Comments from the Devs

[Siatdiat]

Why do people think balance doesn't matter or shouldn't be focused on at all for classes/jobs? They could have 50 jobs in the game, but as long as they have the people who make encounters, the people who design the jobs, and the people in charge of itemization on the same page, there will be 100x the balance going on than what we have now. Additionally, there are other ways to pull a class onto even ground with others than equalizing healing/tanking/dps ability. Giving a melee class/job an attack power or crit+ buff goes a long way to make them wanted for endgame. Just make it unstackable, so one of them will improve everyones dps, but two of them would be superfluous. CC options i.e. sleep, bind, and kiting ability wouldn't hurt either, which sadly are wasted on single battle type encounters. I'm not arguing that they shouldn't attempt to make different types of jobs on par for their specific duty, only that a minute percentage difference is not going to break a job or class if they are more creative in other methods of balance.

I think that the current few endgame encounters are designed in a vacuum where they do not consider what the current classes in game are capable of or how they can shine. I also don't see much sign of them having improved itemization. I don't think changing classes or jobs is a bad thing at all and not arguing against it, but there are problems that come up with it that need to be adressed in some manner rather than ignored. I haven't seen any steps to correct any of them.

FFXIV has all the potential in the world to be a great game. There is no reason it won't be other than lack of insight and ability from SE. Insight and ability doesn't mean "make it like wow dawg" either.

[Lucavi]

It's more than that.

In class-locked games, slight variances in balance mean you might bitch and moan, but you still work with it; you have too much invested in a character (be it exclusive gear, crafting levels, faction status, area access, etc.) to simply reroll after each patch.

In FF, if one job is slightly better than another, and you have them both leveled, you simply change jobs. The threshold for "unbalanced" is made incredibly small; if people who have multiple jobs leveled all switch to the job that is 2% better, the end result is that the 2%-worse job is now considered "useless."

Ignoring your other tripe, do you really believe this? Honestly? You think the days of Arrowburn were that simple? Monkburn? The days of OP sams? The current OP War issues? You think it was anything close to a 2% difference? Perhaps in a game with shitty boss encounters with terrible (as long as we stun and cast utsu, we win!) mechanics, your dream world scenario wins, but not in reality. You still don't understand that people want to play the job they want to play, and that changing jobs, even when its is available, isn't always the option that people want to take, as it allows devs to be lazy in terms of not only balancing jobs, but developing future content. But yes, I'd expect a career Ranger to not understand a simple concept such as this, given the long, LONG era of Ranger dominance you enjoyed.

Also, your ignorance is showing through your shirt again. If you can honestly type into your keyboard that all MMOs must be a WoW clone to be successful, then I don't know what to tell you, as you'll never understand. It has nothing to do with "Copying WoW" and everything to do with "Making sense with your design philosophies". You can't separate that from WoW, however, because WoW actually made sense with quite a few of their encounters and philosophies. Tell me how many XIV has made sense with. Please tell me; I can't wait to hear it.

I find it interesting that you claim that SE failed to learn from the lessons of its past. What, exactly, did it fail to learn from, if you're going to attribute everything that people enjoy in modern MMOs as a "WoW clone"? By your (admittedly absurd) logic, SE is humming along at full steam, given just how eerily similar XIV is to XI. What lessons, then, should they have learned from XI to XIV? We're playing a re-skinned, next-gen version (graphically, at least) of XI. Where's your problem with that, genius?

[Spider-Dan]

Here is an interview with one of the top guild in WoW that illustrate what you think doesn't happen.
http://www.mmo-champion.com/content/...way-Blue-Posts

This doesn't really address my point. When you are talking about one of the "top guilds," they necessarily select for the people who are willing to maintain several separate characters. It's the equivalent of dual-boxers in XI.

The fact that it's even worth mentioning in an interview that in a "top guild," each member has "2 to 4" classes at cap tells you something right there. In elite XI LSes, a person with four LV75s was unexceptional.

