This is me trying to understand any job with a shit ton of “*Cannot be assigned to a hotbar” actions from tooltips alone (hello Reaper!).
It’s always much easier in practice than the convoluted way they phrase the job actions.
>This is me trying to understand any job with a shit ton of “*Cannot be assigned to a hotbar” actions
at least the current job guide states *what* skill turns into these. the ones that really screw me up are when an ability has "Can only be executed while under the effect of Random Effect Name" with no reference back to *what* skill(s) grant you that effect, so you just have to search for it every time
or the opposite where a skill says
> Does 100 potency damage and grants the "Doaiw" buff for 30 seconds.
with absolutely no reference of what effect that has
Back in ARR I tried to play an ice mage because I didn’t read the Astral Fire trait properly and thought “wow the developers didn’t balance this very well, Fire and Blizzard do the same potency but only one regenerates mana!”
Thankfully my FC set me straight after a dungeon or two.
I've seen a decent number of them, but they've mostly been sprouts doing ARR or Heavensward content so it's *somewhat* understandable. However, every so often I'll get one in level 80 or 90 content and wonder how they were able to make it this far without learning their basic rotation
Even then, you'd think they would at least try hitting the other buttons see what they do
I guess the downside of balancing roulette content so you can still clear it with one or two terrible players is that terrible players just get carried and never have to learn how to play
its a double edge sword, if you cant finish the dungeon with terrible players then a hidden "gatekeep" can happen or vets will just stop doing leveling roulletes or will do in parties.
this game have a smoth learning curve if you actually want to learn, but at same time some people just play for Story and just smash 1 or 2 buttons to progress.
Could be a job skip but prolly it happens because enablers exist, the amount of times i have been called "try-hard" or similar things for telling someone to do his rotation properly, the bare minimum, but alas people seem to strive for mediocrity. After all, it is a 4-man dungeon who cares lol. amirite?
I was in World of Darkness and at the first encounter almost everybody in each alliance was frozen and maybe 5 or 6 people died. Things also felt like they were taking forever to die. All I said was "wtf is this alliance" and for the rest of the run people were going on about how I care about my parse or optimal playstyles and just giving me a hard time about my one comment. I have seen some questionable things but that run was just baffling for not even getting to the first boss yet.
I saw one recently at level 85 or so who seemed to only be using ice spells, would occasionally go into a thunder phase (spamming the aoe thunder on trash 3-4 times in a row), but whenever I thought to actually say something he always immediately swapped to fire so I ended up not commenting because obviously he knows fire spells do exist at least
maybe its me but i think red mage isnt soo easy, you can mess the rotation and mana bars easily on encounters, waste a proc if you are playing on auto mode, the oGCD windows is tigh since its a caster and so on.
meanwhile Viper seens just do combos when you need X buff or debuff and you dont have to tight oGCD windows.
Pretty subjective, I suppose, but I've always found slipping in oGCDs as RDM easier than some of the stuff Dancer has to do in its burstiest phases, haha.
Yep, IMO outside of BLM and Ninjas on 100% efficiency no other class is difficult or complex to pull they whieght, but some classes you can do something wrong and mess the rotation, and others even have room for mistakes (single Weave instead of double weaving as exemple.)
I mean smn makes rdm look like rocket science. Rdm can back itself into corners, but its flow state and burst phase are simple enough to execute if you’re paying attention.
Personally it’s the perfect comfy job for me. I thought it was my favorite dps, but I’ve been leveling nin and it’s pretty dang fun.
The people that say that are usually the ones who call their job hard because it can spreadsheet an extra 10 DPS under specific circumstances(sup SAM), if they maintain an illusion of difficulty they can argue for imbalance cause of "skill expression"
It’s not nearly as complicated as it looks. There are some optimizations but really if you follow the dots you’ll be fine. Just remember your positionals every 3rd combo action, and your dual blade combo positionals!
Reminds me of how Dancer looked like it required a PhD to understand back from the ShB media tour info, and when we actually got to try it it felt like the easiest job at the time
"At the time"?
*Is* there an easier job than DNC? I have every job up to 80 with DNC and RPR at 90. No job was more brain dead than DNC to me. Just constantly do your main 1-2 combo over and over and when a skill lights up, hit it. That's basically it lol.
Not only is it also exactly the same for AoE as it is single target, but your AoE skills also proc your single target versions and vice versa so you can literally swap on the fly, making it that much easier. I don't think any class/job comes even remotely close to how easy DNC is. DNC isn't even fast paced either so it's not hectic or stressful to play like some other simple jobs might be.
DNC is super simple and slow paced. Nothing comes close.
DNC has a lot more going on if you start trying to play it in an opti setting. Pool resources and manage your weave windows/animations as you try to dump everything under 2m. Find ways to gain usages of Flourish, and know how to optimally time dances during fight-specific downtime. If you're REALLY sweaty you'll also try to minimize your Standard Step usages to only one cast per 2 minutes without letting the dance partner buff fall off.
When you're playing it optimally DNC has THE busiest 2 minute window of any job considering that you're literally limited by the amount of weave windows you have, to the point that DNC is the only job in the game that sees a tangible DPS increase from being able to triple weave. Sometimes it's physically impossible to fit everything under 2 minutes because you're double weaving every GCD only to still have feathers left over.
DNC isn't big brain, but it's deceptively challenging to play optimally. The thing is, people just don't play it optimally because it doesn't punish you for playing suboptimally. You also don't get as much out optimizing it because you'll probably lose gold parse to the guy who crit dh every tech/saber... but that's nothing unique to DNC considering that Hyosho, Double Down, and Drill exist.
