Pipe Dreams: Thief

[Duelle]

For Upper Hand, the hard part is finding a sweet spot between getting a decent number of procs, and having them tied to something balanced. If you tie too much proc rate to a single "waste" ability then this ability might become overpowered, or if it isn't (or you cannot spam it) you can lose resources, well damage in that case. Maybe start with a 25% proc chance from your accomplice that doesn't go up with time, but increase it later to a 50% proc chance. This way, upper hand procs stays "meaningful" (you enjoy having a proc and do not want to waste it immediately because you'll overcap soon) and you don't have to tie 2 billions abilities to Upper Hand. I think the amount you have is fair, but you had too much proc chances in order to be both meaningful and leaving a bit of choice to the player. But that's just my opinion

I think we have a misunderstanding here. Accomplice's procs increase your Stealth level, not generate Upper Hand charges. The idea is that your accomplice is keeping the target busy, making it easier for the target to lose track of you. Stealth level isn't about being invisible so much as the enemy not being able to track you in the chaos of battle.

Upper Hand charges are only generated from your attacks (at lv80 its 10% chance for all weaponskills, 15% chance if executed from the rear of the target), Runaround, Underhanded Tactics, and Sneak Attack (provided you use it while under the effect of Minor, Major or Complete Obfuscation). You do bring up some good points on the frequency of Upper Hand proccing at a reasonable rate, so I'll look into raising the proc rate or doing something like allowing auto-attacks to also proc charges of Upper Hand.

As for the DET increase, why not use a more generalized damage increase ? The issue is that every stat curve gets changed when you level up and when there's an expac released. So that would be a nightmare to balance, as the spell would need a change at every expansion at least in order to stay somewhat relevant at every level which is something really important. I would suggest going for the more straightforward route of "increase your damage dealt by 2%" maybe more, maybe less, depending on what you want. Most damage class do not stack DET that much too, so depending on the BiS this buff can be both amazing or completely useless.

True. I guess I could just allow suspension of disbelief to come into play. I was concerned that if I did something like "Steal Attack Power", someone would be bound to ask why the mob doesn't have a penalty to damage dealt for the duration to show the THF stole that target's attack power to boost themselves.

Once again, thank you for the feedback.

[Eliadil]

I think we have a misunderstanding here. Accomplice's procs increase your Stealth level, not generate Upper Hand charges. The idea is that your accomplice is keeping the target busy, making it easier for the target to lose track of you. Stealth level isn't about being invisible so much as the enemy not being able to track you in the chaos of battle.

Upper Hand charges are only generated from your attacks (at lv80 its 10% chance for all weaponskills, 15% chance if executed from the rear of the target), Runaround, Underhanded Tactics, and Sneak Attack (provided you use it while under the effect of Minor, Major or Complete Obfuscation). You do bring up some good points on the frequency of Upper Hand proccing at a reasonable rate, so I'll look into raising the proc rate or doing something like allowing auto-attacks to also proc charges of Upper Hand.

you're right, I got confused between two tooltips, my bad ! Well in that case tbh I don't see much else to say, I'm sorry for all the confusion ;D

[Shurrikhan]

I think we have a misunderstanding here. Accomplice's procs increase your Stealth level, not generate Upper Hand charges. The idea is that your accomplice is keeping the target busy, making it easier for the target to lose track of you. Stealth level isn't about being invisible so much as the enemy not being able to track you in the chaos of battle.

Upper Hand charges are only generated from your attacks (at lv80 its 10% chance for all weaponskills, 15% chance if executed from the rear of the target), Runaround, Underhanded Tactics, and Sneak Attack (provided you use it while under the effect of Minor, Major or Complete Obfuscation). You do bring up some good points on the frequency of Upper Hand proccing at a reasonable rate, so I'll look into raising the proc rate or doing something like allowing auto-attacks to also proc charges of Upper Hand.
True. I guess I could just allow suspension of disbelief to come into play. I was concerned that if I did something like "Steal Attack Power", someone would be bound to ask why the mob doesn't have a penalty to damage dealt for the duration to show the THF stole that target's attack power to boost themselves.

