So as a brand new Final Fantasy 14 player I am trying to learn how to be a good player (lol good luck me) so part of this is trying to check out guides and advice about how I can improve my gameplay! So today – I am checking out Azurite’s guide on Gameplay/Raid terms from FFXIV! Lets see how this goes lol! Don’t forget if there are other guides I should check out, please let me known down in the description below! I also stream this game on THIS channel so don’t forget to subscribe and pop the notifications on if you want to hang out while I play 🙂
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Please check out the original video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kQ_dfjVioY&t=0s&ab_channel=AzuriteFFXIV
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Welcome 🌱🎉🎉
Final Fantasy 14 Online has been around for many years. A version for Xbox users in the West will finally be released. MMORPG video games are not my favorites, but with Final Fantasy 14 Online there are things that I liked and others I didn't like
Are you going to play the Xbox Series X version?
Global Cooldowns do in fact have a stat which decreases the length, spell speed for spellcasters and skill speed for physical classes, off global cooldowns from what you can guess from the name cannot be decreased.
We do have a stat called Skillspeed and that speeds up the GCDs, though usually the different builds for most jobs will end up with low GCD variance, like, below 1 second variance. And of course some Jobs have faster GCDs than the rest, like Monk!
15:12 – this is mostly for high content -the hardest of hardest – for example paladins have buff which increases their dmg by 25% on long cooldown.. they "SHOULD" use it like 16 seconds before the fight even begins – why? because it helps them to deal dmg at start of their rotation (opener) and they will have it ready again when they have other cooldowns ready – it matches up – but for normal people that is useless, just click on the buff when you have stuff ready
about triple weaving/quadra weaving – i noticed that on red mage – he has Embolden (off global cooldown buff) swiftcast (instant spell) and.. i dont remember the name but another swiftcast – when i start pull, and click at all of these three, i am losing uptime because of animation lock (i cannot cast spell until the animation is done, which wouldnt really happen if i used only two oGCD)
1. Destiny 2 is a good example of raiding, but Destiny Raiding is quite unique so it won't be 1:1. FFXIV is closer to WoW but more focus on personal responsibility and scripted fights. The raids are way shorter (mostly 8-9 mins) but for higher end raiding, one person messing up can mean an instant wipe.
2. Ultimates are boss rushes (that you should totally react to, except Dragonsong's Reprise, that has quite blatant Heavensward spoilers, while the others are mostly spoiler free out of context) that can go up to 20+ mins PER TRY. They're closer to Destiny 2 raids with how harrowing and long they are, but again, both of these games have very unique raiding compared to other MMOs so it's not 1:1.
3. And yes. You are NOT expected to be able to clear raids in one session so you have to study it beforehand and parties are separated between clear parties (for people who have cleared before or people who have reached the end of the fight but unable to clear yet) and prog parties (basically learning the fight. Usually with a helper or two who have already cleared to be a guide.) Most fights you NEED to prog it first and actually have practiced it to clear. Just studying won't be enough due to how specific some fights get
4. Oh and one last thing, don't feel the rush to reach the endgame or to be a perfect player! The story content is really long and really good (though with a slow start), and most of these advanced things you won't need to think of too much until wayyy later on, as these tips about raiding are mostly just for higher difficulty (Extreme and above), and Normal mode fights you can legitimately just queue up with randoms using the duty finder and clear in one go, just enjoy at your own pace, everyone starts somewhere
Welcome to FF14 and i hope you enjoy!
Hey! Glad to see you learning about some of this more advanced terminology for the game!
I do have a tip for you about the GCD as you learn the game though(I mean, you practically just started XD): think of it as an equivalent to the ATB system in this game.
As most actions in the game fit into this GCD(and are affected by the "Skill Speed" and "Spell Speed" stats), you can associate the moment when your GCD is back up as "your character's turn to do something", thus making you want to do something when that happens to maximize your effciency even when you have to dodge things that happen in your screen, hence the association to the ATB.
After that, OGCDs/Abilities serve to fill up the time you have between when you can "attack"(you will see what it looks like later on as you level your Arcanist, and then when you upgrade it to the Summoner job where you get a lot of spells that immediately put you into the GCD, and some other spells that are OGCD, thus filling the gap like lego bricks).
