A plea for RNG and proc based gameplay

[Valence]

After the release of job changes in the media tour, it becomes obvious to me that the devs just hate RNG and proc gameplay.

• AST sees all rng removed from cards, in spite of being THE gambler job. What kind of astrology is this without rng? It was explained that this is a very divisive topic, yet they choose specifically to axe rng out of the job: I struggle to understand the logic there, except if to alienate all the people that actually enjoyed it.
  
• BLM sees all of its remaining rng in the form of Thundercloud and Firestarter removed outright. Perhaps it was a shadow of the rng it used to be due to the overabundance of sharpcasting, but the effect remains the same: rng has been axed out of BLM.
  
• DNC sees the addition of three deterministic, non RNG big attacks to its toolkit (Dance of the Dawn, Finishing Move and Last Dance). The burst segment of dancer is packed to the brim already with moves, notably from the sheer amount of potential Sabre Dances that can happen there. While fortunately Sabre Dance still takes precedence over Last Dance in terms of potency, it still leaves a lot less room for those in the burst, which not only increases dramatically the risk of overcap, but also pushes RNG/proc gameplay further out of the burst sequence, unlike BRD that still has a lot of room. This essentially removes a lot of the player choice and agency on the fly into what to use and when, and how to triage resources accordingly. Most of the rng seems pushed into the filler phase, which is boring and doesn't involve much triaging at all: Sabre is mostly a gauge spender in the filler, with little rng in its generation behind. Of course, the job still retains rng procs on its feather system, fortunately.

With that in mind, no new rng jobs based on a proc system have been added since the last one was added in ShB (dancer).

MCH also had all of its rng/procs stripped back in ShB, and it was like BRD a fully rng proc based job (meaning it had no basic deterministic combos). I have stopped hoping the job would see Reload and ammo come back to make its filler less boring for a long time as obviously it's never going to happen: they'd rather delete rng from controversial jobs like AST than do the opposite to any job.

As someone that literally loves playing that kind of jobs, am I doomed to see less and less of it? I am very worried about it considering how little options I have left for me to enjoy. I find it very depressing, do you just hate rng and proc jobs?

[GrizzlyTank]

Should have been some rng added to things. Like roles that have charge/spender, when you hit it shouldn't be 5 charge each it. It should 3-8 (maybe higher on crit).

[NegativeS]

A little bit of RNG on top of an already robust rotation is a good philosophy for class design. Too bad they're having trouble with the latter, so we're not getting the former either.

[Cynric]

I don't think it's an overall doomed concept, but I think in this case it's probably one of those things where the devs are just responding to feedback given. Procs and RNG based things in rotations are just generally not that popular. People don't like gameplay like 3.x Machinist where for example you have to hit the same ability over and over for a chance to get the next ability which only gives a chance to get the ability after it.

Then you have to introduce things that give guaranteed procs, but then people will say "its only fun when I'm getting guaranteed procs" which limits the design and makes the procs have less of a reason to be there.

As for me personally, I think procs on certain abilities are ok, like an OGCD that you need a proc to get, that's fine, but when it's basic parts of your combo I don't really enjoy that or think its very fun.

All that being said, perhaps when they work more on job identity there will be more room for certain jobs to gain procs to differentiate themselves from each other. Even though many people probably don't like the playstyle of RNG procs , there isn't a reason for absolutely no job to really make use of them. It's good to give people options for the gameplay they desire.

Just keep it far far away from Viper XD. Melee and RNG gcd's sounds like a recipe for the least fun/popular melee job in the game.

[HighlanderClone]

They don't want to do it because they want to prepare us for the AI singularity where we just follow what the AI tells us to do. They even helpfully light up buttons telling us what exactly we need to press on 80% of the jobs now. Square Enix is doing us a favor, and you poor people can't see the light. Embrace the machine, reject thinking.

[Isurith]

I guess it's sad to see the removal of RNG from Jobs that had some, and I hope for you that it goes in the opposite direction later with 8.0 and after.

But I also think that FF is rigid and that's normal. It's the thing with this game. And I'm not sure that's fair asking for the game to be something it isn't inherently.

( As far as I am concerned, I hate rng with passion but as said, I'm not against some jobs having it as core component for ppl that are looking for this kind of gameplay )

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

I feel like this type of gameplay would work better with fewer buttons. Like dnc for instance. So for there to be more jobs like this, people would have to be OK with culling the number of skills available.

[GrizzlyTank]

I feel like this type of gameplay would work better with fewer buttons. Like dnc for instance. So for there to be more jobs like this, people would have to be OK with culling the number of skills available.

And faster gcd.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

And faster gcd.

That would only work if it was gcd related procs, unless no skills are expected to be double weaved.

Gcd clipping feels terrible, so have a low gcd and lots of ogcds would make the class feel terrible to play.

[Kathryn]

I would love more proc based classes as being RNG keeps you interested and focused instead of pressing buttons in a sequenced order for builder spender jobs which is incredibly dull, unfortunately with how PCT and VPR look they're going with the builder spender predictable type jobs.

I might just finish up the story in FF as I always do as I enjoy it and go back to WoW for it's combat as it feels much more fluid, responsive and interesting (Depending on the class you play).

Also /signed, Good luck.