Honest question: If every player/class/job is equal,who is unique? (Gameplay topic)

[Aegis]

Well, FFXI mobs were totally "overpowered" and soloing in FFXIV is lolworthy.

I'd like some normal mobs that can't be solo'd in the overworld. Especially if they a) dropped something useful b) were protecting an important area.

And I did know about solo, maining BST for about almost all my time and soloing with any jobs that could solo.

BST. Good times. Remember checking /seacoms to see if camps were free or if people wanted to duo?

I was the RDM in my static.The BLU always had refresh (and haste) on. All the mage and the PLD did.

I was the DRK. Bane of my WHM's life. SOULEATER LAST RESORT GUILLOTINE! um... cure please?

[XNihili]

BST. Good times. Remember checking /seacoms to see if camps were free or if people wanted to duo?

Always !!! It was in the untold BST code and all BST respected it until Aht Urghant where the leech camp made some younger BST act like punk

[Obysuca]

if you weren't a specific job and job combination, you never got invited to anything. Ever. I waited for over 4 hours as a thf for a party in the dunes once, and that was just for a subjob!

>_> Just going to say, I was pup forever. I still got invited to stuff without a problem lol That's what was great about XI and older mmos, if you knew people, you got stuff done. None of this "solo 90% of the game" crap we have now in mmos. Even better is that if you were good at your job, people knew it (since no cross server instance stuff), which increased your chances of being invited even more

Also >_> For anyone who brings up the argument on "waiting hours" for a party. Usually you can solve that by just making your own. Just saying lol

[Aegis]

Always !!! It was in the untold BST code and all BST respected it until Aht Urghant where the leech camp made some younger BST act like punk

something, something... Kids these days grumble, grumble... No respect. Get off my lawn.

[RiceisNice]

...

And that's the thing. We don't want things to be complex for the sake of being complex, but fun. I feel that ARR (for the most part) has pulled it off really well with regards to how each of the classes reaches their role's goal (dps, healing, tanking) without straying so far that it encouraged class stacking for certain encounters. I'm all for all for having classes having different mechanics if they are designed with it in mind and it works. (stances, aetherflow, positional, etc etc)


As far as job changes goes, I've always seen them as a "promotion" of sorts to the base class (essentially adding new abilities, not changing their whole class dynamic). I don't expect a paladin to play significantly different from a gladiator when you need to be a lvl 30 gladiator to attain paladin and it runs off gladiator's exp bar. Though I'd personally like to see some more reactive skills on the tanks in generals, something to encourage actually using shield swipe when it procs. Whether or not they're pulled off well for the theming (looking at you, BRD and SMN) is another issue (which is never addressed by OP and only by you to an extent up to now, so it doesn't really fit in the grand scheme of this topic.)

The way I see the basic, barebones of a class, is what sort of role they fit (the dps, ranged dps, healers, and tank). What sets them apart for me is how they achieve that; DRG and MNK have incredibly different mechancs with stances and comboing, ARC has the management of aetherflow vs BLM's astral/umbral pendulum. That's touching into the whole subjective thing on what makes a class unique or not, and we'd disagree there (I feel that they;re unique enough that they can be considered different classes, you and possibly the OP since he just jumped onto your post without any other support feel that they're close, or maybe too close, to the barebone of the roles.)

Ninja is most likely going to play different from MNK and DRG anyway in the same manner (different abilities, mudras, concepts), but all of those that are in place already between the MNK and DRG (stances versus combos, positional, lance vs fisticuffs), which OP seems unsatisfied with so I'm not sure if ninja is even going to suffice for his taste.

Though from the couple of recent posts, there's really no more point to continue on. The OP is still out for blood and throwing out retaliation to everyone that challenges him, let alone refuting points.

[erish]

My $0.02, FWIW

Missing the most important healing spell HASTE FTW!

In dynamis we always used BRDS to sleep since well there generally better and most of them were /nin because there pulling anyway. In sea we had rdm/whm sleep because well most of it was super easy to sleep. I cant speak for your shell but by the time blu was released SC was pretty much dead, throwing melee at it and zerging was the norm for most shells.

Yeah id say at least at some point in the game every job has had a niche in the game at some point but i much prefer the wow style of design in regards to balance of jobs ie "Bring the player not the job" that we now see to the im sitting in jeuno for hours with my flag up, please god someone invite me anyone i just want to level...

Quick edit: really hate people who say aby ruined the game, if you actually played during this time you would have seen it bought more people back to the game than ever before it was a great time to play the game its a shame so many people who got stuck on low level rubbish spout this.

[Animarelic]

As an XI player I felt the same way the OP did until... I remembered all the hours I spent LFP versus actually playing XI because I didn't fit a party set up.
While XIV's combat and party system has flaws, it's geared towards everyone using their gaming time more efficiently.
I think one issue is the lack of difficulty it takes to learn a class which also deters people from alienating classes with steeper learning curves.
Yoshi's goal may be to add diversity through different Jobs because if they are evened out then it only becomes a matter of preference which is better than necessity.

[Lux_Rayna]

There are too few differences. Just as you say that I'm ignoring the differences, you seem to be ignoring the similarities. There are more similarities than differences. I'm not trying to start a fight here but that's what it looks like to me.

