Thief>Ninja/Dancer Class/Job

[Kitru]

Small note on the Pilfer/giltoss combo level up.

If the Mug Trait is gained first, you could go Mug -> Gil Toss -> Pilfer.

It's not perfect, but if it's early enough you could get away with a usless mug trait for 1 level until you get the Gil Toss on the next level?

Eh, I think I'd rather just have Pilfer and Gil Toss provided at the same time. Based upon the "standard" levels abilities are gained, the earliest traits are at level 8, which is later than I'd want Pilfer/Gil Toss to be provided. The best way would probably be to provide them both sometime between 4-8, and then provide Mug at 16 or 24.

Also, was Quick Stab -> Flurry supposed to be a two shot combo only? I meant to ask that before but I think I got distracted.

Yes, it is. Both Flurry and Cheap Shot are supposed to be t2 combos. Eviscerate is the only t3 combo.

[Tzain]

Yes, it is. Both Flurry and Cheap Shot are supposed to be t2 combos. Eviscerate is the only t3 combo.

That's a little awkward. Both your potentially best "openers" (Flurry and Ambush) cant be used as openers. You have to throw away either a Quick Stab or a Backstab just to get the buffs up that make them better.

Also, I just noticed that there is no Slow/Stun/Silence to be found on the entire class? (Or am I blind/distracted and just totally missed it)

[Exstal]

Sneaky melee fits Thief more than Ninja. The only game Ninja could even stealth in was Tactics and even then it didn't' have a back attack. Thief however does have a backstab attack and stealth in a game and is a far more cunning and sneaky Job than ninja ever was.

I remember a time when Thief could use stealth and back attacks. Oh wait, that was *once*.

For proofs

Hide (かくれる, Kakureru?) is a recurring ability usually associated with the Bard class.

- Only place this isn't true? Final Fantasy XI where they gave it to Thief

First Strike (せんせいこうげき, Sensei Kōgeki?) or (さきがけ, Sakigake?), also known as Initiative, Preemptive Strike, Surprise or Hamedo (ハメドる, Hamedoru?),

-Pretty much the exact opposite of a back attack in traditional turn base. Who normally gets this skill? Ninja. Where is this not true? Final Fantasy XI and X-2 (where Ninja was not included).

[Calypsx]

The only argument that I ever see for THF to be a job instead of a class is the same one you've given here: because people are emotionally attached to the idea of THF being on the same level as all of the other jobs.

Doesn't mean it can't be strong in this one, there are games where THF is a good Job.

You know what Job also sucked WORSE than Thief? Scholar in FF3, it's still it's own Job though this time around. Scholar was tweaked to be stronger than it was in the first game it appeared in, no reason Thief can't be. Thief is a more iconic Job in the series than Ninja is. It doesn't matter how "effective" they were, the image of Thief still matters to people. Scholar was my favorite job in FF3 even though it sucked, I enjoyed their costume and I liked the fact that it could use books and double the efficiency of items even though compared to other Jobs it was majorly outclassed. Scholar was useless outside of one minor boss.

Efficiency doesn't matter in an online game where things can be tweaked to be viable. Aesthetics matter to people as well. People are going to eat a job like Dark Knight up because well, it's a Dark Knight.

So don't write off emotional attachment, it's still pretty damn important when it comes to representation. FFIX is a popular game among the fan base as well and it's protagonist is a Thief.

A win win? Make Assassin turn into Samurai/Ninja with it's own expansion that fits the lore and location. While having Rogue/Scout turn into Thief/Dancer. With Ninja/Samurai using Katana's, and Dancer/Thief using Daggers. That way you don't end up pissing off a sizable group of people.

[Nahara]

The problem with this is that, in all cases, the Ninja magic and throwing weapons that Ninjas get have always been secondary functionality. The primary damage mechanism of a Ninja has *always* been straight up stabbing people. Building a Ninja class/job around throwing/magic would be like building DRG around *only* jumping or building PLD as a healer role.

I see where you're coming from with this, but disagree with it. One of the reasons Scholar could be what it is in XIV is because it really doesn't have a special identity or mechanic that's unique to the job. Dragoons have always been about their special Jump attack and it's not too hard to build a class around their preferred weapon: the polearm, which they did. Paladins have always been pretty tanky and have had the unique Cover ability and it's not too hard to build a class around their iconic sword and board style, which they did.

