Job Adjustments manifesto Discussion

[xbobx]

Giving pup new attachments is fine and, but make them available easily for all. If jobs are getting all these job adjustments that just happen but pups have to pay 1mil plus for go through stupid time sink hoops for a 0.001 percent chance of drop, its just not right.
You did the right thing putting attachments bought with IS points, then you turn around and do something really stupid with the new attachements and put them in chests that you hardly ever find, or put them on ob forcing you to do old content no one does. that is one thing that always pissed me off, other jobs get some easy great equip to get, but pup, something half decent you put on the hardest mobs in games with rediculous paths and horrible drop rates. then if they too good you nerf them, like burts.

[AyinDygra]

My take on SE's "vision"... in some areas, they're thinking like the players, but in many cases I am made to wonder if they play their own game, or read the english boards. My confidence in their plan for the future of the jobs has taken a major hit. It *almost* sounds like they were asked to make this list up off the top of their heads in about ten minutes. I don't see a well-reasoned and strong vision of how the jobs should operate in the situations they encounter in the game.

Job-by-job reaction and mini-brainstorming exercise:

Warrior
Warriors are physical damage dealers. That's what they've been in past games, and that's what players expect in FFXI. Their use of many weapons is a key feature, and they see it as something to build on too. However, I like the suggestion in this thread about a Job Ability that lets Warriors switch weapons without losing TP a lot more than the example adjustments they listed.

Monk
Well, they've got the punching and countering parts right. The whole "supportive attacking role" probably refers to Penance, reducing enemy TPgain via Chi blast and Mantra, increasing the maxHP of the party, both merited abilities that you can't count on a Monk bringing to a party. I won't say no to more subtle blow and more useful chi blasts, but they're almost completely ignoring guard (still room to build upon their renowned self-defense tactics) Maybe add "holds" to guarded and countered attacks, making them vulnerable to other party member attacks and preventing the enemy from attacking. Chakra should be party-AoE like in several past FF games. (I put forward several ideas in my Monk forum thread too)

White Mage
Nothing ground-breaking here. Ultimate healers and removers of enfeebles. Keeping the party healthy and preventing enfeebles. There are several glaring inadequecies in their repertoire, such as no cure for Amnesia. I could see adding Rosa's Job Ability: Pray for a hateless Curaga type effect and a Job Trait at higher levels that increases its healing power. Another Job Trait I'd give them is something like "Rise" that completely fills the raised person's HP/MP to their reduced maximums. (and many Whm's want Revivivivivivicence (no death sickness raise spell)

Black Mage
Again, very simple job concept, just getting more powerful magic. Glass cannon. A Job trait like "Piercing Magic" could be given to them to prevent the lowest tiers of resists from occurring. It could also bypass "Reflect" status, if that's ever added to FFXI. "Burst Proficiency" could be a trait that returns MP from Magic Bursts.

Red Mage
"We've decided to rename Red Mage: Oracle (From FFT). Forget the whole white and black magic thing and the magic fencing with swords... they're mainly enhancers and enfeeblers now. We're giving their dual magic side to Scholar and melee side to a new job that we're not talking about yet (Mystic Knight.)" That's what I read. "Red Mage" doesn't exist anymore.

Thief
I don't know what to say... they still see value in enmity control and treasure hunter. I get it, Thieves are tricky and the enemy shouldn't know where their attacks came from. They can steal stuff from the enemies. Recently, they became more like "criminals", collaborating and being accomplices, and now a new ability on the table is something like "Gang leader": intimidating an enemy depending on the party size. Stealing most certainly should be the focus of the Thief job. Since real items are a gil-concern, and probably the reason Steal is on a 5min timer right now, they should focus on adding temporary items and other non-gil-producing items to the loot pools of enemies that can be used strategically in battle (potions, grenades, etc) (with a new steal command on a much shorter timer to grab these non-sellable items), as well as stealing intangibles like Stealing Time (haste thief+slow enemy). Another key ability of Thieves is misdirection using distractions that could allow for Sneak Attacks from any direction. "Caution" could be a "circle ability" that increases the party's critical hit evasion rates and increases defensive skill activation rates. (I've got a thread on this job in its forum too)

Paladin
*sigh* Moving on.

Dark Knight
Giving up HP to do damage is the Dark Knight's world. They've got Dark Magic, focusing on absorbing stats and soul stealing. They're intimidating, able to inflict stun and they should intimidate all enemies (not restricted to family types). They're mainly a melee job, so their casting should be similar to Blue Mage (Fast). I could see Dark Knight getting Scathe from FFXII. FFX-2 had Dark Knights immune to status ailments, so an ability to shrug off ailments would be an interesting concept in FFXI. A Job Ability like "Fearful Strikes" that increases critical hit rate and adds a very short duration Terror on crit hits could be useful, and fits the theme (Could make it scythe only, or more effective with scythes.)

