Do you support legacy terminology? ('-ra' '-ga' spells)

[Empath]

Hello! I believe this is my first time posting here -- and if this isn't the right place for this topic, please forgive me.

 

I have been debating this for months now, possibly almost a year (around the time I started playing FFXIV.) I am a lover of many final fantasy titles, and something that always bothered me was the name of spells in XIV. Of course, I'm referring to 'Blizzard II' instead of 'Blizzara'. I'm aware this has been brought up before. I'm also aware that '-ra' and '-ga' were not always a part of the spell names. This is a more recent development, and that the numbers system was used for convenience. 

 

However, I would like to point out that I really don't think any of the points I read as to what brought the localization team to this decision make any lick of sense.

(Yes, I'm aware it doesn't matter, that I could continue on my life and 'get over it' but this is important to me, and I want to know if it's important to you, too.)

 

I'd like to petition square enix to change the spell names back to the original incarnation that the german and japanese versions use. I know this would be a massive, abrupt change that would throw more than a handful of players for a loop, but hear me out.

 

I read the full summation of their logic behind the decision in this post. 

 

Many of their points stood out and, again, I feel they made no sense.

I'll quote a few in question.

 

 

Take for example Cure and Blizzard.

Cure and Cure II both heal single targets, whereas Cure III is an AoE spell.

On the other hand, while Blizzard is a single target spell, it is Blizzard II, not Blizzard III that has the AoE effect. Not to mention, none of the Thunder spells (I, II, or III) have AoE effects at all.

Instead of having a system where ‘ga’ suffix is always going to mean AoE, it just means “learned third in order.”

We also noticed that with the thaumaturge action system, casting Blizzard or Fire stacks what is called ‘umbral ice’ or ‘umbral fire’.

Casting Fire I grants 1 umbral fire

Casting Fire II grants 2 umbral fires

Casting Fire III grants 3 umbral fires

Seeing this, we agreed that I, II, III corresponding to 1, 2, 3 was, in a way, slightly more intuitive than -, -ra, -ga corresponding to 1, 2, 3.

 

For one thing, Fire II/Fira does not grant 2 stacks of astral fire??? and if i'm reading this right, the entire explanation was leading up to that. I'm not sure if fire 2 granted 2 stacks earlier on in development, but if it HAS changed, then so must their reasoning. "Keep it so as to avoid confusion of abrupt change" is a valid reason, I admit, but I still firmly believe that I would prefer seeing the change happen now, than never.

 

I felt their reasoning for Materia specifically was sound enough. If I were to petition them to change spell names, I feel like keeping Materia I, II, III, is a welcome change. It is much more clear, and easier to identify this way.

My reasoning for that is that spells are named after the order they are obtained. Fire is obtained before Fira, Blizzara is obtained before Blizzaga. This is clear with both this version, and the numbers. Because of how different each spell is, logically, it doesn't really matter either way what the spell is called. But it's different with items.

Yes, theoretically speaking you will first be obtaining Materia I, before obtaining Materia II. But this can't really be applied practically, as many players go all the way until level 50 without bothering with materia in the slightest -- and even then, many continue to ignore it. It's less 'chronological' and more assuming what the player will be exposed to in what order.

 

Spells, on the other hand, are always going to be obtained in the exact order that they are set in the class.

 

Another point I feel is strange, is this: 

 

Again, this is not the only reason, but even with a Schrodinger’s box filled with reasons, I’m sure that over hours and hours of play, everyone would sooner or later remember all the combinations. However, the way we saw it was, why try to make everyone bear that burden for the sole purpose of bearing it? If there was a simpler way to make everything line up, why not introduce that?

 

Bear what burden? It virtually makes no difference remembering that Fira is an AoE and Fire is not. Most players will read the spell once or twice, and memorize it by its icon on the hotbar. This is the *primary* way for players to recognize their skills, and thus their logic is moot.