I'll be honest and say you lack experience. Lvl 50 jobs all play very very differently from each other. The only similarity among all the dps classes is that they do dmg. But they all do damage in very different ways, with concentration on different stats. It is all entirely different, from positioning to role in a party.

As far as crafted gear goes, the point of crafted gear is to give you options to customize. You have to look at crafted gear together with materia. Combining them gives you a lot of options in terms of customizing your stats.

[Cynric]

snip

Oh yes most definitely they have accomplished it well enough in my opinion as well. While I have my own thoughts on summoner and bard that is indeed a different topic. Yeah I personally just want to see classes designed from the ground up with special systems in mind help flesh them out, but for a game that came out extremely fast on a re release by scrapping the entire old game and with a lot of new players in mind. I think the current jobs do fine anyway.

As for job changes, I mean more so I expected more of a job change, or advancement but you only get stats, and 5 job skills to replace the 5 cross class slots you lose. While yes going for 30 levels you are a Gladiator, I would still expect paladin to play like a Gladiator of course, but much more paladin like. This isn't the case though, A GLD and a PLD at 50 are very identical because they're the same thing, the only difference is Cross class skills vs job skills. I would of liked to be playing my job from 30 on and not be playing my class (traits for the class,skills from it instead of job) the entirety of me playing that class. It just makes the class change feel like it wasn't even needed. Just my opinion though and once again a separate topic.

Yeah and there's nothing wrong with seeing classes based on their roles rather than their archetype they perform(scout vs asssassin vs mage), and if you do that, like I noted in my first post, it's easy to see the classes are different enough from each other that you can't play them the same. In the end our current jobs just feel like simplified versions of classes I've played in other MMO's before, and while I'd like to see them maybe break the mold. I definitely understand why they couldn't right away. By bare bones I mean basically what they do is too simplified, as I said in my first post I think they're vastly different from each other, they just aren't anything special in terms of an MMO class, and I feel that because of how simplified they made them, some people might feel they aren't vastly different to each other. At least with the DPS classes. They're most definitely different than each other, but they also aren't particularly different from other standard MMO classes.

I personally look forward to Ninja because I main thieves and the like and have been waiting since beta for a class I usually play. Monk was enjoyable but even the constant positioning has lost its luster for me. I take a quick glance at my timers, I instantly know which out of my 9 possible skills I should use or which route to go through, GL is never an issue for me to keep up. Positioning was never anything new to me since I play thieves and assassins anyway, but it was definitely very fun while it lasted. Also you and someone else noted this but yes sometimes just the weapon is enough for people to play the class, or the lore, or the animation, and those I believe are all valid reasons .

Yes things could definitely calm down a bit.

[Dwill]

Honestly? Not even a little bit. That piece of gear would take years to obtain. 6 mo to level your first job was pretty typical. Most people wouldn't have full Homam (for example) until years after when they started. Or Byakko's Haidate until they have been farming sky for months. The piece of gear was something you were proud of, something you built your gearset around. When next coil comes around, HA will have been BIS for what? 6 months? And you will be able to get gear better than it from whatever new tomes they release. One of these systems sounds rewarding to me, the other is like a cat chasing a mouse on a string.

We were giving Haidate left and right in our LS because we farmed Sky so much(to which you could also buy trigger making the farming an irrelevant issue). All of the main core of the LS had their jailers' necklace so they were given to alt.
You could buy the Osode which was BiS for Weapon Skills. For Samurai, a lot of the BiS for auto-attacks had to be be bought (Hagun, Haubergeon +1, Grip, O.Kote, Kyahan, Forager Mantle) and one of the BiS ring was the CoP ring could be obtained in not too long, same deal with Zilart earrings.

It didn't take that long to gear if you were in a decent LS and a similar system in this game will more than likely yield similar results.

Is that all you remember from XI. You don't remember organising skill chains and magic bursts? Setting up SATAs, BRD maintaining 4 or 5 song rotations? Samurais and Blue Magics Self-SC'ing? The list can go on and on. It sounds like you're pretty jaded about XI.

Distortion or Light were the only two really used in endgame. Main strategy in endgame for forever was throw as many Samurais as you can for melees at boss with them being in 6-hit setup to chain WS left and right while buffing them to oblivion with Bards. If you were a two-handed users and you were not a samurai, you would have to/sam for Hasso which lefts you with zero "uniqueness" in term of subjob.

>_> Just going to say, I was pup forever. I still got invited to stuff without a problem lol That's what was great about XI and older mmos, if you knew people, you got stuff done. None of this "solo 90% of the game" crap we have now in mmos. Even better is that if you were good at your job, people knew it (since no cross server instance stuff), which increased your chances of being invited even more

Also >_> For anyone who brings up the argument on "waiting hours" for a party. Usually you can solve that by just making your own. Just saying lol

Yeah, making your own party with people dropping from it once they discovered you were a pup or it would take forever because you'd go anon while recruiting so people wouldn't see that you were a PUP. I knew quite a few people to which that happened during ToAU. And if you were good at your job, you were good at the most optimal one which is what people wanted. People in FFXI were mostly elitists in endgame and no one would let you PUP anything relevant so yeah, good job, you could merit as PUP but do nothing else worthwhile.