4.0 abilities

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Originally Posted by Kit-Kat

Where did they say all that. Source please?

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No, it's my thought. I misspoke, sorry.

Just this is true "It was said, they would change the combat system at 4.0 (or 5.0)."

What I would suguess? Add more Hotbars :P (especially Vertical ones)

Apart from that and moving onto real solutions. I would like to see More traits added or got he XI route and just don't increase the Level cap.

Please give warrior a trait to increase foresight.

There's always conditional effects.

The main thing is to give us, essentially, a contenting number of options, but that doesn't mean we need three and a half bars worth of abilities by which to do that. You can always instead trait an ability to function as another ability, or with a new bonus effect, when attacking from a certain position, when within another buff or debuff's window, or when following another particular skill, etc.

And then there's always specializations, or pick X of (greater) Y number of skills, that give sufficient freedom to craft your character as you'd like without overloading your bars.

As for what I feel new skills in general should aim for, I'd say the basic idea is to give more thematic instruments that allow you to make new innovations within your gameplay up to acquisition—in other words, small steps that can have potentially large impacts. Basically, you get more points of control that allow you to get a deeper feel for your own gameplay. They should augment one's options and cause the player to consider different ways to handle different (frequent) situations. They should NOT jarringly change gameplay.

Form Shift is a pretty good example of this. When we first get it, it basically feels like it at best gives us an extra 2 GCDs of GL uptime, if we should need it. Not the largest addition, for sure, but when we go back to synced content we sometimes wonder why we were ever okay with Monk gameplay prior to acquiring Form Shift. Wanderer's Minuet, on the other hand, is probably a notorious bad example, as it does not augment preexisting gameplay or even, due to its long lock-in time, feel like an additional tool. It is basically a new style of play, with jarring contrast, acquired over a single level, non-optimal for another 4 levels, and still non-optimal over much of your rotation at level cap. A more subtle failing, imo, would be something like Tornado Kick, which adds a niche advantage in the form of a QoL addition, allowing a Monk to pull off a bit more end-of-phase damage, but is a bit too weak to have any real in-combat usage, even at seemingly optimal moments (using Tornado Kick just before buff CDs fade and only after having refreshed all DoTs and having spent all oGCDs). The same can be said of Meditation's not scaling with its current GCD, or even Skill Speed, making it all the more punishing to use in combat under Greased Lightning or with high-SS gear, even though many SS plateaus provide only a half-GCD spare to perfectly reapply Demolish, Dragon Kick, or Twin Snakes, too little to Fracture more often or adjust rotation. What these both are now should basically be what they, and most ideal ability additions, should seem like — fine QoL bonuses that offer something more to do, without being too annoying in doing it, but after perfecting their usage they should also end up situationally viable in-combat options as well, as not to fall off the battle bars completely.

Battle Litany and (the revised) Warden's Paeon are a couple good examples of niche-makers that may or may not actually be that interesting in solo content, but do give a better feel for one's role in group interactions. Dragoon becomes a sort of strike leader, while Bard furthers its support options, finally through a responsive instant cast. Those are good as well, but not an ability type I'd personally like to rely on in design. It's awesome to be able to save party members from a potent bleed or be the one job who can actually deal with Berserk's pacification effectively (if Selene is mid-heal), but when too many abilities all end up being group-content-only, you end up with the disappointment of Smoke Screen and Shadewalker whenever you're in a group with no Monk and/or a tank who doesn't know how to edge his or her dps and enmity anyways.

tank... only play PLD
healer... only WHM
DPS... only SMN

all the other jobs requires too much effort for me =p

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

I think it is time for them to start adding some flare back into already existing skills by introducing Traits that upgrade old skills.

For example, Tank Jobs could get a trait that adds a new additional effect for being in Tank stance such as Paladin gets Oath of Light each time they get hit which increase their chance to block with their shield and increase reduce damage from their shield block.

Warriors's Tank Stance passive can get an additional effect that each time they spend their Tank buff stack they will be given a new buff called "Inner Rage" which cause them to gain a small % of HP back from each hit they take.


For DPS

Dragoons can get a passive that adds special debuff or buff effect to their 1,2,3 skills such as each time they use their 123 skill they build up a special buff called "Dragon's Spirit" which increase their crit chance or ignore a certain amount of enemy's armor up to 5 stacks.

