The future of job design

[Kazuke_Miso]

It's also not that people necessarily hate resolving mechanics by standing in the safe spot in general, but the devs have essentially reused the same 6 patterns for standing in the right spot for years.
Not only is it nothing but DDR mechanics nowadays, but it is the same DDR mechanics that we have seen over 50 times already, repackaged in a different wrapping paper and with a new shiny bow on top.

Well, their improved encounter design is just to speed up those same 6 patterns apparently.

[Valence]

I’m still confused about what a “DDR mechanic” is and how they lead to jobs being made easier. The only endgame raids I’ve done are EW/DT content with only a couple random savages from older expansions, plus UWU, UCOB, and TEA.

This whole time I’m thinking “Dance Dance Revolution” so I’m assuming people are talking about mechanics that are scripted, having specific solutions, and only ask players to move into the right position to resolve them. But mechanics being scripted means it’s easier to do your rotation when you know what to plan around and when things are happening.

Your definition is mostly spot on.

1) The sheer scale and prevalence of fight mechanics. If you look at when they truly started to be standardized and reproduced for most of the fights, in Stormblood, and watch a fight from that era, you'll probably notice that they're a lot less hectic, and require to run all across a lot less than today.
2) Before ShB, the game used to have an actual battle system, from target boss/mob positioning, flank/rear/front that mattered for tanks, resource management (TP, MP, gauge in SB, etc), team play (support), and pre SB encounters that were in fact, not all based on "stand in the right place or in the safe spot" all the time even if it was a big part of it. There is a gigantic difference between a system where you're constantly asked to dodge and move and run all over, and a system that asks you to move once, than relies on other parts of the battle system to actually challenge the players. Killing adds, managing adds, managing enemy power stacks, managing incoming damage or deaths and playing with a limited pool of resources (MP notably), a lot more plays around buffs and debuffs to deal with that don't necessarily demand to run all over, etc. If anything those days, we mostly find debuffs in savage/ultimate, but used within big jigsaw puzzles.

Take a look at coils for example, I think they're the best way to see how encounter design could feel back then. It was frankly, very, very different. It can also look a little weird or non functional those days since they did interact with parts of the battle content that are long gone by now. And if anything, if it doesn't speak to you, then you'll at least notice the sheer lack of floor geometry telegraphs of back then. To me it felt already closer to an actual rpg.

[brinn12]

The first two Extremes were far more fun and creative than #3 and #4. Let’s just hope the high-end raids are different—but judging by the Normal Raids, I’m not expecting much.

SE’s idea of "improved encounter design" seems to be making players lose two extra GCDs in fights that still mostly recycle common FFXIV mechanics. Extreme #4, in particular, is a very good example of that...

[Kazuke_Miso]

in fights that still mostly recycle common FFXIV mechanics

Exactly, but honestly I'm not sure if Square Enix even understands what players don't like.

[Daralii]

Exactly, but honestly I'm not sure if Square Enix even understands what players don't like.

Even if they understood it, I'm not expecting them to care. They've been prioritizing changes that make things easier for them, everything else be damned.

[Illianaro]

Exactly, but honestly I'm not sure if Square Enix even understands what players don't like.

Or what players do like, either. Certainly the changes to black mage did not demonstrate an understanding of what the player who liked the job before liked about it.

[Kandraxx]

What do you expect from a game that has to run on a PS4? For the record: any $300 Windows PC from Walmart has better capabilities.

There’s simply no way to improve this braindead game, partly due to their lack of talent in the gameplay department and partly because it still has to support a dead console.

I strongly believe that they don't even care about the gameplay aspect anymore because I would like to attribute Yoshida that much of self-reflection. And they have more than enough people who still pay for the Barbie & Ken factor. From a business perspective it's probably in their best interest to just flesh out the game's niche instead of trying to do something that they will never get right anyway and they probably already discussed this behind closed doors. You can't beat Blizzard when it comes to gameplay and playability.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

It’d be nice if we are given different kind of encounter than just DDR after DDR per normal/savage raid floors. We have 4 of them. Why all 4 needs to be “all stand here or explode idc” intensive?

[AllenThyl]

Exactly, but honestly I'm not sure if Square Enix even understands what players don't like.

This assessment was brought to you by the "Nael phase is truly random" clown.

It’d be nice if we are given different kind of encounter than just DDR after DDR per normal/savage raid floors. We have 4 of them. Why all 4 needs to be “all stand here or explode idc” intensive?

What's the alternative? "Do whatever you want the whole fight, ignoring all mechanics, suboptimal dps, still clear"? Even if fights wouldn't be as statically scripted as they are, there would still be mechanics to solve, since that's the whole point of this kind of game. You would still be required to move at the correct time to the correct point, to deal with whatever mechanic the boss throws at the players.

[Valence]

What's the alternative? "Do whatever you want the whole fight, ignoring all mechanics, suboptimal dps, still clear"? Even if fights wouldn't be as statically scripted as they are, there would still be mechanics to solve, since that's the whole point of this kind of game. You would still be required to move at the correct time to the correct point, to deal with whatever mechanic the boss throws at the players.

The allegory of the cave.