Rework sage

[fulminating]

In TA it also had gigaflare and esunaga, which are undeniably black and white magic

I don't really see the harm - Amdapor's white mages in lore were supposed to be able to go toe to toe with Mhach's black mages but that doesn't come across in gameplay. Selene and Eos are still introduced as if they have two separate roles, As we've seen with the summoner rework, as long as the animations are sufficiently blinding people won't care (Also a job where they've suddenly picked up the respect identity torch). I think it is worth pointing out that the red mages, black mages, dark knights and even pre-rework summoner were far more true to the core of the job than sage is.

I think I remember reading that when Yoko Taro did the nier raids he wanted character deletion to be a possible consequence. It does seem a bit of an ask to have the main devs consider it seriously though.

[Ransu]

At the very least they should change the name to humourist or something, sage is an established job with a completely different identity so far removed from this that it's baffling they introduced it in the same breath as saying summoner wasn't summonery enough and so needed killed.

And? So what? Again, sage concept in XIV is perfectly fine the way it is.

[Kazemon15]

"I don't like the way this class is, so please change it to something I do like."

Sage is fine the way it is. There are other 18 other jobs for you to play. Go pick one of them if you don't like this one instead of asking to change it completely just because it doesn't appeal to YOU.

[fulminating]

They changed summoner into a joke, why shouldn't they change sage too?

And 18 jobs is a vast overstatement, particularly with sage being nigh identical to the superior scholar and the three warrior clones.

[AnotherPerson]

They changed summoner into a joke, why shouldn't they change sage too?

And 18 jobs is a vast overstatement, particularly with sage being nigh identical to the superior scholar and the three warrior clones.

Uhhh... it sounds like you're just projecting your unhappiness with SMN job changes onto Sage.

Sage could definitely use more DPS skills to further cement itself as a DPS-to-heal healer, but it certainly does not need it's lore concept changed. The concept itself is fine as is. Even SMN with the job changes still fits into its FFXIV lore (3 egis limit, trance playstyle).

[fulminating]

Yeah you're probably not far wrong. I don't think the dev's hypocrisy nor that sage features in most of the ff games I'm familiar with as the pinnacle of magic helped in the slightest.

If it has to stay as it is a way of spreading kardia to the party would be good, and a guaranteed crit ruin 2 to get bigger kardia heals but not be spammed all the time (assuming it works the same way as nascent flash). Haima and panhaima seem very samey, maybe one could be the dark arts eukrasian version of the other to free up a keybind?

[Nizzi]

Here's my hot take, rework Scholar to have more of its old DoTs and toolkit back and then leave SGE as the Fisher Price bargain bin SCH clone for anyone who actually likes that

[Mithron]

I can sympathize with fulminating on this, I think having core relations to job fantasy of its roots is really important, and the state of healers is abyssmally bad right now.

I have to stretch with my thoughts on SGE as "a healer that can heal while DPSing" with the idea of classic FF being "can cast high level White/Black/Summon magic with limited MP" identity. They certainly aren't using any White/Black/Summon magic in FF14, but given they wanted to focus on healer identity with SGE as a barrier healer specifically, they tried to make it fit by saying "they can heal with Kardia while doing damage" which kinda' fits if you really push it, but I completely sympathize with why she isn't satisfied with that.

As for the Greek names being exclusive to Ascians/ancients, I never really considered that before but also is a good point.

[ForsakenRoe]

i'd consider the 'core identity' of the XIV incarnation of a job to be outlined on the fanfest reveal slides, ie 'sage is able to temporarily augment it's magic abilities'. it doesn't exactly fulfill that particular identity descriptor atm in my opinion, but if it DID, maybe it'd feel a bit more like the master-caster of previous games, realizing that job fantasy by being 'a master of healing and damage both, able to effortlessly keep allies alive by weaving healing side-effects into it's attacks'. Kardia is like, the bottom of the barrel lowest level of this idea being used, Kardia-but-AOE is the obvious thing we're missing. Maybe it'd have worked out better for SGE and the fantasy Fulminating would prefer to see, if SGE was a pure healer, being able to just juice up it's healing potencies, rather than applying barriers in various ways. Though I think an idea that allows the SGE to heal via it's damage (the one in the dropdown, the other two i don't like as much anymore), and amplifying it's damage skills in various ways via a variety of augmenting skills, would be better for the class to define itself in the XIV landscape than 'it can cast the best black, white and summon magic'.

At it's roughest times in prog, an idea like the one I posted would mean SGE would play similarly to now, prognosis shielding for safety as needed. But at it's 'best', when everything is going well, you know the fight enough to go for the clear, etc, SGE would become the healer that is keeping everyone alive without even looking at them, via juggling stacks of augments that combine together fluidly, eg allowing it to put up safety shielding for a raidwide, 'BY doing DPS' rather than 'instead of doing DPS'. I can envision a scene in my mind, a shot from a trailer for a hypothetical new expansion where the WOL is a SGE. Walking through a battlefield full of enemies and allies fighting each other, think of the original ARR one with the Garleans and the Eorzean alliance clashing at Carteneu. As he walks, without needing to react to anything around him, the nouliths shoot enemies, heal allies, project barriers to protect himself, all without breaking his stride. Of course, it's kinda harder to represent that in gameplay, but I think my idea pitch would be close. At least, closer than what we have now

maybe the greek means SGE is secretly derived from medical studies the ancients did, in the same way they're derived from old medical terms of the real world, plot of level 100 job quest leaked????

[ty_taurus]

In Final Fantasy's history, it doesn't surprise me that sage was a job that ultimately didn't stick and was pruned out of the series' future works. It failed at establishing any sort of strong identity for itself unlike other mages because its only identity was being an amalgamation of all the rest. This is also problematic from a design standpoint as it effectively invalidates every other magic job in the game. Why carry only summoning magic when you can just carry every type of magic? Sage's limitations were at best a slap on the wrist by comparison to the shear power and versatility it provides on a 4-man party.

While there is something to be said about FFXIV's SGE not needing to use the title of a former job, I also can't be bothered by that either because the job that was lost was based on repetitive identity already. I would really hate to see the techno mage aesthetic get thrown in the garbage in exchange for a garage sale of animations stolen from BLM, SMN, and WHM.

That said, I'm also quite frustrated with how the SGE we do have only looks impressive and exciting, but it's gameplay utterly fails at delivering upon the new identity that it was marketed as. It doesn't feel like a combat healer any more than the other three healers do. It has the same DPS loop, Kardia offers no actual interactions or engagement, and most of its healing tools are just cut-and-paste copies taken from SCH.

I would like to see SGE get a mild rework to actually bring it in line with what the job was explained to be: an offensive healer who excels at high personal damage. SGE should be the healer that feels like a DPS in the same way that GNB is the tank that feels like a DPS. It should be somewhat complex and have elements that are difficult to optimize. It's explained as being one of the most challenging disciplines of magic to learn, yet is one of the easiest jobs in the game. I want it to have a legitimate caster rotation that can get in the way of your healing if you aren't careful in the same way that GNB can struggle with boss positioning while it's going through its burst. I want the other healers to each maintain some form of valuable utility like SCH's combat sprint and better raise potential--things that feel like equal trade-offs with raw damage--while SGE gets none of that and is simply the BLM of healers whose selfish DPS is several steps above the other healers.

Ironically, this would also potentially capture some of the original sage spirit, as having a high damage output is reflective of BLM, and is a healer like WHM.