Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

That said, it's my impression that people don't invite smns, they invite /whms. Nobody ever thinks "This nin would be untouchable with Earthen Ward" or "With Aerial Armor this TP-burn could all switch to more effective DD subs without putting too much strain on the healer" or "Meteorite MB would be great at this level" and certainly not "Imagine how much more damage these mnks and thfs and nins would be doing with Rolling Thunder." Instead it's "We need Cures and this /whm is all that's seeking" with any additional benefits provided by smn main as an afterthought at best.

Hmm. Same with NINs and PLDs, though. These days, it's "We're desperate for a tank! Anything in our range seeking?!" NINs are fine, PLDs are fine, and some people probably at the breaking point of asking WARs to tank, being so desperate to level up.

Every so often, we get posters who don't want to tank on NINs--and we blow them off, or school them to repeat the mantra "NINs HAVE TO tank!"

As for the non-tank, non-healer, non-support role jobs? We lump them all together as DDs, or "SAMs and the rest". Not exactly a model of gathering players for their unique abilities, either.

It may suck that many parties forget SMNs have Blood Pacts, but fundamentally I just don't see anything wrong with thought process like "We need healer--hmm, grab the SMN?"

* * *

I had a SMN in my merit party last night, who was tossing out cures and meleeing nearly full time on Greater Colibri--I had to remind him/her that Earthen Ward is good, before s/he stared using BPs. ^_^;;;; Should've also asked for Lv.70 DD BPs, but I was too busy passing all the Wind Crystals and Colibri Beaks and forgot.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

I should preface myself again by saying that I haven't leveled smn signficantly so my opinions on the matter should be taken with a grain of salt. That said, it's my impression that people don't invite smns, they invite /whms. Nobody ever thinks "This nin would be untouchable with Earthen Ward" or "With Aerial Armor this TP-burn could all switch to more effective DD subs without putting too much strain on the healer" or "Meteorite MB would be great at this level" and certainly not "Imagine how much more damage these mnks and thfs and nins would be doing with Rolling Thunder." Instead it's "We need Cures and this /whm is all that's seeking" with any additional benefits provided by smn main as an afterthought at best.

I'm all for subjob flexibility and I think it would be great if smns got that. Barring that, I'm all for choosing the subjob that best supplements your job and I'm fine with that sub being whm for smn. But what I'm really getting at is that people should be able to look at a main job smn and see something worth inviting before considering how the subjob choice affects that evaluation.

Well there's also the reverse problem - usually in the case of BRD or COR - in which the subjob isn't even cared about and it probably should be cared about a great deal. How good the main job isn't shouldn't completely overshadow what subjob you pick. I don't think any BRD should be allowed to get by without WHM or at least RDM or BLU sub. Conversely, there are far too many CORs (for what few there are) that try to limp by on /WHM and never consider bringing damage to table when they very capably could with /RNG. They try to bank on the buffs and dispels, but don't consider the full scope of what they could do in a PT.

No one has ever invited my COR to DD, I'm invited for other skills, but I'll show them I can and if they ask me to put on my WHM sub in a situation where I don't see the need for one, I'll tell them I'll go back to seeking. It doesn't bother me. And I do specify my interests in search comment, though they do vary.

Support classes should not be so powerful that their other skills are overlooked, but can you seriously show me one instance where you kicked a bad COR or BRD from PT based on subjob choice? Or, even further, on a lack of good gear?

I really cringe when I hear the rationale from PTs, "I don't care what else he does, so long a he refreshes me."

See also RDM on that one. No job should be able to eek by on a couple of spells/abilities.

[Karinya]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

I should preface myself again by saying that I haven't leveled smn signficantly so my opinions on the matter should be taken with a grain of salt. That said, it's my impression that people don't invite smns, they invite /whms. Nobody ever thinks "This nin would be untouchable with Earthen Ward" or "With Aerial Armor this TP-burn could all switch to more effective DD subs without putting too much strain on the healer" or "Meteorite MB would be great at this level" and certainly not "Imagine how much more damage these mnks and thfs and nins would be doing with Rolling Thunder." Instead it's "We need Cures and this /whm is all that's seeking" with any additional benefits provided by smn main as an afterthought at best.

Well, if you expect anyone to invite for Rolling Thunder you really *haven't* leveled SMN. I'm only SMN40 but that's enough to see that Rolling Thunder is horribly gimp. +2 damage per hit if you're lucky - usually 1.

