How a Dual Spec System will affect releasing new Classes/Jobs. (Implementing SAM/NIN)

We know they are keeping the Armoury System, and we know they are going to release a Job System that will bring the classical FF flavor of Jobs into the game world. Me I actually love the Armoury system and I see its merits, and I see where people have trouble understanding it, disliking it and I really do hope the Job System alleviates those issues. The biggest one being forced party Roles. And hopefully SE finds a way to synergize Armoury Weapon Classes with the Traditional Job Classes. (IE a White Mage Heals, A Conjurer White Mage heals with circle AOE. a Thaumaturge White Mage heals with Cone AOE, A Gladiator Paladin Tanks with a Shield, A Marauder Paladin Tanks Groups of enemies all at once.)


My question is how will this affect the releasing of new Weapons and Jobs.

Right now with the way the Armoury System is built you can build quite a few of the classic jobs from past FF's but its your job to do it yourself. It is up to you to discipline yourself into saying "I'm only going to equip the skills that make me a Black Mage." most people don't because they are afraid they might be seen as inferior or not bring enough to a party if they do.

But the list of jobs you can patchwork together from older FF's is kind of small.

Warrior
Monk
White Mage
Black Mage
Red Mage
Paladin
Dragoon
Ranger

I think thats it...

So if they keep skills earned by Classes and then use jobs to allow players to identify themselves by a role and a give bonuses for focusing on that path we will eventually need more weapons and more jobs to allow players to flesh out the play style they really want.

Because of the popularity of the subject. Let us take Samurai For instance.

How would you implement the Samurai Play style?

I can see it happening this way:

1. Implement a class that deals with "Oriental Weapons" This class would use Katanas (Ninja's primary weapon from FFXI) and Great Katana (Samurai Primary Weapon from FFXI). Naming it would have to be something that does not designate it as being either Ninja, Samurai, or other FF Job. And instead reflects the same naming convention that Weaponclasses take in both Japanese and English.

IE: 剣術士 → Sword User｜Sword User→Gladius (Latin: Sword)+ -ātor (Latin: Agent) → Gladiator

For this purpose I believe the best choice would be.

太刀士 → Tachi Professional for japanese. I'm not the most fluent in Japanese but as I understand it Tachi were swords that depending on how you wore it on your belt were either considered a Tachi (FFXI Ninja) or a Katana (FFXI Samurai)

But Tachi translates to Sword in English. Because Tachi has been adopted as an English word to describe a type of Japanese Sword though it can stay translated as Tachi.

But the problem comes from how do you use this to find a name for the class in English as was pointed out the English Classes have more flair added to them then the origin Japanese counterparts. (Sword User vs Gladiator) so its acceptable to think they will use Flair again when naming a new Weapon Class.

I'd Propose the words Wanderer or Vagrant to be the name for Tachi Professional in English.

Sourcing Wanderer: An itinerant is a person who travels from place to place with no fixed home. The term comes from late 16th century: from late Latin itinerant (travelling), from the verb itinerari, from Latin iter, itiner (journey, road).

Wanderer's were just that people who traveled with no home. I came to this conclusion because of another part of Japanese Lore.

Rōnin: The word rōnin literally means "wave man". The term originated in the Nara and Heian periods, when it referred to a serf who had fled or deserted his master's land. It then came to be used for a samurai who had lost his master.

So in a sense a Rōnin was someone with No Home, and No Master. A Wanderer. The reason I chose to propose Wanderer over Rōnin is two fold.

1. ō eh take it or leave it, but not everyone know how to type it on a English 101 keyboard. 2. Rōnin has a negative connotation to it in Japanese Lore. A Rōnin while being someone who wanders and has no master. They also have no "Honor" as they did not commit Seppuku when they lost their master.


Why I would also propose Vagrant and prefer it over Wanderer. This again is two Fold. 1. Vagrant and Wanderer mean the same thing, but there is already an entity in XIV named Wanderer. Oschon who seems to be sourced from Odin (Wodin the Wanderer). 2. Square Enix has a game in their history that is part of the Final Fantasy Mythos called Vagrant Story. Vagrant Story was part of the Ivalice Alliance, its based in the same universe world as FFT whose Art Director is now the Art Director for FFXIV.

