FFXIV Random Speculation/Question thread II: Let's Speculate the Speculations

**Urza** · 2010-06-15 18:27

Anyone not think ditching mana with this system and just having it be like FF13 is a good idea?

Why worry about refilling mana if you can just have the action gauge prevent you from overdoing it on spells.

**Jinko** · 2010-06-15 18:29

Originally Posted by Urza

Anyone not think ditching mana with this system and just having it be like FF13 is a good idea?

Why worry about refilling mana if you can just have the action gauge prevent you from overdoing it on spells.

Yup, I think its a bit unfair to give restraints to mages/caster types when melee/tanks and ranged don't have any.

As long as its balanced correctly I see no problem with that.

**omegaB** · 2010-06-15 18:37

ehhh they give casters some manaless and tp based skills that are basically spells, i dont see a problem with having mp when its a choice, just like some skills cost mp, like red lotus blade.

**Kalisa** · 2010-06-15 18:41

Originally Posted by Jollipop

Yup, I think its a bit unfair to give restraints to mages/caster types when melee/tanks and ranged don't have any.

As long as its balanced correctly I see no problem with that.

While I agree that DD mages shouldn't have restraints if DD melee don't... the upper bound of "shit you can kill" is determined by healers--healing throughput to handle the big hits and raw "how much can you heal before you run dry on MP" for encounter length.

If we want to avoid more 18hr encounters, healing should have limits. And since we don't have a pure healing class, that means applying the MP limit mechanic to everyone. Removing it would mean centering encounter design on tanks instead of healers--can your tank mitigate enough to survive the next hit before the constant inevitable healing trickle tops him off? And that's a REALLY frustrating mechanic to deal with. XD

Looking forward to what they do with it in this brave new world of everyone pitching in for party vs. party encounters, but eventually it's going to be us vs. one big badass dealing with the same old ways of thinking.

**Urza** · 2010-06-15 18:50

So, you don't have a problem with melee weapons breaking faster say, or melee never healing out of combat because a limited resource that forces you to either use items or go back to the aetheryte is fine. The mana less spell (singular) is the same as everyone else gets for their starter attack. Does anyone want to use their starter attack at level cap because they need to conserve their mana just in case?

Now, you want to say Meteor, Flare, high end summons should be limited, I'm all for that. A balanced spell that does roughly the same damage melee can do given stats and time involved along with chance to get eaten based on armor being worn, that doesn't need to be limited to anything but your own stupidity. Everything you're doing is a spell just like the casters. Everything. If you twirl around with a sword for aoe is that not the same as an aoe fire spell. TP limits on spells might be ok depending on the spell. But basic attacks no. Buffs maybe, preventing buffs from being required at all times would go a long way to fixing many end games.

You say you can do your decent attack no more than 20 times before you're required to head back to camp or only use your starter attack, then you can say mana is required on everything. It wouldnt bother me having a mana cost of course if mana replenished out of combat, even if it was slower than HP, but it currently doesn't, so its a big question for later in the game as to whether thats a sustainable paradigm.

**Loaar** · 2010-06-15 18:54

Continuing from last week:

Spoiler: show

**Urza** · 2010-06-15 18:54

Originally Posted by Kalisa

While I agree that DD mages shouldn't have restraints if DD melee don't... the upper bound of "shit you can kill" is determined by healers--healing throughput to handle the big hits and raw "how much can you heal before you run dry on MP" for encounter length.

If we want to avoid more 18hr encounters, healing should have limits. And since we don't have a pure healing class, that means applying the MP limit mechanic to everyone. Removing it would mean centering encounter design on tanks instead of healers--can your tank mitigate enough to survive the next hit before the constant inevitable healing trickle tops him off? And that's a REALLY frustrating mechanic to deal with. XD

Looking forward to what they do with it in this brave new world of everyone pitching in for party vs. party encounters, but eventually it's going to be us vs. one big badass dealing with the same old ways of thinking.

How about healing spells are TP or mana based? Standard attack spells not.

I agree that healing is a big limiting factor in most games. I've despised WoW for enshrining the idea that you need 1/5 -1/3 of a raid to be healers in order to survive. Especially when its 2/15 of specs that can heal, and probably about that percentage who actually like healing.

**Jinko** · 2010-06-15 19:09

@Kalisa

Well TBF we were seeing 18 hour fights even with those restraints in place with FF11, but that is largely down to shoddy balancing and development.

As much as I would like to see a healer with no mana to hold them back (its quite irratating to run out of mana and not beable to do your job) I do think you are correct.

Obviously removing mana would cause other issues such as there will be more stat points to spend which will cause balancing problems there, no use for mp items or +mp stats from armour (if it exsist).

I just hope that later on there will be a refresh effect from some of the armour at least.

