1 week savage delay and everything that plays into it

[INymphI]

I don't believe fights should be balance and meant to be clear on week 1.

okay, in which week then? if we say week 2, what are the reasons to enter any content week 1 if they are not possible to clear?

The week 2/3/4 people would appreciate the fact the fight still remain a good challenge by the time we get there.

if you read other posts in this thread instead of your own you would see that there are indeed people disencouraged by the tight dps check in week 1, having fear not able to clear it on week 2/3/4.


I think you have got something fundamentally wrong: by reducing the dps check (week 1) from impossible to hard, it would not change to an easy experience for week 2/3/4.
all I say is: if a group plays all mechanics deathless, without any dmgdown and any standard-comp pressing their buttons they should be "rewarded" with a clear, even in week 1. for now the same rule applies to week 2/3/4: even if they play everything perfect they still might not be able to clear the dps check.

if that is fun to you, okay, but do not tell me I am selflishly speaking for a whole group while you do the same for the opposite group.

[INymphI]

And I would like to point out, my main problem with your OP isn't really about your own claim, but your superflious claim you made on behalf of people who are probably on the exact opposite of your spectrum.

And I will tell you this, speak for yourself, because that's certainly NOT true. The week 2/3/4 people would appreciate the fact the fight still remain a good challenge by the time we get there.

calling me out for my superflious claim on behalf of people and doing the same on your own 2 sentences later
*mic drop* bye
haha :-D

[INymphI]

As someone who doesn't even do savage, I enjoyed the delay. Usually when a new raid tier drops, my friends who raid will jump in immediately to get their week1, and I'll basically never see them again. They're constantly in the raid zone, banging their head against PF and (sometimes) getting madder and madder as they continue to wipe due to other people being bad or w/e. Then they'll burn out on the game and start only logging in when they have to do their weekly raid stuff. And eventually they just stop playing altogether.

But this time, there was a week before all of that! So I actually got to enjoy the MSQ with those friends and go through the normal raids/EX with them before they went full-raider mode. It's way more preferred and I love this change and I hope they don't revert it back.

sounds great! and I agree: I definitely had more time for others clearing trial, unreal, etc together than just spending 100% of my time with my static in raid.

[ForteNightshade]

when our static finally reached the enrage of p8s doorboss, we were hitting very VERY hard at a wall. the dps check is insane, even WITH a tomestone weapon. we had multiple clean (no death, no dmgdown) runs and still failed to manage the dps check.

Let me guess. You were running a comp that didn't include at least two of GNB, DRK, BLM, DNC, yes? The issue with the DPS check isn't its severity but the horrendous job balance. GNB and DRK are dealing upwards of 500+ high damage than WAR and PLD despite having comparable mitigation. Both SMN and RDM have been reduced to prange levels while BLM is pumping out low end melee damage. Verraise/Resurrection simply can't compensate with that massive a damage difference, especially when the DPS check all but requires zero deaths. Even amongst the melee themselves, RPR is hilariously outclassed. At the very top end, it's being outdamaged by BRD of all jobs. In fact, a comp consisting of WAR/PLD/RDM/MCH has a 0.5-1% level of damage variance where they can clear. This assumes nearly perfect play from the entire group and you crit enough to overcome the disadvantage. Meanwhile, swapping in DRK and GNB allows the group to clear with two damage downs. That's how ridiculous job balance is right now.

The DPS check isn't the issue here. The devs simply didn't test overall job balance whatsoever.

I have a couple questions for you:

- Given the fact that week 1 clear is something a very small fraction (hardcore raiders) of an already small portion (general raiders) of players, why everything have to be balanced and carter around those people?

Who else do you cater it towards? Every other piece of content can be cleared through sheer brute force. There is literally nothing except Savage that pushes the jobs to their limits. You don't balance jobs around the low end because that makes content roll over to any experienced player. In fact, balancing jobs around the high end (but not the very top) benefits everyone. Otherwise, you will start to see jobs being locked out.

Speaking of, since you mention Party finder. They aren't clearing P8S week 1. Even the second week will be a considerable longshot due to the aforementioned job balance. Several jobs right now are simply too disadvantaged to allow for the inconsistencies you'll experience in PF. Warrior offers literally nothing in P8S that Gunbreaker doesn't do better. Meanwhile, the latter brings 500 additional damage with similar defensives. So...

To put it bluntly, yes. You're setting up an artificial wall for yourself by setting up that 1 week thing.

And to point it out, you can get around that wall by changing your team comp. I don't believe fights should be balance and meant to be clear on week 1. But of course I don't say to make it impossible. It simple means if you want to do it, you have to go the extra mile. Either putting more hour than what can normally expected of a average gamer, or be flexible team with your team comp, or have a degree of skill beyond the content designers, or all the above. The wall is not impassable, you're just annoyed because you don't willing to do all it takes to climb it.

And you never need to climb it in the first place. People don't climb Everest and complain it too hard, do they?

Explain to me how buffing Warrior and Paladin by 300 damage would make any difference except to allow people to play on their preferred job? Yoshida has repeatedly said every job and comp are viable for all levels of content. This has been the design philosophy since its inception. So much, in fact, they purposefully broke the old Stormblood meta of DRG/NIN/BRD specifically due to its overwhelming dominance. Right now, certain comps need to perform significantly higher than others for no justifiable reason. A perfect Warrior simply can't match an above average Gunbreaker no matter what they do. Speaking as someone who cleared the doorboss week one. I performed worse on DRK yet we were able to push through the DPS check despite my Warrior performance being at the 90%+ threshold.

