A different approach to ALL jobs

[Ath192]

I wonder if instead of the current approach to jobs that we have we could change it to the following:

All starting jobs in the game (Not added at a later expansion) progress as they currently have, except that the full kit of their abilities gets acquired by level 50. This would essentially create dynamic and rich job kits that would enrich new players experience throughout the early game.

When new expansions release and the jobs get changed you can simply get a quest at the beginning of the expansion that plays like Hall of the novice where they teach you your new abilities and what they do. This way you get to enjoy your new kit and practice it all the way to the end of the expansion.

New jobs on the expansion do not get unlocked until you reach the end of the expansion. In EW this would mean getting Reaper and Sage at level 90. And once they become unlocked the quest takes you through unlocking the entirety of their ability sets, this could be the base set and each quests grants your a new ability. This would actually create a bit more content since you'd have something to do after beating the MSQ whereas now you can do both simultaneously. The reason for this comes next.

Once you have the job and all abilities unlocked they sync down with you. Meaning even in Sastasha, you'd have your entire level 90 ability kit. (Ideally the devs can balance it out somewhat with the newbies) But lets not pretend they are balanced right now either, an max ilvl synced 90 player will outperform ANY noob with MSQ progression gear regardless of whether they have their full kit or not.

Because of the ability density of the base jobs (ARR) would increase rapidly, and finish at 50 (Before there is any active raid or endgame content) I don't think veteran players or new players would mind teaming up with lvl 90 players sporting full kits. After all even new players would have a pretty decent kit by level 30 instead of the two buttons they have now all the way into level 50.

A large portion of the player base also finishes the MSQ, maybe some side content and unsubs as well, so therefore it would stand to reason they would enjoy their new rotations and abilities at THE BEGINNING of the expansion, and not the end, where they no longer have anything to do with them since they don't engage in hardcore/endgame content, meaning as soon as they hit 90 and do some normal raids their content is levelling up other jobs or doing other things.

[Deveryn]

I think the only thing they might do here is maybe push back the job unlock. It makes some sense to learn about these after you've seen them in action.

The other stuff is a lot of extra work that just isn't going to happen. Skill progression is there for a reason. It's better to deal with fewer skills and learn how they all work and add along the way.
Syncing down with a full kit of spells is excessive. (It sounds impossible given how they work. Note that all BLU skills are level 1.) I get missing AOE skills below a certain level, but mobs are super easy to kill.

[Ath192]

I think the only thing they might do here is maybe push back the job unlock. It makes some sense to learn about these after you've seen them in action.

The other stuff is a lot of extra work that just isn't going to happen. Skill progression is there for a reason. It's better to deal with fewer skills and learn how they all work and add along the way.
Syncing down with a full kit of spells is excessive. (It sounds impossible given how they work. Note that all BLU skills are level 1.) I get missing AOE skills below a certain level, but mobs are super easy to kill.

Yeah it’s a lot of work. I think it’s mainly to keep new players from getting bored and quitting early when the game gets much better. When ARR launched we all learned our full skill tree by level 50, we had to since that was endgame and I don’t think people found it overwhelming. The current level 50 job kits are a bit of an insult.

As far as skill progression goes I don’t think I ever enjoyed having my blm at lvl 54 and getting Ice IV but not Fire IV haha. For early on That makes sense because you are learning everything, but I’d much rather go through the MSQ with a complete kit after the base game than a really awkward progression tree and jobs feeling really incomplete the whole way.

Since we are 6 expansions in the game and you only get to enjoy your jobs actual potential in the endgame of 6.0 you basically spend 16% of the entire game actually enjoying your full job, and “dealing” with an incomplete version of it for 84% of the game. And like I said, if you are a casual once you get your job to 90 you maybe have 6 instances you can do with your new skills…. And that’s it… you maybe get a couple new instances every 4 months for 2 years.

And every expansion we have it will keep getting worse. Hence I think this would solve a great deal of the problem, I also recognize it’s not a perfect solution.

[Mosha]

Low-Level bloodwhetting? you're just forcing me to pull the whole dungeon and make the sprout healer cry.

but sadly even if you add a quest that teaches them the basics a lot of people don't even read their tooltips let alone a whole class guide and at least with the current system they get time to learn the job 1 skill at a time so they can learn by doing and not feel overwhelmed.

[Ath192]

Low-Level bloodwhetting? you're just forcing me to pull the whole dungeon and make the sprout healer cry.

but sadly even if you add a quest that teaches them the basics a lot of people don't even read their tooltips let alone a whole class guide and at least with the current system they get time to learn the job 1 skill at a time so they can learn by doing and not feel overwhelmed.

=| I’ve pulled all of Sastasha without it and first time healers and we still make it. You are one cure 1 from being full health all the time. But if we wipe you just slow down. NBD.

But the overwhelming part I think has been addressed, I think the first fifty levels and all of ARR would prevent people from being overwhelmed. As far as new jobs and unlocking all skills besides base line through a well thought out quest line it should be fine since you already have a sense of skill trees from your initial job choice.

It certainly won’t be any worse than level jumpers (buyers) not knowing anything at near max level.

[Jeeqbit]

The problem with getting all of your abilities by level 50, is that level 50 content was not designed for the abilities we have at level 90. The difficulty of some content relies on not having things like gap closers or lots of aoe and has already been made easier by battle system changes. A great example is Ultima's Bane, which at 50 minimum item level is very difficult but the unreal version is easy at level 90 with all the abilities we have.

These suggestions would be unfortunate for people who want to do the content minimum item level as close to how it was originally as possible. Jobs have changed a lot at lower levels, but the essence of them has remained. PLD always spammed the Rage of Halone combo in ARR and it still does for people who want to go back in time.

[Ath192]

The problem with getting all of your abilities by level 50, is that level 50 content was not designed for the abilities we have at level 90. The difficulty of some content relies on not having things like gap closers or lots of aoe and has already been made easier enough by battle system changes. A great example is Ultima's Bane, which at 50 minimum item level is very difficult but it's easy at level 90 with all the abilities we have.

It would be unfortunate for people who want to do the content minimum item level as close to how it was originally as possible. Jobs have changed a lot at lower levels, but the essence of them has remained. PLD always spammed the Rage of Halone combo in ARR and it still does for people who want to go back in time.

No but it can be rebalanced, unreal has been fun rebalanced fights for extreme, so we have proof. MSQ is significantly easier so the balancing wouldn’t need to be harsh, but things can be fine tuned.

[TheMightyMollusk]

So, what new content are you willing to give up or put off in order to have the old content reworked? The manpower has to come from somewhere.

[Jeeqbit]

No but it can be rebalanced, unreal has been fun rebalanced fights for extreme, so we have proof. MSQ is significantly easier so the balancing wouldn’t need to be harsh, but things can be fine tuned.

The fact it takes so much work just to rebalance one fight suggests to me that they would not do it for all of the previous content.

[Ath192]

So, what new content are you willing to give up or put off in order to have the old content reworked? The manpower has to come from somewhere.

Hmm whichever the devs deem necessary. Sometimes it’s better to invest in the bones of the house than getting that shiny new appliance. I’m sure we lost something because of the graphics update that’s coming in 7.0 but it was badly needed. I would’ve thrown anything away to see that done but I can’t see we lost all that much.

Im also sure we’re losing something because they redid praetorium and the msq dungeons + some older dungeons but honestly they are making the game a more consistent experience. I’m not sure I agree with what they did with the older dungeons but I can appreciate them trying to create a more consistent experience.