New Limited Job Concept: Thief

[Sandpark]

I originally made a concept for the standard thief job.
Original Thief Job Concept
I don't know if a Thief Job will ever be added. But now I will put forth an idea for a limited Thief job similar to the upcoming Blue Mage.

If a Blue Mage's unique theme is learning skills from enemies and partaking in the Carnivale. A thief's theme is treasure hunting using stealth, guile, and puzzle solving raiding big houses and secret ruins.



A thief has skills to move stealth like and get to their booty without triggering alerts or alerting authorities or enemies to their presence.
A little inspiration video for me on youtube

The Two Job Gauges:

The Stealth Gauge:

• The Stealth displays the current amount of stealth a thief has accumulated.
• Stealth slowly builds from 0-100% in a thief through time as they remain out of sight.
• Stealth is required to execute special stealth moves.
• The higher tier of stealth moves are available when stealth is 80-100%.

The cloak is white when no stealth is accumulated and completely dark when stealth is maxed.
And has a number showing current Stealth points inside the inner area of the cloak.

The Trickery Gauge:
The Trickery Gauge displays a number of things.
The coin and daggers show this info.

• The coin tracks your amount of loot you have from the bounty area via the coin numbers.
• Say a warehouse has 200k worth of merchandise.

The coin number will display how much of that you have obtained to get a complete clear of the area.

The daggers notify you when you can use brute force silently to get the job done.

• Dull color- Not a good idea or time to use brute force.
• Glowing color- Now would be a good time to use brute force and not get seen.

The Stealth Skills:

Cloud Of Dust- Kicks up a cloud of dust that decreases visibility for 5 seconds.
Crouching Walk- The thief can walk slowly while crouching low to walk quieter.
Crawl- The thief can crawl to get under hiding spots or access an area with a small opening.
Wall Hug- The thief can stand or crouch against a wall to avoid being seen.
Hide- The thief hides in a hiding spot nearby which could be anything SE designates as hiding spots in treasure areas.
Flee- The thief gains super sprint speed for 20 seconds, speed is similar to fully upgraded mounts in Stormblood.
Vault- The thief gains the ability to jump 8 yards forward, which could be used to reach seeming impossible areas or get to better advantage points.
Speed Vault- The thief can run full speed and jump over small fences without losing speed.
Dodge Roll- The thief can dive forward and roll forward shoulder first to avoid traps or detection.
Sliding Kick- This is a move similar to how jobs slide down a slope in an area like The Burn, except the thief can slide forward to an obstacle or under it whether there is a slope or not.
Climb- A thief can climb certain structures like high walls or fences.
Wall Run Climb- A thief can run up taller walls and grasp the top of the wall.
Traversing Shimmy- The thief can grab onto the side of buildings, walls, or fences and shimmy sideways with their hands.
Cat Leap- If there are two walls close to one another, the thief can jump back and forth from one to other to get a higher vantage point or climb a moderately tall building.
Lache Jump- The thief can swing from a pipe overhead and jump to a lower area ledge.

The Thief's Tools:

Lockpick- Upon using it enacts a mini game where the thief is trying to pick a lock to a chest, door, or some other locked thing.
Grapple Hook- Shoots a grapple hook to certain nodes on a building where a thief can ascend to an elevated area.
Razor Blade- Allows the thief to cut paintings out of frames.
Leather Oil- Reduces noise when moving over noisy surfaces.
Leather Padding- Decreases damage taken falling from large heights.
Wire Cutter- Tool for cutting through wired fences.
Rocks- The thief can throw rocks to distract enemies or guards.
Prybar- The thief can use the prybar to open certain chest or things where a lockpick is not applicable.
Sleeping Dart- A dart used for putting enemies or guards to sleep.
Blinding Powder- A concoction a thief can use to blind enemies.
Clawed Overshoes- Spikes that can be fitted to the bottom of shoes to assist climbing dangerous, high, or slippery surfaces.
Brass Listening Cone- A cone shaped brass object used to hear things from farther distance.
Telescope- A large cylinder with glass lenses within to see far distances.
Looking Glass- A wearable eye piece to magnify and make small symbols or writings on maps and ruins clearer.

Some tools are permanent and reusable but they can break from overuse, and the consumable things are limited in stacks. A really small number like 3 per item so choice becomes more important. Say a ruin has 7 treasure chests that require a lockpick. Limiting your lockpicks to only 3 makes you choose which one, maybe you could find one lockpick somewhere else in this area to give you four.