The Ninja's unique abilities have always been Throw and Ninjutsu, and if you take a bit of liberty with mechanical presentation (seriously, people, Bard isn't that bad), a class that focuses on throwing weapons and a healthy mix of "straight out of Batman's utility belt" abilities seems like a reasonable fit.

[Kitru]

You know what Job also sucked WORSE than Thief? Scholar in FF3, it's still it's own Job though this time around.

SCH is its own job in FFXIV not because of the merits of the job historically but because of the need for the game to have a second designated healer. Throughout the entire FF series, there's really only been a single healer job. Some classes have had *minor* healing capability, but it's only ever been a small part of their overall capabilities. SCH was chosen largely because it *didn't* have a strong (or even *cohesive) historical presence so there wasn't anything preventing them from creating something from whole cloth. Scholar wasn't "buffed" to be turned into SCH; SCH was made without any historical input from Scholar whatsoever.

Thief is a more iconic Job in the series than Ninja is.

It depends heavily upon how you define "iconic". If you want to go based off of the number of appearances in mainstream games, Ninja is just as iconic as Thief is: it's in I, III, IV (Edge is a Ninja, not a Thief), V, VI, VII (Yuffie is a Ninja, not a Thief), XI, and all 3 Tactics games (I'm not counting Amarant in IX because he's more of a MNK than a NIN). Thief is in I, III, V, VI, IX, X/X-2, XI, and all 3 Tactics games.

If you want to use some other less quantifiable definition of "iconic", you're once again getting into the realm of making a decision before you even start. The whole "thief is more iconic than ninja" argument gets really old, really fast, especially since there isn't actually all that much support for it.

A win win? Make Assassin turn into Samurai/Ninja with it's own expansion that fits the lore and location. While having Rogue/Scout turn into Thief/Dancer. With Ninja/Samurai using Katana's, and Dancer/Thief using Daggers. That way you don't end up pissing off a sizable group of people.

That would only be a win/win if you only care about getting the jobs, not actually getting the jobs without those jobs sucking or having them adhere to the appropriate model. NIN and SAM should *never* come from the same class: class defines fundamental playstyle and those two classes should *never* use the same fundamental combat style. It doesn't help that SAM should be using heavy armor and literal Katana whereas NIN should be using light armor and Ninja Blades (the split that XI used for Katana and Great Katana was idiotic; it should have been Ninja Blades and Katana, not both being Katana).

The only common link between Samurai and Ninja is that they are Japanese cultural archetypes instead of Western archetypes, and the geographical origin of the archetype is *not* a reasonable method for linking them. They're diametrically opposed in their actual mannerisms/style. It would be like having Knight and Thief be based off of the same class because they're both Western archetypes.

What you're suggesting here isn't a win/win but an "I want Thief to be its own job and I don't care how mutilated Ninja ends up being". There *isn't* a win-win that doesn't break the devs' rule about only bringing in classes/jobs to fill specific niches or obliterate Ninja to assuage the people that love Thief. The devs are basically having to choose between making Thief its own job with Ninja excluded (doing so have it would cover too much of the same ground unless you have to go in a direction so different from what people expect that it's nothing like what they expect) or making Thief the class and Ninja the job.

Keep in mind, there are also people that are emotionally attached to the concept of Ninja. Mutilating their construct just to make sure it doesn't impose upon what THF does is only going to piss *them* off. The emotional argument cuts both ways.

[Kitru]

The Ninja's unique abilities have always been Throw and Ninjutsu, and if you take a bit of liberty with mechanical presentation (seriously, people, Bard isn't that bad), a class that focuses on throwing weapons and a healthy mix of "straight out of Batman's utility belt" abilities seems like a reasonable fit.

Your suggestion is more than a "bit of liberty". Ninja has always been a fundamentally melee class (there is a *single* exception: Yuffie in VII), and, honestly, that's what people expect out of it. If you make it into a job where all it does is mimic Naruto (throwing oversized shuriken, for the aesthetic, and casting ninja magic), it's not going to be the FF Ninja, which is what people want.

Like I've said before, just because you *can* come up with a way for THF and NIN to coexist as jobs doesn't mean that it's the best implementation or even a remotely *sensible* implementation. The devs have to play triage with what classes they're adding which means that they're going to have to implement the jobs that fill the most appropriate niches. If you mutilate the Ninja archetype such that it doesn't create redundancies with Thief, it stops being an important niche to fill. Honestly ask yourself what you could see the developers implementing before they got to "DPS built around throwing weapons". Pretty much every *other* class idea you could come up with would take precedence, including Blue Mage which presents all *kinds* of design challenges.

