Additional Variant Jobs?

[HyonaCookie]

Personally I don't think having two jobs come out of one class works that well if both jobs are different roles balance wise. If they were the same roles, it would probably be easier to balance without one job being completely different from the other off the bat. But overall I'm indifferent on this subject.

[dustdjinn]

Geomancer is definitely coming, I personally hope its a caster dps. fingers crossed

[KurohNeko]

The 'Two Jobs from one Class' idea was an experiment that sadly SE determined was a failure a long time ago and hence they have long abandoned any further plans to expand the system - as it is all new Jobs are classless so the idea is moot anyway (and it seems that they're trying to subtly move SCH away from ACN/SMN, suggesting it may be eventually remade into it's own independent Job completely).

And, although your ideas have merit, three of the classes you've mentioned are already kind of in the game anyway in a different form and so would be redundant and the fourth is basically a revival of a class SE scrapped in 1.0 and rolled into GLA/PLD (SE stated they'll never add an actual Necromancer class due to cultural concerns in Asian countries about depicting skeletons and the dead, specifically China - RPR is the compromise and thus the closest that you will ever get to that sort of thing; Berserker is literally a more aggressive WAR; Geomancer is actually what CNJ is called in the Far East (with a little bit of AST on the side); and Bulwark sounds like adding the scrapped Sentinel class from 1.0 to lances (which is an impossibility given lances are considered two-handed weapons and sp prevent a shield in the offhand anyway).

I'm really sorry for pouring cold water on your ideas (and it's clear you have given them a lot of thought), but all too often it's too easy to fall into the trap of coming up with a new class idea, only to end with something that merely rehashes an existing class with a different skin, something that SE themselves are all too mindful of (it's why I'm loathe to make up my own class/Job ideas).

Because China is a major player base... Also Necromancers exist in the game... Everywhere... So big doubt they wouldn't do a necromancer class due to offending Asians when the concept is everywhere in the game.

[Lihtleita]

Berserk is literally a Warrior skill

[HyoMinPark]

-The Geomancer(GMC)

I don’t put much stock in the “branching jobs”/“split jobs” since it has been a continued issue with SMN/SCH for years, but a lot of people were expecting Geomancer to be the fourth healer after all the Geomancer teasers in Stormblood. Between the AST job quests and Swallow’s Compass, and then the removal of elemental aspects from WHM in ShB, that’s what healers were putting their money on when it came to the next healing job. Instead we got SGE. Which is still cool, don’t get me wrong.

Time Mage/Chronomancer was another job people speculated on after they removed the Time Mage aspects from AST. I think people generally expect it to be a caster DPS when they talk about adding it to FFXIV. Ranger is another (physical ranged DPS), since a lot of people dislike Archer becoming a Bard. I just think that Ranger would end up too similar to MCH, except with a bow and arrow or crossbows. So it would be a bit difficult to really give it an identity and set it apart from the other physical ranged.


I’d be all for them adding any kind of new job. I just don’t think that variants or “branching” jobs should be a thing. Simply because they seem to cause more trouble than they’re worth when you could just add a new job separate from the others.

[ty_taurus]

I don’t put much stock in the “branching jobs”/“split jobs” since it has been a continued issue with SMN/SCH for years, but a lot of people were expecting Geomancer to be the fourth healer after all the Geomancer teasers in Stormblood. Between the AST job quests and Swallow’s Compass, and then the removal of elemental aspects from WHM in ShB, that’s what healers were putting their money on when it came to the next healing job. Instead we got SGE. Which is still cool, don’t get me wrong.

Time Mage/Chronomancer was another job people speculated on after they removed the Time Mage aspects from AST. I think people generally expect it to be a caster DPS when they talk about adding it to FFXIV. Ranger is another (physical ranged DPS), since a lot of people dislike Archer becoming a Bard. I just think that Ranger would end up too similar to MCH, except with a bow and arrow or crossbows. So it would be a bit difficult to really give it an identity and set it apart from the other physical ranged.


I’d be all for them adding any kind of new job. I just don’t think that variants or “branching” jobs should be a thing. Simply because they seem to cause more trouble than they’re worth when you could just add a new job separate from the others.

To follow up on that thought, there really isn't a point to that system mechanically anymore. In ARR, SMN and SCH shared Arcanist actions, and their jobs actions were built on top of those. There was literally no difference between SMN's Ruin and SCH's Ruin, for example, and each job had the same set of abilities with the exception of different pets and 5 different actions. Presumably, going into future expansions could've resulted in classes continuing to get actions rather than only jobs getting actions, and thus SMN and SCH could continue to share tools they might receive. A system like this in theory could work and could warrant other jobs that split off of classes.

Now, though, SMN and SCH no longer share anything other than a handful of ability names, icons, and animations. Not even the effects are the same as SCH's Ruin has a different potency to SMN's. Classes ended up having actions cut from them and don't gain anything after level 50. So what actually changes by hot gluing GEO onto CNJ's thigh other than free XP? Nothing, other than maybe sharing a few animations. There's nothing to gain from trying to revive this concept and no reason to fight for it because the end result would be identical to just having GEO on its own. I changes nothing about what you'd get if GEO were added. It just sounds like it would do something.

