Job Complexity and Difficulty

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

...Huh, I can't say I ever considered NIN and RDM to be hard to play compared to say...

I guess part of the reason (at least for RDM) is because their difficulty & complexity has not changed by much since their inception whereas the rest of the roster (SMN & BLM) all got bonked by the simplification hammers over and over. Do that enough times, you may even reach to the point where two latter becomes easier than RDM.

It kinda makes me wonder if the reason they change those two were because of the “This is too complex pls make it easier”-complaints whereas jobs like RDM & WHM barely gets anything because then they get ”Well they’re the ‘easy’ jobs so they should not need much.”-perception.

[Supersnow845]

That's the other thing too, one person's complexity is another person's contempt.

I mean, I love ya Valence, but I've seen the things you want to do with MCH and most of it doesn't appeal to me as someone who just wants to pew-pew things, and would rather all that stuff got dumped on BRD instead because I don't play it anyway, lol.

And then of course there's the old nugget of "if one job gets to be hard and another job stays easy, which one gets to be which"? Again I point to healers where a lot of WHM mains DON'T want to be the "derpy one" while SCH, AST, SGE get all the fun new stuff. Nor would I want NIN or RDM to become the "hard" melee DPS and caster thus forcing me to pick up different ones because I can't manage their hypothetical new complexity, but I also know full-well there's people who don't want them becoming any easier than they are because then THEY are out of a job.

So who gets catered to and who gets sent to the unemployment line? And what happens if there's not enough jobs left for someone to enjoy despite there being "so many"? What did all the BLM mains change to when what they wanted doesn't exist in another job for example?

Because people aren’t advocating for pushing up the floors of jobs (which is ironically why old BLM is a BAD example) they are advocating for pushing up the ceilings so every job is accessible but has multiple layers of complexity that you can interact with if you want to but don’t have to (don’t hit me with the “if you can interact with someone you have to, 14 has never had that sort of community enforcement)

Jobs shouldn’t top out at “WHM tops out at dungeon difficulty, SCH tops out at ultimate difficulty”, they should all have avenues of being more complex if you want to engage with the complexity to do more for the party

You should be allowed to be challenged by your job in casual content; not be forced to do hardcore content (which I did and don’t do anymore because I don’t enjoy its modern design) just to not fall asleep at the wheel and if you are currently challenged by WHM in a dungeon then the floor shouldn’t be changed

[Absurdity]

I don't trust the developers to be creative with the ceiling installation, and I don't trust the community to let other people be if they decide to ignore said ceiling.
+++

Except we've already had this situation.
We wouldn't be comparing the current state of job design with the past if there wasn't a point in time where jobs were more engaging and arguably more complex.

And if we take Stormblood for example, while the player numbers weren't yet as huge as Shadowbringers (although we're on a trajectory back to those numbers), the game wasn't on fire.
We didn't have elitists flaming people in alliance raids for not playing optimally.
Because nobody actually cared how bad you played your job in casual content.

And it's not like those players have gone away just because they gradually simplified every single aspect of jobs since Shadowbringers.
They're still here and they still just press 1-2-3.
I'd even go ahead and say that it's more frustrating to see people like that now, exactly because jobs are so fool proof that seeing a Cure 1 mage or a filler-combo spammer means they're not even trying to follow what the game tells them with giant glowing buttons.
But just like back then, nobody actually cares in content where you can't really fail.

[Valence]

I mean, I love ya Valence, but I've seen the things you want to do with MCH and most of it doesn't appeal to me as someone who just wants to pew-pew things, and would rather all that stuff got dumped on BRD instead because I don't play it anyway, lol.

And then of course there's the old nugget of "if one job gets to be hard and another job stays easy, which one gets to be which"? Again I point to healers where a lot of WHM mains DON'T want to be the "derpy one" while SCH, AST, SGE get all the fun new stuff. Nor would I want NIN or RDM to become the "hard" melee DPS and caster thus forcing me to pick up different ones because I can't manage their hypothetical new complexity, but I also know full-well there's people who don't want them becoming any easier than they are because then THEY are out of a job.

So who gets catered to and who gets sent to the unemployment line? And what happens if there's not enough jobs left for someone to enjoy despite there being "so many"? What did all the BLM mains change to when what they wanted doesn't exist in another job for example?

Sure I guess, but as a veteran that got robbed of the job I loved above everything else, I claim precedence. Sorry.

Not like we can't design accessible jobs with an optional higher depth and intricacies, but if you're unable to accept playing a job not to its fullest, then yes, it's gonna suck either way, because at some point I'm starting to suspect that a lot of players asking for "chiller" or "simpler" jobs to play are actually unable to accept the idea of not playing one at 100% in reality.

To go back to an example I find pretty striking in what we had in HW/SB tanking in particular: tank stances were mostly a defensive tool that helped just a little with aggro (you gained 20% mitigation which is what modern tank mastery does automatically, lost 20% damage output, and gained +70% aggro generation, which probably went down to 40-50% after the loss in damage), but most players in casual modes tanked in tank stance, in dungeons, everywhere, like they do today, and yet, good players and tryhards would go stanceless. Most people used tank stance because it was safe, and because it was easier, and yet they played sub-optimally.

