Yoshi's Comment on Future Job Design - Are Jobs

[Reylah]

I read that in the new expansion WoW is making alts even friendlier closer to the point that an alt is almost like FFXIV job changing system (not quite, but ish), and if they improved their balance (and stop making certain specs consistently bad lol), that could pose an interesting competition to FFXIV. Not saying anything for certain yet, because the expansion is not even out so we're all on hot air but I'm hoping FFXIV is ready to answer the call for improved competition (potentially).

Honestly I hope they respond like the wow devs did. After finally ditching the “we devs know best” ideology they went back to their roots. And as a Rogue, I am all about that sh*t. Blizzard was known for taking other ideas and adding a twist to them and adding more polish (warcraft hero units in an RTS, WoW standing on everquest shoulders, hearthstone with set mana gain per turn vs MTG land troubles, etc…) results may vary but it's where they’ve had their biggest successes (also they steal from themselves a lot. Look at the cross-pollination of abilities and features between HoTS, Overwatch, WoW, and Diablo). So they looked at what everyone else was doing and said “f-it that looks good, How to make it work for us.” Professions? Everyone loves FFXIVs more involved professions, let's give ours more depth and add a commission board. Mounts? Guilds Wars 2 has a shiny flying system people swoon over. Let's try that out for an expac (I highly suspect they will expand on the system if it's popular). Also talent trees but that’s just a root and tree joke and i’m not a druid (a job FFXIV could add if they tried. They certainly steal enough form the norse and celts it wouldn’t be hard)

Intellectual larceny at its finest. There should be no shame in looking at a good idea and saying “That works, I should try and use it.” blah blah copyright blah blah intellectual property… BS. Obviously things don’t translate 1 to 1 from other systems, make it your own like the teachers said. If you can avoid plagiarism for a school essay you can avoid it when making a game.

The FFXIV devs should look at other games and go “Oh, people like when jobs have more differences than a coat of paint.” “Oh, maybe healers can take more ‘stress’ than we give them credit for.” “oh, that company hired a bunch of people to make more content in areas they are lacking? Maybe we should hire more people to shore up our weaknesses.” etc…

[RitsukoSonoda]

Job identity loss in FFXIV IMO is a result of the game pretty much abandoning the RPG part of MMORPG.

Generally in RPGs all enemies aren't made equal. Enemy types would have different elemental weaknesses/resistances/immunities/absorption. Different resistances to physical damage whether it was all physical damage or just specific types like piercing, slashing, bludgeoning, etc... This at its core would make certain characters/classes/builds excel against some things but fall behind against others. RPGs would also promote horizontal progression options via gear in the form of set bonuses, added effects, skill bonuses, skill augmentations, etc...

FFXIV has gone the route of removing all build diversity and replacing it powercreep making raw stat numbers bigger while trying to make it so every job within a role type has the same tool kit.

[KurohNeko]

Job identity loss in FFXIV IMO is a result of the game pretty much abandoning the RPG part of MMORPG.

Generally in RPGs all enemies aren't made equal. Enemy types would have different elemental weaknesses/resistances/immunities/absorption. Different resistances to physical damage whether it was all physical damage or just specific types like piercing, slashing, bludgeoning, etc... This at its core would make certain characters/classes/builds excel against some things but fall behind against others. RPGs would also promote horizontal progression options via gear in the form of set bonuses, added effects, skill bonuses, skill augmentations, etc...

FFXIV has gone the route of removing all build diversity and replacing it powercreep making raw stat numbers bigger while trying to make it so every job within a role type has the same tool kit.

And the answer for that is the root of all evil, casuals. People who are too normie NPC's to choose something based on playstyle and to learn God damn mechanics and what their jobs strengths and weaknesses are and not pick a job solely because they like the aesthetic. When jobs just become cosmetics people pick based on their favorite looking weapon you have failed. MH does this better, each job has such a unique playstyle that the game changes based on what you play as.

[hagare]

And the answer for that is the root of all evil, casuals. People who are too normie NPC's to choose something based on playstyle and to learn God damn mechanics and what their jobs strengths and weaknesses are and not pick a job solely because they like the aesthetic. When jobs just become cosmetics people pick based on their favorite looking weapon you have failed. MH does this better, each job has such a unique playstyle that the game changes based on what you play as.

at least until you hit a savage where all PF says no Casters because they suck in this fight *shrug*

[Levirre]

Job identity loss in FFXIV IMO is a result of the game pretty much abandoning the RPG part of MMORPG.

Generally in RPGs all enemies aren't made equal. Enemy types would have different elemental weaknesses/resistances/immunities/absorption. Different resistances to physical damage whether it was all physical damage or just specific types like piercing, slashing, bludgeoning, etc... This at its core would make certain characters/classes/builds excel against some things but fall behind against others. RPGs would also promote horizontal progression options via gear in the form of set bonuses, added effects, skill bonuses, skill augmentations, etc...

