Classes vs jobs , are classes near obsolete now?

[Kerwin]

Originally all you had was class rank and an overall level. It was interesting for a while but very confusing at the same time. Just for giggles I might deck out a Gladiator or Muarader with some HQ crafting gear and penta meld some materia in it.

But then again it would be a huge gil sink and I would be gimped in comparison to any job. It really has become a thing of the past and looked down upon. Archers being actual range DPS instead of bard support? I'm growing OLD!

[allluckys]

classes are a base and jobs are basically specializations. mrd can branch off and be a war = tank or later in the future become a berserker dps. Or a gld can become a pld tank or become a drk dps

[Sypherblade]

For all the multi classing arguments on choices….

Having an "illusion" of choices for sub jobs comes from bad sub job design. Every sub should look appealing for several situations

examples of what "could" of helped made ffxi's sub job system a lil more appealing in my opinion.

Tanks
/drk - en-drain added to attacks, absorb defense adding a nice long duration buff, en-stun with a low proc rate
/mnk - large max HP boost 30% maybe, counter(didn't dodge all damage, instead added in another auto attack when struck), chakra (remove many debuffs from user on a short cool down)
/Blu - cocoon (this was actually in the game….but people refused to try war/blu when I played…)

Damager
/rdm (en-element actually made your melee attacks do magic DMG, like formless strikes)

just some 2sec examples… when you make other choices so overpowered compared to the others…thats how you create cookie cutters…this is a fault on the designers.

[Firefly]

Remember the first Final Fantasy? You started as a fighter/mage/thief/black-belt and later upgraded to a knight/wizard/ninja/master. Same concept here. No reason to downgrade once you've been upgraded.

[rabbitzero]

Having an "illusion" of choices for sub jobs comes from bad sub job design. Every sub should look appealing for several situations

examples of what "could" of helped made ffxi's sub job system a lil more appealing in my opinion.

One thing i was thinking when i first learned of the whole job and swapping thing was that you could and sometimes would be encouraged to swap jobs while in a party/dungeon. Say one boss needed more people being dps/tanks/healers, and if you did that, it would go better. Yeah, this would cause problems with people queueing as tank to get quick queues, but would encourage multiple jobs and play styles. I do like that i can have different jobs on one character, but a bit more static than i was thinking.

[Sypherblade]

One thing i was thinking when i first learned of the whole job and swapping thing was that you could and sometimes would be encouraged to swap jobs while in a party/dungeon. Say one boss needed more people being dps/tanks/healers, and if you did that, it would go better. Yeah, this would cause problems with people queueing as tank to get quick queues, but would encourage multiple jobs and play styles. I do like that i can have different jobs on one character, but a bit more static than i was thinking.

Probably could of been more possible if we had a changeable sub job system…this boss i'll sub X…next boss i'll sub Y…but can't change main job in dungeons.

[Senfei]

In the age of youtube and countless blogs detailing the best strategy, I agree wholeheartedly that needlessly complicating the game with the illusion of choice is pointless. People will find the most effective variations with usually one or maybe two other "acceptable" substitutions for a couple of situations, and that will be all that is used by serious players.

If you are asking for choice simply to make the game more complicated and give players more of a reason to feel "elite" by looking down on everyone who does not follow the latest and greatest raid tactic video on youtube/populer player blog, then you may want to reevaluate what you are asking for.

If you are asking for choice simply because you want more choices to run around town in and never use in any serious party, you may want to reevaluate why you would ask developers to spend money and time creating pointless features when they could be expanding the game.

If you are asking for choice because you think you will be the one player to come up with the most awesome new strategy that no one ever thought of, well... I hate to say it, but you aren't a special snowflake and you probably won't.

[Letzt]

There will be more choice in the future , possible , hopefully meaningfull and not just eye candy and more importantly worth of the 14 euro custom the game requires as a monthly subscription. Hopefully more classes more variations , more choices for the lot of people playing this game.

Of course nothing will deviate from the regular tank ,dps ,healer ,support class but there are many ideas for how to differently implement roles. So have at them.

Cause there is definitely not enough content/choices/variety in gameplay and it doesn't come out fast enough to warrant 14 euros is there now?

[Exstal]

I'd say capping at around ~20 is good enough

Enough to do 4:4:12 (healer:tank:dps)

[Nahara]

Example: Say you are killing a NM that hits like a truck and you don't have enough healing to keep your PLD alive. If you have a THF your PLD could sub /NIN and mitigate a ton of damage that way, with the THF (or /THF) covering for the emnity loss of not having Provoke from /WAR while not requiring Defender since you are Utsu-tanking.

Or... they could have just brought a NIN/WAR, pretty much the default NIN tank setup, to be the tank instead of trying to make a party around PLD/NIN.

Kitru's example may have been off (as a WHM, I subbed BLM until SCH came out), but the fact of it still holds true: Sure, you had a huge number of possible job and subjob combinations, but only a few of those options were ever truly viable.