Ninja can get a passive that gives them a new effect for their 123 skill when they are in their poison stances being that each time they hit a enemy with 123 skills they build up a special DoT called "Blade Poison" with it becoming stronger the higher the stack number up to a stack of 5.

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But, but, there's no actual enemy armor (variance) in FFXIV! ("Armor penetration" would instead equate to +direct damage, as with any of the weapon type resistance down debuffs—where they fall from no effect to negative defense. But at least that might mean finally being able to let Chaos Thrust drop off for a couple GCDs, if only at the 4th and onward rotation, etc.)

The first thing I think of when I think of Ninja poisons—well, right after "things that probably could have just been passive damage increasing traits instead"—is universal MP usage. When it was first announced that NIN would be using two poison types, along with a blend of speedy physical attacks and powerful magics, I kinda expected that one would provide means of MP restore, additional magic damage, and/or self-buffing while the other one granted TP restore, additional physical DoT damage, and/or increased debuffing, each typing in a bit more into Assassinate. Admitedly, I'm kind of itching to see something like that in future expansions. It's right under "Mug stealing enemy items usable in combat by the next Mug cast, initially pacifying if used at the right time" on the wishlist, if that means anything...

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

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Enemies still have Defense just like our characters.

Armor Penetration/Ignore in RPGs often have a much larger damage buff effect than a direct % damage increase buff on enemies with High Defense, such as bosses and the more sturdy monsters in dungeons.

It part of the reason why when a game offers a way to ignore a certain percent of enemies armor/defense that buff is often chosen over direct damage increase buffs.

For example,

if there is a 10% armor penetration/ignore on a enemy with 1000 armor then the enemy is only at 900 defense when attacking it. Then more on to a enemy with 2000 then that enemy is now at 1800 defense.

Direct damage buff is more set and the damage output is often weaker than armor penetration/ignore.

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

Enemies still have Defense just like our characters.

Armor Penetration/Ignore in RPGs often have a much larger damage buff effect than a direct % damage increase buff on enemies with High Defense, such as bosses and the more sturdy monsters in dungeons.

It part of the reason why when a game offers a way to ignore a certain percent of enemies armor/defense that buff is often chosen over direct damage increase buffs.

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That's the thing though. At the same gear level, my 300 relative potency (factoring in buffs) attack does the same average damage to a wimpy AoE-burn trash mob or to a boss, unless that boss has a specific form decreasing damage taken, as far as I've seen. Dragon Kick and Twin Snakes, for instance, have identical effects on one's damage.

(Just went ahead and tested this for a few minutes to confirm I wasn't crazy, and every Bootshine and True Strike fell within the same range of damage from either a Dragon Kick alone or Twin Snakes alone, often even the exact same number. Jumped into a DF group for M4N, apologized for being a shitter for a minute in the name of science, and found the same.)

(Testing on multiple levels—53,55, 57, and 60—and mob types in each level has found the same average damage per potency so far.)
Pretty sure the main reason the debuff is preferred in ST group content, just as the self-buff is preferred when AoEing, is that you can adjust more damage with it. Additionally, different calculation layers (your own damage dealt modifiers and then the target's damage received modifiers) will stack multiplicatively (just as with buffs affecting different sources of damage).

(I'm fairly sure buffs affecting the same type, such as simply +%dmg or +%attack speed were confirmed to stack only additively instead.)

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Originally Posted by Furiea

tank... only play PLD
healer... only WHM
DPS... only SMN

all the other jobs requires too much effort for me =p

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Odd choice in Summoner, since that one arguably requires more effort than most other DPS jobs. You have to manage your pet, use Dreadwyrm reliably, keep your MP topped up (BLM has practically endless MP), maintain DoT's etc. Black Mage is basically bombarding mobs with the same two spells for the most part.

The big problem facing the developers is they've built themselves into a corner. Every job relies on using a certain set of skills in a pretty fixed rotation. That's why when they added skills in 3.0, they were mostly either related to previous skills, or they changed the rotation you would use.

Personally, I don't want to see either of those things. I want to see a merit point system where we can stick points into our EXISTING skills to improve them in some way. Letting White Mage regain their lost Stoneskin potency through these would be a good start, improving the HP recovered by Warrior could be another. There is a lot of scope for giving us more customization over our characters rather than playing the same damned way as everyone else.

