New Classes and Bard, the need for a second job.

[Firesped]

I have great concerns for the addition of new classes to the game when it comes to semi support/DPS jobs.

Jobs give 2 things to the class that bring it into an end game role. The job soul, gives a stat boost to all stats of +10. The second thing is the abilities that make up its identity. For instance, Monk gives Pugilist many weapon skills needed in order to properly play the class for it's rotations.

The issue with Bard, is that the abilities that Bard gains from the job are all songs except for 1 aoe weapon skill. They are not needed to play the class/job in a DPS role. They are only needed for it in a support role. As new classes come into the game, more cross-class skills become available. While Bard will not benefit from this. the class Archer will benefit from selecting 10 of the best cross class skills from all classes.

So even with the loss of the attributes gained from the Job Soul, Archer may be found to be better then other jobs.

I feel that Archer should get another job added that is a more strict DPS role, perhaps that specializes more in the AoE aspect. This also goes for any other class that has a support dps job. It should also get a dps job as well.

[Nalien]

When the existing Classes get secondary Jobs, they better make it a more profound difference than Summoner/Scholar. I made an example of Archer and Conjurer in Beta, effectively they should take some of the base Classes abilities, and make them differ depending on the Job, which effectively acts as a role switch with 2 Jobs.

So, Archer could go to Bard and Ranger. In place of Swiftsong, Ranger gets a DPS focuses ability. In place of something like Strait Shot, Bard could get a combo off Heavy Shot which restores MP. Working it like that, Ranger is a ranged DPS, and Bard can become a more pure support Job, lack of MP recovery and Songs is the only reason I feel Bard is more DPS than support currently. It could turn some of Archers abilities into additional Songs or means to recover MP to continue keeping Songs up. For Conjurer, Cure, Cure II and Cure III could all be replaced with Water if the second Job is Geomancer.

I guess the precedent is already there with Summoner and Scholar, since Summon and Summon II differ already, but that's no where near on the scale of what I suggested. Would be nice if they did something like this to make Jobs much more supporty...

[Surian]

They simply shouldnt make "jobs" be upgrades, more side-grades. Giving the job crystal a Stat+10 boost was the most terrible thing they could have done... :/

Why couldnt Gladiator for instance be a full fledged job? I remember loving it in Tactics. Yet in XIV it's demoted to simply being a requirement for Paladin, not suitable or used in any other way.

Archer too could have been great. Yet classes stop getting abilities past level 30. They could have easily let those be "replaced" by the job abilities.

They brag everywhere that they have 17 diffirent combat disciplines to play. Yet out of those 17, only 9 actually get used. That's just a massive waste of time, effort and potential...

[Nuinn]

Why couldnt Gladiator for instance be a full fledged job? I remember loving it in Tactics. Yet in XIV it's demoted to simply being a requirement for Paladin, not suitable or used in any other way.

Archer too could have been great. Yet classes stop getting abilities past level 30. They could have easily let those be "replaced" by the job abilities.

They brag everywhere that they have 17 diffirent combat disciplines to play. Yet out of those 17, only 9 actually get used. That's just a massive waste of time, effort and potential...

Dear Carbuncle, I'm so happy that I got you :3 Now, learn to savor the time we spend together cause soon I shall go down the path of either Summoner or Scholar and you SHALL FOREVER ROT IN OBLIVION NEVER TO SEE THE LIGHT OF DAY AGAIN!!!

<thuder storm sound effects>

[Nalien]

Yet classes stop getting abilities past level 30.

What? Classes get abilities all the way to 50... Jobs only add an extra 5 (and take away 5 sub skills). Classes are meant to be more dynamic, which is something new Classes should improve. Something like Marauder is already a great example of this though, more so in PvP, Warrior is absolute trash there compared to Marauder, though if Marauder gets a second, pure DPS Job, that'll change. Then again, if they go with Marauder > Dark Knight, maybe not.

I actually like how Classes become redundant with Jobs though, it reminds me of Final Fantasy; you never got to use Black Mage again after you upgraded to Black Wizard. They've definitely dropped the ball on "Classes are for solo" concept though, really can't see more sub class skills actually fixing that much either. If they were serious about it, they could have forced it by making it so Job Crystals only get equipped when entering a party, though with reseting skills and gear options, that would frankly be annoying.

[Gormogon]

Thing about bard is that it's meant to be more of a support role than it is meant to be a DPS one. A lot of Bards don't play songs at all to help their team because they are too concern about their own damage to help manage their parties resources. Which is why I always feel grateful to join a good bards party or when they join a party I'm in. Also I do try and do all that micromanage of resource for my team when I leveled my bard.

I know some bards just want to go crazy with their numbers but Bard is not that kind of job. They did mention 2nd Jobs for classes and it's most likely that Archers second job will be more DPS oriented but for now we don't really know how they will address it.

