changes to the game that would go hard

[squatdepthbroooo]

I just played during the free login and had some ideas that would help ameliorate my disdain for the game nowadays enjoy

I

Change: Short(er)-form combat design

-move away from long, linear rotations

-diversify cd timers and durations

Result:
1. less restriction on how players can approach encounters, thus opening up creative avenues for encounter design

2. this also makes questing/overworld combat less cringe, because it won't feel wasteful to pop giant cds for a mob that will die in five hits, run 20 yards to the next mob, and then not have any cds for the rest of the quest

II

Change: Endgame itemization

-upgradeable (meaning increased ilvl from tier-to-tier) cantrip gear from savage

-these could give thematic cantrips/effects from the raid, like:

-giving MNK a somersault dropkick oGCD that works like SAM's backdash

-maybe SMN could invoke Ixion or something in their primal rotation

-PCT get a new skill called "paint me like one of your cat girls" and it turns the targeted player into the Black Cat miqote for fun

-AF gear could directly impact job skills (think FFXI)

-tomestone gear will become prog gear with generic role-based attributes
-an example could be things like

-tanks get a short 10% mit when taunting off of another player

-healers have the mana cost of resurrections halved

-melee dps have a chance for their autos to hit twice

-just basic things that could help in prog, but not so useful that they usurp the greater stats/effects of savage tier

Result:
1. Long term gear acquisition that makes it worthwhile clearing old content, even when the next tier is out.

2. allows players to make builds based on what gear they equip

3. ilvl increase allows you to keep the treadmill going while maintaining value, tier after tier

-players can choose which pieces they want to prioritize upgrading based on how they'd function with the new tier

-hardcore players will want to collect and upgrade all pieces for the most possibilities

4. the upgrade process can also add an incentive to random content that isn't seeing enough activity (criterion)



(1/3)

[squatdepthbroooo]

III

Change: dungeons as repeatable content

-more freedom in pulls (trash + boss = fun chaos potential)

-faster bosses, we don't need learning phases five expansions in

-give trash identity beyond RP

-mobs all blend together because they all do the same thing (nothing)

-each mob should serve a simple purpose that creates a greater challenge when combined with others

-max level versions of all current expansion dungeons with a progressive difficulty system, like dungeon talent trees/affixes (WoW's M+ and VP2's Sealstones for example)

-gearing path

Result:
1. dungeons become more "hop on FF with da boyz and run some dungies" rather than "i missed hunt train i guess i won't cap tomes this week"

2. dungeons can be easily worked into the economy with crafting mat implementation (having certain affixes applied affects what materials are found in chests/from bosses)

-this allows players who exclusively play battle content to make money, and creates a supply-demand system with crafters

3. one of the requirements for increasing the ilvl of savage gear could be completing every current dungeon at +10 or whatev

4. gear gained from the dungeons should have its own worth, possibly allowing you to have very high raw stats (the higher you go in difficulty), at the expense of none of the cool effects that tier gives you

IV

Change: nerf crafted gear

-new crafted sets are equal to previous savage tier, rather than better

-instead, change augmented tome gear (or the item to do so) into a crafting recipe

Result:
1. the aforementioned economy with dungeons would play into the recipes for augmenting tome gear

2. crafted gear would still fulfill its role as catch-up gear

V

Change: loot lockout per role

-lockout is separate for each role (tank, healer, melee, caster, ranged)

Result:
1. if you clear on a tank, you can go in on any of the other four roles without the lockout being applied

2. allows up to five lockouts per week, meaning faster gearing for more jobs

3.the game prides itself on playing all jobs on one character, but doesn't want you to enjoy raiding with more than one or two before you get bored (pugs don't want undergeared alts, and it feels bad to bring them)

4. funneling gear to one job doesn't matter because:

1. clearing on all five roles takes skill

2. who the fuck cares

(2/3)

[squatdepthbroooo]

