What makes a good Job mechanically?

[CidHeiral]

This is entirely subjective but for me what I like in a job is:

- Job gameplay is unique compared to other jobs.
- The job meter does something engaging and interplays with multiple abilities.
- The job is busy with lots of buttons and lots to do, at least in bursts.
- Rotation takes at least some thought and isn't just whack-a-mole.
- Aesthetically looks really cool.

Needless to say the trend of simplifying and homogenizing every job is very concerning. Not every job needs to appeal to everyone, there are so many jobs in the game now it's okay for them to fill different niches. There will always be people whining that X job is too hard or parse goblins saying Y job is LITERALLY USELESS because it doesn't have Z ability. Just ignore them. WoW went down the road of listening to those people and it was a very dark time of every class playing like it was designed for a 4 year old.

Given Yoship's recent comments on lots of jobs getting new rotations in Dawntrail, I wonder if they saw the positive feedback about PvP job design and are bringing some of that to PvE. I hope the lesson they learned was "people like fun and unique jobs" and not "people like having three buttons."

[MonsutaMan]

in MMO theory, a job has an identity, that feels different from others.

I remember when Ryu and Ken from Street Fighter were pretty much the same characters with different gi colors. Fans considered them great characters once Capcom began differentiating them from one another. They were similar, but different.

Most jobs in XIV feel like Ryu and Ken when aesthetics were the only thing which differentiated them.

This may not be a XIV problem, but an MMO problem in general. I feel players should define their own roles. What is the job/class to you? Champions Online and Final Fantasy XI are the only MMO I know were players defined roles.

Ninja was not designed to be a tank in XI, players made it one. It could also be a powerful Melee, ranged attacker (back in the day with Shurikens) or caster.

SAM was designed to be an off-tank, players made it a DPS.

RDM was designed to be a melee mage of shorts, players made it a off-healer. RDM Melee can also be beastly.

MNK is actually a DPS, but it can tank (Counter tanking a mob in XI who used Hundred Fist results in DBZ -esque rapid strikes between you and the mob).

BST is designed to be a limited job, but can DPS heal, debuff and tank.......whatever you want....BST was known to take down monsters which required an entire group to defeat. Ironically, it was not OP in parties. Its' durability is what made it special. It could use whatever creatures were around as weapons. If one falls, charm another. or, heal the one you have before it falls.

Champions Online actually allowed players to pick powers from any other class in the game to create their own Frankenstein class. It surprisingly was not broken.....

[Payadopa]

in MMO theory, a job has an identity, that feels different from others.

I remember when Ryu and Ken from Street Fighter were pretty much the same characters with different gi colors. Fans considered them great characters once Capcom began differentiating them from one another. They were similar, but different.

Most jobs in XIV feel like Ryu and Ken when aesthetics were the only thing which differentiated them.

This may not be a XIV problem, but an MMO problem in general. I feel players should define their own roles. What is the job/class to you? Champions Online and Final Fantasy XI are the only MMO I know were players defined roles.

Ninja was not designed to be a tank in XI, players made it one. It could also be a powerful Melee, ranged attacker (back in the day with Shurikens) or caster.

SAM was designed to be an off-tank, players made it a DPS.

RDM was designed to be a melee mage of shorts, players made it a off-healer. RDM Melee can also be beastly.

MNK is actually a DPS, but it can tank (Counter tanking a mob in XI who used Hundred Fist results in DBZ -esque rapid strikes between you and the mob).

BST is designed to be a limited job, but can DPS heal, debuff and tank.......whatever you want....BST was known to take down monsters which required an entire group to defeat. Ironically, it was not OP in parties. Its' durability is what made it special. It could use whatever creatures were around as weapons. If one falls, charm another. or, heal the one you have before it falls.

Champions Online actually allowed players to pick powers from any other class in the game to create their own Frankenstein class. It surprisingly was not broken.....

