The Mug change, predictably, feels like garbage.

[Manofpassion]

In expansions past it was BRD, AST, SCH, DRK
and EW it was SMN, SAM, NIN, MCH (lack of change). To be honest it would be easier to just list all jobs they haven’t “yet” screwed up for accessibility sake

PLD, BLM, DRG, RDM, DNC, GNB, and RPR and SGE being too new to ruin yet that’s 8/19 almost half the roster is in dire need of attention and I can almost be certain they’ll end up screwing over these 8…or 7 as we all know BLM is in constant state of intensive care. WTF is going on with the job design team?

Honestly, I started playing this game because I was told the devs actually care and listen to feedback. This patch has been a rude awakening to me that it doesn't seem to be the case. I should have been worried when bard stopped being a dot job, but I didn't think too much of it at the time.

Its been said before, but trick change is bizarre. One minute buffs line up with 2 minute buffs 4head, this change does Jackshit other than remove ninja's usp and part of its appeal. Devs, please learn to count.

With ishgard housing showing the devs fumbling with numbers again, the recent changes seems to show that the dev team really need to go back to kindergarten and redo basic maths.

[aloneatsea]

Personally, I don't care if Mug "works better" in the context of raiding or general party play. 6.1 NIN feels way too similar to MNK, and that's not a positive thing to say considering Monk doesn't even have an identity for itself. Ninjutsu and Blitz are too similar, both jobs have problems of having nothing to do or manage in downtime, both have an unremarkable job gauge that is primarily spent on one oGCD that has overcap problems, etc. I do not see the point of the TA/Mug change when they could've just buffed its potencies.

Why even bother having 60s cooldowns anymore at this point?



Primarily by people that did not play the job. If what you wanted out of MNK is a standardized job that has relatively little jank, then EW MNK succeeded in that endeavour. However, that came at the cost of basically everything else that was unique to it, whether it be Greased Lightning or heavy positional gameplay. What it gained did not make up for what was lost.

Completely agree. I was going to pick up Monk as an alt job pre-Endwalker; when I saw the changes, I thought they were neat, but it didn't really fulfil the 'Monk gameplay fantasy' I had in mind.


Back to Trick and Mug, I also hate the idea of managing two personal buffs and a party buff. Both Reaper and Monk only have the worry about the one personal damage buff. It is hard to manage the buffs? Not exactly, no, but it is more rigid and makes the NIN rotation even more scripted than it was before. Now we have to maintain Huton, and we have a party buff and personal buff on strict timers. Ninja has become more rigid and more similar to Monk, and I just can't stand it.

It wasn't broken before, so I see no reason to ""fix"" it. I've said it once before, but if the problem Square Enix was trying to fix was Ninja's low personal damage (for some ungodly reason), we could have always made like a Dragoon and given the party +3% damage up and the Ninja +5%. Would that suck a bit? Yes. It is infinitely more palatable to me than the current changes? Also yes.


I just don't buy any of the proposed reasons why these changes needed to be made. 'Synergy' falls apart when you realise how much synergy with other jobs's one-minute brust windows was lost. 'Balancing' goes out the window when they took the strongest melee DPS in the game and buffed it more.



If there is a legitimate reason for these changes, I would like to hear it. Right now, however, I am really struggling to see the logic. It feels very frustrating when these changes have seemingly been made at random, and for no good reason.

Nobody asked for them, and from what I've seen scouring the English and JP forums, very, very few people legitimately enjoy them.

[wereotter]

I’m not a monk but wasn’t their rework fairly well received?

Your comments about dancer and reaper are opinions. They’re both really well received by the community.

Monk change was VERY controversial, mostly long-time monk mains were upset about it while the people who praised it were mostly people who didn't really have much of any experience with the job. So definitely a mixed bag. I've gotten used to it, and I don't hate it as much as I did to start since it makes a lot of the mechanics they introduced into savage easier, but I'm still not convinced this is the best they could have done.

As for ninja, though, which was the main topic. I agree. Mug just doesn't feel impactful enough for the big skill that raises the party's damage, especially when I think of it compared to skills like brotherhood and arcane circle that have bigger animations with better sounds to accompany them. If the developers are intent on keeping ninja's damage buff at 120 seconds, I wonder if they start you with mug as a rogue, and later it gets upgraded to assassinate at some point leveling up ninja? Though they'd have to dramatically reduce the animation lock for that to work out well.

