Deeper Class Quests

[Alex_Lenderson]

It be a waste of resources to introduce new quest during patches that required you to have x job leveled in order to enjoy. Not every story is going to be interesting but at the same time is every story going to be interesting if it's the same thing? By this I mean, let's just say Evil Ascian's are involved in all 50+ job quest, and each job has to overcome them and defeat them, that would get boring after a while don't you think? I think the way job quest now are fine, they all have their own story which can develop the lore around them and to add quest past the 3.0 introduction would only create less content as a whole because now the Devs would have to use their sidequest resources to create unique job quest which in turn would mean less sidequest to do unless you have x class at 60 which would discourage a lot of people to be left out of content like that.

It could be something different. They don't have to keep using Ascians. There are plenty of characters to dwell into. I'd love to see some more of the Rogue's guild. Hell they don't even need to cut scene so much - I'm good with even mostly text based. Like Hildebrant it wasn't necessary to do them but almost everyone did.

[Friske]

Personally, I thought the Heavensward job quests were a major let down especially when done alongside the main scenario quest. That's not to say I'm expecting an epic from the class quests, what I expected was an expansion that's meant to build upon, improve upon the ARR experience, not replicate it. Although some of the quests were fairly good, it's very inconsistent, and it's led to the creation of low effort quest lines such as the ones from whitemage and blackmage. As a questline that's almost mandatory alongside completing the main scenario, you'd expected it to be of higher quality (mainly from a story perspective, gameplay somewhat too) in comparison to some of the other 'fetch this' side quests. Take my earlier example for instance -

Whitemage. I feel like it was such a wasted opportunity to not expand the storyline leading off from the Guardian Tree. A-Towa Cant's character could've been given the opportunity of being more fleshed out, the connection between Whitemages and Padjals could've been built upon, and the main characters maybe could've had a greater importance. What better way to expand on whitemage lore than through its job quests?
Blackmage. Instead of pursuing some insignificant mage gone 'rogue,' (this may be a mild spoiler but let's be fair, I doubt that tiny chimera could bring Eorzea to its knees, let alone Camp Drybone). We could've instead expanded on the lore of Nald'thal and its connection with Blackmages. We could've explored Ququruka's past in more depth, as well as the creation of more characters that have a lore related connection with the previous characters. The possibilities go on.

Don't get me wrong though, not all of them are terrible. The summoner's questline for example really impressed me with the way it linked skill abilities with the story, as well as utilising underused areas of the game for unique combat. What I think is saddening though is that Yoshida allowed these low effort quests such as Whitemage to slip through, which inevitably tarnishes the perception one might get from job quests as a whole. Although I doubt SE has any plans to improve upon the Heavensward job quest experience, there's no reason why Koji Fox and his team couldn't improve the job quest lore in the next expansion - something which I'd eagerly be looking forward to.

[BreathlessTao]

Tbh, I wouldn't mind if we were getting job/class quests even after capping a certain job. Not every time for every job in every patch, of course, but...yeah. Like, the DRK quest took me back to Stillglade Fane to talk to E-Sumi and I definitely felt a pang of "whoa I haven't been here in forever even though I love this place and this kid"... which kinda sucks. All our old mentors/tutors barely even remember us and we virtually never have a reason to visit them. Kind of a pointless waste that makes NPCs degrade into a soulless state. It's sad.

[Nadirah]

Of all the jobs I've done, scholar was the best, followed by paladin.

Ninja was *okay*, summoner wasn't bad, but white mage and Astrologian were just awful. Unimaginative.

Bard I'm pretty neutral on, I liked the other bard you went with.

[KaedrianLiang]

All the class quests were great except for BRD.

*spoilers

The whole comradery development was cliche, starting out with very bland NPC characters. I feel the whole BRD questline is a rushed attempt to influence BRD players to embrace the support side of their class.

No. Just No.

[Belhi]

Ok, I think the Job quests are a mixed bag. Only the Paladin really felt Meh to me but the other quests varied in what they were aiming for and how much they touched on the class.

In the HW story I noticed a couple of things. Generally they were either about either making a particular discipline more accepted or active in the mainstream of Eorzea or more accessable to other Eorzeans, or they had to the rebuilding of martial orders fallen on hard times. In some cases I think the questlines were 'to be continued' much like the middle movie in a trilogy. I think the for me the White Mage questline fit this best. There is some pretty serious questions raised in that which weren't addressed fully and clearly have been set up for continuation. The BRD fits into that too though that is a much more complete story in its own right.

In general the Job quests either explore the history of a Discipline, the nature of the Discipline or how the Disciplines place in the World, or a mix of the three.

For example, though it was a bit round about, the HW NIN was really about the nature of being a NIN, while the WAR questline deals with the nature of WARs but in a different way.

