We would have already had one massive FF14 press convention this weekend, however there’s nonetheless time for extra. Delivered on stage at Fanfest Berlin, Ultimate Fantasy 14 Reside Letter 93 is a Beastmaster particular. The brand new class joins the MMORPG in patch 7.56 and is our second ‘restricted job’ after the Blue Mage, which means that it affords an particularly distinctive fight fashion from the usual roster, however cannot be utilized in a lot of the common battle content material. As an alternative, there is a particular exercise designed particularly for it, which is dubbed ‘The Crucible of the Unbroken,’ pitched as “a magic board sport that Beastmasters use to coach themselves.”
Becoming a member of Ultimate Fantasy 14 Sport Director Naoki ‘Yoshi-P’ Yoshida on stage is Lead Battle Content material Designer Masaki ‘Mr Ozma’ Nakagawa, who has been the primary particular person engaged on the brand new job and its related exercise. “That is really my first time taking part in the sport stay on stage,” he says, “so if I make any errors, please go straightforward on me.” With the intention to begin taking part in the Beastmaster, you may want to succeed in stage 50 on a battle job (Disciple of Struggle or Magic), have accomplished the bottom 2.0 story quests in a Realm Reborn, and personal the Dawntrail growth. It is a melee DPS that makes use of an axe and defend, and can begin at stage 1 with an preliminary cap of fifty.
We received a fundamental introduction to how the Beastmaster performs courtesy of Yoshi-P in Reside Letter 92, however right now is a deeper dive. Mr Ozma begins with a fast recap of the fundamentals: there are as much as 50 completely different beasts, every of which have to be captured out within the wild. These can then be assigned to your trio of Battlehorns to name them out onto the sector. The summon you presently have lively will change the 4 core ability varieties you’ve gotten at your disposal, with 50 potential ‘Tempered Launch’ talents which you could have your creatures execute, and eight extra which you could ‘Borrow’ to make use of your self primarily based on their overarching kind, and you will be managing two separate meters for you and your beast.
With that setup established, it is time to bounce into the sport demonstration. Mr Ozma notes that he’ll be making use of some debug instructions to hurry the method up, so hold that in thoughts for those who’re watching. In a single instance, he makes use of a Slime’s Syrup means with Tempered Launch to bind his enemy and a Pugil’s Quelling Wave with Borrow, permitting him to assault his goal from a really advantageous place whereas it is unable to maneuver. When the Bomb he is combating makes an attempt to self-destruct, he makes use of Borrow on his Coblyn to ship Soul Crush and interrupt the assault.
The Beastmaster additionally has 4 ‘instinctual expertise,’ whereas every summon has one, and also you achieve extra advantages for those who carry out these in sequence. “Once you carry out an instinctual ability within the clockwise order, we name that an ‘intentional combo’ – for those who do it in every other order, it is only a common instinctual combo.” As you stage up, you may achieve two extra expertise, ‘Rally’ and ‘Rallying Cheer,’ which immediately fill you and your companion’s gauges respectively, and thus can be utilized to chain a number of instinctual combos in sequence. Lastly, every beast comes with a strong area-of-effect finisher, which causes them to depart the sector after its use.
Mr Ozma reassures us that if this initially sounds sophisticated, it’s going to be defined extra totally over the course of the job quests. With that each one established, it is time to have a look at the Crucible of the Unbroken. This begins when you hit stage 30. You will select “between ten and 15 familiars” to carry alongside, plus a collection of duty-specific gadgets. Competing within the Crucible will earn you Beastmaster EXP, and the beasts you carry alongside will develop stronger as you battle by means of its quite a few encounters.
With the intention to dodge too many spoilers, our entry level right now is a brief one – a ‘Crucible Tester’ Moogle within the Black Shroud who opens up the interface. Mr Ozma begins by investigating the primary upcoming opponent, and seeking to decide its weak point – on this occasion, it is susceptible towards piercing assaults, so he filters his Bestiary to seek out creatures that match the invoice. One other later within the run is vulnerable to fireplace, and so forth, permitting him to construct his full staff.
If you happen to discover this micromanagement all a bit tedious, nonetheless, there’s an choice to auto-select a fundamental really useful staff. Yoshi-P feedback that this may be a great way to begin out, however that the extra you play, you may most likely discover methods to experiment with extra attention-grabbing staff compositions. Mr Ozma, because the knowledgeable in all issues Beastmaster, makes a couple of handbook tweaks of his personal to the lineup, earlier than diving head-first into the motion. We begin out with what resembles the overhead view of a boardgame, with branching paths that result in numerous encounter varieties.
