to make it the effect only apply to weaponskills that have a cast time.
No more People doing Kaiten-Yukikaze filler or some other nonesense, Job is fixed, you're welcome.

[Shurrikhan]

No one was ever doing a Kaiten-Yukikaze spam anyways. It's less efficient than Shinten.

???

For that reason, though...
@RyuuZero

No, Kaiten interacts, in the sense you seem to be referring to, only with Iaijutsu. It simply adds a button/timing trap to all else.

While, on the other hand...
@Carighan

It would be plenty easy to tell Kaiten apart even without tooltips.

[BelegErkhten]

No one was ever doing a Kaiten-Yukikaze spam anyways. It's less efficient than Shinten.

Lol
Lmao
And no one ever uses Doton on a single target either

It would be plenty easy to tell Kaiten apart even without tooltips.

Assuming that FFXIV players are Literate is a MASSIVE mistake.

[Jeeqbit]

In my 10 years of playing, with over 2,500 days of playtime, I've not seen a single person have a problem with Kaiten. I didn't see a single person have a problem with it in the stream chats where Yoshi-P claimed he'd met someone that had a problem with it.

This change was when the changes had ceased to just be removing bloat, unused/annoying stuff, stuff that couldn't work anymore, to removing all stress and confusion at the expense of job identity.

in a side scrolling game, if there aren’t any holes you can drop down into if you miss a jump, of course the game would lose its stress, but it would also lose its fun.

[SubmarineAlt]

In my 10 years of playing, with over 2,500 days of playtime, I've not seen a single person have a problem with Kaiten. I didn't see a single person have a problem with it in the stream chats where Yoshi-P claimed he'd met someone that had a problem with it.

This change was when the changes had ceased to just be removing bloat, unused/annoying stuff, stuff that couldn't work anymore, to removing all stress and confusion at the expense of job identity.

Kaiten added no additional depth to SAM. It was a button that had no nuance. No gray area. It had 1 specific use case, use it before a sticker spender. That's it. Because of Shinten's existence, you had a very clear, strict barrier where its use was either more efficient than Shinten (correct use case), or not more efficient (incorrect use case). It was a worthless, pointless filler button that acted as a gauge spender. It introduced a fail state that never occurred in actual gameplay because of how old SAM flowed. That fail state being "I used Shinten the GCD before Iaijutsu." A fail state so rare that you have to intentionally trigger it to get it to happen.

Of all the buttons Square has removed, Kaiten is one of the few that was actually justifiable. It was just worthless button bloat. It's ONLY benefit was thematic and rhythmic. But SAM's identity isn't just fucking Kaiten. And, if you were legitimately stressed or confused with Kaiten's use case? I'd tell you to play something simplistic like Warrior, but you've beaten me to it.

[Shurrikhan]

There is only one use for Midare: to spend it before your next Sen. There is only one use for Tenka: to spend it before your next Sen while in AoE. There is only one use for Shinten: to spend its Kenki before you'd overcap until dumping under raid buffs. Even Higanbana, Yaten, and Gyoten barely have two use cases.

Does that make all those skills, likewise, degenerate bloat?

Or perhaps, just perhaps, might things work rather more interdependently as a complete system, with the likes of only our 2-Sen being AoE, or Kenki originally desiring certain variable margins mindful of upcoming Higan, Guren/Senei, etc. timings, and the like actually make a difference overall even if not skill by individual skill?

Inb4 "Kaiten-simp" or the like: Kaiten can stay gone for all I care, but could we please consider the implications of our warrants evenly when (or ideally before) arguing whether something should or should not have been removed? Else, in giving ammo for anything alike to be removed in the future, we may find far more taken than we first posted...

[Carighan]

There is only one use for Midare: to spend it before your next Sen. There is only one use for Tenka: to spend it before your next Sen while in AoE. There is only one use for Shinten: to spend its Kenki before you'd overcap until dumping under raid buffs. Even Higanbana, Yaten, and Gyoten barely have two use cases.

Does that make all those skills, likewise, degenerate bloat?

Yes, actually. These are all "bad" buttons. You're getting close to a core problem with most DPS class designs in FFXIV (and in fact tanks and healers too but in different just thematically similar ways): They are mostly button bloat.

The core underlying class identity and design is incredibly minimal, and does not at all translate well into the main gameplay loop. The fact so many oGCDs exist in itself hints at this, as it shows a need to find "between the cracks"-space for more buttons to give people more to "do", as their core gameplay holds no mental attention as there's nothing to it.

So yeah, correct, virtually all such buttons are pointless for their respective jobs. And once you take them away, the static rotation exposed beneath the thin veneer shows how utterly simplistic it is, and that in turn shows just why static-rotation-type jobs just don't work well, at least for FFXIV. They really ought to be moving away from them more.

