Beastmaster?Follow

I'm going to interpret that to mean that regular content updates may occur every few months, and that new jobs and classes will be added through them periodically. But not that we should expect a new job or class every time that there's a content update.

There's something to be said for keeping the number of jobs and classes somewhat limited in number. Having too many classes and jobs would be like the selection of characters in Chrono Cross. There were so many characters that none of them really felt unique. Someone summed up my feelings on it when they said Chrono Cross really only had something like 6 "flavors" of characters. We probably don't want FFXIV to become a game where there's 6 flavors of jobs, just with a different name and different set of AF.

Yeah, this is probably closer to what I mean originally - poor wording on my part. Content updates every 6 weeks/2 months, with (speculation here) a new job from an existing class every 3rd/4th update (so 4-6 months apart), and maybe 2/3 classes (from across all 4 discplines) each with 1 job (for DoW/DoM) in an expansion, opening the way for 2nd jobs later in that expansion content cycle as well.

So, let's assume a new job every 6 months, a new expac every 2 years. 3 new jobs are introduced "standalone" within an expac cycle, onto existing classes. New classes (maybe 1 DoW, 1 DoM, 1 DoH/DoL) in an expac. That could easily grow into 6-8 years of content, at least in my view.

Was thinking this the other day. Class is Animist - mimicing the monster abilities. BST job focused on synergy with the animal spirit, as kindred. Requires ACH sub (wildeness ranger-type aspect, I guess). Gets charm (short-term effect, but doesn't turn mob hostile when it ends), tame (beast cc), and maybe 3 different pets that can be "called" - tank, DPS & healing -> support/DPS role, filling gaps as needed. BLU job is about forcibly taking an animal's "soul," sort of a light/dark duality of the animal focus. Requires THM sub (more magey, plus darker focus). Abilities are tougher to fit into 5 slots, though. Only way I can see it working is each ability quest leads you to defeat a certain instanced "NM," but one that can be soloed. You have a technique to steal it's soul upon death, learning an ability (kinda similar to the Sith Inquisitor Chapter 2 storyline for SWtOR), giving you 5 BLU spells @ 50.

The only issue I can see, especially if you level BST to 50 (giving you an instant BLU 50), is that how do you explain how you came to learn these abilities? I guess we'll find out with SCH/SMN, but it may be that if you level SCH to 50, you have a SMN 50 BUT you still have to go through the 5 job quests to learn the SMN abilities. Makes sense, at least from a thematic perspective. Plus it gives you a chance to get a grip on the job-specific abilities too.

Before I go any further, I have to say I'm an old school BST who soloed to lv75 and my first lv99 job was BST. I love the job and would like to see it in FFXIV. However, this is where the problems begin from the way I see them. SMN is basically the same because they can summon a pet and it will stay with them. BST is dependent on natural pets or juggies. Sure they give you random pets to call like they did in old FF games, but that wasn't as good as charming and having more control. Another factor is BST is known to use axes, not Great axes. I'd be pissed as hell if they just forced Marauder on us like that was close enough. Essentially BST without a pet was always a gimped WAR anyway. If BST is designed like most BST's want the job, I see an unbalanced job. They have never been able to fully fix BST in FFXI either. SE appears to be keeping jobs held back as to not have the broken issues of FFXI like the RNG or BLM domination.

I agree, BST should take the Geomancer approach. If you're in an area that has resources such as a certain pet, you get access to it. It would be cool though for BST's Limit Break to include a powerful pet summon /attack.