New 2 Hour AbilitiesFollow

Maybe it should also reset Call Beast timer?

I don't see why there should ever even be a need to consume a pet. The fact that SE thinks that's ever an acceptable thing says quite a lot about their design team.

Then we have stuff like Scholar's new 2-hour. Whoever put that one down on paper really needs to get raked over the coals. When SE is coming to us with rubbish like that they don't deserve an elaborate explanation of how to improve the ability. All they deserve is our contempt and a dismissive response because they didn't put any effort or thought into their design before bringing it before the playerbase.

To be fair, the scholar's new 2-hour is actually extremely potent from the description essentially dumping the sum total of everybody's accumulated enmity onto a single target. In a party alone this would actually be a pretty strong ability, but in an alliance it could be a serious life saver.

Ok, so you don't know how the enmity system works. Got it.

[dev1135] New Special Job Abilities

New special job abilities will be introduced.
*These special abilities will share the same recast time as previous ones.
*The abilities displayed with a gray background have not been included in the August 17 test server update.

Job Effect
Warrior Auto-attacks will not be considered physical damage. Greatly increases accuracy.
Monk Counters almost every enemy auto-attack and greatly increases enmity.
White Mage Prevents party members from receiving status ailments.
Black Mage Greatly lowers the amount of enmity accrued from spells.
Red Mage Bolsters the effects of enhancing magic.
Thief Deals severe damage and transfers your enmity to the party member in front of you.
Paladin Greatly increases chance of blocking with shield and damages target. Increases enmity.
Dark Knight Auto-attacks absorb target's TP.
Beastmaster Sacrifice your pet to recover HP and remove status ailments.
Grants the effect of Stoneskin.
Bard Greatly reduces target's magic defense, magic evasion, INT and MND.
Ranger Allows you to deliver optimally accurate and powerful ranged attacks from any distance.
Arrows are not expended during attacks.
Samurai Evades all special attacks that deal physical or magic damage.
Enhances the potency of your next weapon skill every time you evade a special attack.
Ninja Greatly increases the chance of parrying.
Reduces ninjutsu casting times by half and eliminates the need for ninja tools.
Dragoon Recovers wyvern's HP and removes status ailments. Enhances breath effects.
Summoner Eliminates "Blood Pact" recast times.
Blue Mage Allows unlimited casting of blue magic spells that use Unbridled Learning.
Corsair Allows for up to three Phantom Rolls to be in effect simultaneously.
Puppetmaster Allows automatons to use a special ability that varies by head.
Harlequin Head: Mighty Strikes
Valoredge Head: Invisible
Sharpshot Head: Eagle Eye Shot
Stormwaker Head: Chainspell
Soulsoother Head: Benediction (will only affect the automaton and members of its master's party)
Spiritreaver Head: Manafont
Dancer Gives five finishing moves and resets flourish recast timers.
Eliminates the cost of finishing moves.
Scholar Transfers the whole party's enmity to a party member of your choice.

*The names, help text, and effects that appear on the test server for these abilities are still under development and are subject to change.

Did anyone bother to tell them that combining reverse flourish with waiting about 30 seconds for flourish recast to reset ONCE doesn't make an acceptable 2hour for DNC?

Well, what it's really boiling down to is that most people aren't actually giving them info as to what aspect(s) of the new two-hours they're not liking. Just saying things like "This sucks" or "Throw it away" isn't really helping things too much, because it's not giving them enough to work with necessarily. I mean, look at what Jinte did when she commented about the Pup 2-hour. Rather than just saying that it sucks, Jinte went through and pointed out the exact flaws with it and what could be done to improve it. Square Enix isn't necessarily saying to stop telling them that the abilities suck, they're just saying give them more to work with than just that.

Yeah. I don't understand why "This new 2hour ability isn't nearly powerful / versatile to ever use over the first one," said however you like (up to, and including, OMG THIS SUCKS) doesn't get the point across well enough.

The new 2-hours were developed based on the idea that they would share the existing 2-hour ability's recast timer and players would be selecting which ability to use based on the situation. Instead of these being a higher-tier or universal abilities that can be used for any situation, they are abilities that are designed to be used for specialized conditions.

Below are the envisioned applications of some abilities as well as planned adjustments.

- Warrior

While Mighty Strikes offers a lot of physical damage through critical hits for a period of time, the idea was to add a way to attack enemies that have strong resistances to physical damage.

Based on testing and feedback, we are planning to make adjustments to extend the effect duration to 60 seconds. (Planning to make this change during this week’s Test Server update.)

- Paladin

The new 2-hour ability can be used for cases where just turtling up with Invincible and letting an enemy wail on you will not turn the tides of the fight, since you can enhance your defenses while reducing an enemy’s HP with the reflected damage.

*As mentioned previously in the post about adding an enmity boost effect to this ability, we understand the problems with the enmity cap. We plan on considering this for paladin in general and not limiting it only to the new 2-hour ability effect.

- Bard

In addition to INT and MND, we will also be adding CHR to the stats that are lowered.

- Samurai

Meikyo Shisui excels in instantaneous power. On the other hand, the new 2-hour ability is for cases where an enemy's AoE damage is too strong and getting close is dangerous. It will allow you to evade special attacks while dealing damage.

*Magical attacks will not be evaded, but will be made so that the damage received is 0. This will not have any effect on breath attacks, though.

With this ability we are aiming to make it possible to have a stable way of fighting by increasing defensive capabilities and diverting your time in battle towards enhancing offense capabilities.

- Dancer

Trance is an ability that allows the player to take advantage of Waltzes and Steps, while the new 2-hour ability makes it possible to utilize Flourishes to the maximum. The advantage of this ability is that it makes it possible to always use the maximum effect for Building Flourish, Reverse Flourish, Climatic Flourish, etc., as you are granted 5 finishing moves.

There have been requests asking for the recast times for Flourishes to be reduced or removed. The reason we did not do this is as you can expect, due to consideration for Reverse Flourish.
While it's not our intention to allow for weapon skills to be used continuously without limitations, it would be nice to be able to utilize Flourish II and Flourish III continuously, so we will be changing the effects as outlined below to allow for instantaneous damage.

- Reduce effect duration from 60 seconds to 30 seconds
- In addition to the Flourish recast timer being reset, it will be possible to use Flourish continuously up to a total of 3 times.
- The effect will wear off when either 30 seconds elapses or Flourish is used 3 times.


During this week's Test Server update, we will be adding white mage's 2-hour ability as well the warrior adjustment listed above and fixing related bugs.

We are planning to address the bard and dancer adjustments in the following Test Server update.

Amongst the feedback we have been receiving, there have been a lot of comments about changing the effects, reducing the 2-hour recast time, removing the shared recast timer aspect, and other ideas for largely changing the concept. It may take a bit of time to discuss and look into all of these, but we are planning to spend time on this without rushing implementation so that these are abilities that everyone is satisfied with.

- Bard

In addition to INT and MND, we will also be adding CHR to the stats that are lowered.

*As mentioned previously in the post about adding an enmity boost effect to this ability, we understand the problems with the enmity cap.

Obviously you wouldn't use it JUST to land songs easier, in a melee party, because you'd be using soul voice.

you can't use the improved accuracy of debuff songs as a selling point for the new two-hour because Soul Voice for debuff songs pretty much does the same thing.