Why can't we have jobs with this level of depth and customization in FFXIV?

[atomicdeath]

It takes time for things to be developed. That's why.

been about 4 years now. This games direction is pretty much set in stone.

Casual duty finder theme park with a bunch of one shot mechanics and a gear treadmill.

[Felis]

been about 4 years now. This games direction is pretty much set in stone.

Casual duty finder theme park with a bunch of one shot mechanics and a gear treadmill.

3 years (the planning started 2011)

[Almalexia]

You need to consider two things:
- The philosophy of XIV is that every job fulfills a narrow role (DPS, tank, healer) as opposed to XI, where jobs fall on a specialist-generalist spectrum.
- PUP is very weird.

[Fated]

Like someone else said, you're talking about things that came out in FFXI after many years. The automaton in particular is from the third expansion, which means we're talking something in the neighborhood of 5 years? after release. Even then, it was still something that they had to optimize over time.

FFXIV's big problem right now is that everything is so mind numbingly straightforward. The original FFXIV ability system was highly convoluted, but it was very diverse and interesting. The change to what we have now was a major step backwards IMO. However, SE has acknowledged that there will be some changes to the ability system once the first expansion is released. Whether or not they deliver is another story, but they are at least aware.

[Sandpark]

XI lots of redundancy-ARR has lots of simplicity
XI most jobs use same interface but play differently mechanics wise-ARR most classes/jobs use same interface but play similarly mechanics wise
XI is unbalanced due to varied job mechanics-ARR is balanced due to similar job mechanics.
XI skill use mostly governed by tp/mp-ARR mostly governed by cooldown.

3 or 8 tier cures?Who cares. In one game combat is slower I have spurts of spam with more buttons/tiers & in the other combat so fast I spam all the time with less buttons/tiers. ARR feels more like playing GodOfWar than a Final Fantasy pace wise.

I'd like to see the cooldowns removed from all but each classes most powerful skills. The tp/mp cost raised to use skills & the damage raised. And some form of synergy system through whole fights. Skillchains, combos, regiment, Chrono Trigger's combos, anything. The goal should be less gauge watching, more player watching, support and beef each other up.

[GalkaBikini]

Why can't we have jobs that have this kind of customization and depth in FFXIV?

Go ask all these Puppetmasters how often they get parties.

[Risvertasashi]

Go ask all these Puppetmasters how often they get parties.

Not applicable, I'm not asking for XI's mechanics, endgame, or puppetmaster to be implemented in this game.

[Triston]

The main problem is that FFXIV is a modernized MMO with veeeery careful tuning to ensure that a well-played job performs similarly to others in its role. FFXIV also adheres very strictly to the MMO Trinity of roles, so you can't have any particular job that outclasses others.

FFXI is a very outdated MMO environment, where things are made for the sake of flavor rather than practicality. It also doesn't care one iota about the Trinity; there's nothing stopping you from forming an entirely ineffective group of jobs. (and indeed it's very LIKELY that you will if you don't carefully sculpt your alliance)
Heavily customizable content like PUP and BLU in FFXI's outdated environment is okay because people can and will make tons of varieties of builds, with vastly differing effectiveness in different situations. That's fine there, because holistically the game is 'looser,' in fight difficulty, tuning, DPS checks, etc.
In a modern MMO like FFXIV there's no point in making a ton of customizable content for one small subset of players. (a single job for instance) Suppose that you bring back PUP as a DPS. Very soon players will find one or two "optimized" DPS builds, which might end up blowing other DPS out of the water. Because this is a modern MMO, those builds necessarily MUST be nerfed/reworked so as to bring PUP DPS back in line with DRG and MNK. This process repeats until eventually there is likely only one remaining competitive PUP build, or a handful of exactly equal potency. If you don't have one of those specific, carefully-crafted builds, you will be a pretty useless DPS. SE tunes fights under the assumption that the damage dealers collectively do X DPS, split 2 or 4-ways among relatively even jobs, (plus tank damage) and it's pretty clear from playing how carefully-tuned these things are. If you bring any PUP build that isn't the absolute best of the best, you're deliberately reducing your party's chance of success.


tl;dr Making heavily-customizable content for jobs is a large amount of man hours spent in design, followed by a large amount of man hours spent in rebalancing, with the end result of a job with effectively one 'real' build anyway, a build that SE will have to assume everyone is using when they make new fights. They could just do away with the middleman and make it with one build to start, and make that playstyle more interesting via other factors (see: stances, charges, pets, combos, etc)

[Gilthas]

tl;dr Making heavily-customizable content for jobs is a large amount of man hours spent in design, followed by a large amount of man hours spent in rebalancing, with the end result of a job with effectively one 'real' build anyway, a build that SE will have to assume everyone is using when they make new fights. They could just do away with the middleman and make it with one build to start, and make that playstyle more interesting via other factors (see: stances, charges, pets, combos, etc)

Well, there's also the solution they used for several jobs in FFXI: assume that they'll never be used in endgame.

[Hyrist]

While Gilthas puts on a good point, I wish to add onto the social aspect of such options.

Diversity is neigh on impossible to maintain in a game culture that worships gleaning efficiency and uniformity in every conceivable aspect.

Take the Subjob system. A Job was expected to have a specific set of sub classes it was to use, and woe onto the player that experimented beyond the experienced norm. Same went for equipment or weapon usage. The use of Red Mage alone was a perpetual debate on even the smallest of party trash mobs.

Here, the roles, the flexibility and usefulness are clearly defined. The game gives you limits and bounds with a bit of flexibility of use but primarily maintaining a clear focus. The trade off is that every player can still play every class on a single character- a level of diversity and depth that is still lacking in most MMOs to date - something I feel players overlook.