Reconvene the Magic Council Please - Spell names in 5.0 please fix. [Request]

[Ameela]

Blizzard is the complicated one. Blizzard III and IV would be renamed to Blizzard II and III, which remains consistent. Blizzard II is does not center around a target, but centers around yourself. As such I would suggest not renaming this Blizzara. Of course, if this is the only one with such an inconsistency, this is still overall an improvement.

Eh, I'm sure calling it Blizzara wouldn't make it THAT confusing, it's still an AoE version of Blizzard just like how Fira would be an AoE version of Fire.
Hell, if you want it to be consistent with things that are already in XIV, Amon in Syrcus Tower has an attack called Blizzaga Forte which operates just like a bigger version of Blizzard 2, so you could always go with that minus the "Forte".

[Imakun]

The whole black magic system is crap anyway, I really hope Black Mage gets reworked as much as Summoner. More freedom and variety with spells and less timed buffs bullshit.
This would also open up a more balanced and consistent magic list with things like a Blizzaga spell line with the ice element freed from being just a mana pill.

[Ultima]

You understand, at a glance, which spell is higher tier. Cure 3 certainly is stronger than Cure 2, given that there is more than one target. Medica 2 is more potency than Medica 1 for the same GCD. You could perhaps make a case for moving AoE spells away but I personally like the number system. It's more clear and I prefer the old school naming scheme.

I really dislike when they did it to Dragon Quest too. Like between Blaze, Blazemore and Blazemost and Frizz, Frizzle and Kafrizz and then later Kafrizzle, like what am I even seeing?

I understood at a glance which spell was higher tier when we had the Cure/Cura/Curaga system and I'd rather use that because that's what I grew up with and it caused an interesting shift in naming. The difference between 1/2/3 and Cure/Cura/Curaga is minimal because nobody reads their tooltips anyway and nobody wants to play the game properly to begin with.

Cure 3 is a meme skill that is only used in that scenario where you can get everyone clustered together, but on an individual cast it is weaker than Cure 2. You'd have an argument if Cure 3 healed more if it only had a single target, but someone will see "Cure 3" and think that it's better to use this over Cure 1 or Cure 2. They'd be wrong, but there's no reason to use Cure 1 in 99% of scenarios because you have the mana to spare for Cure 2. If Cure 2 is outright superior to Cure 1 and costs twice as much mana as Cure 1. Then you give them Cure 3 and, oh... this isn't superior to Cure 2 and it doesn't cost twice as much mana.

Medica 2 is not more potency IMMEDIATELY, Medica 2 is weaker but has a HoT that will heal for more total potency at the end.

I like that DQ magic system because it gives personality to the game.

By the way, the Cure/Cura/Curaga naming scheme exists in pretty much every other language's version of XIV, just not NA because they think we're stupid. The very lore that started this thread, I think in Japanese says they switched from numbers to the spell suffix system.

[Nestama]

Blizzard is the complicated one. Blizzard III and IV would be renamed to Blizzard II and III, which remains consistent. Blizzard II is does not center around a target, but centers around yourself. As such I would suggest not renaming this Blizzara. Of course, if this is the only one with such an inconsistency, this is still overall an improvement.

Which is why I figured going with FFXI's system just won't work (especially as AoE's on targets are -ga spells, while AoE's casts around the caster are called -ra). With the smaller spell list compared to FFXI, it just looks inconsistent and dumb (three Fire spells with numbers and a single fire spell called Fira). It's because of this why I suggested maybe renaming the AoE spells. Fire II - Scorch, Blizzard II - Frost and Thunder II/IV - Storm/Stormga. Going that route can easily allow SE to nix the numbers for BLM.

For WHM, they won't need to have their AoE spells renamed to something else... unless they get a fourth Aero in the next expansion and it's not an AoE.

By the way, the Cure/Cura/Curaga naming scheme exists in pretty much every other language's version of XIV, just not NA because they think we're stupid. The very lore that started this thread, I think in Japanese says they switched from numbers to the spell suffix system.

Not quite. French client uses words instead of suffixes. Examples: Soin, Extra Soin and Mega Soin.

[Vstarstruck]

You understand, at a glance, which spell is higher tier. Cure 3 certainly is stronger than Cure 2, given that there is more than one target. Medica 2 is more potency than Medica 1 for the same GCD. You could perhaps make a case for moving AoE spells away but I personally like the number system. It's more clear and I prefer the old school naming scheme.

I really dislike when they did it to Dragon Quest too. Like between Blaze, Blazemore and Blazemost and Frizz, Frizzle and Kafrizz and then later Kafrizzle, like what am I even seeing?

Cure III and cure II are not based on the same spell at all. Cure III is a TINY, rarely used aoe spell, while cure II is a stronger heal on one target, they should not be in the same naming line because cure III is NOT an upgrade to cure II, its a completely different spell.

I agree with changing the naming. It is not necessary per say but at the same time the current naming structure makes no sense. Also changing the name of cure III can prevent the few new people here and there that fall for that "noob trap" It does happen, do not deny it never does.