[Shurrikhan]

What? Classes get abilities all the way to 50... Jobs only add an extra 5 (and take away 5 sub skills). Classes are meant to be more dynamic, which is something new Classes should improve.

They've definitely dropped the ball on "Classes are for solo" concept though, really can't see more sub class skills actually fixing that much either.

Class viability would probably only need traits that are more alike to mechanics (Freecure, River of Blood, etc.) and the ability to cross-trait another trait or two as a class. That said, that would require that more than a couple classes have unique mechanics outside of their default spells...
...which may be for the better, but is generally a pain to rebalance.

Even if these mechanics weren't worked in, the abilities will still be incredibly dull, but at least a Lancer could have reason to use Archer abilities at a 18s Venomous Bite and 20s Straight Shot, or the 2-min CD Raging Strikes, or a Pugilist the trait-enhanced 30-second Fracture. That said, an Archer could probably rip things to shreds with a 30% Internal Release, for better or worse...

(I also wouldn't mind seeing Skullsplitter and Savage Blade having a starting potency of around 130 to 150, as to be viable for DRG and Monk snap-tanking, being able to combo from each other, in case one wanted, for whatever silly reason, to be able to use two non-delayed high-enmity moves in a row (as opposed to the delayed RoH and BB), or even become a possible 4-combo at higher average TP cost per enmity (TP cost increase during such a combo... but whatever.)

[Shurrikhan]

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I think the only major concern here is whether the two jobs can feel distinct when varied only by 5 abilities and will most likely sharing the same role. (Our remaining classes are unlikely to shift role, as they will either be bogged down with too many conflicting CDs (tanks), or are dependent on offensive cast upkeep for any unique advantage (BLM if it were to ever become a healer); many dps are also just too lightly armored to become tanks, leaving this possibility only to LCRs and PGLs, unless ARC were to suddenly pick up a pet aspect for potential tanking, which would still leave it short of the dps afforded to 'pure' dps.

Just as an example, even with Lustrate, Leeches, Sacred Soil, Adloquiem, Succor, Whispering Dawn, and Fey Covenant are all strong healer abilities, Scholar still remains a healer only because and according to the frequency by which it stops using its dps abilities. (Of course, the same would likely be said of any dps class stemming from Conjurer, and I would probably have the same faint disappointment there too.) And without the pet mechanic that helps to differ Scholar and Summoner, other classes will be truly limited to the 5 job abilities given, rather than Scholar's unique 9 and Summoner's pseudo-unique 14.

It doesn't help that the jobs aren't even trait-differentiable, either. The closest we get to unique 'mechanics' is in the priorities given by abilities (i.e. Fester), any unique niche granted (Scholar healing-to-shielding), and in the text of toggleables like Defiance. Outside of the last, any job-unique triggers, conditions, counters, tokens, stacks, etc. are impossible to distribute in the current system.

[xenosuke1]

i dont care what classes they add, all i want is Dancer, was my fav class from ff tactics

[Nalien]

I think the only major concern here is whether the two jobs can feel distinct when varied only by 5 abilities and will most likely sharing the same role.

Honestly, the only one I can realistically see working, is Marauder => Dark Knight (Thaumaturge sub with access to Fire/Blizzard). First ability just needs to be "Increases damage taken X%, magic damage proportional to enmity level, magic attacks shed enmity.", then it works perfectly well with Marauders enmity related abilities and creates a viable system to cast nukes (something lacking in XI). Build up enmity, nuke. Use Storm's Path combo, Foresight, ToB, pull hate and do an absolutely devastating magic attack (presumably with its version of Flare/Holy).

Pugilist => Counter based tank could work I guess, since unlike Lancer its combos aren't dependent on direction, but everything else just wouldn't work. Bard doesn't have enough of a focus on Songs to make a Ranger type Job seem different since they'd both ultimately be DPS. Gladiator has far too many defensive abilities for anything but a tank to really work, likewise Conjurer has far too much healing spells. Thaumaturge basically is Black Mage, there isn't really anything else Thaumaturge can do, at best it could enfeeble, but that would work as well as Bard does.

Given how secondary Jobs is actually something the developers have mentioned so much, I'd really love to hear from them as to how they'd actually go about it. If they plan anything like what I suggested earlier, that could make for an amazing Jobs adjustment patch. It could even make for Classes becoming more useful, strip Bard of Strait Shot, Raging Strikes, Misery's End, and Barrage (MP combo, Song, Song, same effect but for Songs instead of auto-attack) and you're not going to solo anything on that, not that you would on Bard already...

You know, maybe they could make Classes more useful by just nerfing Jobs base stats... We get a stats bonus when we're in a party, why not just nerf Jobs stats and buff that bonus substantially? On a non-tank Job without a tank in party? Enjoy getting two shotted. Would certainly do the job, but I don't think that would be a popular adjustment...