Fleshed-out Job Concepts

[Tokitoki]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

The concept for Mystic Knight spells is completelty different from Enspells. Enspells add additional damage to an attack, but Malacite's concept *changes* the weapons physical damage to magical damage.

It really isn't that much different though. You cast a spell on yourself to do elemental damage to a foe. The main difference is that RDM can still do physical damage if the en- spells are getting resisted. It also allows RDMs to give 0TP to the mobs, which Mystic Knight would not be able to do. This, in some situations, makes it better. The other difference is that Mystic Knight would have higher tiers, or a few new spells.

And recycling *some* spells isn't that big of a deal, but when you have basically take an existing spell list from a job that can already do the same thing then add and remove some spells yet still have it do the same thing, it's kinda redundent.

Existing spell list: Enfire, enstone, enthunder, en... etc.
New spell list: Endrain (I know it's not called that, bare with me a minute), Enflash, Enfire II, en... etc

Ok so we get higher tiers and a few new spells, but the function is still basically the same, the ability to do elemental damage with melee attacks.

Cor is a Buffer, and as you said, closer to Brd then Rng. Rng is a DD who specializes in ranged weapons. The *roles* do not need to be different, the execution and abilities do.

Now you're contradicting yourself. The abilities and spells don't need to be different just teh roles? Then why complain about a recycled spell list?

Ding! page 4

[Lmnop]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

as for GEOs:

Hantz, I like your concept a lot. Especially the focus on counterattacks.

My criticism:

First and foremost, it has abilities that will likely go unused. If it only ever uses the Stone Clone (just wanted to say that 'cuz it rhymes), it'll never use the fire/thunder/air/light abilities. And we know players -- if one way works, they'll drive it into the ground.

Second, it doesn't seem to have enough damage mitigation. Or maybe it does. I'd probably make it work off of a system wherein it gains Stoneskin often and quickly, but isn't terribly potent. W/out heavy defensive gear, it takes around 28-42 seconds for a Greater Colibri to kill a full health level 75 character. Let's say you parry 2 attacks (that's out of 7, btw), you just gained 8-12 seconds to your lifespan. With light curing, you're effectively gaining ~300 hp/minute. Anything more is probably wasteful for your backline (this is mostly guestimate based off of Cure 3's cost of 46 MP for 190 HP). Afterall, most PLDs pretty much main heal themselves these days and still have MP to spare.

With these things in mind, a +100% HP stoneskin that they could activate every minute would be rediculously overpowered solo, and yet probably still not enough for tanking in parties. I quite like the idea of a Stoneskin type effect that has a maximum per-hit amount it can take. In this regard, it'd be a cross between Stoneskin and Phalanx.

More later

[Amberly]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

Just to throw something out there...what about a Mimic?

The job can randomly change to one of the 5 other jobs in the party. recast 1:00 min

2 hour. You can choose what job in the party to be and have 100% mp and hp. aka the life saver of a party.

If you do switch to blm for example, you would only be able to use the spells that your char has already learned.
Other ja would consist of reverse ( whatevery ja, special attack, or cast the mob does next, you do the exact same including buffs) and reflect (sends next cast against you, back at the mob.)

Don't hate me for not giving a whole indepth guide. This is just an idea of something that would be cool. This is mainly just to get the ball rolling on the mimic idea.

[Ziero]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

It really isn't that much different though. You cast a spell on yourself to do elemental damage to a foe. The main difference is that RDM can still do physical damage if the en- spells are getting resisted. It also allows RDMs to give 0TP to the mobs, which Mystic Knight would not be able to do. This, in some situations, makes it better. The other difference is that Mystic Knight would have higher tiers, or a few new spells.

En-spells only add an additional elemental effect to a weapon, where the only way to make it stronger is to increase your enhancing skill. Which is why so many Rdm use the Hornet Needle, because it's crap damage has no effect on the power of the Enspell but it's speed lets them swing faster to get more hits in. But Malacite's concept, at least from my perception, would base the damage on the DMG of the weapon combined with the elemental weakness of the mob and strength of the spell cast. It fundimentally changes *how* the spell works.

Existing spell list: Enfire, enstone, enthunder, en... etc.
New spell list: Endrain (I know it's not called that, bare with me a minute), Enflash, Enfire II, en... etc
Ok so we get higher tiers and a few new spells, but the function is still basically the same, the ability to do elemental damage with melee attacks.

Agreed, the spells will still have a similar function, but the *jobs* won't. Rdm is the best debuffer and a great support job, a MSK, under this concept, will be a front line magical DD. Though I will agree that just having a spell list 'similar' to enspells won't make it that unique, which is what I stated in the other topic, which is why I suggested adding some JA based special attacks as well.

Now you're contradicting yourself. The abilities and spells don't need to be different just teh roles? Then why complain about a recycled spell list?