Of course, it's not 100% the ATB system because of Abilties/OGCDs' existence, but it can give a better idea of the what and why to an FF fan with literally no MMORPG knowledge.
As for you questions about Raids, you can plan for them, but you don't have to if they're not in a high difficulty. Those difficulties are tied to what type of instance you get, those beings Trials and Raids(you'll see what they are as you play through the game, Trials being introduced first, then Raids after you reach lvl 50).
There are Normal Trials and Normal Raids, then Extreme Trials and Savage Raids and then Ultimate Raids, and the order of difficulty goes like this: Normal Trial<Normal Raid<Extreme Trial<Savage Raid<Ultimate Raid. Because of them being harder and optional, you usually want to plan around Extreme Trials and onward(like "raid Nights" and such where you gather the same party member to tackle this content), as you progress through their phases/mechanics.
Those "mechanics" are the crux of what a boss does in order to kill you: AoEs, Raidwides, Clockspots…. They are designed in way where it's like solving a puzzle, with sometimes familiar things on it, (which is how Clockspots, Pairs, Light Parties, etc… got their names!), with harder instances usually introducing new things that can either be separate or added on top of what you already know, complexifying them.
For Odd and Even Burst Windows, just think of the Even ones being those where you can unload all your hard hitting attacks at your enemy, while Odds are when you only have some of them back up and you use them so that their cooldown aligns back to the Even window. The fact that they're most of them are 1min and some others are 2mins make this easier to understand: the 1 min cooldown are always used on both windows, because they are back up every minute, while 2 mins cooldowns are only on Even because they are only back up on even minutes, or 2/4/8/etc minutes into a fight). The reason why we make such a dinstinction is because the game has what we call "Rotations", it's basically the relative "order" of actions you will do during a fight to make the most amount of damage, and to make all you cooldown align as smoothly as possible.
I hope it helps!
WOW I didn't think I'd make it this long lolThere's a term he didn't mention which I think you kind of brought up during the video, and it's the "correct" order in which skills and abilities should be used to increase your overall DPS. We refer to this order as a "Rotation" and it ties into the idea of the 2 Minute and Drifting.
I've seen that video before but now that I see from the pov of a new player I can see how confusing it is.
Sorry for the wall of text but I don't think you can TLDR weaving:
GCD in this game is 2.5 seconds by default, so you can use a spell or weaponskill every 2.5s. In the case of Ruin it has a casting time of 1.5s so after the cast finish you have 1s window before you can cast it again. You need to use that window to cast your abilities, for example Energy Drain and Fester, but in 1s window you can only weave one.
So it would go like this: Ruin > Energy Drain > Ruin > Fester > Ruin > Fester > Ruin…
But if you have an insta cast spell, like Topaz Ruin you can double weave: Topaz Ruin > Energy Drain > Fester > Topaz Ruin > Fester…
And if your cast is as long as your GCD then you can't weave at all.
Other way of looking at Always Be Casting is always keep your GCD spinning, look at your gameplay at 21:00, once the clock indicator fills in the Ruin icon (which notice how it fills at the same time in all your GCD actions) you should be casting it again, in that clip (heh) you clipped your GCD for like 8s!
I believe what is confusing you is that you are watching your character animation, but you can do stuff far faster, instead look at your bar, when you cast Ruin most buttons get darker but as soon as the cast finishes they light up which means you can weave. In fact you should start pressing the ability BEFORE it lights up because the game has a queuing system, meaning if you press it up to half a second before you can use it it will be executed as soon as is possible.
Don't worry if you keep fucking this up because it takes practice, specially doing it without having your eyes glued to your hotbars, but the earlier you start to practice the less headaches you gonna have later when you have a dozen spells and abilities to juggle.
Going in blind or not really depends on your raid group. Majority of raid groups I've seen do the homework, study and discuss raid mechanics. But I have also seen people decide to go in blind with maybe 1 or 2 people who know the raid mechanics. It's usually always best to communicate with your raid members.