There's no room for individuality in this game at the moment, so it's past time they made some room.

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Originally Posted by Kaldor

Hello just wanted to discuss 4.0 60-70(?) Abilities and how they will be implemented -will there be new traits?
-my hotbars are starting to fill up >.>
-can there be selectable traits/abilities like for example i play as off tank and would like less dmg mitigation for more dps or as bard with less dmg outpuf but better songs for a more support role???

Thanks for reading ☺

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They need too look at and fix the blm rotation enochian is hard to keep up on fights with alot of moving hopefully its removed in 4.0

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Originally Posted by Lemuria

Odd choice in Summoner, since that one arguably requires more effort than most other DPS jobs. You have to manage your pet, use Dreadwyrm reliably, keep your MP topped up (BLM has practically endless MP), maintain DoT's etc.

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No, you just have to use Tri-Disaster, Bane and put your pet on Sic and twiddle thumbs/throw a few Ruins. That'll make it look like you're trying enough for people not to notice. ;)

Personally, I think some jobs have far to little to do (PLD being the main one). I enjoy DRG and SCH because there's always something to do, something to optimize. Having a few more skills wouldn't hurt, as long as they're implemented in a sensible way.

What will probably be needed to reduce skill bloat is to change the way we get skills.

Take Whm for example and the stone spells. You get stone 1 2 and 3 all seperate from one another. What should happen is for stone 2 and 3 to be changed to traits that replace the previous stone spell. You get high enough and stone 2 replaces stone 1 and the same for stone 3. This would not only fold 3 skills into 1 but free up space.

This could also work for new skills. What happens is you get a trait that replaces an earlier skill with the new one. This would both prevent skill bloat and allow for upgrades of skills without needing to change hotbars too.

I could see both of these happening witj future skills as even tho I play with a g13 which allows me to set up to 36 abilities at once even thats full on me and Ive no room for more. Hell I had to drop a skill from my NIN cos Ive no room for it.

Please look at condensing abilities SE :O! Don't do what Blizzard did with WoW for years before their stat squish :O!

There are definitely a few abilities that could stand to be removed (heavy thrust and hot shot come to mind immediately) as they don't really add much to game play and are more of a chore than anything to maintain.

I believe the cross class system could stand to be revised or eliminated entirely. Give each Job the 2-3 cross critical abilities it needs as a baseline (provoke, blood for blood, invigorate, raging strikes, etc.) as well. That would save some bloat. As far as traits go, I've posted it in another thread but I'll add it here, I'd want the traits to be more than just a slight increase to a stat or ability, I would want them to add some really meaningful interactions and adjustments to gameplay, just a few examples:

Paladin- Enhanced Bulwark, for the duration each shield block resets the cooldown on shield swipe, each shield swipe does 50% more damage and ignores the damage penalty of shield oath.

Dark Knight- Enhanced Dark Passenger, using Dark Passenger makes the next Dark Arts free.

White Mage- Enhanced Spells, each Cure 1-3 has a 50% chance of reducing the cooldown of Presence of Mind by 10 seconds, cannot occur more than once every ten seconds.

That's what *I* personally want with any new traits we get, we could use some abilities to shake up the current playstyles without adding even more abilities to the rotations.

the thing is actualy that there isn't much left to add at this point.

you could always add longer and/or more complex combos, but that would make the game overall harder for quite a few ppl I guess. same happens with more stances and buffs you need to keep up.
for tanks you could probably add more damage potential but i you give one of them a new defensive cd, the other will need a similar skill aswell. and more def cds would just trivialize tank busters.

though new skills will very likely mean a change in your rotation so some older skills are probably not be used anymore.

new traits is probably the better option but that means less fun compared to new skills since you are basically playing the same game you did before

Less maintaining of passive buffs and more actual skill interactions.

They can fix button bloat by pruning useless skills and adding them to existing skills. For example, put heavy thrust's buff into the impulse drive chain.

Make chain skills take the place of the previous skill used, like 1 is true thrust, then when you use it it becomes vorpal thrust, then when you use that it becomes full thrust, then resets back to true thrust. Sure it is pressing 1 button the same time, but positionals can make it a little more engaging. and not to mention that there will be lots of room for new skills

Im happy on getting new and more skills but the PS4 HOTBAR is getting (if not already) crowded. I understand that we have 4 by pressing R2 but some of us like to have all our main skills + CD + combos in the same hot bar.

