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FFXIV's elemental system: concepts, thoughts, ideas (draft)
Ikkei
Member Posts: 169
It's all in the title.
1. The basics
The elemental system in FF XIV is close to FF XI's, but slightly different. In FF XI, it works in a circular manner (Fire beats Ice which beats Wind etc.) as such:
(source: http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Element)
In FF XIV, this is how it works:
(made by me from a Famitsu illustration, source of data: "The Call of Adventure", in-game book available at any Aetheryte crystal)
It's a somewhat disjointed/dual "paper-rock-scissors" system. I'll refer to the pink and the green orders, as seen on the picture above, as "halves". Astral and Umbral elements (Light and Darkness in FF XI) remain unchanged, apart from the other elements, each being the other's opposite.
2. Advanced concepts
Now let's move on to advanced concepts. You can find food for thought at this link on the general concepts behind known FF's elemental systems and properties: http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Element.
The bottom line is that elements most often present specific sub-properties in FF, usually an increased potency against some type of enemies, sometimes status effects, or typically-stacking small buffs/debuffs. Not much of this is seen in the UI but the end result in damage points (albeit a few NPC's subtle hints in dialog or animation). Yet with knowledge one can put those specificities to good use. For instance, in many Square FFs (and RPGs), besides the classical one-on-one oppositions (fire kills ice well and vice-versa, water/lightning, wind/earth, and light/darkness), one can observe that:
Fire is stronger than other elements against most plant and undead enemies (so can be Light against the latter);
Ice is stronger than other elements against amphibious and insect enemies;
Lightning (Thunder) is either stronger or way weaker than other elements against mechanical enemies;
Earth won't affect flying enemies (classic RPG logic), or on the contrary will be very effective against them--different FF, different ways...
Water is a bit weird (!), sometimes unpredictable (in FFs where many mobs are quite resilient to it), sometimes quite straightforward (basic), often a good bet in desert areas.
and so forth...
Other examples include the existence of smarter "combo" or "chaining" of spells, such as [water then lighting] (you "wet" a mob then electrocute it) or [ice then fire] (you freeze a mob then melt it), etc.
I'm wondering how FF XIV's elemental system works. I don't think it's relevant to do too much testing at this point in beta because, well... it's a beta, with all that implies. However we can think, and we can also dig in history.
3. Ideas
The guardian system seems to be tied to the elemental one: each of the six moons belong to a specific element, regardless of the moon being astral or umbral (1st astral and 1st umbral moons are Ice, 2nds are Water, 3rds are Wind, ..., 6ths are Earth). I wonder how much it will impact the basic commonly shared elemental vulnerabilities. I guess no one can really answer that yet (the Guardian system isn't implemented in the beta). But I'm sure there are a few precedents (or close enough...) that we can use to reflect (FFT perhaps? my memory is blurry). On a side-related note, this will probably affect crating as well.
Moving on. I find it odd that the dual paper-rock system in FFXIV does not put all natural opposites in different "halves" (for example, Ice and Fire are in the same "half" of the elemental system, so are Lightning and Water in the other). That leaves only the pair Wind/Earth in separate halves. This means, player wise, that specializing in either of those two elements is the only way to get a potent element against "the other half" of the system. Or not, since that could imply that all natural oppositions are irrelevant in this XIV. Quite interesting I think, I'm eager to know the logics and numbers behind.
Well, these are my current mind wanderings. Basically, since Square chose to split up the elemental system in two halves, I guess I'm just trying to find how to connect them together, what ties them; and whether or not there can be "better ways" to specialize, should one choose to prioritize some elements before others.
4. History
I think we can look for possible answers by digging into previous FF concepts, to see what subtleties we may find (or rather recall) and then, perhaps, make educated guesses on the XIV's system. That would hopefully help cutting the chase to getting results when we'll test "stuff" after release. In order to do that I'd like to replay an old FF (and for my own pleasure ofc), any FF from V to XIII. The only question is "which one..." (...would be the closest to XIV in terms of elemental system), if I am to find some hints.
Thoughts about all this, anyone?
Comments
If you are in the LL city (cant recall the name Loma LIminsa or whatever)
you can go to the customs house (far west side by the ferry marker)
and there is a book next to a mi'qote that has elemental stuff in it.
I'm not sure if its a rehash of what you listed or not though.
Drop the next-gen marketing and people will argue if the game itself has merit.
Great, thx!
I went to check that book, and indeed it contained interesting information. However if I learned about in-game time and the calendar (how it's counted and some history), it contains much less info about elements. It's clear that there are cycles which will increase (or I suppose lower) the potency of some elements (in game time: hourly cycle, daily cycle, monthly cycle, yearly cycle, and even epoch cycles). The question is what numbers are behind those cycles.
Nice read anyway. It allows us to understand the whole Eorzean calendar. Thanks again for the tip! : )
Great research. In FFXI the elements, weather, and all kinds of hidden things were tied into each other and you can tell with FFXIV they are going for something similar. Keep up the work it will be interesting to see what all ties into this.
I love the element useage in FFXI and so far in FFXIV. Looking forward to finding out more.