The Thief's Traits:

Perception- The thief becomes aware of things via his senses. This trait is a passive trait that affects what treasures you can hunt which requires wandering the world's bars, brothels, and cities to obtain information like maps, rumors, gossip, and news. It also affects things you do in the world like noticing wind passing through a hole in a dark cave, or knowledge of an ancient language to unlock the secrets to a hidden ruin.
Charm- This is the thief's ability to sway conversations with either humor, flirtation, persuasion, or intimidation. Some rumors will not come to your benefit even if your perception told you something was there. Charm them well enough and you shall find the route to your loot. (This could be passive or active, but active would take more work having role playing conversations with people out in the world.)
Luck- This trait increases the rate at which good things happen. The chance a chest has a better reward, the chance you can pick a lock, the chance you land on your feet when falling, the chance at escaping capture.
Cunning- There are many things in the world hidden to adventurers in general, but not you the thief when your cunning is high. You see nodes, nodes in the thief's world can be anything from lockpicks on the ground, a place in a ledge you could grapple hook to, a mountain section you can climb, certain people will try to get your attention to ask for a treasure hunt if they sense high cunning in you.
Alertness- This trait is the thief's innate ability to sense when something is about to hit the fan, he can see traps otherwise visible to the naked eye, he can see a pattern in the world's puzzles, his senses are keenly aware and his speed to do multiple things or tasks increases for a brief moment during his adrenaline rush.

You start with each of these traits at level 1. Which trait you increase must be chosen each time you level up. I am not sure if it would be better to be able to learn them all in the end without choosing or make us choose which one's get maxed out and which do not.

So I believe that covers the basics of what the job is, now I want to talk about what you can do it in terms of content.

The gameplay aspect and feel:

Thief is a limited job that delves into ruin and treasure hunting. It excels and grants access to parkour, acrobatics, and the feeling of what it would feel like to be a master thief with thief centric tools in Eorzea.

Think AC Unity or GTA V Heist. Zones with objectives. The theme is sneak or steal more than kill. With amazing traversal through areas, avoiding traps, solving puzzles, and obtaining mass loot.
With awesome treasures hidden within tombs, ruins, warehouse, mansions, and castles throughout Eorzea. This concept is born from Locke, the FFVI thief or he preferred to be called treasure hunter. If you played the game you can remember him scouring the world for lost treasures with his famous Phoenix Cave run.

Tavern, cities, and world rumors:
Sort of like sightseeing, only gossip seeing in this case.
Various Taverns, and cities across Eorzea have gossip about treasures hidden across Eorzea.
The rumors quest can only be seen/heard or started when playing the thief job.

If you ever played Final Fantasy tactics the rumors thing works similar to that.

How the loot raids work:
When I say loot raids it makes you think multiplayer parties. Well it could be a solo thing or possible a multiplayer thing, but that would take more developer resources.

Castles, Houses, Mansion, and Warehouse runs:

• Have various big money targets that are interspersed throughout Eorzea in elegant expensive houses/castles or huge warehouses.
• A loot target builds up potential(thieves attention) over time until three hours have passed.
• Every three hours a certain loot target area can be raided by thieves which are guarded by security guards or creatures, you get caught by more than one guard you die.
• It starts you back at the beginning area if you die similar to how dungeons do but there are no shortcuts.
• If the thieves successfully loot the area the potential(loot amount) returns to zero, if the thieves fail in looting the area it becomes un-lootable for 3 hours.
• The loot areas contain things you can vendor in the thieves guild(I'll explain this part later) or Eorzean vendors.

Ancient Ruins and perhaps a Castrum run working:

• You get access to ruins by obtaining secret maps or gossip.
• You gain access to Castrum places from gossip, someone wants certain things stolen and give you a passkey to get in, maybe at certain points you need a disguise.
• A loot target builds up potential(thieves attention) over time until three hours have passed.
• Every three hours a certain loot target area can be raided by thieves which are guarded by security guards or creatures, you get caught by more than one guard you die.
• It starts you back at the beginning area if you die similar to how dungeons do but there are no shortcuts.
• If the thieves successfully loot the area the potential(loot amount) returns to zero, if the thieves fail in looting the area it becomes un-lootable for 3 hours.
• The loot areas contain things you can vendor in the thieves guild(I'll explain this part later) or Eorzean vendors.

