Materia - A system reborn (attention devs!)

Brace yourselfes, wall of text is coming!

Please reply AFTER reading the full text or leave it be, since I want a nice discussion, ideas and comments for this.

Since the beginning of the game, a lot of stuff happened. But ever since, the customization of stats and anything related to it, was restricted and the attribute system while leveling is nothing more than a "I have to distribute points even though they have no significant effect"-system, which forces you to distribute points, fitting the job. Or in other words, from a bard, who skills STR instead of DEX, I expect nothing in fights.

However, with the introduction of the zodiac-weapons, especially Novus, SE took the right direction. The only bad thing about it: The weapons are not worth the effort and especially not the cost, given the fact that you need at least 75 Materia if every meld is successful.

Sure, the materia-market is booming ever since, but those shiny little stones could be used way better.

Until now, except for crafters and gatherers as well as the Novus weapon, you could only use them for the crafted gear or PvP stuff. That's a waste of potential in every way. However, there would be a way to make a good use of our beloved materias and I will explain the general Idea in some simple blocks.

1. The best crafting gear should always have the same Ilv as the current gear for tomes while the raid gear (coil or what comes next) should be 10 Ilv above.

2. Every piece of gear, crafted or not should have 2 or 3 Materia-slots with the option to penta-meld it to get a total of 5 possible materia per piece of gear. (for my example, we will have 3 materia slots for gear and 2 for jewelry.)

3. The Ilv of melded items should rise based on the provided stats by materia (since lv IV materia grants significantly more than lv I)

4. There should be the option to remove single materia from items instead of all together
- Lv 1 Materia: 500Gil
- Lv 2 Materia: 1000 Gil
- Lv 3 Materia: 4500 Gil
- Lv 4 Materia: 10000 Gil

Example (with old gear, but you will get the idea):

Let's take the Auroral Tabard (soldiery tomes + sands of time, Ilv 110)

Dexterity +39
Vitality +46
Critical Hit Rate +41
Determination +20
Defense: 91
Magical Defense: 91

If we slot it with materia now (let's take lv IV for this), we can get the following for example:

2x Heaven's Eye IV: 2x +9 ACC
2x Savage Aim IV: 2x +9 CRIT
1x Savage Might IV: 1x +6 DET

This makes a total of 42 additional stat-points. Given the fact that all 5 materias are IV's, let's say every materia grants Ilv +1, this makes the following:

Auroral Tabard (Ilv 115):

Dexterity +39
Vitality +46
Critical Hit Rate +59
Determination +26
Accuracy +18
Defense: 91
Magical Defense: 91

So we now have a customized "tome-item" which grants more stats, a higher itemlevel and a good amount of customization. Here's another example:

Kirimu-Coat (crafted, Ilv 110):

Dexterity +35
Vitality +36
Accuracy +33
Determination +16
Defense 91
Magical Defense 91

now we are gonna slot it with the following materia:

2x Savage Aim IV: 2x +9 CRIT
2x Quickarm IV: 2x +9 Skillspeed
1x Savage Might IV: 1x +6 DET

This makes:

Kirimu Coat (Ilv 115)

Dexterity +35
Vitality +36
Accuracy +33
Determination +22
Critical Hit Rate +18
Skillspeed +18
Defense 91
Magical Defense 91

This makes our crafted Item and the tome-gear relatively even and well customized. Since there are lots of different materia, you have several options to slot it according to your playstyle and gives different builds.

As mentioned, raid gear should be 10 Ilv above the tome gear and the crafted pieces. So you are now free to image how it would look like with an item with Ilv 120 and materia.

"But the only change here is the itemlevel and the fact that tome-gear can be slotted!", will some of you say now. Yeah right, in fact, that's what it is now, but since I love materia so much (hey, they paid my 46 Million Gil house <3), I have another concept of even improving the use more.

Since this system will cause a huge demand of materia, I took the system from FFVII and combined it with our current Soulbind system. Beware!

1. Everytime a materia will be melded into an item, the binding will go back to 0.
2. The materia themselfes won't get binding, only the item will

Given those 2 points, we can now start to master our materia. There we go again and here is my example item:

Kirimu Coat (Ilv 115)

Dexterity +35
Vitality +36
Accuracy +33
Determination +22
Critical Hit Rate +18
Skillspeed +18
Defense 91
Magical Defense 91

2x Savage Aim IV: 2x +9 CRIT
2x Quickarm IV: 2x +9 Skillspeed
1x Savage Might IV: 1x +6 DET

We have now melded all materia into the Kirimu-Coat and got the item above. Binding is at 0%. We now start binding it, until it reaches 100% binding. Since we have those shiny little materias in it, the following happens:

We MASTER the materia, which means every materia gets "MASTER"-status. Only melded materias can gain this, since they brake if removed from the item.

