What if every job was like how it started?

[DiaDeem]

What if every job was like how it started?

[Local_Custard]

*pat pat*
It'll be okay (I hope)

[ty_taurus]

I do wonder- what was dragoon like when it first launched? Was it a floor tank even back then?


Also: how long have people been backflipping off the edge?

If you take a look at Dragoon's moveset up to level 50, that's very similar to how Dragoon has always functioned. This was before Fang and Claw/Wheeling Thrust and before Geirskogul as well. Your jumps had longer cooldowns as well. Jump was 40 seconds rather than 30, but both Spineshatter and Dragonfire were 3 minute cooldowns. Jump also had a longer animation, meaning a longer animation lock. Besides that, you had a few more GCD attacks that you'd use between combos. Heavy Thrust increased your damage for a short duration, and you had a second DOT outside of your combo trees called Phlebotomize. I didn't play Dragoon back then so I can't really speak to how different it was back then from how it developed over the following expansions, but Dragoon is one of the jobs that hasn't had its gameplay elements purged (yet), so it would realistically feel slower and more simple than today. Someone who's more familiar with ARR Dragoon can speak on that more.

[Local_Custard]

If you take a look at Dragoon's moveset up to level 50, that's very similar to how Dragoon has always functioned. This was before Fang and Claw/Wheeling Thrust and before Geirskogul as well. Your jumps had longer cooldowns as well. Jump was 40 seconds rather than 30, but both Spineshatter and Dragonfire were 3 minute cooldowns. Jump also had a longer animation, meaning a longer animation lock. Besides that, you had a few more GCD attacks that you'd use between combos. Heavy Thrust increased your damage for a short duration, and you had a second DOT outside of your combo trees called Phlebotomize. I didn't play Dragoon back then so I can't really speak to how different it was back then from how it developed over the following expansions, but Dragoon is one of the jobs that hasn't had its gameplay elements purged (yet), so it would realistically feel slower and more simple than today. Someone who's more familiar with ARR Dragoon can speak on that more.

woag a second DoT?? I love DoTs so so much
So far I getting from this thread: red mage and dragoons weren't changed as much as many jobs were

[ty_taurus]

woag a second DoT?? I love DoTs so so much
So far I getting from this thread: red mage and dragoons weren't changed as much as many jobs were

You also had Maurader's Fracture as a cross class action, which could be a third DOT. Both it and Phlebotomize were 18 seconds. I was checking it out through waybackmachine.

It seems like the main difference in your rotation was that you'd use Heavy Thrust to buff your damage before applying DOTS as needed and then going into either your standard combo, or your Impulse Drive > Disembowel > Chaos Thrust combo, which would inflict a piercing resistance down debuff through Disembowel and Chaos Thrust's DOT for 30 seconds each. You also had more personal buffs to apply. Life Surge was there along Power Surge to enhance your Jump damage, Blood for Blood which increased both damage dealt and damage taken, and Inner Release as a cross class action from Pugilist which increased critical hit rate. There were also a bunch of defensive things as well, as it seemed like there was this idea that a Dragoon could semi-tank in some circumstances by being able to wear tank gear and have very limited defensives, but that was never done by players and never explored in any updates afterward.

[Local_Custard]

You also had Maurader's Fracture as a cross class action, which could be a third DOT. Both it and Phlebotomize were 18 seconds. I was checking it out through waybackmachine.

It seems like the main difference in your rotation was that you'd use Heavy Thrust to buff your damage before applying DOTS as needed and then going into either your standard combo, or your Impulse Drive > Disembowel > Chaos Thrust combo, which would inflict a piercing resistance down debuff through Disembowel and Chaos Thrust's DOT for 30 seconds each. You also had more personal buffs to apply. Life Surge was there along Power Surge to enhance your Jump damage, Blood for Blood which increased both damage dealt and damage taken, and Inner Release as a cross class action from Pugilist which increased critical hit rate. There were also a bunch of defensive things as well, as it seemed like there was this idea that a Dragoon could semi-tank in some circumstances by being able to wear tank gear and have very limited defensives, but that was never done by players and never explored in any updates afterward.