Putting that aside, though: sure, lots of people don't understand or appreciate SMN. But player ignorance isn't SE's fault or problem. Despite a few really broken (in the bad way) BPs, SMNs *are* effective for more than just cures, whether most players know it or not. But most people won't realize that they kicked more ass than usual because of your Lunar Cry, they probably have your pet filtered so they don't see your BP:Rage damage at all, and even if they saw your contributions individually, they wouldn't mentally add them up to see how much you are doing for the party total.

I'm all for subjob flexibility and I think it would be great if smns got that. Barring that, I'm all for choosing the subjob that best supplements your job and I'm fine with that sub being whm for smn. But what I'm really getting at is that people should be able to look at a main job smn and see something worth inviting before considering how the subjob choice affects that evaluation.

I agree, but I think the lack of sexiness of SMN is in the mind of the beholders; once you actually have one, they're quite useful (and not just for their subjob). Now that they can use twice as many bloodpacts as before, they can pull their weight in a party without casting a single cure spell. (Although I don't recommend trying it if there's no other healer in the party!)

However.

If you think that RDM wasn't designed to be a main healer, and SMN wasn't designed to be a main healer, then you probably also think that BLM and BLU weren't designed to be main healers...

and that leaves one job to heal the other 17. (More after WotG - the same people who want RDM and SMN to not have to cure all the time will almost certainly want the same for SCH, on similar grounds.)

Personally I'm a fan of split-healing parties - RDM+SMN and things like that - since most non-main healers can do something else useful *and* do some healing (definitely including SMN). But on very weak mobs, it's inefficient to have more backline characters - they aren't killing something every 30 seconds because they need MP or aren't a damage-focused job at all.

SMN, like RDM, have a lot of ways to keep the monster from killing the party, but relatively few effective ways to make the party kill the monster faster. Ungimp Rolling Thunder and give Crimson Roar a real duration and that would change, but for now there's the Fenrir acc buff, Hastega (which is darn short iirc) and... well, you can try to do it by debuffing, but in a meleeburn you can't hit every mob that way.

A return to CoP era monster toughness and the party setups that went with it would help SMN, like it would help so many other jobs hosed by the ToAU shifts in party dynamics. A SMN alongside a RDM, BLU, SCH or even one of the rare helpful BLMs could split healing while helping the party with BPs that work even when the other party members don't appreciate them.

The game was designed for exp parties to fight monsters of a certain level and difficulty compared to the players fighting them - and it shows. When you get further away from that designed level of monster, balance problems crop up and playstyle shifts away from the team tactics that some of us old players still remember.

[Malacite]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

Well, if you expect anyone to invite for Rolling Thunder you really *haven't* leveled SMN. I'm only SMN40 but that's enough to see that Rolling Thunder is horribly gimp. +2 damage per hit if you're lucky - usually 1.

You completely missed his point there. I believe he meant that just as a random example of how no one invites a SMN for a specific buff or pact, and really just for the cure battery.


That said, I really wish SE would nerf /WHM by making healing skill affect cure potency a lot more (with high skill levels making for very strong cures, even cure 1). At the same time, SMN should be changed so that when subbing WHM, instead of relying on the cures, the healing skill and extra MND should boost healing pacts similar to blue magic.

That would be a lot more unique IMO and much more flavorful. It was also make things interesting since it would be carbuncle/garuda/leviathan getting all the hate for the cure spikes instead of the SMN. That's how it should really work IMO, with the SMN then tossing out a few cures inbetween but mostly focusing on the strategic use of blood pacts.

The same should be done with /BLM and offensive pacts (maybe even melee subs to boost avatar performance and encourage SMN melee?)


It's the same principal that Scholar apparently works on, so why the hell not SMN? It's a damn good way to shift the focus back onto the pets rather than /WHM.




Also, BBQ, this is rather off topic but since you brought up COR and BRD subs, how does a COR/BLM with MAB gear and HQ staves do with QD? Oh and it's so true what you said about BRD. Almost every PT I got into while leveling BRD recently (thank god I can stop @71) no one ever seemed to give a damn about what I subbed. I"d ask them "WHM RDM NIN or WAR?" and they'd usually either just say WHM , do whatever I want, or simply not care to even answer.

