Tier 3 Job Merits

[Gregedor]

***WARNING! - This thread actually invovles some reading!!! zomg! ***

Celvantes and I were rolling some merits in Lufaise Meadows the other day and got to thinking. I was using my Polearm (yeah my shitty B- polearm) becuase it was outdoing my merited A+ Great Katana on the birds. I was actually doing extremely well with the crummy thing, but had to eat sole sushi to do it. We were at Caedarva Mire earlier and I used my GKT most of the time, but tried Polearm for a little there and the regular hits were probably a little lower, but the Penta Thrust was owning GKT.

Well this is because both areas have bonus to Piercing mobs and reduced damage from slashing. There's been a limbus zone or two like that as well. Considering this (and the fact that SAM/RNG is a blast lol) we thought it might be a good idea to add tier 3 job merits. These would be to upgrade weapons or skills that are not A- or better. Basically, to make your secondary skills worthwhile.

For some job classes this might be great, for others (*cough* MNK *cough*) maybe not so much since there's no reason to use another weapon class. For other jobs (SAM, DRK, etc.) that use multiple weapon types this would be great. Allow you to merit up your alternate weapons so they become viable in certain situations.

Now since they'd be job categories, bonuses from PLD wouldn't apply to WAR and vice versa. So gaining B+ Polearm in SAM can't carry onto WARs and prevent overbalancing other jobs that would get the same merits.

I should think something this potentially useful would be expensive. Tier 1 cost 1 merit point first time and max 10. Tier 2 cost 3 merit points first time and max 6 for the category. Maybe Tier 3 would be 9 for first (and only) and max of 2 of the 3 potential boosts. Perhaps some that I think aren't as powerful can be like 5-6 merits and the best ones be 9.

Below is a list of all the jobs and what I've come up with so far. Yes, I know I don't have 3 for each, but I'm still musing on it. Thanks to Celvantes, Kypdurron, Nikoloi and Draciot for their inputs as well.

WAR
1) Marksmanship - Becomes a C+ weapon.
2) Parry - Becomes a B- combat skill.
3) Shield - Becomes a B combat skill.

MNK
1) Parry - Now effects H2H.
2) Guarding - Grants 2% TP per guard.
3) Asuran Fists - Gains 1 extra attack. (9 fists total)

WHM
1) Staff - Becomes a B weapon.
2) Enfeebling Magic - Becomes a B magic skill.
3) Shield - Becomes a C+ combat skill.

BLM
1) Scythe - Becomes a C weapon.
2) Dagger - Becomes a C+ weapon.
3) Enfeebling Magic - Becomes a B+ magic skill.

RDM
1) Dark Magic - Becomes a C- magic skill.
2) Healing Magic - Becomes a B- magic skill.
3) Elemental Magic - Becomes a B magic skill.

THF
1) Sword - Becomes a C+ weapon.
2) Marksmanship - Becomes a B weapon.
3) Shield - Becomes a C combat skill.

PLD
1) Club - Allows use of Hexa Strike.
2) Great Sword - Becomes A- weapon.
3) Parry - Becomes B combat skill.

DRK
1) Axe - Becomes B+ weapon.
2) Sword - Becomes B+ weapon.
3) Parry - Becomes C+ combat skill.

BST
1) Scythe - Becomes a B+ skill and gains Cross Reaper.
2) Parry - Becomes a B- combat skill.
3) Shield - Becomes a B- combat skill.

BRD
1) String - Becomes a B magic skill.
2) Singing - Becomes a B magic skill.
3) Wind - Becomes a B magic skill.

RNG
1) Throwing - Grants 3 different throwing weaponskills.
2) Axe - Becomes a B+ weapon.
3) Evasion - Becomes a C+ combat skill.

SAM
1) Polearm - Becomes B+ weapon and gains Skewer.
2) Archery - Becomes B weapon.
3) Sword - Becomes B weapon and gains Vorpal Blade.

NIN
1) Throwing - Grants 3 different throwing weaponskills.
2) Great Katana - Becomes a B- skill and gains Tachi: Yukikaze.
3)

DRG
1) Sword - Becomes a B weapon.
2) Parry - Becomes B combat skill.
3) Evasion - Becomes B- combat skill.

SMN
1)
2)
3)

BLU
1)
2)
3)

COR
1)
2)
3)

PUP (hopefully H2H skill becomes higher w/o merits)
1)
2)
3)

Obviously some jobs got more than others. Then again some jobs probably need more than others. DRK and SAM got large boosts to other weapons they do use. I think hexa strike on PLD (which has the highest club skill) is at least interesting to play with, WAR might look bad, but getting higher marksmanship so they can bloody/sleep/poison bolt things is actually useful. All in all I tried to balance and think I got a good mix. Certainly those that I talked to were decently happy with the options. Again it's not to break any one class, but to pose other options for play, up a weakness or better solutions to certain situations.