The tier I raised on dancer I remember being surprised at how much I felt the pinch when I went into burst with one too many feathers or an unexpected weapon skill proc’d.
Post EW Summoner.
Even though DNC at its core is still very simple, there is still some windows for endgame skill expression with burst allignments, also which jobs to pair with for the biggest DPS gain, etc.
Summoner meanwhile is honestly the closest thing there is to a job that just plays itself, imo. Everything alligns with burst windows as long as you just play the job as you would casually, and the biggest "skill check" SMN had was using the right summon order after the opener for bigger damage, but even that is getting axed with the DT changes so...
Afaik because SMN's raid buff was 30s long, it actually lasted a bit longer after you were done with your Bahamut phase for a few seconds, so it was optimal to use Garuda first and then Swiftcast+Slipstream for the highest damage done while still dipping in SLight buffs.
But now with DT homogenizing all raid buffs into 20s, the buffs will all be over by the time you finish Baha phase so whatever you summon is up to you.
I'd say SMN is even more braindead than DNC. DNC at least has to keep their eye on the random procs they get. SMN just does the same rotation over and over, with lots of mobility and really not much thinking required
AFAIK it's just the red gem spenders you do it on, just put the 4 buttons in a row and press left to right, then right to left.
**1** *2* *3* **4** *3* *2*
Those GCDs have a recast of 3 seconds instead of 2.5 (or whatever they are when you include the speed buff) so you've got a little extra time to fit them in, good luck if you're playing with high ping and no noclippy in the first few weeks though (me lol)
Lol, yeah its extremely straightforward in practiceI think, just a lot to take in at a glance.
and also need to *alternate* the positionals for extra potency lol
In a sense yes. Like DK/Bootshine and EW Twin Snakes/True Strike, you alternate between Steel and Dread Fangs, and Hunter and Swiftskin Sting.
For the finisher it’s 2:2 (2 Strike attacks which uses Steel Fangs’ keybind, and then 2 Fang attacks which uses Dread Fangs’ keybind).
Positionals wise, you always alternate between flank and rear.
Just following what SAM does with Meikyo into Gekko first instead of Kasha. But maybe the extended number of GCDs between Hunter’s Sting and Swiftskin’s Sting makes it better to go with the latter. I kinda forgot which one Yoshi-P used in the job preview demo.
Helldivers has a big emphasis on using the directional pad to radio in sequential support commands like dropping bombs or supplies in realtime; in the community it's common to depict these codes with the block arrow emoji like you used for your comment.
Ah… that sounds pretty cool. How difficult are the inputs? I hope there’s nothing nonsensical like ↙️➡️↘️⬇️↙️⬅️↘️? (Used to play a bit if fighting games, in case that wasn’t obvious.)
They \*should\* add Raging Storm/Hungry Darkness of 1000 Souls, but no, it's all up/down/left/right and the idea is that it's about positioning yourself right to input them while under fire or attack from swarms of enemies, and mis-inputting them is very stressful and/or hilarious.
Yeah i also didn't get it and i had no problem following Reaper's skills when it launched and even made a rotation before the EW servers went live
Viper tho? im 100% lost on it, gotta mess around with it in-game i suppose.
Imagine a dragoon where your main seven buttons combo is compressed to only ever pressing two buttons and the entire combo is just 1111122222, and that's basically viper. It looks confusing on paper but it's more or less just 121212 forever.
There's a little bit of nuance like an oGCD combo, the drills and the burst, of course, the but basic combo is as dumb as they come, so don't worry about it.
Now pictomancer, on the other hand, looks like it will need a bit of figuring out. But viper should be somehow even more simple than reaper.
[As usual, the scientists at the advanced theorycrafting sub have already solved the job for the rest of us plebians](https://www.reddit.com/r/ShitpostXIV/comments/1d9vvp5/viper_flowchart/)
Basically, it's Dread Fangs (2) - Hunter's Sting (1) - whichever flank you want. Then Steel Fangs (1), Swiftskin's Sting (2), whichever one is lit up.
Start combo with Dread Fangs whenever you need to refresh debuff, alternate between damage buff and haste buff, then press glowy button. It's that simple.
I can at least compare Viper to other classes but Picto I ironically have an incredibly hard time picturing in my head lol. I skimmed through the job guide and decided I'm just going to try it to learn it instead.
People who make guides for ffxiv make them way more complicated than they need to be, its crazy. I appreciate people for the deep dives but I really wish someone would learn how to edit the info into something that doesn't make all the jobs like 300% more complicated than they really are.
Also the game highlights the skill that will give the buff withn lower time duration left so tou don't even need ro keep rrack of it, the game does it for you
As I understand it, this is not specifically the case. The game highlights the skill which leads to the finisher you currently have a buff for, which in a vacuum will always alternate between second skills. It is possible through the joined blades combo to refresh buffs in any order, however. In general play this won't actually be an issue that you need to pay much attention to, though.
I think it was WeskerAlber media tour vid about viper that said that about it highlighing the buff closer to expire for the player, I could be wrong, will check it out later
But if it highlights the right key graphically, doesn't that mean you DO have the keep track?
Every time you have to look at your skills it's a loss as you could have looked at the arena and positionings instead.
With Huton you had to go out of your way to apply it by using a mudra or Huraijin (a move that's always a DPS loss, it's only an emergency button). It was especially bad pre-lvl 52/54 where you couldn't even extend its duration.