FFXIV has gone the route of removing all build diversity and replacing it powercreep making raw stat numbers bigger while trying to make it so every job within a role type has the same tool kit.

I think they could have used Bozja as a testing ground and played around with introducing Lost Actions into main pve content (Not considering the balance needed for this like grinding for those lost actions). Coming from BLU, collecting skills with friends was really fun. Lost Actions could have been a doorway to more varied encounter design closer mimicking JRPG mechanic interaction with how BLU missions are set up. Low stakes normal content like dungeons could have been a great way to introduce using them to offer more wacky mechanics than just 2 mobs and a boss that does a slightly different venn diagram. On a side note it also sucks that they stopped using the Duty Button and just made everything a keyboard mash for transitions because it was fun using it in stuff like Lakshmi and the Ivalice raids.

[Dzian]

Job identity loss in FFXIV IMO is a result of the game pretty much abandoning the RPG part of MMORPG.

Generally in RPGs all enemies aren't made equal. Enemy types would have different elemental weaknesses/resistances/immunities/absorption. Different resistances to physical damage whether it was all physical damage or just specific types like piercing, slashing, bludgeoning, etc... This at its core would make certain characters/classes/builds excel against some things but fall behind against others. RPGs would also promote horizontal progression options via gear in the form of set bonuses, added effects, skill bonuses, skill augmentations, etc...

FFXIV has gone the route of removing all build diversity and replacing it powercreep making raw stat numbers bigger while trying to make it so every job within a role type has the same tool kit.

thats funny, not only becuase there's a lot of truth in it. but because many would say they've abandoned the MMO part of MMORPG to... with this massive push towards single player...

so if they've abandoned MMO, and they've abandoned RPG,, what the hell is this??

[KurohNeko]

An article is making rounds about Yoshi discussing that they feel they will have to make brand new jobs tailored to xiv

I feel that job design is now squandered by their battle system. Right now all the jobs are basically a set 1 2 3 combo, a burst window with some buffs, and maybe flashy endgame skills that are basically just raw damage. They can't really create cool skill interactions like a MOBA can because they fear job pick disparity. However, I do recognize how much additional testing would be needed for any moderately hard encounters like ex, savage, and ultimate if they did diversify skills more. Ninja and early astrologian were the last jobs they pushed skill usage. Gauges, which originally seemed cool in stormblood, are left at the wayside now only meant to track a 0-100 resource and a 3 stack mechanic. Though there are some successes like BLM from its inception and Monk finally getting good treatment for endwalker, you don't really manage them as they just proc naturally with your burst rotation. Healers slightly have to manage it, but AST is just gutted.
The only job identity I feel now is in pvp skills. Even with just 9 skills, every job feels unique with a focused gameplan on how you want to utilize your kit. I hope someday PvE may feel the same. Though damage output may be the best so far, there's currently a lot of backlash with job decision like SAM for removing its ogcd and NIN for its clunky ogcd like 2 different raijus where they are effectively the same except one is a gap close. How do you feel about the battle system and current job design?

What's funny is even with making all jobs cookie cutters of others and trying to make everything so damn casual friendly and doing their damndest to remove meta we still have meta and jobs that are basically worthless.

Some jobs will be meta and superior to others with others being something only casuals or those who play just for fun will play. That's ok. It's ok for different jobs to have greatly varying playstyles like the classes in Monster Hunter that some casuals will be discouraged that their Dark Knight plays a way they don't want too and doesn't play like a warrior. That's ok.

[Tranquilmelody7]

I'd say job design is by far the biggest concern the game has at the moment, to the point where I would genuinely consider the current state of affairs a crisis.

[Kolsykol]

I think it's entirely possible 7.0 will come with some pretty huge overhauls.
It honestly wouldn't surprise me if if the base combo gameplay will change.

I really don't agree that they '' play the same '' as some people are saying here tho...
Do you lot actually play them for realsies?
I play all of the melee, tanks included.
And they definitely don't play the same... They all have a 123 combo so you could say that they have the same base inherent loop.
But to say that SAM, MNK or NIN play the same for example is just absurd they're very different.
Same with PLD or GNB.
PLD, WAR and DRK do have a sort of spam 1 1 1 1 phase tho but they're still fairly different, DRK with their ogcd's, WAR being more simple 1 1 1 1 but with crits and PLD with magic and the more strict looped gameplay.

BLM and RDM are also totally different etc etc.
The physical ranged are also very different from one another.
I think Healers have the biggest issue with this really.

[VentVanitas]

I'd consider it the only major concern for the game as well. The direction it is going in simply has me worried about the longevity of PvE gameplay.

We have precedent (not just for SAM and NIN mind you) that anything generally liked about your job can be removed for whatever reason the development team sees fit. Why like anything about your job if it can be removed for literally any reason? Why learn anything about your job if SE can decide to suddenly rework it and change the target audience for said job? Why get excited for future skills if it means losing something in turn? Why are we wasting our time providing feedback?