Following a discussion in another thread, I thought about how SE has been fearful of giving RDM's higher tier Cures or Area of Effect buff spells/abilities and our general lack of power in every department has left us lingering FAR behind. As it stands we have little avenue for boosting our current abilities beyond what they are, so why not implement something to do just that.
My proposal is something along the lines of a gear based berserk. Basically it take's whatever stats you have on your gear such as Defense, MND, INT, STR, Acc, Haste, Skill, Cure Potency, and even the base damage of the weapon equipped, and boost those by 25%. As far as implementation, it could be a new Job Ability(JA) at level 99, or a new merit JA/Composure buff that increases the effect (and possibly duration) by 5% for each merit.
Example: You have +20 Acc, M.Acc, Haste, Cure Potency, skill, whatever
1 merit (5%)= +21 Acc, M.Acc, Haste, Cure Potency, skill, whatever
2 merits (10%)= +22
3 merits (15%)= +23
4 merits (20%)= +24
5 merits (25%)= +25 Total
The ability would give us three distinct bonuses.
Scaling: You get more out of what you invest.
For example, say you are trying to stack Magic Attack Bonus to cast Thunder IV. A player who only has 10% would only receive an additional +2.5%, however suppose they had +40% instead they would receive an additional +10%.
Increase Gear Flexibility: Allowed to focus on other/multiple stats.
For example, a player could sacrifice some Accuracy gear in turn for STR or Attack, because the bonus accuracy obtained from the Job Ability would pick up the slack to help cap our accuracy.
Another example, Instead of having to equip 25% haste to reach the gear cap, we would only need to equip 20% and let the JA pick up the other 5%. Of course that's only if the haste gained from the JA counts towards the gear cap and not treated as a JA haste, which could propel us past 30% haste on equipment alone.
Boosts to other misc. gear effects: Increases bonuses for non-traditional stats.
For example, increases the effect for set bonuses, such as further increasing the Composure bonus from the +2 Estoqueur's Armor Set.
And it perhaps the best thing of all, it would work for all aspects of RDM DD, nuker, healer, buffer, enfeebler, that guy who like's to leech in Abyssea exp parties... well maybe not that last one, but still it would be something that everyone can be happy with... except maybe other melee and mage jobs.
Tell me what you think.
EDIT: This is not a fix! This is not an End all adjustment that I'm trying to perpetuate for RDM, it's merely an idea for possible future updates to give us a boost outside of the typical methods thrown around for RDM. While I know people's opinions differ, I feel the idea is within reasonable boundaries taking balance and any possible future updates into consideration.