Unsubs vs Resubs over BLM changes

[HikariKurosawa]

I know I did(resub), how many others though? How many people actually unsubbed over it?

People who are happy are much less likely to be writing commentary over the changes than people who are upset as that's human nature, but I still see a lot of people celebrating the changes.

I wonder why BLM players felt they'd keep their overly complex job design in a game where every other job is being streamlined and made to reflect a game design shift of outer(encounter design) difficulty, inner(job design) fun.

If you want challenging content, do challenging encounters, the game will always be this way. FRU was made "easier" than TOP and DSR because people cheated(and continue to cheat, including in FRU) in the past ultimates that were made "satisfyingly" difficult, you want stuff to continue to be made very difficult, make sure to not cheat and the designers will ramp up the difficulty. People still cheated in FRU though and likely still do to this day in party finder commonplace. People still cheat in UWU for that matter instead of adopting a simple priority system with preassigned markers. That's enough for the content tangent of this point, but it is relevant because job design is linked to encounter design and this is why there has been a shift.

At the end of the day, if you want to be challenged, it should be coming from encounters. If you find jobs to be too easy, stop using third party tools to handhold you through encounters. I assure you the game is much harder that way.

Now for the DPS/job design part of the argument: People shouldn't have to work so hard to experience the full satisfaction of a job. We shouldn't be gatekeeping this part of the fun of mmos since a wide range of players engage, and it shouldn't really be a part of the encounter design difficulty. I've used the final boss of elden ring as an example before, and I'll use it again. The game can be reduced to pressing dodge, pressing heal button, pressing R1 to attack, and using movement inputs. They manage to make the most satisfying level of difficulty ever expressed in a game despite having 3 buttons required to win, 2 buttons if you don't get hit.

You can say that "there are easier jobs to engage with if BLM is too difficult for you", but why should someone who wants to play BLM be forced to not play BLM if that's what their fantasy is? Why is that how you want a roleplaying game to be set up? Why are you not happy that the difficulty is shifted toward encounter difficulty and not job design? Why can you not see how much more fun this makes the game overall? Why can you not appreciate what this does for their freedom of encounter design? Why are you still using third party tools to carry you through the game if you want a difficult and complex experience? So many whys for your complaints. Why is it only a minority that played BLM prior to the changes? Why were the SMN changes so popular? Why are you so wrong when I am so right?

[Supersnow845]

You make conflicting statements here

“If you don’t want a complex job don’t play BLM, well what it I want to play BLM I shouldn’t be stopped from playing it because you want a complex job”

Just reverse that statement for the other argument

Why should I lose the complex job because you want a simple job. I don’t want to play a simple job I want to play a complex job”

People like you never explain why you should be allowed to change whatever job you want to your fantasy but if that impacts others fantasy then it’s tough shit get over it

Basing difficulty only on encounters also basically consigns 99% of content to being boring slop. If I need to play TOP to engage with a job then your job design is a complete failure

[HikariKurosawa]

You make conflicting statements here

“If you don’t want a complex job don’t play BLM, well what it I want to play BLM I shouldn’t be stopped from playing it because you want a complex job”

Just reverse that statement for the other argument

Why should I lose the complex job because you want a simple job. I don’t want to play a simple job I want to play a complex job”

People like you never explain why you should be allowed to change whatever job you want to your fantasy but if that impacts others fantasy then it’s tough shit get over it

Basing difficulty only on encounters also basically consigns 99% of content to being boring slop. If I need to play TOP to engage with a job then your job design is a complete failure

Answer is pretty easy: Capitalism. Majority rules. Sucks to be a minority when you're a consumer of a product. Same reason tech death metal isn't commercially viable, it's not popular enough to compete with pop music.

All I can really say is "Awh too bad" to people who cling to the past. If you don't want to prog stuff like TOP maybe you should re-evaluate your relevance in the difficulty discussion.

[Gunz_Zbestest]

You make conflicting statements here

“If you don’t want a complex job don’t play BLM, well what it I want to play BLM I shouldn’t be stopped from playing it because you want a complex job”

Just reverse that statement for the other argument

Why should I lose the complex job because you want a simple job. I don’t want to play a simple job I want to play a complex job”

People like you never explain why you should be allowed to change whatever job you want to your fantasy but if that impacts others fantasy then it’s tough shit get over it

Basing difficulty only on encounters also basically consigns 99% of content to being boring slop. If I need to play TOP to engage with a job then your job design is a complete failure

Why should they believe your simple statement about complexity when all you did was make an appeal to emotion?

