Balance between DPS jobs

[Wiseman40]

From what I can tell, SE does a fair job of balancing. I say this mostly because I rarely see people complaining. However, it begs a few questions:

If DPS jobs are balanced, why so many black mages?

On Hades, the number of black mages is about the same as the combined total of all the other dps jobs (at level 75) excluding thf (not sure if that's really a dps job) and war (again not sure if it's considered dps).

There are plenty of warriors and thieves...

I guess there are other things about being a warrior and thief that people like. Thieves are great for skill chains. Warriors can tank and do dps pretty well.

Black mages are not only first rate dps (because of high numbers as well as variety of damage types) but can also warp, heal a bit with /whm, teleport at high levels etc. They're often the first pick for a dps slot in a party it seems.

That's likely why there are so many of them!

Alright, so why be another dps job? I'm headed down the road to dark knight at the moment, which has arguably one job (dps). Sure it can enfeeble but not as well as other jobs.

I'm a little disheartened that in order to do the dps job with drk I'd need /thf.

As such I'm giving serious thought to doing blm, or perhaps leveling mnk. (I have mnk at 20, war at 14).


Monks I hear have great dps at high levels. So do summoners, dark knights, samurai, ranger, etc... but there are very few of those on my server compared to black mage.

Am I missing something? Please discuss this a little so I can better understand the dps role and the distribution of players into these jobs on servers. I'd like to understand why some are so unpopular and others are very popular when there is balance.

[Coinspinner]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

Percieved balance and actual balance are usually not in synch.

Lots of rangers migrated when they were no longer uber.

Black mage was popular even when they were considered "weak".

Black mage is easy to play and equip adequately.

[/cryptic]

[kuu]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

Blackmage are good in HNM/large scale fights.

Elemental + low TP gain + long range.

Otherwise, they're like another job

[Karinya]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

Well, you're somewhat right about fads, but BLM really is enormously powerful in almost all endgame content (HNMs, Dynamis) and BCNM/missions. In exp they're not really any better than physical DD on average (depends on mob type) but in endgame stuff they're really, really sick.

So, in short, there isn't really balance between DPS jobs, in general; only in specific circumstances (i.e. exp parties). The systematic differences between exp and other sorts of content (such as relative monster level, kiting, multiple mobs at once) strongly favor BLM over all other DD.

[Smasholays]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

BLM is versatile. It can do high end damage, heal, sleep, stun, and debuff the mob - except for the gimpy blm who sub smn...

They also don't take as much damage penalty against something IT (XP mob) as a melee will. Pretty much the damage they can do on TW is the damage they can do on IT unless resists.

People tend to migrate to the job that does the most damage the most efficently. Warrior/nin, MNK, and Sam have all become popular since RNG nerf. Nin can do great damage on it's own at 75, and can usually never get hit if they have haste/double march. Of course, some people don't want to be melee, and some don't want to be mages, and others don't care as long as they can deal the most damage. And when you have war/nin, monk, or BLM parties pulling in 8-9K+ an hour, can you really blame them?

[Jei]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

Some hard battles, you can win in less than 10 seconds with an army of blm...
kinda cool, but don't mention balancing...

[Omni]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

Some hard battles, you can win in less than 10 seconds with an army of blm...
kinda cool, but don't mention balancing...

yea seriously... wtf is the balance in that.

army of blm can destory Ark Angels.
1 blm/rdm can solo ks30 6 scorpions via sleep/nuke tactics.
a pt of blm can be the ultimate crowd control team for hnm.
and remember the early battles against jailor of love? it was won mainly by having some 80 blms nuking it to kingdom come.

job balance is a tough thing to handle. sooner or later, players will always find a way to exploit a job.

but yea, blm is so popular b/c its easy to lvl, upkeep is fairly reasonable and rewarding in the fact that you get to drop some big numbers.

[Wiseman40]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

Some hard battles, you can win in less than 10 seconds with an army of blm...
kinda cool, but don't mention balancing...

Hey... that actually sounds like a lot of fun. 0_0

Almost makes me want to be a blm so I can gather an army of my peers and bring down some ridiculous enemy.

Could the same thing be done with an alliance monks using chi blast? I hear about very high damage from that.


You could get 24 monks to chi on some monster at the same time and it should die... especially if they've been building up the chi for three minutes.

[Omni]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

Hey... that actually sounds like a lot of fun. 0_0

Almost makes me want to be a blm so I can gather an army of my peers and bring down some ridiculous enemy.