Take for example the core visual/lore/operational identify of Samurai. Casted melee attacks. How often do these actually even impact your gameplay feel at all nowadays? They do not. They are too fast, they aren't important enough, they are too variable in their placement specifically. They ought to be extremely restrictive moves, but go with the lore have huge payoff when you pull them off - in fact not being able to do should probably be expected to happen sometimes to account for the burst in power. Instead, Samurai has the same static-rotation GCD flow that autohotkey could play optimally for you, with the same filler oGCD spam as everyone else.

Those buttons you mention only exist to make you feel more busy while playing an incredibly mind-numbingly boring core gameplay. It's the equivalent of constantly having to tap on buildings to collect currency in mobile games, nothing more, nothing less. To a very small degree this is not problematic or unexpected, but in FFXIV these non-player-interactive filler buttons have become the vast majority of skills and hence hotbars are so bloated that this is noteworthy when people discuss the game to non-players.

[Shurrikhan]

Yes, actually. These are all "bad" buttons. You're getting close to a core problem with most DPS class designs in FFXIV (and in fact tanks and healers too but in different just thematically similar ways): They are mostly button bloat.

Find me an MMO where, in the same contexts, one's kit isn't likewise mostly bloat? Heck, by your warrants, that'd be true even of most MOBA's abilities if they were placed in PvE against anything living long enough and/or encounters short enough for waste via overkill not to eventually wipe the party.

I'll agree that XIV's kits are, overall, shallow. In a PvE setting like XIV's, so are WoW's, so are GW2's, so are B&S's, and so even most of even Overwatch's (limited to just 2 rotational abilities from which to draw the bulk of their identity). Striking dummies reduce virtually every kit into either a set rotation or set priority order; the best they can hope for are for the APL (action priority list) to be quite long because of uncontrolled but mitigatable/capitalizable conditions.

Why, then, does XIV's kit tend to feel so much more shallow than the others? Part of it is the lack of available interrelation of kit components by which to leverage a deeper or more varied form of encounter, but prior even to that is... the lack of any such deeper or more varied encounter.

So yeah, correct, virtually all such buttons are pointless for their respective jobs. And once you take them away, the static rotation exposed beneath the thin veneer shows how utterly simplistic it is, and that in turn shows just why static-rotation-type jobs just don't work well, at least for FFXIV.

And yet they absolutely have worked for and in XIV... when the encounters themselves offered a constraint notable enough to introduce skill expression in shuffling around what parts remain modular in order to keep more important parts static. Trying to keep a rotation static despite likely or necessary uptime loss and conflicting priorities (say, upon add spawns or in needing to burst down a shield immediately so a necessarily lethal raidwide can be interrupted) involves at least as much cognitive load as adapting to RNG.

Take for example the core visual/lore/operational identify of Samurai. Casted melee attacks.

I don't agree that these have ever made or even been alleged to be the core of Samurai identity operationally or in lore. And if visual... see Kaiten.

they aren't important enough

They're a huge portion of your damage and the centerpiece of our rotation.

they are too variable in their placement specifically

They have been from the start, unless you mean TG. In which case, that's the most leverageably non-fixed part in all of Samurai's gameplay, so...

They ought to be extremely restrictive moves

How so? This sounds as vague and likely therefore to end up way off-base, frankly, as your postulations on what Monk themes and gameplay should have been (i.e., nothing like Monk has ever been or intended to be).

And if restriction was something you liked... see Kaiten.

in fact not being able to do should probably be expected to happen sometimes to account for the burst in power.

That's effectively asking for the job to be impossible to balance. How else would that whole portion of your damage be far more than its already immense portion and yet the overall kit be balanced around a frequent lack of that portion?

Instead, Samurai has the same static-rotation GCD flow that autohotkey could play optimally for you, with the same filler oGCD spam as everyone else.

Because it's in XIV. It's like everyone else in the sense that they striking dummy rotate in striking dummy encounters because what else could there possibly be? So would, in effect, any other MMO's class's kit. That's not remotely an issue specifically with Samurai theme.

Those buttons you mention only exist to make you feel more busy while playing an incredibly mind-numbingly boring core gameplay.

And yet Samurai would be a hell of a lot more dull without "those buttons" (Shinten, Midare, Tenka, Higan, Yaten, and Gyoten, half of which you called the representatives for the core of Samurai identity).

It's the equivalent of constantly having to tap on buildings to collect currency in mobile games, nothing more, nothing less.

Perhaps if said games had a fixed rhythm, fixed gaps, differing priorities between early- and late-gap oGCD presses, and far more to track. At which point it'd be, well, nothing like currency-collection tap-spamming in a mobile game. Because it isn't. You should already be aware that it isn't.

To a very small degree this is not problematic or unexpected, but in FFXIV these non-player-interactive filler buttons have become the vast majority of skills and hence hotbars are so bloated that this is noteworthy when people discuss the game to non-players.

Agreed. Too much is bloat.

But apply your warrants equally. If anything we hit "just for damage", for instance, becomes inherently "bloat", we're left with next to nothing (and if including indirect contribution, then truly nothing, as every fight is ended by killing things so even healing and mit are ultimately in the interest of damage).

