2.1 Patch Notes

[Fojoop]

The devs are completely out of touch with their own game. Buff the #1 DPS by 10-15%, nerf the DPS that was competing with it by ~10%, nerf cross-class skills for no reason, overbuff Warrior when someone who has played the game for 5 minutes could see that the Warrior buffs are completely overboard, completely overbuff DRG, nerf BLM for no reason, buff lustrate which is already tons better than benediction for no reason, change medica 2 for no reason.

Let's buff monk by 15%, then nerf SMN by 10%, effectively making Monk 25% stronger than SMN instead of the current balance of where Monk and SMN are pretty much equal, and monk wins in perfect melee situations. If anything, SMN could've used a slight DPS nerf since it's much easier to play than Monk and provides much more utility than monk via virus and swiftcast res. It just did not need to be changed so heavily as they are doing.

All that needed to be done was buffing DRG DPS to be slightly below monk, because DRG is much easier to play than Monk, adding cast times to some bard skills so they actually lose damage by having to dodge/move like every other class in the game, MAYBE removing thunder from SMN like they did, and only doing 1/3 of the changes they are doing to Warrior to make them competitive with Paladin. Nerfing SMN and buffing other classes DPS, especially the #1 dps = bad bad bad.

This game went from having the best balance of any MMO I've played to completely shitfucking it and resorting to Blizzard Balancing™ where the FOTM class swaps every balance patch. No one likes that type of balancing.

[Carth]

I question the buffs to Monk and fucking over Virus, but otherwise I don't think it'll shake up the current metagame too geatly.

[Prothescar]

Guarantee that a good number of the changes were done due to PvP. Scathe is a perfect example sinnce it didn't need any changing for PvE as it was barely even used.

THere's entirely separate skills for PvP

[Seravi Edalborez]

THere's entirely separate skills for PvP

That are used in combination with, not instead of, PvE skills. And going by their descriptions many of them have long cooldowns.

[Andradi]

because DRG is much easier to play than Monk

Not really.

[Kiarax]

MNK is way more demanding than DRG, it's not even a close comparison. DRG has to be at the side for a single WS every 20 seconds and behind every 30. MNK has to be back and forth constantly. On paper they sound pretty similar but in practice not so much.

[Obsidian]

DRG's actual rotation is pretty technical though.

[Elcura]

DRG's actual rotation is pretty technical though.

Given you know what to do, playing DRG is always going to be easier and less punishing than MNK.

[Soul Side]

Dragoon abilities outside of Jumps didn't need a buff.


The only things that they did right were Warrior and Monk changes; however, they failed to properly balance the other jobs along with them. There will still be a rather large disparity between each class for their respective roles. Don't even get me started on those housing prices

Right now DRG is sitting around 295dps in full i90 while MNK is ~325dps. If they would have just buffed MNK with the GL thing they would have pulled even farther ahead. The jump animations alone are not worth 30dps(more if were talking about 2.1 MNK). The extra DRG buffs are probably to bring it closer to MNK in just raw numbers. MNK has a slightly higher skillcap, but 10%+ more for that skillcap is too much of an advantage. MNK will still be king anyway.

[Seravi Edalborez]

By the way.

When pressing the F key (face target), instead of instantly facing the target, characters will now track the target's movement with his/her head until a direction button is pressed.

If this means what I think it means, it's fucking stupid. Hope you don't play a spellcaster with Legacy control type, because SE decided you shouldn't do that.

[Soul Side]

The devs are completely out of touch with their own game. Buff the #1 DPS by 10-15%, nerf the DPS that was competing with it by ~10%, nerf cross-class skills for no reason, overbuff Warrior when someone who has played the game for 5 minutes could see that the Warrior buffs are completely overboard, completely overbuff DRG, nerf BLM for no reason, buff lustrate which is already tons better than benediction for no reason, change medica 2 for no reason.

Let's buff monk by 15%, then nerf SMN by 10%, effectively making Monk 25% stronger than SMN instead of the current balance of where Monk and SMN are pretty much equal, and monk wins in perfect melee situations. If anything, SMN could've used a slight DPS nerf since it's much easier to play than Monk and provides much more utility than monk via virus and swiftcast res. It just did not need to be changed so heavily as they are doing.

All that needed to be done was buffing DRG DPS to be slightly below monk, because DRG is much easier to play than Monk, adding cast times to some bard skills so they actually lose damage by having to dodge/move like every other class in the game, MAYBE removing thunder from SMN like they did, and only doing 1/3 of the changes they are doing to Warrior to make them competitive with Paladin. Nerfing SMN and buffing other classes DPS, especially the #1 dps = bad bad bad.

This game went from having the best balance of any MMO I've played to completely shitfucking it and resorting to Blizzard Balancing™ where the FOTM class swaps every balance patch. No one likes that type of balancing.

SMN have no risk and have to move very little in comparison to melee. Their nerf makes perfect sense. Buffing MNK in multiple areas is silly though.

