8.0 rework will be a joke

[Daralii]

In order to fix jobs they first need to fix content.

when content is as simple and straightforward as it is there really isnt anywhere for jobs to go. even if they add skill trees they can't go anywhere.

the content at the minute is dubed down and siplified so much there are absolutely ZERO systems and mechanics that jobs can work with or manipulate..

thee is no boss diversity. the only thing different between one boss and the next is how much HP they have.. they all have the same defence the same speed the same evasion. the same resistances.. a level 100 super boss takes the same damage from an attack as a level 1 bug. the only difference is HP.

To fix jobs they first need to fix content design. and put interesting and engaging systems in place that jobs can manipulate and work around.. give monsters varying stats and attributes instead of make them all the same. then you can have fast evasive mobs, slow hulky armored mobs. mobs that make be weak to blindness mobs that could be weighed down or imperrilled to certain elements.

bring back simple concepts like resource management and make those resources actually finate like tp and stuff and you can open the door for supportive jobs to help managae and maintain them. and open the door to actually decison based gameplay. this combo may do a lot more damage but it also cost alot more tp so if you use it to much you may end up starved. so then find a balance between spike damage and sustained damage. actual conscious decision making instead of mindess static rotations.

You cannot have engaging fun and interesting jobs. without engaging fun and interesting combat systems to play with and manipulate...

if the dont fix the content all a skill tree is going to be is path a leads to a x% damage buff on a 2 minute timer. path b leads to a x% crit buff on a 2 minute timer. path c leads to a x% direct hit buff on a 2 minute timer. BORING!!!!!!

That approach doesn't work in a modern theme park MMO that's still trying to copy early 2010s WoW.

[dspguy]

They've backed themselves into a corner. The only rework is the hotbars, but not the "end use" which is that DPS has to be balanced. Tanks need to be a certain percentage under the DPS and healers a certain percentage below that. And content has to be clearable in a certain timeframe due to enrage timers. Therefore, as long as that is true, DPS has to be balanced within a certain range. There won't ever be a true support class because the moment you give a job "too much" support, they'd have to drop the DPS to balance it. But, if a group can't clear content in time, then they'd have to put that DPS back.

I expect further simplification of jobs. More ways to cast while moving. Less positionals. More combining abilities to either the same hotbar button, or just combining a few OGCD DPS abilities into one button that does the sum total of that potency.

I don't think an overhaul/rework can be more than that given how they've boxed themselves in for the last 11 years.

[Chasingstars]

They've backed themselves into a corner. The only rework is the hotbars, but not the "end use" which is that DPS has to be balanced. Tanks need to be a certain percentage under the DPS and healers a certain percentage below that. And content has to be clearable in a certain timeframe due to enrage timers. Therefore, as long as that is true, DPS has to be balanced within a certain range. There won't ever be a true support class because the moment you give a job "too much" support, they'd have to drop the DPS to balance it. But, if a group can't clear content in time, then they'd have to put that DPS back.

I expect further simplification of jobs. More ways to cast while moving. Less positionals. More combining abilities to either the same hotbar button, or just combining a few OGCD DPS abilities into one button that does the sum total of that potency.

I don't think an overhaul/rework can be more than that given how they've boxed themselves in for the last 11 years.

They could do a full support job, but it would be crazy good numbers to compensate the lack of dps. Like if something buffs your damage in some manner, it would have be magnitudes stronger than is currently considered the best to be worthwhile. Like so good for the damage boost for the party that it makes Ninja's Trick Attack look minor by comparison. And it has to be that cracked if they test it with stuff like ultimate in mind so it would be like a big selling point of an expansion. Meaning it would have a similar effect like Pictomancer, where for lower tier content like a normal dungeon, the party is just speed clearing through.

[Lilapop]

Unsubscribe. Man, how is the mobile version of this forum so bad that I can't edit posts? The forum is another relic of 2008 tech.

Anyone with a house will keep their house even if they are bored, but will still complain about it relying on other people to do the unsubscribing.

[Zelda206]

I get the feeling whatever is being promised in the future will be underwhelming, from a pragmatic approach. How they're doing things now is how they've primarily done things before with this game, and even if the player numbers continue to fall, I doubt any groundbreaking change will come to classes or battle since any criticism towards the systems, designs and staff are considered defamation (from how Japan's criminal laws are written). We (NA) won't be punished, but they (SE/Team) will assuredly ignore what the forums have to say if what we want isn't what they're planning to give, and they will instead perform damage control in positive Lodestone-or-other-media updates. What we have now, in the game, is similar to what we've had for the past handful of years and they're only slicing the meat thinner and thinner on the sandwich. It's the same sandwich in spirit, but it feels stingy; disingenuous. So whatever amazing content they have coming is already being scrutinized heavily by the community they have failed to serve in full, and is the main thing veteran players are looking at while closing their subscriptions for the remainder of Dawntrail.

What will be will be. We need to get through the year first before we can determine if any ambitious plans in the community's favor is coming, otherwise waiting in anticipation for 8.0 will be moot.

[Dzian]

That approach doesn't work in a modern theme park MMO that's still trying to copy early 2010s WoW.

