Are cracks in the Armoury System beginning to surface?

[Betelgeuzah]

Hell, they will tone down on the cross-classing skills. At that point the only "imbalance" is being able to change classes, but that works as intended. There can be content for those with one class (casuals) and those with multiple classes. In single-class only events you are locked to one class, in other content you are free to switch. The former gives intermediate rewards for less effort while the latter gives the best rewards for more effort.

[Thanos]

regardless if they make content for casual players or not the players with multiple abilities will rule them thus causing more QQing from the players who refuses to put more time into ranking another class for their abilities.

[Charismatic]

Should people be rewarded proportionately for the time they've invested?

Yes.

I'd say no.
Proportionately? No, very no.

Should players be rewarded for their extra time and effort? Yes, but see... there's a reason for level caps, there's a reason for a maximum number of action points, there's a reason for EXP curves. It's supposed to get tougher to get better as time goes on. The benefit of leveling extra classes should be there but it shouldn't be so huge that you get a situation where one Gladiator beats the pants off of another simply by having leveled other classes. There should be an advantage, I think we're all in agreement about that much but the real question is just how much of an advantage should there be? I just don't think most are going to see eye-to-eye on this one though.

[Malakhim]

I beg to differ.

Players who play more are rewarded by having more fun play time.

The fact of the matter is that a person who practices or does something for a longer period of time is going to have an edge over a new player in ANY setting, and being that part of the fun in RPGs is character progression and being able to build your own character as you see fit, it is only natural(and should be accepted) that people are going to be left behind if they don't step up their game.

Through the introduction of guildleves, behests, and other quests, it is possible for "casual" players to avoid being left behind by virtue of having faster methods of ranking up, not by limiting the experience of the more "hardcore" players. To tank effectively as a GLD you need MRD or PUG abilities? No sweat, grab a few leves, do a few behests, and in a few hours(unavoidable) you're at rank 20. That's the kind of balance that Yoshi P and other MMO devs should be aiming for: A way to get the casuals up there without ruining the fun experiences of the more "hardcore" crowd.

Also seriously guys? If you're worried about elitism, find or START your own LS that is more about community than min-maxing, or at the very least a group that's accepting of whatever within reason. These people DO exist. I'm in one of those LS right now. I can't stand elitism and pretty much have a "don't play with assholes" policy active at all times. Not hard to do.

[Betelgeuzah]

If a person refuses to level another class to some point (25-30) to enhance his main class he isn't worth listening to. Simple.

[Jobeto-Rin]

The problem is that it will eventually lead to people having to level things to not be considered gimp. For example say god forbid a skill like Utsusemi comes along in FFXIV, it won't matter what Class it is on or what Rank it is, you will be expected to have it. People moaned about having to go /NIN in FFXI and in FFXIV that could very well be 10x worse for the amount of time needed to get those skills and abilities.

However at least in FFXI there was balance within the Jobs/Classes for the most part if I had levelled every Job to Cap that did not give me a huge advantage over someone stood next to me with the same Job/Sub Job, we both had access to the same skills and abilities and it was gear and skill that was the difference maker.

This is why I am not and have never been a fan of the Armoury System as unless SE can get it balanced it will just create and army of over powered Classes with those elite builds while a newer player will have even more work to do to try and catch up. Just getting there Class to R50 will not be enough, they will also have to level another load of Classes just to be effective, the coming Job system will have to give huge benefits to using those Jobs to make them even worthwhile using over the power that cross classing can bring.

Really... a player shouldn't expect you to be good at whatever job you have in a specific manner. As long as they're tanking/healing/DD efficiently, there shouldn't be complaining about what skills your using to do so (in a perfect world).

But other than that if SE tried to balance this, they would have to forcibly entail:

1. Not much character improvement through cross classing.

or

2. Removing the difficulty from content down a notch so more linear characters can still feel as useful.

Doing either of those takes away from the game, and now my time invested feels little to nothing. Not really good choices.

[Kensei]

AlexiaKidd I think you have a point. I can see both sides. Obviously someone who ranked up multiple jobs earned the reward of having more skills and abilities to pick from. However, I think the gap in effectiveness is unfair right now. Someone who only ranked GLA shouldn't be at that big of a disadvantage. The way things are now the difference is incredible. I would go as far as to say that a GLA who hasn't acquired a certain other skills from other classes shouldn't tank at all in the current game and that has to change.

We do have to consider the jobs, from what I read they made it seem like a Paladin wouldn't be able to use cross-class skills and would be able to tank far better than GLA. We will have to wait and see.

[Kobushi]

i agree for the most part that a player should be rewarded by being stronger for investing more time leveling diferent classes, but on the other hand i personaly don't like this system we have now where everyone can use pretty much every skill i mean theres really no challenge in lvling a Con to rank 20 and that means everyone who hits 14 has the ability to cast cure and raise everyone. Sure it's usefull and all but it takes away a little of a class specific speciality when it can be used by everyone in the world so easly.
I would agree with either making more skills class specific or increasing the cost to be equiped by other classes

[Bethor]

Well the reduction in duration and effiency is the hint on it at the moment. It's a nice idea to rise the AP cost if you're cross-skilling.
So you can't equip Second Wind, Bloodbath, Ferocity & Co. You only get Second Wind OR Ferocity or something =D.

You would be forced to choose wisely, regarding your playing style. But we'll see what comes in the future and esp. the new job system :O

[AdvancedWind]

If a person refuses to level another class to some point (25-30) to enhance his main class he isn't worth listening to. Simple.

Wait, what.

Now we're going really overboard aren't we?