 

I understand that many people feel that BECAUSE it makes no difference, that we shouldn't bother with it.

but that is my logic exactly. It makes no difference, sans I genuinely, honestly would feel happier honoring the legacy of final fantasy and its spell names. Final Fantasy XIV deviates a LOT from some of the more traditional 'quirks' of older titles, and at some points? It honestly doesn't feel like a final fantasy. (unable to use items on allies, elemental weaknesses and exploiting them couldn't be less relevant to gameplay, strategies focusing almost entirely on positioning most of the time) and I feel like this change would breathe back a little bit of familiar nostalgia into the game. I sincerely would be happier seeing Cure, Cura, and Curaga on my bar and be reminded that I am indeed playing an online final fantasy title. Final fantasy is rarely defined by its core values -- it is defined by the details, and that is how it's always been IMO.

 

Not to mention, it is bloody awkward saying "Ah yes, he cast Blizzard II and froze my feet to the ground." In character. "He cast Blizzara and froze my feet" sounds.. much more natural, to me. This is an incredibly minor point as I know Square Enix's main focus isn't to cater to roleplayers, so I didn't feel it warranted significant mention.

 

But, yes. Those are a few reasons of why I feel like petitioning them to change the spell names to the original japanese versions would be a fun, refreshing change to the game. It's small enough that it wouldn't be a burden on the localization team -- but a big enough change that it would genuinely delight me, and hopefully many others whom miss this traditional feel.

 

I understand that this was brought up long ago, and no change was made and thus one might see this as a futile effort, but I want to try anyway. Our community has grown so much bigger, and there *has* to be some more people that want this than there used to be. I know this.

 

With that said; do you support this? Would you actively want to contribute to asking square enix to bring back legacy terminology?

[James Rhymes]

h e l l y e s

 

-insert good shit meme here-

 

the point of 'fire 2 gives 2 stacks' is really weird, and your point of it flowing better in RP is very true as well, esp for any characters who deal with magic, ESP those who teach it.

 

'cast fire 2'

'two fire?'

'no, fire 2, like fire but wider'

'???'

instead of something simple like 'please cast a fira please thanks'

 

since they are different spells, it gives them more separation. Even if we have to remember new names ultimately, it doesn't change how the spells work or even the fact that most of us don't read the spell names from a menu but instead remember the icons B) 

 

100% back this idea

[Floodclaw]

I definitely support it. I've always been a fan of unique naming of generic stuff in any games, be it spells or difficulties or special items or whatever. To me, the Final Fantasy spell conventions are as ubiquitous to the series as chocobos, tonberries, malboros and cactuars.

 

So yeah, give us -ra, -ga, -ja, especially in character~!

 

A common counterargument I've heard is that Fire I, II, III for instance, is a lot simpler and easier to memorise than Fire, Fira, Firaga, and to an extent, that's true. But...isn't that being a little insulting to your audience to insinuate that they're incapable of understanding with a little thought? Hell, Shin Megami Tensei/Persona has a much, much more complex spell naming system WITHOUT icons usually, and they still expect you to know what they all mean without much explanation. The Final Fantasy system isn't new, either, so it doesn't really hold weight to assume players are too dumb or inattentive to learn a naming system.

[Lydia Lightfoot]

I vote we go even more old-school.

 

Thaumaturge uses LIT3. It's super effective!

[Oli!]

I dunno, I like the spell names the way they are now. Mostly because it's easier to keep track of tiered numbers than knowing whether I should be casting the a, ra, or ga version of the spell. It's a hassle to everyone but old-school fanatics and Roleplayers, who can just call the spells by those names in roleplay if they really wanted to.

 

Not to mention the horrible, horrible communication errors that would come with Squeenix suddenly changing the names of spells after they've been set in stone this long.

[Kellach Woods]

I vote we go even more old-school.

 

Thaumaturge uses LIT3. It's super effective!

 

LET'S USE ARUB AND XXXX

[Altitis Acquired]

Firaga does sound cooler than Fire III.