[Freyt]

We could rename Blizzard II into Frost. Freeze is a spell that already exists, that is a higher potency, but is ground targeted. They function similarly but different still. The name relation serves to imply that.

[Delmontyb]

No thanks. I've always hated that -aja -ara crap. Probably biased because old school Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest was my jam.

I really dislike the added suffixes to spells. I think the number system is simple and gets the point across. At a glance you know that Cure 2 is stronger than Cure 1.

What I'm saying is that there could be a curaga 2, and that the numbers system would still be there. But the name would also communicate if it's AOE or not AOE.

So Fire 1 = single target
Fire 2 single target

Firaga 1 = multiple target
Firaga 2 = multiple target

This way they can make stronger versions for the AOE spells as well.

[KisaiTenshi]

What I'm saying is that there could be a curaga 2, and that the numbers system would still be there. But the name would also communicate if it's AOE or not AOE.

So Fire 1 = single target
Fire 2 single target

Firaga 1 = multiple target
Firaga 2 = multiple target

This way they can make stronger versions for the AOE spells as well.

Compromise:
-a AOE (Caster centered)
-aga Targeted centered AOE

Numbers for power increase.
In Japanese 'ga' is the topic marker in a sentence. In English there is no equivalent.

In the console games, you'd use the shoulder button to turn a single target cast into an AOE, so there was never a "aoe" version unless the default for that spell was AOE (eg holy, meteor, ultima)

The name confusion is probably worse for BLM than WHM, with only Cure III being the nonsensical. In other FF games "Cure 3" would be the third or fourth tier healing spell that is single-target, but can be toggled to multi target. Thus it's intended effect is in fact correct, but it's expected effect is what Medica does.

With the Black magic casts, same idea, the shoulder button in the games after the NES versions would make them AOE. Otherwise Fire, Fira(Fire II), Firaga (Fire III), Firaja (Fire IV) would still be single target spells.

And to be fair, Fire 1 2 3 4 for BLM are all different, unlike Cure I II III, which the first two are the same, and the AOE versions are different.

Even without stomping on the classical FF naming scheme, the best option would be to rename all the AOE casts since those don't exist in previous games other than FFXI. XI uses -ga and -ra and -ja for the AOE targetable spells. The single target spells are just Fire I-VI. As far as I can tell (because I've never touched FFXI other than the benchmark) there is no range limit to those spells, or they all have the same range.

The XIV Range limits is what makes Cure III and Medica different. Because if I use Medica I need to be near the party for maximum effect, where as Cure III would normally be casted on the tank and may or may not get the melee party members. Tetra and Benediction for all intents are Cure IV and Cure V. As they behave the same as Cure but are relegated to being actions, since the game doesn't necessarily need a "cure" 4,5,6 when the game scales all magic by level.

[Talraen]

Nah, we should go TRUE classic, and take it back to when spells had four-letter limits!

LOK2, SLEP, RUB, XXXX, AFIR, FADE - kudos to folks who never played the original Final Fantasy, if you can figure out what these spells did! (Heck, I'll even give you kudos if you still remember after nearly thirty years...)

Let's turn the magic system into a cryptological nightmare!

LOK2 doesn't work due to a bug but is supposed to decrease enemy evasion, SLEP is sleep but all enemies wake up on the next turn due to a different bug, RUB is death (and doesn't work because death spells don't work in video games lol), XXXX is Power Word: Kill from D&D, so it always works provided the enemy has so few HP that you don't need to waste an 8th-level spell slot on them, AFIR protects the part from fire and does work, unless enemies cast it in which case it's bugged (sorry, WizVAMPs), and FADE is Holy. ... I may or may not have written multiple FF1 guides and host a website with those and others. (Also it's hilarious how buggy FF1 is on the NES. And every version actually, they still haven't fixed the crit rate bug... /sigh)

For anyone suggesting we use different names than the series has ever used, I strongly disagree. Final Fantasy games are very different from one another, parallels in spell naming and such is the throughline that makes it a coherent series. Similarly, for those who liked the numbered spells of the 8- and 16-bit games, keep in mind they always had suffixes in the original Japanese. And every numbered game in the series except 7 has at least one version with the correct spell names. (Well if you want to get technical, not 2 either, because 2 has a different system where spells each level up so "Fire 2" is actually a thing and Fira never is.)

[Niwashi]

I agree with the OP. The numbers are fine when they're meaningful, i.e. when they actually indicate a higher power of the same type of spell. But the name itself should indicate when we're dealing with a completely different type of spell. Using suffixes for types and numbers for potency makes both type and potency more clear.

(As an added bonus, it would satisfy both people nostalgic for the traditional FF suffix naming and those who find numbers clearer than suffixes, since it uses both where each works best.)

In Japanese 'ga' is the topic marker in a sentence. In English there is no equivalent.

minor FYI: While there is a particle "ga" in Japanese that marks the subject of a sentence, the "-ga" / "-aga" suffixes on spell names are not that particle. They're just a phonetic character either tacked onto the end of the word or replacing the last character of the word. For instance, Firaga is written ファイガ (phonetic FAIGA) in Japanese, not ファイアが (phonetic FAIA followed by subject particle ga).