Article: UPDATED: Heavensward: FFXIV info roundup from the Tokyo Fan Festival keynote

[Linnaete]

[20/12] Heavensward: FFXIV info roundup from the Tokyo Fan Festival keynote

​

Naoki Yoshida promised more information on Heavensward (Final Fantasy XIV's first major expansion) to come in Tokyo, and he delivered. Three new jobs including the previously revealed Dark Knight? Check. New playable race? Check. New mounts? Check. New high-end raid? Check.

Let's see what awaits subscribers in Eorzea come the spring of 2015.

Firstly, Nobuo Uematsu will be back to compose the signatory theme for Heavensward. People who have watched the initial CG teaser trailer for Heavensward would have noticed a short sample of the song in the background, which is presumably the very same theme. Unlike the original song "Answers", this theme will be slower in pace and with an emphasis on the piano.

NEW PLAYABLE RACE: THE AU RA

The Au Ra have very distinct physical characteristics. Their bodies are mostly flesh, but partially covered in scales. Horns protrude from their heads, and these range in lengths and sizes. Physical differences between the sexes are the most profound of any race as yet seen in Eorzea. Males are muscular and heavily built, packing the stature to deliver superhuman physical blows to opponents. The females are athletic, elegant and mysterious in some vague way.

Players of Patch 2.2 onwards may remember Yugiri, the robed character from the destroyed eastern city of Doma. As it turns out, the Au Ra do in fact hail from the east - from the continent of Othard. Yugiri will indeed be an Au Ra. Hopefully she will reveal her face in Patch 2.5.

NEW JOB #1 - DARK KNIGHT

Those of you looking forward to tanking around as the Dark Knight, you'll be able to do it with style. Quick footage shown depicts a magic-imbued greatsword, an array of impressive animation effects, and an emphasis on what seems to be stance-based gameplay.

NEW RAID - ALEXANDER

​

This one will be for the hardcore players who want another challenging raid after the Final Coil of Bahamut (and World of Darkness once Patch 2.5 hits). It is a Primal worshipped by the Goblins.

Unlike other Primals in the game, players will not be fighting Alexander the actual whole castle itself. They will venture inside the creature, navigate its levels, fend off the hordes and bosses within, and discover the reason as to why the Goblins have called forth this Primal.

Unlike the Final Coil of Bahamut, this raid will have two difficulty levels. The easier difficulty is apparently comparable to tackling the Second Coil with the Echo effect.

NEW JOB #2 - ASTROLOGIAN

Here's a new healer class to join with White Mage and Scholar!

Like Dark Knight, Astrologians will require no base class. Wielding the power of a Star Globe, the power of the stars and constellations, and a deck of Diving Cards, this job will use all these intricate divination means to heal and support the party. What each card does and what effects they grant currently remains a little unclear.

Fans of FFXI may draw parallels between the Astrologian and the Corsair class.

COLLECTOR'S EDITION

So you want to go big or go home. Splash out on a fancy package to tell Ishgard and the Sea of Clouds that you're coming for them. What do you get when you buy the Collector's edition?

• A large and beautiful box to host the Collector’s items
• Expertly Crafted Dragon Mount Figurine
• Heavensward Art Book
• DVD featuring a set of Videos
• Exclusive In-Game Mount: Flying Griffin
• Exclusive In-Game Item: Dark Knight Cecil-Themed Baron Helm
• Exclusive In-Game Minion: Wind-Up Kain
• And even more to be revealed in the near future

NEW JOB # 3 - MACHINIST

Guild Wars 2 engineers (or anyone who has touched WildStar) will immediately feel familiar with this third new job. Machinists will be the second DoW ranged DPS. If you're not too fond of how support-focused Bard plays, rocking Machinist is probably the right solution for you. Augment your gun, maybe craft certain rounds for it, shoot like crazy at your enemy from a moderately safe distance, and also set up a support turret to provide you with any necessary backup if needed.

Like Dark Knight and Astrologian, Machinists require no base class.

And that's all, folks!

[Full album available here]
​

Nova Crystallis

 

[Dionysos]

I'm liking the Machinist and Astrologian.

The Alexander raid seems interesting.

Currently I'm not won over by the new race. I'm quite disappointed by the design. I think if they had more scales on them and were more reptilian then they'd actually look more unique, and there will be more room for diversity if the skin colour could be green, blue, red, etc... Instead we appear to get crusty humans with horns. The existing non-human races all seem more ambitious than this.

However, the impressions of this race as seen in blurry photographs posted on a German image-dumping website might not represent the species' full appearance. There might be more to them that clearer quality images later on might reveal.

 

[Linnaete]

[HQ screens are now up.]
​

For the full size images, my Imgur album for the game has the collection. You can find it here.

As I deleted my other post in this thread, I'll largely repeat what I said before. I'm with Dan in that the Au Ra are simply underwhelming as designs. While I wasn't expecting something so otherworldly that they would go into Beast Tribe races territory like the Sahagins, I wasn't expecting them to be so...creatively diluted either. You can't convince me they're scales. They look more like ritual pieces they've stuck onto their skills for some weird aesthetic reason or something. The female Au Ra are especially disappointing in design. My first response when I see a female Au Ra would probably not be "heeey, new race!", but rather "cool, I wonder what gear she's wearing" . Nothing here necessitates buying a bottle of Fantasia for.

 

[The Witch]

OMG

Astrologian is by far the coolest shit i've seen for ff in like forever i love magic-wiccan themed stuff and that is just fucking fantastic

this is the first time i've heard of this game though so i have much reading to do thanks for the article


EDIT: we've got a gryffin?? i may be wrong, but is this the first time a gryffin has been used in an ff??

 

[Dionysos]

EDIT: we've got a gryffin?? i may be wrong, but is this the first time a gryffin has been used in an ff??

Griffons (allowing for any spelling) have been used in FF games before, but I think so far only as monsters. They appear in FFIII, FFVII, FFIX and maybe a handful of others.

This one seems to be a flying mount, and that is truly very awesome!


-

Also... thanks for the updated pictures, Livi-Liv.

Unfortunately it seems that my opinion on the new race will remain. They look like humans with a serious skin disease.

The only thing which might save them is that they appear to be very tall (maybe even taller than my character!). It'll be interesting to see how tall they are standing next to other races. I really can't grow fond of them at all though. It seems to me to be a waste of an opportunity to introduce a new race.

 

[The Witch]

i meant as like chocobo creatures. that looks like they're using them as friendlies instead of hostile creatures.

 

[Ed Elric]

I really like the designs of the Dark Knight class, even though its just a standard typical Dark Knight look lol.

I've always been a good support role... even though I suck It's the only class that i'm decent at. so it looks like the Atrologain would be my role. xD


The Machinist looks good as well, just not my strong suite though, sadly


The new race does look rather poorly designed with the scales which is a complete bummer. C'mon is it really that hard?


Good for an extra challenge of Alexander! Something players I think will be looking forward to, and will be prepping for it.

The Collector's edition seems to have a lot added in... how much?