Can we please stop with Cutscenes where we just stand around?

[EdwinLi]

Hildebrand moments where we actually do stuff

They been doing a bit more of this in side quests as well though still small.

In the new Tank Role quest as a example, WoL actually does his job as a Tank in the final cutscene by performing a dive into a attack to take the hit for the NPC since he/she was hired to be a bodyguard for him so the NPC can perform his attack in the cutscene.

It seems Hildibrand (gets more and more as WoL Embrace the Chaos) and the Job Role quests (well slowly each expansion) is where WoL been given a bit more actions in cutscenes.

[Cleretic]

They been doing a bit more of this in side quests as well though still small.

In the new Tank Role quest as a example, WoL actually does his job as a Tank in the final cutscene by performing a dive into a attack to take the hit for the NPC since he/she was hired to be a bodyguard for him so the NPC can perform his attack in the cutscene.

It seems Hildibrand (gets more and more as WoL Embrace the Chaos) and the Job Role quests (well slowly each expansion) is where WoL been given a bit more actions in cutscenes.

Which itself makes a lot of sense when thinking about the limitations of the game. The MSQ can't give the WoL a lot of combat scenes, because they'd have to account for every single combat style; basically the only example to my knowledge is right at the end of the Zenos fight in EW, and even that brief shot is super complex behind-the-scenes as I understand it. Role quests at least have a more pared-down skillset and character being called for; you can have the WoL jump in front to protect someone in a tank role quest, because you know that they're playing a tank.

And Hildibrand is just entirely off the reservation and giving the WoL tailor-made animations for dunking a basketball or something. No job is doing that, so any job can do that and it's not weird!

[Raoul9753]

Which itself makes a lot of sense when thinking about the limitations of the game. The MSQ can't give the WoL a lot of combat scenes, because they'd have to account for every single combat style; basically the only example to my knowledge is right at the end of the Zenos fight in EW, and even that brief shot is super complex behind-the-scenes as I understand it.

I dont think thats too hard to solve.
Sure, you cant show the WoL do specific things without breaking class fantasy, but one easy solution just from the top of my head would be to show the WoL in close up, have him dash out of frame, black screen for a moment with a light flash and the sound effect of your first job skill (If FF14 doesnt have the worst code, one simple "If Job then" option shouldnt break the game) and then show something has happened and our WoL was involved.

Example: An enemy attacks another Scion while they are Distracted. Close up on the WoL, doing the serious face, then have the WoL just run out of frame. The screen goes black, a white light flashes, we hear either the sound of a blade hitting or a magc explosion based on our job, next thing we see, the enemy drops to the ground defeated, and we now stand between the Scion and the enemy. The Scion looks over his shoulder and says "Thanks for having my back!"

Bam, we did something in a cutscene, it took one movement command and moving our Character model during a blackscreen, everything else was just one small visual and one small sound effect, and only one of those had to change based on our job.

[Cleretic]

I dont think thats too hard to solve.
Sure, you cant show the WoL do specific things without breaking class fantasy, but one easy solution just from the top of my head would be to show the WoL in close up, have him dash out of frame, black screen for a moment with a light flash and the sound effect of your first job skill (If FF14 doesnt have the worst code, one simple "If Job then" option shouldnt break the game) and then show something has happened and our WoL was involved.

Example: An enemy attacks another Scion while they are Distracted. Close up on the WoL, doing the serious face, then have the WoL just run out of frame. The screen goes black, a white light flashes, we hear either the sound of a blade hitting or a magc explosion based on our job, next thing we see, the enemy drops to the ground defeated, and we now stand between the Scion and the enemy. The Scion looks over his shoulder and says "Thanks for having my back!"

Bam, we did something in a cutscene, it took one movement command and moving our Character model during a blackscreen, everything else was just one small visual and one small sound effect, and only one of those had to change based on our job.

