The Problem with Red Mage . . .

[Demon6324236]

Comparing RDM+Almace to BLU+Almace is stupid yes, however your comparing RDM+Almace to RDM+Excalibur which is vastly different and what we are talking about here so far as I know. In the end its a matter of Almace vs Excalibur for RDM and the end answer all comes down to how they work and what you use for them. I plan to gear both to the teeth and give my results to everyone which is why I have asked help on the RDM forums of AH.com for more assistance on building a solid build for KoR. I plan to do much of the same for other sets in time as I go along, but thats in due time and once I can really get my hands on more of the gear I need. Sadly my ls is not active in Legion, Neo-Nyzul, or Neo-Limbus currently so my access to the higher end gear I do actually want & require is still out of reach and the prime reason I actually lack a Shedir, which since you brought it to my attention in this same thread I believe, I have had it as a goal, same as Kudzu.

[Neisan_Quetz]

You guys just aren't getting the picture. You keep pointing out that RDM has this and BLU has this, but you aren't seeing what you are saying. It's rather infuriating.

RDM HAS THE BEST REQ SET

BLU HAS THE BEST CDC SET

And both are by a long shot, COMPARATIVELY. RDMs aren't Forced to use Req, they should be more than happy to use it. RDM shouldn't be trying to use CDC because it doesn't have the gear for it. It doesn't have gear like Athos with access to Crit and Crit Damage.

You will always be lack luster outside of scenerios that don't give you Atmas or Atmacites, or something like Potency Potions. In areas unsupported by outside buffs, you will do bad, inconsistent damage. You will only be using the Almace for the ODD, because you could be doing better, more consistent damage with Req.

The TP set i've put up has +122 Atk (5 from sword skill and 10 from +20 STR) and +42.5 Acc, which is higher than whatever you put together. My delay is lower than yours and my Store TP builds are higher than yours so I can do 15 hits. The larger contribution of my delay favors my main hand, meaning that my offhand is actually quickening my main hand instead of slowing down yours with a 230 delay weapon. Dual Wield is working in favor of my main hand aka my damage hand, aka the thing with not 1, but 2 additional procs. The 25% of HP damage can proc on both hits in a Double Attack.

ALSO my off hand steals TP. AND I have flexibility to change out my neck and ammo if I so desire and not lose my Haste cap and my 15 Hit Build.

I can even wear a fancy body that doesn't have Haste on it without dropping my hit build.

Whatever you think your fancy STR sword is doing for you, well it's not. And your Almace. It needs more support than you can give it, because you don't have the gear for it. That's why you can wiff for like 900 damage. You aren't a faux THF, like BLU, so you can just take everyone's gimmicks. Zelus Tiaras are bad and you should feel bad for wearing them on a job that can't afford to give up an entire slot worth of stats.

Learn to play RDM if you're going to tell people about RDM, because all this theoretical math from parses in situations that you shouldn't be meleeing in to being with, is getting old. Your ASSUMPTIONS reek of someone who hasn't taken RDM seriously in a long time. Get off you BLU or w/e you're playing because RDM is hard and actually go do some stuff.

I could not face palm any harder at this entire post.

[Afania]

Well I haven't yet gotten around to legion but from reading this post, as well as others, I take most people arent doing Legion and dont care much about it as you apparently do. I also must admit that RDM does seem quite useful in this event as per your description. My only issue is the bolded line where everyone keeps trying pigeon hole RDM as a mage only/ predominately mage job. I wont claim to be a rpg enthusiast of any sorts because these game can be rather boring and monotonous to get most things done, however I've seen/played enough rpg to know that mages arent seen wielding bladed weapons of any sort very often. In any case they are it is typically something light and low damage like a knife/dagger because mages arent typically seen as strong enough to wield much else. In addition though redmage is capable of equipping a staff like a traditional mage. I respect you like the mage aspect of rdm as i admit is handy but can you please stop pigeon-holing it and respect that not everybody always enjoys the mage aspects as much as you do. Thank you for your understanding in advance.

It's pretty easy to label everything as "Pigeon-holing a job" if players just uses the strongest/most needed aspect of a job to beat an event.

It has nothing about I "enjoy" mage RDM or not, I don't even play the job. It's just the fact that using this aspect of the job makes things easier in certain situation. It's just like ppl invite BRD to sing, and melee BRD isn't most useful in EG event. Or ppl invite SCH to embrava and focus on stun and so on. You can tell ppl I hate buff only BRD and want to play as melee BRD all day, but it just doens't work as well. In the event such as legion, the most effective way to use BRD is to have it SV at start, and lock SV near the portal for entire time, and do nothing entire run except lock 2hr+ sing when needed. You can tell everyone that I want to play as melee DD BRD and have best DD gears, but it just doesn't work as well as lock 2hr+ sing only BRD.

If you want to play role-playing and melee mage, then harder EG event isn't the right place to do it, as pt efficiency and the outcome of the event will be affected.

