Final Fantasy 14 Evercold reveals new tank job Bastion, two housing overhauls, and branching story quests

Square Enix producer and director Naoki Yoshida used the Berlin Fan Fest keynote to lay out some of the biggest changes coming to Final Fantasy 14 in the Evercold expansion — a brand-new tank job, two separate housing overhauls, and branching narrative paths in the main story quests.

The headline job reveal is Bastion, a main tank class that wields two shields called Skyltborg. It's the first job in FF14 with no connection to any previous Final Fantasy job, and it arrives alongside a reworked combat system that introduces the "main tank" and support tank distinction. On the housing front, Yoshida confirmed two major overhauls are in the pipeline for Evercold. The first targets the housing UI, which Yoshida himself called "quite technical and not very accessible," with the goal of making decoration easier for casual players. The second overhaul is being kept under wraps, but Yoshida teased it as "the number one thing on the list a lot of people are requesting" — and said there's a chance it actually ships before the UI update. Yoshida also addressed World of Warcraft's new housing system directly, calling it "amazing" and "a good source of research," while noting that WoW's team said they looked to FF14 for inspiration — something he called "a great honour." On the story side, Evercold introduces branching narrative paths to the main scenario quests, a first for the MMO.

FF14's housing system has been a long-running frustration for the community — plots are scarce, the bidding system is brutal, and item placement without third-party tools is restrictive. The fact that Yoshida is now openly benchmarking against WoW's more freeform housing, and has personally gone hands-on with it, signals that Square Enix is taking the problem seriously rather than just patching around the edges. Bastion's debut is also notable because FF14 jobs have historically drawn from the broader Final Fantasy series — Blue Mage, Gunbreaker, Sage — so a completely original job marks a genuine creative shift for the game.

No release window for Evercold was announced at the keynote beyond the expansion itself being in development. The second housing overhaul remains in the planning stage, so specifics on what it actually changes are still unknown — but Yoshida's confidence in the community reaction suggests it addresses plot availability or ownership limits, the issues players complain about most.