The "win-win" scenarios that people keep coming up with aren't "win-win" because they turn Ninja into a bottom of the barrel class design while giving Thief incredibly import. The devs are *not* going to implement absolutely every job; they're only going to implement the jobs that they think work the best and a NIN that throws and uses some arbitrary magic isn't going to be a job that justifies the work. Think about this: if the developers hadn't developed WAR, do you think they'd be more likely to implement blue mage or warrior first?

[Calypsx]

The "win-win" scenarios that people keep coming up with aren't "win-win" because they turn Ninja into a bottom of the barrel class design while giving Thief incredibly import. The devs are *not* going to implement absolutely every job; they're only going to implement the jobs that they think work the best and a NIN that throws and uses some arbitrary magic isn't going to be a job that justifies the work. Think about this: if the developers hadn't developed WAR, do you think they'd be more likely to implement blue mage or warrior first?

Bottom of the barrel class design? A unique Job that has traits that isn't seen much in other RPG games is "Bottom of the barrel class design"? What are you going on about, everything he said sounded pretty unique and original to me, while emphasizing the key things that made Ninja unique.

I even suggested it uses Katana's and swords like it's usually seen using instead of Daggers which it rarely uses effectively, how is that mutilation of the Job?

At this point, it makes it seems like any idea's that aren't yours are considered bottom of the barrel class ideas. Your argument isn't fair at all. Don't dismiss others idea's as bottom of the barrel because they don't fit your ideals.

No one is saying they don't want Ninja to exist, they just want it to coexist with Thief while being an original job that follows the abilities it has had in the past.

[Calypsx]

Keep in mind, there are also people that are emotionally attached to the concept of Ninja. Mutilating their construct just to make sure it doesn't impose upon what THF does is only going to piss *them* off. The emotional argument cuts both ways.

Sorry, this is outright amusing to me. You think a few Ninja idea's and suggestions are "mutilating" the job.

However you outright want to REMOVE the Thief job from ever possibly existing in the game. Guess who's really "mutilating" a job? You.

Your ideals are far more extreme than a suggestion that Ninja uses throwing weapons or use Katana's instead of Daggers. In your ideal world, Ninja will exist, and Thief will not. That sounds far more like a extreme form of "mutilation" towards Thief than anything that has been suggested for Ninja.

[Kitru]

So you pretty much want to remove Thief because you like Ninja more,

No, I think that, if the devs are going to include Ninja, it's going to come at the cost of Thief turning into a class instead of getting to be a job. If the devs decide to *not* include Ninja, I fully expect Thief to be a job in and of itself. Even then, Thief is going to be no more "removed" than Archer is removed, and Archer is a very fundamental archetype and has a strong presence in the game.

when what I suggested will still make Ninja fight like it always has. With Katana's, Ninjutsu, and agile attacks. While Thieves get to stick to their daggers and stealing based abilities.

First off, Ninja has not always been a katana wielding class and, quite often, ends up not using them when there is actually someone who fits the samurai archetype around. When ninja blades and katana can be conflated without issue, ninja ends up using katana, mainly because the term has a more interesting flavor. When you have multiple Asian themed classes, on the other hand, Ninja uses Ninja blades. Let's go over the gear stuffs...

• FFI: Thief uses Daggers and Ninja uses basically everything.
• FFIII: Ninja is the only Asian-themed class and uses daggers as well as katana; katana are Ninja exclusive
• FFIV: Edge is a Ninja that also has Steal and the only other Asian-themed character is a monk; he uses daggers, katana, and, originally, claws
• FFV: has both Ninja and Samurai; Ninja do not use katana and, in fact, use only daggers and short swords; Samurai are the only ones that get katana
• FFVI: Shadow is a Ninja; Cyan is a Samurai; Shadow has access to daggers and ninja daggers, which are unique to him; Cyan gets katana, which are unique to him
• FFVII: Yuffie is a Ninja but only Cloud gets the katana
• FFIX: there isn't a ninja, but Zidane gets to use the only asian-themed weapons, Masamune, but it's a Thief Sword so it's in a weird category all on its own
• FFX: Rikku is the thief/ninja, Auron is the samurai/knight; Auron uses the katana
• FFXI: Ninja and Samurai both exist; "katana" are one handed weapons used in a reverse grip, completely unlike actual katana; "great katana" are actually katana
• FFXII: Ninja Blades and Katana are completely separate weapon categories; Ninja Blades are braces of weapons wielded in reverse grip; Katana are wielded in 2 hands; in the rerelease job system, the "ninja" class uses daggers and ninja blades while the "samurai" class uses katana

