While the initial concept for the Bard also being an Archer was pretty neat, now that the Bard doesn't really provide much support... it's kind of just an archer class, y'know? They've still got their buffs and all, but they're kind of underwhelming for the most part.
Would it make more sense, at this point, to simply make the advanced form of Archer a Sniper, and make the Bard its own proper Bard-like class? Or are we also beyond ever having a real support class? As for performance for playing instruments, I really wouldn't care, let "Snipers" continue to perform in addition to Bards, not really a big deal. Wouldn't make much sense, but would seem a bit lame to take it away from people who specifically leveled it to perform.
I think for me this is a symptom of a greater issue in the game, where everything has to be rigidly defined as DPS, tank or healer, and the absolute fear the team apparently has of letting anything be too unique, lest it be "required," which seems like a poor reason (again, to me) to sort of hinder the overall design of the game.
I think about how they had to literally carve off a part of the game to let BLU even sort of function as a bootleg job, and I worry that we'll see similar issues (or just more homogenization) for future jobs we may or may not get, like Beastmaster, Time Mage, Puppeteer, that kind of thing.
Personally I think it'd be neat if they just, I dunno, either swapped the DPS role to a support role or, heaven forfend, added an additional slot to dungeons for another person, that person being support.
One of my bigger fears overall is that any new classes we get will just feel the same but with a unique job gauge or a single mechanic to differentiate them, rather than feeling like an entirely new experience. I'm sure it certainly keeps the balancing very simple, but I think it sucks some of the soul away from the game.
Balance is both important and good, but it's a beast that if you tame too strongly, will make everything more boring and less interesting. Having totally unique classes is, to me, far more important than whether something might "break" a savage raid or what-have-you.
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Would it make more sense, at this point, to simply make the advanced form of Archer a Sniper, and make the Bard its own proper Bard-like class? Or are we also beyond ever having a real support class? As for performance for playing instruments, I really wouldn't care, let "Snipers" continue to perform in addition to Bards, not really a big deal. Wouldn't make much sense, but would seem a bit lame to take it away from people who specifically leveled it to perform.
I think for me this is a symptom of a greater issue in the game, where everything has to be rigidly defined as DPS, tank or healer, and the absolute fear the team apparently has of letting anything be too unique, lest it be "required," which seems like a poor reason (again, to me) to sort of hinder the overall design of the game.
I think about how they had to literally carve off a part of the game to let BLU even sort of function as a bootleg job, and I worry that we'll see similar issues (or just more homogenization) for future jobs we may or may not get, like Beastmaster, Time Mage, Puppeteer, that kind of thing.
One of my bigger fears overall is that any new classes we get will just feel the same but with a unique job gauge or a single mechanic to differentiate them, rather than feeling like an entirely new experience. I'm sure it certainly keeps the balancing very simple, but I think it sucks some of the soul away from the game.
Balance is both important and good, but it's a beast that if you tame too strongly, will make everything more boring and less interesting. Having totally unique classes is, to me, far more important than whether something might "break" a savage raid or what-have-you.
Continue reading...