Moreover, I suspect that most things we can think of to use for damage would still, ultimately, be used in rote rotation so long as encounters and other contexts of combat in XIV remain so unvaried. You could have the fanciest ramping-per-crit ability that requires you and two others to dash through the boss and rotate alternatingly in a hexagram formation and buffs your next-next hit and it'd still slot in rotationally, just with firmer job constraints... so long as the encounters allow that to be a norm.

[RyuuZero]

well yeah Kenki still feels useless like it currently is because there is no much else you use it on but burst.

But Samurai's Dawntrail Gameplay is enough to bullshit you into having fun, which is better than Viper which is only enjoyable with a Good Glamour, or NIN (okay at least Raiton is still fun, but Zesho Meppo/Deathfrog should be just a permanent upgrade instead of a 2min) or DRG(is supposed to Jump but these new animations just fall flat).. also lvl100 Monk, where is my Hundred Fists Skill!?

Though I may have a New Proposal to the Bring Back Kaiten Demand:
Tendo for 20 Kenki
think about it, I mean there is no reason for a Samurai to do a Tendoless Iaijutsu at lvl100, so I have to Visions for the Future:

The Hopeful One:
Kaiten returns at lvl52 but granting the next weaponskill to be direct hit and getting The Tendo Buff at lvl100.
The Desperate/Consequent One:
The Kenki Removal would be the consequent path of the Direction of the Current Samurai, since there is not much use for Kenki outside of Shinten. Gyoten, Yaten are utility and do not necessarily need Kenki anyway and I do not know anyone who asked for One Minute Senei/Guren.

But I'm also not a Fan of the simplification of all rotations and harmonizations, like the Mumyo Shoha Removal.. yes, because I wanted Shoha to be Geirskogul ugh..
I remain of the opinion that 6.08 Samurai was the peak state of Samurai Gameplay and all they had to do is to

1. Make Kaiten Direct Hit
2. make Sen'ei/Guren into buffs to Shinten/Kyoten, activated by Ikishoten
3. keep Tenka Goken Conal

Also: Iaijutsu should always require a target
The Fantasy of a Sword Master possess the ability and agency to decide what to target and what not in order to become One with the Battlefield.

and now a little RANT:
How does it feel that Ikishoten is your 2minute Conal AoE Button now?
that Zanshin not only requires Zanshin ready but also 50 Kenki? a bit redundant if you ask me 2 requirements for One OGCD Cone Attack.. The Funniest Part about it is: I didn't even need to rewrite my Double Slice Buster Macro, which I still rewrote by renaming it into Rising Slice Buster, but yeah I'm not a Fan of the current direction of Rotation Design due to compromise of Job Fantasy and Harmonization.

[Shurrikhan]

Sorry for the nitpicks, but...

Kaiten returns at lvl52 but granting the next weaponskill to be direct hit

This would be a damage loss if the auto-crit were removed from Iaijutsu. If it remains, it would be only exactly as damage-efficient (240p on Midare for 20K instead of 300p for 25K) as Shinten. You would need to increase the potency of Iaijutsu to make an auto-direct (only a 25% modifier, down from 50%), which would have to be siphoned from elsewhere, or decrease its Kenki cost (say, to 15, which would bring it back to its old 16p/K instead of Shinten's 12p/K).

I do not know anyone who asked for One Minute Senei/Guren.

I didn't, but nonetheless enjoy the change. They're more interesting hit slightly more often.

Also: Iaijutsu should always require a target

At this point, that's simply saying that SAM shouldn't be allowed to destealth nearby invisible enemies with their largest AoE.

I preferred moving in and out for Fuga->Oka->Tenka, etc., but I doubt most will care at this point.

How does it feel that Ikishoten is your 2minute Conal AoE Button now?

It feels fine. Ikishoten still does what it's always done: it forces you to drop to 35-50 Kenki before hitting it as not to overcap. It just now happens to not be quite so worth hitting almost precisely on CD in dungeons. The extra pressure it put on our Kenki gauge by being a 60s CD will be missed, but only barely, especially without a desynced Guren/Senei (which did the same until their cost was halved).

that Zanshin not only requires Zanshin ready but also 50 Kenki? a bit redundant if you ask me 2 requirements for One OGCD Cone Attack.

Yes and no. Again, Ikishoten still makes you drop Kenki prior as before. It does feel weird that it now provides only 2 extra APM, down from 3, though. Before, it felt more frenetic to spend everything in a short burst before and after Iki, and while it's only lost one oGCD spender, it can sometimes feel more empty than that difference since we'll have frequently gone from zero extra space to finally having it. I might also be happier if Zanshin was charged by different means, but... probably not by much.

Tl;dr: I think you're making a bit too much out of the loss of Kenki, at this point (ignoring the other contributors to the results you mention) and failing to notice what's still working just as before (i.e., just fine).