[Supersnow845]

Answer is pretty easy: Capitalism. Majority rules. Sucks to be a minority when you're a consumer of a product. Same reason tech death metal isn't commercially viable, it's not popular enough to compete with pop music.

All I can really say is "Awh too bad" to people who cling to the past. If you don't want to prog stuff like TOP maybe you should re-evaluate your relevance in the difficulty discussion.

There is no majority minority in a closed system. If these changes make BLM more popular it’ll just come at the expense of another job. Like you quoted SMN and said look out how popular new SMN is. Well it WAS popular in EW, as soon as PCT came out people dumped SMN like yesterday’s garbage and now it’s back to being in the lower half of played jobs. Do we rework SMN again? If so which job will thay pull players from

I could also use the example of MNK, MNK has been redone every expansion and made infinitely more simple and it’s still unpopular, AST as well. If they knew after 4 overhauls AST would still be far the least played healer do you think they would have gone though with those changes?

You simply cannot redo every job until every job is popular

And ive already done ultimates, I don’t see what relevance that has to the point of “you shouldn’t have to prog an ultimate for your job to not put you to sleep”

Why should they believe your simple statement about complexity when all you did was make an appeal to emotion?

Because that’s all they did as well, their only justification was “what if I’m a terrible player but want the BLM fantasy, think of me”

[Aysin]

A few things I personally find disagreeable with your thoughts on this topic.

Firstly you are assuming the content we are about to get is going to be significantly more difficult, that is wrong, because they have established a relative difficulty for savage and that is barely going to change going into the second tier, just like previous expacs. They mentioned an increase of boss movement or mechanics that make you move, which is nothing new. Almost every second turn going back in the history of this game did the exact same thing and it wasn't a problem. Just look at abyssos our most recent example. Not reason to change in my opinion.

Secondly, the idea that BLM's core identity was the complexity, it is not. It was the engagement felt from a play style that requires timing, planning, practice and knowledge. It changes nothing for people who can't do those things as not being able to plan your instants is still going to be a detriment and if you couldn't do it before you still won't be able to do it. If you can't hit your GCD while doing extended movement you're still going to do bad damage, the only thing lost is the risk factor and by extension the reward. As soon as the people who think they can play new BLM find out their performance is still bad, they will drop it again. And then who would the change be for? I guess we will wait and see for the clear rates in the next savage.

[Aysin]

Thirdly you say why should someone who wants to play the fantasy of BLM be forced to not play it? I'd argue they should have delved into it before if they liked the fantasy and at least played the basic rotation which in itself is simple. No one forced people away from BLM aside from themselves. The fact that they didn't leads to believe they weren't interested enough in the first place. People with a passion would have overcome this trial. You've only invited people who have had this class in mind on the back burner or had no interest in it in the first place and there's no guarantee it will stick with them. I find it extremely odd you say of all the things that are making you sub to the game it's the simplification of one job. And this entire line of argument is don't gatekeep the fantasy people want to play when no one is doing so, but let's sacrifice what people already like about the class so they feel forced to play something else instead, isn't that a bit contradictory?

And lastly there are plenty of examples of requests from players requesting more engaging jobs alongside encounter designs. It shouldn't be a sacrifice of either one to get the other. SMNs have been asking for it, all of the healers have been screaming for it, it's been multiple expansions for some jobs, its only been loud from BLM most recently. If our current job is starting to feel stale switching to a different one should give a fresh and exciting feel, but if they all play similarly because of homogenization due to simplification then you are going feel the stale about the new job quickly.

The topic of third party is entirely irrelevant, you just made a whole broad statement implying everyone is using third party to simplify encounters while asking for complexity, in itself is not true. And third party should not be taken into consideration when discussing design choices.

[HikariKurosawa]

There is no majority minority in a closed system. If these changes make BLM more popular it’ll just come at the expense of another job. Like you quoted SMN and said look out how popular new SMN is. Well it WAS popular in EW, as soon as PCT came out people dumped SMN like yesterday’s garbage and now it’s back to being in the lower half of played jobs. Do we rework SMN again? If so which job will thay pull players from

I could also use the example of MNK, MNK has been redone every expansion and made infinitely more simple and it’s still unpopular, AST as well. If they knew after 4 overhauls AST would still be far the least played healer do you think they would have gone though with those changes?

You simply cannot redo every job until every job is popular

And ive already done ultimates, I don’t see what relevance that has to the point of “you shouldn’t have to prog an ultimate for your job to not put you to sleep”

It's not about how they compare to each other in popularity, it's about maintaining a level of engagement. Assuming all jobs are equally successful in their design of mass appeal, jobs like samurai, black mage, white mage, dragoon and ninja will always be more popular than jobs like scholar, monk, and machinist. That's just the way coolness works. There is mechanical popularity, and then there is thematic popularity. They can't do anything about some jobs being cooler in theme than others.

