Job Adjustments for the Next Version Update

[Losie]

Greetings!

Below is a comment from Producer Akihiko Matsui in regards to adjustments to take place in the next version update.

Mr. Matsui makes an extremely good point in regards to development about the progression of jobs once progression becomes equipment based.

Because of that, I'd like to ask that the dev team consider Rune Fencer's Lunge - it's based 100% on MAB and your current weapon's skill. Due to it not being based on the weapon's damage in any way, Rune Fencers are stuck collecting and macro'ing in tons of MAB for just one single ability. It'd be rather nice to not have to carry, much less spend tons of plasm/bayld/etc., as much MAB gear in lieu for a skill that scales much better at higher levels.

Second, does "artifact equipment" include any af2/relic/relic2/etc. gear? Or will is JUST be the 50-60 stuff mostly for fun and the few lower level folks/macroing in and out of constantly? Extremely glad to see merits done.

[Losie]

That's a very very bad idea.
You can't force jobs to equip certain items to receive marginal boosts to their pets. What if Dragoons what to use another better Polearm? What if SMNs want to use another different grip?
What if BSTs want to use another pet and boost that instead of using one of the new ones?

Guess this doesn't apply to PUP since Animator is an unique equipment that they're forced to equip anyway.


In my opinion the only possible way to have a fair and balanced improvement of pets conditions is to have what we could call SCALING. Which is exactely the same as pet jobs are handled in 99% of the other MMOs.
You can't have the scaling be too big in a game like FFXI of course, it should be small, a small additional bonus that is calculated according to the master stats.
This way the stronger the stats of the master, the stronger the bonus the pets will receive.
Of course this bonus has to be small, so that "Pet: ..." gear will still be interesting to some extent, at least in certain slots, but that's where trial&error and a good balancement shows.
Imho it's the only possible solution, otherwise you'll be forced to develop more and more and more gear with every patch.

I mean... I like additional "Pet: ..." gear, I LOVE it, but you can't build the balancement of pet jobs around that. It should be a nice specific option, not the "key" to the balance of pet jobs.

You're jumping to conclusions. First off, they can balance it off that, because you're misthinking it. The wording implies that EVERY POLEARM henceforth will increase the petmoreso. So the drg won't have to give up a newer, better one, because it will improve their pet better. That's how the pet will improve via gear as well as the master. It's really that simple.

As for SMN, well.. Most grips, for 2h jobs and casters, aren't really superb anyway (far from as good as the stats you can get offhanding a dual-wielded one hander, to say the least) so it'll probably not be a hard slot to swap.

[jake3614]

Well Tahn... You and I are in full agreement here. These grips better be mini-R/E/Ms for avatars in their own right so to speak. I am very disappointed and hope this isn't the extent of their "adjustments" for smn.

I could see them adding a grip for each individual avatar, similar to the Elemental Macc Grips. So get ready for INV+9! I only hope the stats are beneficial, and without latents like "if player's weapon isn't drawn, Garuda MACC/MAB/ACC/ATTK+50." I could see that happening, actually.

[Duelle]

You're jumping to conclusions. First off, they can balance it off that, because you're misthinking it. The wording implies that EVERY POLEARM henceforth will increase the petmoreso. So the drg won't have to give up a newer, better one, because it will improve their pet better. That's how the pet will improve via gear as well as the master. It's really that simple.

The limitation is the item budget and the fact the last thing we need is even more Pet: Stat gear. It's a band-aid that should really be sparsely used and ideally vanish altogether. Then again, design for DRG should focus on the DRG themselves as the Wyvern has always been supplemental.

The real risk is that polearms moving forward (if you're correct) will be relatively weaker to accommodate DRG and Wyvern stats. Especially for a pet that has paper defense and dies ridiculously easy.

[Calysto]

Dragoon
Addition of polearms that have stats to increase the parameters of wyverns.

Summoner
Addition of grips that have stats to increase the parameters of avatars.

polearm that boost the pet ? congratulation on wasting every drg effort in getting a good weapon. sure theses can be good. that's going to be another reason for me to toss my empyrean i guess.
well, good to know that you know the job. we'll probably get another version of the magian "pet mab" lance. good job on that one btw.
if an equipement is even needed to boost the pet(aka making it not obsolete), why not use something like ranged or ammo, or even earing ?

as for smn and grips, you mean more stuff that take inventory ? i'm sure some of my friends will be happy to need another slots for 8/9 grips to go with their 9 staffs collection. don't forget to make it as situationnal as possible of course, it'd be a shame if it was to be useful.

