The future of Thief and Ninja (minor 2.2 spoilers)

[Melinia]

If Ninja did end up being tank, would they have all new armor sets? I mean I can't imagine them wearing current tanking gear.

They'd no doubt have the exact same armor as their starting class in order to make the transition easier. The example we have right now is Scholar, which is a healer that comes from a dps job. Scholars continue to use the same armor as Arcanists, with the same stat bonuses, even though their role has completely changed. But Scholars also get a handy trait that boosts their MND stat. If Ninja is brought in as a tank, then it will probably get a similar bonus in some fashion that will help make up for their start as a dps class.

[Katchii]

Well, in FFXI, it'll be more accurate to describe the ninja as a "blink tank", rather than an evasion tank. In case you've not played the game, FFXI's ninja is capable of casting "shadows" of himself, each of it would disappear after absorbing a "hit". So, in that sense, the ninja can control when to dodge an attack. Of course, a ninja that's excellent at evading attacks would be able to keep up his shadows for a longer time, so evasion remains a very vital stat for the job/class.

The issue with an evasion and/ or blink tank in this game is that as gear gets better and better, the tank will be getting hit less and less, which would make them the far superior tank unless SE specifically designed encounters to favor one tank over the others (high accuracy fast attack speed to favor WARs and PLDs, or super hard hitting slow attacks to favor NIN). Additionally, if this were the case, parties with Ninja tanks would be far superior because the healer would be able to practically ignore their healing duties in favor of DPS'ing which would vastly decrease dungeon run times.

The other option is for them to implement an ability that spreads damage out on NIN tanks so that when they do get hit, the damage is spread over time so healers have time to react, rather than the tank going from full to dead because of an unlucky streak of no dodging.

[L-D-Omlette]

My money is on Thief and Ninja both being jobs, not sure about roles, but I bet one will be support-ish, and other will be melee dot class. Ninja would be more likely to be support-ish than Thief, but could see it going either way.

[Exstal]

The more I think about it, the more I fear that SE will do the stupid thing and make Ninja a tank again. They screwed themselves by not correcting that mistake in XI. Set a terrible precedent.

I'd personally prefer Thief (class) => Ninja (job) like it was in the old games. Basically since Steal will be either worthless, or overpowered (get items that others can't), there's no need for it to be a job since it's traditionally a weaker, slower Ninja.

[Reynhart]

They'd no doubt have the exact same armor as their starting class in order to make the transition easier. The example we have right now is Scholar, which is a healer that comes from a dps job. Scholars continue to use the same armor as Arcanists, with the same stat bonuses, even though their role has completely changed.

At high level, SCH wears the same gear as CNJ and WHM, not ACN.

The other option is for them to implement an ability that spreads damage out on NIN tanks so that when they do get hit, the damage is spread over time so healers have time to react, rather than the tank going from full to dead because of an unlucky streak of no dodging.

For me, the "fine" way to do an Evasion tank is by using short-duration Evasion buffs. Not something like Utsusemi where you create your shadows, and they absorb by themselves, but something more like "I'm dodging the next attack and the effect lasts 3s with a recast of 15s". We'd have a pure reaction tank, that requires a lot of skills to play nice. I think it's fair for it te be a "better" tank if it's far more complicated to play properly.

As for the job/class relation, I'd think Thief as a class, Ninja as a Job, being a DPS, and Samurai as a secondary job, being not an "Evasion tank" but a "Parry tank", with buffs like I described earlier.

Why "Samurai" ? Because Doma -> Cyan -> Samurai

[Endemerrin]

The thing is, being an "evasion" tank doesn't necessarily mean it has to solely rely on evasion. It could very well just be a general theme. Maybe they have a few abilities that increase evasion rates or grant 100% dodges. They could also just have an entirely new tanking mechanic. Paladin's go-to is blocking, parrying and dodging, Warriors is parrying and dodging, and Ninja could be something like dodging, parrying, and countering.
They could have a passive stance that increases enmity generation, HP, and grants them a 50% chance to counter attack or something.

They could have your run of the mill defensive CDs. Some with a damage reduction %, some with a defense increase %, some with an evasion increase %, etc.

Another interesting mechanic I had thought would be perfect for Ninja would be adapting arcanist's aether flow mechanic to the job. Give it an ability they can pop that gives them three stacks of a buff, and they could use charges of said buff to cast Utsusemi on themselves, allowing them to absorb one attack. Maybe not all attacks, but most. Or they could use it to cast other ninjitsu abilities, for example. Maybe some that blind enemies, things like that.

That in itself would bring an incredibly interesting tanking dynamic into the game.

Suffice it to say, there's plenty of options to make Ninja an awesome tank, and I'd be all over it. I know that opinion will get a lot of flak, as many people want it to be a DD, but in a game where we're lacking interesting tanking roles, it's something I really want to see happen.

Now, speaking as some one who mains a tank, I think the biggest thing that's pushing me to believe Ninja will be a tank is the fact that the game is desperately in need of tanks right now. Yoshi-P has admitted it, and the player base has definitely felt it. They tried to entice people to play the tank roles with mounts and bonus gil from the duty roulette, but even that only goes so far. I hear all the time of how long low level DD have to wait in queue for dungeons. If they went ahead and added two more DD classes (The gunner and dagger wielders), the DF would be even further clogged with more DD and the tanks that would normally be there would probably be leveling the new DD jobs as well. It'd make leveling as a DD a mess, there's no question about it. Making one a tank would both force people to play a tank and level it up, thus helping that area of the duty finder and it's lack of tanks, and it would also revitalize the endgame tank population. At this point, I just kind of feel like the evidence is stacking up in the favor of it being a tank. Adding two more damage dealers into an already heavy damage dealing pool would just further unbalance the game. If there's one thing we desperately need, it's a little bit more tank variety.

