Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

[Pteryx]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

P.S. Pteryx's post is also a good example of the lack of respect for healers and healing that Itazura points out. Healing is a "ghetto" that only "underpowered" jobs belong in? Sheesh. No wonder people don't want to play healing jobs/roles with attitudes like that around.

You misunderstand. Healing itself is not a "ghetto". I'm RDM75 and WHM65 myself, and don't terribly mind healing. (Being treated as though I have an infinite MP pool instead of a time-limited ability to recover it without resting, OTOH...) The ghetto here is being perceived as a main healer, or being told healing is "part of your job" to at least as much of an extent as your actual job, just because /WHM is the best subjob choice you can make and you have a native MP pool. The ghetto is being told "heal" in /tell on BLM when the RDM's neither busy nor low on MP and things aren't exactly going to hell.

Furthermore, it's not that "only underpowered jobs" belong in the healer role. It's that only jobs that, uh, actually get heals natively to a useful degree that should be expected to heal. You want someone healing for healing's sake? Fine -- invite a WHM, invite a RDM, or invite a SCH. Don't further lower your server's SMNs' self-esteem so that they never, ever summon in the 70s when they can DD like they first wanted and just meekly assume that MP/WHM is all they're good for. And don't bug you BLM for resting for MP rather than healing in non-emergency situations because "that's what BLMs do." -- Pteryx

[Karinya]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

*twitch*
Tanking is part of WAR's design, though it's weakly implemented.
Healing is part of RDM's design.
Using many types of ranged weapons and ammo is part of RNG's design.
Ranged attacks are part of COR's design, and pulling duties tend to come with that.
Healing is part of BLU's design. (So are debuffing and dispelling, for that matter -- how many BLUs do you see doing that?)
...But for crying out loud, backup healing and pulling are not part of BRD's design, nor is healing part of BLM's! Those capabilities are completely a function of subjob. Yes, you shouldn't neglect that your subjob is there, but you shouldn't have your role defined in any large part by it either.

You mean like NIN/WAR and PLD/WAR?

I think you have a duty to the party to use your main and sub jobs to benefit the party, including selecting the subjob that suits the party's needs. If you don't like that, join a different party or solo.

Otherwise you're dragging down 5 other people's exp because you're too much of a prima donna to cure.

"Don't pick the versatile jobs"? BLM is a freaking nuke specialist. Its only real versatility is in having a few enfeebles and nominally being able to choose the right element for the job. The "versatility" you're demanding that BLM embrace is the "versatility" to fall into the same ghetto as SMN -- being invited for their subjob, at the expense of what the job they actually chose to play can do. Even though BLM isn't underpowered like SMN is, and shouldn't have to settle for such a thing. Yes, if something's wrong and the BLM's not in mid-cast they should throw in a cure, particularly if the actual healer can't for some reason. (If there is no actual healer, then something's wrong with this picture.) But don't talk about BLMs as though they're wasting time and MP by nuking as their first priority. -- Pteryx

It's not the BLMs that make nuking their first priority that are the problem - it's the BLMs that make nuking their *only* priority, even when people are in the red.

Any job with MP is a versatile job because MP can be used for multiple purposes. TP (unless you're a dancer) can only do one thing, so of course that's what you do with it. But MP gives you choices, and one of those choices is to save the lives of people who might die if you don't heal them.

BLM/WHM is not there just because there's no sub that helps you nuke better; in fact there are two subs that help you nuke better. /SMN would give you a bigger manapool with auto-refresh, and /RDM would give you fast cast (albeit a smaller manapool than /WHM). Do you remember why BLM/SMNs don't get invited? Because by subbing /SMN they sacrifice the versatility of /WHM, the chance to help in an emergency, to proclaim that doing anything other than nuking is beneath them; and by doing that they proclaim their contempt for the lives of their party members. Gee, that's sure who *I* want to invite to an exp party.

This post is long enough without discussing your insults toward SMN; I'll just say that there are many people who build bad parties with SMN in them and blame the SMN for the results, but that doesn't make the job "underpowered" (or "defined by its subjob", for that matter).