Beastmaster
Interesting turn to take on Beastmaster, with party-buffing pets. The comparison to Odin and Alexander for the instant-use pets was less than ideal if they meant for them to really be treated more like Spells or Job Abilities with a pet graphic effect.

Bard
Interesting, not much to say. Reducing enemy resistance to things like Foe Requiem and all Enfeebles across the board will bring a lot more strategy back into the game, where people have given up on using their full range of abilities since they're usually ineffective when they'd be of most use.

Ranger
Adding enmity reduction to their attacks is a massive step in the right direction.

Samurai
One word: Weaponskills. They've had this focus going for them the whole time. Self-skillchains are all the rage these days, since parties don't really coordinate for them very often.

Ninja
Not exactly what's been expected, but interesting. Deflecting/Turning aside enemy attacks instead of using a shadow to absorb them has interesting uses if this means the attack just moves to another target (like a secondary tank). For cases where a Ninja is tanking with a partner, the idea of having a smokescreen to attack from out of sight could be used to temporarily remove the ninja from the enemy's hate list so they can recast shadows, or still build hate that gets applied when the smokescreen wears off. (I posted on the ninja boards about 3 plausible additions to Ninja: Image Trickery, Smokescreen, and Fade)

Dragoon
I'm glad to see them putting more focus on Jumps and wyvern defense. I recently put forth a few ideas on classic Dragoon strategies in the Drg forums, probably after this road map was put together. I hope the direction they're going incorporates a little more from past versions of Dragoon.

Summoner
The concept is still there. I'm happy to see Atomos (hopefully a mobile glowy maw), less happy about Cait Sith, and still waiting for Phoenix - maybe a new type of summon tied to a new Job Trait: Phoenix Ember... so when a party member dies, Phoenix has a random chance of raising them, including the Summoner. (random auto-reraiseIII)

Blue Mage
Yep, not much has changed here. (more specifics would be welcome with update notes and previews.)

Corsair
Totally ignored the feedback thread on XI rolls... the vision of the gambler is as expected though. Maybe they'll consider the trick dice concept put forth in the "throwing arts" thread, using dice attacks to build up 3 separate results, then creating an effect based on those results, like slots of past games.

Puppetmaster
If they're going to keep adding attachments, they'll need to give us more attachment slots and more elemental capacity. The ideas they're putting forth could be handled with frame upgrades as others have said. Fixing the Automaton casting AI is a huge issue (THE issue) among those who use the mage frames. We need more melee heads too, and maybe a new head/frame combo or more. A way to control our automaton's weaponskills without restricting our maneuver choice would be great. (Maybe AI cards that go in a new slot in both head and body that turn on/off different abilities/spells, and maybe add new abilities/spells! - Abilities on body card, spells on head card)

Dancer
AoE Regain, triple attacks... and no sign of splitting Waltz Recast timers. Looks like they don't want Dancer to be a focused healer, just a support/enfeebling DD who "can" heal occasionally. "And perform better in ensemble casts" leads me to think there may be abilities for groups of two or more Dancers. That has potential, especially in alliances. But it could just be referring to being in a party... which would be disappointing. (there are many ideas in the Dancer forum!)

Scholar
Strategists... they seem to just be FFXI's "Red Mages" who have to choose between white and black magic at any given time. Their Damage over Time abilities are interesting, but the Helix spells never made much sense for the theme (more like Geomancer spells tacked onto the new mage job, since they didn't add Geomancer). If they really wanted to push the whole Strategist part of the job, they should get abilities that support the party's abilities to coordinate their attacks. In this regard, I'd give them abilities like Samurai and Dancer's Wild Flourish to invoke skillchains, a new Etherbound equivalent to allow magic bursts after a single weaponskill, extending the window in which skillchains and magic bursts can trigger, enhanced damage of weaponskills and magic bursts, weakening enemy resistance to magic or certain damage types. Controlling who has hate is a big part of strategy also (the two animus spells were steps in the right direction for the theme). All of these things introduce more "strategy" than "Do I use Black Magic or White Magic right now?" to the decisions of a Scholar.

(I'd have used more paragraphs, but wanted to keep the format itself clean, and it kept me from going into too much detail, since I do go into much more detail in the related posts that I didn't link to, shameless plugging and all...)

[Duelle]

Red Mage
"We've decided to rename Red Mage: Oracle (From FFT). Forget the whole white and black magic thing and the magic fencing with swords... they're mainly enhancers and enfeeblers now. We're giving their dual magic side to Scholar and melee side to a new job that we're not talking about yet (Mystic Knight.)" That's what I read. "Red Mage" doesn't exist anymore.

It is at times like this that I wish I had more space in the signature box, that way I could sig this and preserve it for posterity.

[Malacite]

As long as these WS "Refinements" don't equate into more nerfs, I'm fine.

Seriously SE do not screw with our Empyrean WS. Well, not the good ones anyway. A massive buff to the older elemental skills would be wonderful, while fixing some of the more lackluster ones both new an old. DRG didn't need Wheeling Thrust +1 SE.