The differences between "job changes" and "alt" is purely technical, and given a proper gameplay, they could be the exact same. It has nothing to do with game balance. The biggest difference between both is typically loot distribution, but it could be solved easily by allowing people to trade the gears they win to "alt". There is also things like inventory, achievements, what you have to repeat, etc, but in every cases, it's just a question of game design.

Um, yes, it's a question of game design, and class-locked games are not designed to let you share progression among multiple characters. That's the point.

I mean, if you're arguing that someone could make a game where alts share progression on gear, factions, achievements, etc., sure, I agree. Hypothetically, someone could make a game where you could instantly switch to your alt class by walking back to town (or maybe just by changing your weapon) and keep all of your other progression fully intact.

[Alym]

Ignoring your other tripe, do you really believe this? Honestly? You think the days of Arrowburn were that simple? Monkburn? The days of OP sams? The current OP War issues? You think it was anything close to a 2% difference? Perhaps in a game with shitty boss encounters with terrible (as long as we stun and cast utsu, we win!) mechanics, your dream world scenario wins, but not in reality. You still don't understand that people want to play the job they want to play, and that changing jobs, even when its is available, isn't always the option that people want to take, as it allows devs to be lazy in terms of not only balancing jobs, but developing future content. But yes, I'd expect a career Ranger to not understand a simple concept such as this, given the long, LONG era of Ranger dominance you enjoyed.

Also, your ignorance is showing through your shirt again. If you can honestly type into your keyboard that all MMOs must be a WoW clone to be successful, then I don't know what to tell you, as you'll never understand. It has nothing to do with "Copying WoW" and everything to do with "Making sense with your design philosophies". You can't separate that from WoW, however, because WoW actually made sense with quite a few of their encounters and philosophies. Tell me how many XIV has made sense with. Please tell me; I can't wait to hear it.

I find it interesting that you claim that SE failed to learn from the lessons of its past. What, exactly, did it fail to learn from, if you're going to attribute everything that people enjoy in modern MMOs as a "WoW clone"? By your (admittedly absurd) logic, SE is humming along at full steam, given just how eerily similar XIV is to XI. What lessons, then, should they have learned from XI to XIV? We're playing a re-skinned, next-gen version (graphically, at least) of XI. Where's your problem with that, genius?

^This is spot on. This is the key point here.

If the ability to change jobs meant that everything could/should stay unbalanced then everyone would just change to the best job after every patch. I find that ridiculous. If I don't enjoy that class, I either play alone as a class I like or play with others on a class I dislike. I play MMOs to have fun with others and if the balance issues mean I no longer have fun or don't get to play with others then what's the point of playing? Being able to change classes is no substitute for balance. Ever.

[Spider-Dan]

Ignoring your other tripe, do you really believe this? Honestly? You think the days of Arrowburn were that simple? Monkburn? The days of OP sams? The current OP War issues? You think it was anything close to a 2% difference? Perhaps in a game with shitty boss encounters with terrible (as long as we stun and cast utsu, we win!) mechanics, your dream world scenario wins, but not in reality.

So let's talk about reality. Aren't you the guy that's always bitching about how FF PvE is so mindless and stupid? How the entirety of XI was just "utsu and stun"?

So if that was the REALITY, and every encounter is so brain-dead that every job can win easily, WTF is the balance problem? If all jobs can easily win every encounter, THERE IS NO BALANCE PROBLEM, by definition.

Also, your ignorance is showing through your shirt again. If you can honestly type into your keyboard that all MMOs must be a WoW clone to be successful, then I don't know what to tell you, as you'll never understand.

You must like playing games where, you know, no one plays. The days of having packed servers for unbalanced games are over. You can talk about variety all you want, but the proof is in the pudding. Look at how many "unbalanced" MMOs are thriving today. Thriving, not proudly toting some "niche market" status, as Draylo so eloquently put it.

So I guess when you made this statement, you were actually saying that SE should implement more features from the "thriving" Korean grindfests? Or were you just making another one of your countless appeals to WoW?