Once you’re drawn right into a battle, you select three beasts out of your roster to carry into the world. Yoshida explains that whenever you Borrow a capability from one among your familiars, such because the interrupt we noticed earlier, it can stay in your arsenal even for those who swap your lively companion – it solely goes away whenever you select to Borrow one other. Based mostly on a few of the early motion we’re seeing, it appears as if counters to particular issues equivalent to interrupts are going to be fairly priceless, so hold that in thoughts.
As we go into our subsequent battle, Yoshi-P notes that Mr Ozma’s Coblyn is fairly battered – which provides him the chance to point out off a therapeutic potion, one of many Crucible-specific gadgets at your disposal. He compares this checklist of consumables to the Pomanders you accumulate throughout a Deep Dungeon run, basically appearing as a collection of useful one-off buffs, boons, and restoration instruments that can assist you push by means of any sticky conditions. One other instance is the Tome of the Impervious, which grants 5 stacks of Blink, every of which nullifies the injury from one bodily assault.
The next battle is gained, however not earlier than Mr Ozma’s Beastmaster falls. Thankfully, this offers a chance to point out off one piece of Beast Gear you may equip – a Ring of Sacrifice. It will revive you as soon as in case your character is knocked out, however at the price of sacrificing your present acquainted. “I believed it might be extra enjoyable if I used to be residing a bit bit on the sting, so I secretly turned up the issue,” Nakagawa laughs, inflicting Yoshida to reply in exasperation: “Inform me that upfront – I used to be apprehensive!”
At sure treasure chest areas, you may be offered with 4 potential gadgets of Beast Gear to select from and hold for the remainder of your run. A few of these will be very robust in sure particular methods – for instance, with an upcoming encounter threatening some critical poison injury, Mr Ozma snags an Angel Gown, which affords 100% poison resistance.
You will discover outlets as properly, and these promote a variety of consumables, together with ‘feed’ gadgets, which you should utilize on a well-known in your roster to make them stronger. The quantity of meals you can provide to every of your beasts is represented by their starvation stage, or ‘Satiety,’ which is proven as a sequence of squares subsequent to their identify which you could slot their meals into. Moreover, some feed can solely be used on particular beast varieties. Contemplate this fastidiously – creatures that may not be as robust to begin with may develop particularly highly effective over time on account of their excessive Satiety for those who hold bulking them up.
We’re handled to a short glimpse of our closing boss for the run, “Breaker of Beasts: Pas de Seul.” She’s an imposing succubus with a large pink blade, and Mr Ozma is simply capable of carry her well being bar about two-thirds of the best way down earlier than he falls, regardless of having two revival gadgets. “I need all of you Warriors of Gentle to tackle the problem and clear it for your self,” he smiles.
Run over, it is again to the Powerpoint slides, and on to Beast Ranks. When you stage a companion as much as its most rank of 25, you may have the choice to vary its look to an alternate type, which will likely be seen each within the Crucible and out on this planet, permitting you to point out off your arduous work. “You need not play the upper issue variations like I confirmed you right now – you may nonetheless stage up and improve your Beast Ranks within the simpler variations as properly,” Mr Ozma assures.
“Having mentioned that, let’s discuss excessive issue.” As soon as you’ve got cleared all of the boards, you may unlock extra problem tiers referred to as the ‘First Diploma,’ ‘Second Diploma,’ and ‘Third Diploma.’ Nakagawa reveals that the one we had been watching right now was really on Second Diploma (to Yoshi-P’s repeated disbelief). Yoshida notes that he considers this “a distinct kind of issue” from completely different high-end duties, as a result of that is extra about strategizing, discovering synergies, and data-based evaluation.
There will likely be Crucible rankings for gamers who full Third Diploma runs, and probably the most profitable contenders can earn rewards for his or her efficiency. That is going to work on a seasonal mannequin very like PvP, with the primary rating interval starting two weeks after patch 7.56 launches and lasting till patch 7.58 arrives. The prize for this primary season? A particularly shiny, rainbow-colored crystal golem mount. Get practising!
The FF14 Beastmaster launches with patch 7.56 on Tuesday September 8. Whereas we have had an enormous data dump right now, Yoshi-P encourages everybody to take their time and benefit from the technique of working by means of the story and levelling each the category and your beasts.
