Pictomancer is insanely overtuned and needs to be fixed before savage drops.

[Turtledeluxe]

I mean, I’d say Bard is the polar opposite of Pictomancer in a way in that even though it’s numerically fine, playing it just doesn’t really feel like you’re actually bringing anything of value. Whereas with Pictomancer even when you’re not actually doing super big dps, it still feels like you’re ‘bringing something worthwhile’ to the party with Tempera etc, even though it’s not actually anything incredible lol.

Like Bard just has Nature’s Minne which I don’t think people value particularly highly lol, and Lolsuna on a 45-sec cool-down. Troubadour actually does feel good to use since mitigation is so important now, but it’s also essentially a role skill lol.

Personally I think a lot of it’s to do with Pictomancer being much more active while other jobs like Bard or Dancer have more passive contributions. Like they just happen as part of your damage rotation. I don’t think people are like ‘wow, my singing added a whole 1% damage to the party!’. Like, it’s numerically super powerful, but that’s never really impressed upon the player in the way Pictomancer’s is with drawing motifs leading to big damage or Tempera’s cool-down reduction.

Basically I think Pictomancer is really good with ‘feedback’ in terms of contribution being more easily observable than other jobs. Like, you can see a shield but you can’t see mits if that make sense (unless you like awkwardly hover over them I guess lol). Maybe that’s part of what makes it feel so ‘powerful’ compared to other jobs?

[/QUOTE]

I'm not sure how much of that is just PCT being shiny and new, both in terms of visuals and in terms of its rotation being reworked and ruined like every other Job.

That said I'm a PCT extremist and I've always said it has too much utility for the DPS it does and vice versa.

[Connor]

I'm not sure how much of that is just PCT being shiny and new, both in terms of visuals and in terms of its rotation being reworked and ruined like every other Job.

It’s very possible lol. By the time next expansion comes around it may very well end up as lacklustre as the other jobs ended up becoming (assuming devs don’t change their approach to job design). Probably in the name of ‘streamlining’ that nobody ever asked for lol. As for the balancing itself as a more casual player I find Pictomancer fun; even if they did need to adjust its damage output or whatever, it wouldn’t affect whether I played the job or not for me, as long as the playstyle remained the same. In terms of actual numerical balancing though, I have no idea what would be ‘most ideal’ really. But personally I like the utility of the job too so I’d be sad to see that go

[Ramiee]

You do that, and BRD and DNC become invalidated instantly, regardless of skill level. DNC may be fine due to SAM/PCT but that's it. This discussion already happened in Abyssos. The damage of "selfish" jobs depends entirely on themselves, and thus don't require others to perform well. They should still abuse the buffs of others for further increases, but they're not hindered by comp in the same way that buffing jobs can be (e. g. DNC's DP).

Imho, in the short term MCH would need to have a party buff. The long term solution would be to rework the ranged physical range role and/or not tie the strongest point of most jobs into the 120s burst window.

Im saying this more as a future possible way of fixing it, not fixing it right now to be like this. Yeah giving it a party buff would be the best way to fix it right now but I dont want that to happen because if machinist gets a party buff its not going away and I would hate that on machinist.

[Ramiee]

I play BRD and damage seems fine. I don't expect it to do BLM damage. It's straight up easier to play

Hard disagree, it's still got an absurdly high apm burst and tons of ghost inputs if your connection isn't good. The entire job feels like a job that's forced to be a burst job when it works better as a sustained damage job, song rotation will never be good it should of been ditched after shb. Remove all raid burst buffs on bard and make it solely sustained damage and sustained buff focused imo. (Obviously can't do that shit rn because the game Devs said lala I can't hear you after 2 years of complaining about the burst meta.)

[mallleable]

I play BRD too, and it feels awful to play right now despite what player collected stats say. Its personal damage is way too low for how busy its rotation is. And there are annoying micro timing issues throughout its rotation to where is doesn't seem work at any skill speed anymore. It desperately needs potency buffs, and cooldown adjustments.

[aiqa]

These discussions are always a bit confusing to me. From how I understand things, rDPS already moves all damage gained from external buffs to the person that brings them. Selfish jobs like should be topping the aDPS and nDPS charts, which they are doing, but why also rDPS charts?

And anyway. I don't think the small differences in damage between dps jobs in the upper bracket is an issue. What I dislike far more is the huge difference in rDPS between the upper bracket and lower bracket of dps jobs.

[rewd]

These discussions are always a bit confusing to me. From how I understand things, rDPS already moves all damage gained from external buffs to the person that brings them. Selfish jobs like should be topping the aDPS and nDPS charts, which they are doing, but why also rDPS charts?

And anyway. I don't think the small differences in damage between dps jobs in the upper bracket is an issue. What I dislike far more is the huge difference in rDPS between the upper bracket and lower bracket of dps jobs.

Because a lot of people think that a damage buff is "utility" so they should be taxed for them. I don't know why this belief is so widespread, though.

[Aco505]

These discussions are always a bit confusing to me. From how I understand things, rDPS already moves all damage gained from external buffs to the person that brings them. Selfish jobs like should be topping the aDPS and nDPS charts, which they are doing, but why also rDPS charts?

And anyway. I don't think the small differences in damage between dps jobs in the upper bracket is an issue. What I dislike far more is the huge difference in rDPS between the upper bracket and lower bracket of dps jobs.

Your understanding is correct. "Selfish" jobs should have higher aDPS/nDPS and lower rDPS than buffing jobs and vice versa: buffing jobs should be higher in the rDPS department and lower in the others.

Damage buffs are simply damage that is achieved through others as well as the user, and are not utility. Utility is anything else like a defensive.

Right now, VPR is overtuned because it's high in or topping the rDPS charts and is at the top of the aDPS department as well and above SAM even though VPR's damage is less bursty in comparison. BLM is also higher rDPS-wise than several buffing jobs in different percentiles.

[Eraden]

Wow. Just wow. Now peoples trying to defend Pictos performance by nitpickings and redefinings the word "utility". Standard definition of "utility" has always been any abiltys whats buffs other party members IN ANY WAY. Until now apparently. Mao reminded of another game, Warhammers 40K, where some players would endlessly argue over definitions of words likes "and" or "or" in rulebooks. This is whats Mao seeing rights now happenings with Pictos. When peoples start gettings so defensive abouts Pictos being described as having utilitys, Mao wonders. Mao wonders. Now Mao nots saying that way to fix problem is to nerf Pictos buts SOMETHING has to be done to restore balance. Tryings to redefine the word "utility" is NOT going to convince peoples that is nothings to see here.

[aiqa]

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Thanks. That clarifies things.

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The point is not "what is utility", but "what are you comparing". You can't compare rDPS AND add utility (in the form of damage buffs from external sources). That is counting those damage buffs twice. If you want to compare dps charts and go "yeah BLM should be higher because no utility", you need to look at nDPS or aDPS.