A word on puzzles in thief content:

There is different ways you can implement puzzles to a game. There is the mini game variety that are not in context to the game and their are environmental ones in context to the content or area. I am hoping for the environmental ones in context to the game. I am wanting more of the Resident Evil type variety over FFXIII-2. And some pictures is the easiest way I know to express that without this post becoming a 7 page article.

The environment contextual type-




The mini game non contextual type-

I think my thief concept is done for now unless more comes to me or someone gives some feedback on what they would like to see.

[Lyth]

Stealth-based puzzles are one way to implement a Thie- I mean Treasure Hunter job concept, but I think there's more to it than that. There's a section of Final Fantasy 6 where you have to navigate South Figaro under Imperial rule through disguises and information gathering skills. Even the idea of being able to pickpocket townspeople opens up some interesting options, à la Octopath Traveler. Who knows, maybe it could be makings of a new DoL gathering job.

If we're going to infiltrate Garlemald next expansion, with Thancred in tow no less, I don't see a better testing ground. We did have segments this expansion where we got to play as other characters, like Y'shtola.

[Sandpark]

Stealth-based puzzles are one way to implement a Thie- I mean Treasure Hunter job concept, but I think there's more to it than that. There's a section of Final Fantasy 6 where you have to navigate South Figaro under Imperial rule through disguises and information gathering skills. Even the idea of being able to pickpocket townspeople opens up some interesting options, à la Octopath Traveler. Who knows, maybe it could be makings of a new DoL gathering job.

If we're going to infiltrate Garlemald next expansion, with Thancred in tow no less, I don't see a better testing ground. We did have segments this expansion where we got to play as other characters, like Y'shtola.

Believe me I know there was more. That's what I was going on about special nodes only a thief can see.

A Thief, a Bard, and a White Mage are walking through a cave together. The thief notices a breeze of air coming through a crack so examines the area. The thief finds a hole(node which triggers an action) and sticks their arm inside. Inside the hole he finds a lever and pulls it opening a secret passage. Inside the revealed room they find themselves standing atop an indoor cliff with no visible bottom. The thief uses a rappelling rope and climbs down to the bottom. At the bottom he sees an underground lake with a waterfall and a wall with indecipherable text on it. But since he travels the world gathering knowledge, he notices that the text looks like a text he uncovered and had translated by a bar patron who specializes in ancient writing. It speaks of inserting a certain gem into a hole in water's bottom to open a path to a golden temple. He dips into his bag and pulls out an onyx gem and dives and he finds a hole down there. As he inserts it the water drains and a stone door slides open. It is dark, really dark and damp in the corridor as he travels deeper inside.< To be continued...>

[Shurrikhan]

It seems a fair enough idea, and well situated in terms of expansions / settings.

I guess I'm just loathe to see yet more added into secluded play rather than augmenting the overall experience.

Information gathering? Pickpocketing? I'd much rather see these as easter-egg options within a wider scope of questing and leveling.

I'd rather see Wilder/Scavenger and Infiltration/Heist content added that's enjoyable by multiple jobs, though Thief in particular may excel at the latter, depending on the mission (perhaps Bards in others, as a performance distraction, and Ninja in yet further, for rooftop travel, or even a Geomancer to send gusts and torrential rains against the windows to keep the other guests inside and leave none suspecting that it was you who killed Professor Hogo, with a lead pipe, in the basement).

I'd rather see Thief an actual job, split from Rogue, that deepens into stolen tech and scrolls and chance-manipulation and gambits and hidden-in-plain-sight subterfuge rather than windwalking and shadowdancing and generally cutting enemies to ribbons to be burned by subsequent fireballs.

I'd rather see every job have its own little place and appeal that give them a place in the world -- Thieves excelling in pulling out ARG for upcoming story threads to be released in next month's missions, allowing people to theorycraft out some horizontal gearing strategies for them, Bards able to cull favor with NPCs (innkeepers especially) with their performances and slip into otherwise hostile areas, MCHs to actually build up tech of their own, DRG to make awesome scouts (capable of a far more vast range of dynamic movement than anyone else, with only NIN near, and the only ones capable of dropping into combat from flying mounts...), etc., etc.

[Sandpark]

I guess I'm just loathe to see yet more added into secluded play rather than augmenting the overall experience.

Information gathering? Pickpocketing? I'd much rather see these as easter-egg options within a wider scope of questing and leveling.

Yeah but some jobs won't be added unless augmented it seems. Sure but then it would be kind of like role actions or the original concept of classes. For some people once something becomes global it loses it's identity and becomes a samey repetitive thing.