P.S. Pteryx's post is also a good example of the lack of respect for healers and healing that Itazura points out. Healing is a "ghetto" that only "underpowered" jobs belong in? Sheesh. No wonder people don't want to play healing jobs/roles with attitudes like that around.

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

>_> Damn good reason for most who do refuse. Its tiring. Its draining. And, it's PIGEONHOLING!

And, "Enfeeb Onry" isn't pigeonholing?

I've only hit RDM75 for a bit and don't really play during NA prime hours, so maybe it's worse than what I've seen for others, but I've been the "One Main Healer" only three or four times between Lv.72 to Lv.75 with capped exp and 11 merit points. But, I've been co-healer many times, and just a measly back-up healer nearly as often.

Are you really being forced to main heal only? Or just never bothered to ask if the party leader can get another mage into the party? I see SMN and WHM in party all the time. Much more often than BRDs, that's for sure.

If a rdm wanted to play heal monkey they'd level/merit whm.

Don't appreciate people tell me to go level WHM when they think so little of healers. >_> A part of playing Red Mage well is being able to main heal when needed-- it's insulting to see such derisive term as "heal monkey". The ability to function as a main healer as RDM/WHM in a group of six is just as much of the job as being able to function as a one-man, "no down time" skill up party on Steelshells in Boyahda Tree as RDM/NIN.

[Pteryx]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

I abhor people who refuse to tap the versatility their jobs may offer them.

- WARs that won't tank.
- RDMs that don't main heal.
- /NIN onry BRDs
- Cheap RNGs
- CORs that won't pull.
- BLUs and BLMs that never cure people.

If you want to be one-dimensional, don't pick the versatile jobs.

*twitch*

Tanking is part of WAR's design, though it's weakly implemented.
Healing is part of RDM's design.
Using many types of ranged weapons and ammo is part of RNG's design.
Ranged attacks are part of COR's design, and pulling duties tend to come with that.
Healing is part of BLU's design. (So are debuffing and dispelling, for that matter -- how many BLUs do you see doing that?)

...But for crying out loud, backup healing and pulling are not part of BRD's design, nor is healing part of BLM's! Those capabilities are completely a function of subjob. Yes, you shouldn't neglect that your subjob is there, but you shouldn't have your role defined in any large part by it either. Particularly if the reason that it is your sub is simply because there's nothing out there that lets you perform your specialty better.

"Don't pick the versatile jobs"? BLM is a freaking nuke specialist. Its only real versatility is in having a few enfeebles and nominally being able to choose the right element for the job. The "versatility" you're demanding that BLM embrace is the "versatility" to fall into the same ghetto as SMN -- being invited for their subjob, at the expense of what the job they actually chose to play can do. Even though BLM isn't underpowered like SMN is, and shouldn't have to settle for such a thing. Yes, if something's wrong and the BLM's not in mid-cast they should throw in a cure, particularly if the actual healer can't for some reason. (If there is no actual healer, then something's wrong with this picture.) But don't talk about BLMs as though they're wasting time and MP by nuking as their first priority. -- Pteryx

[Akashimo]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

- RDMs that don't main heal.

>_> Damn good reason for most who do refuse. Its tiring. Its draining. And, it's PIGEONHOLING!
If a rdm wanted to play heal monkey they'd level/merit whm.
Any and all parties I've been on with rdm or talked to other rdms about, always ends up in 5/1 or 4/2(brd) setups. 5/1 as whm is hard enough, on rdm, its demeaning and hard to keep mp up, even with convert. Spiked damage takes the most mp. With the high chain parties, its tiring, dynamis or trigs tiring. Simply for that reason I've stopped meriting on rdm and whm all together unless i need to recap exp.
Being rdm and choose not to main heal isn't one deminsional by choice, its for sanity and pride. If anything is truely one deminsional, its the parties that sees us only as a one deminsional job.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

I abhor people who refuse to tap the versatility their jobs may offer them.

- WARs that won't tank.
- RDMs that don't main heal.
- /NIN onry BRDs
- Cheap RNGs
- CORs that won't pull.
- BLUs and BLMs that never cure people.

If you want to be one-dimensional, don't pick the versatile jobs.

[Lunaryn]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

The WAR community made a huge push years ago to be removed from the random tank ranks into the DD slot they're in now. I for one think it was a good move. Yes, we miss a tank, but it was just more work than I think was worth it to gear for a tanking role.