Personally I think this would be a great addition goes beyond just taking the 12 combat skill merits. Normally you sink the max 8 in your best weapon anyhow and have 4 leftover that doesn't do a whole lot anyways, or goes on your second job. Having now heard my list and idea, I was kinda wondering what others thought, or if other classes even care to up their weaker skills. For me though this would be awesome. Anyway, time to discuss!

Please try to stay civil. =P

 

[Bajaratt]

A lot of the merits seem thrown in there just to give the jobs something. Honestly, healing magic skill on rdm would be pointless, since the only thing it's even remotely(very remotely) useful for is cure 5 which they don't get. Increasing the mages' melee skills wouldn't really effect the game much, just make them be able to skillup better(no blm would ever try to DD in a scythe or a thf with sword other than ridill). A better solution would just be to increase the maximum amount of merits you can have in the combat/magic category. SE could also just increase those skills without merits, there's almost no reason to make them obtained only through merits.

 

[Dragon Ryder]

think that's crap
i like things the way they are and you should too

 

[Gregedor]

A lot of the merits seem thrown in there just to give the jobs something. Honestly, healing magic skill on rdm would be pointless, since the only thing it's even remotely(very remotely) useful for is cure 5 which they don't get. Increasing the mages' melee skills wouldn't really effect the game much, just make them be able to skillup better(no blm would ever try to DD in a scythe or a thf with sword other than ridill). A better solution would just be to increase the maximum amount of merits you can have in the combat/magic category. SE could also just increase those skills without merits, there's almost no reason to make them obtained only through merits.

If BLM is melee DDing he already fails. But if he's by himself he might use that skill. Since you said thf with ridill uses sword, there's your use right there.

Considering I got suggestions from people that play the jobs I don't think any of them are worthless. And yeah SE could increase without merits, but since when has that happened?

Anyways it's some thoughts on upping some lacking skill areas, making there a reason to actually have some skills, etc. It's not to make what you do well even better.

 

[Gregedor]

think that's crap
i like things the way they are and you should too

Very constructive, let's never improve SE so please take back tier2 merits SE, the game was fine before.

 

[Dragon Ryder]

yeah because "fuck this GKT imma use my swordon my sam and 300 tp spirits within on a mutha fucka"

 

[Gregedor]

yeah because "fuck this GKT imma use my swordon my sam and 300 tp spirits within on a mutha fucka"

Um no, vorpal blade. Spirits within is lame. And yes, there are zones that I can't use GKT in.

 

[Celvantes]

yeah because "fuck this GKT imma use my swordon my sam and 300 tp spirits within on a mutha fucka"

When crappy polearm skill outdoes capped meritted GKT, yeah, something needs to be done.

And Greg's Vorpal Blades outdo *my* Vorpal Blades, even in DD gear.

 

[Bajaratt]

Very few thf's have a ridill, so giving them a merit they would only use if they have one of the hardest items in the game to get would be a huge waste of time. Why not give WAR's A+ axe if they have an adaburk or red mages A- sword skill if they have excaliber?

Looking at the list, most of these changes are superficial at best, the people you asked either don't know much or just want changes for the sake of changes. Most of these changes are only for when the job is soloing or skilling up and would serve no real use. Even the normal combat merits would be more effective because they'd boost the skill of other jobs. I can honestly say none of the mnk/whm/sam merits excite me. I can't speak about the other jobs first hand, but based on how crappy your upgrades are for those I can't imagine your upgrades for most of the others are much better. Almost all are for soloing or very rare situations involving very rare gear.

Parrying makes no sense(need a weapon, not fists) and you already get TP when you guard. I'd much rather have asuran fists have a chance to double attack or crit than just add another hit, or make it's modifiers not suck ass.

White mage, I don't give a shit about staff/shield skill since I don't solo with it, and I don't enfeeble on anything really big with enough frequency to want more skill; because even with B skill, a rdm would be far better at the job and would actually have the time to do so.

Samurai, I don't use any of those weapons, so increasing the skill would be pointless; the only instance I can see where a GK would be flat-out useless is the limbus zone with different weapon type immunities so that's as obscure as the thf sword increase. Swords suck anyways, the only reason as a sam that I'd want a ridill is to skillup sword faster and never touch it again.

Throwing the pointlessness of the merits aside, there's still no reason to make them merits rather than just increase those skills.

When crappy polearm skill outdoes capped meritted GKT, yeah, something needs to be done.

And Greg's Vorpal Blades outdo *my* Vorpal Blades, even in DD gear.

On mobs that are very weak to piercing damage, so it's skewed. On those mobs in those 3 camps, sure go polearm, on everything else in the game, stick with GK.

 

[Skaw]

Martial Arts affecting Staff in some way would be a good change.

Change your Guard idea to counter attacks, and you'd win on that idea.

