The Experience of Playing Jobs Under Level Sync

[BlisteringFrost]

They won't, because it isn't possible. How are you gonna "balance" decked out level 100s with loads of AoEs in their kit against babby level 15 DPS who don't even have any?

If you don't like being synced, don't do synced content. This doesn't become an issue just because it's a style of play you don't particularly care for. I don't go around saying savages/ultimates need to be "fixed" just because it's content not suited for me.

Same thing WoW does. Just make the mobs systematically scale upwards to the players levels on their end.

[Masha_Awandah]

They won't, because it isn't possible. How are you gonna "balance" decked out level 100s with loads of AoEs in their kit against babby level 15 DPS who don't even have any?

Simple, by giving every DPS an aoe skill at 15. Like, duh.

As for the difference in damage, they could make it so the skills of the level 100s are massively nerfed to the point a level 15 Lancer spamming Doom Spike is competing with them.

The goal here isn't to make new players irrelevant, it's to make the game more fun for high level players.

[VeyaAkemi]

As for the difference in damage, they could make it so the skills of the level 100s are massively nerfed to the point a level 15 Lancer spamming Doom Spike is competing with them.

While I agree with everyone getting a basic AoE by 15, there is the obvious issue of the other suggestion, by simply nerfing potencies so the damage is roughly equal would be massively punishing to high level players, imagine using your entire burst in a high APM job like VPR or NIN, while the little Lancer who barely has a 1-2-3 is doing basically the same damage as you, it can feel incredibly punishing for the high level player to put all the effort, which it is effort even in the context of simplified jobs we have currently to never clip GCDs, never let things drift, so on, and see no payoff other than "I got to press buttons", personally, I would find that significantly worse than what we have now.

[Atreus]

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...very-expansion

I like to point out that there have been many discussions about this that pop up both here and on reddit. Despite the comments here "hurr durr just don't do the content", this is a commonly complained-about issue.

The simple-minded solution (and the wrong one) would be to scale damage like WoW, but that doesn't work in a game that has extremely high-potency attacks later in leveling. You need to cap the potencies so that you can never exceed what you're capable of at different level brackets, likely with traits.

In fact screw it, I'm gonna bump that thread.

[Masha_Awandah]

While I agree with everyone getting a basic AoE by 15, there is the obvious issue of the other suggestion, by simply nerfing potencies so the damage is roughly equal would be massively punishing to high level players, imagine using your entire burst in a high APM job like VPR or NIN, while the little Lancer who barely has a 1-2-3 is doing basically the same damage as you, it can feel incredibly punishing for the high level player to put all the effort, which it is effort even in the context of simplified jobs we have currently to never clip GCDs, never let things drift, so on, and see no payoff other than "I got to press buttons", personally, I would find that significantly worse than what we have now.

Well, I do agree that this would be a problem. One posible solution would be to make it a duty finder option.

If you want the smaller, synced moveset that a new player has, you could keep the option turned off.

If you want the full set of skills but nerfed, you could turn it on.

Default setting would be at off since that's what we already have.

[Minarisweet]

They definitely should at the very least revise how jobs play at lower levels if they want to keep this system up because it makes it really hard to enjoy doing roulettes.

[Wasselin]

I like going back and experiencing previous versions of my job. It would be weird to power through Sastasha spamming Holy and Assize. It would also be a poor experience for new players. High level characters being synced down are already too overpowered.

However, for my own favorite job White Mage, I do think it gets a lot of skills way too late and this should be rebalanced -- especially the Lily system. The whole system is pointless without Afflatus Misery so I think that should be unlocked with Afflatus Solace.

I'm sure other jobs have things like this where the level you get skills could be tweaked. Or perhaps when syncing down it would make more sense for ALL of your abilities from that expansion be unlocked, regardless of which level you got them at.

I like how the newer or reworked jobs work, where even when leveled down it feels like you can use the same muscle memory for your core gameplay.

[Atreus]

While I agree with everyone getting a basic AoE by 15, there is the obvious issue of the other suggestion, by simply nerfing potencies so the damage is roughly equal would be massively punishing to high level players, imagine using your entire burst in a high APM job like VPR or NIN, while the little Lancer who barely has a 1-2-3 is doing basically the same damage as you, it can feel incredibly punishing for the high level player to put all the effort, which it is effort even in the context of simplified jobs we have currently to never clip GCDs, never let things drift, so on, and see no payoff other than "I got to press buttons", personally, I would find that significantly worse than what we have now.

I need you or someone to explain to me why playing the game as you normally would is "punishing". If it's that self-harmful to do it, then at least those players will still have the option to just 1-2-3 to their heart's content.

[VeyaAkemi]

I need you or someone to explain to me why playing the game as you normally would is "punishing". If it's that self-harmful to do it, then at least those players will still have the option to just 1-2-3 to their heart's content.

Because it isn't about "playing normally", it's about playing well, putting your best foot forward, and it's about seeing the effect that getting new skills has, if you just drastically remove the player's power as they get higher level, so that landing a Starcross at level 100 has the same effect as landing a Full Thrust when you were starting, what feedback that gives players about their growth?

Let me tell you about another MMO, Elder Scrolls Online, ESO at one point had an updated called One Tamriel, it does more or less this but on a global scale, the entire game including open world works that way, I played ESO for a while and you can feel how much this update was made with max level and nothing else in mind, it made the progression and leveling experience utterly miserable, things die as fast when you are level 1 as they do when you are level 50, it makes it feel like there is no point in leveling, why would you care about leveling, if it is only going to make you weaker? that's the feedback that just normalizing damage numbers independent of actual level gives people, it is miserable and it made me hate it, and this is what your suggestion would do, in a game where all meaningful combat happens in level sync'd instances.

[Masha_Awandah]

I'll be honest, what I *really* want, isn't to have access to my full skillset at any level, but rather to have an actually good rotation at 50. I'm a DRG main, and it sucks to lack such a massive amount of skills at 50.

I don't have Battle Litany, so I can't buff the party.
I don't have Geirskogul, which means I'm missing a large chunk of my burst phase.
I don't have my 5 hits combos, so I have to change my rotation.
I don't have my 3 hits aoe combo, so I either have to buff myself with Disembowell, or spam Doom Spike without my buff.

I don't mind having downgraded versions of the skills, or being nerfed so hard that a level 15 LNC out-DPS me. I just want to play the job I like.