If you've already done ultimates and crave that level of challenge again, do them again and again any time you get the urge. If you're burnt out or not stimulated by that anymore, move on to something else until they release new content. Game is not for you anymore. I see you posting lots and you're perpetually unhappy with the game. Why do you even play anymore? Just do something else lol, or lighten up and just have fun playing the game. It's a cool world to exist in and interact with, why does it have to be so much more than that? You have the means to re-experience the level of challenge you want, just do it if it's so important to you. If you're not engaging with it, it is a personal issue you should try to resolve.

Because that’s all they did as well, their only justification was “what if I’m a terrible player but want the BLM fantasy, think of me”

Which is sound logic in a capitalist environment. Play the game for better reasons.

[HikariKurosawa]

A few things I personally find disagreeable with your thoughts on this topic.

Firstly you are assuming the content we are about to get is going to be significantly more difficult, that is wrong, because they have established a relative difficulty for savage and that is barely going to change going into the second tier, just like previous expacs. They mentioned an increase of boss movement or mechanics that make you move, which is nothing new. Almost every second turn going back in the history of this game did the exact same thing and it wasn't a problem. Just look at abyssos our most recent example. Not reason to change in my opinion.

Secondly, the idea that BLM's core identity was the complexity, it is not. It was the engagement felt from a play style that requires timing, planning, practice and knowledge. It changes nothing for people who can't do those things as not being able to plan your instants is still going to be a detriment and if you couldn't do it before you still won't be able to do it. If you can't hit your GCD while doing extended movement you're still going to do bad damage, the only thing lost is the risk factor and by extension the reward. As soon as the people who think they can play new BLM find out their performance is still bad, they will drop it again. And then who would the change be for? I guess we will wait and see for the clear rates in the next savage.

That wasn't the point I was making about encounter difficulty, nor is it relevant in this context. I said that they are shifting the focus of difficulty to the level of encounter you engage with, from the job you play. For all we know(and this is true since third party addon usage is so prolific), the game is too hard by the developer's metrics. They feel betrayed by the playerbase who complains about lacking difficulty yet largely(not wholely) relies on third party tools to engage with the difficulty. They likely want to rework the way encounter difficulty is expressed so that they can get the metric of third party tool usage down. This will likely mean more straightforward encounter design of lower difficulty, not higher difficulty. While also shifting difficulty away from job difficulty at the same time. Never once did I say the game would be getting harder or should be getting harder in any way. If anything TOP and DSR prove that it should be made easier overall. Maybe stop cheating(not you personally, I don't know or care whether you cheat or not) if this stuff is important to you.

"Its core identity wasn't about complexity" then you proceed to explain the complexity of the playstyle lol. Do you even read your own words before posting them? What is lost is the complexity of maintaining the full rotation during encounters. There is fluent optimal job expression, and then there is successful job expression. Two very different things, with two very different levels of performance.

Thirdly you say why should someone who wants to play the fantasy of BLM be forced to not play it? I'd argue they should have delved into it before if they liked the fantasy and at least played the basic rotation which in itself is simple. No one forced people away from BLM aside from themselves. The fact that they didn't leads to believe they weren't interested enough in the first place. People with a passion would have overcome this trial. You've only invited people who have had this class in mind on the back burner or had no interest in it in the first place and there's no guarantee it will stick with them. I find it extremely odd you say of all the things that are making you sub to the game it's the simplification of one job. And this entire line of argument is don't gatekeep the fantasy people want to play when no one is doing so, but let's sacrifice what people already like about the class so they feel forced to play something else instead, isn't that a bit contradictory?

And lastly there are plenty of examples of requests from players requesting more engaging jobs alongside encounter designs. It shouldn't be a sacrifice of either one to get the other. SMNs have been asking for it, all of the healers have been screaming for it, it's been multiple expansions for some jobs, its only been loud from BLM most recently. If our current job is starting to feel stale switching to a different one should give a fresh and exciting feel, but if they all play similarly because of homogenization due to simplification then you are going feel the stale about the new job quickly.

The topic of third party is entirely irrelevant, you just made a whole broad statement implying everyone is using third party to simplify encounters while asking for complexity, in itself is not true. And third party should not be taken into consideration when discussing design choices.

Cool!

[MitsukiKimura]

Oh look its the person who doesn't play black mage at end game level trying to tell other people to put up with the job changes.
In such a hypocritical way.