8.0 speculation

[RavLandslide]

I'm not personally expecting anything viking-adjacent. All new jobs have to start in one of the three starter cities which means that the new job cannot be from the Fourth. Gunbreaker and Dancer had absolutely nothing to do with the First in the other shard-focused expansion we had.

While it can't be from the Fourth it could be from Aerslaent, which is supposedly very Norse/viking-adjacent.

I don't have any predictions for the tank, but I am willing to predict that the ranged physical job will be Viper's style of 'original' and basically just be Wakka and/or Hope.

Did the devs not say that while the new jobs will be FFXIV OriginalsTM they would be "returning in a way"? While I would love not-Blitzballer as a job, I sadly can't imagine that lining up with the devs' comment unlike something like Musketeer which has an unused guild in Limsa. Unless that quote was just a mistranslation/false info.

[MikkoAkure]

Judge first appeared (as a playable Job, even) in Tactics Advance. It also isn't historically related to shields; XII's iconic Judge Magisters all use combining dual weapons (akin to VPR), though lesser Judges and the original Judgemaster (or Judge Magister) Cid Randell from TA could equip them.

Calling Judge a “playable job” when it was only ever available to one single optional character is a bit of a stretch. I wouldn’t consider any of the FFTA/FFTA2 unique character classes isolated to one person as “FF jobs”, same as gameplay tied to individual characters and not linked to classic FF jobs. I wouldn't call Squall being a gunblade user a "FF job" and I was under the impression that Yoshi-P’s quote had to do with actual jobs from the series.

As someone whose first FF game ever was FFTA and since then attributes FF as a whole to Ivalice, it would be nice to have a job that’s Ivalice-inspired similar to what we’ve had with FFVIII with GNB and sort of FFIX with VPR.

And we could always just have a Blindfrost native show up and teach us whatever it is, if it's related to Roegadyn culture.

The area of the Blindfrost has absolutely nothing to do with Roegadyn at all as far as we know and is on the opposite side of the world from their homeland so I don’t expect that to change. There’s Xaela there though.

Did the devs not say that while the new jobs will be FFXIV OriginalsTM they would be "returning in a way"? While I would love not-Blitzballer as a job, I sadly can't imagine that lining up with the devs' comment unlike something like Musketeer which has an unused guild in Limsa. Unless that quote was just a mistranslation/false info.

While I had wanted Musketeer since 1.0 beta when we were told it was going to be in release (and IIRC was even on the official website), Machinist has taken everything over in regards to it and has spiritually succeeded it to the point I don’t see it arriving in any form. MCH job quests even have Limsans train Ishgardians on how to use guns and they brought back my favorite lost 1.0 NPC just for that. And the Musketeer’s Guild isn’t unused, it’s the Marauder’s Guild now. Even though the old 1.0 version of the pirate ship was much better.

I can't find the quote where Yoshi-P talked about the new job not being an old job, but I did find other people talking about Judge, which makes me feel less clever than I thought I was.

[Cleretic]

Did the devs not say that while the new jobs will be FFXIV OriginalsTM they would be "returning in a way"? While I would love not-Blitzballer as a job, I sadly can't imagine that lining up with the devs' comment unlike something like Musketeer which has an unused guild in Limsa. Unless that quote was just a mistranslation/false info.

They said that the jobs would be originals, but they also act like Viper is 'original', and it's not.

Also, Musketeer is probably permanently on the shelf because they tried to crack that thing from 1.0 through to Heavensward before eventually going 'this isn't working, Machinist will'. My guess has always been that they ran headlong into the same problem every single MMO since FFXI has faced, that 'Shoots Good' is not enough of a gimmick to make a whole job skillset out of, you need to add something else. And so Machinist solved the Musketeer problem by adding gadgets.

[StriderShinryu]

They said that the jobs would be originals, but they also act like Viper is 'original', and it's not.

