History of the Gunner job.

[Dynza]

First off, just to get this out of the way, Yoshi-P's reference to 007: The Man with the Golden Gun, may be referencing Laguna Loire who, coincidentally has a golden machine gun. So there's a hint.

The gunner job has something of a short history. It's first official appearance in the mainline series came with FF7 with both Barret and Vincent. Barret's limit breaks had him charging up powerful single target blasts and even calling down lasers from satellites. With Vincent, his limit breaks had him transforming into various monsters and dolling out damage in these forms.

In FF8, the Irvine was the de-facto gunner, though he used a shotgun. Equipping various ammos in prep for his limit break allowed him to deal out damage to several targets at once. Though, all in all, his fighting style was fairly limited. Laguna, another gunner utilized a machine and the occasional grenade for his limit break, Desperado.

It wouldn't be until FF10-2 that we see the Gunner come into a full blown job with associated abilities, attacks and more. In this iteration Gunners had rapid fire attacks (Trigger Happy), guaranteed criticals (Burst shot), attacks that ignored enemy defenses (Cheap Shot), and attacks that could hit all enemies at once (Scatterburst) and attacks that had a similar effects to gravity spells like Demi (Quarter Pounder). The class did not have a whole lot of MP, or particularly high HP, but it was a fairly quick class that was pretty straight-forward and easy to work with. A typical starting class.

The Gun Mage in FF10-2 used the Blue Mage as a base to build a job that specialized in killing monsters and acquiring blue bullets (blue magic, in other words) to power up and dish out lots of damage. It had a unique set of abilities specifically designed to take out specific monster types, but the real draw was its blue magic. This - like the Alchemist in FF10-2 - weren't really gunners in the truest sense, but instead used the idea of classic job and built it around usage of a magical gun. Yet this particular class would set the stage for future gun jobs in various spin-offs and later mainline games.

In FF11, the Corsair is often remarked as the main gunner class, but guns had been in the game years before the Corsair - Rangers and Ninja were the primary classes that could use guns. Yet, the Corsair was really the first class the arrived on the scene using its unique Hexagun, a gun-like weapon with six barrels. Though the corsair was primarily a support class and was based off the Gambler job from early games in Final Fantasy, the Corsair's Hexagun could combine magical cards to fire off magically charged shots.

Guns make an appearance in FF12 with Balthier being the primary wielder. Yet, FF12 doesn't contain anything unique regarding the guns or their usage. Even within the Zodiac Braves system from FF12 international, the Job board didn't provide anything truly unique. Yet the job license board leaned the Machinist (a job that used both measures and guns) leaned the class heavily towards time magic.

Finally there's FF13 which had at least two characters wielding guns, Sazh and Lightning. In the case of Lightning, however, her gun combined with sword and could transform at will, so she doesn't really count. Sazh, then, is the only gunner on the team and his primary class at the start was a Ravager a magic-based attacker. Later Sazh would pick up the physical-based Commando, and the support-based Synergist. This combination of roles bears remarkable similarity to FF11's Red Mage or loosely resembles a bard. The middle of the road combination of physical and magic attacks combined with buffs such as Bravery, Faith and Haste made Sazh a rather interesting gunner.

In FF14, the gun class long hinted at was the Musketeer. This itself has its own history. Originally datamined from the alpha/beta web-page featuring a screenshot of Commodore Reyner wielding a gun and the term Musketeer appearing in various early documents prior to beta test, the Musketeer commanded an air of mystery like that of the Arcanist. Unlike the Arcanist, however, we never really learned what the Musketeer's role would be. But it has long been thought that the class would quickly appear given the lack of combat classes in Limsa Lominsa. Sadly, much like the Shepard, we never got to see the Musketeer in action. Our only glimpses come from NPCs like Merlwyb, and a smattering of bosses. Whatever the Musketeer's role would've been, we have don't have much to evidence to guess.

Why do I speak in past tense? Partially because the Musketeer has not been mentioned by name from Yoshi-P since 2011. There's only the mention of a gunner class or job in the works, but not the musketeer. There's still a good possibility that we'll see it come expansion time, but its best to maintain some restraint until we truly know.

Next time, I'll go over the gunners in the spin-offs and remakes. It's here where we get to see some more creative uses of the gunner class.

[Enkidoh]

As you noted in FFXIV it's always been called Musketeer, and was a class that had been meant to be included in version 1.0 as well (like ACN was), but was dummied out (although it's class symbol still appeared on the map).

I can only speculate the reason for MSK's long history of 'no shows' in FFXIV is simply that both development teams (firstly the original 1.0 team under Tanaka and Yoshi's team that took over) just couldn't make the class 'unique enough' from simply being a gun-using copy of ARC - both ARC and MSK are ranged Disciples of War, the only real difference is the choice of weapon, one uses bows and the other guns.