Kinda Full Circle Eh?

So we now have a name for the Weapon Class, Vagrant. But what skills would it have?

In the most simple of terms, we shall call it Sword Magic and we will consider it a Discipline of Magic. As a Discipline of Magic each class under this Discipline has its own form of AOE casting. Right now Conjurer casts in a circle from Target, while Thaumaturge casts in a Cone from Self.

Vagrant while being a Front Line Damage dealer should have an AOE that allows them to affect all of their kin on the battlefield. As such they should have a Circular or Wave AOE that originates from themselves but doesn't have the same range as the Target Casted Circular AOE that Conjurer has.

For their weapons their 1 handed Katanas would reflect more on magic having a Higher Magic Potency (while not as high as a Conjurer or Thaumaturge Weapon) and lower Physical Attack Power. While the Two handed Katana should have a higher Physical Attack power (not as high as a Marauder or Lancer) and lower Magic Potency (again not as low as Marauder and Lancer)

As each weapon class already present in the game can reflect the core skills of various Classical Jobs. As such the skills they get would come from all of the Classical Jobs that deal with using a physical weapon as a tool to deliver magical damage. En-Spells could come from this class, so would the classic Samurai Skills from FFT and FF6, as well a Modifier skill that transforms a Casted Spell (From Conj or Thaum) into a Ninjitsu Magic. This skill would be seperated by ranks with each rank having the names of Ichi, Ni, and San, it would be a Meta Magic skill that would modify the next casted spell to operate as a Ninjitsu Spell. It would cost both TP and MP to cast the spell. Also, the spells for Invisible and Sneak could come from this class.

Ninjitsu (Ichi, Ni, San being the 3 ranks similar to Cure I, Cure II etc.) as a skill would work by using TP to modify the spell itself. Spending the TP to use Ninjitsu the next spell once casted would operate differently.

Instead of just casting "Fire" the Vagrant can use Ichi then cast Fire, the spell would be casted as Katon: Ichi have different casting animations and different spell effects. But how the spell operated with how it dealed damage to the target would be different. The damage dealt would be lowered but the next spell casted with Ichi as long as it was the next spell in the Elemental Wheel would deal massive more damage. Using these skills should AOE though which is the major downside and way to balance its use.
For those that do not know:

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The spark of Lightning ignites when it strikes, and thus Fire is born.
The heat of Fire renders to ash all that it touches, and thus Earth is born.
The density of Earth shuns Sun and harbors cold, and thus Ice is born.
The armor of Ice melts away, and thus Water is born.
The moistness of Water mists and rises, and thus Wind is born.
The gusts and sighs of Wind gather the clouds, and thus Lightning is born.

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Is the Elemental Wheel for FFXIV.

So so far we have the following skills as possible for this Vagrant.

Ichi, Ni, San (Ninjitsu Meta Magics), Wind Slash, Iai Blow, Blade Bash, Shimmering Blade, Hoarfrost Blade, Skyfury Blade, Lifethread Blade, Unburden Soul, En-Elemental, En-Status, Third Eye, Hasso, Meditate, Seigan, Sekkanoki, Shikikoyo, Sengikori, Hamanoha, Zanshin, Blood Price. Etc.

As Such the skills Vagrant brings into the game would let a player create or enhance the jobs Ninja, Samurai, Spellsword (Mystic), Red Mage, Monk, and more. Yes I know some of these skills already exist in game, I simply dumped the skills I knew Samurai had in previous FF games as examples.

Alternate idea for Ninjitsu and skills

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Originally Posted by BlaiseLallaise

Ok, I read the entire OP.

Well it's certainly a good idea. I'm a bit on the fence about the implementation of the Ninjutsu spells. Why not just put each of them in the same as a CON has the elemental spells? And I would suggest having those just use MP. You'll have plenty of weapon skills for burning TP. I think if you take the Ninjutsu spells, one weapon skill per element, the en-spells, and implement the SAM battle stances, you have a pretty good formula for a new class.

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With the Job System in place you could Equip the Samurai Job, Equip a Two handed Katana and be a Vagrant Samurai who specializes in Sword Magic.



