Your Hopes and Ideas for the Battle System Changes in FFXIV 8.0

[Fatch38]

probably an unpopular take but : remove positionnals for melee, they bring close to nothing to the table and it could even help having more new mechs without having to cater to it.

otherwise, rework all jobs, prune some skills and make closer to the pvp job uniqueness. bring more dots/buff/debuff as it used to be instead of getting rid of those. shorter GCD. rework all the gearing process and substats (so they have more impact instead of always going crit/dh) and while we're at it give use % instead of blurry values on those.

[Daralii]

PVP seems to have it right.
A re-evaluation of tank and healer dps rotations needs to happen.
An aoe balance pass for all jobs needs to happen as well.
The early game kits needs to be improved vastly. There is no reason some jobs dont get an AOE ability until lvl 45.

However this is extreme copium and I'm pretty sure they will launch 2 new jobs, lightly touch the existing jobs and focus on removing button bloat in 8.0 instead of actually adjusting/reworking jobs.

I'm fully expecting them to announce that there won't be new jobs because all the time that would go toward designing them went towards the amazing, sweeping redesigns instead, and for the reworks to actually be very simple and lobotomize combat even further.

[Jeeqbit]

they need to take the combo plugin and make it a part of the game button bloat has been a problem for a long time

They could, because they already do it in solo duties and PvP. They just don't want to simplify battles that much obviously.

and will only get worse

No, it will not. They first faced a button bloat crisis in Heavensward and truncated and merged lots of actions and replaced cross-class with Role Actions with the release of Stormblood. In Shadowbringers, in addition to merges and truncating old actions, they created the trait upgrade system so that, for example, Stone 1 upgrades to Stone 2, to reduce bloat.

A lot of this is how jobs became as lacking as they are at lower levels. Not that anything meaningful or useful has really been removed at those levels, but it was stuff to press or extra steps that we no longer have to go through, making it a lot simpler.

In summary, this "bloat" issue would have already got out of control by now if SE had not been pruning, merging or upgrading actions each time they add them.

blackmage has been in need of a rework since heavensward time to make this a priority

I could imagine it being very different. But it's also fine how it is. I don't see the problem. If you want a different implementation of a mage that uses fire, lightning and flare, you could play Red Mage.

non story ARR dungeons are in serious need of a rework

Since you seem unaware, they recently said they are doing this. They started with Halitali in 7.1, and I suspect Dzemael will be revamped in 7.4.

i thought dragoon and astrologian was supposed to be getting a rework this expansion

It turned out Dragoon did not get the huge rework they suggested it would. They commented how everyone was expecting a big rework of it but said it was fine as it was.

Astrologian was reworked. The cards work completely differently. RNG was removed from them, and the cards have unique effects like they used to, which had been heavily requested. Unfortunately, the lack of RNG and a Royal Road or Lord/Lady type system makes it less fun in my opinion.

since it was first announced months before dawntrail even released

It wasn't announced months before. More like years.

[MoofiaBossVal]

Return Samurai AoEs to cones you have to aim, which is more engaging.

Make overworld and instance trash mobs dangerous.

[CidHeiral]

Undo everything they did to DRG in Dawntrail.

[CalvinDescoles]

Hoping that "Battle System Changes in FFXIV 8.0" is not a huge copium...

[Sacae]

I actually like how most jobs play at max level. What I want is for the low level experience to be improved. Give us a weakened version of our full kit at 50, and have traits upgrade the abilities as we level past that.

[Eraden]

Only one thing would satisfy Mao. Get rid of DDR-style boss fights. Make boss fights more random with less mechanics barfage. Give back (assuming players ever has any to begin with) agency to players. Make boss fights more about what players can do and less about following scripted dance pattern. Until this done, any job rework would be meaningless to Mao as it would still be focused on DDR and thus not about player agency.

[Valence]

Only one thing could satisfy Sunie: please listen to Mao.

[remiff]

Only one thing would satisfy Mao. Get rid of DDR-style boss fights. Make boss fights more random with less mechanics barfage. Give back (assuming players ever has any to begin with) agency to players. Make boss fights more about what players can do and less about following scripted dance pattern. Until this done, any job rework would be meaningless to Mao as it would still be focused on DDR and thus not about player agency.

Given the minimal risks the devs take and the fact that all fights have always been like DDR battles, I doubt they would do it.
That would mean overhauling the entire battle system, including jobs and bosses, as well as reworking bosses from previous expansions since they would become obsolete.

Even the mobile version, which had the opportunity to deviate from DDR-style battles, still uses DDR mechanics. Unfortunately, I think this is probably the least likely thing to happen.
That said, the purpose of this thread is to dream big while being fully aware that we’ll inevitably be disappointed when 8.0 arrives.