Post by SongRune on 2024-03-30 16:02:28
If Ranger and Fighter can outright fly, I'm going to be REALLY disappointed if I can't fly too, as a Bard.
I was honestly not expecting the airdasher style gameplay from an MMO, but you know what, I think I could maybe go for that. I'm not sure that's a good thing for Ashes, though. If anyone (or even most people) can choose to be anywhere, then it doesn't matter where anyone is.
I'm worried about Tanks. If a Fighter can just fly over my tank and crash down on my Cleric and Mage, then "If you want to hurt them, you have to go through me!" isn't really a thing anymore. You're stuck with things like transferring incoming damage from an Ally to the Tank. If that's "Allies near me", now your Cleric Mage and Bard are going to be standing clustered near you... right in the AoE range of "Fighter SMASH!", and innumerable Mage abilities. If you go with "tag an Ally to defend", my Fighter's just gonna "SMASH!" the Mage, and Blitz at the Cleric as soon as you link your shield on the Mage. If you don't, they'll just kill them instead. Maybe Tank's "yank" will be enough... if the enemy doesn't have two Fighters for some reason. When everyone can move everywhere, "formations" stop mattering, and you can no longer use them to solve (or create) problems.
I'm worried about Bard. I'm supposed to get formation related buffs, right? If formations don't matter, my team will never have a good incentive to be in one that I can empower. Doing so can only provide our opponents with ways to harm us. Whether that's being able to predict where my allies are going to be standing, or even just losing the damage race through "our Fighter needs to get off the enemy backline to be in position". It'll almost never be worth it.
It's not just that, though. How on earth am I going to be able to even buff my teammates, when one of my Fighter's best actions is to rocket-boost half-way across the map? She's never going to be in range of my Songs. Am I just not going to have range limits? Are you gonna solve this by making that not matter? You kindof have to if you're living in a world where formations don't work. But then I lose other things.
In FFXI, Bard songs have a specific range limit. It's quite far, honestly. I can hit all of my party without trouble unless we've really spread out for some reason. But I also can move and reposition myself further back, off to the side, or even behind the enemy (in PvE at least), so that that range limit now cuts my party in half. It lets me put the right buffs on the right allies, since in that game, Bard has a limit. The thing is, if you solve this the other way. If Bard doesn't have limits, "BuffBot" is all but guaranteed. In what way is it NOT optimal to just keep buffing my party? Even Hunting Horn needs its limits, and it's one of the best designs against this.
Still, I can see some gameplay where I get in, and get out. Where I can manage to be in somewhat dangerous positions so I can still get off my buffs, without being utterly defenseless to the inevitable. Have some Risk and some Reward. But only if Bard can fly too. Is that good for the game? I'm not sure. But it's required by this design space. All I know is I'm definitely BRD/ROG now, not BRD/RNG.
I was honestly not expecting the airdasher style gameplay from an MMO, but you know what, I think I could maybe go for that. I'm not sure that's a good thing for Ashes, though. If anyone (or even most people) can choose to be anywhere, then it doesn't matter where anyone is.
I'm worried about Tanks. If a Fighter can just fly over my tank and crash down on my Cleric and Mage, then "If you want to hurt them, you have to go through me!" isn't really a thing anymore. You're stuck with things like transferring incoming damage from an Ally to the Tank. If that's "Allies near me", now your Cleric Mage and Bard are going to be standing clustered near you... right in the AoE range of "Fighter SMASH!", and innumerable Mage abilities. If you go with "tag an Ally to defend", my Fighter's just gonna "SMASH!" the Mage, and Blitz at the Cleric as soon as you link your shield on the Mage. If you don't, they'll just kill them instead. Maybe Tank's "yank" will be enough... if the enemy doesn't have two Fighters for some reason. When everyone can move everywhere, "formations" stop mattering, and you can no longer use them to solve (or create) problems.
I'm worried about Bard. I'm supposed to get formation related buffs, right? If formations don't matter, my team will never have a good incentive to be in one that I can empower. Doing so can only provide our opponents with ways to harm us. Whether that's being able to predict where my allies are going to be standing, or even just losing the damage race through "our Fighter needs to get off the enemy backline to be in position". It'll almost never be worth it.
It's not just that, though. How on earth am I going to be able to even buff my teammates, when one of my Fighter's best actions is to rocket-boost half-way across the map? She's never going to be in range of my Songs. Am I just not going to have range limits? Are you gonna solve this by making that not matter? You kindof have to if you're living in a world where formations don't work. But then I lose other things.
In FFXI, Bard songs have a specific range limit. It's quite far, honestly. I can hit all of my party without trouble unless we've really spread out for some reason. But I also can move and reposition myself further back, off to the side, or even behind the enemy (in PvE at least), so that that range limit now cuts my party in half. It lets me put the right buffs on the right allies, since in that game, Bard has a limit. The thing is, if you solve this the other way. If Bard doesn't have limits, "BuffBot" is all but guaranteed. In what way is it NOT optimal to just keep buffing my party? Even Hunting Horn needs its limits, and it's one of the best designs against this.
Still, I can see some gameplay where I get in, and get out. Where I can manage to be in somewhat dangerous positions so I can still get off my buffs, without being utterly defenseless to the inevitable. Have some Risk and some Reward. But only if Bard can fly too. Is that good for the game? I'm not sure. But it's required by this design space. All I know is I'm definitely BRD/ROG now, not BRD/RNG.