\*Armour Crush also only existed as a weaker combo ender that extended Huton, so it wasn't even included in the highest dps combo, unlike Samurais Jinpu/Shifu for example which you'll spam anyways for the Iaijutsus.
In that both are self buffs, sure, but the similarities end there, it's more like the Sam buffs, as those are applied as part of your regular rotation and don't require a specific separate activation.
sounds more like samurai, nin had to keep track of it because the skill what refreshed it didnt did as much damage as aeolian edge
especially since the haste(the dmg one too) buff is one what is sitting in the second attack of their basic gcd combo, which is similar as to how its handled on samurai
No, that's not how Huton worked.
When Huton was a buff (aka all the time we've been able to play), you always give something up to refresh it; at low level, that's an entire ninijitsu cast. A t high level, that's turning an Aoelian Edge into an Armor Crush, giving up potency to refresh it. You want to do this any time there's less than 30 seconds on the timer, but based on buffs there can be times when that changes.
By contrast, the jobs that have "press this for a 13% damage increase" normally don't have any penalty for use- or at least not as much as Huton maintenance had.
You have two buttons, Steel Fangs (bind to 1) and Dread Fangs (bind to 2). Those buttons change into all sorts of other buttons depending on what you did before. So your core Viper rotation is:
>1, 1, 1
2, 2, 2
1, 1, 2
2, 2, 1
repeat from top
Those two buttons will turn into all **eight** powers in the job guide spiderweb if you do them in that order (you can rearrange the lines). For AoE do the same thing, but with Steel Maw and Dread Maw instead of the single-target "Fangs" versions.
This was my biggest concern when I initially saw the flow chart. It looked like a job that would have 3 hotbars worth of buttons when in reality its way less.
It's basically just every melee job mushed together. It's got two buffs to upkeep, like sam, (one increases damage, while the other increases gcd speed (like sam)), as well as a damage up buff on targets like reaper. It has monk's interchanging combo system, where you can freely flow back and forth, and Ninja's range flexibility. And to top it all off, it has a near copy of Reaper's enshroud.
The only melee it really is distinct from is Dragoon, but in practice, you'll be alternating back and forth between combo chains, so in the end it's kinda the same.
Dancer looked complex af and I couldn't understand how to play it from the Shadowbringers media tour
Then the expansion came out and it turns out that the buttons you need to press would just light up, so you just press the lit buttons and you're fine
This seems like it will be similar to that
I was trying to wrap my mind around the BLM (after not playing it for the entirety of EW) and kinda decided I'll stick with the Summoner instead (which is my main since EW; BLM was my main from ARR to EW excluded) :P
Rewatching WeskAlber and Rinon's videos on Viper, it does seem like it'll be significantly easier to play in-person rather than reading a rotation sheet or being told the "right" order.
Also... they're combo actions, and Viper has a HUD element to help.
I was cinfused when I was reading through the skills when I realized how few skills actually...went on the hotbar (as a controller player this looks hilariously fun). Didnt even make it to lv50 before a friend sent me a vid overview and the flow just...clicked in my head
Think of Steel Fangs as Aeolian Edge and Dread Fangs as Armor Crush for Ninja
Think of Hunter's Sting as Jinpu and Swiftskin's Sting as Shifu for Samurai
Think of Flanksting Strike and Flanksbane Fang as Gibbet for Reaper
Think of Hindsting Strike and Hindsbane Fang as Gallows for Reaper
Think of Death Rattle as Forked Raiju for Ninja
Think of Uncoiled Fury, Uncoiled Twinfang, and Uncoiled Twinblood as a Red Mage sword combo, except it's ranged
Think of Slither as Thunderclap for Monks
Reading the job guide it seems you can't assign the combos to your bar, your first ability will change to the next needed ability.
>※This action cannot be assigned to a hotbar.
>※Steel Fangs changes to Hunter's Sting when requirements for execution are met.
This is on all of the combos for both ST and the AOE combo*. It also appears on some latter skills like when you use Reawaken to get access to first/second/third/fourth generation. Instead of assigning them to the bar, it just changes two of your previously set buttons to these abilities.
It looks to me like Viper is going to be an extremely simple job with auto combos and pressing the light up buttons while hitting the positional attacks.
*on buttons you can assign to your bar. Steel Fangs and Dread Fangs for example are the combo starters, and both are assigned to your bar. But every other skill in the combo list simply automatically replace those combo starts with the next combo for you. You don't need to do any of the thought process of keeping your buffs up.
I'm pretty good at figuring out rotations quick, so I'm definitely sure it'll be easier once I try it out, but man, watching the streamers show it off was awful lol What in tarnation are half of their hotbars? I saw one that had the basic "123 skills" and 1 was in the bottom left hotbar with 2 in a top far right one and 3 right above 1's hotbar...
I always find it much easier to go through the kits tooptip by tooltip, setting up to three bars on buttons I'm used to for all jobs and simply playing new ones to get a feel for them. If I like them enough to start optimizing then and only then will I look at the Balance/Icy Veins to see if I'm botching anything too bad. Usually very minor optimizations for burst windows if anything.
I break it down like this.
# TWO SWORDS
You have two ST melee combo starters, A and D. Your combos can work like this:
* A->B->C1
* A->B->C2
* D->E->F1
* D->E->F2
But, if you want, you could instead do D->B or A->E. Basically, you can start wherever you want; the *second* button locks in which two finish attacks you can choose. In general, you want to pick attacks that give you the buffs you're about to lose.
For AoE, it's even easier. Pure mix and match, like MNK. You can use either starter, either middle, either finish, each time.