[Warren Castille]

I've got extensive history with FFXI, where the suffix system is in full use AND still has a hierarchy of roman numerals. You'll learn Stone before Fire, and Stonaga before Firaga, and you end up learning Thundaga III and Blizzaga III long before learning Aeroja...

 

I don't mind the difference if it avoids more confusing pigeon-holing in, say, two expansions. Sequential numbers are easy to remember if you aren't a long-time fan or played the older games to know what they're talking about.

[Berrod Armstrong]

Speaking as someone who did not come into the game as a Final Fantasy buff, I can completely agree with the reasoning given for the change in spell names. It is easier to read, more concise, and unmistakable.

 

Take this for example:

 

Two raiders on voice chat during a raid, both healers. They're from different places, with different accents. One healer tries to communicate 'Cura' to the other, but the other hears it as 'Cure' because of his accent. Whoops! Or perhaps he tries to communicate 'Curaja' and the other hears 'Curaga'. 

 

While it is a good novelty to go with the old spell names (I mean, I like them too, don't get me wrong!), ultimately it's just not ideal for a game so widespread among so many people with different backgrounds, manners of speech -- and it may certainly get confusing to those who are just starting out and trying to learn what the hell the spell names do. 

 

'Cure one' is unambiguous and straightforward! I can see why they did it. A simple matter of function over fancy, and a wise choice.

[James Rhymes]

Overall there's some good points in either way about it, and I am totally down for both keeping things how they are and changing the names, so it got me thinking:

It'd be pretty cool if we had the option to be able to have one set of names or the other, like a little button similar to the standard and legacy camera sort of thing.

 

It would still probably bring confusion between players using the numbers or the other names when speaking of spells, though. I think that's where we hit a bit of a road block unfortunately and as great as it would be we are pretty late into the game to change a load of names. 

 

I still think it'd be cool and I'd be totally down for it if SE did ever go with it

[Shoshopu]

The problem with this that I have was that in FFXI this terminology was used a little differently.

 

-aga spells were a set of AoE versions of other spells, but they were all numbered in sequence. For example, Cure, Cure II, Cure III; Curaga I, Curaga II, Curaga III.

 

-ra spells are a little different. Cura is obtained much later than Curaga and seems to just be a tweaked version of it and Fira (and other normally BLM -ra spells) is a Geomancer spell, so it came long after I quit. They're both still AoEs but they break the order of -ra, -ga, -ja, so that's weird.

 

Considering FFXI and FFXIV are both "the MMOs" and FFXIV borrows a lot of its aesthetic and design from FFXI, if anything I'd rather do it this way, but there aren't really perfect analogues for every spell so it wouldn't be neat at all.

[FreelanceWizard]

In RP, I often refer to the spells L'yhta casts using the suffix system for several reasons, but OOC? I vastly prefer the numbers for the reasons Berrod stated. It's a lot easier to explain rotations, ask for particular spells, and so on with the numbers, IMO. I personally find "F3->F4->F4->F1" easier to read and type than "Fga->Fja->Fja->F".

 

Also, if we go old school English localization style, the spell names used numbers back then due to character limitations. Those of us who played the SNES and NES FFs know what I'm talking about. So, there's a set of older players who remember fondly the days of Cure4, Fire3, Bolt 2, and so on from FF6 and earlier.

[No Longer Exists]

In RP, I often refer to the spells L'yhta casts using the suffix system for several reasons, but OOC? I vastly prefer the numbers for the reasons Berrod stated. It's a lot easier to explain rotations, ask for particular spells, and so on with the numbers, IMO. I personally find "F3->F4->F4->F1" easier to read and type than "Fga->Fja->Fja->F".

 

Also, if we go old school English localization style, the spell names used numbers back then due to character limitations. Those of us who played the SNES and NES FFs know what I'm talking about. So, there's a set of older players who remember fondly the days of Cure4, Fire3, Bolt 2, and so on from FF6 and earlier.