I feel like I just dumptrucked a whole bunch of ideas... Oh wait I did...

That was longer then I thought it would be...

Too much speculation.

Lol thats all we can do right now Jinko.

So everyone level it to put Hasso, Third Eye, Meditate and Siegan on their custom class or if it is class exclusive then everyone just be /Vagrant

The post is very long. I can see your point on some things but overall it's more of a guessing game on how they will do it. Good suggestions but idk how practical it would be.

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Originally Posted by AlexiaKidd

So everyone level it to put Hasso, Third Eye, Meditate and Siegan on their custom class or if it is class exclusive then everyone just be /Vagrant

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Thats up to SE to decide. Its their game if they chose to let everyone have access to those skills then thats their choice, All I did was give examples of what skills could be given to Vagrant as a Class. I have no doubt some of them would probably end up being Native Class only. But lots of them don't have to be like the En-Elemental and En-Status spells.

third eye is already in game with lancer
meditate is already in game with lancer
hasso is what increase str?
seigan is basically in the evasion or parry boosting skills, and corresponding weaponskills.
comrade in arms is store tp

samurai basically got taken by lancer, as it was anyhow, the magic swordsman could be interesting, but you can make a spear sam out of whats in game already pretty easily.
ninja....
well we got various dots, and debuffs on thaum
lancer has third eye, which is basically utsusemi, but lets throw archers one in there so you get two.
what else ninja got... oh dual weild, which was rumored to be fencer in the dats, but who knows if that will ever occur.

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Originally Posted by Cairdeas

But the list of jobs you can patchwork together from older FF's is kind of small.

Warrior
Monk
White Mage
Black Mage
Red Mage
Paladin
Dragoon
Ranger

I think thats it...

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You can totally be a Dark Knight too.

Ok, now I'll read the rest of the post.

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Originally Posted by Physic

third eye is already in game with lancer
meditate is already in game with lancer
hasso is what increase str?
seigan is basically in the evasion or parry boosting skills, and corresponding weaponskills.
comrade in arms is store tp

samurai basically got taken by lancer, as it was anyhow, the magic swordsman could be interesting, but you can make a spear sam out of whats in game already pretty easily.
ninja....
well we got various dots, and debuffs on thaum
lancer has third eye, which is basically utsusemi, but lets throw archers one in there so you get two.
what else ninja got... oh dual weild, which was rumored to be fencer in the dats, but who knows if that will ever occur.

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Again, I was just making examples. I know most of the skills that Samurai has were already in the game as different skills. New skills can also be made to fill in the Spots. Also like I said in the beginning of the OP. To make any specific Job build from classical ff games you have to pull skills from multiple FFXIV weapon classes. Samurai would be the same, so would ninja.

Vagrant isn't specifically a Samurai, or a Ninja, just a Oriental Swordsman. And yes once Samurai as a Job is implemented you can still make a Lancer Samurai (I did in XI for most of the time I played it.)

Dual Wield also can be given natively to multiple classes it doesn't have to be restricted. in XI Dancer can now Dual Wield.

Didn't read, lol.

Whatever happens, I just hope Samurai are completely different from FFXI if they even get introduced. No meditate. No WS spam. Give me something more FF tactics style. (Yes I loved SAM in XI but shit has to change).

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Originally Posted by Demacia

Didn't read, lol.

Whatever happens, I just hope Samurai are completely different from FFXI if they even get introduced. No meditate. No WS spam. Give me something more FF tactics style. (Yes I loved SAM in XI but shit has to change).

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A lot of the suggestions I made would do that...

Or you could just strip back weapons to learning weaponskill's only and with the Job system let the Job's unlock the skill's traits and abilities. That way you could have a SAM equip a Lance, G.Katana, Banana whatever.

I really hope they strip the armoury system back with the incoming Job System as for me it just seems like one big headache that will only get worse the more classes they add. Unless SE have got some super plan to tie it all together and it all works great, then fair enough.

Or they could do what was suggested in one thread and make it so you can't equip the job unless you learn the skills needed for it similar to how FFTA does it.

IE To Equip Black Mage as a Job you have to have at minimum Fire, Aero, Earth, Water, Ice, Lightning, Poison and Bio.

