why the devs take the lazy way out on low lvl content scaling?

[technole]

It's not worth it as a producer, or developer to even consider the option because of a few people wanting to play try-hard in obsolete content that isn't even balanced around that. The dungeon and quest overhauls of ARR was worth it because analytically that was a way to sell the game beyond the free trial and add new subs versus people whom just quit and never make it to level 90.

They already maintain so many skills across jobs plus separate PvP skills and you're going to consistently add more jobs every few years for the next decade. More to maintain and balance. Some people think in the now and not the future.

[KatiaRelanah]

and only give them potency/mitigation nerfs when level scaling to bring them in line with lower level content.

Yep. It's just that simple. Just nerf it bro there's no inherent imbalance unless you account for every possible point of progression/skill unlock and how the total potency in a combo syncs with the potency of a full L90 combo or anything.

Like, let's say you have a combo at L90 that does 1000 potency. Say 100 first skill -> 200 second > 250 third -> 350 fourth. The new players don't have that same combo, they only have the first two skills (so they can combo up to 300 potency). Even doing two cycles of this, for the same number of GCDs (four, two times two), they'd be doing only 600 potency for every time the L90 player is doing 1000. And mind you, this is ignoring traits/transforming skills that become stronger versions over the course of leveling.

So what do you do? Make the L90's abilities about half(ish) as potent? 50+100+200+250 = 600? See, can't even just cut everything in half, instead need to manually tweak every skill to match the highest-potency combo the at-content-level players would have. What if the newbies have the third combo skill there? Now you need to account for them doing 650 damage every three GCDs, except you'd have to balance it out with algebra and shit cuz the "GCDs performed" line only matches at 12 (they've done 4 full combos with 3 skills, you've done 3 with 4 skills). You wanna do the math there? Cuz I don't feel like doing so. Now balance out a job with 5 or 6 skills in their full rotation, or alternate branches where the "middle" skills are different (speaking honestly, yes, I can only talk about DRG from experience - but there is indeed a 12345 but there's also a 1ab54. Also 1 becomes a higher-potency skill after doing the last hit in the combo. Also after doing two 1s (modified) you get another OGCD attack that literally doesn't exist for the lower level player - factor that into your math).

You can't just say "nerf potency" when one or the other of scaled-down and content-level players will inherently be at a disadvantage, unless and until you account for EVERY permutation and have a different nerf at every level.

Host/lower level has 3 skills unlocked? Have to find the lowest common multiple (whatever the mathematical term is) is. Say the class has 7 skills in a combo at cap: In which case, you need to make the potency of 7*3 full rotations equal to 3*7 rotations. What, now you have skills that do 132.73 potency

Oh and btw that only applies to Level 43 content. Host will get another skill at Level 45. New set of math needed. Now you have to intersect 4 and 7, so... Shit what's the math on that? Balance it for parity after 28 GCDs? Lmao

And this still avoids the question of OGCDs. You can not nerf these enough to compensate for content-level players who don't have them to begin with. It can be a frickin 10 pot attack, that's still 10 pot the lower level player doesn't have.

Edit: also, I'm not even accounting for the fact that this is assuming the downsynced player IS at level cap. What if you have a Level 70 downsyncing, and let's say they have 5 skills in their rotation vice 7?

The amount of granularity necessary is not sustainable.

[Shinkuno]

Yep. It's just that simple. Just nerf it bro there's no inherent imbalance unless you account for every possible point of progression/skill unlock and how the total potency in a combo syncs with the potency of a full L90 combo or anything.



You can't just say "nerf potency" when one or the other of scaled-down and content-level players will inherently be at a disadvantage, unless and until you account for EVERY permutation and have a different nerf at every level.

Host/lower level has 3 skills unlocked? Have to find the lowest common multiple (whatever the mathematical term is) is. Say the class has 7 skills in a combo at cap: In which case, you need to make the potency of 7*3 full rotations equal to 3*7 rotations. What, now you have skills that do 132.73 potency

Oh and btw that only applies to Level 43 content. Host will get another skill at Level 45. New set of math needed. Now you have to intersect 4 and 7, so... Shit what's the math on that? Balance it for parity after 28 GCDs? Lmao

And this still avoids the question of OGCDs. You can not nerf these enough to compensate for content-level players who don't have them to begin with. It can be a frickin 10 pot attack, that's still 10 pot the lower level player doesn't have.

Edit: also, I'm not even accounting for the fact that this is assuming the downsynced player IS at level cap. What if you have a Level 70 downsyncing, and let's say they have 5 skills in their rotation vice 7?

The amount of granularity necessary is not sustainable.

Because lv20 dungeon mobs arent already melting in 3 seconds from archer aoe...oh wait they do. Anyone who argues against having your whole toolkit when synched down for the sake of "balance" is in some mad denial. Anything below level cap is a unbalanced mess already.

