For those that want skill bonuses on gear: How would you do it?

[SaitoHikari]

I often see the idea that this game's gearing progression is rather flat and boring, and one suggestion that gets thrown around a lot is the idea of putting skill/ability/spell bonuses on your gear. Very few people elaborate on this idea, however.

So, as the thread title states, how would you do it?

Myself, I think it'd be best done through new 'Ability/Skill (or Spell) Materia', partly because the developers would not have to create dozens of versions of the same piece of gear just for different bonuses, and players would have to choose between getting the ability bonus and using a stat materia instead.

Ability Materia can only be slotted into necklaces and earrings, limit of one per.
Skill/Spell Materia can only be slotted into the two rings, limit of one per.

That would mean players can only choose between two of each, a total of four bonuses per class. Some abilities/skills may also have multiple materia bonuses, but there will be a limit of one bonus per skill (as specified in the item descriptions of those materia). If players choose to ignore that, the game will prioritize the materia slotted into the Necklace or Ring Slot 1.

As for the actual abilities themselves, I'd imagine the main obstacle would be designing abilities that would help introduce different playing styles for classes, but they shouldn't veer directly into quality of life territory (otherwise they might as well be built into the class itself in a class balancing update).

Here's some ideas I've had:

WHM:
(Ability) Oblivion Materia - If Asylum is cast while in Cleric Stance, the healing field is instead reversed into a damage over time field at 50 potency. (Cannot be used with Revelation Materia.)
(Ability) Revelation Materia - Asylum gains the ability to restore MP to all party members inside at 30 refresh potency per tick. (Cannot be used with Oblivion Materia.)

BRD:
(Ability) Wanderer's Focus Materia - While in Wanderer's Minuet, using Mage's Ballad or Army's Paeon will no longer incur a damage penalty. (Cannot be used with other 'Wanderer' materia.)
(Ability) Wanderer's Voice Materia - While in Wanderer's Minuet, MP drain from using songs is reduced by 25%. (Cannot be used with other 'Wanderer' materia.)
- Note: I had originally thought to have Wanderer's Voice allow songs to be used with no cast time, but eventually decided that was something that should be built into the class itself.
(Skill) Storm Volley Materia - When Quick Nock hits an enemy afflicted with Windbite, there is a 25% chance that the next Wide Volley will gain the ability to apply Windbite to all enemies that are hit. (Cannot be used with other 'Volley' materia.)
(Skill) Hail Volley Materia - Upon using Quick Nock, there is a 50% chance that the following Wide Volley's potency is increased from 110 to 170. (Cannot be used with other 'Volley' materia.)

As for how to obtain the materia? I'd imagine there would be three main ways:
- Hunts: Namely exchanging either 10 Unstained Mark Logs/5 Behemoth Horns/5 Odin Mantles for skills/abilities learned at Lv. 50 and below, and 10 Clan Mark Logs/5 Coeurlregina Horns/5 Proto Ultima Plating for skills/abilities learned at 52-60. Materia obtained in this fashion would be untradeable.
- Completion of Major Boss FATEs: Defined as the 30-minute FATEs. Each would award a new currency, one per completion at maximum contribution, that upon collecting 10 of can be exchanged for any materia. Materia obtained in this fashion would be untradeable.
- Crafting: Of course there'd be a crafting component. Each Materia would require 5 Battlecraft Demimateria I, 3 Battlecraft Demimateria II, and 1 Battlecraft Demimateria III, along with 1 tier IV materia of the class' main stat (for example, Mind Materia IV for CNJ/WHM materia). Materia obtained in this fashion would be tradeable.

While it would be rather easy to obtain the materials for the Crafting portion, different class materia would be locked behind different specialists, which would justify them being tradeable.

- Carpenter: ARC/BRD, CNJ/WHM
- Blacksmithing: MRD/WAR, LNC/DRG, MCH
- Armorer: GLA/PLD, DRK
- Goldsmithing: THM/BLM, AST
- Leatherworking: ROG/NIN
- Weaver: PUG/MNK
- Alchemist: ACN/SMN/SCH

(Leatherworking and Weaver only get one class each because they're already known for having the most specialist exclusive crafts in the form of glamour already. Blacksmithing gets three because they get pretty much nothing at all these days, because endgame craftable weapons have not been a thing for a very long time.)