Though it was funny as hell meleeing against lesser colibri as a 56 BRD and taking hate off the tank with /WAR buffs and food with a gimp sword skill lmao. Schlaeger ftw

[Taskmage]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

I knew Rolling Thunder was bad, but I didn't know it was THAT bad. But it still seems like you're focusing on the trees rather than the forest. All I'm saying is there should be notable mainjob abilities that the community identifies the job with rather that thinking of them as just a healer. It's true that smn does have some abilities that are in fact quite useful, but it's not exclusively the community's fault that buff and dubuff BPs are underappreciated. Many of them genuinely suck and the that are good have effects that are difficult to percieve without a parser.

If you think that RDM wasn't designed to be a main healer, and SMN wasn't designed to be a main healer, then you probably also think that BLM and BLU weren't designed to be main healers...

Don't go putting words in my mouth. Have you not read any of my posts gnashing at the "pink mage" camp, advocating whm as the only justifiable sub for smn and happily welcoming blu as a new possible main heal?

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

and that leaves one job to heal the other 17. (More after WotG - the same people who want RDM and SMN to not have to cure all the time will almost certainly want the same for SCH, on similar grounds.)

Well, scholar can only dedicate itself to one school of magic at a time, barring subjobs perhaps. People who come into play Dancer and Scholar purely for DD purposes are only going to set themselves up for disappointment. Dancer's design is very anti-WS, that is, unless they're granted TP-free WS somehow (which could be Kreigstanz).

Scholar was built to have a healer function, but also have a place in nuking. I know healing is going to be part of this gig and a big one, so I don't have a right to bitch about being invited to heal more than nuke. But I'll still nuke when I see a chance.

Of course, what we still don't know at this point what WotG EXP camps will hold. Everyone's assuming the trend of EXPing on T and VT mobs will hold. For all we know, Sanction might take a hit next week to move us out into the new zones or WotG mobs might give better EXP by default. If IT++ mobs are the EXP trend again, RDM will be more focused on enfeebling, PLD tanking will become more relevant again, WHM would probably get their healer spot back, etc.

Then there's our likely"Campaigne" buff we know nothing about. If it gives a strong incentive, this may also change the EXP situation, not to mention 30 high level zones could get people even more spread out for more EXP options - that's a lot more that CoP and ToA gave us. If people are still cramming themselves into the same three ToA camps after next week, that's just sad.

[Pteryx]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

Of course, what we still don't know at this point what WotG EXP camps will hold. Everyone's assuming the trend of EXPing on T and VT mobs will hold. For all we know, Sanction might take a hit next week to move us out into the new zones or WotG mobs might give better EXP by default. If IT++ mobs are the EXP trend again, RDM will be more focused on enfeebling, PLD tanking will become more relevant again, WHM would probably get their healer spot back, etc.

My concern is that Campaign is going to be what prevents WotG zones from harboring the camps that save FFXI. Part of what Campaign means, as far as I can tell, is that any WotG zone could be attacked at any time. That doesn't sound like something that allows for uninterrupted XP parties -- and I don't mean "uninterrupted" as in "chain infinity", either. These will be the first zones in which the game can suddenly smack you upside the head with an unsolicited change of activity from XPing to something you didn't intend to do.

No one hangs around in Al Zahbi unless a Besieged is building up. I have a sinking feeling, and I hope I'm wrong, that WotG zones will have the same problem despite the likely presence of good XP mobs in some of them. -- Pteryx

[Malacite]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

Well, the new "signet" is supposed to remove exp penalty from death (At least for Campaign anyway according to that Osaka report)

Also, there are imps in Castle Zvahl now in Wings (Further proof of Odin's influence ^^) so I'm curious how WotG imps will play out vs ToAU.

[Karinya]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

I hope WotG will weaken the Empire. With players too busy Campaigning or leveling their DNC to show up and defend the candy, it may fall into beastman hands more than once a month, and if that happens, sanction loses its bonuses *and* you can't warp to staging points. (IIRC.) Which obviously is going to have a big effect on the exp situation. Heck, just taking some players out of merit camps will let the beastman armies build up faster (I think) resulting in more common attacks, and if people are too busy playing with WotG content to go rescue generals in between attacks... Let alone if WotG gives people a good reason to set their homepoint somewhere other than Whitegate; the Empire is still a pain in the ass to get to if it isn't your homepoint (IIRC, the *best* way is to use your once-every-24-hours olduum ring, if you've bothered to quest it, and then use a chocobo whistle, if you've raised at least one chocobo to maturity, and ride from there to town. Everything else is worse, including if you don't qualify for that method or have already used it in the past 24 hours.)