Also, Musketeer is probably permanently on the shelf because they tried to crack that thing from 1.0 through to Heavensward before eventually going 'this isn't working, Machinist will'. My guess has always been that they ran headlong into the same problem every single MMO since FFXI has faced, that 'Shoots Good' is not enough of a gimmick to make a whole job skillset out of, you need to add something else. And so Machinist solved the Musketeer problem by adding gadgets.

Yeah, "original job to FF14" is a descriptor that should be taken with a large grain of salt. Some "FF14 original" jobs haven't exactly been entirely original to FF14 given they have clear inspiration from previously seen jobs/characters, and some other "FF14 not-original" jobs like Sage actually exist completely separately from their historic namesakes. Probably best to just keep your options open to what the actual jobs end up being instead of worrying too much about the names.

That said, it's a massive "Please No!" from me for any job related in any way to Blitzball and/or Wakka. I actually wouldn't hate Blitzball showing up in FF14 as some sort of Gold Saucer game but keep it away from the combat jobs plz.

[Yuella]

We can speculate on the weapons they use since the names can be anything. Since the tank is a main tank, it could use double shield or hammer + shield but they will come in pairs instead of separate like Paladin's sword and shield. The physical ranged dps can use arm gun like Barrett or maybe double guns like Yuna in FFX-2.

[Cleretic]

That said, it's a massive "Please No!" from me for any job related in any way to Blitzball and/or Wakka. I actually wouldn't hate Blitzball showing up in FF14 as some sort of Gold Saucer game but keep it away from the combat jobs plz.

Ironically, 'Blitzballer' would solve the problem Musketeer got thwarted by. A big problem with 'Shoots Good' as a combat style is animation variety; there's only so many ways you can depict pure skill with a ranged weapon in a game like this before having to either get weird or make twenty different minor variations on 'Shoot Guy'. This is a problem melee styles don't typically have, you can get kits like Samurai or Monk that are mostly heightened forms of 'plausibly doable by humans' because there's a bunch of different ways to kick or cut a guy that can all read distinctly and look good.

The one ranged tool that avoids this, though? Sportsballs. By lifting from basketball, volleyball, all international forms of football and so on, you actually can populate an entire ranged DPS skillset with things that humans can do.

[Cilia]

Berlin Fanfest Reveals

The new tank job is Bastion, which dual-wields shields known as Skyltborg (Roegadyn: Shield Castle; a more nuanced translation would probably be "Shield Wall," referencing an ancient battle formation) that also function as claws, pile bunkers, and cannons by flipping them around the wrist. This art is an ancestral Roegadyn fighting style practiced by inhabitants of Aerslaent. (Meaning, anyone who wants to pick it up, you know where to log out before maintenance!) Props to Yoshi-P for delivering the entire 2-hour keynote wearing a replica of the Bastion artifact set!

The 8-man raid series is titled Beyond the Lifestream, and is the long-awaited VII(:R) crossover collaboration with involvement from Naoki Hamaguchi and Tetsuya Nomura. There are no details on the plot yet.

Also coming from VII:R on October 28th is a new Gold Saucer minigame called Keybound Brawler, a typing game themed around VII. (Guess I need to hook up a keyboard to my PS5. Annoying, but if I can make buckoo MGP using this with my 70 WPM typing...) Releasing alongside this minigame is Tifa and Barret's outfits for purchase. It was hinted there will be updates for other collaborations using Keybound Brawler.

Oh and a massive array of new character customization options, custom animations, and other fun stuff is on the way...! (In 8.1.)

Meat and potatoes: MSQ
-The world of the Fourth, as suggested in the first teaser, is covered in unending winter. In order to survive and escape the "arcane beings" ravaging the surface, the people constructed what are known as Realmships, each powered by a giant elemental "Ark Crystal." The first appears to the the Realmship of Water, Naglfar, which features the main hub city Fargarthr. The second shown, what bears a resemblance to Midgar, is the Realmship of Fire known as Hringhorni. (Go ahead, get it out of your system.) These are actually ships from Norse myth; Naglfar ("Nail Farer") being a ship constructed wholly from the fingernails and toenails of the dead, destined to bring beasts to the battlefield during Ragnarok, and Hringhorni being the "best ship" belonging to the god Baldr. There are three other ships themed after Wind, Lightning, and Earth; the fleet is known collectively as the "Finhymnar" (sp?), or "Five Firmaments."

