How do you define (meaningful) choice?

[TheDustyOne]

I'm not sure the BLM example is good

Mind explaining why?

- healers have that already with their oGCD and instant cast heals and optional Swiftcast use. (BLM is praised a lot but...)

In all our examples we're talking about competing choices (GCD vs GCD), oGCDs themselves are usually just "a free thing" every x seconds. You aren't choosing between a Glare cast and Tetragrammaton, you're doing both simultaneously, therefore that's not the choices we're talking about. If you were talking about Aetherflow, that'd be a different subject.

I think I would argue that meaningful choice cannot exist without depth of choice. If there is one right answer and every other answer is wrong, then there is no choice. There have to be more than one "right or close enough" choices, else there is no choice. Imagine if BLM didn't have Thundercloud or Sharpcast or anything other than Scathe and Xenoglossy (that you can use all the time, not limited by stacks). That wouldn't be real choice, since Xenoglossy would always be the right answer and there's no condition where Scathe would be.

Meaningful choice can exist without depth, this is how a lot of jobs end up with very rigid rotations. Sure, old PLD I could use Royal Atonement before Goring, it wasn't the highest damaging choice 99% of the time, but I could do that choice. Under certain circumstances it was optimal in fact. But 99% of the time I should use Goring. The fact the rotation wanted Goring didn't make the choice meaningless, just lacking in depth.

Technically speaking, the choice to use Xenoglossy over Scathe in your example is still meaningful, but of course EXTREMELY shallow because now there's never a time when Scathe has a use. I would agree that it's pointless, but the meaning why someone uses Xeno is clear; it does more damage with no MP. That said, however, we're not talking that hypothetical, BLM as it is has a lot of meaningful choices in its kit, and is the reason why it gets praised. You have to explain why it's not a good example of meaningful choices and depth. I gave my example.

I also think it's interesting two replies back to back say that Broil IV vs Ruin II both is and is not a meaningful choice...

Ultimately it comes down to what definitions people are using; I go by it being about consequence (be it from lower DPS, costing a resource, or some other potential loss). The consequence of Ruin II is less damage, but free movement and a double-weave. Depth is about providing lots of choices with consequences. Depth of course does add meaning to your choices overall, so you are right in that you want many choices, but that each choice needs an associated risk and reward (aka, a consequence). You're also right in that the Scathe/Xeno dichotomy has very little meaning, but I still contend that it has a meaning, just very little meaning, and it should rightfully be rethought if a designer made that gameplay choice possible.

To me, a meaningless choice is if all the answers have the same outcome; if Xenoglossy and Scathe both costed the same MP and resource and did the same damage, then it's a false choice. If Xeno and Scathe had different damage outcomes but stilll cost the same resources, it's a shallow choice. If Xeno and Scathe had different resources and different damage outcomes, then it starts to gain more depth. Depth can make something more meaningful, but it doesn't mean a shallow choice doesn't have meaning.