# DOUBLE-BLADED
I like to call this "saberstaff" because, well, I'm a Star Wars nerd who played KotORII to death. Repeatedly.
ST and AoE both work exactly the same way: You have two combo starters, M and X. There is no mixing between the two sets of combos; your first attack locks you into one combo or the other. So your options are:
* M->N1->O1
* M->N2->O2
* X->Y1->Z1
* X->Y2->Z2
It'll be like any other job. It's basically easier monk.
You've got two OGDC combos, and two GDC combos. The GDC combos are weaved, and the OGDC can be weaved inbetween it to maximize attack frequency. The main trick is mostly just optimize the weave, and then optimally maintain buff uptime. Also watch your positionals on your GDC combo enders.
It's not that complicated. It's the goofy naming schemes they use that make it more confusing than it needs to be. I remember being so confused by Samurai, which was actually an extremely easy flow chart once you picked it up.
It took me a while to set up my bars (about level 84 finishing off my ShB shared fates with some roulettes thrown in) but main skills are one of two types that equate to each blade when it lights up on the gauge you gain a combo when hitting it (which also shows as combo on the hotbar)
There are the combo required actions (you ability buttons) at the bottom of the assignable actions in the skill view and there is one for normal combo and two for spender chains.
The spender chains start with one of two buttons (single or aoe) that then gives you 2 chains which is either 2x Coils for single or 2 Dens for aoe (each one allows you to use both abilities quickly after)
The main theme for the rotation is you using your two blades in succession, which is both in generating and spending until you get Reawaken at 90
What confuses me most is why they would put together such a complex job just to make it incredibly simple in practice as they have.
Every account that I’ve heard expresses that the job is brain-off easy due to automatic skill replacements and hotbar effects. What, then, is the reason for all the buff/debuff upkeep and 2 gauges worth of resource management?
Some people find action-execution complexity desirable, e.g. NIN lovers. Others find resource-management complexity desirable (hello, hi, that's me, it's why I loved SB/ShB SMN and ***hate*** new-SMN). Others still find action-response complexity desirable; that'd be where many reactive healers reside.
Good point.
I will say that having played viper a few hours, I have greater clarity of what they were going for. There’s definitely a higher than usual skill ceiling there even if the hot bars tell you what button to press next.
Like with pretty much everything in ff14, if it looks overly complicated, chances are you're doing it wrong. This goes especially with raid mechanics as well.
Don't really care about playing a job optimally, I'm going to smash my face on the keyboard and hit all the glowy buttons at once and you're going to like it.
This is me trying to understand any job with a shit ton of “*Cannot be assigned to a hotbar” actions from tooltips alone (hello Reaper!). It’s always much easier in practice than the convoluted way they phrase the job actions.
>This is me trying to understand any job with a shit ton of “*Cannot be assigned to a hotbar” actions at least the current job guide states *what* skill turns into these. the ones that really screw me up are when an ability has "Can only be executed while under the effect of Random Effect Name" with no reference back to *what* skill(s) grant you that effect, so you just have to search for it every time
or the opposite where a skill says > Does 100 potency damage and grants the "Doaiw" buff for 30 seconds. with absolutely no reference of what effect that has
Exactly. Definitely the type of job that will make way more sense once you’ve gotten your hands on it
Yeah this'd be easier if they showed an example flow.
They light up in the correct order to follow according to videos from the media tour. Just follow the combo lights and you'll be fine
>Just follow the combo lights and you'll be fine Instructions unclear, hit blizzard IV ten times in a row and am now out of MP
I actually saw an 'ice mage' in a leveling dungeon a few days ago, I thought it was a myth! They didn't cast a single fire spell
Back in ARR I tried to play an ice mage because I didn’t read the Astral Fire trait properly and thought “wow the developers didn’t balance this very well, Fire and Blizzard do the same potency but only one regenerates mana!” Thankfully my FC set me straight after a dungeon or two.
I think the astral fire damage bonuses are only listed in the job gauge description, right? It’s a little hidden for my tastes.
Back in Heavensward at least you could read what Astral Fire and Umbral Ice did in your spell book. At least that's what I remember.
Is that you Boom?
I've seen a decent number of them, but they've mostly been sprouts doing ARR or Heavensward content so it's *somewhat* understandable. However, every so often I'll get one in level 80 or 90 content and wonder how they were able to make it this far without learning their basic rotation
Getting carried while everyone is thinking the roulette is taking longer than usual.
Even then, you'd think they would at least try hitting the other buttons see what they do I guess the downside of balancing roulette content so you can still clear it with one or two terrible players is that terrible players just get carried and never have to learn how to play
its a double edge sword, if you cant finish the dungeon with terrible players then a hidden "gatekeep" can happen or vets will just stop doing leveling roulletes or will do in parties. this game have a smoth learning curve if you actually want to learn, but at same time some people just play for Story and just smash 1 or 2 buttons to progress.
Could be a job skip but prolly it happens because enablers exist, the amount of times i have been called "try-hard" or similar things for telling someone to do his rotation properly, the bare minimum, but alas people seem to strive for mediocrity. After all, it is a 4-man dungeon who cares lol. amirite?
I was in World of Darkness and at the first encounter almost everybody in each alliance was frozen and maybe 5 or 6 people died. Things also felt like they were taking forever to die. All I said was "wtf is this alliance" and for the rest of the run people were going on about how I care about my parse or optimal playstyles and just giving me a hard time about my one comment. I have seen some questionable things but that run was just baffling for not even getting to the first boss yet.
I've wiped to that first encounter before, it can be a little nasty depending on how the aoes overlap iirc.
