Ideas for a Samurai class

[Morningstar1337]

Well I decided to make a thread for speculation on the Samurai class, my take will be spoiler-ed to avoid opinions on it from monopolizing the thread (I welcome criticism though but I also want other to post their own ideas for the class.

My take will be a Tank that will focus on Counterattacks. Its weapon will be Katanas (and it's relic will be Masamune). Swordsmaster will be the base class and Samurai will be the Job. It is based on STR.

The Counters will be buffs that trigger upon taking a specific attack (Think a specialized version of Perfect Dodge) and most of the skills will be based on the naming conventions of the Swordmasters skills from BD (being based on parts of figures of speech, with most of the corresponding buffed named after the missing part of the figure [Except The Road Less Traveled which is an except from a Robert Frost poem and Ummovable Object which will have the same name in status form and with the other half of that phrase being another skill]). All counters have a 25 second cooldown unless otherwise stated

Class Skills

• 1: Spirit Slash: 100 potency basic attack
• 2: Nothing Ventured: CD that gives a status: "Nothing Gained". 20 second buff that halves damage from a physical attack and hits the one who used the attack with a 50 potency attack
• 4: Natural Law: 120 potency attack that can be proced by Spirit Slash, at which point the potency becomes 150
• 6: Before Swine: CD that gives a status: "Pearls". 20 second buff that haves Magic damage and hits the caster for 80 potency.
• 8: Purge of Honor: not a buff CD, just the usual 200 potency only available when mob HP is at a certain threshold skill.
• 10: Sword's Code: 180 potency that can be proced by Spirit Slash, in which case the Potency is 240 and you get a DoT on the target
• 12: Early Bird: attack that adds a DoT to the mob, called "Gets the Worm"
• 15: Cornered Rat (quest): CD that grants a status: "Bites the Cat". 20 second buff that triggers when a teammate is attached while they're under 30% HP, halving the damage to them and directing it back to the aggressor at 80 potency
• 18: Know Thyself: unlike the rest, this is just a buff skill that increases the potency of Counter skills
• 22: Squeaky Wheel: Grants a debuff to the mobs: "Grease". Debuff increase vulnerability to magic and also adds Slow
• 26: Abyss: CD that grants a status: "Gazes Also". 20 second buff that triggers upon your next attack and stuns the enemy
• 30: Timber (quest): CD that grants a status: "Make a Sound". 20 second buff that triggers upon your next attack and silences the enemy
• 34: Honor and Glory: 200 potency attack that can be proced by Natural Law in which case the Potency is 250 and it has a 20% chance of proccing counters.
• 38: Haste Makes Waste: AoE attack that has a potency of 60, adding heavy to affected mobs and increasing their skill speed (for triggering counters)
• 42: It Takes One: CD that grants a status: "To Know One". 20 second buff that triggers upping taking a deadly hit (and under 30% HP), nulling the attack and directing it towards the opponent for 6x the potency. Has the 2nd longest cooldown period of 5 minuets
• 46: Free Lunch: A CD that is akin to Goad and Apocatastasis; you cannot use it on your self but on your teammates. The effect being a buff that makes spells cost no MP for 5-10 seconds
• 50: The Road Less Traveled: CD that grants the party a status: "All the Difference". 30 second buff that triggers upon taking powerful move, it reduces the HP of those hit by it to 1, but makes them immune to all damage for 2 seconds. Has a cooldown period of 10 minuets, the longest cooldown of the class

Job abilities:

• 30: Multitask: A CD that grants a 25% chance to follow up a skill from an autoattack or a counter. (Meaning that while the buff is up any skill can proc Purge of Honor, Natural Law, Sword's Code and Honor and Glory, each with their whole effects)
• 35: On The Wall: CD that grants a status to anyone in the party (including the caster): "Mirror Mirror". 20 second buff that triggers upon taking damage from their own spell (as with Before Swine or Reflect) allowing them to redirect the spell back to its original target at half potency.
• 40: Unmovable Object: Stance skill. Counters gain more enmity and you get 20% HP based on the damage counters do.
• 45: Bushido: an attack skill that can only be procced by a counter. It has 250 potency.
• 50: Unstoppable Force: Skill that removes all defensive Buffs, Unmovable Object and active counters to boost the party's Determination by 50%. Must be procced by using 5 successful counters.

The traits will consist of enhance STRs, increased duration for counters and free lunch and a chance to proc a random counter whenever one is triggered, as well increased emity on counters

[Mimilu]

I already have an entire thread for my idea, so I'll spare you that... >w>

Here are my thoughts:
Question, when Nothing Ventured or Before Swine counters, does it still stay for 20 seconds and work continuously or is it used up and we have to wait for the cooldown? If it lasts the whole 20 seconds , it seems very Tank-ish, you're lowering the damage by half and redirecting it for double.

Early Bird would be useless in boss fights that are heavy in none-cleanse-able debuffs (specifically, debuffs that play an important part to the battle).