Following rules apply to MASTER-materia:

1. The provided stats double or (just insert a random multiplicator here, e.g. 1.5)

2. The provided Ilv bonus doubles

3. Everytime a materia is removed or melded, the binding of the item goes to 0%.

4. If an item has MASTER-materia melded and the binding gets back to 0%, the materia lose their MASTER-status

5. Based on which materia you melded, you get a replication of it. Here is my example:

Savage Aim IV MASTER:

10% Chance of getting Savage Aim IV
20% Chance of getting Savage Aim III
30% Chance of getting Savage Aim II
40% Chance of getting Savage Aim I

Savage Aim III MASTER:

20% Chance of getting Savage Aim III
30% Chance of getting Savage Aim II
50% Chance of getting Savage Aim I

Savage Aim II MASTER:

40% Chance of getting Savage Aim II
60% Chance of getting Savage Aim I

Savage Aim I MASTER:

100% Chance of getting Savage Aim I

The sense behind this is to get more materia into the economy since the demand will rise sky high. Also, you will now have more ammo for materia-gambling :D

Anyway, to get back to our example, we have now mastered all 5 melded materia in our Kirimu-Coat and so we will finally get:

Kirimu Coat (Ilv 120)

Dexterity +35
Vitality +36
Accuracy +33
Determination +28
Critical Hit Rate +36
Skillspeed +36
Defense 91
Magical Defense 91

2x Savage Aim IV MASTER: 2x +18 CRIT
2x Quickarm IV MASTER: 2x +18 Skillspeed
1x Savage Might IV MASTER: 1x +12 DET

This is a maximum on customization, makes good use of materia, provides good possibilities to gear up another way and simply looks like more fun than the current system. Also, the crafted gear gets a more important role than it does now.

Q&A:

Q: Isn't this going to make all players broke because of the pricing?
A: Since MASTER-materia will replicate themselves, we will get more materia into economy, henceforth the prices should regulate themselfes

Q: Nobody will take me into dungeons if my gear isn't melded! I even got vote-kicked!
A: Seriously? There are always people like that. Since only the endgame-content requires such a good gear, you should be fine with normal duties like 24man raids, PvP or even dungeons.

Q: Aren't your examples totally overpowered?
A: Yeah, they are, but given that those are examples, feel free to imagine a fitting balancing. Also, there will be stat-caps, just like now.

Q: I don't like to spend money on materia and I don't want to be forced to meld my stuff.
A: No one forces you to do so. Just like with Novus, this is optional and except for the hardest content you should be fine with unmelded gear.

Q: I'd love to use this system but I can't afford all those materias!
A: There are tons of opportunities to get money in this game! Just search for them! (or the forums!)

Anyway, there you go! How do like this idea? Any improvements? Suggestions? Let me know :D

Couple things.

First off, the Auroral Tabard example puts crit rate on it. There are caps for attributes at each ilvl, and the tabard is already at that cap in crit rate. If you bypass this system, then the only thing worth putting on gear is STR/DEX/INT/MND because they are so overpowered vs the secondary attributes.

Each piece of raid/dungeon gear and HQ crafted gear gets main attributes and two secondary stats, the main attributes and one secondary are at the cap, the other secondary is at ~70% of the cap. Raising the ilvl by 5 won't raise these caps by very much.

Second, instead of the complex master materia system to increase the amount of materia, they need to simply make dungeon gear convertible.

I like most of it. It's not how I would suggest the materia system, but it still sounds good. (There's no point in me saying how I would revamp the materia system as it would completely go against yours. However, if your version were implemented, I'd like it too.). The best part about the MASTER system is the ability to specifically target materia, instead of relying on the convert RNG.

Only thing I'd change about yours is:

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Originally Posted by YGSLlew

(let it cost 10k gil and you have a nice Gil-sink too :D)

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I would exempt materia 1's that are in actual materia slots for this (so not 1's that are in the Advanced slots). To give the newer players a little break for making mistakes. Either free or something more friendly, like 500 or 1000.

Allrighty^^

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There are caps for attributes at each ilvl, and the tabard is already at that cap in crit rate. If you bypass this system, then the only thing worth putting on gear is STR/DEX/INT/MND because they are so overpowered vs the secondary attributes.

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Well, as mentioned, these are just examples, not looking at the actual caps, which are in place right now. You are right of course. What I mean is, that we can use the materia to individualize just like with the Novus for example. Of course you can not break the caps for specific stats and also it is not meant to bypass the cap mechanic.

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I would exempt materia 1's that are in actual materia slots for this (so not 1's that are in the Advanced slots). To give the newer players a little break for making mistakes. Either free or something more friendly, like 500 or 1000.

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Seems legit. I didn't think about it because I doubt that the current gear ingame (which includes everything < 50) would be reworked if such a system is implemented. But I will edit it in.

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Second, instead of the complex master materia system to increase the amount of materia, they need to simply make dungeon gear convertible.