[Rowde]

as others have stated the devs have said on numerous occasions that they aren't interested doing another job split like acn/smn/sch again

I'm also surprised they haven't completely separated them yet because behind the scenes over the last two expansions they changed all of SCH abilities that used to be shared/carried over from acn into "unique" sch only variants

The only ability in the sch kit that is still acn/smn/sch is Resurrection
Even the derpy Physick that acn/smn still have sch has it's own unique version of (which really makes me scratch my head as to why they can't make the acn/smn one scale off of int instead of mind but ehhh)

They also stated in a LiveLetter prior to EW that they had strongly considered removing Resurrection from smn but decided to leave it in for now
that's probably the only thing still tethering the jobs together

Personally I think smn should lose it's low level raise and have it replaced with a raise learned at higher level associated with Phoenix for more cohesive identity
could call it Phoenix Pinion for example

[Seraphor]

Geomancer was their original intention for a WHM offshoot, back before 2.0 was redone, or maybe in it's early planning stages.
Alongside Machinist being the Job evolution of Musketeer, which most likely meant that AST and DRK also had base classes loosely planned. My theory is Astrologian was supposed to be the base class for a Time Mage job, but when they shelved those base class plans they added on the cards mechanics and 'promoted' Astrologian to differentiate it from a full blown Time Mage.

Now that the game has developed and evolved for a decade, Geomancer now is tied to Hingan and Yanxian lore, so it would be odd to split it off from WHM now, the lore just isn't connected anymore.

Necromancer if anything, would be a dps offshoot of WHM, rather than a healer offshoot of BLM. Every existing Necromancer in the game is a former WHM who has bastardised white magic, basically using Raise too late. So it would be a pet based dps job that raises undead minions. But that's not likely to become an actual job.

[Seraphor]

I don’t put much stock in the “branching jobs”/“split jobs” since it has been a continued issue with SMN/SCH for years, but a lot of people were expecting Geomancer to be the fourth healer after all the Geomancer teasers in Stormblood. Between the AST job quests and Swallow’s Compass, and then the removal of elemental aspects from WHM in ShB, that’s what healers were putting their money on when it came to the next healing job. Instead we got SGE. Which is still cool, don’t get me wrong.

Time Mage/Chronomancer was another job people speculated on after they removed the Time Mage aspects from AST. I think people generally expect it to be a caster DPS when they talk about adding it to FFXIV. Ranger is another (physical ranged DPS), since a lot of people dislike Archer becoming a Bard. I just think that Ranger would end up too similar to MCH, except with a bow and arrow or crossbows. So it would be a bit difficult to really give it an identity and set it apart from the other physical ranged.


I’d be all for them adding any kind of new job. I just don’t think that variants or “branching” jobs should be a thing. Simply because they seem to cause more trouble than they’re worth when you could just add a new job separate from the others.

I never saw much healer potential in a Geomancer tbh. Most of it's portrayal in the game has been as offensive sorcery, the only healer-like portrayal was via the AST job quests, which didn't showcase an awful lot, and well... no new job has ever been something that was already featured in another jobs job quest. It would end up being way too similar in style to a Conjurer using wind/earth/water spells. If Geomancer would be anything, it would be a caster dps loosely based around the Yanxian branch of Geomancy.


Also AST hasn't had nearly enough of it's Time Mage influence pruned to give Time Mage enough to work with yet. It's still holding onto Gravity and Lightspeed, Celestial Stasis, etc. along with the space motif and the pointy hats with the moon and stars on them.
Classic Time Mage signatures are basically just: pointy purple hat with moon and stars motif, Haste, Slow, Stop and Gravity. (in much the same way as Thief being nothing more than a green bandana, daggers and Steal/Mug)
AST still has the controlling share of that aesthetic.

[Seraphor]

as others have stated the devs have said on numerous occasions that they aren't interested doing another job split like acn/smn/sch again

I'm also surprised they haven't completely separated them yet because behind the scenes over the last two expansions they changed all of SCH abilities that used to be shared/carried over from acn into "unique" sch only variants

The only ability in the sch kit that is still acn/smn/sch is Resurrection
Even the derpy Physick that acn/smn still have sch has it's own unique version of (which really makes me scratch my head as to why they can't make the acn/smn one scale off of int instead of mind but ehhh)

They also stated in a LiveLetter prior to EW that they had strongly considered removing Resurrection from smn but decided to leave it in for now
that's probably the only thing still tethering the jobs together

Personally I think smn should lose it's low level raise and have it replaced with a raise learned at higher level associated with Phoenix for more cohesive identity
could call it Phoenix Pinion for example

They should really just sever the two jobs completely now.
Rename SMN's Resurrection as you say to something more Phoenix inspired.
Rename SCH's Ruin II and Energy Drain.
Have SCH be a classless job that unlocks after the level 30 ARC job quest as it does. It wouldn't be too odd, after all Rogue is a class that doesn't unlock until after level 10.
Grandfather in any players who have already level SCH/SMN (although likely losing intra-level exp similar to when they did the stat squish)