Combat still too slow. We need a shorter Global Cooldown!

[M4Fade]

F*** off plz.

Honestly.

Lowering it would destroy haste mechanics, and with it an avenue for support classes depth, it would destroy the tempo of non GCD abilities, destroy class diversity like having monk be faster than other classes. It also trivializes positioning mechanics for some classes (instead of moving to the flank on a giant boss in 2s, now do it in 1, over and over. OKAY. It's not going to happen.) Gameplay aside, it would also take a giant dump all over the animation quality. Everyone who ever offers this idea is short sighted and just trying to homogenize the game into some shitty twitch spammy crap. Stop it.

I agree and I get what you're saying about the "shitty twitch spam crap", so why couldn't they have just kept the battle system from 1.23 then? You know it was good.
I keep seeing people saying in here that they like the "slower" pace of the 2.5 second GCD, they don't want faster combat, etc. etc.

The pace was fine in 1.23.

A little strategic. Faster than XI and a little slower than 2.0's current system. And for the animation people.. the animations had more weight to them and looked great and/or even better than today's animations, never minding the solid animation locks(which sucked at times).

[casker]

I agree and I get what you're saying about the "shitty twitch spam crap", so why couldn't they have just kept the battle system from 1.23 then? You know it was good.
I keep seeing people saying in here that they like the "slower" pace of the 2.5 second GCD, they don't want faster combat, etc. etc.

The pace was fine in 1.23. A little strategic. Faster than XI and a little slower than 2.0's current system. And for the animation people.. the animations had more weight to them and looked great and/or even better than today's animations, never minding the solid animation locks(which sucked at times).

I can't really answer your question of why not keep 1.23 combat, but I imagine it actually has more to do with FF14 needing to reinvent itself and overhaul everything even if what we had was good. Sucks I know, but I'm also pretty fine with what we got in return. I suspect that what we got was borne out of an idea to make the game more actiony than 1.23 while keeping a strategic turn based feel. So what we already got was made in an appeal and compromise to the "make it twitchy" crowd, and like you said, sacrificed some animation quality. But the twitchy crowd wants to throw it further to their own end of the spectrum and homogenize it until its the same as every other game out there.

And you know, personally I'm not someone who says they "like the slower pace" because actually as a monk the pace is very speedy. At a 2.5 GCD, you weave in non GCD abilities at 1.25s. And when you have 3 greased lightning stacks, it becomes 2s, with 1s inbetweens. It's actually faster than other mmos I can think of, and requires more decision making. It adds of layer to technical skill in execution, and I find myself having to plan ahead sometimes 3 or 4 moves in advance in order to get through my "pipeline" properly.

The GCD pace requires rapid but steady decision making, compared to other games where maybe you can react to something faster because of a shorter GCD, but IMO don't have to make that many decisions.

And while I liked the 1.23 combat, it actually used the usual kind of cooldowns on every ability like other mmos. The fact that ARR mostly doesn't lock you out of abilities after you've used them is MORE like FF and lends itself to decision making. I like where they went in ARR with the idea that most abilities don't have cooldowns but instead just an opportunity cost. If a different developer were doing this the gaming media would be calling it innovative.

What ultimately bothers me here is that people think just lowering the GCD will magically fix everything they don't like about the combat, like that's the only change you'd have to make, and like it wouldn't screw a lot of things over. If you dislike the battle system you're going to have to offer a ton more changes than just lowering the GCD. It makes no sense by itself.

[M4Fade]

I can't really answer your question of why not keep 1.23 combat, but I imagine it actually has more to do with FF14 needing to reinvent itself and overhaul everything even if what we had was good. Sucks I know, but I'm also pretty fine with what we got in return. I suspect that what we got was borne out of an idea to make the game more actiony than 1.23 while keeping a strategic turn based feel. So what we already got was made in an appeal and compromise to the "make it twitchy" crowd, and like you said, sacrificed some animation quality. But the twitchy crowd wants to throw it further to their own end of the spectrum and homogenize it until its the same as every other game out there.

And you know, personally I'm not someone who says they "like the slower pace" because actually as a monk the pace is very speedy. At a 2.5 GCD, you weave in non GCD abilities at 1.25s. And when you have 3 greased lightning stacks, it becomes 2s, with 1s inbetweens. It's actually faster than other mmos I can think of, and requires more decision making. It adds of layer to technical skill in execution, and I find myself having to plan ahead sometimes 3 or 4 moves in advance in order to get through my "pipeline" properly.

The GCD pace requires rapid but steady decision making, compared to other games where maybe you can react to something faster because of a shorter GCD, but IMO don't have to make that many decisions.

And while I liked the 1.23 combat, it actually used the usual kind of cooldowns on every ability like other mmos. The fact that ARR mostly doesn't lock you out of abilities after you've used them is MORE like FF and lends itself to decision making. I like where they went in ARR with the idea that most abilities don't have cooldowns but instead just an opportunity cost. If a different developer were doing this the gaming media would be calling it innovative.

What ultimately bothers me here is that people think just lowering the GCD will magically fix everything they don't like about the combat, like that's the only change you'd have to make, and like it wouldn't screw a lot of things over. If you dislike the battle system you're going to have to offer a ton more changes than just lowering the GCD. It makes no sense by itself.

Ah, great post Casker. I agree with pretty much everything you said.

As I said in an earlier post in this thread.. I have come to get used to the new battle system and find myself enjoying it a lot more than I did when I first experienced it. I guess I am just bitter that Yoshida got rid of everything that was good about 1.23 just so he can "reinvent" and "overhaul" everything as you said, which you're probably right about. The new battle system isn't perfect but as you say it sure is different or even perhaps "innovative". A dangerous word, no doubt.

As for the people demanding a lower GCD, yeah, it ain't gonna happen. That would require a major re-balance of... everything!