SAMURAI SHOWDOWN

[Laerune]

Aside from Samurai being a damage dealing role or tanking once, can we discuss about the gear that they are going to wear? In ARR and HW the main tanks have always received a armour look that fits the Knight theme. Maybe its just me, but dont you guys think fashion-wise the Knight theme does not fit the Samurai at all. The only way I can see Samurai looking like one, is if they give Samurai their own gearset, like Monk, Dragoon and Ninja.

But past interviews and from what we have learned of the developers, is that they do not like to do extra work. An example is:

1. We can not have butts, because modeling gear around the butts would be to much work.
2. We cant have belts, because modeling them with the other geats takes to much work.
3. The races need to be as close as possible to the current ones so they can remodel the gear easily and it wont take alot of work. That is why we will never see very different bodytypes, open gloves and shoes for races that have big claws or races with digitigrade feets.

All of these stuff that I have mentioned come straight out of Yoshida"s mouth.

So my question to you guys is, how will they keep the Samurai identity if the Samurai is going to look like a European knight with a samurai blade? Or is the look of the samurai not important and we should only focus on Katana and skills?

[Khalithar]

Snip

Well, it's an interesting question certainly, but I have to say that it will share probably share the same armor as all the other tanks and carry a samurai blade. If you want it to "look" like a samurai then we'd either have to hope for an eastern themed set like the old 170 gear or another class themed Esoteric set. Fitting in with their desire to do as little work as possible, Samurai tank will be fending gear while I think samurai dps would be Striking, by making Striking gear specific to Sam and Mnk they could keep the eastern theme going at all times with them.

[Yuni_Queen]

Aside from Samurai being a damage dealing role or tanking once, can we discuss about the gear that they are going to wear? In ARR and HW the main tanks have always received a armour look that fits the Knight theme. Maybe its just me, but dont you guys think fashion-wise the Knight theme does not fit the Samurai at all. The only way I can see Samurai looking like one, is if they give Samurai their own gearset, like Monk, Dragoon and Ninja.

I must disagree. Samurai, just like ninja, will probably come from Far East, Doma, or even farer. That means, they are immigrants here. A comparison for that: When you live, in example, in Italy, you can eat best pizza ever, but when you go on holidays to, say, Greenland, you probably have to eat, what they have, so probably you won't be able to eat pizza.
In other words, Samurai will be forced to use what they are given, since there won't be access to their national gear.
But don't worry, i am sure that SAM at level 50 will get his relic gear (if new classes will start from level 1 that is), and later Esoterics gear will fit Samurai iconic look for sure.

But past interviews and from what we have learned of the developers, is that they do not like to do extra work. An example is:

And here i must agree, thou i still hope it doesnt mean, new classes will start at level 30, avoiding all ARR content again .__. lvl 50 relic gear + zodiac braves included...

1. We can not have butts, because modeling gear around the butts would be to much work.
2. We cant have belts, because modeling them with the other geats takes to much work.

Not sure how about butts, but belts would colide with armors, so implementing visual effect of them would really make it problematic, here i am on their side.
Belts are actually pretty hard, i cannot remind myself of any game that implemented visible belts. Maybe there are in ones i didn't play thou.

3. The races need to be as close as possible to the current ones so they can remodel the gear easily and it wont take alot of work. That is why we will never see very different bodytypes, open gloves and shoes for races that have big claws or races with digitigrade feets.

Iirc, there were speculations about that bunny-type race from DS version of FF Adventure (or something like that...).
Thou i am pretty sure, this is just a little exaggeration, i am sure it is a matter of fact, they are already focusing on 4.0 and thats why SE is so defensive in their promises.

So my question to you guys is, how will they keep the Samurai identity if the Samurai is going to look like a European knight with a samurai blade? Or is the look of the samurai not important and we should only focus on Katana and skills?

Well, the same way we kept Ninja indentity in Toad leather set in example lol. Ninja had same struggle, he used knives and gear that didn't fir ninja at all. More. 51-59 gear is also very european, no stuff for ninja at all. Glamour is only way to feel like a ninja here.

Under level 50 we can probably use this FF XI event gear we recieved not so far ago.
After level 50, i would give a chance to relic sets, if we get one. If not, i would give a chance to Sets we can normally buy. I am sure there will be all kind of Primal weapons, Ironwork gear (While you won't be looking like SAM, you still will have matching set, which i believe will be worth giving a shot) and other things.

Depsite the fact, it is not gonna look like samurai outisde of relic/Esoterics gear, i am sure it will be possible to make it look decent enough to be content with the effect. :3

[Khalithar]

Belts are actually pretty hard, i cannot remind myself of any game that implemented visible belts. Maybe there are in ones i didn't play thou.

WoW and Swtor have visible belts, I'm sure there are others.

[Laerune]

WoW and Swtor have visible belts, I'm sure there are others.

ESO has visible belts aswell.

Thanks for responding to my post, Yuni and Khalithar.