8.0 speculation

[Iscah]

I'd have to find a way to review the stellar exploration materials, but I believe Botanist sees a few bugs, too.

Check Garland Tools – look at the patches database and you can see items added in each patch and sub-patch.

[Cleretic]

Check Garland Tools – look at the patches database and you can see items added in each patch and sub-patch.

Checking Gamerescape on that (which has a generally more readable way to check these things) says Botanist doesn't harvest any bugs on Oizys, but it does harvest tentacles. Which... raises some questions that I don't think I'm gonna get answers to.

[Cilia]

Checking Gamerescape on that (which has a generally more readable way to check these things) says Botanist doesn't harvest any bugs on Oizys, but it does harvest tentacles. Which... raises some questions that I don't think I'm gonna get answers to.

It's probably referring to the tentacle-like vines that feature on many of Oizys' flora (e.g. the kiting poulps, colloquially known as "those floating ball thingies").

More pointedly there are giant pitcher plants (or what appear to be such) around the Foregone Oasis, which raises the question of what these things eat. Despite growing in hexagonal shapes the cactoids are also flowering plants, suggesting the presence of fauna that act as pollinators.

[EdwinLi]

I will not be surprised if some how Gaia become involved as a main character in 8.0 since Square Enix manage to develop Gaia into a Time Mage for Dissidia Duellum and develop some of her Hammer attack animations. Not to mention give her a bit more as a individual character (with more as Dissidia Duellum main story updates over time). This can open up the chance for Time Mage as a 8.0 Job as well.

Gaia trailer for Dissidia Duellum
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BRJj9G1x2xA

[Cilia]

I will not be surprised if some how Gaia become involved as a main character in 8.0 since Square Enix manage to develop Gaia into a Time Mage for Dissidia Duellum and develop some of her Hammer attack animations. Not to mention give her a bit more as a individual character (with more as Dissidia Duellum main story updates over time). This can open up the chance for Time Mage as a 8.0 Job as well.

Gaia trailer for Dissidia Duellum
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BRJj9G1x2xA

I'm not inclined to believe a spinoff featuring Gaia is any hint as to this game's plotline.

If you go look in Garland Tools and/or Gamer Escape though, there is a certain minion and certain mount that have been datamined that may or may not be Fan Fest rewards and may or may not hint at the direction things are headed. I will refrain from posting these things both because I want to keep the surprises for people and to avoid maybe getting banned; but even these things do not properly clarify much of anything, and they may be red (heh) herrings unrelated to the plot or maybe even Crystalline Conflict feelies.

I'm not surprised if that is the direction they're going, and just a little disappointed if it is.

[Cleretic]

Duellum has some buck-wild picks in general, between Iroha for XI, Krile for V and Balthier for XII. I don't think it shows anything but the developers wanting to get diverse with their roster and making deep cut picks that allow for the cast to be things other than 'Here's Another Sword Boy'. Gaia's packing a hammer and time magic, she's great for that! (Being a desperate attempt to reuse that canned Kingdom Hearts game's assets might've helped too; they might've already had some hammer or time magic assets ready to go and were shopping for a user.)

Which, incidentally, is probably why previous crossover games picked Y'shtola; she's a woman, non-human and primarily a spellcaster, which is a great splash of variety in a lineup of FF protags.

EDIT: Also, within the context of FFXIV itself, Gaia's not turning up in any non-optional MSQ context because it'd require them to make Eden mandatory, and that is a TERRIBLE idea.

[Cleretic]

If you go look in Garland Tools and/or Gamer Escape though, there is a certain minion and certain mount that have been datamined that may or may not be Fan Fest rewards and may or may not hint at the direction things are headed. I will refrain from posting these things both because I want to keep the surprises for people and to avoid maybe getting banned; but even these things do not properly clarify much of anything, and they may be red (heh) herrings unrelated to the plot or maybe even Crystalline Conflict feelies.

Also, while I don't like double-posting, it's probably good to let you know that the mount that you're most likely thinking of literally just got officially revealed to be an item shop thing completely unrelated to FanFest or 8.0.

[EdwinLi]

I'm not inclined to believe a spinoff featuring Gaia is any hint as to this game's plotline.

If you go look in Garland Tools and/or Gamer Escape though, there is a certain minion and certain mount that have been datamined that may or may not be Fan Fest rewards and may or may not hint at the direction things are headed. I will refrain from posting these things both because I want to keep the surprises for people and to avoid maybe getting banned; but even these things do not properly clarify much of anything, and they may be red (heh) herrings unrelated to the plot or maybe even Crystalline Conflict feelies.

I'm not surprised if that is the direction they're going, and just a little disappointed if it is.

It is not about what 8.0 main story maybe about directly but that they have assets for her being built up now to be used in FF14 beyond just her role in Eden for whatever they may have planned in any expansion main story. If she becomes a main character for any expansion, 8.0, 9.0, and etc, they now can use her for party role as well being a Time Mage Job.

This can also lead to introducing Time Mage Job later for a future expansion or 8.0 if they want to.