I think one of the problems is the Duty Finder. It's just too static. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to go back to the days of XI where you LFG for hours but everything needs to fit into either DPS, tank, healer. No hybrids, no experimentation, no nothing. And it's made worse by DPS checks and enrage. Now all DPS must be equal. I don't know what the solution is. That's why we have game designers, but I think SE can't really afford to remove even more systems. There barely is anything left at this point. I never understood why XIV couldn't learn from XI, instead of being as different as possible. As per usual in this game there is no middle ground.

[VentVanitas]

I think one of the problems is the Duty Finder. It's just too static. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to go back to the days of XI where you LFG for hours but everything needs to fit into either DPS, tank, healer. No hybrids, no experimentation, no nothing. And it's made worse by DPS checks and enrage. Now all DPS must be equal. I don't know what the solution is. That's why we have game designers, but I think SE can't really afford to remove even more systems. There barely is anything left at this point. I never understood why XIV couldn't learn from XI, instead of being as different as possible. As per usual in this game there is no middle ground.

as much as I would love to have a less rigid trinity system, a lot of the game would have to fundamentally change, changes so I deep that I don't realistically see SE doing to a game that's 10 years in unfortunately. not to say that they still can't learn things from games like XI of course, Eureka/Bozja exist after all.

[RitsukoSonoda]

as much as I would love to have a less rigid trinity system, a lot of the game would have to fundamentally change, changes so I deep that I don't realistically see SE doing to a game that's 10 years in unfortunately. not to say that they still can't learn things from games like XI of course, Eureka/Bozja exist after all.

It's not so much the trinity system itself that is the issue and more to do with the combination of the overall game being nearly entirely stripped of everything related to RPGs in terms of design and game mechanics being paired with dumbing down player choices and decisions as well by essentially making all the job options in each role the same because actual choices beyond aesthetics is too high of a learning curve for the "accessibility" they're trying to create.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

It's not so much the trinity system itself that is the issue and more to do with the combination of the overall game being nearly entirely stripped of everything related to RPGs in terms of design and game mechanics being paired with dumbing down player choices and decisions as well by essentially making all the job options in each role the same because actual choices beyond aesthetics is too high of a learning curve for the "accessibility" they're trying to create.

I think it has more to do with how powerful party buffs are, and the pushing towards that 2 min burst window than anything.


Back in SB, when the windows weren't perfectly aligned, was my favorite tbh. Its not really a lack of RPG elements at fault for the current issues. We had the same lacking back then. Its the way combat is structured, and the way players use jobs, which is done due to damage being the highest goal of a group. So now we have 2 min burst windows that sucked the soul out of everything combat.

[TheDustyOne]

What makes a good job mechanically?

Honestly a very complex question, and a lot of it will be heavily mired in subjectivity, but I'll do my best to answer what I think makes a good job.

A good job feeds into itself with complementary abilities, a defining mechanic (or two), and thoughtful decision making.
Monk for example, has a few mechanics we can look at; Bootshine will always crit in the right form, which guarantees Chakra generation. But its potency is lower than Dragon Kick, however instead of just spamming Dragon Kick, it generates a buff to the next Bootshine.
This now makes us alternate between the two combos rather than only spamming one combo to generate something. We're now looking at Leaden Fist, Chakra Gauge, and current fist form. The DoT and buff on different timers further changes up our combos so that we're having to make an on-the-fly decision with every combo step, rather than a set "4-5-6, 1-2-3, 4-5-6...." for infinity, instead that combo may ask us to "4-5-3" "1-2-6" "4-2-6" "1-5-3".
Blitz throws a wrench into the flow of the combos where we have to ask; what Blitz attack generates the Nadi I need? Will I need to refresh my DoT/buff? How will that interfere with the Blitz I need? This means that our decisions have some weight behind them.
Ideally, when you go for Elixir Field, you want to use only Bootshine and Dragon Kick, so if your DoT or buff is about to expire, you may need to refresh those first before entering PB. Sure, you can go Demolish > Snap > Snap, but that's not as strong as Bootshine > DK. This in turn further feeds Chakra and lets us use Forbidden Chakra more often.

