Thread: A plea for 3.0 and beyond: Job Customization

I think it would be fun to mix and match certain class/job abilities, but I don't think it would be good for game balance if that were to happen.

No thanks, I do not like the OP's idea at all.

Make whm into a healing tank and im all for this idea.
By 2.4 i'll be at 7k hp out of party sooo give me some of tht tank defence skills + flash etc.

In the original example I think they only mentioned class abilities. Even with just the 5 slots for cross-classing having class cross-class-ability is broken. If you could cross-class Job abilities it'd be broken to the Nth degree...

Nope. That was tried on 1.0, see how it worked out.

One of the major problems with job customization is that it ends up as an exclusive practice rather than an inclusive one. It's already pretty bad in that many groups won't touch a WHM or SCH that doesn't have swiftcast, or a WAR that doesn't have provoke. can you imagine how bad it would be if everyone had access to most of the game's abilities? Being an effective tank would mean you have both tank classes at level 50, as well as PGL for all the abilities it offers.
It would basically lead to no one being unique, because there will ALWAYS be a "golden" way to do things.
The abilities as they stand simply don't have enough varied applications to warrant the level of customization you want.

Originally Posted by kyuven

One of the major problems with job customization is that it ends up as an exclusive practice rather than an inclusive one. It's already pretty bad in that many groups won't touch a WHM or SCH that doesn't have swiftcast, or a WAR that doesn't have provoke. can you imagine how bad it would be if everyone had access to most of the game's abilities? Being an effective tank would mean you have both tank classes at level 50, as well as PGL for all the abilities it offers.
It would basically lead to no one being unique, because there will ALWAYS be a "golden" way to do things.
The abilities as they stand simply don't have enough varied applications to warrant the level of customization you want.

lol that's everything i said in my post but you found a way to make it shorter nice! xD

We had this in 1.0. Yoshi took it away because of his precious WoW holy trinity system. He wants things to be as simple as possible for new players, and that means no customization.

Originally Posted by Sholah

We had this in 1.0. Yoshi took it away because of his precious WoW holy trinity system. He wants things to be as simple as possible for new players, and that means no customization.

And it was incredibly unbalanced and complex.

And it has less to do with the trinity (which, by the way, isn't his and neither is it WoW's; it started with EQ) and more to do with the fact that ARR is designed for new gamers and MMO players which meant keeping things simple.

But the biggest problem with any kind of customisation system is that there is really only 1 customisation you are allowed to use if you want to join any kind of end game group. There are some players who can pull off unique and interesting choices but for the most part players prefer to look up the "standard" and go with that because they aren't the kinds of players who can understand and appreciate the subtleties of a game. Generally, it's an illusion of choice. Even with the simple cross class choices of ARR, it's very obvious that most of those "choices" aren't actually choices at all.

It's very difficult in an MMO to balance customisation and still have it be true choice. Single player games have it easier because your choices as a player do not affect anyone else. In an MMO, though, those choices directly affect the party you are with. So unless you play solo in an MMO (which isn't really how it works), then customisation is customisation in name only. Just like how having horizontal gear progression is also an illusion; there's still a best set for a given role/action.

Originally Posted by Sholah

We had this in 1.0. Yoshi took it away because of his precious WoW holy trinity system. He wants things to be as simple as possible for new players, and that means no customization.

I really wish we could get it back myself.