Jobs that could fit other roles?

[Cabalabob]

I’ve been thinking lately about jobs that could fit into other roles and it got me thinking about how they could have a branching job system as a future concept instead of adding entirely new jobs. To be clear I’m not talking about something like SMN and SCH where 2 jobs branch off the same base class, or some kind of illusion of choice tree system. I’m talking literally building a new job just keeping the same name and theme.

Some examples:

DPS DRK: uses skills that consume their own HP to deal high damage, has abilities that give it barriers to protect itself when low HP and drain spells to recover.

Tank SAM: Parry and dodge style tank using skills like Seigan and third eye to block and recover.

Healer DNC: using skills like curing waltz as a basic cure spell, healing waltz as an esuna, drain samba to give the entire party bloodbath shield samba and attack reducing dances for the enemy for mitigation.

What other jobs can you think of that could fit into other roles for a potential branching role system?

[Payadopa]

So basically FFXI. lol
Maybe with a toggle? But I honestly think that ship has long sailed in XIV and has come back with exotic spices.

[Shougun]

Long ago there was talk of potentially having jobs locked off, like you could either be a Paladin or a Dark Knight like a Cecil sort of narrative. This was back when the class and job differences had some sort of meaning. One of the most roleplay like things I've ever heard in terms of FFXIV lol. On one hand I feel that, given this is an MMO on a single 'character', is "TOO" roleplay.. yet the other I still feel a little sad that maybe I didn't see the rest of the world where ideas like that flew (given that I feel there is a lack of roleplay gameplay elements in this game).

Though again personally given how we are character centric, that's a bit scary lol- I think if we went more like WoW's warbands* that then super heavy roleplay would fit really well without feeling too punishing. * Effectively WoW will be adding 'jobs' where almost everything is account wide, such that you can play multiple characters as if they were jobs like in FFXIV (many QoL improvements over FFXIV, one major downside is you do have to log out to switch jobs- that's fairly big con still; however, in context of this post you can imagine major decisions impacting specific characters and yet being able to flow between characters easily would allow you to have huge decisions without being like "welp, I hate Paladin- I wasted 2,000 hours to get to this point").

They tried SCH / SMN sourced from ACN some time after that.
--

Certainly we have seen different variants like FFXI. We even had it in 1.0... You could select abilities and build your own job as you leveled weapon and character levels. Though like most of 1.0 it really shouldn't have been released at that time and had a lot of issues. Was funny being a super mage tank though. Cross / mix job systems can work, I feel they are harder to balance than other options but they can be cool. I think I enjoy them more in single player games where things can create insane wombo combos and it's okay that happens, in multiplayer its like.. either you have to smooth it out too hard that it doesn't matter, accept there will be insanely good combos, or be a genie.

Naturally the more easier method we can see actively in games like WoW with an approach to jobs where you could have different specs-

WoW: 13 classes (many can multi-role), about 39 specs (spread across the classes), and approximately 39 sub-specs (hero talents)
FFXIV: 19-20 jobs (if you count limited)

Likely a few less jobs given that though, so who wants to lose their potentially favorite job so we can multi-role?



Answering the question more directly:

Starting with nodding that BLU can do this (with middling gameplay for certain 'role').

DPS:
Warrior
Dark Knight
Gunbreaker
Paladin
Sage
Bard - HAHA

Tank:
Samurai
Reaper
Red Mage
Summoner


Healer:
Paladin
Machinist
Dancer
Bard
Red Mage
Summoner

[Rithy255]

healer: DNC, RDM, PLD, Bard, Ninja
Dancer obviously already has a lot of team healing, RDM has rez/healing they could even have two "shifts" in like PVP, PLD has usually been associated with white magic and healing is one of the only jobs that has a "Cure 2" equivalent heal beyond having aoe healing and regens, Bard funnily had lb3 for healers and I think kind of makes sense especially if they used songs of mending. Ninja might seem like a odd choice but as they're a magic user in some sense and they have a direct way of healing others in PVP I could possibly see a "ninja healer"

Tank: Melees? (Summoner)
What "fits" a tank is very dependent, really tanks are just more defensive melee, Samurai makes sense from previous games, Ninja could be a interesting "spin" on tanking being about evasion, Dragoon/reaper already share the looks of a lot of "tank gear" and have higher HP pools. Monk was known for having a lot of mitigation with riddle of earth until it was changed, Really I can see any melee fit as a tank if done right. EDIT: I forgot summoner used to actually be kinda a tank with pet summons so that could be a thing?

Dps: Drk, War, Gnb, Sage
On the reverse I can see most tanking jobs (expect for PLD who's identity is usually more about protecting others then just damage) I mean drk has usually been a DPS, gnb looks like a DPS, war is a berserker, Sage somewhat looks like a DPS and is meant to be the most "dps like" healer so I choose it, really any healer can fit DPS (even white mage arguably)

[Oizen]

All of the tanks are basically just melee dps with defensive cooldowns.