It has nothing to do with "Copying WoW" and everything to do with "Making sense with your design philosophies". You can't separate that from WoW, however, because WoW actually made sense with quite a few of their encounters and philosophies.

Of course, since you define "making sense" as "doing what earns the most subscriptions," your logic is completely tautological; whatever WoW does has to make the most sense because it was the most successful.

I would love to hear you explain how any enemy encounter in an MMO empirically makes more sense than another. I particularly look forward to the part where you explain healing magic, "friendly" AoE attacks, and projectile vs. melee damage.

What, exactly, did it fail to learn from, if you're going to attribute everything that people enjoy in modern MMOs as a "WoW clone"?

Such a line of argument would be more convincing if you yourself weren't continually referencing WoW as the example of How It's Done Right at every opportunity. If you don't actually believe that cloning WoW is the way to go, why do you keep referring to WoW?

[Spider-Dan]

If the ability to change jobs meant that everything could/should stay unbalanced then everyone would just change to the best job after every patch.

While "change to another job" is an option, that's only part of the picture.

When players can easily change jobs on a whim, small imbalances result in a mass exodus. In a class-locked game, you'd have to switch to an alt and suspend your progression on your main.

[miokomioko]

While "change to another job" is an option, that's only part of the picture.

When players can easily change jobs on a whim, small imbalances result in a mass exodus. In a class-locked game, you'd have to switch to an alt and suspend your progression on your main.

I don't think you're looking at the big picture when the average player most likely does not just simply go level another class or buy another fucking character. They continue to play what they like to play and just complain and/or struggle with the community preference because having fun is their top priority in a video game... not efficiency.

[Cichy]

Most of the community bitched that they want super hard fight which as with XI ended up favoring certain classes.
There is no question that there need to be fights that can be done with mix of classes as this flavor of the month shit is getting ridiculous. I would really like to hear Yoshi's view on this.

[Spider-Dan]

I don't think you're looking at the big picture when the average player most likely does not just simply go level another class or buy another fucking character. They continue to play what they like to play and just complain and/or struggle with the community preference because having fun is their top priority in a video game... not efficiency.

That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that in order to preserve balance (in a non-class-locked game), the jobs must be even enough that it's not worth the time for someone who has multiple classes leveled to simply change classes. (And let's be clear: the vast majority of the people bitching about balance have multiple classes leveled.)

In a class-locked game, there is an incentive to stay on your "main" because your progression will go to your primary character. In FF, there is no such pressure; it's easy to change to the flavor of the month. That makes the comparison of what actual "balance" is completely different between the two types of games.

[Celeras]

Oh, XIV has certainly failed... but not because they didn't copy WoW enough. Tanaka was bent on ignoring the lessons that SE learned from XI.

Do you enjoy spewing bullshit, or are you just genuinely retarded? The vast majority of problems stem directly from Tanaka going through extreme lengths to fix things that were wrong with XI.

-Kite strategies for everything? Ranged attacks for all, and retarded leash mechanics.
-People over camping with numbers and swapping people in/out of alliance? Can't do anything in combat.
-Overpowered subjobs and no class balance? Everybody can equip everything, both ability and gear-wise.
-Not casual friendly? Fucking fatigue.
-Camp competition? Invisible leve mobs.

All terrible fucking ideas stemmed from Tanaka being a retard, and attempting to do the exact opposite of 'ignore what happened in XI'.

[miokomioko]

the comparison of what actual "balance" is completely different between the two types of games.

Completely? I don't think so. Slightly? Maybe.

If you're going to make huge, general arguments... you should probably keep in mind there's a whole spectrum of players outside of "hardcore." The lack of balance in a class-switching class still means the world to someone who doesn't have the time to level more than one or two classes.

[Dein]

That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that in order to preserve balance (in a non-class-locked game), the jobs must be even enough that it's not worth the time for someone who has multiple classes leveled to simply change classes. (And let's be clear: the vast majority of the people bitching about balance have multiple classes leveled.)

