Viper Changes Thread - Share your thoughts

[W00by]

You won't have to stare at boss debuffs, for one. That's a pretty big win since all of your pertinent UI information is available in the class UI or on your hotkeys themselves. And you may have liked looking at your UI to choose which thing to refresh next. I personally was whatever on it and was mostly expecting combo finishers to be extended since that's the only trap I regularly walked into. But the devs have actual metrics, actual data on what's happening on vipers. And this was clearly a pretty major problem if they'd devote the first major patch to removing noxious gnash and increasing buff timers to delete this problem. But hey, you got to keep positionals that have entire bosses and boss mechanics that ignore them anyways.

You're right: the devs do have player metrics about Viper. Player metrics that show that it was the most successful job launch the game has ever had and the current most popular job. Surely Noxious Gash wasn't a "huge problem" keeping people from playing the class, right? Otherwise, it wouldn't have quadruple the amount of Ninjas playing right now. Even Pictomancer is struggling to keep up and it's ALSO a shiny new DPS job. There was no reason to change it so soon. In fact, plenty of people that might've liked Noxious Gash didn't even get to finish leveling the job to 100, so who knows what they would've thought? Certainly not Square's "actual metrics."

And, for the record? A month ago, they also thought it would be a good idea to remove positionals, and feedback showed them that they were wrong about that. So their "actual data" clearly isn't infallible. If that change was wrong, this one could be too.

And it is, for what it's worth. (Also, imagine complaining about having to stare at boss debuffs. You can move where debuffs are and even set it so only yours show up... this would never be prohibitive to someone who actually took the time to set up their class. And it's not like Viper is the only one who ever has to.)

[ZhanMough]

Awful change, job design team need to be more open with decision making and points of feedback. This feels like they said they had to change "something" and they saw the feedback about positionals, because that's the only thing they made clear that they would adjust in their vaguely worded pre-7.01 messaging. So of course the feedback was about the positionals. Ridiculous as usual.

Feedback would have been exactly the same as the positional feedback if they had mentioned that they were changing this, but they chose not to.

[Miqutie]

They need to revert the changes, but they won't. When was the last time they genuinely listened to job feedback from players? It's so tiring.

I loved Viper as it was, it was really fun. Now they've changed it for... what reason? If Viper's design was considered 'too difficult' then I have no idea who they are accommodating when it comes to job design.

[Zerovii]

It's not free or zero thought? I think you vastly overestimate the average skill of the playerbase. A mistake the devs made with DT, EW, and HW. Having traps built into the class is something the devs have been trying to remove since HW taught them that trap class design is bad for the game.

The ability to make minor mistakes isnt a trap.

[HippeusOmega]

I'm not a big dps person persay as I've always been a healer more then a dps class but Viper as it was felt so good to play. Now it feels like it's just been gutted with what made Viper viper.

[Rhael]

I think you vastly overestimate the average skill of the playerbase.

I don't. However, I am aware as to the fact that the average skill is as low as it is by choice, not because of how the game is designed. The vast majority of the playerbase does not wish to engage with the game on any meaningful level. There's a world of difference between not wanting to play the game and genuinely low skill.

Having traps built into the class

Not allowing you to make one of the stupidest possible rotational choices is not a "trap." I'm sorry, but if you think juggling a handful of buffs and debuffs is a "trap," then you probably shouldn't be playing or discussing this game as you are clearly unqualified. The sheer possibility of making even the smallest of mistakes is not a trap or a mistake on the part of the game. Please stop discussing things you know less than nothing about.

The vast majority of this playerbase doesn't actually want to engage with this game in any meaningful way.

Case in point:

You won't have to stare at boss debuffs, for one. That's a pretty big win

You unironically consider not engaging in a fundamental game mechanic as a win.

[Lamarcy2699]

There is another foray coming later in DT and Delubrum Savage is not particularly casual. It's extremely likely there will be another equivalent later this expac.

In theory I'd like to ignore it, but as long as the buff cap remains at 25, "increases damage dealt by one specific person" debuffs are pretty obnoxious. If it was a dot it'd be fine. If they fixed buff culling issues that would be far better. "Vipers exist in this 48 person raid, but they might be dead and so this debuff might be providing absolutely no utility to anyone" is not a good use of a buff slot.

You're confusing buffs and debuffs for the player and a boss. Buffs/debuffs on the player have a max cap that is easily reached, just look at TOP, buffs/debuffs on bosses have a display of 30 and a max of 60. Meaning your hypothetical falls flat with the very change viper got. More buffs on the player is more problematic than more debuffs on the bosses.

[Sad-Panda]

Personally, I would have preferred they kept the dot and removed some positionals. The dot kept itself up with the rotation, but positionals are annoying,

[Broenwyrn]

I mean... It shows debuffs placed by you all the way to the left, and there are no other debuffs worth knowing about except maybe the odd mitigate, which usually is still somewhere near the left end because the debuff you're looking for would be recently placed (otherwise you wouldn't be thinking about placing it yourself). I don't understand the issue.

[EponaTBHSMH]

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...3%83%AC/page50

When you google translate the last few pages of the Japanese Viper thread, the reaction is not as negative as the English forums, especially regarding the removal of Noxious Gash