Level Sync feels worse every expansion

[Atreus]

You can work out an effective HPS/DPS for any given level and then take the ratio of that value against the level cap value. Using that you'll instantly equalize long term sustained healing/damage between any two levels. What is left unmatched is burst, but leveling was never tightly tuned in the first place. You will encounter players with outdated gear, players lacking skills because of level or not doing job quests, and players with different amounts of experience. In the end it doesn't matter very much that we'll have a wide range of ability between different levels of the same class, because that's already the case.

Yeah pretty much. I'm so unconcerned with higher-level players bringing in their abilities. As you say, players already come in WILDLY varying skill levels, some who aren't even pressing the buttons they're given. The content is literally made for people like that so it's hard for me to not just want it to be a more enjoyable experience syncing to it.

tell me how you would make a warrior with bloodwhetting scale down to be equal to a warrior without it.

You don't, but tbh that's really not an issue to me.

[RinaB]

Level sync feels really bad on viper. I know reaper and other newer jobs have the same issues but it just feels so dumb. One of the worste is the 40s dungeons like stone vigil. I can keep my attack buff up with aoe but I have to single target to get my speed buff....why? It's just pointless and clunky. The other thing i don't understand about lower level syncing is CBU3 is determined to have combos in this game yet you'll have to run an entire dungeon pressing 2 buttons.

[Commander_Justitia]

I think if a player is lvl100 and still goes a lvl 20 dungeon or something really low, he should be allowed to use a few more skills of his whole set. Similar to how crossskills worked previously. In lower dungeons you were able to use like 3 out of 10 crossskills. In max level dungeon you were able to use all.
Just another category in the action menu 'synced' where you can select them. Let's say he is allowed to use 3 more abilities in sastasha, but each fit a certain category like offensive, defensive or support - so players are prohibited from just using 3 damage abilities for the lowest dungeons. This would have to be on a job to job basis, which one are allowed specifically for synced - as some wont make sense.

Dungeons itself are however already too easy. And this on SE.... I think the player damage output is less relevant, when the damage received is already so low, it will never put you in any trouble....
They can probably increase damage taken by 100% in most low level dungeons and it would be just fine.

Maybe upon entering the dungeon, players being able to set dungeon modification, that make the dungeon more difficult when starting it (damage, healing, HP, amount of mobs, random mobs, no sprint, random cc etc. - modifier) - while at the same time unlocking 1 more slot in the synced category for each detrimental dungeon effect picked.

but they will probably never do something like that, because it would break their trusts and squadrons scripting

[VeyaAkemi]

Maybe upon entering the dungeon, players being able to set dungeon modification, that make the dungeon more difficult when starting it (damage, healing, HP, amount of mobs, random mobs, no sprint, random cc etc. - modifier) - while at the same time unlocking 1 more slot in the synced category for each detrimental dungeon effect picked.

Also another problem is that would cause a lot of friction within the community due to disagreements.

Like let's say you need unanimous agreement to set the modifiers, then it would never go through, most players are there from roulettes which already have scaling rewards, so increasing the difficulty, and thus making the dungeon take longer, would not sit well with many people, do remember that there are people who intentionally never unlock additional Alliance Raids so that they always get CT to abuse how short it is, though I suppose there is a small argument for full premades.

Let's say it's a vote, akin to kicking, and you need half the party to agree for the modifiers to go through, you would likely get people leaving if things don't go their way, dungeon is unmodified? the one person who wanted to have their skills leaves, dungeon is modified? the people who wanted the quick and easy payout leave.

You can say this wouldn't be a gamebreaking issue, but it's something that could lead to many "feels bad" moments the devs would want to avoid, if there is a consistent thing about design in this game is wanting to remove as much friction as possible, not add things that would inevitably cause more friction.

[Wasselin]

I think it's fun to experience the jobs the way they were at the level when the content first released. It's like going on a trip down memory lane.

I play a healer though, so I don't have the muscle memory of a strict rotation to deal with in older content.

Still I just wanted to chime in to say that I like it the way it is, because it wouldn't make sense to me to be spamming Glare IV in Satasha.

[Commander_Justitia]

Also another problem is that would cause a lot of friction within the community due to disagreements.

Like let's say you need unanimous agreement to set the modifiers, then it would never go through, most players are there from roulettes which already have scaling rewards, so increasing the difficulty, and thus making the dungeon take longer, would not sit well with many people, do remember that there are people who intentionally never unlock additional Alliance Raids so that they always get CT to abuse how short it is, though I suppose there is a small argument for full premades.

Let's say it's a vote, akin to kicking, and you need half the party to agree for the modifiers to go through, you would likely get people leaving if things don't go their way, dungeon is unmodified? the one person who wanted to have their skills leaves, dungeon is modified? the people who wanted the quick and easy payout leave.

You can say this wouldn't be a gamebreaking issue, but it's something that could lead to many "feels bad" moments the devs would want to avoid, if there is a consistent thing about design in this game is wanting to remove as much friction as possible, not add things that would inevitably cause more friction.