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Originally Posted by Zied

Less maintaining of passive buffs and more actual skill interactions.

They can fix button bloat by pruning useless skills and adding them to existing skills. For example, put heavy thrust's buff into the impulse drive chain.

Make chain skills take the place of the previous skill used, like 1 is true thrust, then when you use it it becomes vorpal thrust, then when you use that it becomes full thrust, then resets back to true thrust. Sure it is pressing 1 button the same time, but positionals can make it a little more engaging. and not to mention that there will be lots of room for new skills

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That's one of those weird things for me. I want some stuff pruned, but a lost GCD per rotation or rotational string can knock more than just a widely used rotation out of whack. My 2.33, 2.4, and 2.44 GCD rotations from level 50, for instance, each fit perfectly to a certain modified rotation with Heavy Thrust of course in that mix, and the extra 1-2 Gierskoguls from a no-Phb ST-focused AoE rotation at 2.33 at level 60 does as well. Moreover, attaching Heavy Thrust instead into the Impulse Drive combo just means doubling up, effectively on Disembowel, but now having even fewer options in regards to that damage boost. You can't pop it early in preparation for AoE. You can't skip DoTs in favor of Doom Spike spam. You can't even go directly into a Full Thrust combo on a mob that's only going to last 4 GCDs. Locking down such tremendous bonuses to a single combo that already far outweighs its alternatives in most, but not yet all, situations, would likely kill that job for me. I'd rather see potency increases across the board and Heavy Thrust removed than that, and would rather keep it in some form than either. I feel like any changes in these directions need to take into account a broad spread of actual, situationally optimal or potentially (with faint rebalancing) optiomal rotational possibilities. Even seemingly blank space can make things fit far more satisfyingly. A lot of that can be reworked to fit as well without that space, but not all, and I don't think we should ever jump the gun for a thin concept if it may have negative actual gameplay impact.

The most obvious bloat for Dragoon to me is simply Fang & Claw and Whirling Thrust, identical abilities apart from their positional bonuses. That's stupidly redundant. Moreover, only the one that procs is ever even available; you can simply macro them together and, apart from having to spam them as the GCD finishes because we can't queue macroed skills correctly in this game, never again notice that the ability was actually split in two, apart from its RNG-based animation. It's like they ran out of ideas for what to do with the level 58 ability and said "if we limit this first one to this side, and toss in some RNG, we can double it over as a second ability from the back." Unless each can have actual unique and interesting effects, there's just no purpose for us to be spending two whole abilities on this. Heck, if the RNG component stays, you can give each position an effect bonus for a particular side while none for the other, and the same tiny bit of randomness we have now stays. Or you can give it bonus potency for just the one position, but keep the positional effect bonuses for each, so that you can choose the compromise if necessary, sacrificing 90 potency for the effect you really want. (I'd imagine that'd have a less positive reception, however.)

Just making abilities easily modifiable via right-clicks with bars unlocked or via the Abilities & Traits pane to swap between mouse-over, on-target, and set-and-click, and removing the arbitrary penalties on macros would go a long way to reduce bloat, much like the combo-button system this community's been suggesting on and off pretty much since beta. If the game's not complex enough for a one-fits-all-situations macro not to be less than ideal, that's something they ought to be working on directly, not simply punishing macros for. (And this is coming from someone who doesn't even use them that often, let alone depend on them in any way.)

I'm going to guess this is why they are working on the "Double Hot Crossbar"
what this is for people who havent heard is for controller users
right now we have is
L2(Left Trigger) gets 1 set of skills
R2(Right Trigger) gets another set of skills
press and hold L2 then press R2 gets another set
press and hold R2 then press L2 and yet another set
with the introduction of the Double Hot Crossbar we will also have
quick double press L2 gets a new set
quick double press R2 gets another new set
this might seem complicated for some but it will be great for others

I'm playing on PC, on a 3-4 year old screen so it's not that big. With party members left, mini map right top, chat bottom left, my hp left top and boss hp mid top, my skills are mid bottom, 3 rows, and its starting to get cluttered. I love the option to hide Duty lists while in a duty, gives me a lot more space to look right/re-position myself, but more skills would end up being click for me, as my 1 till = are full, as are my shift+1-5 and ctrl+1-5....