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Sure, this would be easy, however, this would be only one materia at a time, while you need a whopping 5 for 1 item to meld. If I take the master system into consideration, I have the (theoretical) chance of getting the materias I like and the chances are increasing, the more materia are melded into my gear piece.

I didnt read all bcoz im lazy but i get ur point. Im For the customization and For the BUILDS. So i agree with ur idea

they could implement the ff14 1.0 materia system as 2nd option, go to a special npc who can overmeld every stat (over the cap), but if it fails the gear + materia are gone :D

I miss my +51 mind melded heal circlet back from 1.0 days :(

Well, that's not what I intended though. Of course, it's punishing and that, but I am not sure, if it will serve the purpose, which I have in mind^^

If it happens, I foresee those gears will have a lot of stats removed beforehand.
Eventually everyone just spending a lot of gils to restore the removed stats... ^^;

My eyes glazed over while reading that. The materia system does not need to become more complicated. Nothing interesting is being done with this complexity. All it is, is WoW's gem system with a ton of pointless restrictions on it. If that's all they're going to aim for, then the restrictions need to be removed and the system needs to be simplified.

No overmelding, no crafting classes required to slot in, no stat/ilevel cap making my materia give me something different than I thought.
Just let me put my materia in my armor/weapon slot, give it what it says on the box and be done with it.

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Originally Posted by Nicobo

If it happens, I foresee those gears will have a lot of stats removed beforehand.
Eventually everyone just spending a lot of gils to restore the removed stats... ^^;

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This. Not to mention it'd make zero demand for crafting gear, where there might be a little bit of demand with the current system.
Really, what they need to do is this:

-Raid weapons/armor gets like one materia slot only. You can customize one stat on it.
-Materia potency is raised. Cap is removed.
-Crafting weapons/armor has less base stats, but more slots. You can spend gil to customize it exactly how you want, but it's expensive.

That should be a good middle ground. Raid stuff can be customized a little, crafting stuff can be customized a lot. Neither is inherently inferior to the other.

Well, if we are talking about crazy upgrades on Materia, and we look into the FFVII a little bit, upgrading the materia level INSIDE the gear would also be interesting...

as in, if you get your gear to 100% binding and you have 1 lvl 1 materia melded in it, you could upgrade it to its lvl 2 version investing the full 100% binding :v (only 1 out of all the materia in the gear per go).

And so restarting till we all eventually get lvl 4 materia in all the slots!! (which would require a ridiculous amount of time).

I do not get why "RAID" stuff should always be higher or better... to an extent.

If were getting complicated, let's get REALLY complicated. All armor have no stats on them to begin with, and you have to gain exp equivalent to a level 50 to gain 1 level in the gear, and every piece of gear has a sphere grid like that in FF 10, and you have to buy stat spheres to place in the slots! Anyone can have any stat to get some stupid crazy gear.

Nah, but seriously, I didn't read the entire thing, about 1 paragraph in, my eyes stopped working and I began to cry blood. But judging by the response, I guess you're onto something?

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Originally Posted by StouterTaru

Second, instead of the complex master materia system to increase the amount of materia, they need to simply make dungeon gear convertible.

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I liked the Master materia thing, but I'd like to see your idea implemented. Dungeon gear should be convertible as you get it, no need to enhance spiritbond, since they are "special" and all. Much more worth than GC seals. ^.^

If the materia system is going to be changed its needs to be streamlined not made more complex. Fundamental facet of game design is understanding that complexity doesn't always equal depth. Important to note that while materia increasing ilv in theory works it would require altering how stats interact with ilv atm. Since ilv determines stat caps adding stats with materia would create weird and confusing interactions such as how much you can add changing as you add them. Would also mean the items cap on main stat would increase so at least one slot would automatically be dedicated to it lowering overall options. Not saying such a system cant be done but it would require alot more effort and resources to implement then people realize.

Materia does need to be more useful as it stands atm its really only used for 3 things in the games. Crafting/gathering, customizing relic and endgame melding which few do and decreases in usefulness over time as you clear w/e you melded for. Most the gear players actively use tombstone, dungeon and raid gear have no interaction with materia, can't use it and can't be converted to. Key phrase is interaction, depth of a system is not how complex it is but how its parts interact with each other.

At the very least SE needs to do 2 things, make most unique/untradable gear convertable and alter stats somehow. Make lesser stats better or add new stats since most materia sucks because the stat it provides is useless. Crit/Det demand will always be higher the supply simply because there are no real other options. Acc only matters till you hit cap for relevant content. Skill/spell speed is a joke. Elemental resistance useless and even if it wasn't it would still only be good for certain events. Main stat materia has very niche uses mostly for making hybrid tank/dps accessories or melding vit to accessories to survive hits ie Fcob. Out of all the combat class materia two are good(DET/CRIT) two are marginal (Acc/Speed) three are rarely used(vit/str/pie) and the rest basically don't even matter.