SE, the concept of "Limited Jobs" is a really bad idea, turn back now

[SonKevin]

I'm tired of people bringing this up whenever they try to adapt a job into XIV's gameplay style. We'd never have gotten Summoner, Bard, Dark Knight or Red Mage if the dev team insisted on translating the job into a system that it wouldn't work with.

People want a playable blue mage. By playable, they mean a job that uses enemy skills and is usable in party content. Nobody wanted a special job that is a literal translation of the job at the cost of being segregated from the rest of the game.

So you want a job, the uses enemy skills, but the enemy skills aren't unique because they have to fit into a rotation like every other class? Why even bother at that point? It would just be a carbon copy of RDM except you'd change RDM's skills in one that looked like enemy skills. You might as well make something brand new.

[Skyskip]

So you want a job, the uses enemy skills, but the enemy skills aren't unique because they have to fit into a rotation like every other class? Why even bother at that point? It would just be a carbon copy of RDM except you'd change RDM's skills in one that looked like enemy skills. You might as well make something brand new.

By this logic, why have more than 1 of every role type? Why do we need more tanks, healers, or DPS? Why don't we all just play the same three jobs?

It's a stupid question and you know it.

[Zakon]

So you want a job, the uses enemy skills, but the enemy skills aren't unique because they have to fit into a rotation like every other class? Why even bother at that point? It would just be a carbon copy of RDM except you'd change RDM's skills in one that looked like enemy skills. You might as well make something brand new.

Bringing up RDM is just showing how they can make a fun and unique gameplay style out of a system that people thought would be unable to be adapted into the trinity, while also remaining true to the job's roots. It casts white and black magic, it double casts, it has a melee combo, it has heals in the form of powerful battle resses and the best heal any job has access to outside of literal healer jobs.

How can you look at Red Mage and think their only option would be to copy something that already exists? Why would Blue Mage suddenly use the exact Red Mage gameplay style?

[SonKevin]

Why would Blue Mage suddenly use the exact Red Mage gameplay style?

Why don't you explain to me how it would be different? How could they adapt BLU to be different from RDM?

[Nariel]

Why don't you explain to me how it would be different? How could they adapt BLU to be different from RDM?

First of all, while being blue magic they are monster move, with a lot of variation.

They can use the elemental weakness as a mecanic, you use a fire element spell to grow up a debuff on the monster and consume it with a wind spell for additonal damage per exemple, force to rotate between different duality whith cooldown on the "stack consumer".

They can use the physical or magic monster skill changing wich spell to choose and what rotation to use for any monster who use mainly magic or physical or even use the template of weakness they actualy choose for the masks carnival to force the mage to use a definite set of spell that exploit their weakness to be efficient with a base toolkit of jack of all trade skill.

[SonKevin]

First of all, while being blue magic they are monster move, with a lot of variation.

They can use the elemental weakness as a mecanic, you use a fire element spell to grow up a debuff on the monster and consume it with a wind spell for additonal damage per exemple, force to rotate between different duality whith cooldown on the "stack consumer".

They can use the physical or magic monster skill changing wich spell to choose and what rotation to use for any monster who use mainly magic or physical or even use the template of weakness they actualy choose for the masks carnival to force the mage to use a definite set of spell that exploit their weakness to be efficient with a base toolkit of jack of all trade skill.

So you're actually suggesting that they make it so that damage is calculated different from every other class in all content? The change of damage calculation works in the Carnival because it's a separate content system. You're suggesting they bring that to the entire game AND apply it only to BLU. So every other class is going to be damaging the mob in one way while BLU handles it a different way? I can't even imagine that SE can do that with this mess of a game.

[jon041065]

First of all, while being blue magic they are monster move, with a lot of variation.

They can use the elemental weakness as a mecanic, you use a fire element spell to grow up a debuff on the monster and consume it with a wind spell for additonal damage per exemple, force to rotate between different duality whith cooldown on the "stack consumer"..

