We are approaching a button bloat problem that can be solved

[Digit4lC4m]

It seems SE would rather remove an action to free up space, than to go with the PvP solution. Glad there's third-party solution to this, except the part where they remove the skill because they think it is pointless and its existence contribute to the 'button bloat' issue.

[VictorSpoils]

How you people have absurdly disgusting filled rows confuses me. Mines clean, takes up 2.5 and that's for a FULL ROTATION on ALL my classes. And yes. I raid.

We get it! You raid!

[hagare]

MORE REMOVED SKILLS!!!!
AHAHAHAHAHA
appropriate considering the reaction to button stacking like PVP

[Shin96]

Instead of removing abilities that cost them part of their budget with animators spending a good amount of time to animate the animations, it is better to consolidate these combos. I dislike 1-2-3 on DRK, I prefered the days of 1-2-3-4-5, honestly.

[Jeeqbit]

Now as we trudge along to 7.0 the obvious next issue is going to be button bloat.

For 7.0 I think Square Enix has 2 options. Continue the approach of replacing existing attacks with new attacks that change as you hit X level.

It's because of this and pruning things at lower levels that there isn't a button bloat issue already and why there won't be one in the future either.

What if we had Eureka type options that could imbue our attacks with different elements?

Imbuing attacks with elements would be interesting but it would interfere with the fantasy of classes that aren't magic. The game would probably spoil which enemies are weak against certain elements like Eureka does and that would make it boring. If it didn't spoil which enemies were weak to them then new or casual players would just do less damage and then you might end up with a situation like DR where it causes everything to take longer.

[Jybril]

i think the reason jobs get button bloated is because a lot of skills do one thing and one thing only. wether its just a damaging ogcd or just an aoe heal, the more they add things with a singular purpose and no internal synergy the more the jobs are gonna feel bloated if they try to give jobs new functions.


i am NOT a fan of removing a skill and adding it back a shiny "new" skill 10 levels later. it makes low level play feel awful and it doesn't add anything to the job.

instead I think traits are the way to go, and maybe merging skills together to have skills that do more than just 1 thing. for instance, the lv 78 trait for sacred soil added 0 skills but it gave a lot more depth of gameplay to scholar and it essentially made sacred soil have a new use. instead of discarding divine seal largesse and making it temperance, a trait that added mitigation + a new animation would've been so much better.

as for making room for the new, i believe merging is also a better answer than deleting. one of the very few decent things shb did for scholar was merging fey covenant with fey illumination. sure, its more restrictive to have them tied together, but its still preferable than straight up losing either.

We also suffer the fact that we have a lot of skills that do the same thing.
Most of healers skill set are like multiple flavors of shields, regens and
potency ups left and right. Us healers could actually have a good portion of our
skills removed and replace them with some DPS skills and consolidate others.
I know not every healer wants to be like a "Support DPS" but that's what I'm rooting for at this point.

[Theox]

We also suffer the fact that we have a lot of skills that do the same thing.
Most of healers skill set are like multiple flavors of shields, regens and
potency ups left and right. Us healers could actually have a good portion of our
skills removed and replace them with some DPS skills and consolidate others.
I know not every healer wants to be like a "Support DPS" but that's what I'm rooting for at this point.

Since we press 1 like 80% of the time in a fight I don't see why giving us a simple dps rotation is going to be an issue.

[Azuri]

If SE was actually concerened about "button bloat" they would stop adding those completely pointless 120s CD abilities that require a proc from another 120s CD ability that only lasts 30 seconds as separate buttons. This is the new trend like charges were in ShB. "Can only be executed while under the effect of X Ready" is atrocious design. Ikishoten > Ogi Namikiri. Arcane Circle > Plentiful Harvest. Flourish > Fan Dance IV. Devilment > Starfall Dance. This. Garbage. Needs. To. Stop. Either give us a good reason to have those long CD abilites we press 4-5 times per encounter as separate buttons or stop making them separate buttons.

The second problem are complete duplicate ST/AoE abilties. We already have a solution. Make them a singular ability with fall off. They already do it for some jobs. Just apply it everywhere.

SAM is unironically the best example of how shortsighted their vision is. Ogi Namikiri has no reason to exist. They could have just made Ikishoten turn into it. Or just gave Ikishoten potency and called it a day. Or replaced Ikishoten with Ogi and made Ogi give 50 Kenki. Shoha & Shoha II and Guren & Senei eat bar space for absolutely no reason. Once again a button you will only press a few times per an entire dungeon takes a permanent slot on your bar. But which "solution" did they come up with? Remove Kaiten.

[LeonKeyh]

What SHOULD happen is AoE kits should go away. That would make for much better gameplay.

Either, give people a stance that makes their single target rotation cleave and hit multiple enemies, or just make all single target attacks cleave. Make it so that the single target rotation is the only rotation and get rid of the anemic, boring AoE rotations (This also allows you to play around with focus targets in packs more since damage fall-off abilities deal more damage to your target).

For healers, keep the 3 attacks and have their stance only affect heals.

SAM's button bloat would have been easily improved by:


Have Shoha upgrade to Shoha II with a high potency plus AE fall-off damage

Combine Shinten and Kyuten into 1 ability with high potency plus AE fall-off damage

Combine Guren and Senei into a single attack with high potency plus AE fall-off damage



Alternatively, make it so the AE versions can't be placed on your hotbar and the "AE stance" replaces the ST version with the AE version (if people feel like they "need" to have control over that for some reason)

[Unease_Lemming]

If SE was actually concerened about "button bloat" they would stop adding those completely pointless 120s CD abilities that require a proc from another 120s CD ability that only lasts 30 seconds as separate buttons. This is the new trend like charges were in ShB. "Can only be executed while under the effect of X Ready" is atrocious design. Ikishoten > Ogi Namikiri. Arcane Circle > Plentiful Harvest. Flourish > Fan Dance IV. Devilment > Starfall Dance. This. Garbage. Needs. To. Stop. Either give us a good reason to have those long CD abilites we press 4-5 times per encounter as separate buttons or stop making them separate buttons.

The second problem are complete duplicate ST/AoE abilties. We already have a solution. Make them a singular ability with fall off. They already do it for some jobs. Just apply it everywhere.

SAM is unironically the best example of how shortsighted their vision is. Ogi Namikiri has no reason to exist. They could have just made Ikishoten turn into it. Or just gave Ikishoten potency and called it a day. Or replaced Ikishoten with Ogi and made Ogi give 50 Kenki. Shoha & Shoha II and Guren & Senei eat bar space for absolutely no reason. Once again a button you will only press a few times per an entire dungeon takes a permanent slot on your bar. But which "solution" did they come up with? Remove Kaiten.

This. This entire post. I have nothing to add to it. But I really want SE to see it and read it.