Just make the job system not unlock till level 20 so most basic jobs would be unlocked by the time you get there anyway.

Ok, I read the entire OP.

Well it's certainly a good idea. I'm a bit on the fence about the implementation of the Ninjutsu spells. Why not just put each of them in the same as a CON has the elemental spells? And I would suggest having those just use MP. You'll have plenty of weapon skills for burning TP. I think if you take the Ninjutsu spells, one weapon skill per element, the en-spells, and implement the SAM battle stances, you have a pretty good formula for a new class.

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Originally Posted by BlaiseLallaise

Ok, I read the entire OP.

Well it's certainly a good idea. I'm a bit on the fence about the implementation of the Ninjutsu spells. Why not just put each of them in the same as a CON has the elemental spells? And I would suggest having those just use MP. You'll have plenty of weapon skills for burning TP. I think if you take the Ninjutsu spells, one weapon skill per element, the en-spells, and implement the SAM battle stances, you have a pretty good formula for a new class.

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Your correct, I think its up to SE to take the ideas we give though if they chose to use them at all. I'll copy your comments into the OP.

I used the Ninjtisu Meta Magic idea as a way to allow the Vagrant to have an AOE casting ability while preventing it from being used for a specific spell type. Ninjitsu normally cant be casted as a AOE spell so using Ninjitsu to modify the source spell and restrict it from AOE allows the Vagrant to still have AOE casting for other non-ninjitsu spells he learns like En-Elemental.

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Originally Posted by Physic

third eye is already in game with lancer
meditate is already in game with lancer
hasso is what increase str?
seigan is basically in the evasion or parry boosting skills, and corresponding weaponskills.
comrade in arms is store tp

samurai basically got taken by lancer, as it was anyhow, the magic swordsman could be interesting, but you can make a spear sam out of whats in game already pretty easily.
ninja....
well we got various dots, and debuffs on thaum
lancer has third eye, which is basically utsusemi, but lets throw archers one in there so you get two.
what else ninja got... oh dual weild, which was rumored to be fencer in the dats, but who knows if that will ever occur.

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I think featherfoot is more like utsuemi.

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Originally Posted by Reika

I think featherfoot is more like utsuemi.

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I wouldn't want them to implement Utsusemi anyway.

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Originally Posted by Cairdeas

I wouldn't want them to implement Utsusemi anyway.

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Agreed, Utsu was awful for balance. There are better ways of dealing with soloing content and survivability than slapping straight up damage negation on everyone.

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Originally Posted by Reika

I think featherfoot is more like utsuemi.

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mannn i get hit all the time with featherfoot,
the lancer skill, that lets you dodge any close attack, that is utsu, but its only 1 shadow per minute so it wont become a way of life.

of course a man desiring the ninja way of life could probably take the lancer one, and the archer one for ranged attacks, and just run away for the archer one so he negates a ranged attack. but prolly seems like too much work for too little reward.

I hope ARC stays the best spike dmg in the game so peregrine cries more otherwise . . .

changes yes please i like new shiny things

In most of the proposals that came up for how to handle classes... Only mine had this in mind going forward and came up with a solution, along with a few other things people tend to overlook.

Just a thought.

This was long, drawn out, and unnecessary speculative rant that could've been kept in any of the other threads.

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Originally Posted by Kurokikaze

In most of the proposals that came up for how to handle classes... Only mine had this in mind going forward and came up with a solution, along with a few other things people tend to overlook.

Just a thought.

This was long, drawn out, and unnecessary speculative rant that could've been kept in any of the other threads.

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Sorry but it would have been off topic as it has nothing to do with the actual job system and was instead a speculation about how future weaponclasses would be implemented around it. This would have either hijacked or been lost in another discussion. And no your thread wasn't the first or only one to mention anything like this mine was just the first to bring it public as its own topic, please get over yourself.

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Originally Posted by Speeral

I hope ARC stays the best spike dmg in the game so peregrine cries more otherwise . . .

changes yes please i like new shiny things

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What affect.
Got archer to 26 yesterday. Totally spoiled and brattish population base, ranger fans. They shouldn't give us any tp for multishots. I can solo things a full party at my level gets capped sp on faster than I can get hit three times. Glass cannon my ass lol...