[Akujin]

I'll actually laugh some if the gun class, which from Yoshi himself having said "it's not what you expect", turns out to be the tank class. Rather than rebooting the XI tradition of putting Ninja in as a tank. Granted, Ninja was originally designed as DPS, but the players saw the opportunity with the shadows to use it differently. Problem back then was that Ninja did not have native hate generating abilities, the elemental powders were good, but costly, being an ammo slot rather than a JA as Provoke or even Flash was for War/Pld.

I honestly don't want to have a XI 2.0 Ninja come into the game, I'd like to see the job come out as a true to form DPS.

So far we have 2 tanks, 2 healers, 2 DPS, 2 range DPS, 1 Support DPS. With two new class>2 jobs, they could pull out a new Tank (Maybe, Machinist?), DPS (Ninja), Support DPS (Thief), Range DPS/Healer (Corsair - again, breaking away from the XI style of things, not coming in as a support job. How exactly, no clue. But I would personally love to heal people by shooting them lol). But there's lots of possibilities.

[BobbinT]

was hoping a simplified version instead, with thief as base class, then ninja as job with sub-class of either thaumaturge/conjurer/archanist. XD

[Kyan]

So far we have 2 tanks, 2 healers, 2 DPS, 2 range DPS, 1 Support DPS. With two new class>2 jobs, they could pull out a new Tank (Maybe, Machinist?), DPS (Ninja), Support DPS (Thief), Range DPS/Healer...

I'm totally with you there. If they are going to stick with the trilogy of positions, tank, dps and healer, I would like to see all those options available to both DoW and DoM schools; A DoW healer - a DoM tank. There are a lot of possibilities as you've said! I'm curious and anticipate these new classes and jobs, but in the mean time, I'm trying to avoid having expectations to try and remain open-minded!

[MartaDemireux]

Fairly certain Yoshi said in an interview that if they do implement Ninja that it would not be a tank.

That said I could see both Thief and Ninja coming from the same class, like others said likely Rogue or Scout.

I would put my gil on saying Ninja will be a DPS utilizing water magic (staple in the series), some sort of ranged attack via Throw (another staple, Thancred also showed us this ability), a poison or a blind (ninjas would do that IRL), the electrifying AoE attack (Yugiri showed us) and perhaps a buff/stance that added or enhanced a mechanic to their attacks. They would probably focus on attacking from behind for higher potency or combos like in the 2.2 cutscenes.

I think Thief could function as either a support DPS like Bard or perhaps even more likely as a tank. If someone steals from you, you don't like them. That would be a good theme to make them a tank. They could steal enmity from others and perhaps steal an enemy's energy for "charges" to use with other abilities. They could also charm and attract the monsters attention. On the other hand they could be a support DPS by stealing enmity from one player and putting it on another. They could focus on big burst damage like Dragoon. I could see them also stealing buffs and perhaps making use of them. Maybe a mechanic where they dispel a buff but if they do it a certain way, like from behind, they can get the exact buff for a short amount of time. Or, perhaps it activates other abilities or changes the effects of some abilities. They could potentially also steal a target's TP for their own use.

For the base class I would expect there to be an ability that is similar to DoL's stealth but with a short duration and for there to be attacks that capitalize on this ability to deal extra damage or even negate enmity generated. Both Thieves and Ninjas like to operate in the shadows and both had ways to make themselves invisible in XI.

As far as Thief as a class leading into Ninja: I greatly disagree. As we have seen from current classes not one of them shares a name with a traditional FF job. I expect that to continue. It was only in FF1 where Thief upgraded directly into Ninja and if we go by those standards then Warrior would have gone into Paladin. Thief in the rest of the series has always had a separate identity from Ninja when they appeared together. Thief has also varied quite a bit depending on the game much like Scholar did so this is a great place to give it another identity of its own in a similar fashion.

Examples of its variance:
FFI: Can escape from battles.
FFIII: Can now steal.
FFV: Can now mug (attack while stealing), boost movement speed and detect hidden passages.
FFX-2: Can now steal MP, HP, inflict Berserk and Stop status effects and force the enemy to run.
FFXI: Can now transfer enmity of own attacks to another player, steal enmity from other players, steal buffs from enemies, inflict Terror and focuses on quick critical multi-hits.
FFT: Can now steal a units equipment and EXP as well as inflict Charm.
FFTA: Can now counter attacks, steal abilities directly from the enemy for use and prevent the theft and damage of your own equipment.
FFTA2: Same as FFTA but with the ability to steal the units Smash Gauge, a new battle mechanic.
FF4HoL: Can now steal from multiple enemies at once and gains an instant death ability.
BDFF: Can now convert their speed into an attack that ignores defense and recovers it's own HP when stealing an item.

So with that variance I could most certainly see a tank coming in the form of Thief in FFXIV. Throughout its history it's always had a focus of stealing but always had something different. A combination of HP/TP stealing, Terror/Stop (could function as Stun here), AoE stealing (for enmity), Berserk/Charm (could function as a provoke), countering attacks, stealing a party member's enmity and burst damage could make for an interesting tank. Evasion tanking is tough to balance though but it could potentially be done with a stance that allows the build of charges gained with stealing actions to either mitigate damage or evade it.