Could the same thing be done with an alliance monks using chi blast? I hear about very high damage from that.


You could get 24 monks to chi on some monster at the same time and it should die... especially if they've been building up the chi for three minutes.

yes you can. there is a video out there of 18 mnks taking on 5 ark angels. they sleep tp themselves first, then max boost, and let it rip. i think the first one they raped was AA Mithra, you just see her hp bar go from full to dead in about 3 seconds. then every mnk drops asuran fist on the same AA, rise and repeat. i think they got wiped once... but all had reraise hairpins, got up, healed, tp, boost and finished the rest off.

[Armando]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

You know what I've always wanted to see but I've never even heard of? Some hardcore Meikyo Shisui abuse. 18 SAMs build up 100 TP using the Opo-Opo Necklace + Sleep Potion method, then make full use of that, Meditate, Meikyo Shisui, and an Icarus Wing to unleash some glorious 108-WS-long barrage, dancing all over the skillchain chart. In the end it's not that different from 18 WARs abusing Mighty Strikes + WS, 18 MNKs using Hundred Fists and Chi Blast, or even 18 DRKs abusing Blood Weapon + Souleater + WS, but it'd certainly be more visually impressive (except maybe for 18 MNKs going into a nonstop attacking frenzy, that must be fun to watch.)

[Omni]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

lol, 18 sam meikyo shisui would be glorious!
like they can demonstrate every skill chain type possible!

[Armando]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

Exactly! It'd be the biggest lights show FFXI has ever seen! In fact, if anything, there's too many WS and way too many little skillchains to be done with that many SAMs.

[Omni]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

id love to see gravitation done over and over again. its my favorite looking renkei but... next to never used. even on toramas, like the ONLY mob that stone based atks are great against, people still want to use some form of water/distortion based atk -_- makes no sense i tell ya!

[Armando]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

I think I've only done Gravitation once...I remember being impressed at the animation, but I can't even recall what it was like Pity, too, if anything, it's good for bursting Drain. Fragmentation is my personal favorite. I love how the crystal shatters just before all the damage is done, and I tend to associate it with SA Sturmwind XD

P.S. I think we just successfully hijacked the thread.

[Lmnop]

Re: Balance between DPS jobs

To OP:

DRK shouldn't sub thf 'til the last 10 level of the game, so you're fine in that department. Their job is damage and enfeebling. What people forget is that dark knight enfeebles aren't the same ones you'll see other jobs doing better. Theirs are one-of-a-kind. That said, they do seem to perish in the night at higher levels. =(

Monk will always have insane DoT, but many people (like myself) can't stand partying with them because it pretty much always means no skillchain. They have extremely few attractive SC options (read: forces either opener or closer to use a WS they'd rather shy away from, or mob won't be weak against the good ones.) I've come to realize via my parser, that a monk is a black mage that can't heal. Normally, you need 3 melee (tank + 2DD) to make a balanced party. But if you have a whm + rdm or something similar (good back-up curing potential), monk really does become the new BLM. What else did I think about while reading this?

yea, if you want damage and don't care about SCs, you want Monk, Warrior (to some extent. Really only at earlier levels.), or Beastmaster (same thing as war).
If you want high damage as well as SC participation, you're looking at rng, thf, drg (rediculously potent, always has been). The more oddball jobs are Sam and Drk, as they both fall into the above category but with gimmicks. Drk will never outDD a decent War or Drg, but they have their enfeebles to offer and devastating chain ending potential with Souleater. Samurai also will never hit Ranger level damage, but of course, their SC options make them extremely desirable. They're also heartier than DRG at taking a beating and make for a thief's best friend at times. After all of that, if you want to consistently be a desired and sought after DD, you're right to go blm. But you should know that S-E keeps alluding to a blm nerf.


About Meikyo Shisui:
I've wanted to see that for a long time, but about SCing -- it occured to me that one long SC would get the alliance whiped out. Even if they were good enough to coordinate a cross-continental SC, they wouldn't live long enough. 90+ WSs is just way too much time for retaliation. If they were all /nin I guess it's plausible that one sam will get hate from his chain. and as soon as his stops (he'll be taking a beating by the time he's done), someone else starts and tears hate off of him with fresh shadows. I know... exactly 2 samurai talented enough for it, and 1 of them is lazy and selfish and prolly wouldn't do it.

A hate to say it, but they'd have a much higher survival rate if they all just did all their SCs at the same time and got Random SCs here and there.