With FF14 Dawntrail now having been out in the wild for a week, players have spent plenty of hours exploring Tural, seeing the new story in the Final Fantasy 14 7.0 update, and testing out its new Viper and Pictomancer jobs. One key talking point in any new expansion is job balance, and game director Naoki Yoshida announces the first round of adjustments that will be rolling out in its first two post-launch patches.
The relatively smooth launch of Dawntrail has seen Final Fantasy 14 reach “a record number of concurrent users we’ve not seen since the release of A Realm Reborn in 2013,” Yoshida reveals. Given how many players were attempting to log in during the Endwalker launch, this success is likely down to the new server infrastructure for the MMORPG as much as it is the demand to play.
“It has been a joy to watch you all play, each in your own unique way, but we’ve become aware of several issues that may have proven a hindrance to your overall experience. For that, I sincerely apologize,” Yoshida writes. He notes that some key issues are under investigation, but also takes time to address some of the planned fixes and adjustments for job actions in patches 7.01 and 7.05, both of which will arrive in the coming weeks and introduce the normal and savage versions of the first Dawntrail raid series respectively.
We’ll start by addressing the two newcomers. Yoshida addresses an issue where the paint-wielding Pictomancer can manually turn off certain status effects to squeeze a little more juice out of their rotations. This will be adjusted in patch 7.01, Yoshida says, asking players to “please refrain from manually removing these status effects when practicing your rotations” in the meantime.
The Viper, meanwhile, will receive several improvements targeted at making their skill rotation feel less busy, “including the easing of directional requirements and changes to the effects of several actions,” all planned for patch 7.05 As a long-time enjoyer of positional skills I’m hoping they aren’t removed entirely, but the four branching paths of its core skill rotation can be a little much to keep on top of while you’re dealing with some of Dawntrail’s endgame fights.
Monks have suffered from a couple of key issues, Yoshida admits, including incorrect potencies on some actions and “an error pertaining to the requirements to apply stacks of Fury.” These should be rectified in patch 7.01, giving monks more effective group damage potential. Yoshida apologizes for “Monk’s inadequate performance, which presently differs from what we previously announced.”
The team has also received “considerable feedback concerning Astrologian,” Yoshida says, in particular focusing on a difficulty keeping up during burst damage phases. This should be addressed in patch 7.01 with Light Speed’s recast time adjusted and being turned into a charged action. The two draw actions also get shorter recast timers, and Macrocosmos sees a potency boost.
Tanks have also found that they’re struggling to hold onto enemy aggro during fights as a result of some of the early burst damage other classes are now capable of. As such, tank area-of-effect attacks will see their enmity boosted in patch 7.01 along with boosts to their movement abilities to help you pick up all your targets quickly.
Rounding out the list are improvements to mana regeneration for Black Mages prior to learning Umbral Soul to help with earlier content; an extended duration for Manafication for Red Mages to make landing your melee burst easier; and reduced recast timers for Samurai’s level 100 skills Tendo Setsugekka and Tendo Kaeshi Setsugekka.
Yoshida says this list “does not entail everything we have planned,” but should cover the major issues of note. As for when you can expect these changes to land, patch 7.01 is planned to arrive on Tuesday July 16, two weeks after the initial launch, bringing with it the first tier of the Arcadion raid series. Patch 7.05, meanwhile, should arrive an additional two weeks after that on Tuesday July 30, introducing the harder savage variant of the raid.
For the time being, you’ll want to make sure you’ve unlocked flying in every zone by collecting all FF14 Dawntrail Aether Currents. Don’t forget to unlock FF14 Facewear, too, as it’s easily missed and an essential upgrade to your fashion game.
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