Take a serious look at that list. The only time that ninja uses katana is when there isn't a samurai around, and, more often than not, they end up using daggers and ninja blades, which are basically just upgraded daggers. Furthermore, the only times that Ninja gets its own brand of magic is in IV, IX, FFTA, and FFTA2.

If you want to talk about "fighting like it always has", Ninja is going to be about stabbing things in the back with daggers and ninja blades.

Also Thief is more iconic, it has protagonist that's a thief. Ninja has side characters, but never had a ninja main character. Both are pretty damn iconic, but Zidane is a pretty damn popular character.

Your entire description of iconic is based off of a single instance where the thief is the main character. Tidus was a Time Mage, does that mean Time Mage is more iconic than Black Mage, since there are no Black Mage main characters? On top of this, a lot of what makes Zidane a main character diverges *heavily* from the traditional Thief model: he has a cover variant, he isn't even remotely squishy, and he uses weapons that are quite often the strongest around. He actually gets the Ultima Weapon and his penultimate weapon is actually stronger than the ultimate weapons of everyone but Steiner. Zidane doesn't even use an appearance that remotely resembles the traditional thief.

Ninja and Thief are equally iconic, which is where much of the problem stems from.

I said Ninjas will keep everything they could do in the past, Ninjutsu, Katana's, and throwing weapons. Nothing "Obliterated" by Theif existing and being a sneaky Dagger based stealing job.

Except that you're having ninja lose access to daggers and actually stabbing things, which is what it spend a vast majority of its time doing. Having Ninja be built exclusively around throwing and the relatively recent Ninjutsu without making them a highly proficient melee fighter would be like making it so that Thief can *only* Steal things and run away or that Paladin can *only* Cover and use some weak White Magic.

It doesn't cut both ways, you're just being petty. You don't have to outright remove a Job because you can't think of ways it can be different. Both Thief and Ninja should exist as their own separate jobs.

Seriously? You *don't* think that people that are emotionally attached to the FF Ninja tradition would be deeply perturbed if Ninja ended up *only* throwing things and attacking with magic? It *does* cut both ways. People expect certain things about Ninja just like they expect certain things about Thief. The difference is that the expectation of THF is that it should be a job on par with BLM, WHM, WAR, and PLD whereas the expectation of NIN is that it should be the almost-entirely-melee combatant that it has pretty much always been.

Also, bringing Thief in as a class instead of a job isn't "removing it" like you keep repeating to yourself. It's including it in a less important place. If you want to claim that Thief would be "removed", you'd have to also claim that Archer/Ranger isn't represented in ARR.

The developers have slowly developed Thief and Ninja to be two VERY different jobs over the years, they should take advantage of it, not remove one or the other.

Not really... Did you actually go and look at the implementations of the classes or just say it because you see Thief and Ninja in the same games without actually looking at them? Thief and Ninja are only different in FFXI. In every other implementation, they're so similar its almost dumbfounding.

Oh and btw, no reason Samurai and Ninja can't wear different armor after the job change. Yoshi did say he can change these kind of things if needed, like with Dark Knight.

It's not as much about the armor as it is about the combat style (armor is still a factor though). A NIN and a SAM are *not* going to use their attacks in the same way, nor would it make sense for them to share a *vast* majority of their abilities. Seriously, imagine THF and WAR having the same base class: it wouldn't work. The only reason you can come up with for the two to be based off of the same class is because of the shared Japanese origin, which is a painfully flimsy reason.

Also, Yoshi said that they could change the secondary attributes of attacks (e.g. remove the high enmity modifiers from GLA attacks) and insinuated that they could change other attributes about the attacks as well. The difference between SAM and NIN would be so stark that you could just as easily make an entirely new class (which would honestly make more sense).

Do you even *think* about your "compromises" or simply assume that, as long as you get THF as a job, it doesn't matter how absurd the implementation for anything else would be?