Man, I love that idea. Made me think of what I hoped samurai use a system sorta like skillchains on XI. That instead of combos, there would be the same initial starter, then like three mid combo moves, and then two finishers. The middle combo moves would be like the royal road effects and either boost, spread, or lengthen the effect of the skillchain. The finishers then would be the typical large finish or smaller finish with a DoT. The "lengthen" effect for the large finisher could be some debuff that you could consume like your fire -> wind idea. So you have to make choices in combat to do things like "I should combo a spread DoT" or "I need to consume my stacks on the target".

I like the idea of two job crystals for blue mage. "Carnival Mage" can be the announced iteration (FFV blu) with the limits and the supposedly crazy solo capabilities. "Blue Mage" then can be the XIV version, hell it wouldn't even have to be a ranged caster, with a proper rotation or gameplay gimmick that makes it different than what we have now and be used in the full game. The dev team has done overall very good with their own versions of the classic FF jobs with a few misses but those have also become better with time after listening to feedback.

For a full version of blu, they could do something similar from another. If anyone has played Legend of Legia 2, do you remember the girl with the elemental magic? If you just spammed the elements they barely did any damage but there were many many combos depending on which elements and which order they were performed in. That's something they could do here for blu gameplay/rotation. Just give each offensive blu spell an elemental affinity and make combos like I described from that other game as the base rotational stuff and then the ogcds would be spells like bad breath or aqualung. The mechanic could be like a very expanded mudra system where you trigger your built up elemental combo or be the actual job gauge to track and then the elemental explosion happens as you finish the "spell combo".


To anyone at SE that is reading these forums and is in charge of gathering our feedback. PLEASE don't go forward with the limited job system unless you do a limited and full version of these jobs or the limited job is onion knight/freelancer. When I heard "it's too hard" as an excuse to not balance the blue spells, I really heard that we have seen the best that Yoshi and the dev team can do already and that I shouldn't expect the game to get better going forward. That more of the same is the best I could hope for. That's a terrible message to be sending to your playerbase and I'm not the only one that heard it that way. I do have faith in Yoshi and team that they can do a lot better than what the live letter made it sound. I will be quitting WoW for the first time due to the game itself and not a guild issue and it got this bad because of lazy and "it's too hard" reasonings for decisions that have made the game worse and worse since 2012. The current expac is awful and I don't want to see 14 start go follow a similar path. There is nothing wrong with solo and other forms of content that are not endgame but they shouldn't come at the expense of limiting jobs. They are the tools that we use to interact with your game. If you tell us that you are working on things and they need more time then most of us will be fine to give you that time. Just no more cutting corners please.

[Powercow]

So you want a job, the uses enemy skills, but the enemy skills aren't unique because they have to fit into a rotation like every other class?

The skills can still be unique, and it is possible for them to figure out some way of allowing you to use abilities in different orders. For example, imagine BLU, with its ability to learn tons of skills but only bring a limited number, actually changing what skills they bring based on the fight and party composition. Have a movement-heavy boss and a physical-heavy group? Bring skills A, B, and C. Movement but have a mage buddy? A, B, D. Boss with an add phase and physical? A, E, C. Adds with a mage? A, E, D. Boss you have to stand way back from, physical? A, L, C... you get the idea. Would it be tough to balance? Probably. Would it be cool to have a job that actually has variety in how it prepares for a fight and deals with fights? Absolutely!

Why even bother at that point? It would just be a carbon copy of RDM except you'd change RDM's skills in one that looked like enemy skills.

I mean, isn't Ninja just Monk with reskinned skills? They both hit bosses in melee, use a buff. Heck so is Samurai. And Summoner is clearly just Black Mage but reskinned -- you cast SPELLS! C'mon SE, don't be lazy, why did you guys make AST exactly like White Mage but with card-like animations instead of magic?!

You might as well make something brand new.

Like Summoner! Oh man that could never work, imagine a job that summons primals... I mean, Odin's Zantetsuken would insta-kill any boss, and it's not like they couldn't implement Summoner without one of the most iconic summons in FF history!