If you ever want to practice your skills, head over to middle la noscea summerford aetheryte and there are striking dummies at the lower level
Destiny raids are a somewhat different beast to MMO-style raids, as in FF14
in Destiny, you usually have to execute mechanics to gain the ability to do (meaningful) damage to the boss and to avoid death. then you do as much damage as possible in that DPS window.
in an MMO like FF14, you are usually damaging the boss non-stop during the fight, while also executing mechanics at the same time.
the birds' eye perspective of most of the arena makes it somewhat easier to do this than the very limited first person perspective in Destiny. it takes less communication between players, since everyone almost always has the same information, and more coordination since the mechanics tend to give you a lot less leeway.
there are blind progs and just progs. some people go into raids blind and some people plan it all the way out
Honestly just go for it, stay out of the orange areas, learn what each marker means and keep uptime if you're a DPS, you'll eventually get it, I main tank because it's fairly easy, as long as you're keeping your attack rotation up while paying attention to what the enemies are doing, you'll get it with enough practice, honestly it's not as intense as it seems
theres these usual mmo raids
and then there are raids from Destiny which is something else
Hopefully to answer your "homework" question: you can look up guides if you want, or try to run it 'blind', but it's important that your party mates understand what to expect from you.
When you get to raiding, Party Finder is the in-game party… finder… and the groups will be labelled such as, "farm party" where everyone is expected to have cleared already and can clear the fight easily and repeatedly, "learning" where folks are expected to have at least watched a guide and are practicing their execution (and hopefully have someone to guide folks), or "blind" where you go in completely fresh and figure out mechanics as you go. The important bit is that folks understand what they're getting into. There's also C41 or Clear for One where everyone else has cleared and are helping someone get their clear. And trap parties, which are like… when people join a farm party hoping to get carried through even though the don't know what they're doing, and causing everyone to wipe instead of… farm.
I am compelled to mention that PF can be used for anything in the game, really, and not just raiding
For the spreads/clock spots: Usually you take unavoidable damage with spreads, so no need to run from your previous location. If the spread aoe is very big though, rangeds (healers + ranged) may want to move out though, so melees and tanks can keep hitting the boss. The global cooldown is affected by skill speed or spell speed, depending on whether it's a weaponskill or a spell, but most tend to go for more damage per spell instead of more spells cast because of raid buffs, mana and ressources. The "opener" refers to the optimal damage rotation in the first two minutes, which includes all raid buffs at around 10 seconds in and all hard-hitting abilities in there. Mechanics of the bosses may change the optimal opener for a specific encounter though, but this is pretty rare, because you'll usually still be able to damage the boss when you are dealing with them. The raiding scene is quite complex, I'd assume most people prepare by watching guides, especially for ultimates, but for savages and extremes the audiences that go in right when it drops so there simply is no guide yet (or they go in later and want to learn blind, but that has to be communicated in the team) will be a bit larger.
Some thoughts:
Mitigation: For you as an Arcanist/Summoner, your two mitigations are Radiant Aegis (use whenever you're being attacked in solo content, or when you see a cast bar on a boss in dungeons) and Addle (basically the same deal but it's still useful even if the effect is something that doesn't target you, like a tankbuster).
Opener: While openers include a couple of abilities before a pull, the term is less about the preparation and more means your first big damage combo. So "a Summoner opener" refers to the set of buttons you would push to deal the most damage possible in the first 2 minutes of the fight.
oGCD: JoCat has my favorite term for these: Free Damage Buttons. In your case Fester from your Aetherflow is the best example. You can cast these BETWEEN your regular spells, WHILE you're waiting for your GCD to let you cast Ruin again. As you seemed to be catching onto in the video, your best way to do it is like, Ruin (Aetherflow), Ruin (Fester), Ruin (Fester), Ruin. This literally takes the same amount of time as Ruin, Ruin, Ruin, Ruin but does an extra 680 potency of damage from those two Festers. If you don't alternate like this you're losing a little damage because you're not casting your GCDs as soon as possible. Some people call this "clipping your GCD" because the time from your oGCD abilities is clipping into time you can be doing GCDs.
