Class System Blues

[AceofRains]

I may not speak for everyone when I clarify this for you, but I can personally say that's not the way we're talking about lack of uniqueness. As it stands now, any given class or job does not have it's OWN uniqueness. Yes, they have started to address this when the Job's came out, but it still bugs me that I have aero as a whm, but no banish.

The concept that you can "fluff" your skills by pulling a few skills from your primary "classes" is silly. Jobs are lacking massive amounts of skills and spells imo. Yes, I'm about to compare FFXIV to XI:


FFXI White Mage:
52 WHM Only Spells.
102 Total Spells.
10 Active Abilities.


FFXIV White Mage:

3 WHM Only Spells.
2 White Mage Abilities.
10 Conjuror Spells.
4 Conjuror Abilities


Yes, a lot of those spells in XI were upgraded versions of AoE / Bar / pro/shell. That's not the point. The point is that feeling of being the one and only, knowing your class brings purpose to the goal of a team. This has nothing to do with someone with every class at 50. It has everything to do with each one of those 50's standing out.

Did you even play any earlier FF games? Aero is a common white mage magic. I don't know about you but when I look at my Action bar when playing white mage, everthing about it screams WHM

Look under the "specs"
Aero was originally a white magic. Maybe not stone but it fits the "natural" theme of Conjury.


Oh and please tell me more about how each job doesn't have uniqueness. Maybe not classes AS MUCH but each class has its own methods of doing the same thing and that thing is SOLOING.

[Keres]

snip

I'm not sure if you actually read my post completely. My point of view is that I can sympathize with the argument in certain ways, but that things are still better off the way they are currently, as the downsides of the suggested alternative are even worse. I explicitly said as much.

Regarding not having completed the current endgame content, I fully admit this, and never have once tried to hide it. I simply do not have fun playing XIV 1.0, so I have no desire to invest the time required to gear myself sufficiently for an endgame that I wouldn't even enjoy. If you look at my post history, you'll see that I absolutely never participate in discussions about endgame content strategy or difficulty, as I have no interest in pretending to have great insight into such topics. However, this particular issue is not exclusive to endgame players -- job flexibility and uniqueness in groups is a topic for debate that's relevant to all players, from level 1 to 50.

[Vindrax]

I agree with this. When I originally started this thread, I hadn't considered people making alts (personally I like to keep one character; two at most.) So maybe that is one of the reasons SE decided to set it up the way they did. Hmmmmm. . .

Having played WoW with a progression based raiding guild, I will just say that the people who currently have every level 50 would be the same ones in WoW that have an alt that does everything anyway. I know that for a lot of our raiding I would play as my priest (main), but if people wanted to do something else and my priest was on timer I would go on my rogue, or my shaman... So at the end of the day people that want those maxxed classes are going to have them, but if you looked at the gear disparity between my rogue and my priest it wasn't even close because I played my priest just that much more. I'd imagine you'll likely find it the same here.

[fusional]

job flexibility and uniqueness in groups is a topic for debate that's relevant to all players, from level 1 to 50.

how does job switching affect you negatively at all outside of endgame circumstances?

[Orophin]

@ OP

Coming to this party late, but if you wanted to be locked into what class you're playing, this definitely isn't the game for you. This game was built off of FFXI to an extent and it was known for its versatility in what you can play on one character. This game is taking a lot already from WoW and other MMOs, but that's one feature this game doesn't need.

[AceofRains]

Okay addressing the topic.

The armory system makes it really easy to switch jobs on the fly as I'm sure we've already established this. I find no need to go to a moogle to change my job as in XI, it is just an extra time consuming step, especially in a game that encourages you to play more than one role.

Why more than one role?
While I get that there are some people who like to play just one job, they simply can not expect to get the role every time with that attitude. Take league of legends for instance. 5 roles on the field, often times rather than being versatile, people claim one role at queue and complain if they don't get it. That game encourages you to play different champions and you can not participate in ranked matches without at least 16. Even if your interested in a particular role and accept responsibly if you want to get a task done. Which ever role you play the end result of the battle will probably yield the same rewards.

What I'm saying is that in a game where multiple roles are encouraged, you're better off taking fancy to more than just your favorite because you are not the only one playing and roles will get filled before you.

OP, why are you so concerned with being unique from other players? Your experience with the game will vary socially and with what jobs you decide to take up first. Locking people to one role per discipline isn't going to create uniqueness, it will just create the pain in the ass of having to switch characters for a new job. At the end of leveling yes, all character will pretty much look the same but that goes for ANY game you play.

What I'm saying here is pretty much the sky is the limit, and how you get there is going to vary from everyone else.

