Removal of the cross class system announced.

[Reynhart]

Even where two skills are clones of each other—and I'm not saying that's okay—I'd much rather have Shadowskin on my edgy DRK job than Rampart, and would rather not have it on my Paladin, merely in terms of name and appearance.

The name doesn't really matter in the end. As for the animation, you could have a different one depending on the job. Like doing Fracture with a Sword is different than with an Axe.

Moreover, moving it to a broad "tank" skill does nothing for customization or button-bloat. It'd still be a required choice;

Considering there's no real customization with the cross-class, it wouldn't worsen the situation. The most important part, for me, is that I don't think you'll have to chose the role skills. You'll just have all of them available. But keep in mind that if tank skills are always available, you can still have traits to modify them. Maybe WAR will have the basic "Rampart-like" but PLD and DRK will keep the improved version.

Making a universal enmity combo does not save space. It replaces three more unique slots with 3 absolutely homogenized ones that force the remaining skills to then also be more homogenized.

Stormblood will not reduce the number of skills we have at our disposal, anyway. They already said that moving skills to the role-pool will give room for more personal skills.

It tears apart each tank's previous rotational priorities, where they previously all varied immensely.

Level 70 will already change our rotation, it's not a big deal.

I don't understand why you would think that would be, in any way, a good thing.

IIRC, I never said this was "good". For me, not designing an expanded class/job system is where the system started declining.

But eh, it worked that way from the start "Ok we have a deep but flawed system, how do we fix it ? Adressing the flaw is boring, let's make the system as bland as possible, it can't come bite us in the future, right ?"

[Shurrikhan]

IIRC, I never said this was "good". For me, not designing an expanded class/job system is where the system started declining.

But eh, it worked that way from the start "Ok we have a deep but flawed, how do we fix it ? Adressing the flaw is boring, let's make the system as bland as possible, it can't come bite us in the future, right ?"

My apologies for mis-extrapolating there.

And yes, painfully true.

Stormblood will not reduce the number of skills we have at our disposal, anyway. They already said that moving skills to the role-pool will give room for more personal skills.

My only point here is that they said either that—and my memory isn't perfect here—that our total skill-count or the general skill requirements (skill floor and ceiling) would be the same in SB as in HW. And as long as these role skills are free, rather than having to sacrifice a native skill to be taken, then that movement has absolutely no effect on button-bloat. Whether you need to level Paladin to 22 for Provoke, or get it automatically, you still have it and 4 other obligatory "cross-class"/"role-based" skills on your bar in addition to all your native skills. There is zero effect on the total skill-count by just changing that label. You still have exactly 32 skills (+ whatever net addition, if any, comes with SB).

Level 70 will already change our rotation, it's not a big deal.

Better to still have some differences... Further homogenization, at this point, should be all the scarier, not just inundating to the point of apathy.

[Reynhart]

My apologies for mis-extrapolating there.

No hard feeling

My only point here is that they said either that—and my memory isn't perfect here—that our total skill-count or the general skill requirements (skill floor and ceiling) would be the same in SB as in HW.

When questionned about that during the Q/A session at Fanfest, I think Yoshida meant that the skills needed for our rotations will not change. It doesn't automatically means that we won't have more situationnal skills on top of that. For example, as a DRG, you have access to Foresight, Featherfoot and Mantra, or even Ring of Thorns and Doomspike...Some of those skills are still useful, but you don't need to take them into account when practicing an optimal rotation.

[DadFynal]

Woah, ok...can someone give me a yes or no? Does this mean I can stop thinking about leveling classes I don't really want to play for cross class skills? I am a new player and want to get through 3.0 asap in prep for SB, but feel pressure to go down the rabbit trail of picking up cross class skills I need; like quelling strikes lvl 34 archer :/. Can anyone confirm I can just play w/ and forget that for now?

[programcanaan]

Woah, ok...can someone give me a yes or no? Does this mean I can stop thinking about leveling classes I don't really want to play for cross class skills? I am a new player and want to get through 3.0 asap in prep for SB, but feel pressure to go down the rabbit trail of picking up cross class skills I need; like quelling strikes lvl 34 archer :/. Can anyone confirm I can just play w/ and forget that for now?

You can do whatever you want. Though it is pretty safe to say crossclasses are going bye bye.

But dabbling in some other playstyles never hurt anyone.

Only so many additional skills are very preferential Swiftcast, Awareness, Raging Strikes. While others are very optional like Stoneskin, Eye for an Eye, Quelling Strikes, Blood for Blood.

And still at the end of the day it's still your choice whether to get those or not.

[ADVSS]

Woah, ok...can someone give me a yes or no? Does this mean I can stop thinking about leveling classes I don't really want to play for cross class skills? I am a new player and want to get through 3.0 asap in prep for SB, but feel pressure to go down the rabbit trail of picking up cross class skills I need; like quelling strikes lvl 34 archer :/. Can anyone confirm I can just play w/ and forget that for now?

The answer is NO, that will be a thing in the past. you wont have to level another class.

[Gumbercules]

you should be fine just continuing with 3.xx series of quests without quelling strikes, and yeah the cross class revamp is to make it to were they open up by role not by job/class. So using a very loose example atm you get quelling at 34 arc (if i remember right) but come 4.0 it will be more like "open quelling strikes at lvl 34 ranged dps" or w/e the criteria becomes. (as in if your blm hits 34 it opens up quelling strikes for the "ranged dps" category of cross class skills etc)

[Llus]

I was actually hoping that all of the CC skills would be place in a single menu that you could choose from, and certain actions like BfB would become traits that could be cross classed. But, from what's been said in hearsay: it looks like we will never have to play a class or job that we hate to have access to certain skills, which should be popular. Fast cast and surecast as traits would be great!

I don't think these would be good as traits... Imagine taking 20% more damage all the time for a 15% damage boost? Swiftcast always being up, so there's no cast time for anything anymore? Surecast always being up so you can't be interrupted?

[Llus]

I'm a bit concerned by this change and hope that customization of cross-classed skills will still be a thing. For example; with WAR I tend to cross class second wind over flash because the enmity I build as WAR is more than enough and generally don't need flash except for large mob pulls where I might start running low on TP. For PvP content, I drop provoke in favor of featherfoot. As long as we still have the same skills to choose from and can customize additional actions; I'm all for the change. But if the cross-class skills are pre-set and can't be customized; I'd hate to work within those restrictions.

[MPNZ]

I don't think these would be good as traits... Imagine taking 20% more damage all the time for a 15% damage boost? Swiftcast always being up, so there's no cast time for anything anymore? Surecast always being up so you can't be interrupted?

Well what would happen is that the skills would probably have to be rebalanced to have a smaller affect on stats, or allowing stuns and silences still affect players with sure cast.
But, it would seriously remove a lot of the clutter that is currently a problem. They have to do something or they'll just end up pushing away the crossbar users, which is already a major handicap in some the game's content right now.