Atonement, for example, could really stand to have it's damage uncapped and have the damage scale much higher with more TP & Enmity. Almost all of the 70~71 quested WS really need their fTP modifiers for 100 & 200 bumped up to justify using them.

Finally, I would really like to see some refinements to the "Break" Weaponskills. Shieldbreak is arguably the best early-game weaponskill of all, but by the time you get Weapon Break there's no point in using them anymore because there are far better WS available around that time (Rampage, Raging Rush, Guillotine etc...) and Fullbreak is a joke since while it inflicts multiple stat downs, they are all at half-strength of the singular versions. The WS itself does junk damage too.

[Andrien]

Paladin: Their only purpose is to protect/defend full time, not temporally. Adjust Rampert. Rampert magic shield should not work like Stoneskin, instead it should work like sentinel except it mitigates magical damage. Add another job ability to share the effects of our own buffs with the whole party.(Fealty and/or Sentinel for everyone) Paladin should stand out more with divine magic. Holy II etc.

Ninja: Shuriken needs to be addressed. Ninja can already dish out damage quickly at high speeds at close range combat much more effectively than their best combat skill known as Throwing. I'd like to see Shuriken adjusted in a way that they can deal massive spike damage if the player chooses to enter a stance for shuriken. Their are even some throwing weapons with base damage 250. Unfortunately those weapons are rare and can be carried in single file only. We need some more affordable Shurikens that is stack-able like that.

Blue Mage: Need more Blue Magic Points. Being stuck at 55 points is kind of tough in my opinion. Summer Breeze, (if nothing to erase we gain Regain instead) Autumn Breeze would be fantastic, and Spike Flail. Edit: also like to note that the mp cost and spell casting time should not be huge! k thanks^^

[Ravenmore]

Paladin: Their only purpose is to protect/defend full time, not temporally. Adjust Rampert. Rampert magic shield should not work like Stoneskin, instead it should work like sentinel except it mitigates magical damage. Add another job ability to share the effects of our own buffs with the whole party.(Fealty and/or Sentinel for everyone) Paladin should stand out more with divine magic. Holy II etc.

Ninja: Shuriken needs to be addressed. Ninja can already dish out damage quickly at high speeds at close range combat much more effectively than their best combat skill known as Throwing. I'd like to see Shuriken adjusted in a way that they can deal massive spike damage if the player chooses to enter a stance for shuriken. Their are even some throwing weapons with base damage 250. Unfortunately those weapons are rare and can be carried in single file only. We need some more affordable Shurikens that is stack-able like that.

Blue Mage: Need more Blue Magic Points. Being stuck at 55 points is kind of tough in my opinion. Summer Breeze, (if nothing to erase we gain Regain instead) Autumn Breeze would be fantastic, and Spike Flail. Edit: also like to note that the mp cost and spell casting time should not be huge! k thanks^^

Why wouldn't we get more points at 91, we got them at 81. Just because they don't say we will be getting them doesn't mean thier not coming. Before the last update they didn't even say sam was getting the next tier of STP. The only time I can remeber them saying a new tier of a JT was th3 for thifs since there was a big up roar over if they would get it of not. Drgs acc bouns 3 wasn't even mention.

You know the HNM spells are going to cost a lot of MP, on par with 1000 needles best case worst case we get to cast them under effect of our 2hour. With the spells found in the .dats we could make out better then most of the other jobs. They even finally listen to blus and revamp our 2hour.

[Miera]

Needs more Automaton AI fix. SE WHYYYY!?!?

also.. I like the SMN Idea, can you fix the Elemental AI too? <_< if all they are good for is to siphon then why do they even attack or cast spells? -.-

[Nala]

Glamdring: (wow just realized where i reconized your name from nice hobbit ref. >.<) i agree thf can do decent damage (managed a few 6.5k evisceration's x.x), guess i failed to re-enforce the reason for my agitation, its that the few abilities that are a part of being a DD as thf and make it unique are being out sourced with nothing of impact given back.

[Seha]

Adding an ability that increases the effectiveness of phantom rolls.

A welcome addition.

Revising the potency of certain rolls.

If this means buffing, very well welcome, if it means nerfing GTFO.

Allowing three phantom rolls to be in effect at the same time.

Now, I really hope that by 3 rolls they don't mean the new 11 bonus, cause that sucks.
Anyway, whilst good to be able to keep three buffs, PR recast time becomes an issue. Meriting this will most likely be vital, or else we can just start forgetting even bringing the weapons cause the time to deal damage will be very limited. I like having more buff capabilities since that's my role in the party, but at this rate I guess I'll only have the time to QD and WS.

Revisions to job-specific merit point enhancement attributes.

QD/PR recast merits -5 sec per upgrade yes please!!

[Dieth]

"Adding a new spell that removes Charm from a party member." - We already know how to deal with charmed players.
1. Have the Blackmage kill them
2. Sleep them.
3. Bind them.
4. Gravity them.

I implore you if anything you should do "Adding a new spell that removes Amnesia from a party member."