BODY: For the first time since 2019, Final Fantasy XIV is adding a physical ranged DPS — and it comes with a hawk.
Square Enix announced Zephyr on October 31 at the Final Fantasy XIV Fan Festival 2026 in Tokyo, held at Makuhari Messe. It is the second of two new jobs arriving with Final Fantasy XIV: Evercold (Japanese title: 白銀のワンダラー, "Hakugin no Wanderer"), following the tank job Bastion revealed earlier in the Fan Fest circuit.
Zephyr wields a crossbow and fights alongside a raptor-type familiar called Nephele. Producer and director Naoki Yoshida's team showed the job chaining crossbow volleys into combination attacks executed with the bird, which also delivers party support effects and doubles as a mobility tool — a notable design choice for a role that has traditionally traded damage for the freedom to keep moving.
Japanese outlets covering the keynote reported that Zephyr starts at level 90 rather than at the expansion's floor, with its unlock quest located in Gridania — fitting for a job built around falconry and the Black Shroud's hunting traditions. That mirrors how recent expansions have let returning players jump straight into new jobs without a long grind.
Evercold launches February 23, 2027, with early access from February 19, across PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC. Pre-orders open November 4. A benchmark tool letting players test the new job's look is expected in late December.
The insider take
Physical ranged has been FFXIV's thinnest role for years — three jobs against melee's six — and the Japanese player base has been asking for a fourth since Shadowbringers. What raised eyebrows at Makuhari was the word 使い魔 (shimaー, "familiar"), not "pet." Yoshida's team spent the Endwalker era simplifying Summoner's pet management into pure button presses, a change JP forums still argue about. Handing a ranged DPS an actual commandable companion reads, to longtime Japanese players, like a quiet admission that something was lost in that streamlining. Whether Nephele requires real positioning or is another cosmetic flourish will be the first thing Japanese theorycrafters test when the benchmark drops in December.
Originally reported by GAME Watch (Japanese).