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Originally Posted by Vidrian

I'm playing on PC, on a 3-4 year old screen so it's not that big. With party members left, mini map right top, chat bottom left, my hp left top and boss hp mid top, my skills are mid bottom, 3 rows, and its starting to get cluttered. I love the option to hide Duty lists while in a duty, gives me a lot more space to look right/re-position myself, but more skills would end up being click for me, as my 1 till = are full, as are my shift+1-5 and ctrl+1-5....

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I recommend reducing the overall HUD scaling to ~80% and also, learn to use hotbar switching. There's more than enough time between GCDs for that not to impair your play and it can free up a lot of screenspace.

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Originally Posted by Lemuria

Personally, I don't want to see either of those things. I want to see a merit point system where we can stick points into our EXISTING skills to improve them in some way.

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I can see it now;

Ninja

Enhance All Fours!
Enhance Fleet of Foot!
Enhance Mug Effect!
Enhance Hide Effect!

Whatever they do for 4.0, I really hope they seriously adjust Ninja... It's not particularly broken, just a whole lot of odd choices... Kiss of the Wasp/Viper was seemingly designed with stance dancing in mind, then they completely failed to provide effects that would justify it... All Fours was always pointless, even before they removed fall damage from instances... Hide is incredibly meh after Lv50 and even before that it fails as a stealth skill, perfect invisibility is the god-mode cheat of stealth gameplay... Ninjutsu is fine, though I don't get why they halved the potential number of options... Why do I have two combinations for Huton when I could have Huton and Utsusemi?! Dream Within a Dream is just the mediocre icing on the proverbial cake... Yay, something not remotely interesting...

What I wouldn't give for them to rework the Hidden mechanic entirely... Tie it to enmity, make Shadewalker feel mechanically justified... Make me use it so I remain Hidden for longer, not because I'm bored and want to see if I can help a DPS pull hate and die... Suiton should just remove enmity to maintain Hidden, no idea why I can't Smoke Screen myself and no idea why Shukuchi, a skill in which I Smoke Screen myself and teleport away, doesn't reduce my enmity... Can Ninja feel stealthy please? In a manner that doesn't reduce my movement speed to that of a six day dead snail... I feel left out, Monk and Dragoon get nice glow effects from their mechanics, can't I have some misty effect for when I'm Hidden or something?

I would like a mix of traits and skills. 5 new skills would lead to further ability bar bloat and be a bit much, but I think a couple new skills would be nice. As a NIN main, here's my wishlist for 4.0:

62: Improved Armor Crush (trait) Increases the duration your Huton is extended by Armor Crush to 45 seconds.

Allows more uses of AE in the rotation and makes keeping DE up less of a chore if needed. A moderate increase to single target damage that feels powerful yet doesn't change things too drastically.

64: Hayagake (new skill) Delivers an attack with 100 potency to your target and gain a movement speed up buff for 10 seconds. 60 second cooldown.

As a NIN I often feel like the least mobile melee dps. Shukuchi is awesome and fun, but only available every 60 seconds. Meanwhile, dragoons are flipping around left and right as needed. NIN should be a mobile class and this allows us to have a sprint-esque ability to compliment Shukuchi. Unlike gap closers, this needs to be used proactively to apply the buff prior to movement phases, so it has a different feel from other skills.

66: Improved Kassatsu (trait) Reduces the cooldown of Kassatsu to 60 seconds.

Mudras are such a fun part of the class but only used every 20 seconds. More kassatsus = more ninjutsu = more fun. This adds versatility to both single and aoe situations.It also compliments my level 70 trait.

68: All Creation (new skill) Delivers an attack with 300 potency to all enemies in a straight line. 90 second cooldown.

Stole it from Yuffie's final LB. An off global cooldown AOE move, something NIN currently lacks aside from ninjutsu. 300 potency is a lot, but it's on a 90 second cooldown. Monks are tossing out 220 potency elixir fields every 30 seconds, so why not.

70: Improved Sneak Attack (trait) Sneak Attack no longer shares a recast timer with Trick Attack.

Rather than adding a new big hitting single target ability, why not just let us use one we currently rarely touch? Trick attack kassatsu suiton sneak attack would be so fun...

Just some ideas. They likely sound pretty powerful, but every class would be getting fun new toys.

