Final Fantasy 14’s London Fan Festival has just kicked off, and with it Square Enix has finally revealed the first of its two new classes coming to upcoming expansion Dawntrail: melee damage dealer Viper. The job was first teased back in July’s Las Vegas Fan Festival, but this is the first time we have a name and a full reveal of the kit.
During the festival’s opening keynote, localisation supervisor Michael-Christopher Koji Fox called Viper a “technically demanding but highly stylish melee job,” where the player can dual-wield single blades for swift strikes, before temporarily combining them into a single sword to deal huge damage with tons of flair.
As is customary with Final Fantasy 14 Fan Fest reveals, director and producer Naoki Yoshida appeared on-stage cosplaying in the new job gear—sporting a brown and white getup with Tetsuya Nomura-levels of belts across the chest, silver shoulder plates and giving big pirate energy. It’s got a wonderful adventurer vibe to it, fitting for Dawntrail’s focus on exploration and new beginnings with a brand new narrative arc kicking off.
The new job will start off at level 80 and can be picked up from Ul’dah, one of the three major starting cities. I’m not usually much of a melee player myself but Viper looks like a ton of fun, and should be a good alternative for fellow dual-wielders Ninja who are looking to try something a little different.
As for Dawntrail’s second job, Yoshida is keeping that one under wraps until Japan’s Fan Festival in January, 2024. All we know so far is that it’ll be a ranged magic DPS job, which Yoshida dropped a few turtley hints towards back at the Las Vegas Fan Fest.
