I'm bored when I heal because I need more complex DPS rotations

[Nezerius]

Anyway, this whole thing of 'you just fished for balance!', I've come to realise, is emblematic of the playerbase's attitude towards game design nowadays. It seems that things can't have 'a chance of having the best result' anymore, the playerbase at large seems to feel almost... not entitled? IDK how to word it, but basically whatever the 'best result' is, they feel like they deserve only that result, and therefore rather than the 'powerful moment' being just that, a moment that comes sometimes and goes just as quickly, they feel like that 'powerful moment' is the baseline the class operates at, and anything else is just 'you got screwed by the game, devs pls fix this garbage'.

When the game design shifted to balancing savage raids with optimal dps in mind, this optional "powerful moment" stopped being optional and became the moment to aim for. This was especially the case for Gordias, the very first raid after AST's introduction. With that in mind, the "just fished for balance" mentality is hardly one of entitlement/deserving nature. It's simply a reaction to a shift in design.

And considering you've mained during HW, possibly SB, I'm sure you've had moments of drawing a Spire/Bole/Ewer before/during the opener, and wishing it'd have been a Balance instead.

[Sparkthor]

Where do we start... At the start, I guess. So as I just posted (which you may have missed due to the timing), AST wasn't always 'one button'. Personal anecdote, when I was first maining AST in 3.4 my balance draw rate was so high I'd question if it was really 1/6 equal chance for each card. Guess I was one of the lucky ones. Anyway, this whole thing of 'you just fished for balance!', I've come to realise, is emblematic of the playerbase's attitude towards game design nowadays. It seems that things can't have 'a chance of having the best result' anymore, the playerbase at large seems to feel almost... not entitled? IDK how to word it, but basically whatever the 'best result' is, they feel like they deserve only that result, and therefore rather than the 'powerful moment' being just that, a moment that comes sometimes and goes just as quickly, they feel like that 'powerful moment' is the baseline the class operates at, and anything else is just 'you got screwed by the game, devs pls fix this garbage'. This isn't just a FF thing either, I think it's just that people have adjusted their mindset over time, as they got older, etc. But I'm not a psychiatrist and IDK how brains work, so back to the topic here.

IMO, having a huge system full of choices where according to all, only one choice remain is boring and should get changed. On the other side, people are now complaining how lucky crit run could me a boss pass or fail. What would they say if the passed card system were in place nowadays. I also wonder what they were thinking about all this at this moment.

Another issue i found by looking at the past is people tend to enjoy the first thing they learn the game with, and defend it even if theses games were broken or full mess. And ARR, according to Yoshi-p, was a mess, particulary around Scholar implementation (which, as a reminder, was only 7 actions different from sumoner in ARR).

Also my bad about one button : i though Conbust 1 was like aero 1 : weaker than malefic 2 like aero 1 was weaker than stone 3.

About having cool speel/ability for group burst phase : people tend to get exited by powerfull looking abilities, Presence of mind, chain stratageme, divination are sure good group burst tools, but they lack of "WHOA" feeling. And if you don't see what i mean : expedient is probably one of the strongest mitigation ability on the game, however as it's not visual enough, people where mad at Scholar when the EW job actions showcase was diffused. And on other side, Pneuma feel desapointing for people expecting a big laser attack to do big dommages, instead of being a strong AOE heal.

[Mithron]

Another issue i found by looking at the past is people tend to enjoy the first thing they learn the game with, and defend it even if theses games were broken or full mess.

What you're referring to is called "anchoring." It's rarely true. People want fun, and looking at MCH, I much prefer current MCH over HW/SB. A lot of people also learned bow mage BRD/Gaus Barrel MCH and I can't think of anyone that wants those to return in earnest. I also like 4.3 WAR more than old WAR, but do wish it was a bit more complex as it's way too accessible now.

I also love PLD's playstyle in every expansion, even if it's damage wasn't the greatest and especially in HW it had TP issues. I think PLD just got better and better and more fun to play with each iteration. DRK however most definitely was best in HW but worst in SB. I like current DRK too, just wish it had more healing and utility for less damage, and Scourge.

BLM also has been a steady improvement since ARR. So as you can see, this isn't really about anchoring, but just about what's actually fun.

