Viper would of been better if it had a different name

[Darkpaw]

To you, maybe. Not necessarily to other people. "Viper" offers nothing in terms of information about the actual job itself, and unlike other jobs it has no history in the franchise or in RPG classes in general to provide a reference point, nor anything about it that suggests what its weapon or function might be. The most you could do is theorise off the snake imagery, which is what people have been doing, but the issue with naming something after an animal is that it's a practice linked to organisations rather than actual jobs, and that means it could be anything.

Historically DRK should be a DPS, Dancers a healer, Samurai a tank. Gunbreaker shouldn’t exist nor should astrologian which is an amalgamation of several previous jobs. Monk should be named Fighter, Sage should be casting high levels of all spells. Summoner should play vastly differently than every iteration it has ever been in XIV. Black Mages should have more than 3 elemental spells.

At some point this argument is asinine. We criticize this dev team for only taking job inspiration from previous FF games, they dip one toe into something truly original. These forums spew copious amounts of word vomit and hope something sticks this time it’s “oh i dont like the name despite knowing everything about the job based off the 3 minutes of information you gave to us.”

Names can be misleading. Whether they are associated with the franchise historically or not. Does anyone remember the lead up to shadowbringers after the dnc teaser dropped and everyone thought it was going to be a healer? And then were salty af when it wasnt.

[Lunaxia]

snip

Like... again, this feels more like misdirected anger at the perception of the amount of criticism the game gets than the topic actually at hand. You still know what those jobs are based both on both previous incarnations in past games and what the name immediately tells you, even if they're not a 1:1 fit of how they've been implemented previously.

At some point this argument is asinine. We criticize this dev team for only taking job inspiration from previous FF games

I've never actually seen this as a criticism. If anything, it's usually people clamouring for weapons/ jobs that have appeared previously that haven't been used yet.

they dip one toe into something truly original.

(That doesn't make it automatically good, though!)

There is something to be said for making hasty judgements, but in this instance I don't think finding out any more about the class would change anything when the problem is with the name, what it tells you and how it comes off.

[Raven2014]

There is something to be said for making hasty judgements, but in this instance I don't think finding out any more about the class would change anything when the problem is with the name, what it tells you and how it comes off.

Have you ever thought about the fact that we're going into Jungle theme with an Amazon as one of the main zone? If the job is native to this region, it already have a very good thematic reason right there.

[SeverianLyonesse]

At some point this argument is asinine. We criticize this dev team for only taking job inspiration from previous FF games, they dip one toe into something truly original. These forums spew copious amounts of word vomit and hope something sticks this time it’s “oh i dont like the name despite knowing everything about the job based off the 3 minutes of information you gave to us.”

If it were truly original, I would agree with this line of thinking.

But it's not. It is a job based, at least in some part, on Zidane, and to some extent terribly underutilizing the source material.

And even then, to call an extremely narrow, unidimensional job concept like "viper", where the only thing it seems to have going for it is two swords and a snake motif, "truly original", is I think deluding oneself. This is, by far, the shallowest, non-design we have seen in a job to date. Despite what people are saying, it really isn't *creative* on the same level of prior job designs. It is amateurish.

IMHO a lot of people dislike the name simply because it lacks "legacy". I'm pretty sure they'll try to create lore and personality for it, but for right now my reaction was 'meh'.

The "piratey" looking armour and beach/island/treasure setting is why a lot of people went with Corsair (plus Merylwb has animation sets for pistols, I honestly thought they were going to reuse them), it was the logical choice. But they decided not to have a gun/blunderbuss so that option went out the window. Would people have reacted negatively to a Corsair without guns? We can only speculate now.

Viper wouldn't have been my first choice. As some people on other threads have pointed out names like Thief or Pirate have "negative connotations" (fun fact: I worked on a game about pirates once and some countries really hate to use the term on titles, so it had to be changed to sailors or something).

I would have gone with "Treasure Hunter" as a wink to FF6's Locke. Too long or confusing? something like 'Raider' then. (As in Raiders of the Lost Ark, or Tomb Raider. Fits the setting).

I think people absolutely would have accepted a more Corsair-leaning job with two swords, if it were flavored correctly to still emphasize (1) Zidane traits, and (2) swashbuckling. I am glad we agree that "Hunter", and leaning into both animal hunting and treasure hunting, would have communicated both Corsair and Thief reasonably well. I also like your idea of Raider.

There is something to be said for making hasty judgements, but in this instance I don't think finding out any more about the class would change anything when the problem is with the name, what it tells you and how it comes off.

Basically this. We actually have been given quite a lot of the overview of the job to judge if the name and concept is actually very good. Just because there are remaining details to be revealed doesn't mean it is very savvy to hide behind WAFO apologism. I don't think being undiscerning makes for a very strong argument in favor of the class, and I definitely see a difference in the quality of rationales between the ugh-Viper commentators and the woo-Viper commentators.

I have seen a bunch of illiterates saying "oh you're just mad that you didn't get Corsair or Thief", and that just isn't the case. I didn't need either of those jobs, but when a job is this close to being a coherent, solid reference to past FF jobs and had a clear path to victory (Hunter), obviously I am irritated that the devs tripped over their own stupid ideas and ended up implementing a very shallow, non-concept instead.

I have also seen a bunch of people insisting that the devs are "creating" a new job out of this concept. Pray tell, what exactly can be coaxed out of this motif? It's a snake. That's all there is to it. It may get a little poison. It may get some speedy slashes. But outside of that, Viper just doesn't offer as much creative direction and design space as "Hunter" or "Raider" or "Ranger". It is so self-limiting and shooting itself in the foot. We assuredly are not going to get a cool multifaceted job like Sage or Reaper out of this, and if we do, it will at best be in *spite* of the name, and at worst be *actively dissonant* from the name.

[Mayhemmer]

-And even then, to call an extremely narrow, unidimensional job concept like "viper", where the only thing it seems to have going for it is two swords and a snake motif, "truly original", is I think deluding oneself. This is, by far, the shallowest, non-design we have seen in a job to date. Despite what people are saying, it really isn't *creative* on the same level of prior job designs. It is amateurish.

Some of you sure do take yourselves awfully seriously.

[jameseoakes]

If it were truly original, I would agree with this line of thinking.

But it's not. It is a job based, at least in some part, on Zidane, and to some extent terribly underutilizing the source material.

And even then, to call an extremely narrow, unidimensional job concept like "viper", where the only thing it seems to have going for it is two swords and a snake motif, "truly original", is I think deluding oneself. This is, by far, the shallowest, non-design we have seen in a job to date. Despite what people are saying, it really isn't *creative* on the same level of prior job designs. It is amateurish.

I think people absolutely would have accepted a more Corsair-leaning job with two swords, if it were flavored correctly to still emphasize (1) Zidane traits, and (2) swashbuckling. I am glad we agree that "Hunter", and leaning into both animal hunting and treasure hunting, would have communicated both Corsair and Thief reasonably well. I also like your idea of Raider.

The job seems to have no actual inspiration from Zidane, particularly from his actual game appearance as the weapons have pretty much no relation to anything he does outside of having a twobladed weapon. The job seems to pull more from Gabranth than anything to do with Zidane