So My Prediction From 5 Years Ago About The 7.0 Job Proved True...

[Jeeqbit]

Well, yes, it's been expected for a long time considering it's the only one that doesn't share left-side gear.

I really hope it doesn't start at level 80 or something. I want to be able to actually level it.

Of course both the jobs will be level 80. SE doesn't break from their conventions very much.

[TheRealMadruck]

Ninja is the only dps without shared gear. It wasn't much of a stretch to guess that we would get another melee that will absolutely share gear with ninja.

Yet many including several content creators over the past 2 years have said they wouldn't introduce another melee so soon after Reaper.

[Raikai]

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...5.0-And-Beyond....

Its almost like there is a pattern to the design SE does! I was told by several people in different avenues online "they won't put in a new melee dps so soon"...I predicted based on basic logic that SE would put in a sister job to NIN to share gear with based on other melee sharing gear.

SE believes in balance. The entire theme behind FF14 and Final Fantasy can be summed down to the premise to balance. Take that to mind and you can easily see future aspects to FF14!

Addition: Based on the Yoshi P TShirt on Fanfest...let me also break down some more logic. Look at the weapons the TMNT team uses. (Leo) Dual Katanas, (Donnie) bo staff, (Raph) Dual Sai, (Mikey) nunchaku. Out of every weapon listed here, which one of these weapons is not in game? Ninja use Dual Daggers and Katana in many forms with their weapons. We have casters that use two handed staffs(unless you think SE will have melee start using caster staffs as weapons lol), then whats left are nunchaku!

I give it 99% the next job whatever it is called or implied is a "ninja" styled nunchaku user. I will also state that my prediction for this jobs influence since we are so close to Limsa with this expansion is Maxi from Soul Caliber type of job. Think Pirate Ninja...here is a link to this character to give you a idea of what I believe is coming! https://soulcalibur.fandom.com/wiki/Maxi

But they would really add a third melee Far Eastern themed job? I feel that if we had one, it would be in any of the other niches.

[Shurrikhan]

Balance, but they add a job to a role that already has the most jobs.

There are currently 6 Ranged and 5 Melee -- 3 Casting, 3 Aiming, 2 Striking, 2 Maiming, and 1 Scouting. Soon there will be 7 Ranged and 6 Melee -- 4 Casting, 3 Aiming, 2 Striking, 2 Maiming, and 2 Scouting.

That's not an imbalance towards melee; it's just a matter of Melee DPS being split across more armor classes than are Ranged DPS.


Physical Ranged hasn't made any sense as a separate "Role" since party resources were decoupled from the Rangers' skills.

The only half-way sensible division of DPS at this point is just Melee DPS (with varying levels of ranged uptime), and Ranged DPS (with varying levels of mobility).

:: Or, heck, with the enlarged hitboxes and lack of melee downtime, it's basically just Taxed/Supportish DPS (Non-BLM Casters and the Hypermobile pew-pewers) and Untaxed/rDPS-only-or-basically-no-support DPS (Melee and BLM).

• In 1.x, there were 2 Tanks, 2 Caster/Healers, 2 Melee/Half-Tanks, and 1 Ranger/Support.
• In 2.0, there were 2 Tanks, 2 Healers, 2 Melee, 1 Ranger/Support, and 2 Casters (because SMN and SCH share the same class; else you'd have 2 Melee to 2 Ranged).
• By 2.4, there were 2 Tanks, 2 Healers, 3 Melee, 1 Ranger/Support, and 2 Casters (because SMN and SCH share the same class; note that the consequent imbalance was seen as important enough to address mid-expansion).
• In HW, there were 3 Tanks, 3 Healers, 3 Melee DPS, 2 Rangers/Supports, and 2 Casters (because SMN and SCH share the same class; else you'd have 3 Melee to 3 Ranged).
• In StB, there were 3 Tanks, 3 Healers, 4 Melee DPS, 2 Rangers/Supports (though they lost virtually all agency over said Support), and 3 Casters (because SMN and SCH share the same class; else you'd have 4 Melee to 4 Ranged).
• In ShB, there were 4 Tanks, 3 Healers, 4 Melee DPS, and 6 Ranged -- 3 Rangers (who were no longer in any way Supports), and 3 Casters -- skewing towards Tanks and Ranged.
• In EW, there are 4 Tanks, 4 Healers, 5 Melee DPS, and 6 Ranged -- 3 Rangers and 3 Casters -- again mostly correcting that imbalance (i.e., balanced if not for the freebie of SMN).
• And with DT, we'll have 4 Tanks, 4 Healers, 6 Melee, and 7 Ranged -- 3 Rangers and 4 Casters (again, balanced if not for the freebie of SMN).

If anything, it'd be most in balance if they just added the Scouting job and that was it, but then (A) we'd be giving up a job just to keep people from feeling butt-hurt and (B) no matter what, they're going to have to alternate imbalances unless they instead add 4 jobs every other expansion and no jobs each expansion between.

[KageTokage]

We have casters that use two handed staffs(unless you think SE will have melee start using caster staffs as weapons lol), then whats left are nunchaku!

Bo staves are a distinct weapon type in FF XII/FFT, so they could reasonably go that route as well.

The new variant dungeon has a blurb on one of the records mentioning how the monks of Hingashi are capable of far more with a staff then unsophisticated bludgeoning so there is some slight precedent for it already.

[Shurrikhan]

It shouldn't be considered 2 melee all the time, you don't get a special buff for bringing 2 melees in particular. the last DPS slot should be flex

main reason why you bring two melee dps is because melee does the most damage by a marginal amount.

As should have become the case for Physical Ranged vs. Magical Ranged from the moment they changed Rangers from a Support Role to just another Ranged DPS (but with more mobility [rather than Rez/Verraise] in exchange for a lower damage ceiling [outside of RDM, who remains on a being-shafted spree]).

But alas, I guess they can pretend the game still has actual utility considerations or resource gameplay as long as they arbitrarily divide the Ranged DPS between Low Mobility+Utility but Maximum Damage, Full Mobility but low Utility and Lower Damage, and High Mobility and High Utility but Lower Damage.

Oh, wait, no... that division might make sense, so instead we'll just classify them solely by whether they launch magical arrows/bullets/chakrams or launch magical energy-balls,fireballs/lightning-bolts regardless of their overlaps in damage, mobility, and/or utility. And so long as that's the way it has always been, in tremendously different past contexts, that'll make sense, right?

[TheRealMadruck]

Bo staves are a distinct weapon type in FF XII/FFT, so they could reasonably go that route as well.

The new variant dungeon has a blurb on one of the records mentioning how the monks of Hingashi are capable of far more with a staff then unsophisticated bludgeoning so there is some slight precedent for it already.

Ok fair, yet the odds of SE implementing another staff using class is a bit far fetched to me. Monks already exist. I sincerely do not believe they will introduce a "monk" style job into FF14 that shares the left side with Ninja.

[KageTokage]

There is a very distinct difference between punching something with your fists vs. barraging it with staff strikes.

Its kit could be inspired by a mix of the staff weaponskills from XI and FFT Monk abilities like Earth/Sky Render.

[Jojoya]

The WoL in the trailer is clearly using the new melee job. I don't want to add my own speculation here but my advice is to watch the trailer at slowspeed during the combat and at the end to see what's equipped. I think there's a second weapon hidden under the robe.

Like many others, I'm leaning toward the TMNT shirt having an obscure reference to the caster job instead of an obvious one (think the Spiderman shirt that was the Samurai hint). It's probably going to be Krile's new job; whether or not Krile's traits could possibly offer hints I don't know.