It should be noted this was back in 1.0 days when Jobs didn't exist, you could cross class any ability on any class usually with little penalty, and ARC actually had to equip consumable ammunition, which due to the predicted high cost of having to craft probably was another nail in MSK's coffin.

Of course with the change over to ARR, those issues probably are no longer relevant, so it will be interesting to see how MSK makes it's debut (and it will, even ignoring the thinly veiled references at the Fanfest - the Coral Tower still has the MSK class crest inside it in ARR.)

[Duelle]

I can only speculate the reason for MSK's long history of 'no shows' in FFXIV is simply that both development teams (firstly the original 1.0 team under Tanaka and Yoshi's team that took over) just couldn't make the class separate from ARC - both are ranged Disciples of War, the only real difference is the choice of weapon, one uses bows and the other guns.

I'm not sure why it's so difficult to separate one from the other. There's several gimmicks and mechanics that could be used. A unique resource would be one (troppers in SWTOR had an ammo resource). A different approach to ranged damage would be another (archers being mobile sustained damage, whereas musketeers would be a little more stationary due to their attacks having "cast times" to simulate them aiming at their target). The option of heavy artillery would also help differentiate the two (grenades and other things MSK would have access to that the tree-huggers wouldn't). It's not like there aren't options available without having to go off the deep end for stuff like gunmages and whatnot.

[Marxam]

You forgot the Machinist from FFT. Mustadio was a gun weilder who used the skill "Snipe" to stop actions, and movement. There's also the Agent class in FFT: A2 who mainly acted as a support and wielded a gun. Though his skills only affects the opposite sex and acted as a pseudo-healer.

[Enkidoh]

I'm not sure why it's so difficult to separate one from the other. There's several gimmicks and mechanics that could be used. A unique resource would be one (troppers in SWTOR had an ammo resource). A different approach to ranged damage would be another (archers being mobile sustained damage, whereas musketeers would be a little more stationary due to their attacks having "cast times" to simulate them aiming at their target). The option of heavy artillery would also help differentiate the two (grenades and other things MSK would have access to that the tree-huggers wouldn't). It's not like there aren't options available without having to go off the deep end for stuff like gunmages and whatnot.

True, but then, this is 1.0's development we're talking about.

Also, with MSK's continued snubbing I think it's been because SE have been reluctant to simply add more DD classes to the game, which MSK would just be yet another to that pile - it does make one curious as to why they added the wholly new ROG and NIN to the game though instead and continued to leave MSK orphaned on the kerb, but that's game designing for you.

[Altijacek]

I know you said you'd discuss spinoffs but...man you gotta mention guns in Final Fantasy Tactics...chemists and engineers and mediators

[Duelle]

Also, with MSK's continued snubbing I think it's been because SE have been reluctant to simply add more DD classes to the game, which MSK would just be yet another to that pile - it does make one curious as to why they added the wholly new ROG and NIN to the game though instead and continued to leave MSK orphaned on the kerb, but that's game designing for you.

This is kind of where principles come into play. The fact they've held off on Musketeer this long has painted them into a corner, but at the same time I do not want the concept and aesthetic to be throw under the bus for the sake of role parity. This is why I originally suggested MSK be implemented as DPS with a healer job sprouting from it to create that healer without sacrificing musketeer.

Assuming one has sided with the people angered by DRK being a tank, you could say SE has already crossed that line, but we'll know for sure come December 20th.

[Nahara]

True, but then, this is 1.0's development we're talking about.

Also, with MSK's continued snubbing I think it's been because SE have been reluctant to simply add more DD classes to the game, which MSK would just be yet another to that pile - it does make one curious as to why they added the wholly new ROG and NIN to the game though instead and continued to leave MSK orphaned on the kerb, but that's game designing for you.

My guess would be it was easier to figure out what to do for a dagger class (slashing damage melee DPS) than a gun class. As you said, there's really not a whole lot separating an ARC and a MSK conceptually aside from their choice of weapon. It'll be interesting to see how SE decided to make them different come 3.0.

[Noll]

I hope they do something like that

[Sylve]

My guess would be it was easier to figure out what to do for a dagger class (slashing damage melee DPS) than a gun class. As you said, there's really not a whole lot separating an ARC and a MSK conceptually aside from their choice of weapon. It'll be interesting to see how SE decided to make them different come 3.0.

There is a LOT they can do with stances and general shot animations though. At the end of the day, The only difference between ANY of our Jobs is their choice of weapon. But so far, they've managed to give a LOT of personality to our Jobs through that weapon. I'm willing to bet they go with a midrange Job with the Guns. We already have several examples ingame of NPCs who fight with a Gun in one hand a cutlass in the other hand.

Personally, I'd have a lot of fun with a class that spent its combat time dashing into and out of melee range.