I disagree with the opinion that monk doesn't feel good or flow nicely. It keeps me on my toes, it's fast, the combo system is unique amongst the jobs, Blitz interacts with that combo system, the job as a whole feels cohesive. At most, Riddle of Wind increasing auto attack speed is boring. If it also had auto attacks generate Chakra on crits, then it'd be worthwhile.

This is also what I think made old SCH a good job too. Multiple DoTs to upkeep, an ability to spread those DoTs, a DoT that acted as a weave window and movement tool as well as spammable AoE, a bevy of oGCD heals to take advantage of said weave window, Quickened Aetherflow that would feed into itself and rewarded good Aetherflow management, Energy Drain acting as your MP tool and a risk for wanting a little extra damage, etc. It was thematic, its abilities interacted well with each other, had some good risk-reward payoffs based on your decisions on the fly, and took a lot of skill to master.

[SargeTheSeagull]

In lieu of writing an essay I'll say this: I just want unique, fun, interactive jobs. I don't have to like every single job there is. In fact, it's probably a good thing if I (and everyone else for that matter) don't enjoy every job. The very point of having more than 1 job/class/spec/hero/fighter/character in a game is so that it can have a unique gameplay style from other jobs/classes/specs/heroes/fighters/characters in the game. That's THE point. And currently that's the point 14 is missing.

[Renathras]

One thing I think that we have to collectively realize: All the push for min-maxing is bad.

Simple example:

RDM had Corps-a-Corps and I still remember when SB's Fanfests introduced RDM, everyone thought it was so cool they could dash in, melee some quick strikes, then backflip out.

...then the complaints about backflipping off the edge.

So Engagement was introduced, but did less damage than Displacement. It didn't look as cool and was less risky, so did less damage.

Then the min-maxers complained.

So then its damage was increased to the same as Displacement. And now, they're not even used for movement. RDM is supposed to be near melee at all times for all that glorious auto-attack damage, and use Engagement exclusively because it has less animation lock and thus can be used to weave more and do more DPS.

So where we had a set of cool abilities - charge in, throw out some quick strikes, stylishly flip back out - now we we have stacks of abilities and cram Corps-a-corps and Engagement into weaves during the burst window to maximize damage and avoid using Displacement unless absolutely necessary for the movement. What was cool and fun was sacrificed on the alter of min-maxing.

EDIT: Typo for "cram"

[TheDustyOne]

One thing I think that we have to collectively realize: All the push for min-maxing is bad...

*snip*

While I agree that we've lost some job specialty and flavour because of min-maxers, I wouldn't use RDM as the example there. Especially since Displacement can still be used, and used effectively for movement when needed. Displacement has a lot of issues, especially in cramped arenas, so a RDM DPS was gimped simply because the square or circle was too small. Not exactly fair for a job to not be able to use an attack because the arena designer held a middle finger to your face.

RDM always used Corps-a-corps on cooldown with Displacement when possible, free damage is free damage. Min-maxers are fine taking extra risks when it's needed to push extra potency, and "not being in melee range when it's time" is one of those acceptable risks. The extra charge helped with letting Corps-a-corps and Displacement serve their actual functions. Engagement just brought an extra tool to minimize stupid risks. There's an argument to be had about Engagement being less DPS to encourage still using Displacement, but it's a minor part of the RDM kit as a whole, and it's not worth creating stupid risks over 20-30 potency every 35s.

Also, who in their right mind cares about RDM auto-attack damage? it's like 20 points of damage per auto, it barely registers as a point of potency, crit variance alone negates whatever "advantage" auto attack uptime brought. You may as well complain of BLM not being in melee range for staff whacks at that point. No min-maxer has ever complained of a RDM losing out on autos.

You're better looking at something like AST cards for min-maxers taking away flavour. RDM is one job that consistently improves in design as the game ages, the biggest problem people have with it are balance related. Also it's not always min-maxers doing this, a lot of it is also people not wanting to put in the effort to learn the intricacies of a job and want it to play "more like x". I'd put it more on Squares needless push to streamline as much as possible before min-maxers at this point in the games life.