The BLM and the WHM joblines focus on the place of those Disciplines in the world. In the BLM case it was challenging the stigma attached to the Discipline as much as it was dealing with a potential threat. BLM is a forbidden magic. While many might not recognise it, its actually illegal in a lot of places to practice it.

SCH on the other hand has for quite a while focused mostly a lot on its history which is frankly awesome.

On the actual topic of patch storylines for Jobs, I would LOVE this. However I don't think its realistic. Making engaging quests for each of just the combat Disciplines would require 12 different questlines in addition to what we already have. That's a lot of work and resources. Its probably why they leave the Job story development to expacs.

On the topic of Job companions, I think that is unlikely, particularly since it sounds like they are working at building a system which involves building a team of NPCs to fight with you linked to the Grand Companies. I think this is more likely where they will chose to develop it.

I will say two things. A lot of the Jobs seemed to have themes of strengthening the military strength of the city-states though our actions and, in the case of the new Jobs, a movement to start to push Ishgard out of its old established traditions and into accepting new things.

Tbh, I wouldn't mind if we were getting job/class quests even after capping a certain job. Not every time for every job in every patch, of course, but...yeah. Like, the DRK quest took me back to Stillglade Fane to talk to E-Sumi and I definitely felt a pang of "whoa I haven't been here in forever even though I love this place and this kid"... which kinda sucks. All our old mentors/tutors barely even remember us and we virtually never have a reason to visit them. Kind of a pointless waste that makes NPCs degrade into a soulless state. It's sad.

Its worth noting that their dialog does change. If you visited them after 2.55 all of them had things to say about the events at the end of that patch story. It was kind of cool seeing all your old trainers believing in you. I kind of hope they do bring them back into the story more going forward. Some of them could be incorporated into on going Job quests linked to the class like Jacke is with NIN.

[Calypsx]

I hated all of the Paladin quest line. It was so boring and it felt like nothing happened, especially 50-60. Not defending 1-60 though as a whole, I love Paladin but compared to the others I've played it was possibly the dullest story I've encountered in the game yet.

Also give me Oathkeeper... What is the point of having the title without having the actual blade itself?

[BreathlessTao]

Its worth noting that their dialog does change. If you visited them after 2.55 all of them had things to say about the events at the end of that patch story. It was kind of cool seeing all your old trainers believing in you. I kind of hope they do bring them back into the story more going forward. Some of them could be incorporated into on going Job quests linked to the class like Jacke is with NIN.

Oh, yes, I'm aware of that did try that myself, just to see - but then again, that's the problem: if I visited them. I did, because I'm curious like that, but I can imagine even many like-minded players didn't, simply because there was no reason whatsoever to visit even one of them...


On the whole though... I can't speak for all job quests (haven't even started MCH yet), and I certainly can't speak for all job quests all the way through lv60, but from what I can remember and what can I speak about...
I do like DRK one so far. (Just at 54.)
SMN was nice, although the way its whole focus (which hasn't felt like actual summoner to begin with) shifted more towards a shapeshifter after 50 (that troll quest...) really bugs me - I love Deathflare, but I feel like it'd fit a BLM much more. SCH on the other hands is awesome, but then I've loved Tonberries, so...might be biased here.
The Rogue set-up was great, but I found the ... switch to NIN really abrupt and random - notice how I don't even say "transition" or any such, because I really didn't feel there was any. In the case of a class/job that I had felt was nothing more than a glorified PGL/MNK anyway, it was rather unfortunate, like they didn't know how to do it, and just threw it in there because they had to.
And AST was nothing but pain and a snoozefest for me ("acquiring" cards one by one every few levels when we're able to use them all from the first time we get the skill anyway, really?).

[FeliAiko]

That 1.0 GLA quest mention has me curious on what the other class quests were like now. Odd they didn't keep the Coliseum element in ARR. Wouldve been a good way to teach people the fundamentals of tanking.

[Belhi]

/snip

I didn't find NIN or MNK anything alike in how they play or their story. Mechanically NIN is far closer to DRG than MNK. I also don't think any of the class to Job transitions were that bad. Rogue to NIN both explained why you got involved in the events in the first place as well as why they accepted to train you.

As for AST the stargazing quests really didn't have much to do with the cards as they were about attuning ourselves to celestial bodies as they are the source of a AST's Aether. By attuning to a particular celestial body, the AST can draw Aether from that body. Further those quests were really background to the events involving Shalayan and Ishgardian Politics. This is even more so in the HW quests where the those events come to a head.

That 1.0 GLA quest mention has me curious on what the other class quests were like now. Odd they didn't keep the Coliseum element in ARR. Wouldve been a good way to teach people the fundamentals of tanking.

There are GLD quests that go through those basics. Infact one even has you 'tank' for an NPC. I think between those and the Guildhests they felt there was enough tutorials. As for the story, I guess they wanted to focus on an actual event that tied into the general world more.