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Originally Posted by Lemuria

Personally, I don't want to see either of those things. I want to see a merit point system where we can stick points into our EXISTING skills to improve them in some way.

There's no room for individuality in this game at the moment, so it's past time they made some room.

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I'd rather not this be the only thing if we're going into a new expansion. This doesn't leave for any feeling of character/job growth as you gain levels, and you ultimately feel exactly the same as if you were playing at level 60 than you are now at 4.x's cap. Adding bonuses or additional perks to your existing abilties will do nothing to stray it from the same, predetermined rotation.

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Originally Posted by seekified

I recommend reducing the overall HUD scaling to ~80% and also, learn to use hotbar switching. There's more than enough time between GCDs for that not to impair your play and it can free up a lot of screenspace.

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http://puu.sh/puWZn/940e84aa25.png

I'm using 3 hotbars (using keybindings 1-7, +ctrl and +alt variations, as well as numpads and moues buttons) and I'm struggling to fit PvP abilties (not without dropping some of my PvE abilties such as recall turret). Do mind that at least 5 of these slots are to skills that either add no depth to the job (such as gauss round) and cross skills. There's a few ways to prune or consoldate skills where it's needed. Even if you were to use hot bar toggling, it still doesn't resolve the increasing skill bloat, nor does it help gamepad/console players.

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Originally Posted by RiceisNice

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I think it is not the question what it can not change but the question of what can a Merit/Modification system can change using what we already have.

For example..

a Machinist Modification tree could progress can provide options on how they want to change their skills.

Gauss Barrel Modifications choice, once unlocked, can be
1) Give electric shock DoT effect on attacks with it stacking up to 5 for stronger effect per stack.
2) Remove cast and return auto attack with Gauss barrel equipped allwoing players to be mobile again with Gauss Barrel Active but reduce the damage a bit in exchange for getting auto attack back.
3) Increase the damage increase of Gauss barrel even more.

Ammo modification can be
1) incendiary ammo - perform a burn DoT effect.
2) Armor Piercing Ammo - a more direct damage increase.

Rook turret modification can be
1) Modificed Rook Turret - Stronger version of Rook turret.
2) Pawn Turrets - Give all members in the party a mini-turret (noticed by a buff on them) that attacks their target. Alone it is weaker than Rook but if all 4 members can stay alive it can be stronger.

Bishop Turret
1) Modified Bishop Turret - A slightly stronger version of Bishop with a larger AoE range.
2) Knight Turret - does slightly more damage than Modified Bishop Turret but sacrifice their 360 degree AoE for a 90 degree AoE attack.

The merit/modification system can also be the means to allow Summoner to access the other Primal Egi as they have established Summoner's are restriected to a limited number of summons lore wise being 3 (1 tank, 1 melee, and 1 range).

Melee Summon - Default is Ifrit-egi
1) Ravana Egi
2) Default Carbuncle
3) Ruby Carbuncle

Range Summon - Default Garuda-egi
1) leviathan egi
2) Good King Moggle Mog egi
3) Default Carbuncle

Tank Summon - Default Titan egi
1) Default Carbuncle
2) Obsidian Carbuncle
3) Odin egi

etc etc etc.

Another matter would be the leveling of the Merit system as it is the question should it be a separate leveling system so the max level remains lvl 60 or would players begin to obtain points for the Merit/Modification system once lvl 61+ and the unlock of the Merit/Modification system in each Job remain separate for each job. Unlocking only sections of the Merit/Modification tree as players complete their Job Quests.

Honestly hope 4.0 we don't level to 70. And use all that development making new zones, still making zones but less about leveling and more about doing things in them that are relevant

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

I think it is not the question what it can not change but the question of what can a Merit/Modification system can change using what we already have....

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None of which that actually does anything to change MCH's gameplay. If you were to give GB a damage buff or a stacking dot, it has no change how a MCH plays, while the removal if cast times is straight up removing an existing mechanic to begin with. That's the perfect example of an illusion of choice where it doesn't have an influence on how you play the job. A better alternative (which was one of their scrapped ideas) is the concept of multiple attachments that augment your attacks, sort of like a stance. You'd have a choice of weaker, higher TP cost aoe weaponskills (and do away with spread shot, which is an exact copy of spread shot), or a stronger, less TP efficent attachment with more emphasis on DPS than sustainability, or not using an attachment at all. Ammo could've been a side resource used to use specific skills rather than what we have now for a straight potency buff and tp regen.