Cornered Rat is very situational and I would hope your party's healer(s) wouldn't allow your party's HP to get that low during an important fight. This also seems like a Tanking skill, you're decreasing the damage done onto others, it's almost like a pseudo-Cover. >A>()

Abyss is another situational move and it would mess up your tank's Stuns.

Timber is a bit wasted because you don't have any Magic abilities to begin with.

For Haste Makes Waste, when you refer to "them" getting a Skill Speed boost, do you mean the user or the enemy? Because I don't think anyone would willing want their enemy to be faster.

For It Takes One, I think x6 is a bit high. For example, if you are hit for 1000, which is then halved to 500, you would counter for 3000. This would be crazy in EX/Coil fights.

On The Wall seems kind of situational because Reflect hasn't been implemented in this (yet?). It could only be used while fighting other Samurai.

Bushido's Potency is way too high. Lancer/Dragoon's highest is 330 and that in a combo and Rogue/Ninja's Sneak Attack only gets to 300 when used in Stealth and when they are in front of them. And your using it after a counter, which is already double the damage you received.

Unstoppable Force is too broken as is. If maybe there was a required of buffs needed to activate it, maybe, but then that's could be a lot of useful utility thrown down the drain.

My Recommendations
- Instead of Countering for double the damage you received, how about if counters had their own potency based on what skill you used? Maybe one skill has a lower potency but last for the whole 20 seconds, while another has a high potency but is one-time only.
- I also think the damage potency reduction would make tanks green with envy, I would suggest removing them.
- Replace Early-Bird with a regular DoT attack. You only have one other DoT and it's from a combo.
- Replace Abyss with a regular Stun skill, it would be far more controllable that way.
- Replace Timber with a regular Silence skill. Again, it would be way more controllable.

[Morningstar1337]

I already have an entire thread for my idea, so I'll spare you that... >w>

Here are my thoughts:
Question, when Nothing Ventured or Before Swine counters, does it still stay for 20 seconds and work continuously or is it used up and we have to wait for the cooldown? If it lasts the whole 20 seconds , it seems very Tank-ish, you're lowering the damage by half and redirecting it for double. It works like Perfect Dodge, it gets used up and we have to wait for the cooldown.

Early Bird would be useless in boss fights that are heavy in none-cleanse-able debuffs (specifically, debuffs that play an important part to the battle). Not every job has to have every skill be viable for bosses. BLM Aetherial manipulation and NIN's teleport move have limited use in battle.

Cornered Rat is very situational and I would hope your party's healer(s) wouldn't allow your party's HP to get that low during an important fight. This also seems like a Tanking skill, you're decreasing the damage done onto others, it's almost like a pseudo-Cover. >A>() See below.

Abyss is another situational move and it would mess up your tank's Stuns. Well i also made this mock-up with the tank role in mine as well as DPS. It could be use to take soem of the load of the tank by having another class be able to stun, In fact, NIN has something similar with Jugulate

Timber is a bit wasted because you don't have any Magic abilities to begin with. It's cuppose to be a me a move to stop magic damage, not augment it

For Haste Makes Waste, when you refer to "them" getting a Skill Speed boost, do you mean the user or the enemy? Because I don't think anyone would willing want their enemy to be faster. The enemy, and the point of SAM is to use counter so the faster the skills, the faster the counters

For It Takes One, I think x6 is a bit high. For example, if you are hit for 1000, which is then halved to 500, you would counter for 3000. This would be crazy in EX/Coil fights. Hence the high cooldown period

On The Wall seems kind of situational because Reflect hasn't been implemented in this (yet?). It could only be used while fighting other Samurai. It has been in the game since at least 2.3. Agrippa and Sycrus Tower's 2nd boss has that status.

Bushido's Potency is way too high. Lancer/Dragoon's highest is 330 and that in a combo and Rogue/Ninja's Sneak Attack only gets to 300 when used in Stealth and when they are in front of them. And your using it after a counter, which is already double the damage you received. Good point. Will consider tweaking that

Unstoppable Force is too broken as is. If maybe there was a required of buffs needed to activate it, maybe, but then that's could be a lot of useful utility thrown down the drain. Fair enough will add a proccing condition.

My Recommendations
- Instead of Countering for double the damage you received, how about if counters had their own potency based on what skill you used? Maybe one skill has a lower potency but last for the whole 20 seconds, while another has a high potency but is one-time only. I'll think about that
- I also think the damage potency reduction would make tanks green with envy, I would suggest removing them. Again this partally conceptualized with tanks in mind just in case SE decided to acualy make SAM a tank instead of a DPS like it has been implied so far, besides Healers have enought to deal with tanks as is (especialy considering Dark Knight)
- Replace Early-Bird with a regular DoT attack. You only have one other DoT and it's from a combo. I'll consider that
- Replace Abyss with a regular Stun skill, it would be far more controllable that way. Not sure about that, part of that take (with oen obious exception) is implimenting one half of a praise for a skill name and the other half for the status name Also a counter class needs to be difficult to play, as tank or as DPS
- Replace Timber with a regular Silence skill. Again, it would be way more controllable. See above

My responces are in bold. Also you could have linked to your SAM idea thread.