We don't know what other balance changes SE may have in mind; they never talk about that stuff until they spring it on us. (With some good reasons, I admit.)

Don't go putting words in my mouth.

Sorry. The second half of that post was intended to be a generic "you" for all the people who want /WHM nerfed (don't you think we have enough of a healer shortage without nerfing the ones there are?) and jobs other than WHM to not "have" to heal. It was unclear that it wasn't about you personally, though. My bad.

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

Why the cool kids don't set HP in Whitegate anymore

Let alone if WotG gives people a good reason to set their homepoint somewhere other than Whitegate; the Empire is still a pain in the ass to get to if it isn't your homepoint (IIRC, the *best* way is to use your once-every-24-hours olduum ring, if you've bothered to quest it, and then use a chocobo whistle, if you've raised at least one chocobo to maturity, and ride from there to town. Everything else is worse, including if you don't qualify for that method or have already used it in the past 24 hours.)

That' a silly way to get around.

Set home point at home--home nation, that is. Then, pay 300 Gil to use the Warp NPC at home to get to Aht Urhgan Whitegate if that's where you want to go, or Outpost Teleports if you're heading out to Conquest zones. The worse case scenario is to having to go to Aht Urhgan to catch a tele-texi, which isn't all that bad.

Want to go to Jeuno? Bust out the Tavnazian Ring if you just need to use the Auction House, or use one of the Warp NPCs in Aht Urghan to go Jeuno.

Windurst (and the other, lesser nations) are the new Jeuno, my friend, without the unwashed masses to lag you into POL errors.

I hope WotG will weaken the Empire. With players too busy Campaigning or leveling their DNC to show up and defend the candy, it may fall into beastman hands more than once a month, and if that happens, sanction loses its bonuses *and* you can't warp to staging points. (IIRC.) Which obviously is going to have a big effect on the exp situation. Heck, just taking some players out of merit camps will let the beastman armies build up faster (I think) resulting in more common attacks, and if people are too busy playing with WotG content to go rescue generals in between attacks...

IIRC, the reason why S-E gave such a bonus to Sanction was to attract people to Aht Urhgan, fearing that people may be too glued to the old regions for exp'ing. (Thanks to all the people who roundly ignored CoP areas.) Though the company didn't say it, that also made financial sense; you have to buy the expansion to get to the new area, so it's good business sense to make the new area more attractive than the old area.

So, we can probably count on S-E scheming to get people out of Aht Urhgan, and move them into the new area, one way or another.

We don't know what other balance changes SE may have in mind; they never talk about that stuff until they spring it on us. (With some good reasons, I admit.)

Well, I think they want to rebalance the jobs (again).

The company kept promising major job re-balancing, and we keep lamenting it wasn't happening, or not happening fast enough--until the two-handed update. Now I'm throwing hissy fits at that "improvement" while at a significant portion the population probably wish people like me would just shut up and leave their good damage fast killing parties alone.

I look forward to the next balance change with dread at least equal to anticipation. x_x;

[Saren]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

the Empire is still a pain in the ass to get to if it isn't your homepoint (IIRC, the *best* way is to use your once-every-24-hours olduum ring, if you've bothered to quest it, and then use a chocobo whistle, if you've raised at least one chocobo to maturity, and ride from there to town. Everything else is worse, including if you don't qualify for that method or have already used it in the past 24 hours.)

Call of the wildcat quests, if you have done them, make getting to Whitegate fantastically easy now. The update for the warp was about 2 months ago now I think.

I would like to see healing skill more relevant but I don't think that /whm should be heavily nerfed. WHM is the only job in the whole game with status removal spells. Status effects like attack down or accuracy down are not fixable with items and seriously harm melee performance and whm or /whm are the only combinations that can remove those effects.

I honestly think that heavily reducing the power of /whm cures so that the only reason to sub whm is mp and status cures is just going to harm exp in general. I've never tried blu but I am guessing that heavily nerfed cures might main main heal blu a lot lot tougher. Even considering blm and smn being used in parties as their main jobs and not mp/whm or non main heal rdms the occasional cures and/or status removals that non main heal rdms and good /whm blms and smns throw out really help keep chains going.