If you want to play melee mage in easier content, such as old limbus/salvage/nyzul, then you will also face another problem, that is other melee jobs like BLU, still do the same thing, and do it much faster and more efficient, this issue was being pointed out earlier and addressed.

MMORPG, after you gonna grind stuff for months and years, sometimes ppl will lean towards efficiency rather than novelty.
And there bound to be most efficient way currently discovered to do anything. For Melee mage lovers, maybe their first try will be fun, after a few tries and more grind, I believe majority of player would want to choose faster ways to do it. Is melee RDM cool? Sure. Will melee RDM lovers enjoy it? Maybe for a few times. But after you do 100 salvage/old nyzul/limbus runs on melee RDM, and do it slower than coming another melee job such as BLU, will you still insist to do it on RDM? That is my question.

RDM works just fine as it is, if you're going to complain that RDM's melee ability is too weak compare with other job and you can't melee, then you may as well go complain PUP BLU BRD DNC THF BLM WHM COR SCH SMN RNG needs better melee ability because "I enjoy melee with a club" "I enjoy using a sword on pirate" "I enjoy playing as a musician with a dagger" "I enjoy magic warrior BLM meleeing with a staff and nuke on same time" and so on.

What I don't understand is, why nobody ever complained BRD BLM SCH COR SMN needs a melee dmg buff, but ppl do so to RDM and if you claimed RDM can do something else(mage aspect) better, it's "pigeon-holing". So it's not "pigeon-holing" RNG if I said RNG excel at ranged low enmity DD but not melee, or if I said BLM excel at nuking but not melee, or if I said BRD excel at singing but not melee?

Your standard can extend to every job then, that having RNG and COR shoot bullets instead of meleeing, or BLM nuking instead of using a staff, or BRD singing instead of using a dagger is "pigeon-holing".

And when we refuse to "Pigeon-hole" every job, let every job do what they want, there are no real way to handle party role anymore. And this is not how this game, FFXI is designed. This game is designed every job has it's best party role, despite every job gets certain weapon skill level for melee.

RDM is not classified as melee job but a mage job at the moment, deal with it. Maybe SE may change it in the future and nerf it's mage role, makes melee role stronger, but whatever it goes, deal with it, accept the fact that every job in this game is "pigeon-hole" and specialized at one aspect, and be glad that at least it's wanted for one event in this game.

[saevel]

I really don't know how else to explain this. We're discussing pure damage output here hence the preference for STR Sword off hand, and in any situation where you want pure offensive power it's what you'll be using. This precluded alternate situations where things like Sanus Ensis would be preferable or the PDT sword.

Almace's ODD can not proc on WS's, it's melee damage only but it's proc rate is much higher then Xcal's 2.5. Req vs CDC is a very big "it depends" as RDM has crap attack compared to other DW jobs, mostly due to it not being able to have /WAR with DW. You never EVER want your cRatio to be under 1.0, that's the territory of absolute sh!t damage. Req's -20% attack penality pretty much guarantees that you'll be under 1.0 on anything more then 4~5 levels above you. At that point in time a crit is double damage (1.0 -> 2.0) and crits suddenly become very important to WS damage.

Messed up thing about Xcal's add damage is that it's pretty much equal to using enspell 1's on a Dual Wielding job. I don't know about the precedence of Enspell II vs Add effect, I've NEVER EVER heard about them being different then Enspell 1's and until I see evidence otherwise I'm assuming their the same. The attack on Xcal is really nice, but it doesn't make up for the damage lost. In either case you would be using STR sword off hand, I really can't see anywhere that 3% would do more for you then 27.5 attack and 2.7 fSTR as you can already cap gear haste.

I've been around and around this for a very long time and no matter what numbers you plug in STR Shikagar -> Eph Sword, on both RDM and BLU. It's really just an expensive glowing sword good only for town gear.

[ManaKing]

I could not face palm any harder at this entire post.

OMG I made a single line comment.

[ManaKing]

No~ Last I knew it proced on WSs as well as normal strikes. I was led to believe the main reason for most emps these days such as Masa or Calad was to use the WS to have an active aftermath of which you then spam the corresponding Merit WS with a chance to get the ODD effect to proc thus creating more overall damage, I may have been mistaken however, this is only going off of what I have been told, never looked into it much myself. If I'm wrong then so be it, but in either case I still think neither of us have had an Excalibur long enough to say with 100% certainty which one is better than the other. Because so far as I gather from the thread asking for a loan that you have had yours about a week, and I doubt that is enough time to get any definitive info on which is better and in which situations without going simply off another's testimony of which I can not see it as a good idea to defend another's ideals or opinions so adamantly.

I've had an Almace for a long time. I know what Empys are. An Almace is BLUs Relic, since they didn't get in on Excal. I would have never put together a Relic if I didn't do my research first. MYTHICS ARE THE ONLY AM THAT PROC DURING A WS AND THE ONLY WS THEY PROC DURING IS THEIR MYTHIC.

