SAMURAI SHOWDOWN

[Kazrah]

This also opens the door for a more traditional PLD in my opinion, where healing is a major part of their toolkit.

Just because a job was one role or more in a past Final Fantasy game doesn't mean that it'll be the same way in FFXIV. PLD is known in FFXIV as a more original knight lead by morals, not as the tank that doubles as a healer in some other Final Fantasy game.

Also, wasn't this thread supposed to be about Samurai?

[DWolfwood]

Also, wasn't this thread supposed to be about Samurai?

More specifically, it's a thread about how SAM should be both a Tank and DPS. However, people keep justifying one or the other with examples like, "RDM should be tank," which leads to more discussion and inevitably leads to discussions on tanks.

I don't think people should be asking: "Which should be tank?: SAM, RDM, or BLU."

People should be asking: "Should SAM be: Only a Tank, Only a DPS, or Both." which shouldn't affect the questions: "should RDM be a Tank, Healer, or DPS" and "should BLU be a Tank, Healer, or DPS."

[Souleater13]

People are making good points on all parts of the spectrum.
I have always preferred playing a dps, when SE announced DRK I re-subbed to the game for DRK is my favorite class and looked forward to using it once again. Finding out that it would a tank role was not what I wanted to hear but since it was my favorite I would still play it. I don't mind being a tank role, still would prefer DRK to be dps but it is what it is.
The biggest let down about DRK is that there is the lack of sacrifice hp skills or other skills that are iconic to DRK from the rest of the FF series. SE could of made it work and still be a tank role.

So for Samurai whether its tank or dps as long as SE executes it properly is what should matter most.

I do agree that there should be a dps class that uses swords. Samurai being introduced as dps would definitely steal people from tank roles. I myself prefer a sword dps class so thinking forward what will hold my attention, my favorite class; DRK or sword dps class; potentially samurai.

Personally I think SE should bring Samurai into the game as tank and convert DRK to dps. hahahhaha never will happen...or will it.....

[Alacran]

Can anyone suggest an eastern themed FF Job that more readily fits the Tank role? We already have Monk, Ninja, what else could be used to satisfy the players who have not had the play style/ representation they want?

[Nalien]

Blue Mage has been given something of an Arabian look over the years, not quite as far east as Samurai, but close enough IMO... Both Samurai and Blue Mage, I think, would make for solid Jobs for a counter-based tanking gimmick; Samurai can take some mechanics from Bravely Defaults Swordsmaster, while Blue Magic I can't imagine working any other way in XIV... They'd have to seriously rework the current system to allow Blue Mages to go out and learn individual spells to set (a mechanic which will already require Blue Mage to be fairly beefy, if we're sticking to nostalgia), meanwhile having Blue Mage get hit with an attack, only to throw it right back in the form of Blue Magic? Perfect.

[Quor]

Imo, this is how I would SAM as a different style of tank.

Basic mechanic - 3 stances. For sake of description, let's call them Balanced, Offensive, and Defensive stance. Usage of certain skills in Balanced stance would shift the SAM into Offensive or Defensive stance. I.e. the standard 3-hit combo that all tanks have could have two separate moves for the 3rd hit; one would shift the SAM into O-stance, while the other would shift the SAM into D-stance. For the sake of MTing, a skill acquired at a low level could be implemented that starts the SAM in D-stance. You can think of the stances as something similar to the MNK forms, only with the intent being that the SAM doesn't cycle through them nearly as quickly. All of a SAM's moves are done with a deliberate power.

Balanced brings minor boosts to everything. 5% more damage dealt, 5% less damage taken, 5% more attack speed (includes reduction in GCD timer), and 10% less TP consumption. Being in B-stance allows access to a few Balanced-exclusive moves, as well as a move that would "force" the SAM into Balanced stance for a specific benefit. B-stance is the "baseline" stance for SAM, and it's the stance SAM would be in while out of combat and as a default. The SAM would eventually get a combo that let's the stay in B-stance and would serve as a mid-point between a full DPS combo and a full aggro combo. Finally, to incentivize B-stance as more than just a speed bump between O and D, all attacks made in B-stance would apply a stacking 15 potency DoT for 30s, up to a maximum of 5 stacks. Each stack would also restore 3 TP per DoT tick, up to 15 per tick.

Offensive brings major boosts to damage, at a cost. 10% more damage dealt, with 10% more attack speed (including GCD reduction) but with 5% more TP consumption. O-stance would also have certain Offensive-exclusive moves. Certain skills in O stance would generate stacks of "Focus" (working titles), up to 5, that would increase critical strike and damage by, say, 2% per stack, as well as TP cost by 5% per stack and would be used to power B-stance exclusive moves. The idea behind O-stance is high damage that is ultimately unsustainable due to the increased TP costs (unless, of course, the SAM is supported correctly by the right skills, but that is a stop-gap measure at best). The B-stance "force" move mentioned above would be powered by the Focus stacks, requiring at least one stack of Focus to use, and would have high potency (100 per stack) and restore TP based on the number of stacks (say, 40 TP per stack, for 200 TP at 5 stacks). Using the "force" move shifts the SAM into B-stance and starts a cooldown on being able to shift back into O-stance (10 seconds). The main idea here being that the SAM gains some pretty stout damage potential that will be impossible to sustain, even with outside help, without shifting into B-stance. The use of Focus could also be applied to D-stance, with a move that shifts the SAM from O-stance to D-stance, consumes all accumulated Focus, and provides a short-term buff. This buff would make the next 1-5 TP-using skills free of cost, and boost the power of the next defensive skill used by 10-50%.