I don't think anyone wants to be playing the exact same job in the exact same manner at level 70 cap when it as when it was 60. I'm not opposed ot the idea of a merit system to offer some form of customization (even if it does lead to the inevitable min/maxing and cookie cutters), but I don't want that to be the only thing that's supposed to be the growth to our character, because there isn't any feeling of growth or evolution.

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Originally Posted by RiceisNice

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I extended the description a bit since you last posted. Check on it when you have the time.

Back on topic:

Those were just small examples as I do have much more gameplay changing examples on some of the skills but I rather not use them as example as those are just wishful thinking.

As for introducing new skills to expands on Jobs the merit/modification can do that assuming effort and consideration how it changes certain skills and combos was put into it. As other have said there is a point when adding more skills does become a burden than actual growth of a character and completely changing a gameplay style for the job from what it was can have some negative effects as we saw in 3.0 when they completely changed the game play for Bards.

Adding new skills to expand on current rotation can also be a burden as well as we see in Dragoons dealing with a RNG 4th combo while trying to maintain their new buff changing them from their more simple direct gameplay into a more RNG position depended gameplay. They expanded on Dragoon combos along with trying to change the gameplay style from its origial simple melee DPS base gameplay into a more maintain combo buff style gameplay but we already have that with Monk.

Not to mention they may start running out of ideas on how to expand a Job's combo as we see with paladin's 4th combo skill introduced in 3.0 being a simple 350 potency direct damage skill with no Tank Job effects on it other than pure damage.

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Originally Posted by Nalien

Whatever they do for 4.0, I really hope they seriously adjust Ninja... It's not particularly broken, just a whole lot of odd choices... Kiss of the Wasp/Viper was seemingly designed with stance dancing in mind, then they completely failed to provide effects that would justify it... All Fours was always pointless, even before they removed fall damage from instances... Hide is incredibly meh after Lv50 and even before that it fails as a stealth skill, perfect invisibility is the god-mode cheat of stealth gameplay... Ninjutsu is fine, though I don't get why they halved the potential number of options... Why do I have two combinations for Huton when I could have Huton and Utsusemi?! Dream Within a Dream is just the mediocre icing on the proverbial cake... Yay, something not remotely interesting...

What I wouldn't give for them to rework the Hidden mechanic entirely... Tie it to enmity, make Shadewalker feel mechanically justified... Make me use it so I remain Hidden for longer, not because I'm bored and want to see if I can help a DPS pull hate and die... Suiton should just remove enmity to maintain Hidden, no idea why I can't Smoke Screen myself and no idea why Shukuchi, a skill in which I Smoke Screen myself and teleport away, doesn't reduce my enmity... Can Ninja feel stealthy please? In a manner that doesn't reduce my movement speed to that of a six day dead snail... I feel left out, Monk and Dragoon get nice glow effects from their mechanics, can't I have some misty effect for when I'm Hidden or something?

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My thoughts on reading the new Ninja ability names:
Smoke Screen: Ooh, a way to mass-LoS attacks to bring ranged enemies attacking multiple party members in close, OR a way to make myself and others enter Hide in combat with minimal movement loss.
Armor Crush: (Honestly had no idea what to make of it until I got it, at which point I'd just have called it Wind Spine instead, or swapped its name and animation with Dancing Blade...)
Shadewalker: Can place a shadow image on a target ally or enemy, allowing me to attack through it for increased melee range or enmity transfer, and likely for further synergy later?!
Duality: Doubles my attacks for a brief time or causes an active Shade to mimic my attacks, including additional effects, on its target or target of target.
Dream Within a Dream: Able to blink-strike to and instantly attack for 100 potency at a time any enemy within X yalms, or Y if affected by one of your (or your Shade's) DoTs, to a maximum of A strikes total or B strikes to a single particular target?...

I also feel like if NIN wasn't supposed to be a MP- and TP-self-restoring job/class, then there needed to be some sort of near-rotational component to Wasp and Viper. Hide really should have had at least normal movement speed (just losing the advantage of Fleet of Foot, basically), but rendered you more vulnerable to detection the faster you moved (using an alternate /walk animation for its sneaking about), and the more time you spend (especially if moving) within the enemy's field of sight. But even then there's just so much to be desired from any stealth aspect of this game that it's not likely to deliver on.