VI

Change: true story mode (solo) raid

-make one giant instance of the whole raid with trusts

-i'm gonna use this space to say that trusts don't need to be able to do mechanics; just make them borderline invincible it doesn't matter and isn't worth sacrificing boss design or the effort programming them

Result:
1. allows you to expand upon the RP elements (puzzles, trash, exploration) without compromising weekly/prog content

2. allows you to make normal difficulty raid have a semblance of difficulty, providing the tuning of EX with the more complex mechanical density of raids

-this would allow you to make the first two savage bosses actual prog content as well, but also feel free to make more than four bosses a tier no one's stopping you

3. allows you to tie it in with the main story, as you don't have to worry about scaring MSQ nerds with optional content

VII

Change: remove positionals and make it a MNK cd

-you guys truncated the combat system crazy style, yet positionals were worth keeping???

-all bosses are omnipositional

-MNK's get a cd called "Chiropractic" where the target ring gets segmented into different colors indicating where your hits do big dam (green/yellow/red representing intensity)

Result:
1. positionals are gone

2. MNK get something unique that's funny and maybe cool




anyway, that's my quick rambling brainstorm of how to get this old man (about to turn 30 and its already over) to resub


(3/3)

[Jeeqbit]

move away from long, linear rotations

I don't personally agree with this. I used to enjoy Paladin's long, linear rotation before it changed in mid-Endwalker. I still enjoy Dragoon's long, linear rotation as well. Not all jobs should be long and linear; it's fine for some of them to be proc-based or whatever, but having options is good. Maybe if they go ahead with the skill tree idea in 8.0 they can give people a choice in this area.

diversify cd timers and durations

Agreed. It would help if they just made them all align at 6 minutes because then different jobs can have buffs at: 15s, 30s, 1min, 1min 30s, 2min, 3min - and all would align mid-fight for the DPS check. Or they could just get rid of party-wide damage buffs and stop them being multiplicative.

these could give thematic cantrips/effects from the raid, like:
-giving MNK a somersault dropkick oGCD that works like SAM's backdash
-maybe SMN could invoke Ixion or something in their primal rotation

Seen suggestions like this before. They could drop rewards that give unique effects to each jobs from duties. The only hope of us seeing it is probably 8.0 when they rework leveling and power gain, as well as look at job uniqueness. The potential issue I can see SE having with it, is that they don't want to be stuck revisiting rewards from old content for new jobs that they release. But they could just stick to making improved power versions of the same things in each expansion too.

we don't need learning phases five expansions in

I think this is aimed at Returning players tbh. So a player that has been away for, say, 5 years and last played in Shadowbringers. You might say "but that's quite far into the game" but if they haven't played for 5 years then...

I think it is also trying to solve a problem the game had a long time ago where it didn't explain mechanics at all, so a lot of players just never came to understand the mechanics ever and it was predictable they'd cleave you with everything and give you 5 vulns stacks. The result is it became a backloaded solution where the greater difficulty was in ARR and HW. They're slowly revisiting that now as well.

I think they are trying to revert to ARR and HW design again to some extent, so according to what they've said they are trying to enact your suggestion already in Dawntrail, but how successful they are at that is for everyone to judge or otherwise remains to be seen.

mobs all blend together because they all do the same thing (nothing)

They have actually made more dangerous mobs sometimes. In Dohn Mheg, there are some enemies the tank interrupts to make it WAY easier for the healer. They can choose to do a really large, dangerous pull at the end. In The Twinning, some of the mobs have interrupts that also make it easier on the healer who already is frantically keeping the tank alive at the start. You can prevent a pretty devastating raid-wide for the healer in Akadaemia Anyder.

Even in the latest dungeons there are some examples of different enemies. Tender Valley starts off with a big cactuar and one of the casts sprays needles that takes most of the tank's HP if it hits. It's easy to get hit as well because the mobs are all doing AoEs and it's hard to distinguish them from eachother. The end of Stayborough does something of a heal check with all the raid-wide spam and you can do a lot to mitigate it, including stuns, reprisal, Arm's Length and raid-wide mit.