[Camate]

Greetings everyone (and happy Friday!),

I'd like to follow up a bit about the planned wyvern enhancements for dragoon.

To give a simpler idea of what we have planned, by equipping a high content level weapon, we are envisioning that the stats of your wyvern also increase along with you. It's somewhat close to what a player mentioned about making it so your wyverns damage value, delay, attack, and defense increase based on your own values.

Currently there are pieces of equipment that have pet enhancing stats and by equipping them they influence your pet's strength (for example, there are already polearms in existence that enhance wyverns); however, this is not what we will be doing this time with polearms. With that said, it'll help a lot if you think of this as the polearms that are to be introduced from here on out will allow you enhance your wyvern, and the enhancements will not only increase specific stats. (We will be making it possible to enhance your wyverns after we implement the RME revamps.)

Also, the reason we didn't choose grips was because there are varieties of strong pieces of equipment that can be selected based on the situation, and if we were to make these enhance wyverns, it would be difficult to choose other options.

With that said, we felt it would be best for dragoons to be able to enhance their wyverns with their weapons.

[Babekeke]

Greetings everyone (and happy Friday!),

I'd like to follow up a bit about the planned wyvern enhancements for dragoon.

To give a simpler idea of what we have planned, by equipping a high content level weapon, we are envisioning that the stats of your wyvern also increase along with you. It's somewhat close to what a player mentioned about making it so your wyverns damage value, delay, attack, and defense increase based on your own values.

Currently there are pieces of equipment that have pet enhancing stats and by equipping them they influence your pet's strength (for example, there are already polearms in existence that enhance wyverns); however, this is not what we will be doing this time with polearms. With that said, it'll help a lot if you think of this as the polearms that are to be introduced from here on out will allow you enhance your wyvern, and the enhancements will not only increase specific stats. (We will be making it possible to enhance your wyverns after we implement the RME revamps.)

Also, the reason we didn't choose grips was because there are varieties of strong pieces of equipment that can be selected based on the situation, and if we were to make these enhance wyverns, it would be difficult to choose other options.

With that said, we felt it would be best for dragoons to be able to enhance their wyverns with their weapons.

I'd like to see an element of this in every weapon that is worth equipping for DRG. This includes all Magian weapons at their level 99 stage. Obviously the increase won't be as much for a 99 magian weapon as it is for a delve weapon, but there should still be some sort of boost.

The magian weapons are, by design, situational weapons. The other pet jobs can equip their situational weapons and still receive boosts for the pets, but if a DRG needs to use their -PDT or MDB polearms for a specific monster, they have to gimp their wyvern too? How is that fair?

[Kojo]

Greetings everyone (and happy Friday!),

I'd like to follow up a bit about the planned wyvern enhancements for dragoon.

To give a simpler idea of what we have planned, by equipping a high content level weapon, we are envisioning that the stats of your wyvern also increase along with you. It's somewhat close to what a player mentioned about making it so your wyverns damage value, delay, attack, and defense increase based on your own values.

Currently there are pieces of equipment that have pet enhancing stats and by equipping them they influence your pet's strength (for example, there are already polearms in existence that enhance wyverns); however, this is not what we will be doing this time with polearms. With that said, it'll help a lot if you think of this as the polearms that are to be introduced from here on out will allow you enhance your wyvern, and the enhancements will not only increase specific stats. (We will be making it possible to enhance your wyverns after we implement the RME revamps.)

Also, the reason we didn't choose grips was because there are varieties of strong pieces of equipment that can be selected based on the situation, and if we were to make these enhance wyverns, it would be difficult to choose other options.

With that said, we felt it would be best for dragoons to be able to enhance their wyverns with their weapons.

But what about RUN?

[SpankWustler]

The TL;DR version that my deranged mind put together is:

"Tons of Wyvern parameters will increase based on more-or-less weapon base damage."

[Keyln]

But what about RUN?

Addition of artifact equipment, merit points, and limit break quests.

There ya go.