Then call the roulette "Modified Leveling dungeon" roulette, and make the modifier random I guess (similar to the evil floors of potd). Give slightly better rewards on exp or gil as incentive. People can only do 1x leveling dungeon a day nevertheless, so it is up to them what they prefer. Classic or randomized.

(I would also like a mentor roulette for only ex trials, but I guess this could be abused for achievement purposes (e.g. people spamming garuda ex with 1 character queueing at 4am). I would still prefer them over boring long dungeons...)

[Gurgeh]

Limiting people's job kit does nothing to enhance fun for new players at all. Although CB3 thinks it's does, it doesn't.

Rationing actions was initially done as a 'learning aid' for new players. For that it's valuable. But there is no need to give players any longer than 50 or level 60 at the VERY most before they have their full kit. Once upon a time they had their full kit by level 50 which included many many actions long since removed.

It is a fact that action rationing is why so many people like me don't know and can't be bothered to learn rotations at all for 14/16 of jobs. There is no point. It's futile. To really be useful it needs to be muscle memory. Muscle memory is impossible when different syncs keep forcing you to mutilate that muscle memory. This is the case even for mains.
Also it's impossible to keep track across 16 jobs of which actions appear and disappear when. When you combine this with how undemanding content is, it's easier to just learn a core of actions for each job and just ignore searching for when the others appear. Instance will be over soon and you won't see that 1 unique flavour of action combinations for another 3 months, and then you won't see it again after that either.

THIS IS ESPECIALLY THE CASE FOR HEALING. Stop making jobs, including healing, 'way' harder to MASTER. Then demand more of them.

It's a ridiculous irony that people who do a LOT of casual content have to contend with the handicap of sabotaging their opportunities to practice and master a job, in a way that people who have a lot of high end content to run, don't have to contend with or 'constantly' overcome.

To anyone who bemoans how 4-8 year casual veterans can be 'so' bad at their jobs... THIS IS 95% OF THE REASON WHY. And to a lot of you high end players, with your critical mentor roulette YouTube's (not you spider) you'd be worse at your jobs too if 97% of your practice was this counter productive nonsense.
You learn your rotation. Then you unlearn it next week. Then you learn it. Then you unlearn it next week. Then, 'meh', you just don't bother anymore... This never used to bother me, but I didn't realise that's had actually become my attitude, it was a gradual journey towards giving up.
"Final Fantasy XIV! Meh!"

CB3 it's like you just don't think sometimes. You don't want to provide casual, and then it's just literally endless needless barriers to high end, that have no to little counter benefit.

But it's not going to get better. Because CB3 don't do real change. If it's a bit broken , then get fixed it a bit. If it's 'badly' broken then it can't get fixed at all.
Great. Just great.

Oh yeah... also... THIS is why I gave up learning Pict at around level 65/70, and never bothered to even unlock viper. Its just so hard to learn jobs with this going on that you never master them. It's just... not fun. It's just another 2 jobs for me to be shit at. Which is unfun. How the fck an I ever supposed to learn Pict, if I keep getting keeper of the lake and LoA. Fck this.

Another reason why I have totally lost interest in 'jobs' and 'leveling' in FFXIV. Not a good state of affairs for an MMO or an RPG.

[PyurBlue]

Then call the roulette "Modified Leveling dungeon" roulette, and make the modifier random I guess (similar to the evil floors of potd).

A higher difficulty roulette might work. I'm not sure if I'd want to see randomized modifiers. The roulette might be at a fixed difficulty and the modifiers could be edited for unrestricted party. People do run MINE or atypical party compositions for fun so I can see the modifiers being used.

It is a fact that action rationing is why so many people like me don't know and can't be bothered to learn rotations at all for 14/16 of jobs. There is no point. It's futile.

Sync in combination with roulette is really bad for learning jobs. As you go higher and higher, it becomes less likely that even get to use your latest skills and you have to be ready for 10-20 different playstyles at random depending on how you get synced.

[Daralii]

I think it's fun to experience the jobs the way they were at the level when the content first released. It's like going on a trip down memory lane.

I play a healer though, so I don't have the muscle memory of a strict rotation to deal with in older content.

Still I just wanted to chime in to say that I like it the way it is, because it wouldn't make sense to me to be spamming Glare IV in Satasha.

Jobs at 60 in 2015 were completely different from jobs synced to 60 in 2025. Something like SCH has probably lost 4 core rotational spells, most have had their upkeep buffs/debuffs completely removed, and plenty have had core mechanics revised multiple times or outright removed.

[Commander_Justitia]

Jobs at 60 in 2015 were completely different from jobs synced to 60 in 2025. Something like SCH has probably lost 4 core rotational spells, most have had their upkeep buffs/debuffs completely removed, and plenty have had core mechanics revised multiple times or outright removed.

They massacred that boy. Shadowflare dotspread was very satisfying as healer. Squadron NPCs are mocking you, they are still using those skills.

I also loved monk during heavensward. How you were so fast, that is was almost broken when you got a buffed arrow from your favorite ast and clipping GCDs...How you had to manage greased lightning stacks and TP. I was happy not having rate utility besides mantra, I didn't want raid buffs for a glorified burst window every 2 or 3min. Just letting it be a high single target damage dealer with positionals, a cool aura and tons of off globals to press at once.