Please Share Updates on 8.0 Job Design

[Daralii]

That being said, visuals can be an important bullet point for players, too. That's part of the reason for good amount of SCH players took an issue when it's revealed they're giving SCH Seraphism, not just because how it functions to forgo what makes a SCH SCH, it's also severely clashing with the job fantasy of being a genius military strategist being made to wear chastity robe of all... for what? Only Creatively Bankrup Unit 3 knows the real answer.

It feels like they frequently just blend WHM and SCH together when designing and naming things. Remember when Liturgy of the Bell was named Lilybell because they forgot that it was the actual name of the WoL's faerie?

[ty_taurus]

It feels like they frequently just blend WHM and SCH together when designing and naming things. Remember when Liturgy of the Bell was named Lilybell because they forgot that it was the actual name of the WoL's faerie?

Even in the beginning, I'd argue that the name "Sacred Soil" sounds more in line with the Conjurer identity than Scholar. Then when White Mage got its gauge, they went with lilies as opposed to literally any other flower despite the fearie's name being "Lily." PVP White Mage has Seraphic Strike despite Scholar having had access to Seraph since the LB3 update in Heavensward. We have the Liturgy example you mentioned. I'm not sure if I'd say the priestly elements of Seraphism are innately White Mage. Final Fantasy's token healer has rarely taken on the more religious context that D&D's Priest or other generic healer classes often do, and XIV especially focused more on a nature theme, but it's certainly not a match for the combat medic or city of nym themes that were previously established. Personally, I feel like it's something out of Bloodborne more than anything Final Fantasy.

[Supersnow845]

To be fair sacred soil in Japanese more correctly translates to “temporary fortress of safety” or “safety tactical camp”

[CidHeiral]

I was thinking about this earlier today when running some stuff but I used to love bouncing between different jobs for different content. Even doing the usual roulettes would be a fun time on an engaging job, or if I'm challenging myself on something I don't play as much like old BLM. Now the jobs are so simple and homogenized I was looking at the job list earlier before queueing and had an overwhelming sense of apathy like "what's the point?" What a bummer.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

To be fair sacred soil in Japanese more correctly translates to “temporary fortress of safety” or “safety tactical camp”

Sounds like what an Asylum would look like-

Oh wait...

[Mikey_R]

In terms of animation, VFX and SFX, let's not pretend the past actions were any better. Even going back to Paladin's Savage Blade, the animation was 1 horizontal slash, but the VFX showed 3 slashes done at the same time. Take a look at Monk's The Forbidden Chakra, you mean to tell me those first 2 weak punches have the same energy that the SFX is giving off? How about Twin Snakes? Has anyone actually looked at the animation? The WoL is crouching, arms outstretched, barely infront of the front leg, with their wrists bent backwards and head looking to the floor. It is nonsense.

As for the comment on Dragoon's Coerthan Torment, 1 'slash' having multiple effects isn't uncommon, Fast Blade for example has at least 2 'slashes' per slash, but it also isn't the first time 1 slash has had multiple slashes even for Dragoon, Fang and Claw, the first part is one upwards slash with 3 separate 'waves', then the thrust has multiple effects of different designs. If you want the best one though, Samurai's Higanbana has zero slashes and yet produces multiple effects (if you check the animation, the sword never leaves the scabbard).

Now this isn't to say they couldn't do better, but to act like it is only fairly recently the animations have sometimes been slightly off is a bit disingenuous.

[ty_taurus]

On the topic of animation, I guess since I’m the Sage junkie, my biggest gripe with Sage’s animations is I feel like the attack animations aren’t really capitalizing on the “cool factor” of a sci-fi laser mage.

Dosis is fine on its own but hideous and choppy when casted repeatedly. Theres no grace or fluidity. Dyskrasia is very bland, and I’m not a fan of the point blank AOE route for healer trash mob buttons.

Toxikon and Toxikon II are quite different and both animations are very nice. It’s just a shame II replaces I instead of being something different.

