New interview from JP 4gamer site

[_C-a-e-r-i-t-h_]

i agree, and think as well there was a big lull in the story when they got into the echo thing. It was really very sparse, and it literally ends like, now your story begins, 46 levels of inane purposeless grinding(in this context, i mean leveling for the sake of leveling, not for any story related reason), for what is usually the story in the first 3 hours of a regular rpg. That will not entertain most offline rpg players.

Seriously. I stopped at 30 or so because the little bits of story each mission gives weren't compelling enough for the hours upon hours of grinding it would take to get them, but basically it was like... 1-16 or so you're introduced to this city-specific story with interesting NPCs, then then 20+ they completely change gears and you never hear from Thancred again while you go off an play silly games with beastmen and do parley missions and seriously how many hundreds of hours until the next bit of cutscene?

I hope with the re-vamp that they compress the storyline into the traditional "advance the storyline whenever you're ready" model and let people grind to be ready for it, not because they have to. And unless "Throw Stone" sees a serious upgrade, delineate the missions for combat and non-combat classes. Battle missions as a crafter, waiting for NPCs to kill off the enemy while you throw stones, are a really bad idea.

[Rydin]

Battle missions as a crafter, waiting for NPCs to kill off the enemy while you throw stones, are a really bad idea.

You couldn't be more right... It actually has been one of the worst aspects of the game

[zoekwon]

u throw rock and u rage mobs more.... then u run.... NOW THATS FUN!

[VydarrTyr]

Thanks so much to Reinhart and Rentahamster for the translations. You guys rock.

[Amsai]

Originally Posted by _C-a-e-r-i-t-h_
Battle missions as a crafter, waiting for NPCs to kill off the enemy while you throw stones, are a really bad idea.

This has been one of my biggest problems with them trying to flesh out the roles of crafters and gatherers. It seems like if they continue in this direction, all content would have to be dumbed down to make sure to be inclusive to DoH/DoL. Aside from that it seems to me that DoH/DoL would have more fun and more consistency to thier chosen path, if they did have seperate storyline missions for them that worked in parallel with DoM/DoW storyline missions. And that those be things like special missions with a lot of story content about the war effort behind the scenes. Like say a rare gem or ore is needed for the completion of a powerful artifact, or say Cid contracts a crafter to make an important part for an airship, etc etc.

[_C-a-e-r-i-t-h_]

This has been one of my biggest problems with them trying to flesh out the roles of crafters and gatherers. It seems like if they continue in this direction, all content would have to be dumbed down to make sure to be inclusive to DoH/DoL. Aside from that it seems to me that DoH/DoL would have more fun and more consistency to thier chosen path, if they did have seperate storyline missions for them that worked in parallel with DoM/DoW storyline missions. And that those be things like special missions with a lot of story content about the war effort behind the scenes. Like say a rare gem or ore is needed for the completion of a powerful artifact, or say Cid contracts a crafter to make an important part for an airship, etc etc.

I agree. They should have separate storyline missions. I think it would even be a good thing for them to have entirely separate stories. Like, not just connected to the war effort, but connected more with the politics of the realm. While a DoW/M is off fighting this or that, a DoH/L is working his way up through the ranks of the guild(s) and working on a more political/diplomatic role. Instead of "throw stones at the monster" their quests will be like, "The ambassador from the beastmen tribes is furious, but we think a gift would help to win him over. You're a skilled <class>, can you make <crafted good X> or perhaps find <resource Y>?"

Might be a bit monotonous (like the crafting/gathering leves all are), but it's a vast improvement over throwing stones, and gives players two different storylines to follow and a sort of incentive to play as both DoW/M and DoH/L.

[Mireille]

Translation isn't 100% I did the best I can, 2 AM now so I go sleep. For quick translation look at the Rentahamster's one on Page 6.

Thanks for the translation. Sorry I got steamed at you in the other thread. Its clear since you put this sort of effort in that you care about how the game is progressing. The complaints get to me sometimes since I know how much creative effort is going into the redesign, and it seems that people are so rude to the devs sometimes. Having been to Japan I've seen how polite the people there are, and it just gets me incensed at times to see westerners act like prats, and I sort of snapped.

Seriously thanks for the effort this was a good read.

[Griss]

10/10 would read again.

[Biggs]

My first response about the job system was to get upset. I was not liking this "mode" idea. But the more I thought about this, the more i realized that if every "class" has several "modes", that doesn't mean they won't increase the number of classes. I mean, if each combat job in the game now is a class, then I feel we can safely speculate that more classes are on the way on top of however many modes they add per class. I say this because each class has an official guild that represents them , and that means (I would think) that Muskateer and Arcanist will be new "classes" and not modes. Again this is all just my best guess, but I actually could warm up to the idea of "job modes" if this is the case. They could still have a large amount of actual classes.

Take conjury for instance. I feel like they tried to do too much with conjurer as a job on its own. It has the keys buffs in the game right now but also has spells that do a considerable amount of direct magic damage. In a group combat scenario its tough to be both the healer and a damage dealer so you are typically forced to pick a role. If you then give it the added options of a pure white mage or pure black mage roll (2 logical modes for that class) you can more thoroughly choose which role defines your style.

Same with building off the pugilist class. You could fullfill more of a thf roll, or switch to a direct damage roll with monk. All this still leaves room for a TON of other classes to add that they can build off of. After thinking about all the classes and sub classes SE has ever created for all the FF's, I began to realize that they could still add a ridiculous amount of all the jobs we have ever loved in some form to this game, and in doing so making each class more flexibal.

For now we wait and see (nothing new there lol). Like so much else in this game, this system has a lot of potential, it is just gonna require a fantastic execution.

Heres hoping....

[Evangelus]

thanks a lot rain =) you did a great work !

would you translate the end of the interview please ? =)