A major character in the expansion is stated to be Bisna (sp?), the pink-haired adolescent Miqo'te seen in the extended teaser.

The story will progress in a new (to the game) way: rather than a strictly linear story, after completing the introduction you will be allowed to tackle regions in any order you wish, unlocking the ending by finishing them all. This is not a new concept (Borderlands 4 does something identical, and I'm sure it's even older than that) but it does provide more leeway in what order you progress through leveling content and experience the story. Still, being familiar with the setup I'm skeptical how this will actually work in practice. Level syncing is not an issue, but the setup makes it difficult to tell a good story with rising action and whatnot. Guess we'll have to wait and see how it's executed. Probably jump between the various Realmships before heading to the frozen surface for the finale.

They're deliberately keeping the story a tight-lipped secret here. Let 'em cook!

[Yuella]

I wonder if Rhytatyn will have updated dialog if we fight him as Bastion in Cape Westwind

[Cleretic]

So far my read on the expansion is that it's weird that both Nintendo and Square-Enix announced Xenoblade Chronicles 2 remasters in the same week, and I don't think it's necessary because I think the original is perfectly good. Seriously, what we've been given is uncannily similar in places.

So far basically none of the Evercold stuff is grabbing me and I remain skeptical bordering on pessimistic; congratulations to the Aerstlant-Likers for getting a new job, but all of that curiosity got eclipsed by me realizing that the mechanical pitch sounded like 'a tank designed to make the healer obsolete' and I am already worried that healers aren't even gonna make it through the Evolved combat revamp alive. The story so far has given me nothing and promised even less; 'going to another shard' is already a dud note to me, making sure I definitely don't care about these people by default, and this Fanfest has given me no additional reason to.

The one thing keeping me hooked is, of all things, the Evangelion raids! FFVII as far as 'expanded universe' stuff has always seemed frustratingly conservative and self-absorbed to me, constantly producing what it sees as 'More FFVII' without understanding or particularly caring why I even cared about FFVII in the first place; I don't think crossover raids are often the parade of shallow references people act like they are, but FFVII's is absolutely going to be basically a museum of 'Look At The Reference' without adding anything much to either game. But Evangelion is a franchise built on 'tear it down and rebuild it', constantly doing new weird stuff with the 'canon' with each new installment instead of just making a prequel or sequel and going 'here's what Misato was doing before meeting Shinji'; this is the one that's gonna go gonzo and give us weird and interesting new things to LB3 in the face.

[Cilia]

FFVII as far as 'expanded universe' stuff has always seemed frustratingly conservative and self-absorbed to me, constantly producing what it sees as 'More FFVII' without understanding or particularly caring why I even cared about FFVII in the first place; I don't think crossover raids are often the parade of shallow references people act like they are, but FFVII's is absolutely going to be basically a museum of 'Look At The Reference' without adding anything much to either game.

To be fair, the VII:R series sits in this weird space where it's neither a sequel nor a remake despite the title and premise. It's more or less a deconstruction of remakes; YMMV on how it's going, but it's hard to remember that Cloud was himself a deconstruction of RPG protagonists of his time who became so iconic he replaced the archetype.

Without any story information it's near to impossible to say what's going to show up, though an appearance from Jenova and the final boss being (Safer) Sephiroth is all but given. If they are just gonna do a parade of references I'm at a bit of a loss for what enemies they can throw at us; the Ultima Weapon has been around since A Realm Reborn, the Guard Scorpion since Stormblood, and the other Weapons since Shadowbringers. Everything else is, in my opinion, too context sensitive to VII itself. (Though it should be noted this is specifically a crossover with the Re- games, not the original VII.)