[Sparkthor]

I can assure you early SB a lot of people wanna see cast ranged back. And it's not because you think otherwise that it's the case. I will give you a exemple from another sucessful series of games : Pokemon. A lot of people tends to prefer the 2 first generation because they grew up with them. Also the Game Boy was pretty popular, more than the GBA where the 3rd gen came out.

However, some tennage/child prefer the gen they start with. Some not. But i rather call it "Misplaced Nostalgia", and it's full looking backward.

[Nizzi]

There are a lot of people who started playing in ShB and EW who hate the 1 button spam healers. You don't have to have played back in ARR to know that the current design is shit.

[flowerfairy]

There are a lot of people who started playing in ShB and EW who hate the 1 button spam healers.

Guilty as charged Of course, I didn't join ShB immediately hating healers because this was my first MMO experience outside of playing crappy P2W Korean grinders with friends, but after getting accustomed to SCH at level 80 in 5.4 and playing Endwalker EX1 and EX2 as my first "hardcore" experience, it got boring pretty fast.

There seems to be a lot of drama with AST's old cards, specifically Balance. There was something I liked in another thread that recommended Spire as a magic damage buff, so what if Balance became a physical damage buff as well? Even though melee DPS is OP as hell this expansion I think Balance fishing won't matter as much if you also have a chance to roll Spire, Spear, or Arrow too.

How I would do it:
Balance: +10% Physical Damage. RR effect: +150% potency
Spire: +10% Magic Damage. RR effect: +150% potency
Arrow: Auto Attack Speed buff. RR effect: longer duration
Spear: +10% Crit Chance buff. RR effect: longer duration
Bole: +10% Defense buff. RR effect: potency buff + spread to nearby allies
Ewer: Mana regen buff. RR effect: potency buff + spread to nearby allies

Not getting a damage boost card for your opener does sound sucky though. I think it should be adjusted so you'll always either get Balance or Spire when not in combat.

[ASkellington]

There are a lot of people who started playing in ShB and EW who hate the 1 button spam healers. You don't have to have played back in ARR to know that the current design is shit.

Started AST in Shb never played HW/SB. A friend telling me about SB AST was what even got me playing this game to begin with. I want the damn cards back.

[ForsakenRoe]

IMO, having a huge system full of choices where according to all, only one choice remain is boring and should get changed. On the other side, people are now complaining how lucky crit run could me a boss pass or fail. What would they say if the passed card system were in place nowadays. I also wonder what they were thinking about all this at this moment.

Another issue i found by looking at the past is people tend to enjoy the first thing they learn the game with, and defend it even if theses games were broken or full mess. And ARR, according to Yoshi-p, was a mess, particulary around Scholar implementation (which, as a reminder, was only 7 actions different from sumoner in ARR).

And now we have the same people who would reset over and over for the perfect 'all balances' log, resetting over and over because Crit RNG still exists, or because they didn't draw enough Lords instead of Ladys. At some point you have to realise, removing EVERY instance where RNG can screw you will just sterilize the game into being bland and flavorless. Do we remove Lord and Lady cos people got bad runs where they got Ladys? Do we remove Crit and DHit as stats, because some people don't crit their Double Down, their Confiteor, their Hyosho?

Also, regarding what I started with, it was Gladiator, then SCH, then NIN for a while, while doing the post ARR stuff as I had capped SCH and wanted to level something with the roulettes, then AST when I reached HW. This was at the very end of 3.2, I then played AST and occasionally SCH until 3.5 where I started to play DRK more and more, and in 4.1 I started dipping into Extremes and Savage as tank proper. So technically, I was a tank to begin with, both in terms of 'started the game' and 'started raiding for real' and now I'm a healer main. So yeh, 'anchoring' has nothing to do with how I feel about classes. I think some classes have diminished in fun over the years, and others have improved. PLD for example, has only gotten better and better gameplay (soon to be destroyed probably). BRD in SB was a massive improvement in fun. MCH's rework was a great change for the identity of the class, it just needs more effort put in from the devs to make the balance work vs DNC and BRD.

On the flipside, healers seem to be on a downward spiral at the moment. I won't try to say 'I preferred SB healers' because people who can't read will jump on it with 'AH SEE THEY WANT THE CRAP LILIES BACK'. So instead I'll say 'I would want to see healers be a mix of SB's damage options, with EW's healing abilities'. I want DOTs on SCH, Aero3 on WHM, unique card effects on AST (reworked for balance's sake if needed), and SGE idk it has no previous form so rip. But just because I want, say, Aero 3 back, doesn't mean I would want to throw away the new Lily system, and Misery. New-Lilies don't conflict with Aero 3, they can exist side by side you know.