**omegaB** · 2010-06-15 19:16

Originally Posted by Urza

So, you don't have a problem with melee weapons breaking faster say, or melee never healing out of combat because a limited resource that forces you to either use items or go back to the aetheryte is fine. The mana less spell (singular) is the same as everyone else gets for their starter attack. Does anyone want to use their starter attack at level cap because they need to conserve their mana just in case?

Now, you want to say Meteor, Flare, high end summons should be limited, I'm all for that. A balanced spell that does roughly the same damage melee can do given stats and time involved along with chance to get eaten based on armor being worn, that doesn't need to be limited to anything but your own stupidity. Everything you're doing is a spell just like the casters. Everything. If you twirl around with a sword for aoe is that not the same as an aoe fire spell. TP limits on spells might be ok depending on the spell. But basic attacks no. Buffs maybe, preventing buffs from being required at all times would go a long way to fixing many end games.

You say you can do your decent attack no more than 20 times before you're required to head back to camp or only use your starter attack, then you can say mana is required on everything. It wouldnt bother me having a mana cost of course if mana replenished out of combat, even if it was slower than HP, but it currently doesn't, so its a big question for later in the game as to whether thats a sustainable paradigm.

Not exactly sure what direction you're leaning here, but to clarify, the mpless spell does similar or more dmg as the regular spells in Alpha, but its not aoe, and if they give you tp based skills and spells that dont require mana.
in endgame situations, most likely the melee will be using regular attacks to get tp, yeah, most likely the same light slash will be be used endgame, one option the atb battle system opens up is having different atb cost regular attacks, that could be cool. Oh yeah and some weapon skills also use mp.

Anyhow basically what it seems like the plan is, is that magic users combine
regular attacks, tp skills and abilities to manage thier mana, but its not like ffxi, where you will be useless without mana, and have no ways to replenish it. you can actually be an active magic user now, instead of sitting back or fearing mp loss on everything. spells also seem to be low cost now.

melee users balance is usually hp, by using binds distance, kiting and provoke, magic users can try to avoid taking dmg, but melee users generally dont have the option not to get hit, what limits melee is balancing thier hp.

**Cureslime** · 2010-06-15 19:38

Originally Posted by meonline

Continuing from last week:

Spoiler: show

thanks for the weapon comparison screenshots. i was going to try to put together screenshots and a spreadsheet of all the different items but my ADD got the best of me.

**qpoiuwer** · 2010-06-15 23:38

Spoiler: show

My hypothesis is that this would give a 200-focus modifier when used in an axe with all other +2 components (if you use all +1 components, your focus starts at 100). I'd work towards testing it more but I keep running out of god damn fire crystals. When you get high enough to make those scorpion harnesses or whatever it is you kids use these days, you might be able to get +3s of all the base materials and practically get a risk-free +3 high level armor.

**mintyice** · 2010-06-15 23:41

did anyone else see this?

i.imgur.com/AStLh.png

paste in browser, i can't post urls

**Celeras** · 2010-06-15 23:46

Originally Posted by qpoiuwer

Spoiler: show

My hypothesis is that this would give a 200-focus modifier when used in an axe with all other +2 components (if you use all +1 components, your focus starts at 100). I'd work towards testing it more but I keep running out of god damn fire crystals. When you get high enough to make those scorpion harnesses or whatever it is you kids use these days, you might be able to get +3s of all the base materials and practically get a risk-free +3 high level armor.

You seem knowledgeable on the subject, what the fuck does crystal instability do? Are you just supposed to wait a few rounds for it to stablize or what.

**Jinfire** · 2010-06-15 23:47

Originally Posted by mintyice

did anyone else see this?

i.imgur.com/AStLh.png

paste in browser, i can't post urls

Whoa I have not see that before that looks really cool. Maybe its just a planned set of classes that would be released, I doubt all of these will come at launch.

**qpoiuwer** · 2010-06-15 23:49

Originally Posted by Celeras

You seem knowledgeable on the subject, what the fuck does crystal instability do? Are you just supposed to wait a few rounds for it to stablize or what.

Man, I've never seen the Wait command do anything except sometimes make Hasty Hands pop up. I usually just cross my fingers and press on. I kinda feel like Careful has a higher chance of failing, but who knows? I usually try to stick to Standard/Rapid when it's unstable because those generally have a lower durability cost.

**Squeaky** · 2010-06-15 23:51

Image for easy viewing (thanks mintyice)

Spoiler: show

There was discussion about all of these a month or 2 ago, but no one could confirm if they would all be real classes or not. People datamined a lot of class names from FFXI that never were playable, so it's hard to guess right now what we will have access to.