How is that good design?

[INymphI]

Let me guess. You were running a comp that didn't include at least two of GNB, DRK, BLM, DNC, yes?

Tanks:
DRK WAR
Heals:
SCH WHM
DDs:
SMN DNC MNK DRG

our WAR switched to GNB after enrage. then it got (barely) manageable

[Raven2014]

if we say week 2, what are the reasons to enter any content week 1 if they are not possible to clear?

But it is though? You just have to do what it takes.

if you read other posts in this thread instead of your own you would see that there are indeed people disencouraged by the tight dps check in week 1, having fear not able to clear it on week 2/3/4.

I never said there is none other than "you". But my point stand unless you believe there are more week 1 clearers than any other week, in that case I'm sorry but the statistic and math is not on your side.

I think you have got something fundamentally wrong: by reducing the dps check (week 1) from impossible to hard, it would not change to an easy experience for week 2/3/4.
all I say is: if a group plays all mechanics deathless, without any dmgdown and any standard-comp pressing their buttons they should be "rewarded" with a clear, even in week 1.

There are things called common sense and logic, that's not possible to bent no matter how you want to play the word (what the word "fundamentally" doing here except being a big word and trying to be impressive?). With all else holding constant - which they are (unless the fight scale with gear level), the only variable is the ilvl, and higher ilvl as the week progress = easier fight. Try to argue against that logic is like trying to argue the Earth is flat, good luck with that.

calling me out for my superflious claim on behalf of people and doing the same on your own 2 sentences later
*mic drop* bye
haha :-D

There is nothing superflious about my claim, because I'm making on the side of people who does not clear week 1, which is the portion of players I am a part of. You were making the superflious claim because you were making it on behalf of the group you do not represent. As a week 1 clearer you are advocating your own benefit by making claim it will not affect people who do week 2/3/4. It's like hearing a CEO trying to explain why his need of bigger bonus will not affect working condition/compensation of his worker ... Do you need further explanation why your claim is superflious?



And don't forget to pick up the mic you drop. If you're more interest in theatrics posting, I can assure you I'm not interested in watching.

[Ravor]

It is all round positive for me since i can finally watch world first race, having it in week 1 make me unable to watch the race since i was busy with crafting and new content but now i can finish everything and focus watching world first race while chilling in my island sanctuary doing crafting

[ForteNightshade]

Tanks:
DRK WAR
Heals:
SCH WHM
DDs:
SMN DNC MNK DRG

our WAR switched to GNB after enrage. then it got (barely) manageable

Want to know the sad thing? If your SMN could play BLM at a comparable level, you'd clear the doorboss with a support death. That's how enormous the difference is comp is right now.

Like I said, I also switched to DRK and suddenly we were able to push through despite not even having a tome weapon. We just happened to be running DRK/GNB/BLM. It's absurd the difference right now.

[INymphI]

Well, the patch notes proved it.
Though i don't buy that "our dev team spent more time testing and improved".
Like, were all the previous ones not that much playtested?
If they spent more time, they surely would realize "oh, this comp is barely able to make the clear, that's weird".

[INymphI]

TL;DR: if the fight is correctly balanced or not is a throw-the-dice game. or these are just lies cause of the never-there-before upgraded tomestone weapon week 1.

https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes...340b373870140b
well they just released further info.
thank you Yoshida for addressing this issue, giving us explanations and a deeper insight why these adjustments were made and what went wrong beforehand.

however, a certain part of the explanation bothers me really:

The top percentage of players are overwhelmingly better at the game than we are.
We regret not stating this more clearly in the previous explanation, but said premise is the reason why we do not release content tuned precisely as it was when the battle team’s balance testers cleared it.
We always add a little bit extra to the boss values before rechecking the fight and releasing it live.
The team responsible for balancing boss fights does so without debug commands and at the appropriate item level, employing available materia, foods, and medicines while experimenting with mitigating actions and various job compositions. Yet we recognize that player skill far exceeds our own. If we were to ship content with the same values which challenged our battle team, the top raiders would be deprived of that by-the-skin-of-your-teeth victory in the initial week of release.
Based on the team's skill and our experience, that "little bit extra" usually translates to:
Balance test clear values +1-2% HP

so the dev team responsible for balancing uses APPROPRIATE item level, not MIN ilvl.
what is the workflow for final adjustments?
1. clear fight (barely)
2. add some HP cause "top percentage players is better at the game than dev team"
3. repeat fight, hit 53% enrage
4. release it, "players will be fine and able to do that"
5. ???
balancing the fight at apropriate item level also causes mitigation issues.
if the AoEs are very hard hitting, healers might use more GCD healing, causing them to deal less DPS. if dev team gear "mitigates" most of the AoEs/tankbusters and healers can keep spamming their DPS button, it would cause a big gap.
that was really my issue on p4s-1, we almost required a mitigation sheet cause the fight was hitting repeatedly very hard.
p8s-1 although was in the very tiny "perfect" mitigation/hard hitting AoEs.
so it just all a random throw-the-dice numbers game?

I ask to find different/accurate/more methods for balancing fights and classes.