Skillchains and bazaars

[Gemina]

Snip...

Skill chains were a convoluted system in FFXI that were eventually abandoned completely by the time I left that game. TP instead of being a readily available resource as it is in FFXIV, was a resource you built up by causing and taking damage in XI iirc. You had to be able to build this up to a minimum of 100% in order to unleash a weaponskill. These weaponskills had modifiers through equipment mods and building the TP gauge past 100% that affected the overall damage caused from them. Skill chains, as the name implies, involved at least two players using their weaponskills in tandem in order to create an effect causing even more damage to the mob. This effect had an elemental property attached to it, which would further modify the damage to the mob depending on if it was weak, neutral, or strong against said element. This also opened the window for mages to contribute to the damage via Magic Bursts.

So you have to know the mob's elemental weakness, look at a skill chain chart, and determine the best possible according to the weapons - NOT jobs - in your party. So as an example, a scythe wielding DRK might have to switch to a greatsword for the optimal skill chain, but then this DRK might tell you that his/her skill level with that weapon is too low to have reliable accuracy. A lot of the time, one player would be holding on to their weaponskill waiting for their chaining partner to build up their TP due to the accuracy issues in that game.

Starting to get a gist why it was abandoned? xD
It is a really good thing that SE abandoned this system entirely, and also getting rid of TP come ShB. These type of resources are antiquated and behind the times.

As for Bazaars, I know they were still present back in 1.0. I am pretty sure I know exactly why these are no longer with us, and it's because of players going AFK for long periods of time, turning their avatar into a non-interactive merchant with limited goods. This won't fly now, and we have retainers which basically serve the same purpose and allow for transactions to take place while logged out of the game.

To OP, these two systems are still present but have evolved to be more convenient and less cumbersome overall to the game and its players. Jobs still interact with one another, and perhaps ever more so in FFXIV. We have things like a NIN combo placing a slashing debuff on the mob that benefits all jobs that use slashing damage, ogcd skills that weaken a mob's damage so that their unavoidable attacks do less, and even skills that tether two players together.

I have to agree with Vidu here, and systems belonging to XI should remain there. There are things about XI that I do/did enjoy more than XIV, but keeping those things there allows me to continue to appreciate what that game meant to me at one point in time.