Job Complexity and Difficulty

[Shurrikhan]

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.

Short Answer / Abridged Post:

Complexity: The net amount of "real" decision-making to be done (which can admittedly feel like more or less when that decision-making is more stressed).

No, this does not merely mean "more buttons" = "more complexity". Most safety actions (see Surecast, Arm's Length, Swiftcast) will reduce more complexity than they will produce, because you'll have replaced a crit-shield or Cover to prevent knockback and the raid rotating themselves to shuffle away from a flare on the healer with... hitting a button to make all a non-issue. Hitting each highlighted button in a sequence will not add complexity, nor will an individual dodge. Choosing a variable combo by which to arrive at a certain skill option on a particular GCD may, as might baiting something one moment to make room for another bait moments later so that you can then maximally reduce proximity AoE damage as you teleport to an ally later (rather than just running to tower, etc.).

On average, the more interrelated your choices are without becoming outright bundled (if A, then you must use B, C, D) or interchangeable, the greater the complexity.

Depth: The amount of cognitive load worth engaging with (which then depends on the risk-reward structure of those different considerations and the performance differences among decisions to be made based off those considerations).

Like complexity, this tends to be best measured holistically even if it's also worth looking at what considerations a new weaponskill/ability/spell may devalue (usually by overemphasizing another or by providing a glut of capacity for some purpose so that more intricate optimizations are no longer needed). The more depth, the more each additional bit of depth will often tend to push players. The less depth, the more independently a consideration can be made and therefore the less cognitive load it produces. Think "exponential", even if that's slightly an overstatement.

Long Answer / Original Post:

Etymologically, and close enough to common usage, "complexity" is the degree to which a set of tools create further (pseudo-)tools through their combination. Literally, there's something more "folded up" among what's visible from the surface, allowing a greater number of stuff (on unpacking) to appear within a smaller area/glance. "Depth" is usually the kind of cognitive load that goes into deciding among those additional choices.

Let's take ARR Monk as an example. You had essentially 9 ST rotational weaponskills: Bootshine, Dragon Kick, True Strike, Twin Snakes, Snap Punch, Demolish; Impulse Drive, Fracture, and Touch of Death. (I'm ignoring One-Ilm-Punch because it only saw use on two pieces of PvE content in XIV's lifespan, essentially becoming a PvP-only ability. Impulse Drive was TP-inefficient but was for a time the way to put out maximum DPS.)

Ultimately, though, we don't play with different isolated abilities except in odd snap-decisions (and in XIV, rarely even that, due to combos or modifiers massively making one choice outweigh all others). Instead, we devote certain amounts of attention towards different considerations to be tracked/estimated and decide on sets of actions accordingly. To my mind, the extent/breadth of what all is worth tracking and making decisions from can generally be considered "depth"; our "complexity" comes from what discrete actions we can choose accordingly at the level we actually think about this stuff / put it all into action or optimization. The more interrelated those decisions are without being interchangeable (or inexpressive in their differences), the greater the number of actions ultimately available per a given situation, and therefore the greater the complexity.

In ARR Monk's case, before considering ToD and Fracture, we'd just have <Dragon-Twin-Demo-Boot-True-Snap; Dragon-Twin-Snap-Boot-True-Demo; Dragon-Twin-Snap-Boot-True-Snap> and a "Dragon-down" rotation at higher GCD speeds of <Demo-Dragon-Twin-Snap-Boot-True-Snap-Boot-True>. With them, though, a ToD had to fit into every standard string (every .83, really), which then improved the efficiency of that standard rotation by reducing Dragon/Twin clipping, and could perfect this via a Fracture per Demolish.

And because ToD and Demolish were basically not affected by Dragon, our number of good openers was thereby enlarged to include, especially after PB, the likes of Snap-Snap-Snap-Twin-ToD-Demo-Dragon-Fracture-True-Snap-Boot-Twin-Snap-Dragon-True-Demo and what drifting ToD per string, Fracture per Demolish rotations would come of it.

Add to that the fact that Demolish would offer a ~2-second longer GL (just 10s back then, meaning you only had ~3.5s spare per cycle, with Demolish therefore adding over half) because it'd snapshot its use of GL at actuation but wouldn't apply it until after the long animation had completed, and you've then got fight-specific openers to deal with uptime gaps.

So, a decent bit of depth (know what adds can be Demolished, know what jumps/gaps can be Demo'ed and how much you should overclock or underclock Demo's accordingly with ToD/Frac --or Impulse Drive, if it comes to that-- or an extra Snap, know how this affects your strings before it, know how those strings in turn affect your best opener) and complexity (the choice-making from whatever knowledge and/or tracking/estimation is rewarded).

Now let's compare that to Monk as is now. How much of a performance gap stands between completely optimal play and "refill orbs when they run out", and how much cognitive load and/or situational decision-making goes into that gap?

If I were to now say that EW Monk was more complex than HW Monk, how would you react?

Depending on the GCD tier, since each had different permissible rotations (and therefore swaps one could make / levers to pull), I'd agree.

