Comments from the Devs

[miokomioko]

I imagine the boohoo'ing might have been greater if they made you automatically spending arrows and dealing damage by just being engaged. I think this is the better route of the two considering a melee class could avoid auto-attacking by turning around or creating any amount of distance between themselves and their target while Archers would be attacking something as soon as it came into their field of vision, whether they meant to or not.

Again, things can be adjusted and corrected further down the road. This is most definitely not the be all end all battle adjustment. It will probably work just fine for the time being until a single class can get the attention it needs.

[Corrderio]

I just don't see the ammo thing being a valid excuse. With every type of weapon having a delay I'd assume archers would have an AA speed of something like a Marauder or Lancer so running out of 999 arrows seems kind of rare unless you're on one hell of a grindfest. Even then should be the Archer's responsibility to keep an eye on their ammo and carry a spare stack or two.

As for the turning thing, unless they adjust it you always turn to the mob you have targeted when you attack them.

[miokomioko]

I think the strongest issue is that, if ranged attacks were automatic, if you were to engage a mob, you would immediately start attacking it without being able to buff yourself up and/or wait for party members like anyone else could.

With regards to ammo, I don't think it matters how much arrows cost, how much they stack to, or how competent one might expect a player to be. Ammunition is finite and it would be odd to have anything automatic expend a finite resource.

Personally, I would like to see some way of making arrows infinite (as a quiver type to fit in the sub-weapon slot, as mentioned before) and have a vast variety of arrow types with varying damage types, elements, ranges, speeds, etc. and implement an auto-attack for ranged attacks... toggle-able of course.

[Corrderio]

Well it's not really that hard to disengage. The server isn't THAT laggy.

Either way, there is a lot of negative feedback so maybe they'll consider doing something. Since if bare fist does any type of respectable damage I'll be surprised.

[miokomioko]

Well it's not really that hard to disengage. The server isn't THAT laggy.

I mean, it's a ranged attack... and if it were automatic, engaging an enemy at all pretty much guarantees that you would immediately commence shooting arrows at it... and with every action requiring active mode... it gets stupid.

[Corrderio]

True got me there, though I was used to it in XI with shadowbind of disengaging a second after using it. I do like Cutriss' post about it what to do. Ability to stay in active mode without fighting and a self buff for archers that don't move similar to Steadfast. Maybe an accuracy boost?

Speaking of disengage, is there a command to use in a macro to enter/exit active mode?

[qpoiuwer]

Why they didn't just let you press a button and pick which of your basic attacks you wanted to start autoattacking with is a mystery to me.

[Biggie]

.....so running out of 999 arrows seems kind of rare unless you're on one hell of a grindfest......

Lol I can tell you have never played ARC. They go much much faster than you would think......

[Corrderio]

Why they didn't just let you press a button and pick which of your basic attacks you wanted to start autoattacking with is a mystery to me.

That's what I thought they were doing at the start to. If I hit Light Thrust, my AA is Light Thrust, if I hit Pierce, Pierce becomes my AA, I press whatever attack I have in AA mode again I'm out of AA and just in active. Wouldn't be that hard to do and could fix some of the issues people complain about (IE: Bind/sleep)

Lol I can tell you have never played ARC. They go much much faster than you would think......

Haven't yet, but since I try to reserve stamina in case something goes wrong that could be it. Though I did carry about 5ish stacks on me when I leveled it.

[Jojimbo]

Wouldn't they have to have a button to start the AA? If it just went off whenever you were in active mode then I could see a fuckton of times where people hit a random nearby mobs while trying to target another.

Also if they don't give archer ranged AA then I wish they would keep stamina for their basic attacks, much better than a timer imo. There'd be no need to constantly spam the action to get the most DPS and haste would be easier to implement for it.

[Waraji]

Why's it people think that stamina≠timer. On average just by eyeballing them, they are both the same, both having a drawback/advantage.