 

If memory serves, Final Fantasy (the original) had a character limit of 4 characters for naming conventions and the spells were always either limit 4 or possibly limit 5 which accounts for the numerical values. I'm leaning toward limit 4 but my ancient memory isn't so stunning these days. This was due to the rather crappy tech the company used to put the game out, as they were about to shut down completely at the time.

 

Which is a fun fact: Final Fantasy was so named because it was supposed to be the last title the company produced. It was, quite literal, their final fantasy and was produced with.....I want to say a team of no more than 6 people using leftover equipment.

 

Anyways, there's nothing wrong with RPing the aesthetics of calling the spells by name....when you're RPing. I don't see a large scale change of the system mechanic names in the future no matter how hard one tries.

 

-Hatter

[Empath]

The problem with this that I have was that in FFXI this terminology was used a little differently.

 

-aga spells were a set of AoE versions of other spells, but they were all numbered in sequence. For example, Cure, Cure II, Cure III; Curaga I, Curaga II, Curaga III.

 

-ra spells are a little different. Cura is obtained much later than Curaga and seems to just be a tweaked version of it and Fira (and other normally BLM -ra spells) is a Geomancer spell, so it came long after I quit. They're both still AoEs but they break the order of -ra, -ga, -ja, so that's weird.

 

Considering FFXI and FFXIV are both "the MMOs" and FFXIV borrows a lot of its aesthetic and design from FFXI, if anything I'd rather do it this way, but there aren't really perfect analogues for every spell so it wouldn't be neat at all.

 

I'm not exactly how I understand that as a problem. Even as it is, Fire II and Blizzard II are an AoE, Thunder III is not. Cure I and Cure II are single target, whereas Cure III is an AoE. It already doesn't really make any sense. I cannot say that I honestly believe that it would have any difference.

 

 

Two raiders on voice chat during a raid, both healers. They're from different places, with different accents. One healer tries to communicate 'Cura' to the other, but the other hears it as 'Cure' because of his accent. Whoops! Or perhaps he tries to communicate 'Curaja' and the other hears 'Curaga'. 

 

 

Could this not be applied to most any words if we're discussing heavy accents? There will always be misunderstandings in this field, and while I get what you're trying to say, I don't think it makes the game any more, or less, accessible.

[Warren Castille]

I'd like to call into question exactly how "legacy" these spells are. From one of the wikia pages:

 

Final Fantasy VIII is the first game in the saga to have the spell called Thundara. Thundara causes medium Lightning-elemental damage on one opponent. It is a common spell that can be drawn from various mid-level enemies in the game, as well as refined from items and lower level spells. Casting Thundara in battle increases compatibility with Quezacotl by 2, but lowers compatibility with Ifrit by 0.6 and with Eden by 0.2. When Magic Booster is used in the 2013 PC re-release, the player's inventory gains 100 Thundara spells, among other basic spells.

 

Every other game prior to 8 called Thunder spells "Bolt" until you get to the remakes.

 

So... the legacy for people who played the originals ignore ra-ga-ja.

[ɴᴘᴄ]

Anyways' date=' there's nothing wrong with RPing the aesthetics of calling the spells by name....when you're RPing. I don't see a large scale change of the system mechanic names in the future no matter how hard one tries.[/quote']

 

Can't disagree. I'd have no problem with another player RPing spells in this way, whether in conversation or in a duty, while I myself would stick to the game's conventions when it comes to discussing gameplay.

[Teadrinker]

I have no strong feelings one way or another.

[Empath]

I'd like to call into question exactly how "legacy" these spells are. From one of the wikia pages:

 

Final Fantasy VIII is the first game in the saga to have the spell called Thundara. Thundara causes medium Lightning-elemental damage on one opponent. It is a common spell that can be drawn from various mid-level enemies in the game, as well as refined from items and lower level spells. Casting Thundara in battle increases compatibility with Quezacotl by 2, but lowers compatibility with Ifrit by 0.6 and with Eden by 0.2. When Magic Booster is used in the 2013 PC re-release, the player's inventory gains 100 Thundara spells, among other basic spells.