[Lux_Rayna]

I may not speak for everyone when I clarify this for you, but I can personally say that's not the way we're talking about lack of uniqueness. As it stands now, any given class or job does not have it's OWN uniqueness. Yes, they have started to address this when the Job's came out, but it still bugs me that I have aero as a whm, but no banish.

The concept that you can "fluff" your skills by pulling a few skills from your primary "classes" is silly. Jobs are lacking massive amounts of skills and spells imo. Yes, I'm about to compare FFXIV to XI:

This would kinda be the problem. Just stop doing that. This is not XI. For the love of god we understand as FF fans that every successive game is a lot different than the last. Why should XI and XIV be an exception? I didnt play FF8 and bitch and moan about how there's no omnislash, no knights of the round, and that shit was generally different. The same with XI, with X, with all of them really. Why oh why MUST you compare them? This is assuming, of course, that you are an FF fan. If you're not I totally understand why you're doing what you're doing.


I can count the number of times my WHM had Banish in Final Fantasy....on one hand. Probably less than that. I can't speak for the early early titles since i didnt play them, but I dont remember Banish in 7, 8, 9, 10, X-2, or XIII. Jus sayin. Not so sure about XIII as I never finished it.

So why should you have Banish now? Im just curious. XIV WHMs =/= XI WHMs...its a totally different story, in a totally different place, with totally different lore. Maybe you just learn Banish later, maybe not at all. Maybe its a beastmen Shaman thing, or maybe Banish belongs to Red Mages (if we get them). I mean seriously, this is not FFXI.

[darkm0d]

So why should you have Banish now? Im just curious. XIV WHMs =/= XI WHMs...its a totally different story, in a totally different place, with totally different lore. Maybe you just learn Banish later, maybe not at all. Maybe its a beastmen Shaman thing, or maybe Banish belongs to Red Mages (if we get them). I mean seriously, this is not FFXI.

I consider it unfortunate that there is little room to discuss things like this when people take such an offended stance at someone bringing up points from a game that is directly related to this one. Yes, you can bring up plenty of points about WHM's from other titles, but for the purpose of this discussion, XI's is the most practical.

But, as I said, there is no discussion to be had. This isn't about turning XIV into XI, it's about not ignoring what made that game as fun as it was, which is, in large what caused such a problem with XIV's release (at least for those who are major fan's and could ignore the interface / input / glitch issues).

[odintius]

I love being able to switch jobs on one character two thing though. 1. Inventory with that many jobs will add up over time making forums wanting more inventory space for the game life span and making mules just like ffxi but will cost 3$ just to have them etc. 2. Again equipment people will want the same gear since they can be whatever job making it a headache to some people getting that gear when a whm will lot on a pld gear for example.

But I say as a community when you go to raid/instance whatever you make a list say whoever started the party or link shell event on what that player wants as a drop for one particular job they ask for! Though a drop can be something that no one lot for and that can be free lot. For inventory space that a battle will always be in play but I still like being able to be any job....

[Renen]

This would kinda be the problem. Just stop doing that. This is not XI. For the love of god we understand as FF fans that every successive game is a lot different than the last. Why should XI and XIV be an exception? I didnt play FF8 and bitch and moan about how there's no omnislash, no knights of the round, and that shit was generally different. The same with XI, with X, with all of them really. Why oh why MUST you compare them? This is assuming, of course, that you are an FF fan. If you're not I totally understand why you're doing what you're doing.


I can count the number of times my WHM had Banish in Final Fantasy....on one hand. Probably less than that. I can't speak for the early early titles since i didnt play them, but I dont remember Banish in 7, 8, 9, 10, X-2, or XIII. Jus sayin. Not so sure about XIII as I never finished it.

So why should you have Banish now? Im just curious. XIV WHMs =/= XI WHMs...its a totally different story, in a totally different place, with totally different lore. Maybe you just learn Banish later, maybe not at all. Maybe its a beastmen Shaman thing, or maybe Banish belongs to Red Mages (if we get them). I mean seriously, this is not FFXI.

I think you got his post wrong. He wasnt REALLY comparing the game to 11, he was saying that the amount of skills that are actually unique is too damn low.

Meaning that in 11, a WHM had many skills that no one else had, while here, the only things u get as a WHM (and use often) can be counted on one hand.

You know how ppl run Ifrit with 2 whm? I had run ifrit with no WHM, and just had 2 THM spam cure. We actually won. Granted, because the THM were good, and knew how to do it, but still...
Not counting the Class skills, there is only 2 WHM (out of 5) skills that I use often: Regen and Presence of Mind.
Kinda makes WHM not worth it, if I only get 2 useful skills off it

@OP topic, I like having 1 char that can do everything. When I started playing other MMOs after i stopped with FF11 (being my 1st one) the 1st thing I had to get over, is why on earth they ask us to have different chars for different jobs.
Its like having a separate email for every person you want to email.