[Mimilu]

First, my link:
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...29#post2551729

And my responses:
- Abyss: The only problem with taking the load off of stunning for a tank is that monsters gain an immunity to stun if you use it too often. Additionally, as a DPS in a party, you should rarely get attacked, seeing as the main and off tanks should be grabbing enemies (unless you have only one tank, which is usually when you know the trash in the fight can be easily DPSed). Looking from a Tank perspective, Stuns need to happen at the right time, stunning the enemy when they are using an attack that is bad for the party. Having to wait for the enemy to use a Stun skill wouldn't at all be productive.
- Timber: What I mean is that you, as a melee DPS, have nothing to fear when silenced. This protection is being wasted on a class/job that doesn't need it. Also, from a tanking perspective, it's similar to stunning, you need to silence at the right time, when the enemy is using a magical attack. You need to be able to control it.
- Haste Makes Waste: But then that means your counters via Nothing Ventured and Before Swine will be wasted quicker and then you're left with a monster that can hit faster In a DPS perspective, this would be bad for everyone that is not a Samurai as they have no way to counter back.
- Counter Damage Reduction: As a Tank, this is fine but for DPS, it makes you too buff. Think if Dragoons had access to multiple versions of Rampart, then we wouldn't have the concept of a loldrg. Melee need the threat of damage to balance out their ability to out-DPS tanks. Additionally, Healers are fully aware of how much damage a Melee DPS can rake up. :B

[Exstal]

...I read the entire opening post as if Samurai was a tank. This DPS is godlike.

[Morningstar1337]

...I read the entire opening post as if Samurai was a tank. This DPS is godlike.

Yeah i decided to just make it a Tank class. mostly bcause I feel that I focus too much on the tank side then on the DPS side I'll see what I can do about nerfing the counters and such

And my responses:
- Abyss: The only problem with taking the load off of stunning for a tank is that monsters gain an immunity to stun if you use it too often. Additionally, as a DPS in a party, you should rarely get attacked, seeing as the main and off tanks should be grabbing enemies (unless you have only one tank, which is usually when you know the trash in the fight can be easily DPSed). Looking from a Tank perspective, Stuns need to happen at the right time, stunning the enemy when they are using an attack that is bad for the party. Having to wait for the enemy to use a Stun skill wouldn't at all be productive. I already made it so that it makes the next attack will be a stun, i'ts not a situational counter anymore
- Timber: What I mean is that you, as a melee DPS, have nothing to fear when silenced. This protection is being wasted on a class/job that doesn't need it. Also, from a tanking perspective, it's similar to stunning, you need to silence at the right time, when the enemy is using a magical attack. You need to be able to control it. I did the same thing as what i did to the above skill
- Haste Makes Waste: But then that means your counters via Nothing Ventured and Before Swine will be wasted quicker and then you're left with a monster that can hit faster In a DPS perspective, this would be bad for everyone that is not a Samurai as they have no way to counter back. You make a good point do you have any ideas for fixing it
- Counter Damage Reduction: As a Tank, this is fine but for DPS, it makes you too buff. Think if Dragoons had access to multiple versions of Rampart, then we wouldn't have the concept of a loldrg. Melee need the threat of damage to balance out their ability to out-DPS tanks. Additionally, Healers are fully aware of how much damage a Melee DPS can rake up. :B Well I made it 100% now.

Again, responces are in bold

[Shioban]

They're abolishing classes from new additions come 3.0 it would seem.

Dark Knight is the first classless job.

[Sylve]

Yeah i decided to just make it a Tank class. mostly bcause I feel that I focus too much on the tank side then on the DPS side I'll see what I can do about nerfing the counters and such



Again, responces are in bold

I feel like the Samurai theme just fits better as a Tank. Samurai were often employed as Bodyguards. And being generally honorable, would probably not have enjoyed constantly backstabbing their targets.
I've always felt that (real world, from reading their history etc) Samurai were always more about timing and parries/dodges rather than overwhelming strength of arms.

[Altijacek]

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...urai-abilities

I can't give too much feedback to yours because I'm at university right now, but initially it looks a bit overpowered, and I think it needs more combos. Maybe I just couldn't tell but it looks like there are not many options when it comes to fighting, like war for example.

[Shougun]

I feel like the Samurai theme just fits better as a Tank. Samurai were often employed as Bodyguards. And being generally honorable, would probably not have enjoyed constantly backstabbing their targets.
I've always felt that (real world, from reading their history etc) Samurai were always more about timing and parries/dodges rather than overwhelming strength of arms.

That last part is why I think Samurai should be DD/DPS lol, western knight with a shield could (shouldn't) stand ground fairly well - you would not stand ground if you were geared like a Samurai, and in FFXIV a tank that moves a lot is going to wreck directional players. Honorable is like chivalry, sort of not really there.. lol. Also (a number of)* Samurai were quite skilled with bows and a back would be an awesome target xD. *Too much romanticism with Samurai, truth is pretty far from media.