Defensive stance would function as a mirror to O-stance. It would provide a damage reduction buff of 10%, as well as -5% to attack/skill speed, an increased threat of 15% and a TP cost increase of 5%. It would provide a unique buff named "Restraint" that adds an additional -2% to incoming damage, +2% to threat, +1% TP cost and -1% to attack/skill speed. Much like there would be a skill that instantly shifts the SAM to defensive stance, there would also be a skill with a relatively short CD (maybe 30s) that would instantly grant 5 stacks of Restraint, for those moments when you need to snap-tank something. The B-stance "force" move would be used to provide a heal with 100 potency per stack, that would also apply a short-term Inner Beast-like damage reduction, 3% reduction per stack (and it would, of course, stack with the B-stance damage reduction buff). This, combined with the D-stance shift move and 5-stack Restraint move, would allow the SAM to stack a lot of dmg reduction should the need arise. Likewise, using Restraint to shift into O-stance would increase attack/skill speed by 3% per Restraint stack, and cause the next 1 moves-per-stack to deal 30 potency more in damage.

The general idea behind these stances would be to provide a certain flow to the combat that the SAM engages in. There are advantages and disadvantages to each stance. B-stance has no drawbacks, but beyond the TP reduction/restoration and stacking DoT, there's no benefit to staying in the stance for too long. Ideally, being in B-stance would create a net TP gain, forcing you to shift into D or O stance to create a TP deficit. Shifting into O or D stance grants strong benefits, but also comes with a cost; you can't sustain O-stance for long, even with outside help, due to the increased cost and faster native attack and skill speed. The built-in attack/skill speed slow in D-stance is offset by the increased TP cost; ideally D stance would be a net zero situation in regards to TP, with no appreciable gain or loss so as not to negatively affect SAM's ability to tank (and putting them on the same level as the other tanks, who have no TP problems when tanking outside of WAR's spamming OP).

Furthermore, you also have reason to use D and O stance outside of their normal functions; there are ample opportunities in many current fights where a SAM could pop into O-stance for a few moves before moving back into D-stance, thereby nabbing a nice little TP and defensive boost in the process. Sure, the cost is your Restraint stacks, but that's part of the fun of the class; making those decisions as to whether the cost is outweighed by the benefit.

Overall, you've got some of the playstyle of a MNK, only lengthened out and not as a frantic, with some of the playstyle of a WAR with the stack mechanics, combined to create something that, to me, seems like it would be a fun challenge to master. Tweak the numbers as needed to ensure balance, and add the right kinds of skills (defensive CD's, some oGCD moves, a standard DoT skill maybe, some kind of aoe threat move) and you'd have a solid tank class that can shift with relative ease between OT, MT and pseudo-DPS as needed, assuming the player plans ahead. It would reward foresight and knowledge of a fight, but not be so locked into a pattern that it can't adapt to change.

It'll never happen, but it was fun to envision it anyway. Thanks to whoever managed to read my little book here.

[MaikoRaines]

Above all else, it's "Shodown"

[silentwindfr]

with an expansion they can change everything, that the point of an expansion generally, add new mechanic that the current game can't support.

let's take one second and say that red mage will be a tank, i don't say it must or will happend but just give an example, using a spell for enhance himself for defend against enemy and enhance him attack for generate more damage (work nice with the En- of the red mage this by the way). they decide to add a new type of armor for the melee caster, at that moment it have no interest, but there come later a new expansion with the blue mage and some other caster melee that will need this armor.

yes actually a caster tank seems weird, but if we only look to the past we will not progress that the point.

and one more time Shippuu your idea of the sam is only a war with a different mechanic for replace the rage and that use a katana... *shrugs*

ps: add a tank jobs physical wearing a heavy armor and using another slash weapon will never arrive can we stop to beat the dead horse it become gross.

[Shippuu]

and one more time Shippuu your idea of the sam is only a war with a different mechanic for replace the rage and that use a katana... *shrugs*

ps: add a tank jobs physical wearing a heavy armor and using another slash weapon will never arrive can we stop to beat the dead horse it become gross.

You don't have the faintest clue of the ideas I have for Samurai as a tank or dps or anything else. So don't even begin to say I just want it do be WAR.

You have time and time again however shown how narrow minded you are when it comes to Samurai that it could only be a dps.

A heavy armor wearing tank is the most plausible option if they're going to add a tank, it requires the least amount of extra development work and the least amount of issues disrupting balance.

[Nalien]

it requires the least amount of extra development work and the least amount of issues disrupting balance.

While this is true, it's exactly why I don't want something like that... Ideally, if I'm getting a new expansion with new Jobs, I want those things to actually be new... Another physical slashing tank wearing Fending is the easiest thing to produce, but it's also something I've already got three of, so I have very little interest in having a forth... A mage based tank would be new, we currently have nothing like that in the game, the fact that it would require more work from the developers means little to me considering I'm a paying consumer... I'm paying for their product, and if they're not going to offer variety, instead opting to cookie cutter their way through future content, I'll start reconsidering that... The state of dungeons is bad enough...

I mean, after what the developers did with Bard and Machinist I'm fully aware that new Jobs are probably going to be handled in the cheapest way possible, rather than anything that offers true variety. Various new content gives some hope that the developers aren't just planning to use the same template for the rest of the games life, but I'm still fully expecting new Jobs to be fairly lackluster. Ideally though? Ideally I'd like all the money from subscriptions and the cash shop to stop going into FFXV/FFVII and to start being put back into XIV to give us some decent variety of content... Looking at Jobs like Bard and Summoner, I have no expectations that they'll deliver what I want from future Jobs, but I'm allowed to voice hopes for such things, no?