...I don't know *where* you got this from. In fact that is the *exact* opposite of what I did say. There is only so many roles needed in a party, DD, Tank or Support. Some jobs mix and match these roles, but all will fall under at least one of those categories. For a new job to be successful, imo, it doesn't need to create a new role, just accomplish that role in a unique way.

Cor is a Buffer, and as you said, closer to Brd then Rng. Rng is a DD who specializes in ranged weapons. The *roles* do not need to be different, the execution and abilities do. Where Cor is based on luck and long timers, Brd is not. Where Rng is able do massive Dmg with their ranged attacks, other jobs have to be up close. It's not *what* they do, it's how they do it.

Seriously, where does it say the roles should be different?

His concept for Dancer was to take Brd, remove some songs, add higher tiers of other songs and give it some wacky, totally uneeded JAs. And it's purpose isn't to work *with* other jobs but to specifically replace one. And his concept for Geo was to take Nin/Rdm, remove it's MP and cures, have it cast *all* spells by items on 30-ish timers and add some mildly useful AoE buffs. The only thing that makes it even similar to Geos of old is the fact it uses Bells...that you would have to travel the world to recharge with an element every time you get more. It combines the worst part about Blu, and makes it worse, with the worst part about nin, making it worse as well, into one *highly* overpowered job. (having all those buffs, stacked, every 30 seconds for no MP).

To me, they're poorly thought out and nothing really too unique or special, which is why I don't think they're good concepts.

[Tokitoki]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

Yea typing at work wasn't the brightest idea.

I think my point was this:
You commend Malacite for his use of spells that are basically En- spells, but then condemn LF because he took BRD and made it a little more melee-oriented with a few new buffs.

His idea for Mystic Knight is Red Mage that is a little more melee oriented with a few new buffs. Essentially you are dismissing an idea for a new job while praising another that uses the same concept.

Ok guys here's what we're going to do! We're going to make a new job that uses a hammer. They can flash and have cures. But heres the thing! They have better defense and are more melee oriented. We'll give them access to shield and sword as well. What? You mean that just sounds like a melee WHM? Well, we call it Paladin!

Mystic Knight is the new Mage gone tank.

I'm not even commenting on Geomancer because, truthfully, I could care less.

[DakAttack]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

Whm >> Pld
Blm >> Drk
Rdm >> Mystic Knight?

I always assumed it was Rdm >> War. White, white. Black, black. Red, red.

[Lmnop]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

Ziero, you're too harsh on your analysis of BRP's Geomancer. In fact, it honestly looks like you're trying to hate it.

Look at Hantz build. Notice how he makes it clear that lots of things (durations/strength/recasts) could be heavily modified. And let's say S-E liked the Legal Fish posted build, we know they'll change things.

My point is... you can point out things like "being able to do those every 30 seconds is overpowered" not say "that's so poorly thought out that you must be a baboon with a keyboard." It's just not fair when you're looking at one person coming up with a concept when we know S-E uses a whole team to develop and test a single job.

Now it's my turn to take a stab at BRP's Geomancer:

I like the idea of them casting w/out MP, and I like the idea that it'd be free (essentially making them interruptible JAs) a lot of the time. What I think would be better than elementalizing your bells is simply going to those regions to learn your spells. Lots of people are quick to bitch about traveling the world to convert your bells, but no one's mentioned the fact that it'd be an awful process to select all 99 of your bells and one-by-one convert them. In order to make this plausible, the job would need it's own unique menu (much like PUP or BLU have their own) that's a "convert table." Still, I don't think this is necessary as I'd rather you just bought the 8 different bells already imbued with the correct elements. Then simply learn the spell the same way you gather elements for your Carbuncle Ruby.

Also, it's impossible to stack Spikes, as far as I can tell. The reason that an Enthunder spell overwrites the additional effect: defense down of a melt dagger (or whatever it's called) is purely technical. They all attempt to fill the same slot, so instead they just overwrite each other.

Here's one thing that's for sure for all GEO builds:
-implementation of Bells but not as weapons. This is the concept I like the most of BRP's. It could also be like Instruments as BRDs use them, but that seems pretty meh.
-spells do not depend on where you are currently too heavily. Still, I expect them to get a bit more effect out of it than BLMs do.
-More than one way to mitigate damage thus making no single one overpowered.



Btw, since we know WotG is all time-travelly, here's just a silly idea for implementation:

During the War, there was an elite fighting force of shamanistic Humes from the wilds of <somewhere>. Who cares about that part. The point is: they didn't have many troops, but they made this unit of all their Geomancers to battle for the sake of good and cheese.

Well, as these things tend to go, they did something heroic during some great battle that basically sacrificed the entire unit to buy time for the regular Bastokan army or something. Thus, the job is lost to time but via time travel, we'll have a chance to retrieve it. I guess this could be said of really any job in the expansion. I just can't think of any good ones for GEO...