[LilimoLimomo]

All of the tanks are basically just melee dps with defensive cooldowns.

I'll supplement this by saying that if you give just about any DPS analogues for Esuna, Medica 2, Raise, and maybe Cure 2, you've got yourself a healer capable of taking on most of the game's content. Red Mage is halfway there!

[Shikiseki]

I think there are plenty of split jobs they could use, the FF Job system has a lot of inspiration to pull from:

PLD --> Sword Saint: DPS that specializes on heavy knight style attacks
WAR --> Berserker: DPS that goes nutso with high hp pool but poor defenses
GNB --> Ravager: Squall goes dps Lightning instead
DRK --> Mystic Knight: DPS that specializes on elemental attacks, primarily holy and dark

WHM --> Devout: DPS that focuses on attack white magicks
SCH --> Summoner: DPS already exists
AST --> Time Mage: DPS using a variety of support and space magicks like comet
SGE --> Psychic: DPS that floats and yeets enemies with telekinesis

BLM --> Geomancer: Healer that blends elements to create life
SMN -->SCH: Healer already exists
RDM --> Green Mage: Healer that focuses on Buffs and Debuffs to support the party

DRG --> Templar: Tank that uses unique support spells
RPR --> Necromancer: Healer that uses void magicks and zombies
MNK --> Black Belt: Tank that deflects attacks by flexing
SAM --> Parivir: Tank that focuses on parry and evasion
NIN --> Illusionist: Magic DPS that focuses on the elemental mudras

BRD --> Sharpshooter/Ranger: DPS with higher dps based on distance
MCH --> Chemist: Healer FFX-2 style with hidden stash of potions
DNC --> Juggler: Tank that grabs attention with debuff trick focus

(but yeah that split job boat sailed off 10 years ago lol)

[Renathras]

I'm going to preface this with saying - they will probably never do this. The combat and Job systems are too rigid. That said:

When RDM was announced all the way back in SB, I thought it might be a Healer Job.

Think about it: HW WHM, what did it play like? Well, you had a damage spell (Stone), two DoTs (Aero and Aero 2; Aero 3 in AOE or for marginal DPS optimizing?), and then heals in the form of Cure 1, Cure 2, Cure 3, Medica 1, Medica 2, and Regen. I'm trying to remember, but I think we still had Stoneskin and Protect at the time as well, oGCD heals Benediction, Assize (used by most? people for healing), Asylum, and Tetragrammaton, and a couple utility/boosting things like Divine Seal (Temperance without the party damage reduction), Shroud of Saints (Lucid + threat reduction), Esuna, Repose, Swiftcast, Surecast, Presence of Mind, and so on.

But the point is, our mainstay use stuff was "some GCD attack spells and some GCD heals".

So I remembered thinking, "Wouldn't Red Mage just be White Mage, but instead of Stone and Aero and Holy, it would have Fire and Blizzard and Thunder, and maybe a melee combo?" I was playing FF Dimensions at the time, and Red Mage there takes Cure/Raise/Protect/Shell/Regen/Poisona/etc from WHM and the first two grades of Fire, Thunder, Blizzard magic and some utility stuff from Black Mage like Frog. So in FFXIV terms, RDM would have been WHM with the attack spells having a VFX swap and having a melee combo.

So I genuinely thought it could be a Healer Job at the time (before they announced which roles Jobs would be) since that was effectively how WHM worked in FFXIV at the time.

[Cabalabob]

So basically FFXI. lol
Maybe with a toggle? But I honestly think that ship has long sailed in XIV and has come back with exotic spices.

Not really like FFXI, we’re not talking making the jobs more role fluid, more giving them access to more roles entirely. The idea is a toggle. For example you’d equip the dark knight job stone and then you’d be able to switch your role from tank to dps, you’d get an entirely new set of skills and traits, maybe sharing some skill/assets repurposed for the new role, but practically a new job just sharing the dark knight name, themes and weapon.

All of the tanks are basically just melee dps with defensive cooldowns.

Realistically, most of the melee dps could be tanks and most of the tanks could be dps.

MNK: counter tank reducing damage and returning it.
RPR: dark magic tank, using attribute reducing magic to weaken enemies.
DRG: potentially an evasion tank using jumps to leave the field and dodge attacks.
NIN: change all the mudra into defensive variants. Huton > Utsusemi, avoids a certain number of attacks. Hyoton > Jubaku, applies paralysis. Doton > Hojo, applies slow.

[RitsukoSonoda]

It was something many like myself discussed frequently back in ARR due to the original jobs starting off as a core class then acquiring a job stone later. The idea was to have a branching role path for each core class at the time in a manner similar to many other RPGS since they'd already done it with Arcanist. Keep in mind that back then the process of getting a job stone involved leveling more than 1 core class. However most of it petered out when HW was launched and the 3 new "advanced" jobs had no core class to start as and simply started with their job stone immediately.