[dev1002] FFXIV Beast Mode

[Atma]

I can't find anywhere in this thread where I said this should be a "As soon as possible" or "oh my god, we need to get this game fixed yesterday" implementation.

That's true, however it in no way alters my assertion. To clarify, if this is not something intended to be pitched as something for "recent content", then by the time it reaches something that might be feasible, it will have been forgotten. Thus, discussing it now is, effectively, pointless.

As far as "The majority of MMO players..." go: I doubt one person has the wisdom or capability to speak on their behalf

In most capacities, this is a true statement. However, I think you're pushing it to disagree that "The majority of MMO players are very attached to their avatar." If this wasn't a true statement, games wouldn't need character creation processes like FFXIV, games like WOW wouldn't need a barber shop, and people would not have raised a 3000 post tirade when they reduced the size of Orc shoulder pads by 15%. Games would not need options to hide one's cloak or helmet, and most have these (FFXIV is working on implementing it at this moment). Sorry, but no. The majority of MMO players DO care about their avatar's appearance, and if they didn't, we'd have have about 10 fixed avatar appearance options in FFXIV - and believe me, this would save on system resources immensely. The reason we have CHOICE is because it's something people CARE about.

Let the Devs decide how and when to best implement this concept.

As someone who purchased the game and is eagerly awaiting changes to see if they can make it worth coming back to, I reserve the right to post with my opinions. Based on your other posts in the thread, it is quite clear that you are only interested in hearing the opinions of people who agree with you that this is a "cool idea.", or finding ways to attack those who don't. You are visibly disinterested in entertaining even the slightest notion that the game is not ready for you idea, or that the idea just doesn't fit into the game.

So, I'll throw it out just a few major flaws in your idea, and let you reconcile them:

Attunement will increase while the transformation is active and player engaged in combat. Every minute the attunement will increase.

How does this addressed during solo gameplay, such as when running between spawn points, getting to combat areas, etc? Is the "morpher" just up a crick if they get ambushed unprepared? Do I spend the majority of that spawn point just building up to where I'm effective, only to lose that edge as soon as I have to move on? What happens if I switch forms, do I start over? What limits my time transformed? How is this class balanced so that it is not just better then everyone else at high levels of "attunement" and worse then everyone else at low levels of attunement?

There will be a rage meter.
The rage meter will Fill based on it's Mode.

Why is there a need for a "rage bar" when you already have a time in combat measured mechanic?

There will be several Modes:
-Defender: rage meter fills when you take damage.
-Reaver: rage meter fills when you give damage.
-Lunatic(available only to highly attuned forms): liken to defender yet applies to damage any party member takes.
-Angst(available only to highly attuned forms): liken to Reaver yet applies to damages any party member gives.

The rage meter will begin to deplete once the player has transformed.

What does this rage meter even do? What is it's purpose? How much UI work is required to implement a "variable mode rage bar"? It depletes when I am transformed, yet I have to have high attunement, aka "be transformed" to possibly get to the higher tiers? Do you know that balancing your "Lunatic" and "Angst" concepts is realistically impossible, due to the fact that every party is different, buffs will vary, etc?

There will be two modes of stance: standing(biPed) and all fours(quadPed). The player will be able to switch between these at will.

What mechanical purpose does this intend to serve? Considering that you are placing two or three times the burden on the art team at this point, it needs to be a significant aspect of the class, not just "oh I thought it was cool"

As the players attunement increases: various aspects of the form will change.
The form will become bigger and bulky if the players actions during attunement are more defensive.

The form will become more muscled and remain slender if the players actions during attunement are more offensive.

Ok, so now just to have you on my screen, I need to have anywhere between, hypothetically, 8 and 16 forms cached. assuming there's, just to pick a random number, 4 levels for each, then I need biped and quadruped versions of each. Every single one of those meshes and textures needs to be cached to allow for any form of seamless transition between them, otherwise you'll disappear, or you'll force disk reads in the middle of combat situations, which is something that should be avoided in every case even possible. This is a large amount of data for a single class to be caching, in a game that is already intense on system resources. How do you possibly rectify this with the PS3 version? How do you reconcile such a major investment of the art team for a single, high level, hard to access class?

Basically, at the end of the day, the depth of your post amounts to "I think it'd be cool to have a class that can transform into monsters!"

[Sasanctus]

I've skimmed through most of this thread and have not seen anything that makes me think this would work as a job in the current concept, you need to simplify it down. I think drop transforming into mobs altogether and just stick to a few hybrid skins unlocked via quests. It should start out as a mage class before transforming so you'll need to work out some spells for it that are unique. After transformation you are now a melee, so for this to be an advanges it would have to be faster than switching weapons. The only other thing I can think of to help this would be to have each transformation deal different kinds of damage (piercing, blunt etc). But is that enough? probably not and seeing there a big blu mage following I think giving it monsters skills and abillities is a bad idea. There is potiencial for this as a class/job and to be able to instant switch between magic and melee is appealing but both side of this class/job would need to bring something new to the table or they will be taking another class/jobs possible spot.

Edit: Thought about it little more, this might work well as a buff class with the mage buffs before transformation and Melee buffs after trasformation and dictated based on which damage type form you have taken. Basically a close combat Corsair this would also give you a reason to turn back to your orginal form aswell.
Oh and if you want to be on all fours then that should just be the run animation while transformed nothing else.

[Zaireeka2025]

After reading each and every post on this thread, it seems Atma has made the most sense out of all of this. I am totally against the OP's original concept and agree that he/she is just pushing for something they think would be "so cool!" Even after the concept changed from "everyone turns into beasts!" (ugh) to "only beastmasters turn into beasts!" I just couldn't envision anything like it. In my opinion it's full of cheese and needs to stay in games like PSU or Pokemon.

What I can envision is something more along the lines of the ability to have a Summoner trade places with their summon thereby letting the player control/become the summoned avatar. I'm all for pet classes and all, but this OP seems to be fueled by self-righteous ambitions for a poorly thought-out pubescant concept.