 

[Bajaratt]

Or make one of these "tier 3 merits" give another martial arts trait, that would also be better.

 

[Sneakypants]

I like options. Sounds sexy to me.

 

[Gregedor]

I don't want my MNK better. (Comment: it is called parry even with H2H when you turn a strike.)

My White Mage sucks.

My Samurai sucks.

I just suck.

There, got the gist of that post. Thanks for your input Baj. *files in trashcan* I was nice before, but now I'm going to say it flat out. If you never swing a weapon on WHM, if you never use an alt weapon on SAM, if you don't know how to play your job (oh snap) then don't offer me contructive criticism becasue you don't know any. Yes, mild flame, rebuttal welcome on the proper board.

 

[Lavi]

I like options. Sounds sexy to me.

And thoughtful options. Give something that would force people to make different choices and not just the "ultimate" setup as usual.

 

[Sneakypants]

And thoughtful options. Give something that would force people to make different choices and not just the "ultimate" setup as usual.

That what I like about the fact that you can't max out tier 2 ( edit and tier 1 too^^ ). Kind of have to choose a path.

 

[Gregedor]

That what I like about the fact that you can't max out tier 2 ( edit and tier 1 too^^ ). Kind of have to choose a path.

Yeah that's what I was trying to achieve by allowing only 2 of 3. I know they need work, that's why I asked for some thoughts. Honestly though I'm kind of tired of this mode:
I'm samurai.
/equip Hagun
Play 3 years with no other weapon.

Honestly you could do that and you'd not be wrong. To open some options and make you use your alt weapons or try other gear or introduce another aspect to the game I want to make it resonable to change the way you played. Original notion was to modify your skills above and beyond what the Combat Skills merits can do. Maybe it's better done with nice perks like I came up with on MNK.

For the record, yes you get TP on guard, but that's cause you got hit. This would be 2% more because you guarded and not just got bitchslapped. You can also already double attack and crit on Asuran Fists, I wanted a mod without saying hey let's double the fists count! 1-2 more would be reasonable.

 

[Bajaratt]

There, got the gist of that post. Thanks for your input Baj. *files in trashcan* I was nice before, but now I'm going to say it flat out. If you never swing a weapon on WHM, if you never use an alt weapon on SAM, if you don't know how to play your job (oh snap) then don't offer me contructive criticism becasue you don't know any. Yes, mild flame, rebuttal welcome on the proper board.

I have no reason to use a alt weapon as a sam, because I have a far better job for exp; and in endgame anything but a GK would be a waste of time. Since you have no options on what to merit with, I can see you caring about an alt weapon, but sword still sucks, and hard.

Any whm who melees in an exp/endgame setting should be deleted, period. Maybe 5 whm's on the server solo enough to actually be effected by any boost, so that doesn't warrant a change.

Whoever the monk you talked to is a fucking idiot, those "improvements" won't do anything for monk that'd actually be worth tossing a merit into. You already get TP with a guard, the asuran change would have to re-write the ws code and wouldn't lead to a noticeable change. Parrying wouldn't make sense, because a parry is using a weapon to deflect a blow; the only effect would be to make mnk/nin a tank without provoke or improve their solo potential.

You're continuing to ignore my other point about why make them merits, but go ahead and just say I suck and completely avoid the argument like and idiot.

You can also already double attack and crit on Asuran Fists, I wanted a mod without saying hey let's double the fists count! 1-2 more would be reasonable.

Just further proof you talked to a monk with no idea what he was talking about, but then I'm not surprised. 8-hits is the max a weaponskill can get, so a double-attack wouldn't process, otherwise you'd see monks pulling out huge spikes the damage of their asurans, but you don't. It also can't crit for the exact same reason.

Edit: As for your guard gives extra TP, that I wouldn't mind, but you didn't say that in your OP. Your OP acted like guard did nothing, if you said gave additional TP, then the mnk set wouldn't be useless.

 

[Knightblade]

SAM
2) Archery - Becomes B weapon.

isn't this already like a B or so? <.<

 

[Gregedor]

isn't this already like a B or so? <.<

It's currently C+

 

[Gregedor]

Just further proof you talked to a monk with no idea what he was talking about, but then I'm not surprised. 8-hits is the max a weaponskill can get, so a double-attack wouldn't process, otherwise you'd see monks pulling out huge spikes the damage of their asurans, but you don't. It also can't crit for the exact same reason.

There's no physical way of knowing if you missed and reswung the fist as a double attack or if you hit it the first time. I had that discussion ad nauseum with 3 MNKs. As for the crits we're thinking no, but even landing all 8 hits (based on TP return) there are wildly varying dmg results. It is also impossible to decypher this. Double attack and crit hit animations do not process on WS regardless of if it's H2H or GKT or any other weapon. You are right though that 8 fists is the absolute limit based upon TP returned. However, it is honestly really easy to change that and to add a new animation to the game for it.