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  1. #1
    Player
    Vendalwind's Avatar
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    Vendal Solairune
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    Cactuar
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    Ninja Lv 90
    Quote Originally Posted by PatronasCharm View Post
    If anything, build resource by completing Elemental Rotations:

    I made a few concepts, and I may rewrite my existing Mystic Knight and make it into a "Magical Melee DPS" with a big great hammer lol.
    Hammer would be wholly unique but I do think this game tends to stick with tried and true FF classes. so Mage hammer isn't really identifiable as one. In fact blunt weapons now that I think about it are probably the most underused in the final fantasy series.... Pretty much just viking and onion knight.

    Quote Originally Posted by PatronasCharm View Post

    So, I'd say have 4 rotations.

    Elemental Weakness Rotations build up Charges: Opener WS >> Flametongue >> Galestrike [1 Astral charge]

    Opener WS >> Lightning Strike >> Stoneshear >> [1 Umbral Charge]

    Player can change their rotation based on what charge it needs.

    Have x3 Charges of Umbral / Astral opens up to the "Dark" and "Holy" Element.

    x3 Astral = Excalibur (Holy)
    x3 Umbral = some dark type WS.

    If they have both 3/3 they can have a super rotation mode.

    Then we can sprinkle "Charge" based Astral / Umbral only Elements that could buff party members or hinder foe.

    We need a "Debuff" Job!

    On a side note, I enjoyed reading your concept a few pages back, good stuff =)
    I would love to see a more distinct debuff job, Devs do seem loathe to properly allow debuffs tho sadly. So the classes unique style would be management of multiple different resources that enhanced play? This actually makes me think of insect glaive from Monster Hunter series. They have to maintain "nectar" collection from three different parts of a monsters body to charge up, but can remain charged as long as they maintain the gathering of each nectar. Head boosts attack, Body boosts defense (flinching) and legs and arms boosted maneuverability. Put em all together and you are ina super strong state.

    We have many jobs that maintain some meter or buff, Greased Lightning as an example. But we dont really have any that have to maintain multiple status enhancing statuses at the same time. It would be cool to have a class designed with that in mind. Each part could enhance the kit, but downtime would force you to temporarily lose a certain part of the enhancements for a little while and you would have the freedom to choose which one for different circumstances. or make it so there are many things that could be maintained but only 3 could be up at any time.

    The class could start out with forced cast bars on all skills

    -Wind could grant swiftcast, making it extremely valuable for mechanics, but it doesn't actually add dmg, so dropping it briefly at times in favor of pure damage would be a gain.
    -Earth could grant the ability to ignore positionals (dont let the class use true north then)
    -Fire could add raw damage, but not so much that missed positionals or inability to swiftcast wouldn't be more damaging in certain moments.
    -Lightning could grant dots in the kit extra damage so you always want to have lightning up right before re-applying dots, but not otherwise
    -Water could offer a healing boon to self thus making it a less used recovery buff
    -Ice could enhance AOE damage.

    -Thus max damage would come with Fire Lightning and Ice up at the same time, but this would make weaving impossible and movement impossible thus the class has to sacrifice some of its boosts to operate at times.
    -Each could be accessed as a finisher to a 3 step melee combo, Enfire, enIce etc. or Icestrike etc.
    -So the class would have one 2 step melee combo each with cast times and positionals (back on the first one) then have the finisher attack in 6 variants also all have positionals for full dmg (not effect, effect should always be safe to activate)

    -each granting an ability that is maintained for about 9-10 GCDs.
    -Thus only three could be active at a time with some mild 4 overlap.
    -Then give it an alternate aoe combo that still finishes with the same Ice strike skills.
    Immediately Earth and Air become extremely important, because they allow oGCD weaving and enable positional movement. but not so necessary that during certain moments they couldn't drop air to do more dmg.

    This class would be highly difficult to perfect tho with this design, and would be EXTREMELY fight dependent. Every prog would see them using Earth Air Fire, but then for fights without positionals earth would drop entirely, and as fights became more memorized thunder or ice might occasionally replace fire, and with even further skill a player could at certain moments go full YOLO with fire ice and Lightning active.

    I realize this is definitely a different direction than your original design but it could be interesting. It would be fun to see some class synergy too such as granting wind refreshing a Caster's swiftcast or something, but that kinda utility is really hard to balance around unfortunately. This is kinda I guess my own random vision for a spell blade now. Man. It would be hard to perfect it. But man I like the idea of utilizing all 6 elements
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    Last edited by Vendalwind; 09-25-2019 at 09:55 PM.

