Me as a newbie after skimming through the forum be like

[KeshLives]

Me: decided to make the jump to the complete edition as 3 of my classes are reaching the free trial level cap due to me playing in a new world and not wanting to waste any EXP.

Sweet, I heard that I can only access the official forum (or maybe post a thread?) if I have a sub. Let's see what people are discussing.

People in the forum: balance is out of whack, job identity is non-existent, content has gotten worse, the game is at the lowest point since 1.0, etc.

Me: Did I just make a grave mistake?

Nah, the game is not like the forum at all, and that's a good thing.

[Renathras]

Me: Did I just make a grave mistake?

What's the question in reference to?

If you mean in playing FFXIV?

No. The game's fine. Balance is extremely tight (Jobs "out of balance" are "less than 2% damage less on average than the top performing Job in their role", which is negligible since MMO's often have 5-20%(?!) difference in given roles between classes. Job identity is great, people generally are complaining about mechanics, and often in oversimplifications that are ridiculous ("Every Melee Job has a 1-2-3 combo! Let's ignore literally everything else about the Job to insist they're identical and have no Job identity!!"), and content is fine. Anyone comparing this to 1.0 is speaking in hyperbole to the point of hysteric caricatures...or knows literally nothing about 1.0 and is speaking from abject ignorance. The game is fine for what it is and is a lot of fun if you enjoy it. If you have gotten to the free trial level cap and enjoyed the game thus far, taking the leap to full sub makes perfect sense, as you clearly enjoy what the game has been offering you, and more of that is a positive.

If you meant coming to the official FFXIV English Forums?

Probably. This place is a bit of a cesspit because this is where all the people disgruntled and upset with the game come to vent their frustrations, attack the game, attack the devs, attack anyone that doesn't hate the game as much as they do, try to run off anyone making positive posts, and then insist that they represent a clear majority and are merely offering "critiques on the game because (they) want it to be better", and think they represent a majority despite all metrics of the playerbase suggesting they're at odds and hold opposite views to the playerbase at large. It's where people that are angry try to lash out at anyone and everyone who doesn't agree with them, and then try to say no one views the game positively (because they run off and attack everyone who does and call them names like "white knights", even when said people are offering their own critiques), to try and validate their own views, which most people happily playing the game seem not to share.

.

Hope that answers your question.

[Shinkuno]

No. The game's fine. Balance is extremely tight (Jobs "out of balance" are "less than 2% damage less on average than the top performing Job in their role", which is negligible since MMO's often have 5-20%(?!) difference in given roles between classes.

STOP. WITH. THIS. ALREADY

Stop quoting random numbers. They dont say anything meaningful. It doesnt matter if jobs are within 2% of each other when those 2% are the difference between a clear and wipe. And its honestly pathetic that making every job the same they still dont manage to get them within like 0.5% of each other. The game is badly balanced for how homogenized it is.

[Mosha]

STOP. WITH. THIS. ALREADY

Stop quoting random numbers. They dont say anything meaningful. It doesnt matter if jobs are within 2% of each other when those 2% are the difference between a clear and wipe. And its honestly pathetic that making every job the same they still dont manage to get them within like 0.5% of each other. The game is badly balanced for how homogenized it is.

FFXIV Ben Shipero doesn't understand this

[Fawkes]

It doesnt matter if jobs are within 2% of each other when those 2% are the difference between a clear and wipe.

I'm no scientist but wouldn't that imply SE was making content that was like "gold parse correct jobs only", because I feel like I usually hear from good players that bringing meta jobs literally never matters.

[Jojoya]

STOP. WITH. THIS. ALREADY

Stop quoting random numbers. They dont say anything meaningful. It doesnt matter if jobs are within 2% of each other when those 2% are the difference between a clear and wipe. And its honestly pathetic that making every job the same they still dont manage to get them within like 0.5% of each other. The game is badly balanced for how homogenized it is.

Or players could get 2% better at playing their jobs instead of blaming the developers for minor differences.

Unless you're going for a week one clear at minimum ilvl, it's not going to be the 2% difference in optimal job balance that's going to be the difference between a wipe and a clear. It's going to be that 2% less than optimal player performance that caused the wipe.

It gets really tiresome listening to people who want to blame job balance for their party failures.

I'm no scientist but wouldn't that imply SE was making content that was like "gold parse correct jobs only", because I feel like I usually hear from good players that bringing meta jobs literally never matters.

I wouldn't say "literally never matters". First week of P8S is an example of where it did matter because SE set the boss HP a little too high and even the best in the world were challenged to get it cleared without switching up their comps a bit.

But "very rarely matters" would be accurate. Most failure is caused by player performance, not job balance.

[Shinkuno]

Or players could get 2% better at playing their jobs instead of blaming the developers for minor differences.

Unless you're going for a week one clear at minimum ilvl, it's not going to be the 2% difference in optimal job balance that's going to be the difference between a wipe and a clear. It's going to be that 2% less than optimal player performance that caused the wipe.

Thats literally the place where balance matters. Nobody cares about your clear 3 months in. Thats true regardless what MMO you play.

[NekoMataMata]

People on the forums typically jump to extremes whenever it comes to whatever they're arguing about. You have one crowd that believes the game is a steaming pile of you-know-what and you have another crowd that believes that the game is absolutely immaculate and that there's no point in having any discussion over it.

And between both crowds is who knows how many alts that are used as trolls, bad actors and for whatever else. This has left everyone trapped in between feeling a bit jaded from the experience.

Just ignore the forums and enjoy the game. Unless you go beyond casual play then you'll likely never want to have any serious discussions about it anyways.

[Fawkes]

I wouldn't say "literally never matters".

I am a slave to hyperbole.

[Jojoya]

Thats literally the place where balance matters. Nobody cares about your clear 3 months in. Thats true regardless what MMO you play.

So then why does this argument even occur when 99.5% of raiders will never have a week one clear and the other 0.5% are dedicated enough to be willing to switch jobs as needed because getting the clear is more important to them than what job they're playing?

The really good raiders don't bitch about job balance when they're struggling on a fight. They look for the ways they can do things better. That can include switching to a job that has slightly better utility (or slightly less utility in exchange for slightly better DPS) for what the fight demands but most of the time it's not necessary.

I am a slave to hyperbole.

I guess we all have those moments. Sometimes it's hard to pick out just who is taking that "literally" seriously, though.