We cannot achieve balance while DPS jobs have utilities

[Connor]

I'm not sure it's worth thinking about those complaints. The moment they're addressed, given reasonable context, etc., they vault to another distant goalpost.

One need only look at when relative healing requirements were higher ATOP more involved DPS kits, see that healers' portion of active population was HIGHER, and... No, that's it, actually. That's really about the end of it.

I mean, as I said above, whether it’s ‘worth’ thinking about to us is one thing, but based on their actions the developers seem to be balancing exactly around these kind of complaints. I.E reducing healer dps to 1 filler 1 dot so healers don’t suddenly get so confused and overwhelmed by the sheer volume of non-healing abilities and kill everyone they’ve ever met through sheer negligence (even though they didn’t do it before). I mean look at their reasoning behind removing Energy Drain in the past.

But then, it’s entirely contradictory anyway, because why would having too many dps abilities confuse them but being overladen with 40 million healing abilities totally won’t confuse healers’ poor little pudding brains. And frankly I don’t think developers will ever see the irony.

[Shurrikhan]

Snip

In short, the contradictions of such complaints are so obviously enough mere veils for simply "Keep gameplay little to null so that I can't be made to feel bad for feeling non-optimal in my casual content" that if the devs continue to pander to them, there honestly isn't much hope for the game.

Not because the game lives and dies with healers (in spirit, maybe -- though that'd be true of any role), but simply because they won't be last thing killed off.

[Connor]

In short, the contradictions of such complaints are so obviously enough mere veils for simply "Keep gameplay little to null so that I can't be made to feel bad for feeling non-optimal in my casual content" that if the devs continue to pander to them, there honestly isn't much hope for the game

Personally I’d argue we’re dangerously close to that point already. Or, dangerously close to approaching it at the very least.

And I mean, realistically, is there even that many players so obsessed with some kind of absolute optimisation that the changes we keep getting are actually going to satisfy them?

Like taking the way that Viper skill because it might get in the way of optimising melee combo uptime. Though I suppose that leads into another question it brings up which is “where did this ‘feedback’ even come from?” Lol.

Personally I feel like if the devs said ‘would you rather have perfect balance, or more unique/interesting/etc job designs’, I feel like they’d be surprised with how many people would opt for the latter. Though maybe just personal bias because I’d say that’s ultimately going to be the most satisfying option. Naturally in practice it wouldn’t be so black and white (both can exist to an extent), but I think most players are more concerned with whether their job is ‘fun/interesting’ to them, rather than ‘is it going to be easy to optimise in savages’ lol (plus again, there’s nothing to say they couldn’t be both)

[ApolloGenX]

Again, as long as the "challenge" in the game is team jump rope..you only have dps and a tank...with minimum heals. The design is constricting. No crowd control, no resource management, no haste, slow, whatever...it's all about mechanics with nominal healing and someone to mitigate dmg.

[Shurrikhan]

And I mean, realistically, is there even that many players so obsessed with some kind of absolute optimisation that the changes we keep getting are actually going to satisfy them?

I don't think that's ever been a source of complaints. The people who actually go for hyper-optimization usually enjoy when there is a lot there to hyper-optimize.

Rather, the ones being pandered to (with little reason the rest of us can fathom/stomach) seem to chiefly complain about simple skill gap / the extent reward differs with effective effort invested: I.e., "If I hit my ABCs and dodge mechanics, I should deal basically the same damage as you (...even if my engagement, considerations, etc., are only a tenth of yours)."

[Eraden]

Personally I’d argue we’re dangerously close to that point already. Or, dangerously close to approaching it at the very least.

And I mean, realistically, is there even that many players so obsessed with some kind of absolute optimisation that the changes we keep getting are actually going to satisfy them?

Like taking the way that Viper skill because it might get in the way of optimising melee combo uptime. Though I suppose that leads into another question it brings up which is “where did this ‘feedback’ even come from?” Lol.

Personally I feel like if the devs said ‘would you rather have perfect balance, or more unique/interesting/etc job designs’, I feel like they’d be surprised with how many people would opt for the latter. Though maybe just personal bias because I’d say that’s ultimately going to be the most satisfying option. Naturally in practice it wouldn’t be so black and white (both can exist to an extent), but I think most players are more concerned with whether their job is ‘fun/interesting’ to them, rather than ‘is it going to be easy to optimise in savages’ lol (plus again, there’s nothing to say they couldn’t be both)

Mao more concerned abouts some jobs being very unpopulars and much less played than other jobs. Is telling Mao that thems jobs not as funs as more popular jobs. Devs should be trying to find way to make unpopular jobs more funs without grindings thems down into simple things. Is does not necessarily mean more dps. Sometimes can be HOW dps is generateds that can make job more funs.

[Raikai]

Again, as long as the "challenge" in the game is team jump rope..you only have dps and a tank...with minimum heals. The design is constricting. No crowd control, no resource management, no haste, slow, whatever...it's all about mechanics with nominal healing and someone to mitigate dmg.

That's precisely the point. People can discuss job/role design as much as they want, but unless the actual encounters involve something more interesting for the jobs than just... 'do damage and keep HP bars full', I doubt we'll ever see more value in individual and group utilities (not talking about +dps% support, which is another beast).

Though, to be honest... it's hard even to speculate on "what ifs" because we don't know really what XIV's combat design can be pushed towards other than just those very chess-like encounter mechanics. We've seen some refreshing stuff in Arcadion, but honestly? For an expansion supposed to focus on great encounter design, I expected something new and exciting, not just their old formula executed very well.

This probably speaks a bit on how drastic the 'job identity improvements' on 8.0 are going to be.

[kaynide]

I mean, this is not a minor thing like tweaking/needing/adjusting abilities. This is asking to change the entire design behind encounter/dungeon/etc building and balancing. For what? It’s not like support is really a needed thing in this game outside of minor abilities.

You also have to remember that the devs are building this game for the candy crush /virtual Disneyland audience. Outside of savage, if they can’t put serious pressure on tanks or healers to keep the party good, why would they even fathom adding a new role type that would invite other players to criticize them not using their buffs right? This game doesn’t even differentiate damage types. We don’t have creatures weak to fire, or poison. Sleep barely works. There is no crowd control. They removed a lot of what mad wwhealers useful (protect/stoneskin) because even that was “too complicated”. Sure, there’s a facade of magic vs physical damage, but it’s very rare even that matters.

The meme “this is a Wendy’s”, is apt. This game, nor its audience, is just not interesting in particularly hard or intricate gameplay. I love hard, complex games just like I love a good steak, but sometimes I just want a cheap burger, you know?

[LilyPendragon]

Mao more concerned abouts some jobs being very unpopulars and much less played than other jobs. Is telling Mao that thems jobs not as funs as more popular jobs. Devs should be trying to find way to make unpopular jobs more funs without grindings thems down into simple things. Is does not necessarily mean more dps. Sometimes can be HOW dps is generateds that can make job more funs.

People have fun with different things though. Even at its most fun, BLM was still pretty low on the player count. Compared to (imo) the least fun job in the game SMN getting a huge amount of players.

(Even this crappy form of BLM is still the most fun job for me btw)

[Payadopa]

Again, as long as the "challenge" in the game is team jump rope..you only have dps and a tank...with minimum heals. The design is constricting. No crowd control, no resource management, no haste, slow, whatever...it's all about mechanics with nominal healing and someone to mitigate dmg.

They threw out the baby with the bathwater, essentially. I have a hard time calling it an RPG at this point. Apart from a couple stats everything else has been removed.