  2. #2
    Player
    Archwizard's Avatar
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    Character
    Archwizard Drake
    World
    Sargatanas
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    Red Mage Lv 100
    Quote Originally Posted by PatronasCharm View Post
    x3 Astral = Excalibur (Holy)
    x3 Umbral = some dark type WS.
    On the one-hand, and at the risk of being accused of trying to make a Keyblader job again, "Ragnarok" has historically been used as the name of another holy sword opposite Excalibur throughout the FF series.
    On the other, "Galatine" in Arthurian legend is a blade described as "the shadow to Excalibur's light".

    However, I would also note that both Excalibur and Ragnarok have been used as weapon names for Zodiac weapons for the PLD and WAR, respectively.
    As an alternative though, you could consider other weaponskills available from the FF series -- for instance, Agrias and Thunder God in Orbonne Monastery provide us with "Judgement", "Cleansing Strike", "Dusk/Shadowblade", all as good options.

    Quote Originally Posted by Vendalwind View Post
    Hammer would be wholly unique but I do think this game tends to stick with tried and true FF classes. so Mage hammer isn't really identifiable as one. In fact blunt weapons now that I think about it are probably the most underused in the final fantasy series.... Pretty much just viking and onion knight.
    I suppose there's enough broadness with the Spellblade's naming conventions that you could go with a (Spell/Rune/Mystic) Knight and avoid having to discuss why it doesn't use some kind of sword.
    But then you would have to ignore half the historical skill names like "Liquid Steel" or "Thunder Blade" (as well as a few of the suffixes we've generated like "-stroke", "-shear", "-edge", etc) since they don't fit as well with a hammer, and probably just go with the generic "-strike" name for almost everything. Plus I think WAR has begun adopting hammers as alternative weapons, particularly now that Slashing/Blunt vulnerabilities are gone.

    That being said, even if swords are "overdone" by some standards, it is worth pointing out that A) there are multiple styles of swordplay the world over, enough that various weapons classified as "swords" can look and be used completely differently (such as, say, the Khopesh versus the Schiavona), and B) only about half of the jobs with swords actually focus on swordplay and technique, versus just awkwardly slashing around.

    Given the Middle Eastern-inspired appearance of the Spellblade in FF5, BD, and various side-entries, I would say the most appropriate weapon-type for them would be curved swords (which FF11 treated with enough distinction to make the purview purely of BLU), such as Scimitars, Falchions, Sabers, Shamshirs, Falx, Dao, Falcata, etc.

    The class could start out with forced cast bars on all skills

    -Wind could grant swiftcast, making it extremely valuable for mechanics, but it doesn't actually add dmg, so dropping it briefly at times in favor of pure damage would be a gain.
    -Earth could grant the ability to ignore positionals (dont let the class use true north then)
    -Fire could add raw damage, but not so much that missed positionals or inability to swiftcast wouldn't be more damaging in certain moments.
    -Lightning could grant dots in the kit extra damage so you always want to have lightning up right before re-applying dots, but not otherwise
    -Water could offer a healing boon to self thus making it a less used recovery buff
    -Ice could enhance AOE damage.
    Oh hey, same hat. 'Bout the only things different are that I swapped some of the effects around -- Fire to do DoTs, Lightning for AoE (chain damage), Ice for (resource) recovery and Water for raw damage (acting as an energy conductor).

    I've also been toying with the alternative idea that each one of them adds an "En-" effect that only lasts for a specified number of Weaponskills (2-3, prob), and that some oGCDs would cheat the system by inheriting the En-effect but not consuming charges by virtue of not being Weaponskills. Gives you a reason to cycle between certain ones and maybe even ignore standard "comboing" mechanics used by other melee (and even RDM) in favor of cobbling together a rotation based on what En-effects you need right now.

    First wave place DoT, second and third wave generate resources, fourth wave resource burst.

    I realize this is definitely a different direction than your original design but it could be interesting. It would be fun to see some class synergy too such as granting wind refreshing a Caster's swiftcast or something, but that kinda utility is really hard to balance around unfortunately. This is kinda I guess my own random vision for a spell blade now.
    But that's good though! Having multiple ideas on how to execute one theoretical job goes exactly towards the point, that such a job could be generated and be completely unique from any existing job.
    "Might step on the toes of X you say? Okay, I'll just pick any of a hundred alternative directions." It's complete insanity to block a potentially limitless number of directions just because one competing job might get one or two more vaguely similar weaponskills an expansion.