They have shown they can make some interesting trash in criterion as well.

max level versions of all current expansion dungeons with a progressive difficulty system, like dungeon talent trees/affixes (WoW's M+ and VP2's Sealstones for example)

It would be nice if SE harnessed their old content in ways like this, across the board really. But their solution is always to make a brand new version instead: Hard Mode dungeons were brand new versions. Variant/Criterion are brand new versions as well. They seem resistant to just making use of what they already have when it'd instantly create more content for people.

new crafted sets are equal to previous savage tier, rather than better

Agreed because it feels awful to shed your savage gear and replace it all with crafted gear, after what you did to earn it - enduring wipes and potentially PF for weeks. It just doesn't feel good.

remove positionals

I feel like people come from other games and just aren't used to these, yet they are one of the few things the combat system still has left that were part of what people liked the game for in the past. There are plenty of jobs without positionals and they made doing them have a very minimal overall impact compared to the past anyway.

[Gwenkatsu]

I feel like people come from other games and just aren't used to these, yet they are one of the few things the combat system still has left that were part of what people liked the game for in the past. There are plenty of jobs without positionals and they made doing them have a very minimal overall impact compared to the past anyway.

Sorry for derailing this thread, but there's one thing about positionals that I never understood. With the server operating only on snapshots that are seconds old, and most bosses rotating faster than a fidget spinner: Do positionals even work?
Personally I gave up on them years ago - seeing how often I got hit by ground effects while clearly not standing within the area, I doubt the server sees me standing on the boss's side required for a positional even in 10% of the cases...

[Collin_Sky]

All the changes tbh are pretty based. Shame Yoshi loves his cookie cutter MMO and none of this will ever happen.

[Jeeqbit]

Sorry for derailing this thread, but there's one thing about positionals that I never understood. With the server operating only on snapshots that are seconds old, and most bosses rotating faster than a fidget spinner: Do positionals even work?

They do work, provided the boss doesn't rotate. This is more of an issue in higher level duties, especially in Endwalker, because of how the bosses re-center themselves all the time. It's annoying but since it's scripted you can anticipate them as well.

often I got hit by ground effects while clearly not standing within the area

That's mainly because the snapshot happens when the cast completes / the red telegraph disappears. If you were in it at this moment, you get hit, even if you subsequently run out. It takes a few seconds for the hit to be enacted, allowing you to run out of it still. Ping, SE waiting for animations to occur and server processing and all that.

I was watching Yoshi-P play the other day on BLM. I noticed something interesting, which was that an attack hit him immediately after the snapshot. It makes you wonder if SE has any idea that it's an issue because they have 0 ping.

[Collin_Sky]

I was watching Yoshi-P play the other day on BLM. I noticed something interesting, which was that an attack hit him immediately after the snapshot. It makes you wonder if SE has any idea that it's an issue because they have 0 ping.

Considering they ignore the animation lock issue being ping related even though people using [A12S boss] and [MS word assistant] notice immediate differences, it's fairly obvious he either doesn't understand, or doesn't care.

[Exmo]

anyway, that's my quick rambling brainstorm of how to get this old man (about to turn 30 and its already over) to resub

Christ I was reading OP thinking is this how the kids talk these days but then I saw this

[Valence]

I'm on the same wavelengths on most things.
I'd add that savage gear shouldn't be the only gear giving people cool tools to strive for. Casual players also deserve to have fun and goals to reach. The ilvl difference between the two is already an incentive to go for savage. I also do think that bringing back a system like Diadem 1.0 for gear would generate an endless threadmill about running fun content, and could also make gear from dungeons less useless as well. This game really does struggle with the fundamentals of any RPG which is based on gear progression, finding newfangled stuff, replacing an old piece with something unique, etc. Being happy or proud of one's gear and not just a carbon copy of the BiS that everybody else also uses to a T.