So whatever you think the argument was for Almace on RDM, you are wrong, just like they are wrong for thinking that CDC + Aftermath for Almace is a good thing for a RDM because it implies that you are going to an event with an extended boss fight with temp support and that you aren't needed for CCS, which means you should have come an actual DD if you really cared about rocking that parse and getting all elitest. If you are going around and murdering small groups of mobs Excal wins and that's what you should be doing. Being able to WS more quickly because of not only the better/faster TP generation of an Ephemeron offhand not to mention the additional affect of even more TP is what is going to kill your mobs faster so that you can keep moving on. The AM that may or may not be relevant at all, will not, nor will throwing a 900 damage CDC that didn't crit and you got unlucky with double attacks.

Pretending an Almace AM is going to pay off because you're too lazy to make an Excal for RDM after you made an Almace for BLU is just insulting for the rest of the people that actually took the time to be the best they could be for RDM. That's what Saevel and NQ are doing. Boo hoo Relics are expensive and PLD is crappy so I'll just say Almace is better and mislead a bunch of people to make me feel better. Grow up.

[Demon6324236]

Like I said, Ill parse both in a number of situations & gear sets once I 99 them both, so Ill get back to ya in about 2~3 months depending on if I feel like doing hundreds of Qilin or not.

[ManaKing]

I really don't know how else to explain this. We're discussing pure damage output here

No, we're not. We are talking about applicable situations where RDMs would melee and the actual merits of doing so. You know, actually playing the game as a RDM.....

Almace's ODD can not proc on WS's, it's melee damage only but it's proc rate is much higher then Xcal's 2.5. Req vs CDC is a very big "it depends" as RDM has crap attack compared to other DW jobs, mostly due to it not being able to have /WAR with DW. You never EVER want your cRatio to be under 1.0, that's the territory of absolute sh!t damage. Req's -20% attack penality pretty much guarantees that you'll be under 1.0 on anything more then 4~5 levels above you. At that point in time a crit is double damage (1.0 -> 2.0) and crits suddenly become very important to WS damage.

Cough Cough soil gorget and belt. Add tons of MND. Do work.

Messed up thing about Xcal's add damage is that it's pretty much equal to using enspell 1's on a Dual Wielding job. I don't know about the precedence of Enspell II vs Add effect, I've NEVER EVER heard about them being different then Enspell 1's and until I see evidence otherwise I'm assuming their the same. The attack on Xcal is really nice, but it doesn't make up for the damage lost. In either case you would be using STR sword off hand, I really can't see anywhere that 3% would do more for you then 27.5 attack and 2.7 fSTR as you can already cap gear haste.

Oh well here's the evidence. I had a friend who had an Excal before me. I was like hey, switch over to RDM please, put on Enspell 2s. Attack those mobs for like 3 minutes.

Results: Additional Affect overrides Enspell 2 damage. Additional Affect can go off on any normal swing done by Excalibur, aka Double Attacks.

I went, holy shit, I want one of those. 3 months later = now. Ask Demon if he puts on enspell 2s if he gets the TH/Enlight proc to go off. Don't take my word for it. We have a 2nd party here that isn't biased to how clearly awesome Excal is.

The attack on Xcal is really nice, but it doesn't make up for the damage lost. In either case you would be using STR sword off hand, I really can't see anywhere that 3% would do more for you then 27.5 attack and 2.7 fSTR as you can already cap gear haste.

I've been around and around this for a very long time and no matter what numbers you plug in STR Shikagar -> Eph Sword, on both RDM and BLU. It's really just an expensive glowing sword good only for town gear.

The attack on the Excal is obnoxiously nice is what you mean to say, because it is. When you guys are all like STR shika this and STR shika that, I'm like how about just having 73 base damage and 40 god damn attack? The thing is a monster. I'm essentially using an Axe with extra damage procs(plural because there are 2). If there was only 1, I would be less adamant about it, but there are 2.

You don't get just attack, you also get accuracy, a faster TP phase, lower total delay, and an additional additional affect that steals TP. Not to mention a ton of AGI for subtle blow and for lessening your chances of being critically hit. You're an elvaan, you know what that means.

Also, what do you want to do with your neck and ammo slot? Anything fancy because idk you're a fancy mage that can melee at a reasonable level? You can use a ranged weapon if you want, so you can pull again magic aggro foes. If you ever manage to get a Portus Collar, you can wear that without messing up your TP phase.

I understand that if you math a STR Shikagar and an Almace, it wins, but you're not seeing the applications of it, nor what you are giving up for it.

[saevel]

Jesus ...

Mana you really need to learn the mechanics behind damage. Your sounding like a noob right now.

Go look up Moten's DPS sheets, pull the RDM one out. You can fit in various gear levels and it's pretty good at predicting what your average damage will be. You can go so far as to put in Dia III and the ODD rates of the various weapons.

That is what we've been basing our info on, rather then just spouting off random stuff.

Everyone here should know me and NQ really don't get along, yet we're both actually agreeing on something. That alone should speak volumes.

[Neisan_Quetz]

As much as I dislike Saevel he has brought more to the argument than your anecdotal evidence you "think" is correct.