FFXIV Patch 2.1 Press Interviews with Yoshida

[Obsidian]

He explained why, though. He literally explained that the current way players complete coil gets war straight-up destroyed on certain parts, and two places that can be singled out entirely are double-dreads and TT snakes. War had to get something to both stabilize the incoming damage and minimize the "spikiness" that apparently had healers straight up deciding that it wasn't worth dealing with when you can simply double-pld and blow through the content.

It makes perfect sense, and while there were other solutions they could have introduced (properly scaling IB heal, introducing ways for war to mitigate single or multiple hits - IE. forced parries), they went with giving war flat mitigation to keep the bars relatively stable while still allowing for solid damage and a decent amount of lifesteal.

If anything, I'm curious about the Dev team's initial tactics that allegedly didn't result in DPS going all out for most of the fights and warriors NOT getting outright lamblasted by certain abilities.

You missed my point completely.

There were options open to them other than just adding flat mitigation everywhere. Paladin's "unique" thing was raw mitigation. Warrior's thing was self-healing. He said that every job should have its own unique quality but they just ripped that uniqueness off of PLD and stapled it to WAR instead of working to make WAR's self-healing legitimately viable. Their chosen course of action directly contradicts their stated ideology. Now WAR has raw mitigation and self-healing. PLD is now not unique in any way (except for looking better than WAR). They absolutely were capable of adjusting WAR's recovery advantage (which they did anyway by moving the potency bonus to Defiance instead of Wrath) by tweaking Bloodbath, Inner Beast, Storm's Path/Eye and other abilities. Instead they chose to throw raw mitigation at the problem for no obvious reason other than because it was easier. If it works for PLD it'll work for WAR right?

It doesn't make perfect sense; it makes no sense in the context of their argument.

As far as how they were doing Coil, they probably constantly fed slimes to Caduceus, WAR was never really at a significant disadvantage in Turn 2 to begin with, and I assume that one of the changes they made before launch without properly testing was related to wave composition in Turn 4, because it's rough on PLDs holding both those Dreadnaughts, never mind a WAR.

[Lucavi]

Leaving it as is would have rendered it far less useful for progression than its counterpart. The fact that their mitigation doesn't scale or that their heals are very inconsistent means they're much less likely to be chosen for world 1st progression.

It's not that their hand was forced, they had a couple of huge design flaws that would be apparent during high-damaging content like Coil.

I thinks its very interesting to note that Yoshi understood that there was beginning to be an issue as early as HM Ifrit, where Pld was initially preferred outright due to the ability to reliably stun whenever it was needed. He didn't outright mention Titan this time, but he previously referenced HM titan's table flip as the beginning of where Pld begins to shine as a pure tank over War, due to the aforementioned reasons.

Based on the fact that they actually "get" the problems and issues that us players have been voicing, it leaves me a little more secure in the fact that the upcoming patch will do what is needed. There were many roads to travel to hit the same point (Players bringing a mix of tanks for the most efficient content clears, as per initial design), its good to see that the final destination will actually be reached.

@Obsidian: I didn't miss the point at all. He said that every job should be able to perform its given task. Warrior was supposed to be able to perform the given task of tanking end-game content, which it could not due based on how they tuned the encounters and based on how they designed the class (and do not cite the obligatory "I have a vid of a maxed out war solo-tanking things that a pld can solo tank with hoplite/DL") bullshit. The problem was not simply healer perception of said class, but a fundamental design error. This is said by the big man in charge.

Now yes, he absolutely stated that each job should be unique, but this comes second to each job being able to perform its assigned task. This was also stated by him. He also stated that these current War changes were not only intended to allow Wars to perform said tasks, but also to help reverse the current state of mind that War isn't worth bringing because of its instability. War would have still been unstable had they retained war's unique quality and refined it. War would still be getting shredded due to a lack of mitigation, even if they were restoring half a bar of HP per inner beast. This change wouldn't have saved war in certain situations, such as Death Sentence.

Now my issue with SE's decision stems only from this absurd belief that War is somehow too complicated to play. Perhaps it seems that way when compared to a Pld, but I swear to SE that Pld would ultimately be more complicated to play had it not been designed with such a large amount of flat mitigation that requires no imput to maintain.