Once again, thank you for the feedback.

I'd probably be that someone.

Though, as long as the theft were, say, item-based -- where the numerous flavor texts and icons for an effect each show an easily understood symbol in common (for Attack Power Up, etc) -- no one would likely question how you managed to literally steal an enemy's muscle mass or why that theft didn't cost the enemy anything at present. Only problem would then be the old "But, but, items are for Chemist alone!" (since Machinist has certainly never used, say, a grenade)...

[Duelle]

I'd probably be that someone.

Though, as long as the theft were, say, item-based -- where the numerous flavor texts and icons for an effect each show an easily understood symbol in common (for Attack Power Up, etc) -- no one would likely question how you managed to literally steal an enemy's muscle mass or why that theft didn't cost the enemy anything at present. Only problem would then be the old "But, but, items are for Chemist alone!" (since Machinist has certainly never used, say, a grenade)...

THF being able to steal the intangible is something I wanted to put on display with Steal's design. X-2's THF had something along those lines (Pilfer HP, Pilfer MP, Steal Will), as did Tactics' THF (Steal Exp, Steal Heart). One of XI's Ambuscade fights is also against a THF Qiqirn that does things like Steal HP, Steal MP, Steal Ability (he'll put a random ability on cooldown; imagine how that would mess up a tank here to discover a THF mob just put Hallowed Ground or another mitigation ability on cooldown without having to even use it) and so on.

That all said, if it comes down to it, I could change the rear effect to Steal Power Drink/Hero's Drink, giving the THF 15 seconds to consume it and boost their attack power by 7%. On the upside this would give THF a little leeway in when they get the attack boost, and I'm sure someone would find it easier to align with other group cooldowns.

...Well, there is another option. Make Steal item-based, and introduce a skill much later (with the current write-up, it'd probably be the lv90 skill) called Larceny that applies a stat debuff on the target while increasing the THF's own stats. Like Steal, make its effects vary depending on where they're standing relative to the mob.

[MyakotApelsia]

I didnt have much time to read and analyse whole writeup yet, but i have question regarding Steal, since i didnt see anything about it. It gives you different effect upon using it from different sides of the enemy.
How such skill will act in position-less instances and situations, such as PoTD, HoH, Eureka and, since if its a melee dps (if i didnt misunderstand anything) - True North.
Will the skill give you all effects at once? Will it give you only one effect? Which one then?

[Duelle]

I didnt have much time to read and analyse whole writeup yet, but i have question regarding Steal, since i didnt see anything about it. It gives you different effect upon using it from different sides of the enemy.
How such skill will act in position-less instances and situations, such as PoTD, HoH, Eureka and, since if its a melee dps (if i didnt misunderstand anything) - True North.
Will the skill give you all effects at once? Will it give you only one effect? Which one then?

True North makes Steal default to the rear effect. I was considering all effects at once, but that would lead to THF always using Steal with True North.

This can be extended to other systems, though I guess Steal being a DPS buff in PotD/HoH and Eureka would stick out like a sore thumb.

[MyakotApelsia]

Some notes, purely my opinion, but thats what comes to my mind at least right now. If i misunderstood something about design then please explain it, since ideas are awesome:

Energy Steal - should probably change it to something like "Reduces weaponskill recast time and auto-attack delay by 6%" unless direct stat influencing is by design

Steal - I dont really either see the reason for it to have several positional skills. You mostly will sit behind the enemy for stealing, since potion and grenade are pretty much useless. Why would you use a heal instead of 7% if healers are not dead. Not even 500 potency, like second wind. I dont see the reason to use Grenade either, 200 potency is nothing compared to 7% damage up you get from stealing from behind (on single target that is, which currently is 90% of high end content). And since you will run around the boss for mechanics a lot, you will just either need to find a moment to use steal from behind to actually benefit from steal, or just use true north and dont bother.
Probably something like GW2 steal would work better in this scenario. You steal, get random effect. Although to make potion and grenade more viable, they would need to have some damage bonus as well (like potion 400 pot heal and 4% damage up, grenade 200 potency and 3% damage up).