Pneuma is fantastic, but it’s not really a DPS action so I never see it. Not that it’s a bad healing action or anything, but in normal content I am drowning in Addersgall that I’m desperate to find uses for, so I never have room to fit Pneuma into my healing plan outside of savage.

I don’t like Psyche’s animation. I just see a giant holy circle which isn’t the vibe I want especially when I’m starved for DPS actions. The DOTs are… inoffensive, but otherwise unremarkable.

It’s a shame that all of Sage’s best animations rarely get used. Phlegma is great, but I feel like the ranged visuals are lacking in style and grace for what Sage sees most of the time. I’d really like to see more style in DPS coming from Sage in the future. Something I’ve talked about in the healer discord is wanting to feel more like Nu-13. Another example would be taking some inspiration from Nier Automata’s pod attacks.

All that said, if the gameplay remains dull and monotonous, animations can’t fix that. And I worry that whatever 8.0 has in store will end up being all show and no substance as others have said. It’s what their current design philosophy implies will be the case.

[ForsakenRoe]

On the topic of animation, I guess since I’m the Sage junkie, my biggest gripe with Sage’s animations is I feel like the attack animations aren’t really capitalizing on the “cool factor” of a sci-fi laser mage.

Dosis is fine on its own but hideous and choppy when casted repeatedly. Theres no grace or fluidity. Dyskrasia is very bland, and I’m not a fan of the point blank AOE route for healer trash mob buttons.

On the subject of Dyskrasia's animation...

Spoilers for some 7.2 content (in case OP hasn't done that content/seen it yet)

Howling Blade's second phase has a 'deal damage to all nearby enemies' kind of attack, where he does an in/out (here's the 'in' version, and here's the 'out' version). Why couldn't we do something like that, and have our nouliths just orbit us in a ring, while emitting energy in a sort of blade? Why do we do this... Gatorade rain dance? I suppose the 'in' version is kinda similar to what Toxikon 1's animation does, but that gets overwritten by Toxikon 2 pretty quickly via levelling.

In fact, the combination of how relatively simple each mechanic is in P8S phase 1, combined with the sheer speed at which he chains them back to back, is exactly the vibe I wish that SGE had in its gameplay. Effortlessly weaving Kardia amplifying abilities like Soteria, throwing out Addersgall moves to mitigate and heal like Kerachole and Ixochole, and all while throwing out constant attacks of our own to keep on the offensive. I wish that, when Metem comments on his speed, that I could say 'Yeh, he's fast. But keep your eyes peeled, Ref, cos I'm even faster', and that be reflected in my gameplay

I think that certain actions could stand to have a bit more... 'randomness' to their animation? For example, let's imagine that we have a new action for Sage, where the nouliths 'slash' the target with energy beams. Rather than the path of the noulith being the same each time, if there was some variance in the angle at which they slashed, such that each time the animation played it was a little different, it'd break up the visual fatigue a bit despite being 'the same button'

Another example would be something like Broil, something with multiple projectiles. Not every one of Broil's fireballs needs to hit at the same time, do they? What if, sometimes they all hit at once, but sometimes they hit in sequence, or in pairs, etc?

What if the animation was modified slightly, when we got a Crit? For example, Broil again, what if a Crit had the fireballs all meet before hitting the enemy, combine into one bigger fireball and then slam into the target? The natural randomness of 'whether we crit or not' would make 'when the different animation appears' more unpredictable, and seeing it go off during the burst window gives an immediate feedback to the player that 'hey, special animation, you hit big number' rather than looking for how many exclamation marks follow the damage number in the floating text

[ty_taurus]

You know, one question I'd love to ask Yoshi P directly is: "If you let players choose which version of Astrologian to use for the job moving forward, which version of Astrologian do you think they would pick?"

[Chasingstars]

SCH is the job where the designer puts on a blindfold and throws a dart at a board and whatever the dart hits is what you get. I still remember how memed on SCH got in the EW job preview where nobody could tell what they got except what looked like a sprint.

Also I would pick HW AST.