Could we have seen some perfect world where Wars had properly-scaling IBs and a 33% damage leech from bloodlust, and overwhelming HP to the point where they literally cannot be one-shot by any mob in the game, therefore eliminating the potential for healers to be cheated out of healing them? Perhaps. This would obviously retain the challenge of playing War while also allowing for communication between a good tank and healer to result in a higher level of performance than some scrub on the streets.

Could we have also seen some perfect world where Pld maintains its flat mitigation, but must perform complex rotations to maintain it, thus increasing the complexity of the class while retaining its inherent advantage in flat-defensive tanking? Perhaps.

The point is that there are many roads to take, and SE took one. A road needed to be taken, however, before more content could be developed for the true end-game. That much is obvious to everyone.

[Elcura]

Perhaps if you tried reading a post before mashing reply, you would see that the person I was responding to specifically cited hybrids in 4-man content.

Holy shit dude. It's still pointless to have hybrids. If the only justification you can think of is 4 man trash content (oh I'm sorry, "faceroll" content) then see my earlier comment. Care to be stupid more?

[Spider-Dan]

When someone says "hybrids are useless in 4-man content" and I reply, "actually, hybrids excel in 4-man content," your response is "not endgame enough yo!"

Try responding to the actual item being discussed, not whatever you actually want to discuss.

[Voyage1970]

If anything, I'm curious about the Dev team's initial tactics that allegedly didn't result in DPS going all out for most of the fights and warriors NOT getting outright lamblasted by certain abilities.

Well they said they used a PLD/WAR tank team, so chances are they just didn't have the WAR maintank anything. As Obsidian stated Turn 1 was probably feed snakes the entire fight (even then WAR does fine w/o feeding as long as you focus down WARs once it gets to 3-4 stacks) and Turn 2 is equally annoying for both tanks, slight favor for PLD with Invicible though. Beyond those 2 the WAR isn't really needed to tank anything big so I could see why they thought WAR was fine.

What I don't get however is how they keep referring to us using PLD in a way they didn't think of. As far as I'm aware nothing we've done is beyond the ordinary as far as fights go. It's just that PLD cooldowns make a noticeable impact compared to WARs Vengeance, Foresight, Bloodbath, etc. How did they clear Turns 1-5 if they didn't use PLDs abilities like you normally would?

[Spider-Dan]

How did they clear Turns 1-5 if they didn't use PLDs abilities like you normally would?

they farmed mistmelts

[Seravi Edalborez]

The point I was making is that, based on what they said about hybrids, when they are added the Duty Finder 4man setup would CHANGE to

Tank DPS Hybrid Healer
8man would have 2 of each.

So yes, SCH is a nice "DPS/healer" hybrid, but it still only ever filled the healing slot. The hell would a 4man do with Tank DPS SCH WHM? An 8man with 2 SCHs and 2 WHMs?

[Lucavi]

That's what I'm wondering as well, Voyage. Pld doesn't need to do anything different. By virtue of flat mitigation, the only thing they could have done differently was... not using shield oath... for end game content?

I'm at a loss. The only thing I can think of is a possible "not tanking double dreads" scenerio, but that would imply that both war and pld are tanking equal mobs, which would rape the war in its current build.

[Elcura]

When someone says "hybrids are useless in 4-man content" and I reply, "actually, hybrids excel in 4-man content," your response is "not endgame enough yo!"

Try responding to the actual item being discussed, not whatever you actually want to discuss.

So wait...

I say hybrids are trash, someone elaborates on that, you say hybrids are good at 4-man trash and I say good job at dedicating yourself to a job that only excels at trash

And somehow that isn't relevant? Like I said, be stupid more, because you cannot follow a conversation to save your life.

[Spider-Dan]

So I guess the takeaway from your no-hybrids position is that COR was a useless job, as its primary outstanding feature (Corsair's Roll) was only valuable vs. trash meripo.

What percentage of weekly playtime is against "trash," again?

[Lucavi]

Wasn't brd a better buffer and Rng a better DPS than Cor? Did people ever use Cor over a Rng for damage or a Brd for support?

Honest question, as I don't remember too many cor Main's experiences in HNM or end-game content. I know they were the shit for merit parties, though.