I'm one of the people who is on the side of the fence that's For no Ranged AA. I don't want to attack automatically and for any reason run the risk of over aggroing (50 DKP Minus), disengaging is not an option because you shouldn't Have to for the sake of not attacking. Then there's the not so very popular Finite resource depletion. The only reason I enjoy Archer is because it makes me be more active than any of the other Melee classes, even more so after this patch. The fact that at least one of the classes has a "different play style" by default is something favorable to me down the road when every other class has AA, and just relying on "waiting" for TP to charge. *I may or may not have worded my thoughts fully as of right now.

[Kaylia]

Honestly I don't get it. You guys complain that it's "too similar to FFXI" yet you want Archers to weild daggers?
You shouldn't be in melee range as Archer to begin with.
Actually, now that I think about it, how are they going to keep Archers away from melee range? After the patch you get a free auto-attack and you can shoot as well.

I think people are more annoyed at the thought of not having close range weapons than not having daggers in particular. Forcing hunters to fights with their fist just make SE look lazy.

[Alkar]

I think people are more annoyed at the thought of not having close range weapons than having daggers. Forcing hunters to fights with their fist just make SE look lazy.

My point was that some are crying that this system is too similar to FFXI yet they want Archer to be exactly like Ranger from FFXI.

[Niiro]

It's entirely possible to create an AA system that would allow you to control what you attack and when.

I just think it's sad that despite this fact, which I'm sure everyone is aware of, we automatically assume SE would never successfully implement it.

And rightfully so, because they wouldn't.

[Alderaan]

My point was that some are crying that this system is too similar to FFXI yet they want Archer to be exactly like Ranger from FFXI.

Why in the world would anyone want that when ranger in XI was absolutely horrible? No traps, no pets, no ability to kite anything while doing damage. The class had no utility what so ever. Do people really want to just stand there spamming /ra? The class can't be fixed unless they get rid of animation locks. It's as simple as that. AA alone will not make it any more fun to play. Time to look at other MMO's that built the ranger/hunter class properly and go from there.

[Hyan]

Lol, in the end there's not really a problem other than the fact that they have more things to take care of than give archer a proper AA weapon that makes no more than an aesthetical difference at best. Hell, they could give them a mini-crossbow in their hand to act as one. Whatever.

Basic attacks are still an important source of damage in this game, and as such they wanted the ranged classes to be able to control their attacks directly.

[Foxer]

In any meaningful battle, Archer won't be meleeing at all... so what's all the crying about?

That's what I was saying. I don't play this, so it doesn't matter to me, but it seems that's what people are talking about lately.

If anything, AA shouldn't generate TP or RAs should be AA, or at the very least ranged based. Can you move and shoot in this game?

[Hyan]

Not in 1.18. After that it's hard to say.

[Jojimbo]

Why's it people think that stamina≠timer. On average just by eyeballing them, they are both the same, both having a drawback/advantage.

What do you mean by this? Stamina has the advantage that you don't feel the need to be spamming the /ra button everytime the /ra is going to be ready.

For instance you could have /ra cost 1 stamina and you regen 1 stamina over 5s, or /ra on a 5s timer.

With a stamina bar for basic attack(s) you could let the bar build up and spam attacks (faster than once every 5s; like you do atm) until you are out of stamina again; end result is you attacked as many times as you would if you had attacked once every 5s.

With a timer if you don't click the /ra after 5s you will lose out on that damage, there is no way to 'get it back' so you have to make sure it goes off every 5s for max DPS.

[Alkar]

Why in the world would anyone want that when ranger in XI was absolutely horrible? No traps, no pets, no ability to kite anything while doing damage. The class had no utility what so ever. Do people really want to just stand there spamming /ra? The class can't be fixed unless they get rid of animation locks. It's as simple as that. AA alone will not make it any more fun to play. Time to look at other MMO's that built the ranger/hunter class properly and go from there.

Ranger dominated the game early on, before SE nerfed them. The difference here is that you can run and shoot but the animation stops you unlike in XI where you have to stand still or you get an error message. If they remove the animation locks I can see it being a lot better.
Would be nice to see some abilities summoning pets like Ranger did in FF5 but I suppose that won't happen and if it does we'll have to wait for the Ranger job to show up.