    Oh, and two more ideas:
    One, Strike skills could potentially do mixed physical and magical damage, with the latter's damage being scalar to the damage dealt by the former. This not only opens avenues for multihitting attacks and effects, but would allow the magic damage to increase with any Physical damage bonuses while also allowing the Spellblade to inherit some magic bonuses as well (albeit not so many as a dedicated caster). Plus, imagine being able to critical/direct hit twice in one swing, which gives some interesting potential for burst damage.
    Second -
    Quote Originally Posted by Archwizard View Post
    Gap closer:
    - Warp Strike: Throw an aetherial blade toward the enemy and teleport to it, dealing damage to the target; 30 sec CD
    --> Improved Warp Strike: Allows the accumulation of charges on Warp Strike, allowing it to be used twice in succession
    --> Link Strikes: Allows Warp Strike to be used on allied targets as well, restoring the target's HP and causing your next Warp Strike within 15 sec to critically hit
    Instead of having a Link Strike heal the target, it heals you, like when Noctis Warps away from a combat situation to recover. That way while you would normally be at a disadvantage with Bloodbath, the fact that you can use it like Aetherial Manipulation and still recover most of that damage could put your personal burst healing higher than most without having to sacrifice as much.

    Plus you could also add in variations on Runic for personal defense.
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    Last edited by Archwizard; 09-26-2019 at 08:58 AM.

  3. #3
    Player
    Vendalwind's Avatar
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    Vendal Solairune
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    Cactuar
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    Ninja Lv 90
    Quote Originally Posted by Archwizard View Post
    That being said, even if swords are "overdone" by some standards, it is worth pointing out that A) there are multiple styles of swordplay the world over, enough that various weapons classified as "swords" can look and be used completely differently (such as, say, the Khopesh versus the Schiavona), and B) only about half of the jobs with swords actually focus on swordplay and technique, versus just awkwardly slashing around.

    Given the Middle Eastern-inspired appearance of the Spellblade in FF5, BD, and various side-entries, I would say the most appropriate weapon-type for them would be curved swords (which FF11 treated with enough distinction to make the purview purely of BLU), such as Scimitars, Falchions, Sabers, Shamshirs, Falx, Dao, Falcata, etc.
    I'm on the same page with you there. I earlier mentioned that saying Nin's dual knives are the same as DRK's greatsword is basically like saying DRG's lance is the same as the bow and arrow.

    Even just dual swords would be fine. NIN back wields his knives (a rather ineffective style to be honest, but expertly flashy) True dual weilding is best done with a longsword and a shorter parrying dagger. The biggest historical example of a truly successful dual wielder is Musashi Miyamoto, who basically one man armied against up to 24 warriors once using two swords. (including opponents with bows) Accounts differ greatly, but a few things are fact, He knowingly came to the "duel" that was actually an ambush with murdering intent and he turned it around. I mean he came out of it half dead and was basically unconscious for a few days after according to some reports. But seriously impressive. At one point the guy literally stopped using real swords because he kept killing his opponents, and then he started killing them with wooden sword strikes too @_@.

    Anyways that's enough mild Historical musashi fan for the moment. Please note my above paragraph holds discrepancies that some scholars argue about.

    But of the swords we have each is extremely unique fighting style. Sword and Board PLD classic, Greatsword/claymore style. Katana Iai Style. RDM fencing is absolutely unique and restricts one from using slashes in favor of flourished stabs and ripostes. NIN dual knives is less practical in reality, but basically acrobatic.
    (0)