Edit: Sorry for the repeat information I was eating lunch while I posted so was writing it for a long time

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

I honestly think that heavily reducing the power of /whm cures so that the only reason to sub whm is mp and status cures is just going to harm exp in general.

It'll hurt exp'ing for SMN more than anyone else.

SMN will become the new BLM--strictly for soloing, while dreaming about the good old days when you were wanted by parties. Except SMN was never really wanted by parties, just tolerated.

I've never tried blu but I am guessing that heavily nerfed cures might main main heal blu a lot lot tougher.

I don't think so, at least not over the "Cure" line of spells. With with Healing Breeze and Wild Carrot, BLU/WHM becomes a sufficient healer on its own at Lv.30. Granted it won't function as smoothly without full strength Cure II and Cure I, since Wild Carrot is closer to Cure III and would disrupt tanking at that level, but BLU can take a few hits anyway, and BLU curing spells have better MP efficiency than the Cures.

Heavily nerfing -na spells or hiking level requirements for them, however, would severely cripple all current /WHM healers, possibly even RDM. Utsusemi defense is useless against Imps without a constant supply of Silena, after all, unless everyone starts carrying 6+ stacks of Echo Drops.

So, yes, nerfing /WHM is a very bad idea. SMN have suffered enough already, let's not take their parties away, too.

[Ziero]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

I hope WotG will weaken the Empire. With players too busy Campaigning or leveling their DNC to show up and defend the candy, it may fall into beastman hands more than once a month, and if that happens, sanction loses its bonuses *and* you can't warp to staging points. (IIRC.) Which obviously is going to have a big effect on the exp situation. Heck, just taking some players out of merit camps will let the beastman armies build up faster (I think) resulting in more common attacks, and if people are too busy playing with WotG content to go rescue generals in between attacks... Let alone if WotG gives people a good reason to set their homepoint somewhere other than Whitegate; the Empire is still a pain in the ass to get to if it isn't your homepoint (IIRC, the *best* way is to use your once-every-24-hours olduum ring, if you've bothered to quest it, and then use a chocobo whistle, if you've raised at least one chocobo to maturity, and ride from there to town. Everything else is worse, including if you don't qualify for that method or have already used it in the past 24 hours.)

1) As said before, you can Warp to Whitegate from any city after a simple quest many people did before the ToAU expansion even hit.

2) You do not need the Ass Candy to use ruinic portals

3) There is a Choco lady by the Olduum spot you warp to, just like there's one by the Yhoat and Altep tele crystals.

And my guess, is that they'll re-adjust and slow down Besiege build ups once the new expansion hit so that the Ass Candy isn't stolen every two minutes.

[Mhurron]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

If IT++ mobs are the EXP trend again, RDM will be more focused on enfeebling, PLD tanking will become more relevant again, WHM would probably get their healer spot back, etc.

No, they just won't get used. If ToAU zones are easier, they will continue to be 'The Place' to get EXP/Merits. Wings zones will only be used if the mobs are even easier to get exp from or they buff up the mobs in ToAU zones to a more realistic level.

[Lmnop]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

I'm of the mindset that if a SMN's only real job was to use both BPs/minute and just rest in between, they'd still be able to back up heal. They'd end up playing very similarly to BLMs in the "days of old" -- sit for a while, stand up and do something impressive, chill. Be ready with -na's and back up cures. If any of you ever got to witness a good blm/whm in the 3 mage/3 melee days, you'd understand why blm/anything else was so shunned. My friend always beat the whms on status cures. Why? Nothing better to do. :3

'Bbq, the people I typically exp with know me too well. I typically provoke incoming mobs while the main tank's voke is still down from the one we're currently fighting. I also run with a Corsair a lot instead of a Bard. And you know that your Light Shot cannot compete with your Horde Lullaby. With less sleeping power, the ability to handle adds increases in importance. Shadows deliver. I also "main tank" a lot. I think I could fill this role as war/sam, and I'm slowly building the trust. But as is, I'm already a massive mp sink as war/nin main tanking. But the point is, we know my War/nin works very well. They trust me to do a lot that a lot of Warriors don't do. Most warriors don't even seem to have a provoke macro. I'm happy with my friends, but I don't have know enough people like me or Armando clones to really let loose with the things I'd like to see in action.

Not S-E's fault that I don't feel like wasting 6 of my 10 hours/week just looking for people crazy enough to waste their time with me? Hmm, sure. Ok. But there's a lot they could do to help me out.