The problem with Tripling Down on Shadowbringers Job Design

[MagiusNecros]

Perhaps that's why, maybe they wanted to get away from their identity in FFXI and create something more appealing to a wider audience. The reality is, not everyone wants to sit and do mental math over what attack is better in each situation or consider cooldown drifting and things like that. Some people want to just sit down, push buttons and complete content quickly without too much thought behind it. The study I linked above basically shows that strategy/critical thinking in video games is on a downward trend. We also had sub jobs here originally but they were removed, most likely at the request of the player base.

I think times are just changing and Square is trying to future-proof for the majority and the incoming generations who are being raised on short-form media/TikTok (media that doesn't require much brain power to comprehend). Those who want something complex just might not be their target audience anymore.

Sure. On the same token though I never saw anything wrong with cone AoEs or Samurai Kaiten. Stuff like that made the jobs engaging to play and there wasn't any math to form out. It was pretty clear cut and dry. Use skill to buff the next skill or stand here for the most amount of cleave. Instead of making everything a circle or removing that extra step.

Now it's just Attack A now always has auto crit.

But you are correct they want to draw in a more casual crowd that isn't required to think. Been that way for a while. Started in Shadowbringers. The signs were there in Stormblood. More began to notice in Endwalker.

Subjobs in XIV was just some cheap Cross Class skills. Subjobs in other iterations of the franchise either had you use other jobs skills or had you acquire traits from other jobs to boost the primary one. This can be seen in many either through the multiclass systems, materia, gear, and of course in standard job based games an Ability Point System.

I'd say if XIV wanted to branch out(it doesn't) they could implement a Mastery Point system that served to increase the effectiveness of a base job. Whether it's simple DPS increases, shorter cooldowns, slef buffs by going through the rotation, stat increases, changes in gameplay, faster Limit Break gain.

And that you only would gain Mastery Points after max level. So even after you maxed your job you always have something to work towards. Cuz you know a lot of people say "I got nothing to do".

Or instead of a relic weapon as they do you have a relic questchain that involves you acquiring gear for your offhand slot or a new slot in general and it alters a skill to do something else to change how you play the job in a completely different way. And if players wanted to metagame and cry about it you could just unequip it and use the base kit.

All perfectly fine ideas. But hey if the goal is to make the game so accessible it becomes boring to play that's a dev choice.