In a new letter from the developers, the creators of Final Fantasy XIV presented the new changes for the upcoming expansion Endwalker in detail. The spotlight was on the revisions of the existing classes as well as the two new jobs, Reaper and Sage.
What is the “letter from the developers”? In an event during the night of September 17 to 18, FFXIV lead developer Naoki Yoshida talked about the innovations of Endwalker. The expansion will be released on November 23, 2021.
The event lasted over 7 hours and began with a screen of Endwalker. Subsequently, there was new information about job changes and balancing, new jobs, and general gameplay.
We have already embedded the video here, which outlines the changes to the jobs. You can find the key points of the letter further down in the text. In our hub, you can find everything we know so far about Endwalker.
Reaper and Sage – The 2 new jobs of Endwalker
What kind of jobs are they? Sage and Reaper have been known for a while. The Sage will be a healer with a special mechanic, while the Reaper is a melee DPS class.
What can the Reaper do? Reapers look like they came from Bloodborne and use a scythe as their main weapon, which mainly deals damage but also provides a few buffs for the group. The Reaper, however, is rather “selfish,” similar to the Samurai.
As a special ability, they can summon an avatar from the void, which not only fights for them but also takes over their body. They thus become a host for a more powerful being that assists the Reaper.
The avatar itself is a unique mechanic that the Reaper can work with. Through two bars that charge up during combat, Reapers can unleash powerful combos in conjunction with their avatar. We have embedded the gameplay video here for you:
The flow of combat looks something like this for the Reaper:
- uses combos to fill the soul meter (“souls”)
- spends souls to use avatar abilities
- fills the shroud meter (“shroud”)
- consumes shroud energy to temporarily switch to an enhanced Reaper form, with even stronger combos
What can the Sage do? In contrast to the selfish DPS Reaper, the Sage will be a healer with a special twist: They heal not only with regular healing spells, but also by dealing damage to enemies. A type of vampiric healing that is redirected to a friendly target.
The Sage uses shields and selects a target to heal via Cardia. The protected target then receives healing equal to the damage that the Sage deals during that time – similar to Discipline Priests in World of Warcraft.
For healing and enhancing abilities, the Sage has its own resource. Through enhancements, skills can be transformed into damage-over-time abilities (“DoTs”). Additionally, the Sage possesses a skill that grants them more mobility and acts as a “gap closer.”
Yoshida expects that mastering the job and learning the abilities will take some time. We have embedded the gameplay here for you:
New max level, but nothing gets more complicated
What changes in gameplay: With Endwalker, the maximum level increases from 80 to 90. Additionally, several changes will be made to the jobs. New abilities will be added, but the game is not supposed to become more complex.
Instead, it should become even easier to coordinate within a group. Many cooldowns for skills are set to 60 or 120 seconds so that they work better together. Despite more abilities, cooperation should be improved.
The changes are based on experiences from Shadowbringers, the current expansion. However, they are not final and may be adjusted until the release in November.
Endwalker will be the 4th expansion for Final Fantasy XIV and even now the MMORPG can already show strong growth. On Twitch, it has even surpassed World of Warcraft in popularity – but a new competitor is also emerging:
New MMORPG has more viewers on Twitch than WoW and Final Fantasy XIV