 

Every other game prior to 8 called Thunder spells "Bolt" until you get to the remakes.

 

So... the legacy for people who played the originals ignore ra-ga-ja.

 

I'm aware! But in the remakes of these titles, where the character limits were less restricting, they have gone back and changed them. See: the FFIII remake for DS and PC. 

I also did mention in my original post that -ra/etc. spells are a somewhat recent development, but they are still more widespread than numerical spells at this point.

[Kage]

I'd like to call into question exactly how "legacy" these spells are. From one of the wikia pages:

 

Final Fantasy VIII is the first game in the saga to have the spell called Thundara. Thundara causes medium Lightning-elemental damage on one opponent. It is a common spell that can be drawn from various mid-level enemies in the game, as well as refined from items and lower level spells. Casting Thundara in battle increases compatibility with Quezacotl by 2, but lowers compatibility with Ifrit by 0.6 and with Eden by 0.2. When Magic Booster is used in the 2013 PC re-release, the player's inventory gains 100 Thundara spells, among other basic spells.

 

Every other game prior to 8 called Thunder spells "Bolt" until you get to the remakes.

 

So... the legacy for people who played the originals ignore ra-ga-ja.

I guess if you're going by Japanese play it is? For those of us who played english versions, even FF7 had SpellNumerals. -ra, -ga, -ja for us were added in for other titles when they were remade / remastered.

 

Personally I don't mind the system as is. When I dabbled in some spell RP it was never "cast named spell". Even now, it's not a concern for me if I were to in the future. I mean it's not like I am going to 'cast Flash' in roleplay either.

[Ashe]

Uuuuuuh, depends >>

ICly, no. ICly I wouldn't name spells if Ashe was to cast any. I would describe what they are doing and the person I'm fighting with can use their common sense to infer what I am doing. Like....

 

/emote channels aether and casts a large circle of fire around his target the flames immolating both the target and those around him/her/it.

 

....

That's Fire II >>

 

OOCly, no. IF I'm helping someone play, I"ll say the names of the spells that are displayed on the screen.

[No Longer Exists]

Uuuuuuh, depends >>

ICly, no. ICly I wouldn't name spells if Ashe was to cast any. I would describe what they are doing and the person I'm fighting with can use their common sense to infer what I am doing. Like....

 

/emote channels aether and casts a large circle of fire around his target the flames immolating both the target and those around him/her/it.

 

....

That's Fire II >>

 

OOCly, no. IF I'm helping someone play, I"ll say the names of the spells that are displayed on the screen.

 

In this case, I cannot blame you. It -is- fun to infer rather than be outright but some RPers thoroughly enjoy casting rotes "Flames of Judgement. BURN! Firaga!" as an example. The aesthetic loses some of its fun and flash unless you're a retro-gamer like myself when you supplement firaga with "Flames of Judgement. BURN! Fir3" <---See, toldja it was 4 characters limited.

 

I'm still not convinced that a game-wide alterations needs or even SHOULD be made though, to stick with the OP's original intention.

 

-Hatter

[Warren Castille]

I'd like to call into question exactly how "legacy" these spells are. From one of the wikia pages:

 

Final Fantasy VIII is the first game in the saga to have the spell called Thundara. Thundara causes medium Lightning-elemental damage on one opponent. It is a common spell that can be drawn from various mid-level enemies in the game, as well as refined from items and lower level spells. Casting Thundara in battle increases compatibility with Quezacotl by 2, but lowers compatibility with Ifrit by 0.6 and with Eden by 0.2. When Magic Booster is used in the 2013 PC re-release, the player's inventory gains 100 Thundara spells, among other basic spells.

