10k Universal MP Is Boring.

[Valence]

If we could specifically use something like materia to increase MP, that could potentially be an interesting form of customization. Like for BLM, having a bit more MP might mean that when things get wild, you'd be able to cast Fire an additional time without sacrificing your ability to hit Flare Star. Deciding whether that was worth the materia to have that flexibility might be an interesting choice.

But that said, I don't see anything like that happening, unless they get really wild in 8.0.

It may blow your mind that raising MP pools by using Mind Materia on BLM back in HW was actually a thing to ensure 6 Fire 4 in astral on some species (notably highlanders), and that reaching certain thresholds above on every species was strongly suggested to prevent bad tick rates making you unable to regen MP fully under umbral or just falling dry of MP and being left unable to cast anything.

Not saying that it was good execution of the system, but it sure was something. You could customize a lot more back then.

Actually, it was problematic because anyway people would follow the same meta models and builds, and all it was doing was making casuals or new players left behind because they just didn't know or cared, that's what was bad in execution. But for example if you take doh/dol even today with their stat thresholds, it's interesting somewhat that as the expansion progresses and gear goes up it unlocks more possibilities and thresholds for them to reach, potentially changing rotations, gameplay, etc.

[Nero-Voidstails]

ya know that we have a 10k pool but at no point we you the first zero so it could be legit removed without impacting that game

[BabyYoda]

MP do not exist with melee dps

[Carighan]

Actually, it was problematic because anyway people would follow the same meta models and builds, and all it was doing was making casuals or new players left behind because they just didn't know or cared, that's what was bad in execution. But for example if you take doh/dol even today with their stat thresholds, it's interesting somewhat that as the expansion progresses and gear goes up it unlocks more possibilities and thresholds for them to reach, potentially changing rotations, gameplay, etc.

This can always be a problem.

It's in fact a solid argument to remove such systems entirely: If all players just copy the one optimally-mathed variant from The Balance anyways, why complicate the entire process so much. Just remove all secondary stats and all Materia, and bake the extra expected damage performance into the skill system itself. It's the expected outcome for every player anyways, might as well save the space in the item database and the GUI files and so on.

It's very difficult to design a system of player choice - be it talents, gear, materia, whatever - that allows for actual player expression without it just coming down to 1 optimal solution that someone has to puzzle out.

WoW briefly had this when they replaced talents entirely with 6 choices of 3 options, but by and large these were always "non-performative". So for example a damage dealer would have no damage options, so there is no tier where you can even talk about an optimal performance choice. Rather they were all defensive or supportive in nature. You could pick between 3 ways of healing people as a damage dealer, for example. This got dropped later as while it was bautifuly on a design and balance level, it also just felt weak. Damage dealers want the illusion of influencing their own damage, even if they just copy "the optimal spec". It's just basic human nature.

[AmiableApkallu]

It's in fact a solid argument to remove such systems entirely: If all players just copy the one optimally-mathed variant from The Balance anyways, why complicate the entire process so much.

Does this mean that Piety is one of the better-designed stats?

Because whenever I've looked at The Balance for inspiration, there have always been low/medium/high piety sets in the recommendations. And this tier, there are even max eHP (vitality) vs. max damage sets in the recommendations.

My take away is that even when the goal of (almost) every encounter is to reduce the boss's HP to zero, there can still be an interesting and real choice between maximizing damage and maximizing the probability that you clear. (See also: Strats that sacrifice uptime for ease of execution.)

[Valence]

This can always be a problem.

It's in fact a solid argument to remove such systems entirely: If all players just copy the one optimally-mathed variant from The Balance anyways, why complicate the entire process so much. Just remove all secondary stats and all Materia, and bake the extra expected damage performance into the skill system itself. It's the expected outcome for every player anyways, might as well save the space in the item database and the GUI files and so on.

It's very difficult to design a system of player choice - be it talents, gear, materia, whatever - that allows for actual player expression without it just coming down to 1 optimal solution that someone has to puzzle out.

WoW briefly had this when they replaced talents entirely with 6 choices of 3 options, but by and large these were always "non-performative". So for example a damage dealer would have no damage options, so there is no tier where you can even talk about an optimal performance choice. Rather they were all defensive or supportive in nature. You could pick between 3 ways of healing people as a damage dealer, for example. This got dropped later as while it was bautifuly on a design and balance level, it also just felt weak. Damage dealers want the illusion of influencing their own damage, even if they just copy "the optimal spec". It's just basic human nature.

That's why even if we can't find creative systems where you can customize and express yourself through different options, the doh/dol example is interesting to me. Gated by stats at each tier, and having different thresholds being unreachable at lower tiers but suddenly becoming viable at later tiers, offering more or different options and changing the gameplay as players progress through the expansion, is a way to shake things up, even if everybody goes for the same builds like for doh/dol.

And even then, we do still see different options even on the balance, be it for doh/dol or some pve jobs that have speed builds, and non speed builds, or even various speed thresholds (notably old BLM), so I do believe that variant builds aren't a dead idea if executed properly.

And frankly? Make MP negative rotations again. It's not gonna matter in casual because fights are too short anyway. And then you'd have a lot more value put behind different builds with different amounts of piety for example, and the whole game would be reducing it as you go and gear up, and as you get better at each fight. If the fear is to see popping a lot of players thinking with the current damage focused rot brain mentality that just run out of MP and complain, then I'd consider this 1) hilarious and 2) part of the course correction syndrome evoked by Yoshida on difficulty.

Could work for other stats as well, like tenacity, etc. Make tanks without any like slightly more buff physical DPS roles, and tie half of tank actual additional defense to tenacity and see how it goes.

[LilimoLimomo]

My take away is that even when the goal of (almost) every encounter is to reduce the boss's HP to zero, there can still be an interesting and real choice between maximizing damage and maximizing the probability that you clear. (See also: Strats that sacrifice uptime for ease of execution.)

I like this framing, and I appreciate your having given me the chance to read it.