Shield Smite & Chain Strategem: Remove or Severely Cut

[Atreus]

I am less miffed by Shield Smite. For those who play at a top level-- which they should balance the game around-- you get more value out of it. As a learning player, however, it's a GCD. It's easy to get guarded just as you start a GCD, and because Shield Smite is a GCD in of itself with a delay to the guard crack application, it's very possible for it to apply with just a second of guard remaining. More experienced players on the other hand are able to better read this person is being pressured, they are going to guard, and either input it in advance, or delay to punish. The PLD job just so happens to also have been one of the most toxic jobs in the history of PvP, especially since EW and the addition of the elixir. I really think, way back in EW, we should have made Cover just absorb 99% of damage taken, then balanced the job around the limitations this would provide. As it stands, it makes it hard to approach Shield Smite in isolation, because I think the kit as a whole is problematic.

I unironically agree. Shield Smite being the lesser of evils being GCD and 8 yalm range. I also agree that PLD could use a new identity, because if this is truly what brought about crack to function as a counter, then I'd rather rewind and rework.

Chain Stratagem on the other hand is a point-and-click oGCD that couldn't be easier to use or get value out of. The same job also rather generously applies a healing debuff. When it becomes blue/green meta, and sustain is a big part of the game, the queen of attrition just creates an overall less fun game to play as, or play against. Unlike with PLD I think the job has issues with direction as a whole. This isn't the first expansion when healing debuffs defined a meta. DRK + SCH train during Shadowbringers wasn't fun in Feast, either. The mechanic could be fine if it was put on less obnoxious buttons and involved more expensive cooldowns or opportunity cost.

1000%, we should have learned our lesson with stacking heal down from the Feast. In isolation, heal down is not as bad now because you would conceivably be able to use Guard to manage burst. Now, with instant 25yalm Chain Strategem, you put someone below 50% HP even after a well-timed Guard and they're literally drowning afterwards from the heal down.

[Talke]

It's been a month and I feel I have enough matches and scrims under my belt post the 7.4 adjustment to express that I do not think they solved the fundamental issue, just palliated it. I continue to agree with Atreus that shield break is not healthy for the game at any level, that it takes one of the most fundamental defensive moves in the mode and makes its well timed impact negligible, and that at the higher end of gameplay, it forces two jobs to always exist in lobbies and scrims. Surely Square Enix has some way of gathering not only win rate but also pick rate data on SCH, PLD and DRK. In JP and NA crystal/omega brackets, some of these jobs dominate the lobbies to such an insane degree that sometimes you know you made the wrong pick if you're the sole red job in your game.

For a clearer example, imagine you're playing a Fromsoft game, specially from a melee perspective. You've polished your dodges, you know how to read the boss' moveset, most importantly you've learned to time your parries really well. You're in the middle of an intense boss fight, see that window of opportunity, and land that beautifully well timed parry that ought to buy you a nice little riposte... and then the boss looks at you, grins, says "no", nullifies the effect of your defensive move and sends you and your foolish ambitions flying off anyway. Anyone would wonder "well why would I bother to learn to use this mechanic if it can be negated at any point? I'll just never be in reach instead".

Dragoon, Ninja, and Monk can all have their burst damage negated by guard and then just kinda flounder around. If they had a "guard crack" option, they'd be way more relevant in the meta.

I think it's interesting you'd bring two jobs that have spicy shield piece moves and a third that is infamous for having the form of shield break that is hardest to play around. As already mentioned, the entire point of their gameplay is not to burst into guard, but they also ALREADY have moves that punish guard anyway, and I think that's a better and healthier form of pressure than shield crack is.

[Atreus]

It's been a month and I feel I have enough matches and scrims under my belt post the 7.4 adjustment to express that I do not think they solved the fundamental issue, just palliated it. I continue to agree with Atreus that shield break is not healthy for the game at any level, that it takes one of the most fundamental defensive moves in the mode and makes its well timed impact negligible, and that at the higher end of gameplay, it forces two jobs to always exist in lobbies and scrims. Surely Square Enix has some way of gathering not only win rate but also pick rate data on SCH, PLD and DRK. In JP and NA crystal/omega brackets, some of these jobs dominate the lobbies to such an insane degree that sometimes you know you made the wrong pick if you're the sole red job in your game.

For a clearer example, imagine you're playing a Fromsoft game, specially from a melee perspective. You've polished your dodges, you know how to read the boss' moveset, most importantly you've learned to time your parries really well. You're in the middle of an intense boss fight, see that window of opportunity, and land that beautifully well timed parry that ought to buy you a nice little riposte... and then the boss looks at you, grins, says "no", nullifies the effect of your defensive move and sends you and your foolish ambitions flying off anyway. Anyone would wonder "well why would I bother to learn to use this mechanic if it can be negated at any point? I'll just never be in reach instead".


I think it's interesting you'd bring two jobs that have spicy shield piece moves and a third that is infamous for having the form of shield break that is hardest to play around. As already mentioned, the entire point of their gameplay is not to burst into guard, but they also ALREADY have moves that punish guard anyway, and I think that's a better and healthier form of pressure than shield crack is.

7.41 just passed and there wasn't a single change. There may be fear to do so because the first CCRC preliminaries are around the corner, but this is a terrible line of reasoning. This sort of thing needed to be addressed long before a major tournament, but NA is going to be stuck with it.