Monk needs to be nerfed hard. Change my mind.

[Shurrikhan]

This was the reason I made the comment in the other thread that the role system has to evolve.

We're slowly losing differentiating mechanical boons and boiling down to only damage, and while that's sort of always been the mentality (that has likely lead to this development), I think the train needs to turn around.

We need more pronounced and celebrated differences, but we can have them in a role system designed for it. I think we can borrow Paradigms from FF13 for this and use them to great effect.

Commando - A role that focuses on creating advantages for SKill Chains / Spell Burst (Effectively Team combos)

Ravager - A role that exploits openings and buffs provided by others. (Pretty obvious who goes here)

Saboteur - A role that debilitates enemies and opens up exploit windows.

Synergist - A role that boosts the party.

By expanding from 3 roles to 4, we create more incentive to bring one of each. By celebrating role specific synergy, we create more incentives to bring one of each, but not necessarily punish having more than one.

If we go by XIII's naming, weren't Commando and Ravager reversed? Ravager more quickly built stagger, while Commando had more damage per stat point and therefore better exploited Stagger (while also maintaining whatever Stagger had been pushed thus far, though that was only important outside of chained attacks via Overwhelm). I say this only because if you look at the original XIV classes, they actually dipped noticeably into these roles, easy enough to point out what was what even while no job was ever limited to just one at a time.

Lancer, for instance, was your speed-tank because it could generate openers for building up attacks, its sabotage kept enemy damage manageable (by pushing back the timers until mobs could use specials) and kept the party alive when rotating aggro via raid-wide Lifesteal buffs against the target, and it had self-buffs to capitalize on damage (which shared recast timers with the raid buff), etc., etc. Heck, Pugilist was a unique little odd-ball, roughly a Ravager/Commando, but with tricks like Taunt to exploit its versatility and aid Gladiator/Marauder interplay (whereby Gladiator could most easily shirk enmity and had the most reward from tag-teaming in or out of MTing, but was slower to generate enmity). Until the 1.2 changes, quite a few parts of their gameplay felt like interlocking puzzle pieces, but that wasn't because they were each one role; quite the opposite -- it was because of the peculiarities of how they performed each part, and what and how deeply they went into each role.

Here, ideally, I see Monk as having the most play in (XIII-style) Ravager, especially under Fists of Wind, but very decent Commando play available to it, and with some Synergist output via shared resources (think "Light/Dark Chakra" skills) with a hint or Saboteur then further sharing resources with those.

But even then, I don't think these roles need or even should be followed exactly for every job: BLM could be roughly considered a (XIII) Commando, who creates openings by which to allow for damage-chaining and capitalizes upon chained damage, but would technically have very little of that original opening bit and its damage would be less affected by damage-chaining than most Commandos. On the other hand, I'd like for BLM to be capable of a bit of mob-manipulation, as a sort of self-contained Saboteur, through its Ice, Fire, and Lightning effects. So what is it really? You mostly take it in the same context as you'd take a DRG or a SAM, but it'd come with a lot less frontline presence but more backline support, which can at other times make it fill the space of a ranged Saboteur, just trading out some more precise or sustained control to be able to outright kill some mobs more quickly.

Heck, how do we consider NIN? Is Trick Attack Commando (XIII Ravager) or Saboteur?

While the roles are decent metrics by which to line up individual skills or capacities, I don't think they need to, or even ought to, describe jobs as a whole particularly well. DRG should be DRG, not just "a Ravager" (XIII Commando). BLM should be BLM. SMN should be SMN. The problem is already that these things are too same-y. Why replace one form of same-y with another, and one that more requires threshing their abilities (not to streamline them, but --nonetheless-- to fit them to fine typal requirements)?

:: I realize this is all irrelevant for now. XIV has no room for dramatic change until our fights are more than "drain the HP counter from this variably sized cylinder until it's HP reaches zero while you stand where you need to stand and face where you must face without being distracted from draining its HP". Of course, neither will there ever seem any need to make fights more diverse than what we have until there's kits that could make use of such fights... So proceeds the endless cycle of streamlining.

[Kabooa]

If we go by XIII's naming, weren't Commando and Ravager reversed?

It's been.

Ohgodit'sbeen10years.

So my memory might be a little off - I recall Commandos being how you kept stagger from falling and Ravagers how you pushed it, but I also wasn't a master of the system.

That said, naming convention aside (Commando doesn't really fit FF14, Ravager less likely too), we aim for four distinct roles to which divide our playstyles (Jobs). In this manner, one job of each of our current roles could fit into one of these new roles.

In an ideal world, each Job could shift its paradigm and gain different traits to fit their party (A "Nuker" Black Mage has Xenoglossy, a "Commando" Black Mage has a polyglot spender to enhance a following Skill Chain / Spellburst), but in our slightly more grounded fantasy, it'd much easier to just slide each job into one and design it accordingly.

That said, we can also just shove Machinist, Samurai, and Black Mage into their own category for FF14's system ("Cannons") and make the fullsuite attribute bonus stronger.
(Instead of 1% per, it's 1% per and +4% for a full house. Easy street)

[Shurrikhan]

It's been.

Ohgodit'sbeen10years.

So my memory might be a little off - I recall Commandos being how you kept stagger from falling and Ravagers how you pushed it, but I also wasn't a master of the system.

That said, naming convention aside (Commando doesn't really fit FF14, Ravager less likely too), we aim for four distinct roles to which divide our playstyles (Jobs). In this manner, one job of each of our current roles could fit into one of these new roles.

In an ideal world, each Job could shift its paradigm and gain different traits to fit their party (A "Nuker" Black Mage has Xenoglossy, a "Commando" Black Mage has a polyglot spender to enhance a following Skill Chain / Spellburst), but in our slightly more grounded fantasy, it'd much easier to just slide each job into one and design it accordingly.

That said, we can also just shove Machinist, Samurai, and Black Mage into their own category for FF14's system ("Cannons") and make the fullsuite attribute bonus stronger.
(Instead of 1% per, it's 1% per and +4% for a full house. Easy street)

Again, I just don't feel like there's a need. I'd much rather how Monk fills the Commando position (does what a party fluidly but fundamentally needs which is not what can more easily be considered Ravager, Saboteur, or Synergist) distinct from Samurai not just because they're different takes on Commando, but because they're different beasts altogether. The 'roles' should be terms of convenience, nothing more, to which some jobs are obviously better fits than others over a larger span of situations or intensities. Some may play a better point-guard than others, but no matter who's doing it, it's still just a task or position, not the limit of their capacities.