  4. #4
    Player
    Archwizard's Avatar
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    Archwizard Drake
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    Sargatanas
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    Red Mage Lv 100
    So, some milestones to note for our project, using other melee as examples:
    • Amusingly, every melee gains a mitigation or recovery skill by the time they reach level 15. (If you stretch it and say Life Surge is "recovery" for DRG anyway, who otherwise only has Elusive Jump at 35.)
      If nothing else I concept makes it this far, note that Runic and Critical Shell are common to Spellblade designs, so some kind of anti-magic barrier wouldn't go amiss this early. (Though NIN previously got flak for having an anti-magic barrier until ShB so, maybe just a general barrier with a bonus to magic?)
    • With MNK as the major exception, every melee appears to learn a ranged attack at level 15. (MNK instead gains stances to increase mitigation or personal movement speed.)
    • MNK and SAM learn their first AoE skills at level 26. NIN and DRG don't learn until 38/40, respectively. (While tanks need them early for threat purposes, it's an interesting contrast to casters -- SMN get their first at 10, RDM at 15, and BLM at 18.)
    • DRG, MNK and NIN all learn their first movement skills between level 35 and 40. (SAM is the odd man out here, not learning its gap closer until 54, which I expect is related to its state as an unlocked job and the below...)
    • SAM, interestingly, learns all of its weaponskills by the time it's unlocked at level 50, and only gains abilities from there-on (though I expect that's due to the iaijutsu "quick swings" style) -- consequently it only starts with 1 ability, a mitigation skill. NIN and MNK similarly only gain two weaponskills after level 50, though DRG cheats by being a late bloomer with regards to AoE.
    • MNK has its job gauge unlocked at level 6 and expanded at 15 and 70, SAM at 30/52, NIN at 45/62, while DRG doesn't unlock its until 54 or expand until 70.
    While I'm sure we all expect any future jobs to unlock around level 60-70, maybe even 80 by the time they get around to melee, this type of general progression is something to keep in mind for level synched content like dungeon roulettes -- don't want to be stuck without an AoE for MSQ, don't want to be accused of being OP by having one for Sastasha before other melee.

    Quote Originally Posted by Vendalwind View Post
    I'm on the same page with you there. I earlier mentioned that saying Nin's dual knives are the same as DRK's greatsword is basically like saying DRG's lance is the same as the bow and arrow.

    Even just dual swords would be fine. NIN back wields his knives (a rather ineffective style to be honest, but expertly flashy) True dual weilding is best done with a longsword and a shorter parrying dagger. The biggest historical example of a truly successful dual wielder is Musashi Miyamoto, who basically one man armied against up to 24 warriors once using two swords. (including opponents with bows) Accounts differ greatly, but a few things are fact, He knowingly came to the "duel" that was actually an ambush with murdering intent and he turned it around. I mean he came out of it half dead and was basically unconscious for a few days after according to some reports. But seriously impressive. At one point the guy literally stopped using real swords because he kept killing his opponents, and then he started killing them with wooden sword strikes too @_@.

    Anyways that's enough mild Historical musashi fan for the moment. Please note my above paragraph holds discrepancies that some scholars argue about.

    But of the swords we have each is extremely unique fighting style. Sword and Board PLD classic, Greatsword/claymore style. Katana Iai Style. RDM fencing is absolutely unique and restricts one from using slashes in favor of flourished stabs and ripostes. NIN dual knives is less practical in reality, but basically acrobatic.
    Personally I'm weary of giving Spellblade dual weapons, and not just because of NIN, but for more aesthetic reasons (which, to be fair, which weapon each job gets is largely aesthetic in the first place).
    1. Dual-wielding, and by extension NIN's access to twin weapons, is supposed to be symbolic of a role as a high attacks-per-minute melee job -- you push more buttons because you're swinging more rapidly, main-hand and off-hand. If we were to put our pet project here in the same position, we'd be talking about designing a job with high APM focused around abilities, which I feel is somewhat limiting from a design perspective in "how do we execute the sense of dual wielding without doing the same high APM thing as NIN" and invites much of the same issues NIN faces at present with its present balance, "we push more buttons and my fingers are cramping but we don't necessarily do much more damage."
      I rather think the Spellblade's forte should rather be in empowering individual strikes of a more... average tempo.
    2. Which brings me to the other point, unless we take Duelle's example where each sword gets a different enchantment at a time, there's very little practical reason to have two weapons in terms of animation, particularly in cases where one swing would do. I grant I've already suggested the possibility of having each individual swing inflict multiple hits at once, but that's supposed to highlight the enchantments themselves (which to address Wayfinder's point, would allow the elemental effect to inherit bonuses to physical damage by scaling off an initial physical swing) rather than multiple swings in succession.
    3. The longsword and parry dagger combo is tricky as well. Not only would the longsword mean having to work around PLD or, god forbid, RDM in terms of weapon design (which I admit isn't impossible for the devs to accomplish, given both BLM and WHM have very different staves for instance), but the mismatched weapons would be frustrating as well from a player perspective -- either they're joined together like RDM's rapier and focus (in which case you have to deal with the glamour pain of "this sword is nice but I hate the dagger" and vice versa -- which unlike RDM doesn't carry the practicality of the two being a linked weapon), or they're separated in which case you'll face similar practical gearing troubles as PLD (and I wouldn't doubt that there's a reason only PLD has that trouble).
      Besides, the parrying dagger is literally supposed to be a substitute for a shield -- hence parrying dagger. Swordbreaker daggers were even made to catch onto oncoming weapons. If we're not a tank there's not really a reason to have one.
    4. There appear to largely be two major cosmetic appearances for Spellblade armor throughout FF that stand out: The West European fencer/duelist appearance they've had since Tactics, and the Indian or Middle Eastern-inspired armor sets they've had since FF5. One of those is an aesthetic shared with another existing job, no points for guessing who. If we go with the longsword and parry dagger, it would either need to be tied to a completely new aesthetic that isn't shared with an existing job (good luck!), or explain why we're mixing cultural visual cues, which is a whole area I don't think anyone here wants to get into.
    5. And lastly, I can't think of a single example of a Spellblade, Mystic Knight, Rune Fencer, etc. that dual-wielded.
    I'd never say never to it, but unless we find the design demands two weapons, let's maybe start with just one?
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    Last edited by Archwizard; 09-26-2019 at 07:42 PM.

