Rune Knight

Hello, all. Ellonwyn here. First time posting on these forums. Been playing XIV for almost 5 years now. Had a suggestion for a new class that hopefully the devs are open to.

Rune Knight - Tank Role. A protector of the weak who uses elemental magic to keep enemies at bay.

Weapon - Rune Blade

For the longest time, my favorite character in all of Final Fantasy was Celes from VI. I would love to see her class represented in XIV as a Tank.

Classically, Rune Knights would absorb magic through their Runic Blades. This could be represented in XIV as a Self Buff, called Runic:
Runic - 30 sec CD, lasts 8 seconds - Any healing done to the tank OR magic damage from an enemy to the tank restores mana.
Runic II - 30 second CD, lasts 10 seconds - Same as above, but also reduces damage taken by 5%.

Runes could also charge up based on Runic's uses. As the Runes charge up, they can be expelled to have various abilities, similar to the stickers for Samurai

1 Rune - DOT
2 Runes - Fast Attack
3 Runes - Weakening Effect (Single target Reprisal?) + Fast Attack

Runes can also be charged up via the 1, 2, 3 rotation or the AOE rotation, similar to Gunbreaker.

I'm trying to ensure the class is both familiar (using similar systems already existent in other classes) and unique (magical feel, basically a Black Mage Tank).

Feedback and suggestions welcome.

There's a problem with this in that some of the concepts - like the anti-magic focus - were already used for Dark Knight.

In addition to that, the idea to spend your mana on damage reduction and/or damage is also already on DRK.

Would that prevent a very similar runic knight? Ofc not. But you'd run into the very issues that DRK had: What do you do in fights like M3S where there's ~no magic damage?

Note that this would note be as big of an issue if you do something way more out there, like be an actual battlemage: A tank that hardcasts all of their attacks.

If they did something like a rune knight, it'd be kind of cool if it was similar to how runes work in the game Outward. The gist version is you combine runes for effects, which already exists for ninjitsu. Instead of just using runes, it could also be something like 4 rune sword moves with individual combos instead of just standing there doing combos. That alongside the hardcasts mentioned above and it'd probably be an interesting job without being too difficult to implement. Definitely wouldn't be the same as what we have now at least.

I'm not a creative person, but I always wanted to see a rune knight (because the rune fencer was taken by red mage...), but I do imagine it like Kalocin said. Outward gives a great example and we already have ninja having the ninjutsus, so why can't we have runes work like ninjutsu? It'd create at least 6 skills easily. For instance we could have a rune for attacks (let's call it 1), a rune for defensive cooldowns (let's call it 2) and a rune for utility for the party (Let's call it 3). We could have a secondary rune to be used when we make combinations for the rune 1 in a way that the attacks become AoE. So let's say 1+2+1 (starts being an attack) could be like you said, a DoT. 1+1+1 basic rune attack combo, and so it goes. Like I said, I'm no quite creative but I do think the ninja skills are quite a good inspiration because he really fits an "magic swordsman" vibe, as he uses way more magic skills than physical ones. Oh well.

Also, for the Dark Knight thing, I REALLY still think they should like good ol' FFs and make him use health (like on PvP) instead of magic. There are many ways to make it viable, they're just scared of making the job hard.

I thought of this once a while ago, It was mostly based on FFXI's Rune fencer, and was a loose mix of Monk/Sam weapon was a long sword described as a tuning fork for aether, because the relic sword in FFXI was split in the middle like a tuning fork.

Attacks would fill a gauge like Samurai, then there was three elemental seals to choose from, activating a rune applies a stacking buff that adds that element to attacks and a damage modifier. Runes stack to three of any combination with each element giving a stacking buff while adding non elemental magic damage to physical attacks. The last rune generated will be the primary effect.

Fire Rune, weakens magical damage and boosts physical damage by an amount, +X physical potency for each Fire Rune.

Lightning Rune boosts magical damage and weakens physical damage, +X for magical damage. This includes the runes additional damage effect. So En-thunder would be noticeably stronger then Enfire, while physical damage from weapon skills increases with enfire. Like warriors Surging tempest.
This was a way to get around damage resistance back then it might have mattered more (but not really now days), but the overall dps between +3 Fire or Lightning would be about the same.

Water Rune boosts defense by 30 and increases cures by 5% for each rune

Each rune is generated by a combo path like samurai, a three hit for Physical (Vorpal Blade, Burning Blade, Shining Blade) for Fire, three hit for Magical (Vorpal Blade, Red Lotus Blade, Scourge) for Lightning, and a two hit, Torrent, Shockwave, AOE for Water with the second half adding a knock back chance per water rune.

Similar to Monks elemental stance, Rune Fencers could hit one of three runes to generate a single rune of that type every 30 or 40 seconds. Most other abilities that manipulate runes use that aether gauge generated by attacking. Along with a couple attacks that change with the active rune. There would be an ability to convert all active runes to the last one made. One that consumes a rune to add a 15 second 25 potency counter shield: Fire can inflict a stacking burn dot of 15 potency per stack up to 5. Thunder can inflict stun (the chance increases with the number of lightning runes active). Water adds a shield with a 45 potency refresh +5 for each active water rune. An ability to expend all runes to buff the party Fire and lightning affects that type of damage. Water will add a 60 def buff and the Regen. A Mixed variety of runes can give all three buffs at a low potency. It would be better to make all runes the same type first. A rune can be consumed to self-heal for 400 potency on a 90sec timer. A FF15 like teleport that can target an enemy or party member.

And that's all I went with it.. It was a passing thought back pre Storm Blood, for class that could use some form of en-spell and spike shields.