The way that Endwalker's new, strict two-minute meta has impacted the game has been a somewhat hot topic as of recent. Mr. Happy has made a video on the topic; ZhephZaeora has made a detailed document discussing the impact on PLD.


A lot of this discussion has been brought forth by the recent Savage tier, where in the first two weeks, many groups struggled severely against the door boss DPS check -- even teams of world-class players. While the dev team have indicated this was simply because the fight was poorly tuned, evidence from who did and did not clear during that first week indicates that the bigger issue was largely one of job balance. For example, Xenosys Vex's team cleared the door boss from the very first pull he swapped from WAR (lowest-DPS tank) to GNB (highest-DPS tank).


To recap the changes from Shadowbringers, the 6 raid buffs that were not already on a two-minute timer in SHB were changed to be on the two-minute timer in Endwalker (or changed altogether). From memory, these buffs were:

- NIN's Trick Attack (1 min) -> Mug
- SMN's Devotion (3min) -> Searing Light
- DRG's Battle Litany (3min)
- BRD's Battle Voice (3min)
- MNK's Brotherhood (90s)
- AST's Divination (3min)

In addition, we received one more new raid buff in the form of RPR's Arcane Circle. These changes mean that rather than primarily aligning at the six-minute mark depending on composition, raid buffs will always align at even minute marks.


I think it'd be healthy to discuss the impact that the two-minute meta has had on various jobs. While I don't think it is by any means the exclusive reason why job balance is poor, it is certainly a contributing factor.



1. Some Jobs Burst Better Than Others
I think that this is fairly evident. Some jobs, such as NIN, have incredibly strong burst. Other jobs, such as PLD, are much more focused on sustained damage. Of course, this doesn't explain why WAR, for example, which consistently bursts at the two-minute mark, is so undertuned. RDM is another job that was stealthily impacted by these changes; the addition of Resolution to its finisher combos means that it can no longer fit two whole melee combos into a buff window; in SHB it is my understanding that a typical large burst would involve stocking enough mana for two melee combos.

This strictly burst-focused meta means that jobs that are able to pool and release resources for the two-minute buff window are going to benefit much more from this style of meta, as they can pour as much of their damage as possible into that specific timeframe. Sustained DPS jobs are unable to do so, and do not make nearly as good use of powerful buff windows as other jobs.


Also of note to consider is Black Mage, which has historically been strong enough in DPS to occupy a melee slot for a double-caster composition as opposed to a double-melee composition. As it stands, BLM just barely outdamages RPR, which is considered by far the weakest melee job. Whether this is a result of its nature as sustained damage lowering its overall DPS, or intentional design as Square Enix appears to want casters to deal lower damage than melees, I can't tell you.


2. The Value of Crits
While potencies generally don't run higher this expac relative to Shadowbringers, the number of buffs typically stacked does. Zheph went over this in his document in more detail than I can offer, but the gist is such:



Crits on high-potency abilities during buff windows are worth exponentially more than crits on regular abilities outside of buff windows, to the point where damage variance is genuinely problematic. I experienced this myself during Week 1 on the doorboss; a clean run would result in inconsistent damage -- sometimes enough to break past the check, sometimes not enough.

The developers are well aware of the issues regarding crit variance, but after the incredibly poor reception of the changes to Samurai (in part, likely due to the removal of a beloved ability being paired with these changes), I'm unsure if they will so hastily continue down this route.



Another impact of these changes to party buffs can be seen in how many jobs have had abilities on odd timers changed or adjusted. WAR's Inner Release window, DRK's Delirium window, GNB's Double Down, WHM's Presence of Mind, DRG's Lance Charge, MNK's.....MNK, half of BRD's kit, and BLM's Leylines to name a few.

It's not that odd-timer abilities have completely failed to stop existing -- see NIN's Bunshin, DRK's Salted Earth, and RDM's plethora of oGCDs -- but rather that almost every job has been forcibly aligned to better suit the two-minute meta, bringing into question what happens to the jobs who yet haven't.

The writing on the wall seems clear -- Square Enix have outlined their intentions to make PLD align, and we can expect any other underperforming jobs who aren't aligned to be reworked as well.


So what are the options?
Two options I can see are to either continue going hard on unifying jobs to burst at two-minutes and in addition go hard on giving every job the SAM treatment. Spreading potency throughout the job's entire kit, and giving certain hard-hitting abilities the auto directcrit treatment to minimise crit variance.

Alternatively, they could pull back entirely, and mix up the party buffs once again, restoring abilities to odd timers where possible.

Out of these two options, it's almost certain that we'll see the former over the latter. While the former may have a lot of bad press with it, it's also a lot easier to change the few remaining jobs just a bit, as opposed to the majority of jobs quite a lot.


With that said -- what are your thoughts? How has your job been affected by these changes? What do you personally want to see happen to resolve the issues we've been seeing? Do you feel the two minute-meta has benefited you, or harmed your experience?

I'd like to hear from you!