I don't think it was good at all. It was laziness. They'd rather sit around lfp DD only than get the gear and food to fill the role that needed to be filled. And the community rewarded that by accepting them as DDs and leaving other jobs - that couldn't tank if they tried - out.

Sure it's work to tank. And work to maintain two sets of gear for two different party roles. Nobody knows that better than a post-ToAU PLD. But if you'd rather get exp than sit in Whitegate, *do what the party needs you to do*.

Similar remarks apply to DDBLU. Play your *whole* job - if I want someone who just hits things, I'll invite a monk.

I do take issue with the attitude expressed by tdh. Meleeburn would have come about as a result of the conditions making it viable even if it only achieved xp parity with traditional party. The underlying problem it solves isn't "How can I get xp faster?"* or even "I hate having to think." Meleeburn allows you to take the most common and popular party role (DD) and manage to accommodate five times as many of them per party as support. If you're a DD frustrated by losing a PLD or BRD to another party that asked faster, the appeal is undeniable.

I don't know how many times I've considered building a party, seen no NINs or PLDs but a couple of WAR/NINs and enough other prospects to make a functional party, refreshed the list a couple times while contemplating the prospect of asking one of the WARs to tank and their likely response, and ended up just thinking "forget it, not worth the hassle" and gone lfg instead.

Versatility is an underappreciated trait in a lot of jobs in FFXI. Party leaders like to look at the search list and know exactly what someone is bringing to the table. The fact that most WARs don't begin to know what they'd need to do in order to tank, let alone the fact that so many seem to take offense at being asked to, doesn't mean I'm going to just have to offer them the "better" role of DD instead. If I'm asking a WAR to tank, lack of DD is not my problem. If you as a WAR are asked to tank and refuse, you're setting aside an opportunity at a role in a party because you are unprepared for it or otherwise find it distasteful. If as a community we decide that WARs are not to be used as tanks, that opportunity simply disappears, unnoticed.

I don't know if there's much SE can do about the disdain for versatility that the community currently has. In part I'm hoping that making noticeable payoffs for tactical coordination might have some influence on this... A lot of this is a question of how we organize ourselves, and the search/lfg questions bear some relevance here. Most of the problems I'm observing are issues of how players of this game (especially party members) behave in an information vacuum. I personally think search comments are too space-limited to be as useful as they should be, but even as limited as they are few NA players can be convinced to use them -- either as seekers offering up useful info for prospective leaders, or as leaders seeking info on prospective members. Given that SE provides no other means with which we can express our playstyle preferences, understanding of our job's capabilities, whether we are open to experimentation or demand tried-and-true approaches, etc., the refusal to even use this limited resource means that the process of seeking and forming pickup groups is ruled by assumptions -- about what style of party you'll accept, what role you'll play, what kind of gear/food you'll bring, what camps you're willing to party at -- and when these assumptions don't mesh perfectly, you have players whose parties suck or parties whose players suck, depending on perspective.

I suppose the only suggestion I have that doesn't involve an overhaul of how people register their interest in xp and search for party members would be to increase the seacom line length and shorten the NA versions of some autotranslator phrases (and add a phrase of some sort for tank), but that's really not likely to do much on its own...

*Yes, I'm aware that for some significant groups, "how can I get xp faster?" is THE question, and that at 75 there's some alleviation in terms of job availability compared to lower levels, but most people I party with are more concerned with whether they can get into a decent party at all. If a party with 5 DD and 1 healer worked and pulled in tolerable xp at every level, I believe we'd see meleeburns at every level, just because it lets those 5 DD and 1 healer party without waiting for tanks to spawn.

[Karinya]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

I've never seen this tested, but I'll be surprised if two Tail Whips or Double Punches would out damage a Predator Claw. Also factor in that they have to wait roughly a minute to use another one, the mob may be dead and that 500dmg may come from somebody else just as easily.

But there *are* alternatives between "do nothing but cure" and "blow all your MP on Predator Claw". I think too many people think it's Lv65+ BPs or nothing, and so if you have too many other duties to spam Lv65+ BPs, you're "not being a real SMN". Bull. Anyone who's played FFIV, V, IX, X, Tactics or Tactics Advance knows that summoners don't always summon every round. I don't think there's ever been an FF game where spamming expensive summons was a good idea outside of a few boss fights.

