4.0 abilities

[Furiea]

tank... only play PLD
healer... only WHM
DPS... only SMN

all the other jobs requires too much effort for me =p

[Lemuria]

tank... only play PLD
healer... only WHM
DPS... only SMN

all the other jobs requires too much effort for me =p

Odd choice in Summoner, since that one arguably requires more effort than most other DPS jobs. You have to manage your pet, use Dreadwyrm reliably, keep your MP topped up (BLM has practically endless MP), maintain DoT's etc. Black Mage is basically bombarding mobs with the same two spells for the most part.

The big problem facing the developers is they've built themselves into a corner. Every job relies on using a certain set of skills in a pretty fixed rotation. That's why when they added skills in 3.0, they were mostly either related to previous skills, or they changed the rotation you would use.

Personally, I don't want to see either of those things. I want to see a merit point system where we can stick points into our EXISTING skills to improve them in some way. Letting White Mage regain their lost Stoneskin potency through these would be a good start, improving the HP recovered by Warrior could be another. There is a lot of scope for giving us more customization over our characters rather than playing the same damned way as everyone else.

There's no room for individuality in this game at the moment, so it's past time they made some room.

[seekified]

Odd choice in Summoner, since that one arguably requires more effort than most other DPS jobs. You have to manage your pet, use Dreadwyrm reliably, keep your MP topped up (BLM has practically endless MP), maintain DoT's etc.

No, you just have to use Tri-Disaster, Bane and put your pet on Sic and twiddle thumbs/throw a few Ruins. That'll make it look like you're trying enough for people not to notice.

Personally, I think some jobs have far to little to do (PLD being the main one). I enjoy DRG and SCH because there's always something to do, something to optimize. Having a few more skills wouldn't hurt, as long as they're implemented in a sensible way.

[Nalien]

Personally, I don't want to see either of those things. I want to see a merit point system where we can stick points into our EXISTING skills to improve them in some way.

I can see it now;

Ninja

Enhance All Fours!
Enhance Fleet of Foot!
Enhance Mug Effect!
Enhance Hide Effect!

Whatever they do for 4.0, I really hope they seriously adjust Ninja... It's not particularly broken, just a whole lot of odd choices... Kiss of the Wasp/Viper was seemingly designed with stance dancing in mind, then they completely failed to provide effects that would justify it... All Fours was always pointless, even before they removed fall damage from instances... Hide is incredibly meh after Lv50 and even before that it fails as a stealth skill, perfect invisibility is the god-mode cheat of stealth gameplay... Ninjutsu is fine, though I don't get why they halved the potential number of options... Why do I have two combinations for Huton when I could have Huton and Utsusemi?! Dream Within a Dream is just the mediocre icing on the proverbial cake... Yay, something not remotely interesting...

What I wouldn't give for them to rework the Hidden mechanic entirely... Tie it to enmity, make Shadewalker feel mechanically justified... Make me use it so I remain Hidden for longer, not because I'm bored and want to see if I can help a DPS pull hate and die... Suiton should just remove enmity to maintain Hidden, no idea why I can't Smoke Screen myself and no idea why Shukuchi, a skill in which I Smoke Screen myself and teleport away, doesn't reduce my enmity... Can Ninja feel stealthy please? In a manner that doesn't reduce my movement speed to that of a six day dead snail... I feel left out, Monk and Dragoon get nice glow effects from their mechanics, can't I have some misty effect for when I'm Hidden or something?

[Shurrikhan]

Whatever they do for 4.0, I really hope they seriously adjust Ninja... It's not particularly broken, just a whole lot of odd choices... Kiss of the Wasp/Viper was seemingly designed with stance dancing in mind, then they completely failed to provide effects that would justify it... All Fours was always pointless, even before they removed fall damage from instances... Hide is incredibly meh after Lv50 and even before that it fails as a stealth skill, perfect invisibility is the god-mode cheat of stealth gameplay... Ninjutsu is fine, though I don't get why they halved the potential number of options... Why do I have two combinations for Huton when I could have Huton and Utsusemi?! Dream Within a Dream is just the mediocre icing on the proverbial cake... Yay, something not remotely interesting...

What I wouldn't give for them to rework the Hidden mechanic entirely... Tie it to enmity, make Shadewalker feel mechanically justified... Make me use it so I remain Hidden for longer, not because I'm bored and want to see if I can help a DPS pull hate and die... Suiton should just remove enmity to maintain Hidden, no idea why I can't Smoke Screen myself and no idea why Shukuchi, a skill in which I Smoke Screen myself and teleport away, doesn't reduce my enmity... Can Ninja feel stealthy please? In a manner that doesn't reduce my movement speed to that of a six day dead snail... I feel left out, Monk and Dragoon get nice glow effects from their mechanics, can't I have some misty effect for when I'm Hidden or something?

My thoughts on reading the new Ninja ability names:
Smoke Screen: Ooh, a way to mass-LoS attacks to bring ranged enemies attacking multiple party members in close, OR a way to make myself and others enter Hide in combat with minimal movement loss.
Armor Crush: (Honestly had no idea what to make of it until I got it, at which point I'd just have called it Wind Spine instead, or swapped its name and animation with Dancing Blade...)
Shadewalker: Can place a shadow image on a target ally or enemy, allowing me to attack through it for increased melee range or enmity transfer, and likely for further synergy later?!
Duality: Doubles my attacks for a brief time or causes an active Shade to mimic my attacks, including additional effects, on its target or target of target.
Dream Within a Dream: Able to blink-strike to and instantly attack for 100 potency at a time any enemy within X yalms, or Y if affected by one of your (or your Shade's) DoTs, to a maximum of A strikes total or B strikes to a single particular target?...

I also feel like if NIN wasn't supposed to be a MP- and TP-self-restoring job/class, then there needed to be some sort of near-rotational component to Wasp and Viper. Hide really should have had at least normal movement speed (just losing the advantage of Fleet of Foot, basically), but rendered you more vulnerable to detection the faster you moved (using an alternate /walk animation for its sneaking about), and the more time you spend (especially if moving) within the enemy's field of sight. But even then there's just so much to be desired from any stealth aspect of this game that it's not likely to deliver on.

And don't even get me started on the enmity system...