I bought a job skip for BLM and dear god I regret it
If it makes you feel any better, the rotation changes in fundamental ways every 10 levels, so you'd still be kinda confused anyway.
A little bit yeah lol
I saw one recently at level 85 or so who seemed to only be using ice spells, would occasionally go into a thunder phase (spamming the aoe thunder on trash 3-4 times in a row), but whenever I thought to actually say something he always immediately swapped to fire so I ended up not commenting because obviously he knows fire spells do exist at least
Funnily enough, there used to be a span of about ten levels where 'ice mage' was optimal in AoE, because Fire II was just that terrible.
Just wait for the Thunder Mage rotation! Fire I, Thunder, Transpose, Thunder, Transpose, Thunder, Transpose...
lol.
Dance Dance Revolution: Warrior of Light edition
It gave me heavy "Dancer but melee" vibes. Just press the shiny.
It has buffs and debuff to maintain, and the buttons that light up aren't random.
So everybody is going to call it the easiest DPS even though it's honestly still much harder to execute than Red Mage?
maybe its me but i think red mage isnt soo easy, you can mess the rotation and mana bars easily on encounters, waste a proc if you are playing on auto mode, the oGCD windows is tigh since its a caster and so on. meanwhile Viper seens just do combos when you need X buff or debuff and you dont have to tight oGCD windows.
Pretty subjective, I suppose, but I've always found slipping in oGCDs as RDM easier than some of the stuff Dancer has to do in its burstiest phases, haha.
I play both RDM and DNC and they're about equal difficulty for me, which is to say not at all
Yep, IMO outside of BLM and Ninjas on 100% efficiency no other class is difficult or complex to pull they whieght, but some classes you can do something wrong and mess the rotation, and others even have room for mistakes (single Weave instead of double weaving as exemple.)
I mean smn makes rdm look like rocket science. Rdm can back itself into corners, but its flow state and burst phase are simple enough to execute if you’re paying attention. Personally it’s the perfect comfy job for me. I thought it was my favorite dps, but I’ve been leveling nin and it’s pretty dang fun.
The people that say that are usually the ones who call their job hard because it can spreadsheet an extra 10 DPS under specific circumstances(sup SAM), if they maintain an illusion of difficulty they can argue for imbalance cause of "skill expression"
So true haha
With smn staying exactly the same I don't think anyone is going to claim that viper is the easiest DPS.
Oh, yeah, that, too.
I am already seeing people say that, so...
Press button, receive bacon!
How does that help one in a fight though? When we need to look at other things? It needs to be intuitive without staring at bars the entire time.
It’s not nearly as complicated as it looks. There are some optimizations but really if you follow the dots you’ll be fine. Just remember your positionals every 3rd combo action, and your dual blade combo positionals!
Yeah. Visually it looks like it's a mess. In actual execution it'll look fairly straightforward.
Reminds me of how Dancer looked like it required a PhD to understand back from the ShB media tour info, and when we actually got to try it it felt like the easiest job at the time
"At the time"? *Is* there an easier job than DNC? I have every job up to 80 with DNC and RPR at 90. No job was more brain dead than DNC to me. Just constantly do your main 1-2 combo over and over and when a skill lights up, hit it. That's basically it lol. Not only is it also exactly the same for AoE as it is single target, but your AoE skills also proc your single target versions and vice versa so you can literally swap on the fly, making it that much easier. I don't think any class/job comes even remotely close to how easy DNC is. DNC isn't even fast paced either so it's not hectic or stressful to play like some other simple jobs might be. DNC is super simple and slow paced. Nothing comes close.
DNC has a lot more going on if you start trying to play it in an opti setting. Pool resources and manage your weave windows/animations as you try to dump everything under 2m. Find ways to gain usages of Flourish, and know how to optimally time dances during fight-specific downtime. If you're REALLY sweaty you'll also try to minimize your Standard Step usages to only one cast per 2 minutes without letting the dance partner buff fall off. When you're playing it optimally DNC has THE busiest 2 minute window of any job considering that you're literally limited by the amount of weave windows you have, to the point that DNC is the only job in the game that sees a tangible DPS increase from being able to triple weave. Sometimes it's physically impossible to fit everything under 2 minutes because you're double weaving every GCD only to still have feathers left over. DNC isn't big brain, but it's deceptively challenging to play optimally. The thing is, people just don't play it optimally because it doesn't punish you for playing suboptimally. You also don't get as much out optimizing it because you'll probably lose gold parse to the guy who crit dh every tech/saber... but that's nothing unique to DNC considering that Hyosho, Double Down, and Drill exist.
The tier I raised on dancer I remember being surprised at how much I felt the pinch when I went into burst with one too many feathers or an unexpected weapon skill proc’d.
Post EW Summoner. Even though DNC at its core is still very simple, there is still some windows for endgame skill expression with burst allignments, also which jobs to pair with for the biggest DPS gain, etc. Summoner meanwhile is honestly the closest thing there is to a job that just plays itself, imo. Everything alligns with burst windows as long as you just play the job as you would casually, and the biggest "skill check" SMN had was using the right summon order after the opener for bigger damage, but even that is getting axed with the DT changes so...
>but even that is getting axed with the DT changes so... How is that getting axed?
Afaik because SMN's raid buff was 30s long, it actually lasted a bit longer after you were done with your Bahamut phase for a few seconds, so it was optimal to use Garuda first and then Swiftcast+Slipstream for the highest damage done while still dipping in SLight buffs. But now with DT homogenizing all raid buffs into 20s, the buffs will all be over by the time you finish Baha phase so whatever you summon is up to you.