Drifting/Clock Spots: Don't worry about this. It only comes up in top-end content and you'll be a lot more comfortable with EVERYTHING before you encounter this. Seriously, this probably won't be a term you need to know for another 60 levels. I've finished the story and done extreme trials and I've never needed to think about Drifting. It's reserved for the absolutely ultimate content.
Off-Tank: (The rest of this is maybe interesting but not important to know as a Summoner) This you'll run into before the ultimate stuff, especially if you decide to try your hand at tanking once you can unlock Dark Knight. Basically if you have a boss against an 8-person party you'll have 2 tanks and you want one tank to reliably hold aggro so that you aren't having the boss spinning back and forth between them and possibly hitting the party with cleaving swings in the process. Sometimes in mid-advanced content you'll have a Tank Swap, where a boss has a stacking debuff they apply to their main target, so you have to swap who's tanking so the debuff can wear off of one tank before they take the front line again. Tanks have Shirk (give that guy my aggro) and Provoke (give me the aggro) skills to make this work. But more often, the off-tank just gets to be a spare DPS with an easier rotation. If you're the off-tank your job is to handle any extra monsters who show up so they don't eat your back line. Some bosses also have an ally that can't get near them or they do a big combo and kill everyone, so you usually want to off-tank extra single enemies away from the main tank.
The usual courtesy is whoever turns tank stance on first is volunteering to main-tank. The off-tank should turn their tank stance on a minute or two into the fight, so that if the main tank dies the boss is immediately going after you and not the DPS or healers.
to be honest you got a very long way before you have to worry about all this and much of it youll learn as you play this guide is mostly for those who wanna learn highest raids like savage and ultimates
For drifting, imagine if you didn't press Aethercharge right when it came off cooldown. It will still have a 60 second cooldown, so it will come off cooldown later than if you pressed it immediately. Now imagine you forget to press Aethercharge twice, each time only noticing it was off cooldown 10 seconds after it became available. That means that for the rest of the fight, your Aethercharge will be 20 seconds later than it could be.
In difficult content, people align their buffs along a 2 minute cycle. Lets say your party had a 10% crit buff that lasted 15 seconds, a 6% damage buff for 15 seconds, a 5% damage buff for 15 seconds, and a 3% damage buff for 30 seconds. If everyone in the party pressed their buffs at the 2 minute mark, then your Aethercharge, being 20 seconds late, will miss all but half of the 3% buff. This is sad because Aethercharge makes your Ruin do more damage, and using it at the start of the buff window would mean you do even more damage than normally.
Also, as far a odd minute and even minute burst, its not something you actively have to think about for most jobs. If you press your buttons on cooldown things usually align themselves properly.
Note that none of this actually matters at your level. Not even at max level. These things only matter once you get to the "High-end Duty" tab in the Duty Finder.
I study every time, blind isn’t for me.
Honestly, it's super easy in this game to dip your toes into high level content if you check out a guide and are up front with your lack of experience. Some people like to go into a raid blind, and if they're opening it up to outsiders in the party finder, they'll say so ("blind prog.") I would say don't worry about knowing every single raid term right now, but keep stuff like your party mits, GCDs/oGCDs, and buffs in mind as you keep growing as a player. Weaving is possibly the easiest thing for a new player to learn, I think everyone does it reflexively once they realize how it works. The more experience you get with your class/classes of choice, the better you know what to put where. Most "high level" raids that people will be plugging away at for hours on end are one boss fight or a series of boss fights, with less exploration. There are, however, 24-man raids that work like a very big dungeon. These are basically standard content, and you'll have to do at least one series of those (one run of each of three) to progress the story at one point, so you'll get a feel for those as well. Generally, the difficulty scale of the duties is "normal" content, extreme, savage, ultimate. Extreme trials are always worth a try in my opinion since they drop unique mounts, and once you get to higher levels you can farm older ones for their mounts pretty easily. I've dabbled in high-end content and beating the most recent extreme trial (Golbez) with my friend's help was a high I'll never forget 🙂 I ride the mount I got from that clear basically everywhere.
Monk is the only one that has a boost to gcd and it's a permanent passive. Scholar used to have an ability that would accelerate the gcd if everyone in the party but they removed it so I guess they don't want to have this type of effects in the game