[Atelier-Bagur]

If by "meaningful" you mean all the rehashed skills that they've been returning to jobs over the years that had gotten cut.
My WHM hasn't gotten any meaningful character progression since HW as everything else, barring 3 skills, is a rehashed version of something that I either already have or lost in some way in the past with minute differences.
Temperance = Divine Seal
Divine Benison = Stoneskin
Aqua Veil = Protect
Afflatus Solace = Cure 2
Afflatus Rapture = Medica
Afflatus Misery = Aero 3

That leaves only Thin Air, PI and Lilybell as the only new skills that weren't already accounted for since HW and Thin Air was lowered down to 58 so it's already available in HW. One could even argue that Lilybell exists to serve as a replacement for scenarios that were previously handled by pre-nerfed Thin Air+Cure 3 spam but being locked away at level 90 means it can't even be used in half of those scenarios in the 1st place so it's even less useful in that regard UNLESS a low level version of it was available.

This might only be true for WHM but strictly speaking, there are a number of skills that could easily be brought down to a lower level without much issue in regards to balance since they were previously balanced with other skills and abilities being available at the time.



This is literally MNK past level 60

You missed the part where I said, "its already triviliazed anyway"

[Atelier-Bagur]

Maybe they could adjust lower level player skills potencies to be in sync with higher level players but Im not a game designer to understand how to properly balance that out anyway

[KatiaRelanah]

Because lv20 dungeon mobs arent already melting in 3 seconds from archer aoe...oh wait they do. Anyone who argues against having your whole toolkit when synched down for the sake of "balance" is in some mad denial. Anything below level cap is a unbalanced mess already.

So if these beginning-of-ARR level dungeons are so easy, why do you care that you don't have your full rotation? Mobs wipe after one or two hits anyways? Sounds to me like you're not losing anything in that case lol.

Anyways, you're intentionally going to the most extreme example of things that are trivialized by stat crush and ilevel shenanigans to try to gain a point. Now do ShB+ dungeons. Any given class has lost at least a few skills in their rotations going from 90 to 70-something, therefore forcing the balance I speak of to be needed. And mobs don't "melt in 3 seconds" outside of running it unsynced at 90. And even then, it's not nearly as easy as that after that point.

Source: I literally stopped running unsynced solos for MSQ once I hit ShB specifically because I couldn't melt down mobs with my L90 DRG anymore lmao. Without level cap, even just going down to ShB dungeons: no more Stardiver, Heaven's thrust and Chaotic spring are downgraded to their base versions, I lose the OGCD of Wyrmwind Thrust after every two full rotations, etc. Oh and I think my second charge of Spineshatter? And also only 2 vs 3 Nastronds? Edit: oh, and the AoE combo has a transforming higher-potency skill 1 after level 82, forgot that.

So that's 5 or 6 skills that I at level cap, a 70s player wouldn't have, two-three of which are OGCDs in some capacity. And yes, even with the inherent strength advantage from levelcapped gear synced down, ain't nothing "melting in 3 seconds".

Probably-necessary edit: no, I do not have a full set of level 90 gear, I think my average ilvl was... 538? That sounds familiar for some reason.

But I'm guessing (hoping) you aren't implying that literally everyone ITT asking for skills retention during downsync is in pentamelded BiS gear or something...

[Shinkuno]

So if these beginning-of-ARR level dungeons are so easy, why do you care that you don't have your full rotation?

Because its B O R I N G and you are constantly thrown into this low level stuff with roulettes.

[TheMightyMollusk]

I haven't seen anything below Shadowbringers in leveling roulette in months. Anecdotal, I know, but.

[KatiaRelanah]

Because its B O R I N G and you are constantly thrown into this low level stuff with roulettes.

Elaborate on this.

Assuming your claim is true, is it more satisfying to

- press 1, 2
- oh, mob's dead...
- reach next mob
- I still have the next skill in the combo chambered!
- press 3, 4

Vs

- press 1, 2
- oh, mob's dead...
- reach next mob
- i don't have the rest of the combo!
- press 1, 2

Like, for me, any actual satisfaction in rotations is keeping them going efficiently, weaving in GCDs, etc. But... You're claiming mobs melt right away anyway? so what are you losing?

I haven't seen anything below Shadowbringers in leveling roulette in months. Anecdotal, I know, but.

Did you mean above? Cuz otherwise... That's my point? A ShB player has far more parity with levelcapped players, but then again, you lose a relatively small amount of actual skills (vs just losing direct upgrades). So if the argument is "in turns into a mindless 1, 2, 1, 2 spam fest", sure, but how much does only having 1-2-3-4-5-6 instead of 1-2-3-4-5-6-7 actually matter?

[TheMightyMollusk]

Did you mean above? Cuz otherwise... That's my point? A ShB player has far more parity with levelcapped players, but then again, you lose a relatively small amount of actual skills (vs just losing direct upgrades). So if the argument is "in turns into a mindless 1, 2, 1, 2 spam fest", sure, but how much does only having 1-2-3-4-5-6 instead of 1-2-3-4-5-6-7 actually matter?

No, I meant below. I got Holminster the other day and Dohn Mheg last week. Been getting Atiascope and Ktisis Hyperboria a lot lately.

Like I said, anecdotal. Just thought it was kinda funny.