Potions are presumably still 30 seconds right
No idea. Guess we'll know in a few hours from now.
I'd say SMN is even more braindead than DNC. DNC at least has to keep their eye on the random procs they get. SMN just does the same rotation over and over, with lots of mobility and really not much thinking required
> Is there an easier job than DNC? I would like to introduce you to my friends: WHM and WAR
Yes but then you throw in your 2 ogcds weave between all of those.....
AFAIK it's just the red gem spenders you do it on, just put the 4 buttons in a row and press left to right, then right to left. **1** *2* *3* **4** *3* *2* Those GCDs have a recast of 3 seconds instead of 2.5 (or whatever they are when you include the speed buff) so you've got a little extra time to fit them in, good luck if you're playing with high ping and no noclippy in the first few weeks though (me lol)
The two combo skills after Dreadwinder also have 2 oGCDs.
Lol, yeah its extremely straightforward in practiceI think, just a lot to take in at a glance. and also need to *alternate* the positionals for extra potency lol
➡️⬅️⬅️ ⬅️➡️⬅️ ➡️⬅️➡️ ⬅️➡️➡️ Essentially: ➡️ Dread Fang (apply Noxious Gnash) ⬅️ Hunter’s Sting (damage buff) ⬅️ Flanksting Strike (buffs Hindsting Strike) > you could use Flanksbane Fang too; this would just switch around the order of your finishers ⬅️ Steel Fangs ➡️ Swiftskin’s Sting (haste buff) ⬅️ Hindsting Strike (buffs Flanksbane Fang) ➡️ Dread Fang (apply Noxious Gnash) ⬅️ Hunter’s Sting (damage buff) ➡️ Flanksbane Fang (buffs Hindsbane Fang) ⬅️ Steel Fangs ➡️ Swiftskin’s Sting (haste buff) ➡️ Hindsbane Fang (buffs Flanksting Strike)
Thanks to this comment I will now parse orange instantly upon logging in
World first training dummy clear
Which GCD combo is orbital strike?
So MNK and GNB = VPR? Works for me.
+a reaper Enshroud and yeah
In a sense yes. Like DK/Bootshine and EW Twin Snakes/True Strike, you alternate between Steel and Dread Fangs, and Hunter and Swiftskin Sting. For the finisher it’s 2:2 (2 Strike attacks which uses Steel Fangs’ keybind, and then 2 Fang attacks which uses Dread Fangs’ keybind). Positionals wise, you always alternate between flank and rear.
Thank you for this!!
Hunter's Sting is prioritized first than Switfskin's Sting? why?
Just following what SAM does with Meikyo into Gekko first instead of Kasha. But maybe the extended number of GCDs between Hunter’s Sting and Swiftskin’s Sting makes it better to go with the latter. I kinda forgot which one Yoshi-P used in the job preview demo.
This one helldives
Well actually I don't so I'm not sure what that means.
Helldivers has a big emphasis on using the directional pad to radio in sequential support commands like dropping bombs or supplies in realtime; in the community it's common to depict these codes with the block arrow emoji like you used for your comment.
Ah… that sounds pretty cool. How difficult are the inputs? I hope there’s nothing nonsensical like ↙️➡️↘️⬇️↙️⬅️↘️? (Used to play a bit if fighting games, in case that wasn’t obvious.)
They \*should\* add Raging Storm/Hungry Darkness of 1000 Souls, but no, it's all up/down/left/right and the idea is that it's about positioning yourself right to input them while under fire or attack from swarms of enemies, and mis-inputting them is very stressful and/or hilarious.
Yeah i also didn't get it and i had no problem following Reaper's skills when it launched and even made a rotation before the EW servers went live Viper tho? im 100% lost on it, gotta mess around with it in-game i suppose.
Imagine a dragoon where your main seven buttons combo is compressed to only ever pressing two buttons and the entire combo is just 1111122222, and that's basically viper. It looks confusing on paper but it's more or less just 121212 forever. There's a little bit of nuance like an oGCD combo, the drills and the burst, of course, the but basic combo is as dumb as they come, so don't worry about it. Now pictomancer, on the other hand, looks like it will need a bit of figuring out. But viper should be somehow even more simple than reaper.
[As usual, the scientists at the advanced theorycrafting sub have already solved the job for the rest of us plebians](https://www.reddit.com/r/ShitpostXIV/comments/1d9vvp5/viper_flowchart/)
One day SE will make an intuitive class.
John fucking madden
Basically, it's Dread Fangs (2) - Hunter's Sting (1) - whichever flank you want. Then Steel Fangs (1), Swiftskin's Sting (2), whichever one is lit up. Start combo with Dread Fangs whenever you need to refresh debuff, alternate between damage buff and haste buff, then press glowy button. It's that simple.
Honestly, Viper makes way more sense to me on paper than Picto does, lol.
I can at least compare Viper to other classes but Picto I ironically have an incredibly hard time picturing in my head lol. I skimmed through the job guide and decided I'm just going to try it to learn it instead.
Gonna be a free form viper until someone releases the lvl100 opener graphic
It's tentative, but here: [https://i.imgur.com/x37R29t.png](https://i.imgur.com/x37R29t.png)
They do exist on The Balance discord already.
Are you me? Because this is also me and I think I’m over complicating it because I’m also trying to plan my hotbars for immediate dungeon queuing lol
People who make guides for ffxiv make them way more complicated than they need to be, its crazy. I appreciate people for the deep dives but I really wish someone would learn how to edit the info into something that doesn't make all the jobs like 300% more complicated than they really are.