I'd rather see Wilder/Scavenger and Infiltration/Heist content added that's enjoyable by multiple jobs, though Thief in particular may excel at the latter, depending on the mission (perhaps Bards in others, as a performance distraction, and Ninja in yet further, for rooftop travel, or even a Geomancer to send gusts and torrential rains against the windows to keep the other guests inside and leave none suspecting that it was you who killed Professor Hogo, with a lead pipe, in the basement).

I'd rather see Thief an actual job, split from Rogue, that deepens into stolen tech and scrolls and chance-manipulation and gambits and hidden-in-plain-sight subterfuge rather than windwalking and shadowdancing and generally cutting enemies to ribbons to be burned by subsequent fireballs.

I'd rather see every job have its own little place and appeal that give them a place in the world -- Thieves excelling in pulling out ARG for upcoming story threads to be released in next month's missions, allowing people to theorycraft out some horizontal gearing strategies for them, Bards able to cull favor with NPCs (innkeepers especially) with their performances and slip into otherwise hostile areas, MCHs to actually build up tech of their own, DRG to make awesome scouts (capable of a far more vast range of dynamic movement than anyone else, with only NIN near, and the only ones capable of dropping into combat from flying mounts...), etc., etc.

Well now it is going back to why I asked for the limited version in the first place, which is it does not seem we will get a standard job of Thief. Anything that adds originality and choices not available in some form to other standard jobs, we get to a point which some games forums like ESO always complain about, in their case racial passives.

Don't even get me started on anything horizontal becoming a thing or a more dangerous open world where you need people or trust to survive or how the open world in 90% of today's games are either trivially easy or scaled to high hell making the open world a nice, safe, static place.

[Enkidoh]

ROG is THF - Yoshi stated this outright (and the game's storyline even mentions it in a joking way, that the ROG's Guild was called 'The Upright Thieves', but changed their name to avoid the negative connotations with the word, which is why the class is also known as ROG instead of THF meta wise - Yoshi simply felt having a Warrior of Light as a 'thief' stretched credibility too far. And yes, I know it's a reoccuring Job in the series, I'm just pointing out the feelings of the game's producer and director, the one who creates this game.).

So we already have got THF under a different name, but it's basically the same thing.

[Shurrikhan]

ROG is THF - Yoshi stated this outright (and the game's storyline even mentions it in a joking way, that the ROG's Guild was called 'The Upright Thieves', but changed their name to avoid the negative connotations with the word, which is why the class is also known as ROG instead of THF meta wise - Yoshi simply felt having a Warrior of Light as a 'thief' stretched credibility too far. And yes, I know it's a reoccuring Job in the series, I'm just pointing out the feelings of the game's producer and director, the one who creates this game.).

So we already have got THF under a different name, but it's basically the same thing.

Sure, in the sense that Archer is Ranger. Rogue does few if any thief-y things save to go... DoL transparent? Archer does few if any Ranger-y things save in that it... shoots arrows from a bow?

ROG is THF in the sense only that, for the time being, ROG prevents THF. A stale half-measure stymies potential well greater than itself. In what other situation would that be acceptable? And in what way does ROG, at present, merit preventing the implimentation of a more compelling job, limited or otherwise?

[Sandpark]

ROG is THF - Yoshi stated this outright (and the game's storyline even mentions it in a joking way, that the ROG's Guild was called 'The Upright Thieves', but changed their name to avoid the negative connotations with the word, which is why the class is also known as ROG instead of THF meta wise - Yoshi simply felt having a Warrior of Light as a 'thief' stretched credibility too far. And yes, I know it's a reoccuring Job in the series, I'm just pointing out the feelings of the game's producer and director, the one who creates this game.).

So we already have got THF under a different name, but it's basically the same thing.

I think lore should be important but not when it gets in the way of implementing something cool. Lore is not truth it is a make believe truth the developers made. When something is not truth it can be shaped, changed or molded in any form. I suggest skillchains(no because elemental wheel), I suggest Magitek battle circuits(no because Cid messed it up), I suggest FF tactics minigame(no because lore but we have a Rabanastre now), I suggest two version of thief which is one of the iconic jobs(no because we have rogue), I suggest Besieged or Campaign events(no because everyone is allies and not at war), I suggest free company events(no because too much work).

Sure some of my ideas were inspired by XI, but that does not mean that have to be exactly the same. They can implement a system that fits XIV and provides that same feeling.

Does there come a point where lore must stand aside or does most things not get implemented from feedback due to a backstory?