For AST, we can keep Divination as it is (press for bonus damage, not attached to seals), delete seals entirely, and leave the cards as single target if Royal Road was just too hard to balance. Remember, the people who fished, didn't fish for Balance. They fished for AOE Balance specifically. So if we keep the cards as single target, we can have, eg:

Balance: 10% bonus damage (all types)
Bole: 20% damage mitigation, and counterattack effect upon taking damage
Arrow: Double Autoattack speed (and maybe bonus potency to autoattacks to balance it against other cards)
Spear: 10% crit rate
Ewer: MP restore + 10% magic damage
Spire: 10% physical damage

If it were up to me, I'd move phys damage over to Spear, delete the crit rate effect, and make Spire something wild like 'Allows the use of various skills without incurring cooldown or cost. If the skill has a cooldown, and is ready to be used, the cooldown is incurred before the proc is consumed (to keep stuff aligned correctly). Skill is dependent on Job, from list below:

PLD: Expiacion and Circle of Scorn
WAR: Upheaval and next Fell Cleave is replaced by Inner Chaos
DRK: Carve and Spit and Abyssal Drain (yes the two procs are seperate so you get to use AD in a single target encounter)
GNB: Blasting Zone
MNK: Builds 1 chakra per second for 10 seconds, allowing 2 uses of The Forbidden Chakra/Enlightenment (with less risk of overcapping)
RPR: Harvest Moon
DRG: Dragonfire Dive and a Wyrmwind Thrust
NIN: Bhavacakra/Frog and Dream Within a Dream
SAM: Senei/Guren
BRD: Barrage
MCH: Wildfire (lol)
DNC: Flourish
BLM: Ley Lines, but 15s duration
SMN: Energy Drain (and the two Festers that it'd provide)
RDM: Fleche+Contre
WHM: Misery
SCH: Chain Stratagem, but it only lasts 7 sec
AST: Divination, but it only lasts 7 sec
SGE: 3 uses of Phlegma

Something like that, something a bit wacky and not 'safe' design we keep seeing. And yes, the other healers would be balanced against this so WHM would not be left in the dirt, stop typing

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

There are a lot of people who started playing in ShB and EW who hate the 1 button spam healers. You don't have to have played back in ARR to know that the current design is shit.

Crap, don't call me out like that! I started around early 5.2 and began dipping into EX/Savage by few days before 5.3 dropped.

But anyway.. here's the flashback thing:

Before deciding my first job, I always head to official guides to form some sort of expectation as I progress with my chosen job. Let's see... a healer it is! Like any other previous games I played. Let's just say... I'm anything but impressed at the stark similarities upon seeing each healers have 4-5 single target basic nuke & 3 DoT from lv1 to lv80. I had no clue to their concept of traits that replaces weaker into stronger buttons so it looked -that- way. Okay well... let's see how do they heal-... wait, that's -a lot- of them, wow! What sort of heavily damaging encounters that warrants this much healing buttons, I wondered...

Then my 'honeymoon' phase began. I loved the story, I loved the combat pace, I love the relaxing vibe it gives me, I simp for my own WoL, I also had bunch of my friends who brought me here as we play together. I was having that "first timer blast" up to that point so everything else felt didn't matter much. It should remain this way, right? Right??? Ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahano

Once MSQ, optional dungeons, NR, AR, and trials are cleared, that happy bubble bursts. Mostly, the gameplay is what I have remain to fall back to, and it feels bad. Doesn't matter which content to be replayed, if the job design sucks then it will feel bad wherever you brought it to. I did obviously tried other jobs. The first in line was to try out other healers (WHM, then AST). And then creeping into casters, ranged physicals, then eventually tanks. The other roles never does it for me however... so here I am, back hanging with the green club lol.

[flowerfairy]

For AST, we can keep Divination as it is (press for bonus damage, not attached to seals), delete seals entirely, and leave the cards as single target if Royal Road was just too hard to balance. Remember, the people who fished, didn't fish for Balance. They fished for AOE Balance specifically.

Ooooh. When I read it, I thought Royal Road worked like Redraw (rerolling your card to get a random card with its own RR effect) but it actually consumed the card to put its RR effect onto the next card you play. It’s way cooler than I thought… That does sound like a pain to balance.