How about Dragoon? Blood of the Dragon was a punishing mechanic in HW, made easier coming into SB, did that add complexity? Or was it more of a hinderance to the gameplay? How about HW Enochian? Similar concept to Blood of the Dragon, but even more punishing. We know the community at large didn't like these 2 as they were much easier to manage in SB.

For many, there would have been more "engagement with" BotD after its simplification than before for the simple fact that many would drop access to their Dragonskills (Fang/Wheeling) without that ever being a deliberate choice -- say, for eeking out one extra Gierskogul per BotD.

And while their tuning was initially set in such a way that you absolutely could blow a ton of Gierskogul casts and be happy even without them for the downtime (and I loved dungeoning with a high-SkS DRG that would let me do exactly that for high AoE and focus target damage, both, without every having to worry about needing a Bard), I've no doubt that BotD felt to many more like a wonky CD than like a core mechanic. Its flexibility (to burst and to wreck oneself, both) back then had both pros and cons, for sure.

HW Enochian, on the other hand, I can produce no defense for, especially for so long as the Elemental Timer still existed anyways. As much as it did add some varying intensity between having just recently hit it and having it ready to go again if one failed to maintain element, its "floor" was 95% of its "ceiling", with the remaining 5% being redundant with prior optimizations anyways. If all you do now was what you already did before, it'd can't be said to increase "depth" (unlike BotD), only punishment (and on something that already had plenty of punishment -- enough to actually reduce options for the smallness of their reward relative to that risk).

By properly stating why you liked or disliked certain aspects, it can influence the devs more in the direction you might want jobs to go in, especially if they see people agreeing with your ideas. I have said this several times in the past, but just posting some vague notion of what you want improved, without explaining exactly what the issues are, doesn't help.

Agreed.

Let's face it, though: Details are damn hard. And many will balk at being, in essence, asked to design a game they're paying to have designed for them (even if that hasn't gone well so far, by their count).

[Shurrikhan]

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.

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?

And I'm glad you answered. It's always fun to see how we might (dis)agree on such things when we get down to the small bits.

I picked this little bit just because it makes a decent illustration of what I'd consider complexity... and what I wouldn't.

To me, Iron Jaws, itself, is just two parts:

Tracking (what all you'd likely be rewarded for paying attention to):
How many seconds are left on the DoT? Was anyone late on their raidbuffs last time and therefore will be again this time? How many seconds til raidbuffs so I can refresh under them or have my next refresh at its tail? - OR - How many ticks more can I hold Apex Arrow (or seconds left on Burst Arrow Ready) for to get it or Burst Arrow to line up with adds/raidbuffs? - OR - How many GCDs will compete for priority with IJ over the end of the raidbuff window? Will the enemy die within 8 seconds?

Decision (which mostly comes down to memorized thresholds and are therefore answered passively from what you track unless there are future codependencies and branching paths around them):
Do I refresh now and at the tail of the next raidbuff on the assumption that I'll hit 80 Soul Gauge, or do I wait and refresh last-second just as raidbuffs go up (if no one was late and hoping they'll all go up in the same GCD-gap)? Do I refresh slightly early to avoid the possibility of wasting a Hawk's Eye proc?

And... that's it for Iron Jaws. The only unique parts it has are TTK and a far higher-than-average cost for delays, as underlined above. The last part regarding overrides is decent, but still only half-unique at best. And since dungeons will just devolve to AoE spam, 99.9% of the time it is, for all intents and purposes, just a 925-potency attack... that happens to be reduced if the enemy dies in fewer than 45 seconds and only keeps IJ from being worth using if the target would die in fewer than 3 server ticks (or, untracked, 7.7 seconds average).

Its complexity is absolutely minimal despite ultimately taking up 3 buttons for a vapid, uninteractive action (here meaning that it doesn't conditionally reshape decisions, not just that its value is codependent) used once per 45s. What's worse, though, is that the impact of Iron Jaws isn't just what Iron Jaws itself does, but what it replaces: without it, you'd have roughly a fifth more actions beyond just Burst Shot->Refulgent Arrow filler. But by wasting Caustic and Storm, it has both wasted buttons and increased filler spam.

________

On that note, yes, I too would like to shrink the DoTs and song durations back down a bit, but I think that in itself would be a miniscule change and so I'd want to go further:

• Remove Iron Jaws or restrict it in some way,
• put Caustic and Stormbite on different durations (say, 15s and 21s),
• maybe let Hawk's Eye stack to 2 so there's at least some reason to have a filler buttons (Burst/Ladon) even when a stack of Hawk's Eye is active (even if they're still wasted on two except as a finger-trap) -- or make the proc something that actually feels like it ought to be immediately responded to instead of leaving a massive duration on it, and
• remove the CDs on songs in favor of a softer system by which to be pushed/forced to swap between songs, such as an MP drain that increases with use and declines back to normal with disuse (including, ofc, using a different song), with greater but balanced distinction between song effects (which may in turn, yes, require yet more interdependencies).

I highlight the last bit because unless a change is enough to add new optimizations (i.e., new context-dependence, rather than just replacing one rote rotation or Action Priority List with another), it's at best just a small stimulus, like an average of one more thing to dodge per minute without any disproportionate costs or worrisome alignments.