HW DRK also added another layer of optional complexity over it: Darkside was a stance that made MP being drained constantly and disabled external MP support to gain +20% on damage. It was optimal to play the job with it, and yet half of the casual playerbase if not more didn't turn Darkside on because it was a layer of complexity they didn't want to deal with. Those DRKs were everywhere in casual content, and just on Grit they could do their tank job perfectly fine.

I think the main difference is that the objective set out by the developers in PvE content is for you to (eventually) win, while that's not the case in PvP.

Because of that, PvE encounters are set to follow a strict script that the players can solve and get their win after, contrasting with that, you cannot "solve" PvP because it involves multiple unpredictable people in the field at once. So PvE encounters are only an interaction between your job kit and the script that the boss follows, whether your buttons are useful or not depends on the script, that's why PvE feels like you can clear it just fine with just movement keys and one attack button. On the other side, PvP can actually give you just 5 buttons and be very engaging because your content is not scripted.

So why can't PvE be more like PvP? Because that would require encounters to be unscripted, and if you take unscripted encounters with the mechanics vomit that the dev team enjoys right now together, you get encounters that can occasionally spit out unsolvable mechanics, which runs counter to the end objective of letting the player win. If you then restrict the randomness so it doesn't cause unsolvable mechanics to happen, you run the risk of creating a solvable script once again.

What some of us have been asking for though, is a return of player interaction in PvE. This makes PvE encounters more random because of the players you match with, without messing too much with the scripts they enjoy writing.

Remove mechanic vomit, bring back the Renauds. With more rng.

[Valence]

Well, it wouldn't be the first time I've had a higher-skill player tell me I deserve nothing, and the end result would be that I just don't get to play any ranged DPS at all I guess. Though if other vets of other jobs got their way as well, I'm not sure there would be usable DPS jobs left for me period as they slide backwards into... whatever they were before my time. (And since I don't play healer or tank, welp.)

You shouldn't be left with nothing but easy and boring jobs of course, but I shouldn't be left with nothing but hard and complicated ones either, especially when the content its self is already doing its damnedest to skill-check me out of doing most of it that I don't really want my jobs being difficult too.

I'm a little amazed that what you took out of this was that you should have nothing, and I should have everything. And I'm actually sad that you continue to introduce unbridgeable gaps between jobs that have to be easy and jobs that can only be hard. I do not subscribe to that mindset and that's not what my values about good job design align with.

I just want my MCH and my ammo back. Where did I say it had to have an unreachable skill floor?

Edit: like honestly, if Yoshida was actually serious about changing their philosophy to make content for everyone at every piece of content instead of doing some content for a small portion and another piece of content later for another small portion of people, then perhaps they could also apply this to job design as well.

Like I said before, playing optimally won't remain "optional" and players WILL try and force others into spinning the same number of plates they are on those same jobs, and with the the power to kick/mute/blacklist, there's already tools in place to filter out the sub-optimal at every level. It happens right now even, over smaller inadequacies in job performance, and most of those were noob traps made by Square-Enix themselves (like Freecure) where people literally don't know any better. But once the ceiling gets raised this community will simultaneously raise the floor of what they deem acceptable when the complexities cease to be 1% of the job's expectation that can be safely ignored, and instead are 40-50% or more that determines if the run is efficient or a slog (or even a wipe). PVP already has "community enforced scripts" as it were, we would just be bringing that to PVE as well, and anyone who doesn't follow is going to be labeled "lethargic" and be hit with every consequence that comes with it.

Maybe you have a static/premade/friend group/free company that you roll with that would never give you any sort of grief over performance, but I don't really have that benefit, and I'll never buy into the lie again that "nobody cares in normal content" after what happened to me in Ivalice.

You're assuming a lot of things about me. I only had statics for savage/ultimate raiding (and extremes on the way). For the rest I tend to play solo 99% of the time and queue with randoms. If anything it's in a couple of HC statics that I've been given grief over performance (learning speed performance, imaginary or real), not in casual content. But I do understand that I cannot speak for players that struggle in casual content because I don't, and perhaps the only thing I struggle with in casual is luigi's mansions first two bosses (as an ex hardcore raider, I genuinely do).

Now that's out of the way, I want to point out that 1) people generally don't shit on party members because that's a surefire way to GM talks and 2) in all my 10 years of XIV history the overwhelming majority of the casuals that Ive ended up running casual content with were passable to mediocre with their job performance, and some died all the time, and nobody gave a crap about it.

If you however refer to how players constantly shit on "Oh I had another cure bot in my roulette today" then yes, it happens all the time. The community is as shitty and insecure as any other online community even with the current jobs: if anything, when the jobs were more complex, we didn't have more of this, in fact, perhaps less because today people just use the convenient excuse that "jobs are too brainless to fail" or some nonsense like that. I also do acknowledge that I'm actually very worried where the log rot mentality is moving the community to, especially with the appearance of tools like tomestone, but overall that's something you will encounter in challenging content, something that you don't run. Not in casual content.