 

Every other game prior to 8 called Thunder spells "Bolt" until you get to the remakes.

 

So... the legacy for people who played the originals ignore ra-ga-ja.

I guess if you're going by Japanese play it is? For those of us who played english versions, even FF7 had SpellNumerals. -ra, -ga, -ja for us were added in for other titles when they were remade / remastered.

 

Personally I don't mind the system as is. When I dabbled in some spell RP it was never "cast named spell". Even now, it's not a concern for me if I were to in the future. I mean it's not like I am going to 'cast Flash' in roleplay either.

 

I could probably count on my genitals how many people here first played the FF games in the original Japanese.

 

I'm just saying that "legacy" in this case doesn't mean anything besides "version I liked best / saw first / is how they do it in other languages," none of which have any bearing on the game as a game. SE is trying to draw as many players as they can regardless of familiarity with the game series, and "Fira / Firaga / Firara / Firaja" doesn't denote any sort of hierarchy in terms of power or usefulness to someone who hasn't already seen them in other games.

 

Fire 1 2 3 4 is fairly straightforward, even if the AoE versions are a bit strange. If the game used more attack spells I could see them doing the XI version of both suffix and numeral-level for the combat system in XIV is incredibly anti-that.

 

It's weird, but it was weird in XI, too, and it was weird in other games too.

[Ashe]

Yeah, if we're talking actual game mechanics, if you don't understand what Fire 1-4 are and you're a level 60 BLM....you probably shouldn't be a BLM anymore >>

[Empath]

I'd like to call into question exactly how "legacy" these spells are. From one of the wikia pages:

 

Final Fantasy VIII is the first game in the saga to have the spell called Thundara. Thundara causes medium Lightning-elemental damage on one opponent. It is a common spell that can be drawn from various mid-level enemies in the game, as well as refined from items and lower level spells. Casting Thundara in battle increases compatibility with Quezacotl by 2, but lowers compatibility with Ifrit by 0.6 and with Eden by 0.2. When Magic Booster is used in the 2013 PC re-release, the player's inventory gains 100 Thundara spells, among other basic spells.

 

Every other game prior to 8 called Thunder spells "Bolt" until you get to the remakes.

 

So... the legacy for people who played the originals ignore ra-ga-ja.

I guess if you're going by Japanese play it is? For those of us who played english versions, even FF7 had SpellNumerals. -ra, -ga, -ja for us were added in for other titles when they were remade / remastered.

 

Personally I don't mind the system as is. When I dabbled in some spell RP it was never "cast named spell". Even now, it's not a concern for me if I were to in the future. I mean it's not like I am going to 'cast Flash' in roleplay either.

 

I could probably count on my genitals how many people here first played the FF games in the original Japanese.

 

I'm just saying that "legacy" in this case doesn't mean anything besides "version I liked best / saw first / is how they do it in other languages," none of which have any bearing on the game as a game. SE is trying to draw as many players as they can regardless of familiarity with the game series, and "Fira / Firaga / Firara / Firaja" doesn't denote any sort of hierarchy in terms of power or usefulness to someone who hasn't already seen them in other games.

 

Fire 1 2 3 4 is fairly straightforward, even if the AoE versions are a bit strange. If the game used more attack spells I could see them doing the XI version of both suffix and numeral-level for the combat system in XIV is incredibly anti-that.

 

It's weird, but it was weird in XI, too, and it was weird in other games too.

 

But that's the thing. Fire I, II, III, and IV do not denote their usefulness either. Fire 1 is the primary spell you should be using, whereas fire II is strictly an AoE and a poor choice for single target, Fire III should be used exclusively for refreshing astral fire stacks, and IV should be used to juggle Enochian.

 

They already don't make any sense in the slightest, nor are any of them particularly more "powerful" than other options. Each spell has a use, and the numerical system doesn't identify that just as much as the legacy terminology.

[Kage]

I'll say it. I'm not going to re-learn skills' names after 2 years. Not for this game.