In a class-locked game, there is an incentive to stay on your "main" because your progression will go to your primary character. In FF, there is no such pressure; it's easy to change to the flavor of the month. That makes the comparison of what actual "balance" is completely different between the two types of games.

Those two bolded sentences make absolutely no sense together. What you just described as balance for a "non-class locked game" is the exact same kind of class balance all games strive for, regardless of how easy it is to change your class.

[Spider-Dan]

The lack of balance in a class-switching class still means the world to someone who doesn't have the time to level more than one or two classes.

...but not when every encounter in the game is so simplistic that every class can easily complete it, which is the other common complaint of the WoWers.

If you are arguing for a world where there is no class hierarchy and all classes are equally welcome... you're asking for something that has never happened, and never will.

[miokomioko]

I never said I was asking for anything. Don't assume. You're the one claiming there's a "mass exodus" when a class gets outshined... which is not true. Perhaps in your average endgame guild/linkshell/etc. but not for everyone else.

[Spider-Dan]

The vast majority of problems stem directly from Tanaka going through extreme lengths to fix things that were wrong with XI.

I'm not talking about his misguided solutions to fix what he saw as "problems" in XI (like client-side UI). I'm talking about his dismissal of lessons that were already learned through many years of tweaking by the XI team.

Retail XIV was unquestionably several steps back from contemporary XI. That's a failure to learn the most basic of lessons from your own product.

[Crab_Cake]

I thought FFXI was fine for the most part. You can win nearly any event with most job setups (well any setup with healers, tanks, and DDs).

Some jobs were really overpowered at times but that wasn't really a problem with the job system itself but with SE being a bit slow to adjust things.

As for burn parties (arrow burn, manaburn, etc)? It really depends on the event. If it's exp party manaburn, I don't think it's a big deal because that type of party is rare and noncompetitive with other types of exp parties (at least unlike ToAU bird parties).

With the release of ToAU, jobs with piercing damage were typically favored over any other job. That sort of problem can easily be fixed (make the birds take no bonus damage from anything or introduce a new camp).

As for job stacking in like events, BCNM, it depends if the fight is just as winnable with any other party setup.

A quick fix solution would be to simply give a penalty to stacking certain jobs (maybe reduced damage output and/or increased damage taken and/or reduced time limit) or give bonuses to parties with no job stacking. Of course that's not the most desirable solution but it can work if no other solution is found (it could at least prevent job stacking if done right).

FFXI's job system hasn't really been tested that much, so it's too early to shoot the system down.

SE was just slow with the balance regarding FFXI. It took SE around 3 years before they decided to significantly buff PUP, so it's not that it's impossible to balance but simply that SE (well the old team) was a bit too conservative with balance changes (remember that it took long for PUP to get any changes because they were afraid that increasing H2H cap would make PUP overpowered).

Actually if SE was less afraid of overpowering jobs (most noticeably any pet job, DNC, and a few others), then a lot of balance problems in the past would have been minimized.

With Yoshida now charge (for FFXIV), I can imagine the balance in FFXIV to be much better (at least once everything is in place after 2.0. It's not balanced now because things are still being prepared for jobs to be introduced and lots of other stuff being prepared for a revamp in general).

[Kaylia]

This doesn't really address my point. When you are talking about one of the "top guilds," they necessarily select for the people who are willing to maintain several separate characters. It's the equivalent of dual-boxers in XI.

The fact that it's even worth mentioning in an interview that in a "top guild," each member has "2 to 4" classes at cap tells you something right there. In elite XI LSes, a person with four LV75s was unexceptional.

I don't understand how your brain function. You're making up so many assumptions in your post that I'm not even sure where to start...or if I should even bother since it's not even related to the point you were trying to make in the first place.