I'm also talking from a perspective of someone that have played through a time where things were more complicated, and the skill floor wasn't always very accessible depending on the job and guess what, it was the same in casual content, nobody gave a crap, and everybody shit talked everybody behind the scenes on their FC chat or whatever. Nothing has changed one bit in my experience. It's not a difficulty or complexity problem, it's a community/human/species problem.

[YukioKobayashi]

Well, it wouldn't be the first time I've had a higher-skill player tell me I deserve nothing, and the end result would be that I just don't get to play any ranged DPS at all I guess. Though if other vets of other jobs got their way as well, I'm not sure there would be usable DPS jobs left for me period as they slide backwards into... whatever they were before my time. (And since I don't play healer or tank, welp.)

You shouldn't be left with nothing but easy and boring jobs of course, but I shouldn't be left with nothing but hard and complicated ones either, especially when the content its self is already doing its damnedest to skill-check me out of doing most of it that I don't really want my jobs being difficult too.

So one job that caters towards lesser skilled players in each role isnt enough? WAR for Tanks, WHM for Regenheale, SGE for Barrierhealer, DRG for Melees, DNC for Physranged and RDM for Casters isnt enough?
Every big MMORPG has Classes that are not meant to be played by every 2 Finger Johnny on earth except XIV and im seriously getting tired of it. Some Casuals in this game ruin the game for everyone.

While MCH in HW and SB was quite challenging to pull of and not meant to be played by people that dont put the time into it, there were at least 10 other jobs casuals could play.

[Quuoooote]

I'm really struggling to put into words my thoughts on this, but the starting point is, what do you mean by complexity? This is going to mean different things to different people and can muddy the water in getting across what you want. You then drop the word 'depth'. Is this the same as complexity? What makes a job deep? etc.

I'm glad you asked, actually, because between posting the OP and now I've been cooking the idea in my head some more and wanted to write either a follow-up or edit to clarify exactly this point.

When I say 'complexity' I am mostly speaking in terms of mechanical depth, and not mechanical difficulty. If simplicity and complexity are two ends of the design spectrum, so to speak, then depth is the goal that exists outside of that boundary.

Sekiro, for example, is one of my favorite games of all time. It's often jokingly reduced down to "parry at the correct timing, win game". But despite the mechanical simplicity at play, the game offers significant depth and complexity in how your limited, simple toolset interacts with enemies, bosses, etc. to create a satisfying core gameplay loop. In FFXIV terms, I think White Mage is a solid parallel — White Mage has always been a staple of simplicity relative to its peers, but it's still capable of having greater depth and has previously had a more complex, dynamic toolset without breaking its 'simple' design intent.

To dig back into the Bard discussion, you mention that 30 second DoT duration is "just pressing Iron Jaws every 30 seconds". That's true! And that's exactly the type of interaction I'm aiming for and hope the development team adopts. In a vacuum, just like the Sekiro example, it can be reduced to a very simple action that you perform in a rote fashion, buts is depth lies in how other mechanics interact and interfere with the simple mechanic to force decision making and encourage engagement. Even though you "just press Refulgent 90% of the time", or "you just cycle the songs faster", eventually these goals might overlap or conflict and create tension, or depth (and this will happen with greater frequency if more upkeep is needed). If your hypothetical Straight Shot buff and DoTs are both going to fall off on your next GCD, which should you prioritize? Is managing double procs causing distraction and rotational mistakes like this in the first place? How can you be more mindful of this in the future, to make sure it doesn't happen again? How much raw Bard gameplay will the average player need to iron out all of these rotational nuances?

Questions like these can't exist within the current system because there just isn't enough depth in most jobs' general gameplay. To create that depth, we need more complex systems that will create engagement through player decision making — even if the systems, at their core, are highly simple. Wanting increased complexity doesn't mean jobs need to be difficult (although I believe the two will inevitably correlate to at least some small degree), because simplicity isn't a bad thing as long as there is enough design room for depth to exist across all levels of play. Jobs are how players interact with and play the game at a fundamental level, so it's critical that they are engaging and fun for as many players as possible.

When I express that I'd like for the developers to look into HW or SB-era job design/complexity/depth/etc., I'm also not calling for a 1:1 return to HW or SB systems. Your points about HW vs. EW MNK complexity, HW job mechanics being punishing, and the lack of guaranteed Straight Shot procs within Bard openers aren't entirely relevant because the end goal of looking ahead for future improvements is to hopefully marry the best of both systems to create something greater than the sum of its parts. Meaningful QoL improvements or successful job systems should obviously stay, ideally with more complexity and/or depth added onto them to follow a design paradigm that's more aligned with older expansions. Older systems weren't perfect by any stretch, but at the same time I don't find it unreasonable to think we've strayed too far from one end of the extreme to the other, and could benefit from adopting some older design principles to improve what we have now. If I had to choose, I think Stormblood job design was overall the most 'balanced' between complexity/depth and accessibility, but I wouldn't want White Mage to be reverted back to having 4.0 Lilies for instance because the modern iteration of the system is clearly superior. Could it stand to have more under the hood like Aero, Cleric Stance, etc.? Judging by how healers are clearly unsatisfied with current healer gameplay, I'd say yes.