SE has themselves a case of the chronically spoiled. The jobs a broken joke.

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Originally Posted by Cairdeas

I feel like I just dumptrucked a whole bunch of ideas... Oh wait I did...

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lmao
Actually, beside etymology, you basically said that adding a class that wields one or two handed oriental blades with a bunch of weapon and ninjutsu skills would be a good idea. I can agree with this.

Also, as some others pointed, some skills could be redundant, but I don't necessarily see this as a problem. Obviously we don't want to see the same ability with a different name.

But their could be some adjustments to damage and healing modifiers to ninjutsu spells vs CON or THM spells (VIT and DEX vs MND and INT for example, so you keep focusing on DD-like stats allocation with no penalty on spell damage). Weapon skills could exploit the elemental properties even more. And from an aesthetic point of view, a whole new wave of different looking gear available and new animations for weapon skills could be a great thing.

Class uniqueness is not limited to the role it plays, it also refers to the perception you get from playing it and from your ability to quickly recognize a character that plays it.

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Originally Posted by northernsky

Class uniqueness is not limited to the role it plays, it also refers to the perception you get from playing it and from your ability to quickly recognize a character that plays it.

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Correct.

I'd like to see Two Hand Hammers as well. I did a FF1 game of 4 White Mages with 2hd hammers and it was mad fun

Cairdeas - We both know that you and I are playing a game. One of us is going to end up saying, "I told you so!" If you are that person, I'll delete Belgian Rofl and make a new anonymous character out of shame. That being said, I really think implementing traditional Jobs on top of classes is a ridiculous idea that will not be implemented.

This is not a very risky bet to make, who really thinks that SE will directly use an idea presented in the forums?

Now surely you wish to share with us why you think that adding jobs on top of classes is a ridiculous idea.

lol everything I posted in the first post was speculation on how they would implement a new weaponclass while still thinking about how it works with the Job system they've said they are implementing. Right now its more then likely we'll get the job system before we get new weapon classes.


SE has yet to disappoint me with how they have implemented any of the changes in XIV so far. I have no doubt the way they implement Jobs will be easier to understand then anything I could describe. And will most likely be on par with something I've written though probably not directly birthed from my thoughts. As of today. I've now written atleast 20 different ways they could implement Traditional Jobs into FFXIV and a majority of those were written before the official forums were even released.

I'm sure atleast one of them is probably close to how SE does it.

I like the idea. I'm iffy on the melee enhancing spells (Enspells) coming from this class rather than Red Mage because if you give this class enspells and emphasis in magic-melee , this means Red Mage might get screwed with support abilities a second time around (the one thing I do not want to see happen in this game). I'd place more emphasis on the Draw Out part of the samurai (as seen in FF tactics) with a couple of strike-type skills. Attaching Ninjutsu to this was smart and quite creative, IMO. I'll support this, so long as Utsusemi does not darken my doorstep to ruin another game.

I was actually thinking Ninja should be a smaller specialty of the Thief-job, and likewise, Samurai a specialization of the Berserker-job. I don't like the idea of Red/Blue/Black/White Mages only because they are all covered by the Armory system, so the jobs should focus on the actual cast, not the spell-pool. I think the jobs themselves should be rather broad, even if they contain specializations. Or even just have oriental weapon options for the Thief and Berserker for the same real effect :)

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Originally Posted by Duelle

I like the idea. I'm iffy on the melee enhancing spells (Enspells) coming from this class rather than Red Mage because if you give this class enspells and emphasis in magic-melee , this means Red Mage might get screwed with support abilities a second time around (the one thing I do not want to see happen in this game). I'd place more emphasis on the Draw Out part of the samurai (as seen in FF tactics) with a couple of strike-type skills. Attaching Ninjutsu to this was smart and quite creative, IMO. I'll support this, so long as Utsusemi does not darken my doorstep to ruin another game.

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This would be a Weapon Class that gave Enspells to the game, the job Redmage would still be able to use them once the job system is implemented etc.

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Originally Posted by Cairdeas

This would be a Weapon Class that gave Enspells to the game, the job Redmage would still be able to use them once the job system is implemented etc.

