Job Uniquiness, how?

[Raansu]

The problems people are having with class uniqueness has more to do with the games play style than the classes themselves. there's no real organization in this game right now. People more or less just zerg the behests/leve's and aside from conj's, it just feels like everything is the same.

I thought the armoury system was an interesting idea, but I kinda knew it would it up the way it is right now.. You talk about building a class of your own, but in reality, its not. Everyone will be doing the same thing. Everyone will rank up mages for curing abilities and shock spikes. Melee's will rank up archers for raging strike, lnc's for feint, pugs for chakra etc...

Even though most of my sub classes are only around r15, theres enough good abilities at those levels that my pug has more of those than my own. Aside from the fact that I hit twice, I really don't feel like much of a pug. Just another player in the crowd with a weapon and a bunch of non-pug abilities.

How are they going to fix it? Who knows, but anythings better then what they got going on right now.

[Kimahri]

The problems people are having with class uniqueness has more to do with the games play style than the classes themselves. there's no real organization in this game right now. People more or less just zerg the behests/leve's and aside from conj's, it just feels like everything is the same.

I thought the armoury system was an interesting idea, but I kinda knew it would it up the way it is right now.. You talk about building a class of your own, but in reality, its not. Everyone will be doing the same thing. Everyone will rank up mages for curing abilities and shock spikes. Melee's will rank up archers for raging strike, lnc's for feint, pugs for chakra etc...

Even though most of my sub classes are only around r15, theres enough good abilities at those levels that my pug has more of those than my own. Aside from the fact that I hit twice, I really don't feel like much of a pug. Just another player in the crowd with a weapon and a bunch of non-pug abilities.

How are they going to fix it? Who knows, but anythings better then what they got going on right now.

That is EXACTLY the same way I feel. I have every DoW & DoM class at the halfway mark, R25, from completion and I have yet to see the difference in any of them. The only thing I see different is the weapons, and the mages ability to AoE every damn spell.....

[BelgianRofl]

I'm actually terrified of this, as they haven't explained HOW they are going to do it. To me the only thing XVI has going for it is I can put any ability I learn from any class (Or pretty much any ability) and make MY OWN CLASS.

I'm terrified, horrified and waiting with absolute fear, that in the name of making classes more "Unique" we will be kept from loading out abilities as we wish. Am I the only one with this undying fear?

You are now aware that you like playing games that require no thought or tactics. You are in the minority.

[Demacia]

The current system allows for your "OWN CLASS" at the expense of freedom. I'm not down with that.

[Wolfie]

I'm not a fan of a system that allows you to use skills from another class with minuscule penalty. The vast majority of people are not creative or have enough self control not to make a jack-of-all-trades, master-of-all-trades class. Props to you if you want to have a bowman who can cure people occasionally, but if given the option, people will make a class that does everything (see: Elder Scrolls series).

I would be okay if the system limited to choosing between only 1 or 2 additional classes from which you can pull skills from.

[Dyvid]

I'm not a fan of a system that allows you to use skills from another class with minuscule penalty. The vast majority of people are not creative or have enough self control not to make a jack-of-all-trades, master-of-all-trades class. Props to you if you want to have a bowman who can cure people occasionally, but if given the option, people will make a class that does everything (see: Elder Scrolls series).

I would be okay if the system limited to choosing between only 1 or 2 additional classes from which you can pull skills from.

I get what you are saying Wolfie and I think this is one of the inhereit challenges with making both solo and party friendly. Solo you tend to use abilites like cure to keep you alive and lower downtime, but can become a crutch when you join a party. If you ever played FFXI remember how many noobies would show up a PT with DD/whm. Party requires a certain degree of trust, like is the "healer" going to heal me or is the tank going to AFK when I pull? I think once people get over that intial fear and just let go then you'll see player using abilities to better augment there play style.

[Dyvid]

The armoury system was designed to allow players to create their own unique jobs or even recreate classic FF jobs. The problem is the game as so much freedom something became lost in the process. Take WS for example, those should be weapon unique, no sense on use red lotus blade with a spear or arrow.

Also people don't feel like equip a dagger and having some thief like abilities make them a classic thief. This is why I thought a Legend Armor or "AF" for the FFXI group, would allow people to play those jobs. By equipping said armor the abilities know to be "classic" would be enhanced as well as some added new ones unique to the armor.

As for the uniqueness of the class currently in game they do exist. GLA is your standard sword/shield tank. MRD is a AoE expert making them good for off tank or just trash mob cleanup. PUG can change from offense to defense making them a good backup tank. LNC has good support abilities. ARC is a distance DD with crowd control. CON can dps or heal. THM is enfeebler with a mix of support.

The biggest problem was since the game launch broke combat was put on the back burner until now. The current class has be touched or looked at until now and people are alittle miffed about that fact

[Choc]

Im sorry OP but its a change that must happen. I felt that this system was going to be questionable from the start. I know everyone whines about certain classes being required but there isnt any way around that without having all classes be the same.

Often times its because its hard to find a healer class (white mage) so you cant create a group, but without a healer you cant do much. So people want a system where a healer isnt needed, but then why would anyone play a healing class? More often than not this is the example used as healing isnt a popular choice, but how exactly does it work the other way around? Should mages be able to tank difficult enemies because they cant find one or dont want to play one? If they could why would anyone want to play as a tank?

In the end everyone would end up just playing dmg classes that have a multitude of heals/buffs that are only slightly less effective than the class using them.

Take healing for example in this game. Its dumbed down to the point where most people have at least a mildly effective heal, and we only have 2 heals in the game (1 for each mage) and neither really separates itself from the other. Since theres no downside to having AOE turned on healers are forced to leave aoe on and use the same spell over and over and over and over. I think its like this to prevent all classes from having tons of different heals they could all just spam.

Everyone talks about making your own class, but thats not how it works now. Everyone takes a few useful abilities from each class and everyone ends up the same. You dont see many mages using skewer or moonrise do you? How many warriors start casting thunder and fire?

How do you make a system where using a skill on a cross-class isnt as effective as the class its intended for but still make it worth your time?