[Rocl]

pretty sure Corsair's outstanding features were buffing things previously unavailable to players through means other than equipment (directly buffing crit, store tp, double attack; though avatar's favor allowed another job to do so many years later)

[Rocl]

that said i keep coming back to this thread to see if there's more interview pls tell me there is more

[Kelenae]

I think you guys just ran with bad COR's because they were awesome.

[Kelenae]

that said i keep coming back to this thread to see if there's more interview pls tell me there is more

Please look forward to it.

[Elcura]

So I guess the takeaway from your no-hybrids position is that COR was a useless job

Oh lawd. XI and XIV are different games with different demographics and goals, stop being retarded and trying to turn this argument into a clusterfuck like you always do.

If your job is only good against trash content you're playing a shit job. Even your justification of hybrid jobs is shit, which is why I made fun of you because you are very funny. So good work on trying to further justify their shit existence.

AND I'M NOT SPEAKING ABOUT XI OR COR SPECIFICALLY. Just incase you decide to be an idiot like always.

[Lucavi]

pretty sure Corsair's outstanding features were buffing things previously unavailable to players through means other than equipment (directly buffing crit, store tp, double attack; though avatar's favor allowed another job to do so many years later)

Thanks; I forgot that they had some seriously amazing unique buffs. I remember the TP and crit ones in ballista.

[The Blackrose]

Oh lawd. XI and XIV are different games with different demographics and goals, stop being retarded and trying to turn this argument into a clusterfuck like you always do.

If your job is only good against trash content you're playing a shit job. Even your justification of hybrid jobs is shit, which is why I made fun of you because you are very funny. So good work on trying to further justify their shit existence.

AND I'M NOT SPEAKING ABOUT XI OR COR SPECIFICALLY. Just incase you decide to be an idiot like always.

Oi, pricks. Get your lover's quarrel the fuck out of here.

[Obsidian]

The point is that there are many roads to take, and SE took one. A road needed to be taken, however, before more content could be developed for the true end-game. That much is obvious to everyone.

My point is that the path they chose flies in the face of their stated design philosophy, and it was chosen for no discernible reason.

You quoted my original comment and went off on a discussion parallel to the point I was making because whenever WAR is mentioned you seem to feel obligated to point out that it needs adjusting. The observation was not about why they are adjusting WAR, but how they are adjusting it, and more specifically, that the direction they took those adjustments is one that is completely opposite to their stated design philosophy as it pertains to job and class distinction. (As an aside: the idea floating around that WARs deserve some sort of restitution is ridiculous, and the notion that PLDs deserve to play second string to WAR for a while is equally absurd. I'm not saying you or anyone here specifically carries this attitude, but since I'm already tangential to my actual point of discussion, I figured I may as well nip this in the bud while I'm at it.)

To extrapolate from there (and to avoid and further deviation from my original comment), they've now created a situation where two jobs fulfil their primary role the same way and which one gets used will be determined by who does their secondary role better instead of which one you prefer the look of. Given the precedent set by the eleven or so years of "battle adjustments" in FFXI, I have very little faith they can maintain balance between two jobs that do the same thing the same way (one of which already does more damage than the other). To touch on my other observation, my concerns could have been assuaged somewhat had Square expounded upon all their planned adjustments instead of outlining sweeping, potent changes to Warrior while leaving Paladins to suffer flashbacks of 1.0 and Bards to have an anxiety attack over what cross-class abilities are being revoked (and MNKs to wonder what the hell "increasing the effect" of Greased Lightning means). Instead, I'm stuck waiting for a Live letter that isn't even broadcast in a language I understand. Nor are these interviews ever conducted in English, for that matter.

[Spider-Dan]

In 75 era, COR had the single best meripo buff in the game: Corsair's Roll. Additionally, they could deal ~35-40% the damage of a DD while providing other useful buffs.

The point is that during the 75 era, COR was really only good at meripo grinding, which is no different than grinding AK/WP myth in this game. If there were a job introduced tomorrow that had absolutely no purpose but to obliterate everyone else in weekly myth grinding, that job would instantly become the most frequent LV50 job across all characters.

The idea that excelling at sub-top-raid content is meaningless is dumb. If hybrids are great at AK/WP/equivalent, they are valuable.