New class ideas

[Enkidoh]

I think Time Mage is going to be a DPS. Of course it is just my theory, but Yoshi-P seemed to hint about the fact that Gaia hammer is important, which led some of us to think a new job will use it. The spells Gaia is using through the second part of Eden look like time magic to me. First she kills a monster with a delayed magic attack (the spell is cast, and a few seconds after the spell effect stops, it explodes out of nowhere). And then the effect of the magic she uses at the end of E8N shows a clock. + E3 had a lot of time/delayed magic attacks involved. Now my personal hope for it would be for it to be a DoT based mage, and for Summoner to be revamped to rely almost exclusively on pets.

Gaia's hammer was actually a mistake made by Tetsuya Nomura who was unaware there wasn't a hammer-wielding already in the game, but Yoshi just laughed and kept it in anyway for the 'coolness factor'. Besides, NPCs are a poor indication of new classes because since day 1 of 1.0 they've had access to weapons and skills that players have never been given (like Rostnsthal dual wielding a pistol in one hand and a single handed axe in the other, simply because it's 'cool').

Job 2: Time Mage (chronomancer?)
I haven't played enough final fantasy games to know if there have been previous time mages, but it would make for a great healing class. Reverse wounds, perhaps give small temperary hastes or slows, maybe even an ability that for just a few seconds lets players run very fast around them (to help during difficult mechanics). And rather than using shields or regen, they could cause players to recieve damage at a delayed rate, giving more time to heal up.

Time Mage's role and abilities are already taken by AST anyway (AST has, or had, a lot of abilities that dealt with manipualting time and space, like Lightspeed being effectively Haste), so AST is really just Time Mage under a different name. Hence it would be rather redundant to include an actual Time Mage at this point (to say nothing of back during the Beta Yoshi all but ruled out an actual Time Mage by saying he thinks spells like Haste would make the game "too easy").

Job 1: Jester
My initial thoughts for a Jester class were about making them a tank, primarily based around dodging attacks, or rolling with punches. A jester's tank cooldowns would be to "reduce damage by moving with incoming hits" and could perhaps allow them to completely negate basic attacks from ordinary enemies for several seconds. Useful during large pulls for recovery time.
They could have an AOE provoke (taunt). I also had an idea for a sort of "reverse cover" if you will. Rather than using a shield to block, the jester would leap to the position of an ally and take all damage intended for them for the duration of the ability. GET DOWN MR PRESIDENT!

What if there was a class similar to arcanist, but that was split into ALL THREE roles?
Jester could be a melee tank, a healer, AND a dps all of which use throwing knives. DPS comes to any class (but would primarily be ranged for the jester), tank would be melee (perhaps with a ranged damage rotation to keep it interesting) and then the healer jester could use magically empowered words of encouragement to inspire and heal allies. Consider it! A single class new players could pick up at the start of an expansion and be able to change roles throughout the content while retaining their current level.

Your initial idea for Jester basically is an evasion tank that players made NIN into in FFXI, and that was all very well and good, except they abused it for it was worth, and once their shadows went down they were torn to pieces (and SE increasinly made enemies capable of tearing through NIN shadows with ease just to muck up these players). It sounds good on paper but in practice is a nightmare for healers.

The second idea you had for Jester sounds too mechanically complex for SE to bother with, to say nothing of being too overpowered as it pretty much could satisfy any duty requirement without restriction, practically invalidating the role of every other Job. There is a reason the Crystal Exarch has this very role adaptability in the Trust System during Holminster Switch and that was simply because there was no other story character available to be used in Trusts in that part of the storyline (the only dedicated tank in the Trust system, Thancred, doesn't appear til much later) and so he is an exception rather than a rule.

Also throwing knives are already a ROG/NIN ability so this is already taken by an existing class.

Job 3: Bloodmage
Had this idea for a MELEE HEALER. The blood mage would use a scythe or some other interesting blade (sickle?) to perform their melee hits (bare in mind that healers may only use spells for ranged damage even now). However my idea is that blood mages empower their abilities by gaining blood as a resource through melee hits an damaging abilities. Their healing spells would target an ally, and then target the enemy that ally is currently attacking to leech healing or spike damage out onto other targets. By reducing a bloodmage's ability to perform secondary tasks like shielding or regeneration, and allowing them to spend their own hp as well as syphon hp back from enemies, they could increase risk to weave damage into their healing and even perhaps link to a tank and heal them BY dealing damage in a rotation.
With enough testing to make sure the damage wasn't too high or usability wasn't too low, i'd have a great time playing a melee healer. I think lots of people would find it an interesting and unique class o/!

Bloodmage is pretty much what THM was like in the original launch version of FFXIV (version 1.0). There, THM did not have Fire, Ice and Lightning spells (those were CNJ spells). Instead, THM's original gimmick was using drain spells to steal enemy HP to replenish their own or their party's, while also having access to debuff spells and even Light and Darkness elemental spells like Dia. This was all scrapped when the Jobs were added in a patch and the classes were redesigned to make them more appropriate for their Jobs - hence THM was radically altered, probably the class given the greatest makeover in the game. They lost the drain healing, with CNJ becoming the dedicated healer class, and gained instead Fire, Ice and Lightning spells so it could be a better fit for BLM, retaining only the Astral/Umbral aspect as a focus shift mechanic.

As THM has never regained those abilities it's lost, it's pretty clear SE considers the original form a failed idea and so I do not seem them reviving it I'm sorry to say.