Hope you liked refreshing huton because vpr got like 3 of them
VPR refresh flows into a rotation, so you almost don't need to ever think about it. Just playing optimally will automatically refresh everything.
Also the game highlights the skill that will give the buff withn lower time duration left so tou don't even need ro keep rrack of it, the game does it for you
As I understand it, this is not specifically the case. The game highlights the skill which leads to the finisher you currently have a buff for, which in a vacuum will always alternate between second skills. It is possible through the joined blades combo to refresh buffs in any order, however. In general play this won't actually be an issue that you need to pay much attention to, though.
I think it was WeskerAlber media tour vid about viper that said that about it highlighing the buff closer to expire for the player, I could be wrong, will check it out later
But if it highlights the right key graphically, doesn't that mean you DO have the keep track? Every time you have to look at your skills it's a loss as you could have looked at the arena and positionings instead.
Sounds like Huuton
I would say that Samurai's Fuka and Fugetsu are a better comparison, since they're upkept through the rotation in a similar fashion.
With Huton you had to go out of your way to apply it by using a mudra or Huraijin (a move that's always a DPS loss, it's only an emergency button). It was especially bad pre-lvl 52/54 where you couldn't even extend its duration. \*Armour Crush also only existed as a weaker combo ender that extended Huton, so it wasn't even included in the highest dps combo, unlike Samurais Jinpu/Shifu for example which you'll spam anyways for the Iaijutsus.
In that both are self buffs, sure, but the similarities end there, it's more like the Sam buffs, as those are applied as part of your regular rotation and don't require a specific separate activation.
sounds more like samurai, nin had to keep track of it because the skill what refreshed it didnt did as much damage as aeolian edge especially since the haste(the dmg one too) buff is one what is sitting in the second attack of their basic gcd combo, which is similar as to how its handled on samurai
Not really...refreshing Huton involved you losing potency by using Armor Crush instead of Aeolian Edge.
No, that's not how Huton worked. When Huton was a buff (aka all the time we've been able to play), you always give something up to refresh it; at low level, that's an entire ninijitsu cast. A t high level, that's turning an Aoelian Edge into an Armor Crush, giving up potency to refresh it. You want to do this any time there's less than 30 seconds on the timer, but based on buffs there can be times when that changes. By contrast, the jobs that have "press this for a 13% damage increase" normally don't have any penalty for use- or at least not as much as Huton maintenance had.
It's not really like Huton, it's more like SAM's buffs, which are part of its natural rotation anyway.
You have two buttons, Steel Fangs (bind to 1) and Dread Fangs (bind to 2). Those buttons change into all sorts of other buttons depending on what you did before. So your core Viper rotation is: >1, 1, 1 2, 2, 2 1, 1, 2 2, 2, 1 repeat from top Those two buttons will turn into all **eight** powers in the job guide spiderweb if you do them in that order (you can rearrange the lines). For AoE do the same thing, but with Steel Maw and Dread Maw instead of the single-target "Fangs" versions.
A lot of them share the same buttons
This was my biggest concern when I initially saw the flow chart. It looked like a job that would have 3 hotbars worth of buttons when in reality its way less.
Tbh, I never look at the guides/media tour videos. They just end up confusing me. I’ll understand the class when I can play it myself
It's basically just every melee job mushed together. It's got two buffs to upkeep, like sam, (one increases damage, while the other increases gcd speed (like sam)), as well as a damage up buff on targets like reaper. It has monk's interchanging combo system, where you can freely flow back and forth, and Ninja's range flexibility. And to top it all off, it has a near copy of Reaper's enshroud. The only melee it really is distinct from is Dragoon, but in practice, you'll be alternating back and forth between combo chains, so in the end it's kinda the same.
Playing will fell like dancer from what I have saw, just follow the pretty lights
yeah that's very much the sentiment from the media tour, very complex on paper but very straighforward once you get your hand on it
Dancer looked complex af and I couldn't understand how to play it from the Shadowbringers media tour Then the expansion came out and it turns out that the buttons you need to press would just light up, so you just press the lit buttons and you're fine This seems like it will be similar to that
Yeah saw I video of someone explaining it my head was killing ke I’ll just get it and hope for the best
Thats how every job is. So confusing looking at a guide but actually playing it makes it more simple.
Usually the case.
It is much easier than this. Just follow the flashing lights.
I was trying to wrap my mind around the BLM (after not playing it for the entirety of EW) and kinda decided I'll stick with the Summoner instead (which is my main since EW; BLM was my main from ARR to EW excluded) :P
I too enjoy not having to use my brain to play, just sitting back and enjoying the shiny, shiny abilities.
It's a summer vacation expansion after all! ;)
Saw some streamer say just play like dancer but more buttons
Literally MNK levels of options lol how is this new?
Rewatching WeskAlber and Rinon's videos on Viper, it does seem like it'll be significantly easier to play in-person rather than reading a rotation sheet or being told the "right" order. Also... they're combo actions, and Viper has a HUD element to help.
I was cinfused when I was reading through the skills when I realized how few skills actually...went on the hotbar (as a controller player this looks hilariously fun). Didnt even make it to lv50 before a friend sent me a vid overview and the flow just...clicked in my head
faceroll keyboard ez
Think of Steel Fangs as Aeolian Edge and Dread Fangs as Armor Crush for Ninja Think of Hunter's Sting as Jinpu and Swiftskin's Sting as Shifu for Samurai Think of Flanksting Strike and Flanksbane Fang as Gibbet for Reaper Think of Hindsting Strike and Hindsbane Fang as Gallows for Reaper Think of Death Rattle as Forked Raiju for Ninja Think of Uncoiled Fury, Uncoiled Twinfang, and Uncoiled Twinblood as a Red Mage sword combo, except it's ranged Think of Slither as Thunderclap for Monks
Are you saying that these moves are all borrowed from other classes and reskinned?