[Limlight]

looks like pretty typical BG over reactions to me.

Maybe I'll have a reason to level a dps job now, I just hated playing archer/brd.

Agreed with soul, all the buffs to mnk do seem overkill but we'll manage it.

[Azurewrath]

So even SE knew Mnk didn't need the buff, but did it anyways. Then they added the thing so multiple of the same class would raise LB slower so people wouldnt go 4x monk

Seriously, with 4 monks, one being in charge of Dragon kick etc, even one or two toggling silence, why would you bring any other single target dps to anything else? lol. SE knew this so they added the lb nerf so dragoons will still get invites. Luckily, with the dungeon buff, we can all quit our jobs and take up monk and level with dungeons and actually learn the job right

[Soul Side]

People around the web seem to be ignoring that fact that BLM DPS is also getting nerfed on the order of ~5% from the double spell speed bug fix on Fire III and first Fire in their rotation (right now both get the 2x spell speed from Umbral Ice 3, after patch only Fire III will). It wasn't in the patch notes but is definitely happening. Just throwing it out there.

[CrstyCptSteveWitherspoon]

Am I the only one that was hoping mnk would only get a greased lightning duration buff? Add ten seconds to the duration or make it only drop one stack at a time would have been more than enough to make it very competitive in battles where you need to do a lot of dodging. Why go and fuck everything up? The housing, which was RAVED over for months, is the icing on the cake where basically no casuals will be able to afford it. You know, the people making up majority of their player base. Being legacy, I won't drop my stocked up cash on some vanity bullshit. Overhaul on warrior was really over the top.

So what's left with the patch? Run CT and hope for a drop that will fill that slot you're still missing an i90 for until myth is capped. Housing is over priced so I won't be attempting to farm gil to buy anything. Maybe farm some primals for rings? Lackluster 'content' patch if I've ever seen one.

[Soul Side]

Am I the only one that was hoping mnk would only get a greased lightning duration buff? Add ten seconds to the duration or make it only drop one stack at a time would have been more than enough to make it very competitive in battles where you need to do a lot of dodging. Why go and fuck everything up? The housing, which was RAVED over for months, is the icing on the cake where basically no casuals will be able to afford it. You know, the people making up majority of their player base. Being legacy, I won't drop my stocked up cash on some vanity bullshit. Overhaul on warrior was really over the top.

So what's left with the patch? Run CT and hope for a drop that will fill that slot you're still missing an i90 for until myth is capped. Housing is over priced so I won't be attempting to farm gil to buy anything. Maybe farm some primals for rings? Lackluster 'content' patch if I've ever seen one.

Ironically casuals are the ones that would be most interested in housing.

[Obsidian]

People around the web seem to be ignoring that fact that BLM DPS is also getting nerfed on the order of ~5% from the double spell speed bug fix on Fire III and first Fire in their rotation (right now both get the 2x spell speed from Umbral Ice 3, after patch only Fire III will). It wasn't in the patch notes but is definitely happening. Just throwing it out there.

Ranged DPS have little to no risk compared to melee DPS and probably shouldn't be out-DPSing said melee DPS, so it's lame but not really surprising.

I was also hoping Greased Lightning would get a longer duration instead of more damage, but I'll take what I can get. Some of it is undoubtedly to offset the Blood for Blood nerf, the rest was to incentivise moving away from the flank-only rotation.

[Ezek]

It's a good thing we get nothing but MNK weapons from Twintania. Time to make one of our BRDs go MNK!

Medica II: single Medica II won't cut it anymore for quick Twintania fireball healing, but makes it better for Turn 2. Better for Titan HM if your tank has bad threat generation during pre-heart.
Holy: pretty garbo change. Should have lowered MP cost to compensate for the big potency change. Instead, we get a 40 potency nerf while the spell still rapes your MP.
Cure III: MP cost is still too damn high, and the Cure II 15% proc rate is not reliable especially when you consider how niche the spell is going to be. I see it being used on Twintania fireballs and Titan Tumults, both of which you can't just hold off on casting until you get a proc.

The LB gauge filling up slower when you have multiple people with the same job is also a pretty garbage change, btw.

On the upside, SCH is going to be extremely fun to play with the pet AI & macro QoL changes.

[Kelenae]

The LB gauge filling up slower when you have multiple people with the same job is also a pretty garbage change, btw.

I think this was already in the game. They just made the penalty more.

[Spider-Dan]

If this means what I think it means, it's fucking stupid. Hope you don't play a spellcaster with Legacy control type, because SE decided you shouldn't do that.

There's two ways to interpret this, I think.

1) Mashing the face target button (or /facetarget) during a cast will no longer correct for line of sight break (i.e. a PvP mage vs. melee balance adjustment), or

2) Instead of instantly reorienting for /facetarget, you'll only turn your head (but this still counts as "facing the target"; i.e. a simple graphical immersion fix)

If I were a betting man, I'd go with the former.