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Depending on what the job Red Mage gets. I'm waiting to see how that pans out, but my concern stems from the fact that if you're giving part of the magic fencer aspect of Red Mage to the Vagrant weapon class, I'm afraid to see what's left over in terms of design. Considering nukes and cure are covered by CON, enfeebles are in part from THM, and enspells and magic melee (Magic Sword, Spellblade, or however else you want to call it) would be covered by VNT, that kind of leaves Refresh... >.>

Edit: Maybe I misunderstood idea behind the dual system of class/job. Looking over the OP again, is the intention to distribute the main abilities through the weapon classes with the jobs enhancing those abilities depending the role of the job?

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Depending on what the job Red Mage gets. I'm waiting to see how that pans out, but my concern stems from the fact that if you're giving part of the magic fencer aspect of Red Mage to the Vagrant weapon class, I'm afraid to see what's left over in terms of design. Considering nukes and cure are covered by CON, enfeebles are in part from THM, and enspells and magic melee (Magic Sword, Spellblade, or however else you want to call it) would be covered by VNT, that kind of leaves Refresh... >.>

Edit: Maybe I misunderstood idea behind the dual system of class/job. Looking over the OP again, is the intention to distribute the main abilities through the weapon classes with the jobs enhancing those abilities depending the role of the job?

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I think that SE will use the job system more like a Bonus title system rather then unlocking of skill type of system, but who knows. I like the idea heck I also had a idea for the aoe what if you needed to hit the mob to gain the enspell, but it would only be AOE by Vargard or w/e you call it.

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Originally Posted by Duelle

Edit: Maybe I misunderstood idea behind the dual system of class/job. Looking over the OP again, is the intention to distribute the main abilities through the weapon classes with the jobs enhancing those abilities depending the role of the job?

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Thats what I'm hoping.

Also just to make it clear in past final fantasy's. the "elemental Blade" skills were either part of the job Mystic, Mystic Knight, Spellsword, or Samurai. FFXI gave them to Redmage to give them more to do in combat. It was the first time they ever had those skills.

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Originally Posted by Cairdeas

Also just to make it clear in past final fantasy's. the "elemental Blade" skills were either part of the job Mystic, Mystic Knight, Spellsword, or Samurai. FFXI gave them to Redmage to give them more to do in combat. It was the first time they ever had those skills.

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Seeing that Red Mage had Saber in FF1, which was a melee enhancing spell, it's not much of a stretch to link enspells to Red Mage in the same way. I simply put it to the overt emphasis on the elements when it came to magic design in FFXI. If anything, it supports how the job is usually advertised: a magic swordsman.

Either way, I understand what you're aiming for. All I ask is that Utsusemi and anything like it stays far, far away from this game.

Wow o_O' ! You got a lot to say:p

I didn't read everything sry.
So just a small post to support the dual weild request =)

I would love to use 2 pistols at a time.
Sadly at the beginning of the game in Limsa, they all use one gun only.
But in her description, it's saying that Merlwyb uses 2 guns, more than 2 guns, two relics :p
I wonder if this can be a hope for use, or if it's only to show her uniqueness.

Trying to appease to the Final Fantasy traditionalists is such a handicap.

well it does illustrate why the naming scheme was possibly a bad choice.

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Originally Posted by Nephera

well it does illustrate why the naming scheme was possibly a bad choice.

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Indeed it does. But it was also a great choice to be honest.

If they had just used the traditional job names from the outset for this new class system everyone would have been confused about "Well why is there a Red Mage, and a Dark Knight with no melee weapon" as Conj and Thaum seemed to fit those descriptions at first. If you think of the armoury system outside of traditional FF jobs none of the classes match any of the jobs from past FFs. Instead you have to mix and match atleast 2 classes in XIV to make a traditional FF Job. I have a feeling they always intended to have the Final Fantasy Job names play a part in character customization but they didnt get it finalized before they were forced to release so the system never came to pass. Instead Yoshi-P had to throw one together and hopefully its adequate to create a sense of accomplishment, force role reinforcement, and nostalgia. Even if its illusionary. All without removing the uniqueness of the Armoury System.