[Kaimishi]

Along with what you ask ;

I want :

- While in defiance, no damage penalty
- While in deliverance, permanent bloodbath.
- While holmgang, no damage taken for 6 seconds
- While bersek, no pacification.

[FoxyAreku]

Some of these would be overpowered I feel.

Really, I'd be fine with just little things like "Adlo potency up by 10". Anything for some variety.

[LeeraSorlan]

Do it the way 1.0 did it.

Rip gae bolgs jump dmg increase, ill never forget you

i do like the materia idea a little bit but, i would prefer they have gear that has uses even after new gear is released, while this would most definantly require changing how the entire gear system works, i think it would be much more beneficial, and while there wil lalways be a specific "set" that is better than the rest, it still helps to have more options. would you want to take this weapon, which has 2 more attack power but no bonus? or would you prefer to keep your sword that reduces cooldowns time by 10%. or use this ottther weapon which gives you 5 more seconds added to specific cooldown skills? or gives you minor lifesteal, or some such as this, while this games meta would most definantly take the higherdps option, its just the principle of having options rather than not

[Einheri]

I find find the idea of armor having any basic does more damage or costs less resource type of bonuses as boring as +2 str. I personally would rather have a system the makes the way you play fundamentally different and I would prefer it not to be tied to gear. And the benefits need to come with a cost.

choose this trait. Fire ball takes 20% longer to cast but does 30% more damage.
Or
choose this trait. Fire ball does 20% of its damage over time but can no longer deal critical damage.

my prefered way to unlock the traits would be feats of strengths and time. You gain x amount of points each day and x amount of points for completing a set a tasks. a mix of aoc and lotro AA.

In aoc you accumulated XP both for time passed and things killed and you could spend the points on changing the function of a particular skill. In lotro if you completed a task killing,exploring, using skills you could select a fixed amount of perks and skill changes to make your "build".

Or they could use the soul gem slot because it's basically a low end stat stick these days. Meh

[ADVSS]

something like TP regen +5% or something I could see, not so sure how much dev time it would take to make myriads of materias to alter abilities effects in different ways, not stomping the idea though i would love a dark arts reduction cost materia or darkside mp drain reduction or damage increase by several percentages, or something that alters foes requiem to deal physical vuln down or something

[Kaurie]

I'd love to see stuff similar to Diablo

(http://www.diablo3values.com/attributes)

I also like some of these, for example:
Cluster Arrow (Reduced Resource Cost)
Wall of Zombies (Reduced Cooldown Seconds)
Energy Twister (Increase Critical Hit Chance %)
Chance for Angelic Assistance
Gold Find
Movement Speed
Reduce Impairing Effects
Chance to summon a Demonic Slave
Chance to be shielded
Life per hit

[MagiusNecros]

Cooldown. Reduction.

[Lemuria]

Okay, let's assume for a second that we take your materia idea and twist it slightly. I propose a new slot on gear separate to materia. This would accept up to two types of rune (let's say red and blue for the sake of argument), which each have a different focus.

Red focuses on offensive or healing capabilities. For a white mage this could be enhance cure potency, for example. As a Dragoon, this could enhance their attacks.
Blue focuses on defensive or support capabilities. For a Scholar this could be enhanced damage reduction on Sacred Soil, as a Monk this could be a stronger evasion on Featherfoot.

The problem with using materia is that it's easily abused. With the ability to multi-meld gear, you run the risk of either making the materia too weak or the system too overpowered. If there is a fixed number that can be added to gear, and of a specific type, you avoid this issue entirely. They could even make the slots only available on the body piece, and make them considerable in strength.

[SaitoHikari]

Cooldown. Reduction.

The main thing that makes me go against the idea of suggesting cooldown reductions or resource cost reductions without an alternate materia effect to consider is that those go directly into the 'quality of life' category IMO, the kind of stuff that might as well be built into the class itself from the start. They're far more likely to be considered the sort of thing that would make raid groups go 'you must have X or else you can't join', which is something that would lead to what I'd call 'fake choices/variety'. Something that plagues many games.

The reason why the bard song suggestion would be an exception is that fundamentally, you'd be trading resource regeneration with no penalty for the ability to have 25% more uptime on Foe's instead.