Too bad, because it's the only job I truely care about seeing implemented.

[Malacite]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

MSK is totally different from RDM. The only shared concept is mixing magic and melee through enchanting their swords. That's where the similarities end.

No job to this date actually physically attacks with their spells. MSK is a hybrid DD/Tank mage. I've tried to stay as true to FFV as possible with the build, keeping it as a high end anti-mage fighter-mage. Spellblade can potentially be subjected to a lot of different variables to help balance it out, but basically I'm hoping for it to be the first melee job that actually uses /BLM on a regular basis.


Why? Because no melee other than NIN really has much incentive to do so, and because it's a unique blend of spell casting and sword play. RDM's use enspells to tack on a bit of extra damage. Blue mages cast enemy attacks along with their melee. Mystic Knights transform their swords into spells.


I already suggested toning down the power/duration of their enfeebling spellblades (or even limit what tiers they can access, if not ignoring them completely ) so as not to step on RDM's toes.

The job can't heal/buff other party members like RDM can so it's no threat to it's invites. Mystic Knight, ever since I first tried it years ago in FFV is at least to me the perfect example of what a fighter-mage should be. BLU and RDM are both pretty close, with BLU winning out IMO due to it's better melee, but I just love the idea of hitting enemies with spells as opposed to just spending MP on a 1-shot spell.

All 3 jobs are great, I love them to death but we're still missing my favorite in this game!


In short: While the basic concept of enspells and spellblade are similar, they are in fact fundamentally different in function.

[Yellow Mage]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

And what's so wrong with changing the function of the Red Mage's Enspells, Malacite? Why introduce a whole new job for what could very easily be a very minor adjustment to Red Mage?

Personally, I think that would be a slap in all RDMs' faces, which, with your attitude to your supposed "fundamental differences," I belive it to be your subconsious intent.

[DakAttack]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

And what's so wrong with changing the function of the Red Mage's Enspells, Malacite? Why introduce a whole new job for what could very easily be a very minor adjustment to Red Mage?

Personally, I think that would be a slap in all RDMs' faces, which, with your attitude to your supposed "fundamental differences," I belive it to be your subconsious intent.

Get over it.

Here's a spell we can give to Red Mages: EnSTFU.

[Malacite]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

Why introduce a whole new job for what could very easily be a very minor adjustment to Red Mage?

>_> there's nothing minor about it. We're talking about taking every single target offensive spell (with some exceptions of course like Absorbs) and changing the formulas to include weapon stats and factor in accuracy etc...

[Armando]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

Personally, I prefer BRP's take on Geomancer. No offense Hantz. I just don't like the whole idea of merging Runic Knight with Geomancer, and giving them Great Swords. The parrying bonus trait, while useful, also seems somewhat out of place. A lot of the abilities were really interesting and creative though, so kudos for that.

Lmnop pointed out something that's very critical though: Carve Model is potentially unbalanced. Players WILL develop a dependency on Carve Model for tanking, and that automatically locks a player out of using the light elements. Hell, I think the whole light/dark division is silly. If you want to use a single buff, you lock yourself out of four specific others automatically. Making them stack like the elemental DoTs, according to the elemental wheel would be better, and then you could arrange it so that the abilities on elements that conflict with each other aren't useful together/likely to be used together.

BRP's idea on Geomancer makes heavy use of terrain, while using bells to fill the gaps left. This is far more in line with how Geomancer should play. DakAttack has complained that it would be silly to have to use the bells one by one to turn them into elemental bells. There's no reason why transforming them should take forever; S-E could just make it so that normal Bells behave like a quiver. Use one and receive a "quiver" of 99 elemental bells which also stack. Quick and easy. BRP's Geomancer concept is also a lot less constricted because elemental compatibility doesn't come into play.

However, I feel both job concepts are a bit lacking in one area: Elemental resistance (both player and monsterwise.) So far we depend on BRD and NIN for resistance down. BRD can only use one Threnody at a time. NIN's elemental resistance debuffs only last 15 seconds, and good luck convincing a NIN it's worth taking out 2 seconds from his/her TP gain for lolSkillchaindamage. Sure, BRP also proposes Dancer, but then again those are still threnodies and you can only use one of them. On the other hand, Geomancer is supposed to be able to harness and manipulate the elements; it wouldn't be too big of a stretch to allow them to drop enemy resistances, and it would be a valuable asset to bring to parties.

Then there's elemental resistance on the player side of things. As things stand now you need specialized gear builds on top of a full-power Barspell to be able to resist elemental attacks with any consistency at all. The other option is Carol, but using up a song slot for that hurts, and I think they're weaker than Barspells if I remember correctly. Hantz proposed a job trait to give Geomancers higher elemental resistance. This should definetely be a part of the job, though it'd have to be a much larger number (at least 50.) An ability to boost the party's resistance to an element, with bonuses for having the right day/weather/terrain present, would also be useful.