As for why Gaia can become a Main Character to the new Shard story arc we are in now, it is most likely her role as a surviving Ascian and how the antagonist's current plans will affect the Source and all Shards. We already know the surviving Ascians basically just decided to join the new Antagonists though we do not know how many did and how many did not choose to join him (or her). We are maybe going to explore a split between Ascians between those who side with the new antagonists and those who have always been just happy with their life they have. The Zodiark Arc (aka our first story arc that ended with Endwalker) was always focused only on Ascians who wanted the original world back but never focus on the Ascians who accept the current world and are happy with their current life or Ascians who are against the plan to restore the old world because they never agree with it.

This will obviously lead to us exploring all the surviving Shards since the current patch Main story set this up. It will be interesting to see and meet Ascians who rejected joining the Restore the original world Plan and those who are doing what they can to restore their now damaged Shard world. Not to mention visit shards that are not badly affected since their elemental alignment were not messed up.

As for the Winterer's plans, well we will just have to wait and see since he or she manage to recruit surviving Ascains to whatever the plan is.

Duellum has some buck-wild picks in general, between Iroha for XI, Krile for V and Balthier for XII. I don't think it shows anything but the developers wanting to get diverse with their roster and making deep cut picks that allow for the cast to be things other than 'Here's Another Sword Boy'. Gaia's packing a hammer and time magic, she's great for that! (Being a desperate attempt to reuse that canned Kingdom Hearts game's assets might've helped too; they might've already had some hammer or time magic assets ready to go and were shopping for a user.)

Which, incidentally, is probably why previous crossover games picked Y'shtola; she's a woman, non-human and primarily a spellcaster, which is a great splash of variety in a lineup of FF protags.

EDIT: Also, within the context of FFXIV itself, Gaia's not turning up in any non-optional MSQ context because it'd require them to make Eden mandatory, and that is a TERRIBLE idea.

That did not stop them from making Crystal Tower manditory.

Players may not like it but if Gaia does become more important to a point she becomes a Main character for future expansions, Eden may become manditory like Crystal Tower UNLESS they make adjustments to the story where players will not need to play through Eden raid.

They can just add a system to provide a quick rundown of what happened in Eden Raid and default the the Expansion story to always assume our character did the Eden Raid. So doing Eden raid will just be going through the full story about what happened in Eden Raid recap but they already got all the important details from the Recap system from the beginning of the X.0 expansion storyline.

However, they can always keep it to current system and adjust the story to being IF players did Eden Raid or not like they did with Shadowbringer before they did the whole "Crystal Tower is now mandatory due to patch Main story plot reasons".

[MikkoAkure]

This can also lead to introducing Time Mage Job later for a future expansion or 8.0 if they want to.

Yoshi-P already said that we’re not getting Time Mage.

The Time Mage is known for using time-related abilities such as haste to speed up the party or to stop time. All of the abilities related to the Time Mage were designed to be fun to play using active time battles. However, in an MMORPG, we can’t stop time, and another aspect is that it would overpower the job. What would be the point of a Time Mage that couldn’t manipulate time?

[EdwinLi]

Yoshi-P already said that we’re not getting Time Mage.

I'm not talking about a literal debuff and buff job that Yoshi-p was talking about back then.

Yes, Yoshi-P said no Time Mage job as in the version that actively use buff and debuff to control turn actions in Turn base combat. However, gameplay can be changed to be more visual themed and action combat theme with attacks animations rather than the turn base combat theme.

Gaia, gameplay wise, in Dissidia Duellum is basically a Time Mage DPS Job with slow debuff (which can be changed in FF14 into something else for the Job mechanic). For FF14 style of gameplay it gives a obvious way to make a Time Mage Job for FF14 even though gameplay wise it is different from the Turn Base combat system version of Time Mage. Attack animation wise, her Time Magic is basically Nuke damage based with her attacks focus on shattering time and delayed Nuke damage with Time.

It is a rather interesting way to make Time Magic theme magic work for more action based game like FF14 (which resolves the issue Yoshi-P had for not wanting to add Time Mage back then being he did not believe there was a way to create a Time Mage Job that works for a light action combat theme style game FF14 had as a MMORPG) because the focus is on Delay Damage for Big damage and Shattering Time to cause damage. Mechanic wise, it can work through Delay DPS mechanic like the Machinist time bomb. Each attack hit (while performing their own separate damage) adds on to a Time Magic Bomb mechanic that will explode at a certain point, once it reach a certain stack number, or player choose to activate it early.


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Now Time Mage job talk aside...

the Fanfest has FF7 theme stuff for FF14 with the Red XIII minion and new Bike mount. Why do I feel as if the next expansion Shard location maybe FF7 themed?

IF the next Shard ends up FF7 themed then probably should expect a Zack/Cloud job but question will be if it ends up a Tank Job for more Zack theme with Price of Freedom being our LB3 or Damage Immune skill/Damage reduction mechanic OR DPS Job for more Cloud theme so Omnislash is our LB3 or Ultimate DPS skill mechanic.