They're thinking about job identities for 8.0

[Valence]

Yoshi-P did mention briefly about wanting to delete classes and rework jobs. That's probably happening in 8.0. If that's their plan, it explains the little changes they made moving from 6.0 to 7.0.
We're mostly likely only getting one new job (Physical ranged?), or no new jobs. Maybe expand on limited jobs (Level cap and content to do with them).

I wouldn't even mind getting no new job but a single rphys if it means we can get the pvp treatment over job identity. Hell, I'd even forego a 4th rphys job even though this role needs some love if it meant it got a new identity.

I think it was on a media tour, I think, that he commented on this on the Reaper panel, but I couldn't find it unfortunately.

But I think he says something similar in this video here: https://youtu.be/WSGdMv72ghI 1:16:40

Thank you for finding it.

I guess it makes things clear on that department, and I'll stop pestering them about it then, and concentrate instead on job identity, which this thread is about anyway. I don't care much about extreme complexity and difficulty, or galaxybrain skill ceilings. I just want decent ceilings that allow for meaningful mechanics in jobs that feel good to use and pull off properly.

[Roda]

I guess it makes things clear on that department, and I'll stop pestering them about it then, and concentrate instead on job identity, which this thread is about anyway. I don't care much about extreme complexity and difficulty, or galaxybrain skill ceilings. I just want decent ceilings that allow for meaningful mechanics in jobs that feel good to use and pull off properly.

Honesetly, difficulty/complexity is a red herring in the current job design paradigm anyway imo.

Different people have different brains, which means there's a bunch of different routes people prefer to take when solving problems. What's hard for one person to understand is intuitive for another and so on.
So, when caulking over niches for the sake of making jobs accessible for those who prefer to play other jobs, those who used to fill that niche may now struggle with adapting to a strategy that's less engaging for them, which then leads to simplifying the homogenized group, and thus a vicious cycle is born.

Something something, gameplay diversity is accessibility. We're about to have 21 jobs (4T, 4H, 6M, 3R, 4C), the goal should be that your average gamer should have at least one job that they click with, 3-5 for your more advanced player, and really only your hardcore playerbase should be able to maximize the usage of every job. (and even then..) If your largest player demographic is able to find a groove with every job, it's not because you have accessible job design, it's because you've pushed out every other player who prefers different gameplay niches.

[mallleable]

I want jobs to be "simple**." Jobs being easy, and intuitive to play is good actually, and they should generally be ironing out the jank, but jobs do need some funk to them to remain fun. Like keep the simplicity, and ease of use that's been established with Endwalker (and soon to be Dawntrail I guess), but bring in some of the funkier job mechanics from PVP into PVE.

[OdinelStarrei]

Well, after thinking about it for a few days, this is about as awful as I thought it would be, so I'm not really bothered, one of those upsides of not expecting anything good to ever happen.

I think that Yoshi-P saying "We're going to focus more on job identity in 8.0" is actually a hidden blessing for players like me, because it essentially means that all the feedback that was given since...early ShB??? for more individuality for the jobs is being noticed, but has just been actively ignored/disregarded for half a decade now. So instead of being a complete waste of time and effort, it's only a majority of the waste, and a kernel of value, if only from the validation alone.

Bonus, it also means we get to skip the entire "wait until media tour tooltips/wait until expansion launch/wait until X.1/wait until X.3/wait until next expansion" BS that we go through every expansion, and we can instead just jump straight to the "wait until 8.0" cryochamber instead of providing emotionally draining and unfulfilled feedback for the next three years.

Think I'll finally get around to cleaning out my house instead of just having it unceremoniously auto-demo'd, get rid of that ball and chain. It's long overdue, and that plot should go to someone who might actually enjoy themselves here.

EDIT: Destroyed my house. Honestly, harder than I thought it would be. I've had that house for six years, and I have a lot of memories with old static mates and current day friends. Took my pictures, and let it go.

This sucks, man...

[Naizuo]

It's actually wild that this is the expansion they really seemed to drop the ball on (combat wise). I really do miss shadowbringers combat, stormblood even more. It's one thing to add QoL, but simplifying a "difficult" job to a simple one personally isn't the best plan... Do that to a job to add.

Can't believe YoshiP said people are torn about AST's iterations and that he can't satisfy them all but thats the issue, you cannnot satisfy everyone but you definitely had less unsatisfied players in stormblood than now. Removed, different AST card affects, then removed sects, and now the rng elements....

He doesn't even mention anything about the Kaiten removal in the LL when that has alot of views and attraction since 6.1... So much for giving feedback in the forums...

[Aravell]

It's actually wild that this is the expansion they really seemed to drop the ball on (combat wise). I really do miss shadowbringers combat, stormblood even more. It's one thing to add QoL, but simplifying a "difficult" job to a simple one personally isn't the best plan... Do that to a job to add.

Can't believe YoshiP said people are torn about AST's iterations and that he can't satisfy them all but thats the issue, you cannnot satisfy everyone but you definitely had less unsatisfied players in stormblood than now. Removed, different AST card affects, then removed sects, and now the rng elements....

He doesn't even mention anything about the Kaiten removal in the LL when that has alot of views and attraction since 6.1... So much for giving feedback in the forums...

That appears to be what they do ever since ShB.

Made a change that people didn't like? Ask them to give feedback on the forums and completely ignore all of it until they give up and go away!

Seems to be working out pretty well for them so far.

[Ayer2015]

So apparently we'll have to wait for 3 more years until we get a single consideration for actual job flavor?

Is this for real? You couldn't do that for this expansion?

Meanwhile everything is simplified in order to remove any failure state (notably gauge costs for bursts among other things).

I couldn't agree more with this sentiment.
I've just come to terms that the devs are completely out of touch from what NA players actually would enjoy.

[mallleable]

A comment that has wormed its way into my head regarding having to wait until 8.0 to see drastic job changes is the possibility of a level squish. Which, yes, would require extensive changes to every job. It isn't just simple numbers. 8.0 is gonna pose some legitimate design crossroads for combat, so it kinda makes sense to put it off until then which might be some cope.

[Absurdity]

The big question is also whether their idea of job identity and flavour is even the same as ours, they could be talking about nothing but visuals for all we know.
Imagine waiting another 3 years for 8.0 and then get no improvements to the job pve gameplay at all, we just get some "job flavoured" versions of role skills and some more VFX updates.

[Musashidon]

the possibility of a level squish. Which, yes, would require extensive changes to every job

technically all they would have to do is smash the current 100 lvls worth of jobs into 50 lvls which would also make players happy because a lot of players dislike losing their skills in dungeons.

i will also say i dont see us getting too drastic of a change because at most we are seeing 2 jobs being changes at a time per expansion and magically we want us to be able to do it to 21 jobs in 8.0 which is over 10 times the work.