  5. #5
    Player
    PatronasCharm's Avatar
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    Patronas Charm
    World
    Leviathan
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    Red Mage Lv 96
    Quote Originally Posted by Archwizard View Post
    On the one-hand, and at the risk of being accused of trying to make a Keyblader job again, "Ragnarok" has historically been used as the name of another holy sword opposite Excalibur throughout the FF series.
    On the other, "Galatine" in Arthurian legend is a blade described as "the shadow to Excalibur's light".
    I like that, Ragnarok, in my older concept I'm reworking it; I had it as "Darksbane," but Ragnoarok just sounds powerful!

    Quote Originally Posted by Archwizard View Post
    I suppose there's enough broadness with the Spellblade's naming conventions that you could go with a (Spell/Rune/Mystic) Knight and avoid having to discuss why it doesn't use some kind of sword.
    But then you would have to ignore half the historical skill names like "Liquid Steel" or "Thunder Blade" (as well as a few of the suffixes we've generated like "-stroke", "-shear", "-edge", etc) since they don't fit as well with a hammer, and probably just go with the generic "-strike" name for almost everything. Plus I think WAR has begun adopting hammers as alternative weapons, particularly now that Slashing/Blunt vulnerabilities are gone.
    As far as WS naming conventions: I was sort of taking WS inspirations from FFXI's Club Weapon Skills: for more names to give it's Elemental WSes, because it doesn't just have to be called "Element" Strike / Shear / Boom boom pow, etc. You can call it let's say:

    "Judgement" Deals Lightning Damage to enemies within range with a potency of 350. Consumes Single Umbral Element.

    Liquid Steel could be their throwing ability, slings the big hammer at the target that trails a "Tsunami" towards target. Heck, make it a cone attack!

    Other things to,

    I'd rehash some of these abilities shown in the history of the job. Climhazard could potentially infuse party members attacks with Magic. It would be a "Damage Up" buff, but in the form of an "En-Spell"

    Climhazard: If Mystic Knight has 3 Charges of Umbral Element, Self and Party Member(s) within range are given a magical element to their attacks.

    Quote Originally Posted by Archwizard View Post
    Oh hey, same hat. 'Bout the only things different are that I swapped some of the effects around -- Fire to do DoTs, Lightning for AoE (chain damage), Ice for (resource) recovery and Water for raw damage (acting as an energy conductor).

    I've also been toying with the alternative idea that each one of them adds an "En-" effect that only lasts for a specified number of Weaponskills (2-3, prob), and that some oGCDs would cheat the system by inheriting the En-effect but not consuming charges by virtue of not being Weaponskills. Gives you a reason to cycle between certain ones and maybe even ignore standard "comboing" mechanics used by other melee (and even RDM) in favor of cobbling together a rotation based on what En-effects you need right now.

    First wave place DoT, second and third wave generate resources, fourth wave resource burst.
    This I really like, doesn't sound too complex, but sounds like a neat dance the player can do, and if done properly, they could potentially deal out some serious DPS.
    (0)
    Last edited by PatronasCharm; 09-26-2019 at 08:42 PM.

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