Paladin needs some changes

[PyurBlue]

Holy Circle - Same as holy spirit. I will however state that two buttons that do the exact same thing but ones single target and the others aoe is dumb. SE could consolidate them into one cast on target aoe and nothing would be lost gameplay wise. Only one button saved.
PLD doesn't need two more damage skills.

I see comments like this a lot, but it would actually be a considerable downgrade in that we'd lose the ability to control what we're attacking. I guess part of the reasoning is that such an event isn't so common that the ability to control your targeting is needed all the time, but I have two problems with that. First, if we take away uncommon and niche occurrences, we're left with an even more bland and predictable game and secondly I think a lot of FF14's woes have come from small cuts. We've had many small changes over a large time span that by themselves don't effect the game on a large scale, but when taken together all add up to a massive shift in the wrong direction. The game could function with all nearly all attacks being AoE, but it would be yet another symptom of unnecessary and uninteresting simplification that would likely only get worse with time.

[YovelaLindswood]

I see comments like this a lot, but it would actually be a considerable downgrade in that we'd lose the ability to control what we're attacking. I guess part of the reasoning is that such an event isn't so common that the ability to control your targeting is needed all the time, but I have two problems with that. First, if we take away uncommon and niche occurrences, we're left with an even more bland and predictable game and secondly I think a lot of FF14's woes have come from small cuts. We've had many small changes over a large time span that by themselves don't effect the game on a large scale, but when taken together all add up to a massive shift in the wrong direction. The game could function with all nearly all attacks being AoE, but it would be yet another symptom of unnecessary and uninteresting simplification that would likely only get worse with time.

The aoe is currently around you and doesn't have any ability to control what its attacking. Making it a target on enemy aoe only further promotes controlling what you're attacking and allows for more niche uses. if things like overpower and orogeny or holy spirit and holy circle collapsed into one button with reduced damage after the first target it would lose out on nothing gameplay wise and just clean up bar space. I'm all for complex gameplay but choosing one or the other based soley on if its single target or aoe with no other class interaction isnt complexity, its just bloat.

[PyurBlue]

The aoe is currently around you and doesn't have any ability to control what its attacking.

Not quite, you can position yourself to control what you hit to a certain extent. Precise control over what your hit is harder to achieve as the number of enemies goes up or as they crowd closer together, but this is why there is a separate single target "copy" spell like Holy Spirit.

Making it a target on enemy aoe only further promotes controlling what you're attacking and allows for more niche uses.

Target based AoE comes with downsides too. You can't precast, and worse for PLD you can't center the AoE on the center of a collective group of enemies. The centering problem can be painful on DPS like BLM that only have targeted AoE. If the tank hasn't arranged mobs close enough, or for whatever reason the mobs can't pack together tight enough because they are fixed in position or have large hitboxes, your AoE will miss some targets. Non target AoE gets around this by allowing the user to stand in the correct position to hit everything.

if things like overpower and orogeny or holy spirit and holy circle collapsed into one button with reduced damage after the first target it would lose out on nothing gameplay wise and just clean up bar space. I'm all for complex gameplay but choosing one or the other based soley on if its single target or aoe with no other class interaction isnt complexity, its just bloat.

I don't mind if you don't care for separate AoE and single target skills, but there is no way that making everything AoE won't cause problems. Those problems won't be evident everywhere, but they will pop up in some content. You'd have to avoid your Requiescat combo on tethering adds, or in situations where you can't afford to pull everything because of mechanics or special content like Deep Dungeons. It's not bloat. It's precision that lends itself to decision making and it provides complexity for the devs to build encounters around, if they choose to do so.

[YovelaLindswood]

Not quite, you can position yourself to control what you hit to a certain extent. Precise control over what your hit is harder to achieve as the number of enemies goes up or as they crowd closer together, but this is why there is a separate single target "copy" spell like Holy Spirit.


Target based AoE comes with downsides too. You can't precast, and worse for PLD you can't center the AoE on the center of a collective group of enemies. The centering problem can be painful on DPS like BLM that only have targeted AoE. If the tank hasn't arranged mobs close enough, or for whatever reason the mobs can't pack together tight enough because they are fixed in position or have large hitboxes, your AoE will miss some targets. Non target AoE gets around this by allowing the user to stand in the correct position to hit everything.


I don't mind if you don't care for separate AoE and single target skills, but there is no way that making everything AoE won't cause problems. Those problems won't be evident everywhere, but they will pop up in some content. You'd have to avoid your Requiescat combo on tethering adds, or in situations where you can't afford to pull everything because of mechanics or special content like Deep Dungeons. It's not bloat. It's precision that lends itself to decision making and it provides complexity for the devs to build encounters around, if they choose to do so.

Field targeting is a thing. Just click the middle of a pack or bind target nearest and stand in the middle. I do both depending on the situation.

Player inability to group up mobs doesn't make a move bad. Like in packs with large enemies you can manipulate allowed overlap of mob rings by standing in a corner and only moving for aoes(or stunning them if you can react fast enough). If you play tank right theres very little missed mobs on targeted aoes. In fact one of the worst things you can do for mob grouping on large packs is just stand in the center of them all with nothing to force them to collapse down.

The problem isn't all skills becoming aoes its the aoes that serve the same function as their single target equivalent. Sharing resource and or cooldown. Like orogeny and upheavel. It doesn't add complexity since there's no consideration other than if you're fighting 3 mobs or not. The aoe button doesn't interact with the rest of your toolkit in any way shape or form. Like for instance my ice orb on frost mage in wow has a talent where whenever I have it active it makes my blizzard(basic aoe for class) instant cast and do additional damage. This reduces the target number for it to be more effective than single target and allows me to sometimes hold orb if I know an adds spawning soon on a boss to get both since its a huge damage gain over focusing single target. Holy circle doesn't affect my toolkit in any way shape or form thats different from holy spirit. Sure the 123 buffs them but they both do the exact same thing making them redundant actions.