Unexplored Class Concepts I'd Love to See in FF14's Future

[Shurrikhan]

Long enough for the melees to be very dead by the time you can run back in, at least back when Alex was current.

That... has nothing to do with how long you have to be out there, only to do with how quickly one can move back. You need as many GCDs of ranged action available to you as the content demands -- no more than that. It's not that complicated.

Nor is it absurd for a "melee" to be able to fill a few or more GCDs effectively from range, any more than for a caster to have access to instant casts. A melee healer could spend 90% of their time in melee range and still, if mobile, be in a ranged spot for every split mechanic, and, if merely given the equivalent of the likes of Triple-cast or even (a stronger, CD-based) Meditation, could continue to be use from range in the few GCDs they'd actually need to be.

Ninja, a "melee", can go ~6 GCDs at range without losing damage. There is no reason to assume a "melee" healer could not likewise, once in a while, continue healing for some 4-5 from range from GCDs at a time. "Melee" does not mean "literally no throughput from range ever"; there is not a single melee in this game that fits that definition. In some cases it doesn't even a throughput loss, if those moments are banked for, until having past a threshold of several consecutive GCDs.

:: To say a melee healer can't exist in FFXIV because it'll sometimes be briefly expected to play from range makes no more sense than to call Ninja a non-melee because it has over 6 GCDs worth of time per minute that can be done from range without damage loss or to call BLM not a caster just because at least 3 times per minute it will not have cast times. The roles are not nearly so brittle.

[Kolsykol]

Main thing I'd like to see honestly is different weapon types for the Jobs that already exist.
I want Maces for Paladins for example

[Brightshadow]

Main thing I'd like to see honestly is different weapon types for the Jobs that already exist.
I want Maces for Paladins for example

As seen with Reaper and Dark Knight two similar job concepts can coexist. So perhaps they could add Templar as an alternative to DPS paladin that uses hammers or maces and of Course uses light based magic.

[Sylve]

I don't think a melee healer would ever really work in a raid situation

Well, It actually kind of improves flexibility. If you take 1 melee and 3 ranged, it messes with your 2x balance. But a Healer designed to want to stay in melee range could actually exchange places with that missing melee, bringing your party balance back to 4 melee and 4 ranged.

I don't do Savages or spend time in EX, But i dont recall any mechanics that forcibly required 4 melee and 4 ranged. IIRC, Pretty much all content in the game has been cleared with all sorts of comps, including 8 Tanks lol.

So the bigger question is: What makes a melee healer a healer who wants to be in melee range?
Theres a couple of ways to do that. You could make the heals very short range and tie its healing into doing melee strikes. But this causes massive problems with encounter design as all 4 healers currently do not have weird range restrictions.

Another way is to make it beneficial for the Healer to be in melee, but not a mechanical requirement in its healing mechanics.
An example would be the best way to explain how this could work:

Lets create a "Cleric" as our melee healer. Weapon is a Mace + Shield (Combo like RDMs Rapier + Focus rather than PLDs seperated weapons). Think of it like a Paladin that decided to go all in on the Healing aspects of being a Paladin instead of being a guardian.

It's DPS is a 3 step Weaponskill combo scaling from MIND. No positional requirements, the combo isnt interrupted by other actions and the combo window is handled via a no duration buff so that the rotation can be started and stopped at any time without breaking the combo or resetting.

Next, we give it a Kardion style buff to give to the Tank. Completing the 3 step combo grants a useful effect to the recipient. Kardion heals, so why not make this one grant a buff with a charge mechanic, absorbing 10% of the next damage source with 2 charges.

It's healing kit would for the most part resemble our current healers.
A direct heal GCD single target and AoE heal.
Off global heals of various flavors. Damage Reduction effects etc. No strange range requirements, they'd function at the same ranges all healers operate at.

Now, to make this healer want to be in melee, doing melee things you give it a resource bar akin to Addersgall.
Lets call it Faith. Cap it at 4 charges.
Faith generates naturally over time, 1 charge accumulating once per minute. Charges are spent on the various oGCDs.
However, we want this Healer to be doing melee things right?
So we add a benefit: The second hit of the Weaponskill combo reduces the time to the next Faith charge by 10 seconds.
Now your Cleric actively wants to be caving skulls in to rapidly build Faith charges.

The final problem is a ranged skill. If a particular boss was unfriendly to melees, our Cleric would struggle.
Enter: Smite.
Smite would function exactly like Dosis, Glare etc. A short cast long range spell dealing damage. Using it reduces the time to next Faith charge by 3 seconds. This is so you aren't wholly gimped out of Faith while at range but its not quite as much as bonking heads.

And with that, You have a Healer that aesthetically and mechanically stays in melee caving skulls in while also being a regular Healer when it needs to.
Melee CAN work, if you're creative enough :P

[CaptainLagbeard]

I've said it in previous similar topics... But I want a ranged tank using a Garlean styled Gunshield.

[ApolloGenX]

Well, now that we have the "power of feelings"... I think a psionic would be cool. Not sure if it would be dps or a healer.... I guess ranged dps would make the most sense...afterall... in the story they tried to kill us from a long way off...

[Mezzoforte]

As much as i would like more Jobs as anyone does, i would prefer it if Squeenix would invest more time into currently existing ones, so that we get some form of customisation like alternative Skillsets/ specialisations/ selectable traits/ skilltrees and so on.

This will never happen. Yoshi specifically sats he will add more classes but never customization.

[Haseno]

Long enough for the melees to be very dead by the time you can run back in, at least back when Alex was current.

That said, Arkenaeux's suggestion of being able to leave a radial clone has some merit. Geomancer works like that in FFXI.

Being a melee orientated healer doesn't mean they wont have some ranged spells.

The vast majority of high end content in this game you're stacking a lot. This is where they they'd shine. However, they'd still have some ranged abilities in order to heal targets that must be forced to exit their effective radius. Likely some oGCD abilities. They could also have numerous gap closers which allow them to rush to an ally and deliver burst healing on impact.

People who say "it won't work" are simply undermining the human imagination in flushing out such concepts. FF14's raids are not some super secret formula that limits the potential for certain classes.

[Haseno]

I undertsand that dragoon is essentially a bladed staff user, because that is what a spear is. but as a spear/staff addict who does not like dragoons kit, I would love this so much. honestly just a staff would be sick, because for some reason the concept of hitting things with long sticks activates the feel happy part of my brain. Or a double ended staffblade thingy? Idk what it's called, but like the darth maul lightsaber. That would also be super cool.

The other thing I long for is an alchemist/chemist. Either as a healer or maybe a ranged dps? I don't know what the gameplay mechs would be like (though my friend was talking about how it would be super cool to have a healer with the same concept of dancer's standard step or ninja mudras, where you chain together different buttons to like mix up potions that you'd throw at the boss, which I would love), but I just really love the concept and possible aesthetic of the class. Like I just really want to play a potion mixer person while dressed like a plague doctor or something.

I know exactly what you mean. I love Halberds/Polearms/Spears/Staff Weapons. But Dragoon isnt my thing either.

[Jennah]

I want to see them make Calculator and Mime into real, non-limited classes. Somehow.