And don't even get me started on the enmity system...

No abilities. We need traits to enhance current ones.
DoH and DoL got traits for completing job quest, and that's exactly what DoW/M need.

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

I extended the description a bit since you last posted. Check on it when you have the time.


As for introducing new skills to expands on Jobs the merit/modification can do that assuming effort and consideration how it changes certain skills and combos was put into it. As other have said there is a point when adding more skills does become a burden than actual growth of a character and completely changing a gameplay style for the job from what it was can have some negative effects as we saw in 3.0 when they completely changed the game play for Bards.

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This is where they need to put their thought process to the work. There's really little reason for BRD to have the exact same mechanic as MCH, minus being initially designed with it in mind. The merit system is fine, but by itself I'd hardly justify it as something that expands on your character for the next 10 levels.

I'm not buying into the idea that my MCH "grows" by having their turret (which already has few interaction) doing more damage, but rather something that allows me to interact with my turret through the form of trick shots or micro-management, much like how I didn't buy how my BRD "grows" by having cast times slapped onto their ranged gameplay, essentially turning them into a caster. In general WM and even GB to an extent feels like a hot mess that had very little play testing to see if it was viable (and it wasn't, considering they were actually a dps loss to a degree on release) and if it worked with the job's gameplay.

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

Not to mention they may start running out of ideas on how to expand a Job's combo as we see with paladin's 4th combo skill introduced in 3.0 being a simple 350 potency direct damage skill with no Tank Job effects on it other than pure damage.

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If they are running out of ideas, then they're out of their league when it comes to content design and the game has no business passing off another expansion. Rather than new combos, add in both ability pruning (getting rid of unwanted abilties) and add in oGCDs that work as a inter-combo; Abilities and buffs that interact with each other rather than being a standalone that adds no depth. A stationary melee does that moves to rear/flank via abilties and spot dodging.

I'm a fan of more traits and/or skill points to purchase traits than actual new skills (though I still want AST to get an instant AOE heal).

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Originally Posted by RiceisNice

Rather than new combos, add in both ability pruning (getting rid of unwanted abilties) and add in oGCDs that work as a inter-combo; Abilities and buffs that interact with each other rather than being a standalone that adds no depth. A stationary melee does that moves to rear/flank via abilties and spot dodging.

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The "replacing" part is actually a very dangerous zone they have set up into FF14 due to their rule of not allowing players to use skills above the level sync so any new skills designed to replace a old skill will not be able to be used in older content thus they can't really replace a old skill unless it is for the more current content only.

Unless they allow a skill that replace a certain skill to be used in a lower level area then the player is stuck with placing that skill into their skill bar incase they get into old content, forced to use only old skills, which SE tends to want players to return to older content to help newer players.

SE will need to allow the "Replace" skills to be used in older content or allow all skills to be used in older level sync content if they wish to remove the issue of too many skills in slots if they ever introduce skills meant to replace older skills.

As for oGCD and new buffs that could work if they don't introduce too many. As other said introduction of too many new skills is going to cause a issue with managing skill slot room. Maybe only 2 new skills per exapnsion with the rest being passives that improves existing skills through giving them new abilities or additional effects.

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

The "replacing" part is actually a very dangerous zone they have set up into FF14 due to their rule of not allowing players to use skills above the level sync so any new skills designed to replace a old skill will not be able to be used in older content thus they can't really replace a old skill unless it is for the more current content only.

Unless they allow a skill that replace a certain skill to be used in a lower level area then the player is stuck with placing that skill into their skill bar incase they get into old content, forced to use only old skills, which SE tends to want players to return to older content to help newer players.

SE will need to allow the "Replace" skills to be used in older content or allow all skills to be used in older level sync content if they wish to remove the issue of too many skills in slots.

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Didn't stop them from making the hot mess that the tanks are in (in regards to aggro) and the general gameplay of AST, DRK and MCH. And even then, these are post-60 additions that wouldn't have affect unless it was a change to the ability itself (additions to BotD as you level, versus changes to abilties like barrage and RoD). And even then, I'm mostly referring to foddler skills that add no depth; abilties like gauss round, DwaD, and cross skills in general.