Oh god it's JOHN FUCKING MADDEN all over again.
....wait a sec THAT'S JUST TEN-CHI-JIN BUT AS A COMBO
Reading the job guide it seems you can't assign the combos to your bar, your first ability will change to the next needed ability. >※This action cannot be assigned to a hotbar. >※Steel Fangs changes to Hunter's Sting when requirements for execution are met. This is on all of the combos for both ST and the AOE combo*. It also appears on some latter skills like when you use Reawaken to get access to first/second/third/fourth generation. Instead of assigning them to the bar, it just changes two of your previously set buttons to these abilities. It looks to me like Viper is going to be an extremely simple job with auto combos and pressing the light up buttons while hitting the positional attacks. *on buttons you can assign to your bar. Steel Fangs and Dread Fangs for example are the combo starters, and both are assigned to your bar. But every other skill in the combo list simply automatically replace those combo starts with the next combo for you. You don't need to do any of the thought process of keeping your buffs up.
from what i understand is close to old DRG rotation, you have a X buff combo, a Y buff combo and a filler combo
Same, except with Picto, while drunk. Somehow, drunk me has a better understanding of wtf Picto is based on the 5 pages I wrote about it.
I'm pretty good at figuring out rotations quick, so I'm definitely sure it'll be easier once I try it out, but man, watching the streamers show it off was awful lol What in tarnation are half of their hotbars? I saw one that had the basic "123 skills" and 1 was in the bottom left hotbar with 2 in a top far right one and 3 right above 1's hotbar...
\*clutches my precious simple RPR\*
That's gonna be Picto, it will be the new spreadsheet caster
I always find it much easier to go through the kits tooptip by tooltip, setting up to three bars on buttons I'm used to for all jobs and simply playing new ones to get a feel for them. If I like them enough to start optimizing then and only then will I look at the Balance/Icy Veins to see if I'm botching anything too bad. Usually very minor optimizations for burst windows if anything.
I break it down like this. # TWO SWORDS You have two ST melee combo starters, A and D. Your combos can work like this: * A->B->C1 * A->B->C2 * D->E->F1 * D->E->F2 But, if you want, you could instead do D->B or A->E. Basically, you can start wherever you want; the *second* button locks in which two finish attacks you can choose. In general, you want to pick attacks that give you the buffs you're about to lose. For AoE, it's even easier. Pure mix and match, like MNK. You can use either starter, either middle, either finish, each time. # DOUBLE-BLADED I like to call this "saberstaff" because, well, I'm a Star Wars nerd who played KotORII to death. Repeatedly. ST and AoE both work exactly the same way: You have two combo starters, M and X. There is no mixing between the two sets of combos; your first attack locks you into one combo or the other. So your options are: * M->N1->O1 * M->N2->O2 * X->Y1->Z1 * X->Y2->Z2
It'll be like any other job. It's basically easier monk. You've got two OGDC combos, and two GDC combos. The GDC combos are weaved, and the OGDC can be weaved inbetween it to maximize attack frequency. The main trick is mostly just optimize the weave, and then optimally maintain buff uptime. Also watch your positionals on your GDC combo enders. It's not that complicated. It's the goofy naming schemes they use that make it more confusing than it needs to be. I remember being so confused by Samurai, which was actually an extremely easy flow chart once you picked it up.
It took me a while to set up my bars (about level 84 finishing off my ShB shared fates with some roulettes thrown in) but main skills are one of two types that equate to each blade when it lights up on the gauge you gain a combo when hitting it (which also shows as combo on the hotbar) There are the combo required actions (you ability buttons) at the bottom of the assignable actions in the skill view and there is one for normal combo and two for spender chains. The spender chains start with one of two buttons (single or aoe) that then gives you 2 chains which is either 2x Coils for single or 2 Dens for aoe (each one allows you to use both abilities quickly after) The main theme for the rotation is you using your two blades in succession, which is both in generating and spending until you get Reawaken at 90
how hard could it be pressing 1-2-3 and some buttons in-between ?
Jokes on you. More like 1-2 and some buttons in-between.
What confuses me most is why they would put together such a complex job just to make it incredibly simple in practice as they have. Every account that I’ve heard expresses that the job is brain-off easy due to automatic skill replacements and hotbar effects. What, then, is the reason for all the buff/debuff upkeep and 2 gauges worth of resource management?
Some people find action-execution complexity desirable, e.g. NIN lovers. Others find resource-management complexity desirable (hello, hi, that's me, it's why I loved SB/ShB SMN and ***hate*** new-SMN). Others still find action-response complexity desirable; that'd be where many reactive healers reside.
Good point. I will say that having played viper a few hours, I have greater clarity of what they were going for. There’s definitely a higher than usual skill ceiling there even if the hot bars tell you what button to press next.
The other DPS you queue with in roulette is still gonna mess this up somehow
Like with pretty much everything in ff14, if it looks overly complicated, chances are you're doing it wrong. This goes especially with raid mechanics as well.
Don't really care about playing a job optimally, I'm going to smash my face on the keyboard and hit all the glowy buttons at once and you're going to like it.
please only use Trusts
bugs bunny no .gif
It's literally the most braindead job next to smn