Regarding tanking: Personally, I'd rather not see Geomancer depend on Stoneskin. We already have one job that depends on recast timers to nullify most damage taken. The stoneskins should be weak enough that a Geomancer isn't relying on them to not take damage, but absorb enough HP every so often to be useful (think Flash.)

[Lmnop]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

Regarding tanking: Personally, I'd rather not see Geomancer depend on Stoneskin. We already have one job that depends on recast timers to nullify most damage taken. The stoneskins should be weak enough that a Geomancer isn't relying on them to not take damage, but absorb enough HP every so often to be useful (think Flash.)

Good point that it should be an occasional thing but... they would need something else to put their damage negation up there. This brings up an interesting train of thought...

Let's say you took a Warrior, gave them PLD access to shields and A+ shield skill, and ummm just for the heck of it, A rank Parry and Evasion. Now you have a Rampaging, shield blocking, parrying, dodging fool. Would you accept this as a tank in your party? (btw, I think this "Skill tank" is a rad concept) Honestly, I still don't think it'd be enough for people. Please tell me if you disagree. Fact is, he still cannot cure himself and still doesn't have shadows. Our tanks need a "trick."

ok, now that my aside is over, I have to try to remember why I brought it up...

Having a Stoneskin to fall back on is grand, but it shouldn't be all inclusive. So then... what will it depend on? It can't blink tank in between, and it can't self-cure to keep up. I think as is, PLD relies on timers almost as much as NINs. Timing cures, recast on Flash, use of JAs.

It'd be nice if it could garner hate on it's own, but it has to be build that's not conducive to being paired with Utsusemi. Honestly, the PLD method of tanking isn't conducive to shadows (getting hit so you can make use of shield block/shield mastery and - oh yeah, curing yourself for hate), and yet we see lots of PLD/nins these days (something I'd like to see stopped). But yes, we don't want it to end up yet another /nin tank. That'll be hard if you give it things that can hold hate like Provoke. Still, the idea of an AoE buff they can do once/minute or so (ideally, 8 single elements or 4 dual element abilities that they can do once/5 minutes each) that basically uses the pre-nerf Mazurka concept for hate would be mighty cool.

You could take BRP's basic concept, and apply the elemental restriction. Though I think I agree that I'd like to see it work like the elemental dots. Mainly because it means you can have 2 effects that don't strictly agree with each other or 3 "complimentary" buffs -- and then light/dark would always be present but seperate. I think this would quell a lot of thoughts that the abilities would be overpowered. Also, I really do like the counter-effects of hantz' build. Unfortunately, I don't see how to fit them into a build that's 1) also doing what it can to attract hate and 2) not die.

Magic-oriented tanking is a cool concept and all, but it doesn't work so well against crawlers, imps, beetles, raptors, crabs, mandragora....

And I totally wouldn't be opposed to them using a Greatsword.

[Malacite]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

I really don't think GEO should be a tank. It seems much more like a enfeebling support to me with some DD.


What I would like to see would be to incorporate some kind of area based learning system for magic kind of like how you get Blue Magic. Only instead of targeting specific mobs, you have to EXP in certain places, and even in certain weather condtitions to obtain spells.

After that you'd be able to cast them at any time, but they would be subject to bonuses or penalties depending on the terrain and weather.


For example, you're on the boat and you learn a sea based spell (Aqua Rake? I know it's a classic blue mage spell, I'm just trying to think of a water attack). Then you go to cast in an area such as Altepa or Ifrit's Cauldron. Well, given that these are extremely hot/barren areas, you'd take a penalty.

Casting it near large open sources of water, or during rainy weather on the other hand would grand bonuses (extra effects or damage).



Just an idea for an alternative to bells, not that I don't like them.

[DakAttack]

Re: Fleshed-out Job Concepts

The Geomancer could have spells that would help hold hate as well as mitigate small amounts of damage if it was meant to tank. Let's say you're fighting Crabs on the beach, you could have access to an Earth elemental spell cleverly named Sandtrap that would inflict Slow onto your opponent and lower their Accuracy. Or if you're fighting Crawlers in the Nest a root based spell could inflict Drain and Attack Down.

The only problem I see is deciding what spells you'll have access to. I don't think there's a way you can populate a spell list based on the elements around you so the Geomancer would have access to all their spells at all times. The strength of their spells can probably be based on the zone you're in, and with the same mechanics that decides what foot print animation and sound effect should be playing.

Perhaps with bells you could strengthen the effects of spells that would otherwise not be strong in a certain situations? It'd take a little heat off of them while still making them very useful.

If more emphasis could be placed on sub jobs Ninja wouldn't be a problem. If perhaps the stat bonus were doubled people might have more reason to go with something other than shadows.