FFXIV Healer Strike and the 'How would you fix it?' line

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Originally Posted by CVXIV

Which is honestly really sad we don't get those spells
As someone who has played a lot of the older final fantasy games, it would've been cool to have that

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There is an argument to be made that numbered spells are also traditionally FF since early localizations had to use numbers due to a very strict character limits of 4 on spell names, which led to numbers being used, you didn't even get Fire 2, you got FIR2 and you had to like it, perhaps that mood is what the localization team was aiming for.

https://i.imgur.com/dsK20bt.png

But I agree with you, the -ra/-ga are used in so many more games, and while -ja is sparsely seen, it's more that the final tier of spells is sparsely used period.

Something I find interesting is that, where FFXIV uses suffixes or numbers depending on region, FFXI actually uses both at once, by having the number after the spell denote its 'rank' (eg Cure 3 is stronger than Cure 2), and the '-aga' suffix denotes that the spell is AOE (so you could have both at once, eg: 'Curaga 2'). So the problem we sometimes hear of in FFXIV, where some players mistakenly believe that Cure 3 is better than Cure 2 'because the number is bigger', wouldn't happen in FFXI because it'd be called Curaga. It might sound odd to us because we're not used to it, but it could have actually solved a lot of things over the years if we had such a system here too. For example, we wouldn't need to invent 'High Fire', because it'd be 'Firaga 2' (with the spell we currently call 'Fire 2' being called 'Firaga'), same for High Blizzard, it'd be Blizzaga 2. And the Thunder line, instead of being 1/3 for Single Target and 2/4 for AOE, would be Thunder/Thunder 2, and Thundaga/Thundaga 2. On WHM, on top of the Curaga example above, we'd also have had Aeroga (Aero 3). And for things like RDM and PCT, 'Firaga in Red' instead of 'Fire 2 in Red' or VerThundaga instead of VerThunder 2 (but VerThunder 3 goes back to being singletarget)

Reason I find it interesting though, is that SE were very obviously trying to make 'FFXI, but again' when they released FFXIV 1.0, so obviously in fact, that we didn't have access to female Roegadyn or Male Miqote on launch because those options aren't a thing in FFXI either. So, if they were sticking so rigidly to their previous playbook, what made them deviate on spell naming nomenclature, of all things?

Even that runs into some likely points of confusion, though. Elsewhere, the norm was -Ra for AoE, -Aga for nuke, and -Aja for a yet more limited but powerful nuke/special-feature action (where said special feature may or may not be that it's AoE). Elsewhere still, being AoE may count as just another special feature, such that even -ra could be anywhere from a bonus DoT portion to a longer duration to the normal DoT ticking to the skill becoming multi-target or applying vulnerability, though usually at commensurate extra cost.

But yeah, especially given that we're in a game where the vast majority of horizontally slashing attacks are nonetheless AoE, a simple AoE vs. non-AoE designation would make sense, even if until recently things like Fire 1 and Fire III differed in function while remaining nonredundant.

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So, if they were sticking so rigidly to their previous playbook, what made them deviate on spell naming nomenclature, of all things?

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Tbf, even weirder, 1.x still had some -ra/-na and -ga suffixes mixed in with its 1, 2, and 3. Yoshida then them swapped entirely to -ra / -ga only to then swap purely to I/II/III/IV with ARR... ???

(Was also interesting to find unimplemented mechano-arcanist (Distaff-user), Gunner/Musketeer, and some sort of mace-user abilities among the mined 1.0 database just now. : o)

I think it was -aga : AoE centered on target -ra : AoE centered on caster

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Originally Posted by Lorika

Like i said, it was really on the spur of the moment, i can be greatly improved. But i don't think that a second gauge, and even less another 0-100 is the right thing for the WHM.
And i disagree for the Lilies. Since you have additional way to generate them, you can mix healing and DPS to have acces more quickly to Aflatus Misery, so clearly upping your DPS and your mobility during the DPS phase.

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The ideal play would not use any lily heal (unless downtime), or you would use a lily heal in their burst to use two Afflatus Miseries in the burst window. But I like 1-2-3 combo for healers. Simple enough but can add something to keep track of.

Well, I went ahead and added Nocturnal Sect back to the AST. The Macrocosmos idea is definitely a meta-shaper at the power level it currently sits at, but hey, potencies aren't set in stone, numbers are subject to tuning, and job effectiveness may vary according to player skill. It'd also definitely have massive synergy with WHM's Liturgy of the Bell, allowing you to effectively 'ignore' the damage of any one mechanic (at the cost of only being able to do such 'ignoring' once per 3min)

Also has to be remembered that certain mechanics would function very differently because of it. For example, while the current Macrocosmos (which is 'Diurnal' here) was able to delete the mechanic in P3S (due to the party taking 10m damage beforehand, leading to Macrocosmos 'compiling' 5m worth of healing), trying the same thing with Nocturnal Macrocosmos would not only not work, it'd be a death sentence for the party (as while it would reduce the 10m to 5m, it'd also store a DOT of 5m over 15s, or 1m per tick, impossible to heal through). This would mean that a Diurnal and Nocturnal AST would have to approach fights from completely different angles, and use their actions in very different ways, despite being the same job at their core

After looking at what the evolved WHM looks like, I hope they actually read some of these ideas before finalizing SCH/SGE/AST. Otherwise we might unironically be moving from a 2-button job to an actual 1-button meta.

Since this thread got bumped back to the front page of the General section, I'll link three threads I made over in the Healer section. The purpose of those threads is a thought experiment, of 'can I convert the designs I have in this thread, into a 16 button format to fit with Evolved Mode? And if so, how much of the design has to be lost to make the transition?'

I'd like to think I preserved the original intent of the SCH, AST and SGE designs on the first page of this thread fairly well.

Here is the SCH thread

Here is the AST thread

And here is the SGE thread

(I didn't do WHM because they showed it already and I assume not much is changing about the kit they made for it. I could fit the WHM on the first page into 16 buttons pretty easily though)