This reminds me how throughout ff history dragoon has been one of the tankest dps classes. It makes sense that dragoon may have more defensive options. I do wonder if any dragoon vets could chime in with their experiences with this job from when it was first released or from earlier expansions

[Neoyoshi]

You mean like at level 1?

Sorry, joking. xD

I mean... Monk was... 'game-y' in the ARR days (i didn't get to experience the 1.0 game) - but it was what taught me a lot of my habits when playing a Monk.

I'm not sure i'd want to play Monk in it's 2.0 state again, my fingers are already crippled enough from wear and age. D: Also i don't miss TP- like.. while yes it was freaking amazing to get to greased lightning III and be like FaaAAaAAssTTTZoooOOOOOOmiePunchies, the side-effect was that it drained TP nearly instantly, making it unmanageable.

I do miss the Element stances, Earth, Fire, Wind, and we got to pretend play as off-tanks and stance dance. xD So that kind of gave me the feeling of playing my Human Warrior tank again in World of Warcraft back in my Vanilla/TBC days.

[Mikey_R]

You also had Maurader's Fracture as a cross class action, which could be a third DOT. Both it and Phlebotomize were 18 seconds. I was checking it out through waybackmachine.

It seems like the main difference in your rotation was that you'd use Heavy Thrust to buff your damage before applying DOTS as needed and then going into either your standard combo, or your Impulse Drive > Disembowel > Chaos Thrust combo, which would inflict a piercing resistance down debuff through Disembowel and Chaos Thrust's DOT for 30 seconds each. You also had more personal buffs to apply. Life Surge was there along Power Surge to enhance your Jump damage, Blood for Blood which increased both damage dealt and damage taken, and Inner Release as a cross class action from Pugilist which increased critical hit rate. There were also a bunch of defensive things as well, as it seemed like there was this idea that a Dragoon could semi-tank in some circumstances by being able to wear tank gear and have very limited defensives, but that was never done by players and never explored in any updates afterward.

To add to this, Heavy Thrust's damage up only applied if you hit the targets flank (hitting rear or front gave no damage up) and Impulse Drive only comboed into Disembowel if you hit it from the rear (which means no combo if you hit from the flank or front. Chaos Thrusts also didn't have its rear positional at the time either).

As for Fracture, with the Dragoon combo, there was no spot you could put it, as the debuffs fell off, you were reapplying them and Fracture would have just pushed everything back, not to mention it was weak and very TP hungry.

As for wearing tank gear, only from levelling, and that gear wasn't really tank gear as it wasn't as good defensively as proper tank gear, but still stronger than normal DPS gear. Of course, this is a non issue once you got to 50. Dragoon also had the privilege of higher physical defence, but lower magic defence, which caused issues in final coil as they couldn't survive hits, specifically raid wides, especially under Blood for Blood, which meant they had to either delay their burst or get extra shielding from the Scholar to survive.

[Tint]

To add to this, Heavy Thrust's damage up only applied if you hit the targets flank (hitting rear or front gave no damage up) and Impulse Drive only comboed into Disembowel if you hit it from the rear (which means no combo if you hit from the flank or front. Chaos Thrusts also didn't have its rear positional at the time either).

As for Fracture, with the Dragoon combo, there was no spot you could put it, as the debuffs fell off, you were reapplying them and Fracture would have just pushed everything back, not to mention it was weak and very TP hungry.

Yes and this means you had to basically start over your rotation when the boss turned around and did a mechanic.

DRG was the floor tank becase of the long animation locks of his jumps. Back then in basically every patch note you could read that the animation lock of jump was reduced.

Fracture was necessary because you could not overwrite your own DoT when it was buffed. You had to add Fracture into the rotation because it pushed everything back.

[IzVale]

AHH yes, PLD tank stance at lvl 40, in the meanwhile

*Flash*flash*flash*attack*flash*