(WoW info you had wrong)

Spoiler: show

WoW and FFXI are fundamentally different for multiples reason. For one, leveling a character in WoW is a joke, and because of that, most players will have many leveled to max level (not just top guild). However, since your progress is constantly "outdated", you lose all the time invested in your character every 4-5 months unless you keep it at the top. If you're looking at the "semi-hardcore" players, they generally have more classes at max level than they did in FFXI, but will only use 1 or 2 per update/expansion. You also have to consider that every characters has 3 specs that can fill multiples roles, and that the overall games balanced is much better, reducing the need to of very specific strategy.

But back to the original topic, how is it related to game balance? Playerbase is going to adapt to the game environment they are put in. How "job change" is handled by the game is obviously going to have an impact on how you approach certain events, but it's retarded to look at this exclusively. It's only one of the many factors that need to be considered. I gave you WoW as an example because I change my character in the middle of a raid more often than I did in FF, and it takes about 30 seconds to do so (logout -> login-> get summoned). It's not that rare.



In the end, what truly matter is the amount of effort players will have to invest to be efficient, and how rewarding/fun it is for hardcore, semi-hardcore and casual players. You can't look at one thing and say "balanced" isn't needed.

Um, yes, it's a question of game design, and class-locked games are not designed to let you share progression among multiple characters. That's the point.

I mean, if you're arguing that someone could make a game where alts share progression on gear, factions, achievements, etc., sure, I agree. Hypothetically, someone could make a game where you could instantly switch to your alt class by walking back to town (or maybe just by changing your weapon) and keep all of your other progression fully intact.

Get FFXI out of your skull. Your concept of "progression" relies entirely of what you have seen in that game, but like I tried to explain, different games design don't require that. There is also many way to counter the issues that arise for both models.

"Multiple classes" vs "alt" shouldn't be a debate at all, all that matter for balance is the whole picture and how everything is implemented in relation to everything else.

[Lucavi]

I don't think you're looking at the big picture when the average player most likely does not just simply go level another class or buy another fucking character. They continue to play what they like to play and just complain and/or struggle with the community preference because having fun is their top priority in a video game... not efficiency.

I don't think he looks at any big picture that isn't a conglomeration of "SE's not perfect, but I'll be damned if we do anything that isn't SE". Every "rebuttal" he made was simply a mismash of "well yeah, but its not WoW or Korean at least!", which is stupid.

The bottom line is that if SE's systems were better than the current systems that have attracted millions, SE's products would have attracted millions. How many millions did SE's latest product attract?

Get XI out of your goddamned head and look at XIV. Look at what SE brought out for the current, modern market. Look how well it did. Look at how well its currently doing. You can talk a fat game about all that it "might" do in the future and what "might" be coming via 2.0, but I seem to remember quite a few other failures of MMOs that talked big and crashed hard. Lets talk about 2.0 when 2.0 arrives.

Your points are a joke and so are you, at this point.

[Spider-Dan]

However, since your progress is constantly "outdated", you lose all the time invested in your character every 4-5 months unless you keep it at the top. If you're looking at the "semi-hardcore" players, they generally have more classes at max level than they did in FFXI, but will only use 1 or 2 per update/expansion.

So then, they have "1-2" characters that they keep up to date, and (may have) a bunch of other alts that they don't? How is that any different from what I said?

But back to the original topic, how is it related to game balance? Playerbase is going to adapt to the game environment they are put in. The way "classes change" is handled by the game is obviously going to have an impact on how you approach certain events, but it's retarded to look at this exclusively. It's only one of the many factors that need to be considered.

That's correct; it is one of many factors. Another factor is that when you don't allow cross-class abilities, it's a lot easier to balance classes because there are less variables involved.

FF allows you to use skills from completely different classes; other games (ahem) don't even allow you to have (simultaneous) access to all of the skills available to your own class. Variety vs. balance.

[Spider-Dan]

The bottom line is that if SE's systems were better than the current systems that have attracted millions, SE's products would have attracted millions. How many millions did SE's latest product attract?

You're right; the best products are those that sell the most copies. Oh, wait, you mean only in this case, right?

Seriously, do you have any argument to make besides "scoreboard"? I'm still waiting for you to even address the success of grindfest MMOs.