DRK Spam in Frontlines

[LyraShu]

Eh, part of this is because I am not good at PvP, I will be the first to admit.

But between the stuns and weird timing from when you get attacked vs actually take damage, I hate PvP in this game. The only reason I play it is to get to rank 25 for some cool swag and I am out. I don't even feel like I do terribly while I am in there, but there is a definite curve to learning the differences between the pvp vs pve content. The DRK spam is also something that makes me just want to stop. While, I get that there are ways around it a bit, it seems like you need to preplan for that event or have a group ready for a counter, which doesn't seem likely to happen with just a duty finder frontline pop (to me at least/my experiences).

This is also the only content I disable system sounds in the game while playing. I keep chat open (to keep with the team), but when people start spamming system sounds because they feel like the group isn't bowing to their whims (right or not), then I also start becoming well...annoyed with the content haha.

[Post]

Targeting macros are your friend.

I like to throw the Bind to Target 1 marker on the DRK and then use the macro: /target <bind1>. This lets me target the DRK whenever I want.

I had no idea you could target marked things specifically and I've played the game for years and made plenty of attempts at targeting keybind adjustments and macros because of my general dissatisfaction of how poorly tab works in FFXIV besides.

Thanks a ton!

[All_Nonsense]

PvP balance in frontlines is kinda non-existent because every class uses the same abilities designed specifically for Crystalline Conflict. It's just a quick roulette that gives you xp every day. Just do what makes it fun for you and try to win. I go in as WAR and I pocket support battle high 5 dps or a group of drk knights. I pull people in for the dps to kill and stun the people the drk's pull. I can rarely get kills (only assists) doing that and I don't deal a ton of damage, but I contribute a lot to the team by assisting in the murder fest and making it very difficult for enemy players to escape. And it's fun. And when a drk pulls me in I pop my 10 second shield and always make it out ok. Just find a role you like playing in frontlines and stick to that.

Honestly, rival wings is way more balanced in the sense that once you hit 20 soaring higher stacks you can beat the brakes off of most classes, even melees. And drk are pretty impotent there minus I guess the first clash on mid. You can run around as a mch or smn and cause mayhem the whole time, it's nice for a change.

[Post]

Rival Wings is more balanced I think because its balance is centered more on the 'higher state' of mechs that each light party contributes instead of soaring.

The fact that soaring can be caught up to and doesn't deplete certainly helps, as it means only early, catastrophic losses mean the soaring discrepancy will be great enough that it is impossible to overcome (at least before your core gets smashed).

This and the fact that dying is far less of a penalty in RW than FL (and even CC) means that there didn't need to be any flat damage reductions on any jobs in there, and thus many more jobs feel useful because they're not balanced around the organization used by general JP players in FL.

The lack of that organization in FL on our side often leaves our, shall we say, more lackadaisical playerbase bewildered and annoyed enough about the current state of the mode that they frequently make the same forum posts.

But, I think many complaints also center on the lack of change, which I think players coming from other MMOs with PvP or just other PvP games on general like to see because sometimes change for change's sake can be refreshing. They're not getting that here in the only mode they play, which is FL, because they only PvP to get the exp once a day or for season rewards. Basically, I think another way to help the lack of variety and change would be to shake up the PvP roulettes to include RW or even CC dailies, and then make winning daily also worth a ton so more lackadaisical players are encouraged towards at least trying to improve for their own interests.

[Derio]

Its because all of DRKs good stuff is there that they pulled from PVE.

[Eastwall]

As long as it is not capped to 5 target, yoh solution is to play dk yourself, Or adapt the attitude of "l am just here for xp". Apathy unfortunately helps...

[FuturePastNow]

I used to be able to (try to) counter them as a Bard by hitting the DRK with silent nocturne before they could leap in, but they nerfed that to have less range than Plunge...

[SenorPatty]

Most of the issue really stems from being able to get stun-locked infinitely. To take a page from SWTOR, they could make it so that after 2 cc actions, you gain resistance for 20 secs.

[Post]

They used to do this in FFXIV PvP too, hell it was copied from PvE where it's still the norm (diminishing returns on all status ailments like paralyze or sleep). It would make some sense to apply it to FL at least, given the crowd control for PvP is balanced via 5v5 matches. Maybe they decided against it because purify is available to everyone, but it was in the original version of the mode too, players just had to spec for it.

I would personally find this solution much less soulless and boring than just kneecapping AoE or DRK specifically by culling max targets to 5; I hated that choice in PvE since HW (and AoE is far more trivializing for dungeons nowadays than it was then anyways), and I hated it in WoW, too. Hitting big groups, doing big damage and making big plays is one of the strengths of the MMO medium. Don't just toss that out without trying anything else.

[Zjar]

I think what bugs me the most about it is that it's really the case where you'll use your shield 90% of the time in Frontlines. To counter *one* job. Like, it's kind of nuts how it's just accepted instead of "hey isn't it fucked that the move to beat a *single* job is to just use a shield with a sort of long cooldown?" But yeah, as per the comments, I do have to remind myself sometimes to never enter FL and expect a win or even get mad about a loss because there's just too many variables that don't even count on skill to loose or win.