Has nothing to do with WoW and everything to do with staple systems of the the final fantasy franchise. Right down to oh its a bomb monster. It resists fire but is weak to ice...

And this is a final fantasy game. So.....

Old cars had buttons for everything. Modern cars have touch screens. And the trend going forwards is going back to buttons because drivers prefer them over modern touch screens.

Modern does not always mean better.

[Jeeqbit]

In order to fix jobs they first need to fix content.

That's at least how SE sees it. They want to fix content first through 7.x, then jobs in 8.x.

To fix jobs they first need to fix content design. and put interesting and engaging systems in place that jobs can manipulate and work around.. give monsters varying stats and attributes instead of make them all the same. then you can have fast evasive mobs, slow hulky armored mobs. mobs that make be weak to blindness mobs that could be weighed down or imperrilled to certain elements.

The main issue with doing that is jobs are very fixed in what they can do. As it stands, they want a person to be able to "main" a single job and never change from it. In order to allow some jobs to be significantly stronger in some fights but not others, they would need to expect people to play multiple jobs, or remove the concept of jobs and allow them be able to switch what abilities they can use at will like Blue Mages do.

if the dont fix the content all a skill tree is going to be is path a leads to a x% damage buff on a 2 minute timer. path b leads to a x% crit buff on a 2 minute timer. path c leads to a x% direct hit buff on a 2 minute timer. BORING!!!!!!

Their concern is always going to be how a new player learns the game. In the past, they flat out didn't and even after a lot of playtime they wouldn't play well, and now it's very likely that a new player learns what they are supposed to press.

I do think it would really help them to do all this if there was a tree that made it really simple and merged all the most important and basic stuff into a few buttons, and another where it's more complex allowing for greater decision-making and flexibility, so that both types of players can be satisfied.

[Absurdity]

If the dont fix the content all a skill tree is going to be is path a leads to a x% damage buff on a 2 minute timer. path b leads to a x% crit buff on a 2 minute timer. path c leads to a x% direct hit buff on a 2 minute timer. BORING!!!!!!

Not really true, the current 2-min meta exists entirely because every party buff is designed around it. And because pumping all your damage into a large multiplier window is the baseline the few outliers who can not take as much advantage of that single big damage window always severely underperform.
Simply taking that restriction out would already help a lot, as long as jobs within a role have roughly the same output over X amount of time it doesn't matter how they get there.

The fights in Stormblood and even Shadowbringers were not significantly different than they are now, you just had jobs with wildly different damage profiles, buff cooldowns, strengths and durations.
The content was the same, the jobs weren't, and it worked well enough in SB to differentiate each job. Obviously it wasn't perfect, but even with some underperformers (*cough* Whitemage) each job in a given role had a distinct enough playstyle.

What I do agree on however is that the current content leaves pretty much no design space besides "do more damage, take less damage and heal damage", everything besides damage has been systematically removed and that makes the pool of how you can design a job very shallow.


The problem is that their current approach to fixing the issue is inevitably going to fail, because both are interlinked.
They can not design 7.X fights around anything but doing damage and mitigating damage, because 7.X jobs can not perform anything else.

So by 8.X and the supposed job rework we will still only have content designed around dealing damage.

[Dzian]

The main issue with doing that is jobs are very fixed in what they can do. As it stands, they want a person to be able to "main" a single job and never change from it. In order to allow some jobs to be significantly stronger in some fights but not others, they would need to expect people to play multiple jobs, or remove the concept of jobs and allow them be able to switch what abilities they can use at will like Blue Mages do

IMO much of this also stems from encounter design and the fact raids for example are literally 1 room 1 boss. If raids were bigger and contained multiple bosses. something akin to alliance raids you could then create scenarios where boss Job X is weak in bosses A and D. but stronger in bosses B and E. and fairly middle of the road in boss C. Job Y by contrast may be strong against bosses A and C but we weaker against bosses B and D, middle of the road for boss E.

Well designed content would create so much opportunity. in a way you could liken it to an FPS. a well designed map has areas that favour differing builds. open areas of the map likely favour sniper rifles, enclosed areas may favour shotguns or smgs. but a player cannot carry every type of weapon in there loadout at the same time. so naturally in some areas of the map they will have the upper hand. in others they will be at a disadvantage. this is what makes it fun and interesting.

This would also keep to the philosophy that players still only "need" 1 job as its weaknesses would be compensated by its strengths over content as a whole not per individual encounter.

ffxiv content is currently 1 big room 1 big boss. and thats one of its big problems. fixing that would be a massive first step towards fixing everything else

[Yeol]

I'll quote myself from a different thread.

8.0 Copium.

Players won't be happy if some jobs perform better or have an advantage in certain encounters

I'm a big fan of 'meta'. Let job selection matter for World Race, Week 1 Savage again.

Usually, people asking for unique gameplay are also asking for jobs within the same role to output similar damage numbers. Which for me feels meh. Making jobs unique should also affect their skill ceiling and their damage output.

But I guess the vast majority of players want/prefer fun gameplay over rewarding gameplay. Combining both fun and rewarding seems to be mission impossible for most games.