Animation Lock: Why don't you like it?

[Kikosho]

You know, as someone told me in another thread- its too easy to blame everything on lag. Most of the time I got caught on the cracks, it's because of a spell or ability I actually finished a couple seconds before, but animation lock had me frozen in place so long that if I could have moved immediately after the spell / ability, I would not have gotten hit. That's not lag killing me, that's animation lock.

If you're telling me that good strategy means not using an ability that I should have time to use but don't because of animation lock locking me in place for about 10 years while the enemy does whatever the hell he wants (the enemies sure as hell aren't hindered by this), I'm going to tell you you're full of crap. Good strategy comes from planning things together with your team mates- not from battling against clunky, gameplay-ruining aesthetic features rather than battling the enemy itself.

Ani lock sucks. Period. There's nothing you can say to justify it. I don't care if lag killed people in 1.0 or not. The only remotely arguable benefit of animation lock is aethetics- But that "benefit" comes with countless downsides that make it completely not worth leaving in for its aesthetic value. Besides, if the animations are done properly and aren't too slow, you shouldn't even notice much when you're interrupting animations.

In those fighting games, animations play a lot faster and you aren't locked in place for several seconds at a time when you throw a punch. A punch is a quick fast animation and by the time you can even press another button, the animation is usually over anyway. So your example is very poor- it's only an example of animation lock not SIGNIFICANTLY impacting gameplay (because most fighting games are so fast that you aren't affected by it). You also seem to fail to understand that animation blending is going to be implemented- You are not going to "slide around" as you do things. You are going to do things on the run- Animation blending smooths the transition from one motion to another, such that even when you interrupt an animation, it still looks reasonably natural.

So you're basically complaining that you died because you got punished for doing a skill at the wrong time, ignoring the dangers of the enemy? If you should have time to use an ability "but don't because you're rooted for 10 years", then you obviously don't have time to begin with. Animation lock was not the problem, the extremely long animations themselves were the problem. SE made the boss mechanics faster, while not doing the same for players. Bosses themselves were rooted when doing their animations, so it's not like it was completely one sided either. The fact that more action packed games, with faster gameplay, do fine with animation locks is proof that how SE went about their game in 1.0 was plagued with issues.

Your understanding of animation locks in fighting games is also lacking. Each move has a certain length where you are punishable and where you are safe. Doing a roundhouse kick at the wrong time is just going to get a fist to your face but doing a jab will leave you safe if done at the proper distance and even bait the enemy to try and punish you which in turns means you can punish his counter. Countless fighting games leave you completely open when you do a special move at the wrong time, even fast paced games like MvC2 and MvC3. Just blindly throwing a fireball and whiffing can lead to a phat combo that takes half your life. There are other mechanics in fighting games that don't exist in FFXIV, like canceling one move into another, which honestly, would have benefited all the QQing about "I got hit by cracks cause I was Doom Spiking like a derp!".

That aside, the new battle system we are getting is just a different animal. Since we no longer will be completely rooted when doing a move, battle pace will be different. Whether it's better or not is opinion and perception much like someone who prefers Rugby to Football. The lack of animation locks though means that mages will definitley need instant cast skills for PvP if melee can just attack and advance at will, especially considering mages are "rooted" when casting a spell since movement cancels their damage potential.