[RArchet]

Monk change was VERY controversial, mostly long-time monk mains were upset about it while the people who praised it were mostly people who didn't really have much of any experience with the job. So definitely a mixed bag. I've gotten used to it, and I don't hate it as much as I did to start since it makes a lot of the mechanics they introduced into savage easier, but I'm still not convinced this is the best they could have done.

As for ninja, though, which was the main topic. I agree. Mug just doesn't feel impactful enough for the big skill that raises the party's damage, especially when I think of it compared to skills like brotherhood and arcane circle that have bigger animations with better sounds to accompany them. If the developers are intent on keeping ninja's damage buff at 120 seconds, I wonder if they start you with mug as a rogue, and later it gets upgraded to assassinate at some point leveling up ninja? Though they'd have to dramatically reduce the animation lock for that to work out well.

Honestly, they should just remove positionals entirely at this point with how often they force us into ignoring flanks and rears, such as the 2nd boss of The Dead Ends where it forces you to circle around it constantly. True North doesn't last long enough to cover these situations.

Mug should have been the Personal Damage boost (it already has a lot of personal effects). Trick has a cooler Animation, which is the only reason I'm kinda half and half on this as someone leveling NIN.

[aloneatsea]

As for ninja, though, which was the main topic. I agree. Mug just doesn't feel impactful enough for the big skill that raises the party's damage, especially when I think of it compared to skills like brotherhood and arcane circle that have bigger animations with better sounds to accompany them. If the developers are intent on keeping ninja's damage buff at 120 seconds, I wonder if they start you with mug as a rogue, and later it gets upgraded to assassinate at some point leveling up ninja? Though they'd have to dramatically reduce the animation lock for that to work out well.

I agree with you that Assassinate/Dream within a Dream is pretty boring as it is (cool animations aside!), and that Mug is not a very satisfying party buff button. I really don't understand what was wrong with keeping it on Trick Attack, the iconic party buff of the Ninja class since the very day it was introduced. I just... why not just keep it there... it has historical precedent, a great animation, and most importantly nobody was unhappy with it!


I think the idea of upgrading Mug into a more Ninja-like skill is a great idea too. I don't think it needs to become Assassinate or have a party buff attached, though.

[Grimoire-M]

Honestly, they should just remove positionals entirely at this point with how often they force us into ignoring flanks and rears, such as the 2nd boss of The Dead Ends where it forces you to circle around it constantly. True North doesn't last long enough to cover these situations.

I don’t feel Positionals need to go away at all personally. But they do need better implementation if certain jobs are supposed to have a lot of them. I prefer Samurai’s softer approach where you can flex your basic Sen combos around how you will position in the next 25ish seconds or so to more static options like Dragoon, but I don’t think either is ‘Bad’, but the focus is misapplied. Heavier Positional jobs like pre-Endwalker Monk need to be designed in such a way that they are inherently more flexible by default to compensate for problems with their demand. This is why I’ve wanted positional based chakra generation for so long. With a tightly controlled gauge it would fit better with XIV’s fights overall.

[wereotter]

I agree with you that Assassinate/Dream within a Dream is pretty boring as it is (cool animations aside!), and that Mug is not a very satisfying party buff button. I really don't understand what was wrong with keeping it on Trick Attack, the iconic party buff of the Ninja class since the very day it was introduced. I just... why not just keep it there... it has historical precedent, a great animation, and most importantly nobody was unhappy with it!


I think the idea of upgrading Mug into a more Ninja-like skill is a great idea too. I don't think it needs to become Assassinate or have a party buff attached, though.

Coming from what seems to be the developer's visions for party buffs, Trick Attack had to change. They seem to be in the mindset currently that personal buffs and bursts happen every 60 seconds, even if that burst is rather small, and party-wide buffs go out every 120. With trick being a party wide every 60, changing it to just a personal damage buff is a very sensible solution. But what comes is that mug just doesn't feel like it has the impact that trick does when you use it. It's got a goofy sound effect and very subtle animation, and unlike ninja's trick, requires zero setup to use

Honestly I'd forgotten that Assassinate upgrades to Dream because I never play low level ninja, but I do think there are better solutions than just using mug. Another thought might be having Ten Chi Jin apply a personal buff that upgrades your next trick attack to what we had before, increasing party damage. Sure that would delay ninja's party support, but not so far as to cut off much that's really important these days, and gives it to ninja at the same level monk gets its similar move, brotherhood.

All that being said, I do think that they couldn't do much more major since they tend to avoid massive job overhauls in odd numbered patches so that people don't have to entirely relearn their job potentially mid way through a savage tier or right before ultimate comes out.

