So, the button merging feature... did I get this right?

[ZiraZ]

You have two enemies, one is at one HP, the other is full. You are at the end of your combo. You could use the combo finisher on the damaged mob, wasting potency or you could reset by going to the combo starter which would allow you to start attacking the second mob with the higher damage combo 2 button. DPS gained.

This is a niche situation, but there are drawbacks to forced combos. They are less interesting to play in my opinion and they take away optimization options.

Yeah you're right but those optimizations are so minuscule that a single extra crit would triple the combo optimizations gain, specially when the bosses are like 9 minutes long, I think the 1 button combo that can't ever be failed would outweight it on the long run.
I would rather pvp combos for weaponskills just don't exist and everyone plays on the same leveled field, a few specific abilities having a 1 button combo seems like a fine middle-ground.

[Mikey_R]

Yeah you're right but those optimizations are so minuscule that a single extra crit would triple the combo optimizations gain, specially when the bosses are like 9 minutes long, I think the 1 button combo that can't ever be failed would outweight it on the long run.
I would rather pvp combos for weaponskills just don't exist and everyone plays on the same leveled field, a few specific abilities having a 1 button combo seems like a fine middle-ground.

The bigger brain move would be to swap to the second, full HP target for as little time as possible between GCDs to allow the auto attacks to kill the low HP target.

Your scenario also fails to take into account any extra benefits from combo enders, for example, SAM stickers, the various PLD buffs, resource gains etc. that will be a bigger loss down the line than this simple 2 GCD scenario.

In the past, I was against putting them together, however, more recently, I am going down the path of, at least have the option to.

And, for anyone that claims, but you can miss the combo if they are on separate buttons, but you cannot on one, let me ask a question. When was the last time you seriously messed that up? I would bet, for anyone halfway decent at the game, they do not mess up that often, which means, whilst technically true, isn't a strong case against combo consolidation.

[ZiraZ]

The bigger brain move would be to swap to the second, full HP target for as little time as possible between GCDs to allow the auto attacks to kill the low HP target.

Your scenario also fails to take into account any extra benefits from combo enders, for example, SAM stickers, the various PLD buffs, resource gains etc. that will be a bigger loss down the line than this simple 2 GCD scenario.

In the past, I was against putting them together, however, more recently, I am going down the path of, at least have the option to.

And, for anyone that claims, but you can miss the combo if they are on separate buttons, but you cannot on one, let me ask a question. When was the last time you seriously messed that up? I would bet, for anyone halfway decent at the game, they do not mess up that often, which means, whilst technically true, isn't a strong case against combo consolidation.

Another realistic scenario for a raid I was just thinking about would be the: boss going away on a phase change so you swap to the most instant damaging combo instead of the dot application one, so yeah that's true and I didn't think about it before even though I do this.
As for failing combos, honestly it's common people will fumble a combo now and then, I check a lot of those xivanalysis links posted on discords and you see it happen at least 2-3 times per raid night in ultimate prog, the biggest thing is even though failure rates are not high and non-branching combos are not hard at all on the surface they do still require a small amount of brain activity dedicated to keeping track of them while doing mechanics.

I do still think if their goal was to "reset" all jobs to prep for a huge rework by 8.0 to improve job identity then might as well remove non branching combos if their fate is to end up with pvp combos as an option.

[Mikey_R]

Another realistic scenario for a raid I was just thinking about would be the: boss going away on a phase change so you swap to the most instant damaging combo instead of the dot application one, so yeah that's true and I didn't think about it before even though I do this.
As for failing combos, honestly it's common people will fumble a combo now and then, I check a lot of those xivanalysis links posted on discords and you see it happen at least 2-3 times per raid night in ultimate prog, the biggest thing is even though failure rates are not high and non-branching combos are not hard at all on the surface they do still require a small amount of brain activity dedicated to keeping track of them while doing mechanics.

I do still think if their goal was to "reset" all jobs to prep for a huge rework by 8.0 to improve job identity then might as well remove non branching combos if their fate is to end up with pvp combos as an option.

Since we are being big brained, why did you start the DoT combo and not just use another damage combo (in DRG's case, the Power Surge buff lasts for another full 5 step combo)? Not to mention the initial damage from a DoT is going to be higher anyway. The only job this really applies to is DRG, since we are going for DoT hit the gone, I will assume no damage from the DoT itself, Chaotic Spring has a minimum damage of 260 (300 from Rear), since it is resetting combo, you don't have Draconian Fire, so it defaults to True Thrust, which is 170 potency. Even if you had Raiden Thrust, that is 280 potency, so, as long as Chaotic Spring was hit from the rear, it would still be more potency.

Just note, I am someone who probably wouldn't consolidate my combos, but I do understand why people might want to do it.

[ZiraZ]

Since we are being big brained, why did you start the DoT combo and not just use another damage combo (in DRG's case, the Power Surge buff lasts for another full 5 step combo)? Not to mention the initial damage from a DoT is going to be higher anyway. The only job this really applies to is DRG, since we are going for DoT hit the gone, I will assume no damage from the DoT itself, Chaotic Spring has a minimum damage of 260 (300 from Rear), since it is resetting combo, you don't have Draconian Fire, so it defaults to True Thrust, which is 170 potency. Even if you had Raiden Thrust, that is 280 potency, so, as long as Chaotic Spring was hit from the rear, it would still be more potency.

Just note, I am someone who probably wouldn't consolidate my combos, but I do understand why people might want to do it.

Swap I didn't mean cancel bad choice of word, and also previous phase kill speed and current position on your combo would also affect the decision making, TOP phase 1 to phase 2 to phase 2 post playstation comes to mind.