**Hyan** · 2010-06-15 23:54

I think we have few years worth of classes right there >_>

**Ramsey** · 2010-06-16 00:00

So after having had a chance to watch someone play the Alpha for two nights, we've discovered something that is making my skin crawl uncomfortably, and basically I'm looking for confirmation from those that have been playing the Alpha longer than 2 days, and perhaps people who may have more information than what I have available to me.

The subject here is dual classing.

When the good people over at Square-Enix first talked about how the armory system would work, and how it would be possible to have a "primary" and "secondary" skill, they seemed to basically be implying that you could play as a Gladiator/Conjurer or a Lancer/Marauder or a Archer/Thaumaturge etc.

Perhaps I leapt to a conclusion here, but I was under the impression they were implying you were basically dual classing. I was excited for how unique, interesting and versatile the system would be. I was excited about how this system would allow for great depth and breadth of customization. From the Axe Wielding Marauder with Dark magic, to the Robe wearing healer slinging arrows when no one needs heals.

I was under the impression that you'd be raising these skills simultaneously, essentially allowing you to play the customized and interesting class that you wanted to. And that you'd be able to choose from armor combinations that your skills allowed. Seeing as "secondary" skills weren't limited by your "primary." And that balance would be enforced through what sorts of stats you saw on what sorts of armor. Such that, if you chose to be a Gladiator/Conjurer, and wear exclusively plate armor, but wielded your staff, you'd have much weaker magic than a Conjurer wearing robes, and less magic variety than a Conjurer/Thaumaturge, but more survivability from the plate.

Now I'm discovering not only does it appear your equipment choice is limited by your currently equipped weapon or "primary" skill, but your "secondary" skill, if you can call it that, doesn't raise at all, even when you use those abilities.

For instance, the person I was watching was a Lancer, using conjurer magic, when he cast fire, his polearm skill went up, instead of conjuring skill. This worries me a lot, especially because that conjuring skill that wasn't going up, seemed to still be determining the spells potency?

So the takeaway was: if you want to have a secondary skill, you have to essentially stop every time your primary skill levels up, and level your secondary skill to catch it up, which means you have to change play styles, and train with that other weapon type. So if I want to play a Gladiator/Conjurer, I essentially have to level half the time as a Gladiator, and half the time as a Conjurer, in which case Conjurer I'm sure doesn't much benefit from most of Gladiator's abilities, and can't even equip heavy armor as a bonus for having gladiator skills. Which ESSENTIALLY means if I wanted to play Conjurer effectively to level it up... I'd have to train yet a Third skill to be a secondary skill when I'm training Conjurer as a Primary?

Which leads back into my point, essentially they first advertised this as sort of a dual-class system, but now it turns out it's more like sub-jobs that aren't capped to half your level? I honestly feel like this is a nightmare scenario, this isn't dual-classing at all it appears. Is this something that they mentioned is just the way it works in the alpha, perhaps you unlock the ability to take on a dual class role later?

If I have not missed something, misunderstood the system, or been unaware that this is a change they are planning to implement, I highly implore anyone in the Alpha make a post highlighting these concerns, for all of our sakes. I had a lot of faith in the armory system, and was really looking forward to it, but if the situations I outlined above are true, I am extremely worried.

P.S.
Also... I tried putting my weapon away while I was engaged to an enemy... and it turned out I could change my armor... did anyone else freak out when they found this out? Is this something they plan to change? I hope to god you can't change equipment if anything near you is even remotely aggro'd... Otherwise I can see it now... putting my sword away, changing my outfit for a weaponskill or a spell, taking it out, using it, putting it away, changing back... Gear swapping will honestly ruin the experience.

**Loaar** · 2010-06-16 00:09

I'm not sure where you ever got the idea that you could level more than one class at once as a primary and secondary.

The system is just a variation (and a very good one at that) on the subjob system. You still need to level the class you want to use the skills from, but instead of being forced to pick one class as a sub for a few skills and ignore the rest, you get to pick what skills you want from ANY class you have leveled.

Seems like a much better system to me.

Leveling other classes in the alpha is stupidly easy. I'd expect them to change the system a bit since many people are giving feedback that they don't like the system, but as it stands now, leveling several jobs to max for their skills would still be much faster and easier than leveling 1 job to max in FFXI.

**Zounder** · 2010-06-16 00:10

Originally Posted by Ramsey

So the takeaway was: if you want to have a secondary skill, you have to essentially stop every time your primary skill levels up, and level your secondary skill to catch it up, which means you have to change play styles, and train with that other weapon type.

You do realize this is exactly how FFXI was, right?

However, that does seem weird that polearm skill went up when you cast a spell... I'm sure that'll be fixed.

Thread: FFXIV Random Speculation/Question thread II: Let's Speculate the Speculations

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