Flash Powder doesnt need stun. Singletarget stun that is. Aoe stun would be one thing, but here i feel like giving blind effect to the enemy would make more sense (at least if blind still affects enemies [or bosses lul]).

Aoe combo is being cone -> circle is a bit weird but i guess it works. Although Soul Swipes on 64 is a bit too high for second aoe skill (yeah dragoons get it 61-70 range too, but they dont get any mechanic that pushes blood of the dragon beyond jumping and more st combo skills until later on). Ninja gets its second aoe hit at 52, which does exactly the same thing as soul swipes. Better if it goes down to 50-60 range too.

Escape Plan - interesting idea, but for it to be usable you will need to do pretty much 2 mudras before excecuting, bit too much for a disengage. If its just used when you need to disengage for boss, idk if using 2 abilities -> disengage gonna be easier then just running away. Both abilities are melee ranged as well, so to be able to use disengage successfully, you will need to know beforehand that such situation will occur. Also if its used as emergency, player will most likely just clip gcd to use it, instead of using gcd and running away normally.

Underheaded Tactics should be locked to battle, like everything else in the game (anatman, meditate, aetherflow). Otherwise parse runs will most likely just start with sitting 2 minutes waiting for it to go off cd

I would unify Stealth effect names into one. Some skills give you "Obfuscation", some give "X stacks of stealth". Not like its a huge problem, but it does cause issues when trying to understand what skill does (at least for me)

[Bright-Flower]

I think it's not likely because, well, the core of the 'thief' job in contrast to say Ninja etc, is the signature steal ability. Getting extra items. We have mug but that's really the furthest you can go with that idea in FFXIV because the nature of the game is you're not really going to get anything super useful out of it. You're not going to get good weapons early or rare accessories etc like you might from stealing from a boss in a single player game for example.

The rogue class is the closest we're ever likely to get to 'thief.'

[MyakotApelsia]

I think it's not likely because, well, the core of the 'thief' job in contrast to say Ninja etc, is the signature steal ability. Getting extra items. We have mug but that's really the furthest you can go with that idea in FFXIV because the nature of the game is you're not really going to get anything super useful out of it. You're not going to get good weapons early or rare accessories etc like you might from stealing from a boss in a single player game for example.

The rogue class is the closest we're ever likely to get to 'thief.'

Have you even checked what "steal" does? You either steal Potion, Grenade or get damage up. Those are not ingame items and they shouldnt be such. In fact, if it was, it would be stupid.
Devs have already proven that you dont need to follow "muh lore" to make a job. "The rogue class is the closest we will get to thief" just because you think that steal gives you real items is just cringe tbh

[Bright-Flower]

Have you even checked what "steal" does? You either steal Potion, Grenade or get damage up. Those are not ingame items and they shouldnt be such. In fact, if it was, it would be stupid.
Devs have already proven that you dont need to follow "muh lore" to make a job. "The rogue class is the closest we will get to thief" just because you think that steal gives you real items is just cringe tbh

The cringe here is that you didn't realize I was talking about the classic thief job in the FF series when I said steal was all about getting extra items and that I don't think the classic Thief's identety based around stealing translates well. I was talking about the classic steal not the fan version in the OP.

To address that specifically, while it's a novel attempt to try and fit steal into FFXIV's combat system would it not be rather goofy to always be stealing those same couple things from every enemy no matter how much sense it makes for them to have potions or grenades on them? And if you're not actually stealing stuff from them and just 'stealing strength/attack power' or something vague like that, that's also stepping away from what a classic thief really is.