PLD - From day 1, build to be a tank.
NIN - User base pushed into a tank, and it works well, requires some work.
WAR - They have 1 DEF bonus and Provoke.
SAM - Good Evasion, good HP, great Parry.
BLU - Defensive spells, some fast casting spells, healing spells.

You are very badly underselling WAR. Provoke is huge - every other tank subs WAR primarily to get it. WAR have provoke *and* free choice of subjob. But in addition they also have the second-best shield skill in the game, high HP and VIT, and access to most of the same armor PLD has (and some that's even better than PLD's). At the same time, higher STR, attack bonus and a higher DMG weapon category with better WS (axes) keep their damage output (and therefore hate from damage) superior to PLD's even with the same gear otherwise.

They can't heal themselves (except as /BLU and then it's tricky). But they can easily *take* the same or less damage as a PLD while *dealing* noticeably more, as either /MNK or /BLU.

With Cocoon BLU can greatly limit the damage they take, they can toss out some pretty substantial healing spells, and have other hate generating spells.

You don't say why this doesn't make them "acceptable" tanks. IMO the main reason BLU aren't accepted as tanks is that most of them don't want to try.

How did the community handle the issue of limited NINs & PLDs? They got rid of them. They just found melee that had a means to avoid some hits and mobs that have low HP.

Yes - this is one of the problems SE should fix, because players can't fix it ourselves. That party style is effective - vastly more effective than any other - and therefore *too* effective for the game as a whole to be balanced. Players find (some of the) effective strategies in the game; it's SE that makes the rules that determine which strategies are effective in the first place.

The play your whole job is part of what we're asking for. But a main healing BLU isn't the whole job. Main healing RDM or BLU isn't the whole job. I've seen quite a few BLUs who are front line and help out in healing situations. I've seen BLUs spend more MP on PLDs than the PLD spent on themselves.

Main healing in every party isn't the whole job. Main healing in some parties, main tanking in some parties and mostly damage dealing in some parties is the whole job (as I understand it). That's part of playing a flexible multi-role job: you adapt your tactics to the composition of the party and the camp you are in, rather than doing the same thing in every party the way a narrowly designed job like MNK does.

When there's a global healer shortage you'll find yourself pushed into doing more healing more often. Tank shortage, ditto.

When does the KRT First Burn start? Lv.70. What happens the previous the 60 levels of parties?

Well, ignoring the fact that the comment I was responding to was clearly (IMO) about merit and high-level exp: MNK get invited just fine at all levels, IMX (relative to other DD-only jobs, at least). I've never seen anyone say "monks suck, get a [other job] instead" or anything remotely like it (and if I did see it, I'd laugh, assuming it was a joke).

[Malacite]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

By Lv.50's, though, they regularly take the monster away from PLDs (if not for very long). MNKs, in my view, was never bad, but its output starts low, and grows slowly, but never stops--until it becomes a DD machine which makes every tank wary.

Welcome to the standard for MNK in every RPG since it's inception in Dungeons and Dragons.

[Yellow Mage]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

No, no I really don't.

Never mind, then.

You can't fix stupid

Quoted for truth. In fact, I'm stuffing this in to my sig.

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

I'll give you that part of it was lazy. Nobody, outside of a few jobs, wants/has to carry around gear for multiple roles in a party setting, but this wasn't completely on the WAR. Part of this push was by the rest of the community. Take a look at 5 possible tanking jobs.

PLD - From day 1, build to be a tank.
NIN - User base pushed into a tank, and it works well, requires some work.
WAR - They have 1 DEF bonus and Provoke.
SAM - Good Evasion, good HP, great Parry.
BLU - Defensive spells, some fast casting spells, healing spells.

NIN has same base Parrying as SAM, and SAM has same evasion as MNK. MNK/NIN has been known to tank, often with Trick Attack help--though not sure how that's working out in the post two-handed update era. A WAR who wants to tank also has attack output, Warcry, and a bit of Shield skill (C+) at his disposal.