I don’t feel Positionals need to go away at all personally. But they do need better implementation if certain jobs are supposed to have a lot of them. I prefer Samurai’s softer approach where you can flex your basic Sen combos around how you will position in the next 25ish seconds or so to more static options like Dragoon, but I don’t think either is ‘Bad’, but the focus is misapplied. Heavier Positional jobs like pre-Endwalker Monk need to be designed in such a way that they are inherently more flexible by default to compensate for problems with their demand. This is why I’ve wanted positional based chakra generation for so long. With a tightly controlled gauge it would fit better with XIV’s fights overall.

I agree. I think that overall positionals are more of a positive than a negative for the game. I just think that there are some fights where I don't feel like the developers think through entirely how melee damage will be impacted. P3S has a phase starting at Firestorms of Asphedelos through Death's Toll where, for the most part, where you stand is dictated by the raid mechanics. The phase lasts for nearly 2 minutes, during which time you'll get 40 seconds of true north. So thinking of ways around that so melee jobs aren't punished because of how the fight is designed would be nice. Both myself and my co-melee partner have brought up to the raid group how we can't get enough true north to do our jobs effectively there, and he's just a reaper, he can theoretically hold off his positional moves. I'm a monk, I don't have that luxury.

[aloneatsea]

snip

They do seem to be in taht mind, I am firmly against it. I don't think Ninja needed a personal buff in the first place -- it was already doing plenty well balance-wise this tier as it stood. Having a manage a personal buff on top of the party buff just makes the class feel clunky in my opinion. I would sincerely feel better about the changes if they made Trick a two-minute party buff and removed the personal buff from Mug.

That said, again, the class did not need such a change in the first place. If the developers want to make classes focus around two minutes, that's fine. However, when it comes to the point of changing the usage of an iconic ability of a class, I think it goes a little too far. Ninja is not Ninja without a one-minute Trick Attack party buff. As many people have said time and time again, one minute fits neatly into two minutes. If the problem is balance, there are other solutions that do not come at the cost of class identity.

What I struggle with is that so many people seem to want to compromise on the personal buff. Am I abnormal in thinking that it feels quite awful to play around? There's a reason I avoid classes like Monk or Dancer -- having to put up a personal buff and a party buff feels quite wretched to me. I'd much rather potencies be adjusted to account for the damage increase the personal buff gives. I don't think receiving a personal damage buff makes gameplay more exciting. Buffing the party, however, and lining up my big damage abilities -- that feels meaningful.

I just don't want Ninja to lose what made it enjoyable for me to play in the first place -- the fact that it wasn't like anything else. If they keep these changes, there's really nothing else I can move to.

It makes so much more sense in my mind to keep Ninja as it is, and adjust the potency on Trick Attack if it's so problematic. The developers could always approach it like Dragoon's Dragon Sight and have it buff the Ninja's damage by more than the party member's.

Frankly, I'm glad they couldn't do anything more major. The only 'major' change I want to see in Ninja right now is them reverting the changes to Trick and Mug.

The only problems 6.08 Ninja had were a few unspired oGCDs (Mug, Meisui, Dream within a Dream) and poor Ninki generation. I don't think Ninja needs an overhaul to fix these problems -- nor were they more pressing than other job issues.

[GeneralDil]

Mug feels 10x better than High Jump transforming into Mirage Dive so you accidentally double weave it and mess your entire rotation up. Honestly that and WM -> Pitch Perfect Changes were the worst changes that weren't SAM this patch. I hope with all my heart they revert those changes.

also predictably. Ninja is #1 ranked DPS, so what about Mug feels bad now?

[aloneatsea]

Mug feels 10x better than High Jump transforming into Mirage Dive so you accidentally double weave it and mess your entire rotation up. Honestly that and WM -> Pitch Perfect Changes were the worst changes that weren't SAM this patch. I hope with all my heart they revert those changes.

also predictably. Ninja is #1 ranked DPS, so what about Mug feels bad now?

Nobody is arguing that Ninja isn't strong. Frankly, it's too strong, but this was already the case even before 6.1.

The problem is that Mug is a bloated ability with two effects that in an ideal world you want to activate at different times. Having +40 Ninki on your party buff means you can't build up to 100 gauge for burst, which feels absolutely awful.

That, and it's on a two minute cooldown, whereas our previous party buff, Trick Attack, was on a one-minute cooldown. We've been saddled with an additional buff we need to pop on a strict timing, which makes the class feel more stiff and rigid as a result. In terms of raw numbers, Ninja got stronger, but in terms of play feel, it got much worse.