Final Fantasy VII: International Materia Job System

[Eternal]

So, a while ago, I pondered the concept of FFVII with a job system. I began work on it a very long time ago, but eventually the files were lost. So I decided that I would continue work on it, alongside FFT: Parted Ways. (I work on FFT during the afternoon, FFVII at night).

The premise is simple. Each character gets exactly two Materia Slots to their name, and they're paired. Each Materia is named after a Final Fantasy job, and has skills based off of that job. Each Materia grants stat changes based on the job. A Black Mage materia would increase MP, for example, whereas a Monk Materia would not.

Thus far, I have 22 jobs in line. Depending on further testing, there may be more or less. The jobs thus far are these:

-White Mage
-Black Mage
-Magus
-Sage
-Ninja
-Knight
-Psychic
-Time Mage
-Devout
-Ranger
-Dark Knight
-Monk
-Bard
-Dragoon
-Scholar
-Necromancer
-Oracle
-Berserker
-Thief
-Freelancer
-Mediator
-Summoner

Let me state though that FFT is coming first, and it'll be a very long time before this is done, most likely. Anywho, just something I'd tell you lot about. If further tests prove fruitful, there'd be room for about 5 more jobs in addition to these. Further, I'm very unfamiliar with animation hacking in FFVII, so that will be another roadblock. Cheers!

[RavenOfRazgriz]

1. I really dislike this idea.  Just prefacing.  Obviously execution is what truly decides whether this idea is good or scrap but flavorwise, it seems a bit off for how FFVII is designed story-wise.  I guess you could justify it though.

2. Materia should be named after the Job command, not the Job.  So instead of White Mage, Black Mage, etc., name the Materia White Magic, Black Magic, Planar Magic, Mystic Magic, Time Magic, Summon Magic, Dark Arts, Holy Arts, etc. etc. etc.  It's a lot better flavor-wise and makes it a lot easier to justify the change without story edits by just postulating that the Materia crystalized the power of skills from a time back when the souls sealed in the Mako were once alive, instead of sealing the power of Fire, Ice, Lightning, Summons, etc.

Though, Materia can only handle something like 5 skills if memory serves, so only 2 Materia per character seems far too restrictive, especially assuming you keep the Materia that doesn't directly give the character abilities.  Done right, it seems like you could at least allow 4 Materia per character, especially since there's room for about 27 Jobs worth of Materia.  27/4= 6.75, so Job Materia alone there's enough to go around for 6 characters to have unique setups and a 7th to have 3/4s of one.

[Eternal]

Yeah, I'm with you on naming it after the skillset. It works perfectly for me.

And yes, a Materia's limit is 5 skills. And right now, I'm not certain on there being 27 jobs. I need to do some testing on the false Limit Breaks and see if I can use those slots. So, for 22 jobs, I'm thinking three Materia slots, maybe? When it's confirmed that I can do 24, I'll add the fourth slot.

[RavenOfRazgriz]

Yeah, I'm with you on naming it after the skillset. It works perfectly for me.

And yes, a Materia's limit is 5 skills. And right now, I'm not certain on there being 27 jobs. I need to do some testing on the false Limit Breaks and see if I can use those slots. So, for 22 jobs, I'm thinking three Materia slots, maybe? When it's confirmed that I can do 24, I'll add the fourth slot.

Remember that your average player isn't usually going to use every character unless you somehow force them to, especially since two of them are optional and between time before recruitment and scenarios such as when Cloud goes total emocide they won't all even be in the party.  That means you can go for 4 Materia per character on a practical level and still be fine even with only 22 Jobs represented, assuming most of the Materia is actually worthwhile through most of the game in some capacity.

[Pickle Girl Fanboy]

The Materia system of FF7 was good, but it didn't go far enough.  Materia should be customizable, and there shouldn't be any materia that make any other obsolete.

Think of it as materia shards.

Each materia is made of shards.  There is a formula shard, which must be modified by an element shard to work, and it can be powered up with shards that modify the x and y values of the formula.  The formula shard itself is modified by stat shards, so you can make a Fire Materia that's powered by dexterity (instead of Magic) and damages based on the target's MDef from armor and Luck (instead of Mdef and Spirit).

This would be even cooler in a player vs player vs environment vs monsters mmorpg.  Complete anarchy.  No two people have the save set of materia.  Everyone is constantly trying to out-do one another.  You must adapt to semi-random environmental changes which influence elemental damage (like thunderstorms or concentrations of Mako Energy), and not be eaten by monsters, which themselves follow a sort of natural selection, where enemies that are easily killed die off, and the survivors - and their survival traits -become more common.

The great thing is, you wouldn't need hundreds of skills and status effects and equipment.  All you need is the basic FF7 materia, but with obsolescence removed, and optimized for modifiability.

I think Yojimbo Beta has a FF7 hack that removes obsolescence.  There are green materia for every element, and no non-elemental green attack materia, so you can't just Ultima your way through everything.  He turned KOTR into Holy, that was another good idea.

[GeneralStrife]

What are you going to do about limit breaks?

[Eternal]

Sadly, because Limit Breaks are located in a different part of the ROM, out of the editor's reach, I probably won't do anything to them unless I find some patches that can nerf them. Secondadvent will probably be able to help me in that regard.