THFs have been using TA to make each tank in "Dagger Burn" parties for a very long time, even if those parties are relatively rare. A few brave PUPs have been tanking on /WAR, using Automaton as healing aid.

How did the community handle the issue of limited NINs & PLDs? They got rid of them. They just found melee that had a means to avoid some hits and mobs that have low HP.

And, those mitigation tricks are only possible because S-E made them so, same with the low HP monsters. That is why some of us been repeating that the game balance problem have been making the game less fun.

When does the KRT First Burn start? Lv.70. What happens the previous the 60 levels of parties?

Those who use parsers knew for a long time that low level THF/MNKs (Lv.15+) using Hand-to-Hand can do better damage than MNKs; MNKs' output is low until maybe Lv.30+, but at least they were good for making Fusion with PLD tanks back in the SC+MB times.

By Lv.50's, though, they regularly take the monster away from PLDs (if not for very long). MNKs, in my view, was never bad, but its output starts low, and grows slowly, but never stops--until it becomes a DD machine which makes every tank wary. I'm not sure about the rest of the population, but tanks and healers are very sensitive to the DDs' output, and I'm sure they've noticed MNKs for a very long time.

[711rocks]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

This.
As for R1, cap your damn EXP, suck it up and take R1s. I don't care if your LS does have WHMs, if that BRD, BLM or RDM tosses you a R1, you take it. If you have an HNM or what have you tearing your group up and need to recover, recovery is all that matters, paltry EXP losses do not. If you delevel and lose all your nifty merit abilities and stats - that's your problem, take one for the team. Cap your EXP the next time you merit.

i agreed with the rest of what she said but this part in particular is annoying
every ls event we have there are always like 5 people who delevel to 74
then bitch that then need r3 to get their level back
orz
just joined besieged or solo lesser colibri if you really don't want to waste your merit time

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

/Also, have you been posting where I think you've been posting.

Where do you think I've been posting? Between here and LBR, I don't post much elsewhere anymore. I had maybe a couple posts on Alla in the last two months and KI I've not returned to since leaving Titan. I've not posted on BG in roughly a year and my postcount is a whopping, singular post - though BRP is fond of talking about me there. I feel if I browse any of those three other forums too long, I'll get infected with something.

I'll just stick to this one and LBR. The other forums are for browsing recent update info and results, which means I can just turn to a wiki shortly after.

[tdh]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

I think people focus too much on the level 70 BPs. What a lot of people seem to ignore about SMN is that the lower level BPs keep gaining in power as the avatars level with you - but they don't gain in MP cost. This makes them almost ridiculously MP efficient. If Predator Claws costs too much, throw some Tail Whips or Double Punches for 500 - practically free.

I've never seen this tested, but I'll be surprised if two Tail Whips or Double Punches would out damage a Predator Claw. Also factor in that they have to wait roughly a minute to use another one, the mob may be dead and that 500dmg may come from somebody else just as easily.

As DRG/SAM, I've never had a problem with TP gain - I gain TP faster than anyone but full SAMs. But then I have to wait for WS until I have a hate reducer ready or the mob is about to die. More TP gain wouldn't really help me much at all. (I don't have Seigan yet, so it's not an option.)

Sword Grip is "counterproductive" the same way DW and Suppa are counterproductive. I don't see NINs and WAR/NINs rushing to throw away their DW gear, because while it has zero effect on TP gain, it has significant effect on DoT which makes up most of your damage.

Fortunately, these days all jobs have a TP "gimmick" and not just a small handful of them. A means to make up for a miss, or to build faster.

WAR - Double Attack
MNK - Kick Attacks
DRG - Jumps
DRK - Abs-TP
THF - Triple Attack
SAM - lol

Amnesia hurts just about all of those, but Abs-TP isn't worth the MP vs Imps. Move to another of the only acceptable camps, and everybody keeps their Job ablitities and traits, but DRK loses Abs-TP. So the answer to that is DLY-3%? Nevermind that 3% really equates out to nothing, why use that when there are better options. Which is what I stated earlier.

Anyway, if you're not using Hasso, you have little grounds to complain that you don't have enough Haste to keep up in TP. Throw away 10% haste (that *doesn't* reduce your TP gain per hit) and +10 acc that takes up 0 inv slots, and then act surprised when you don't measure up?