First of all, this isn't as 'catch-all' as you think it is. It sounds good for jobs that are fairly quick on their feet--this would read just fine on, say, Ninja--but doesn't really track for jobs that don't do a lot of quick movement and/or don't necessarily need to move for their main angle. Like, consider Black Mage, whose ideal raid would be one where there's a single pixel that's 100% safe that they could stand in forever without getting hit. The notion of that character having to move quickly kinda breaks their class fantasy.

Second of all, I think you'd complain about that if you got it, in large part because those particular contexts are often times when they actually do break for combat, and you have to fight some trash mobs in the overworld or something. If the MSQ ever calls for the WoL to throw hands in a context where it isn't plausible to have an actual combat sequence, this also doesn't work, because that context is usually that someone else is the scene focus; the way they usually do that is to just have the WoL draw their weapon, and then point the camera at the actual scene focus until they're done. So doing a 'Fight Goes Here' cut doesn't work there, either.

[Raoul9753]

First of all, this isn't as 'catch-all' as you think it is. It sounds good for jobs that are fairly quick on their feet--this would read just fine on, say, Ninja--but doesn't really track for jobs that don't do a lot of quick movement and/or don't necessarily need to move for their main angle. Like, consider Black Mage, whose ideal raid would be one where there's a single pixel that's 100% safe that they could stand in forever without getting hit. The notion of that character having to move quickly kinda breaks their class fantasy.

I would prefere my caster somehow deciding that its frontline time than to just stand there doing nothing at all.
And I already said in my opening post that I would always prefere break for fighting to cutscenes, but if its either cutaway in a cutscene or another case where we lose something or someone important because for some reason our god killing WoL just was not feeling it today, I take the cutaway.

If they wnat to have the focuis somewhere else, thats fine, but just come up with a reason why we dont help. And if its just something like Hermes throwing magical chains on us that we cant break in time, everything is better that seeing someone get killed 10 feet away from us while we just stand there mentally planning our dinner or whatever.

Hell, I would even take the "we tried but could not reach the action in time" excuse...

[Solowing]

Which itself makes a lot of sense when thinking about the limitations of the game. The MSQ can't give the WoL a lot of combat scenes, because they'd have to account for every single combat style; basically the only example to my knowledge is right at the end of the Zenos fight in EW, and even that brief shot is super complex behind-the-scenes as I understand it. Role quests at least have a more pared-down skillset and character being called for; you can have the WoL jump in front to protect someone in a tank role quest, because you know that they're playing a tank.

And Hildibrand is just entirely off the reservation and giving the WoL tailor-made animations for dunking a basketball or something. No job is doing that, so any job can do that and it's not weird!

I would like them to implement class abilities into the story for those key moments. A small divergence of a scene would be required but they would re-converge into the scene once it (class scene) was over

What makes it harder I'm sure is some abilities (thancred in the leviathan cutscene doing the DoT ability Rogue/Ninjas) got that was removed back in Heavensward (Right slash-Left Slash- Totally unnecessary but cool looking back flip) But they could allivate that by playing a specific animation for the class regardless if it exist in-game or not.

[Kennar]

In the new Tank Role quest as a example, WoL actually does his job as a Tank in the final cutscene by performing a dive into a attack to take the hit for the NPC since he/she was hired to be a bodyguard for him so the NPC can perform his attack in the cutscene.

But that wouldn't have had to happen at all if, during the lvl94 quest, our character had acted instead of standing there glaring menacingly while the evildoer gave her speech and peaced the eff out; only after did we stain the snow red with the blood of three of her henchmen. That story should have been over in time it takes me to press Intervention.

I'm with the OP on this, and it's something that I've complained about for a long time. I'm still mad I didn't get to take out Zenos when he was giving his speech in the Royal Gardens at the end of SB. It's one thing if a plot point happens because our characters are prevented from acting, but it is another thing entirely if the plot can only happen if our characters choose not to act. It's a cheap and lazy way to move a story forward.