You're either not reading the entire post, or ignoring parts of it.

Part of the reason why /SAM has become more and more popular in Merit parties is because of it's ability to mitigate damage. Yes, the Haste/Acc/STR bonus is nice, but you have to find a happy medium for the party. As a 2 hander accuracy isn't an issue, as a DRK STR isn't an issue, but even before the update when a DRK could find a party damage wasn't a problem - damage taken & MP consumption was.

Take a standard party post Lv.70 where you have a PLD who Provokes and Flashes and that's it (More and more PLDs seem to be carrying all that MP around for looks.), a NIN that Provokes at the start and just keeps up shadows for themselves, so the heavy hitters are tanking. Some of these guys have no DEF because they piled on attack or accuracy and take 180+ dmg a pop. Next thing you know, what poor non-WHM mage that got pushed into main healing is having to dump several Cure IIIs on one or more non-tanking melee to keep going. This slows down progress as we're still limited by out MP pool. Because of this, some of us have decided that it's better for the overall group to use 3rd Eye/Seigan nearly full time.

I could easily go Hasso full time, die more, slow down EXP parties, and as somebody mentioned previously nobody invites the job because they're becoming increasingly selfish.

I don't think it was good at all. It was laziness. They'd rather sit around lfp DD only than get the gear and food to fill the role that needed to be filled. And the community rewarded that by accepting them as DDs and leaving other jobs - that couldn't tank if they tried - out.
Sure it's work to tank. And work to maintain two sets of gear for two different party roles. Nobody knows that better than a post-ToAU PLD. But if you'd rather get exp than sit in Whitegate, *do what the party needs you to do*.

I'll give you that part of it was lazy. Nobody, outside of a few jobs, wants/has to carry around gear for multiple roles in a party setting, but this wasn't completely on the WAR. Part of this push was by the rest of the community. Take a look at 5 possible tanking jobs.

PLD - From day 1, build to be a tank.
NIN - User base pushed into a tank, and it works well, requires some work.
WAR - They have 1 DEF bonus and Provoke.
SAM - Good Evasion, good HP, great Parry.
BLU - Defensive spells, some fast casting spells, healing spells.

But those pros for the later three don't make them acceptable tanks. There are different caliber players out there. A middle of the road PLD that we wouldn't call great, but not horrible can be a proficient tank. NIN with decent gear that can be purchased, the ability to count shadows, and support from the party can tank. In order for a WAR to be the same tank, they'd have to have exceptional gear, skill, and probably Merits from other jobs. With SAMs two new job abilities they could possibly step up and tank, and I've jumped up to do it in Merit parties, but depending on the mob it required a lot of extra evasion gear that eliminates the use of attack usually and mage support. With Cocoon BLU can greatly limit the damage they take, they can toss out some pretty substantial healing spells, and have other hate generating spells.

How did the community handle the issue of limited NINs & PLDs? They got rid of them. They just found melee that had a means to avoid some hits and mobs that have low HP.

Similar remarks apply to DDBLU. Play your *whole* job - if I want someone who just hits things, I'll invite a monk.

The play your whole job is part of what we're asking for. But a main healing BLU isn't the whole job. Main healing RDM or BLU isn't the whole job. I've seen quite a few BLUs who are front line and help out in healing situations. I've seen BLUs spend more MP on PLDs than the PLD spent on themselves.

That not-so-bright people overvalue spike damage and don't pay attention to the regular hits every round that add up to more damage over the course of the whole fight?
But I already knew that. Lots of people are stupid. Film at 11.
(Although you're exaggerating, anyway. KRT roaming monk parties have been around pretty much ever since they added the high-level part of KRT, which I think was around the introduction of G5.)

~This~ is what I said.

When does the KRT First Burn start? Lv.70. What happens the previous the 60 levels of parties?

So I read through this topic, was gonna quote and comment and snip and quip about so many other poster's comments, when suddenly the true answer just hit me.
You can't fix stupid

Meh, you can fix stupid, it just requires repeated murder.

[Feba]

Re: Can players' interests and needs be balanced?

This.

I still don't understand that.


/Also, have you been posting where I think you've been posting.