Inquiry to the Devs

[Tassidaru]

As I have watched how Red Mage has developed with the post 75 cap updates, some questions have come up that I cannot for the life of me divine an answer to. My hope is a response that, while not explaining everything, will perhaps give me an idea about the future of my first 75, now 90 level job.

The first and perhaps my most important question is as follows:
At the 75 cap RDM had equivalent skill in both dagger and sword, having access to both relics as well as both trial weapon skills and a modest array of weapon options for both. Our mythic was a sword but considering that every job had its own, having one but not the other was understandable. At 90 however, it seems that this balance has become skewed. Our new weapon skill is a dagger, but outside of the twilight knife, no new weapons, not even the dominion augments, nor the Magian daggers.
We can use the Magian and dominion augment swords, but were passed up for the new sword weapon skill. However, our Empyrean is a sword. As someone who has little or no chance at attaining the Almace, at least for the foreseeable future, I cannot help but wonder why. While it seems balanced, it has made it very difficult to be competitive with other light DD jobs, especially considering we were somewhat deficient to begin with.

Another item that has me confused was granting RDM with Shield Mastery when RDM has a native Shield Skill of F, capping out at 90 at a 229, a far cry from WAR, whose C+ shield skill caps at 315. Another aspect is that both a shield and shield mastery only come into play when one is being attacked, which for RDM means solo. The only time I have pulled hate in a melee position was when the THF tank allowed me to pull hate so they could sneak attack, or use evisceration or Mandalic Stab after my Death blossom for either Darkness or Light respectively.

This leads to my next question. RDM is considered to be a jack of all trades correct? Would not tank be part of all trades? If so, then why have you, indirectly or otherwise, removed our hate tools? First it was the reduction of the Enmity of bind, blind and the sleeps, and now the new Curing trait that just so happens to have a RDM button. I maybe entirely out of line with this thought process. If so, please inform me.

Onward to the next thought.
I have heard repeatedly Blue Mage having been grouped by the community with RDM as the omni Melee mages. Assuming that is true, then why is there such a vast difference in the overall performance of these two jobs? I understand that they should have different means of doing things, but parse data suggests that a melee rdm will only do about 80~% the damage that a blue will. That is overall, not per minute.
This extends to the gear comparison of RDM versus BLU. At 75 RDM could wear cloth like the Errant Houppelande set, which BLU can use, as well as light armor such as the Crimson(Blood) Scale Mail Set and leather in the Dusk Jerkin Set, which also has the BLU button. In Limbus gear, however RDM is limited to the mage set, Nashira Manteel Set, where BLU, our fellow melee mage, has access to both the Nashira Manteel Set and the Homam Corazza Set which as an RDM, i would have loved to use. The trend continues in Abyssea where BLU can use both the Teal Saio set, as well as the Aurore Doublet Set where RDM can only use the Teal. It makes me wonder, again, why this is so.

Another curiosity to me is while BLU must set spells for job traits, as well as stat bonuses, which is balanced by the limit of available at any given time, RDM has no melee traits of its own, but a massive list of mage traits. Personally, i would gladly give up the higher tiers of Magic attack bonus and Magic Defense bonus for melee attack and defense traits.

And to wrap up this list of questions, our best skill is in Enfeebling magic, but with new notorious monsters, both before and after the level cap increase, I have noticed a continuing drop in enfeebles that can actually affect my targets. For example, the other day, I found myself in a group killing Orthus, and with an enfeebling skill of 422, plus stat gear and magic accuracy gear, could not land any enfeebles I attempted. I cannot help but wonder if our enfeebling is slowly becoming obsolete and useless.

I would like to reiterate that while clear answers explaining everything I have asked about would be appreciated, my goal is for at least vague answers that will allow me to draw somewhat accurate conclusions about my future as a Melee RDM. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,
Tassidaru Morinestri
Tarutaru RDM 90 COR 83
Quetzalcoatl Server

[Carth]

Liked.

A question I would like to ask is what is the direction, or overall "vague" plan that they have for RDM.

[Duelle]

Good questions. Hopefully the answers are fulfilling and can put some (if not most) of the issues to rest.

[Seriha]

Pretty much been itching for some kind of direction, too. We obviously know RDM's martial side has been lacking for years, but the magical has definitely lost some oomph, or perhaps I should say has finally been truly "figured out" by others in that it wasn't as super to begin with. It's unfortunate it took pretty much every other mage job getting their own buffs to cement this fact, but our immediate future of Thunder IV and a couple Gain spells is pretty meh overall when you consider BLM and SCH get their T5s while WHM can AoE their version of Gain and are possibly getting Addle, too.

In general, we could probably expect a new WS from level progression, but this also runs the risk of going the way of Sanguine Blade and not being something we'd get natively. The dagger side also runs this risk, as with us not being on Dancing Edge and Shark Bite, a future dagger WS could follow this trend.

So really, I think a lot of us just want to feel like RDM will be worth taking to 99 and not just a generic parrot of the specialists that people will only take as a last resort.

[lllen]

I agree with all that is said here. My first job and lol, the first with all Af3 is Rdm, however, I can't get an invite to save my life. Even if I do get one with friends, enfeebles are useless on many mobs. Where is Rdm going?

I have lvl 90 Blu, can get a party in 10 secs, my blm also and my whm....Poor Rdm hasn't seen action in months unless I decided to do something in the "real world" of FFXI. Like today I decided to finished up my Bastok missions (after 4 years of being at 9.1) 9.1 easy as Blm and 9.2 piece of cake as Rdm.

Rdm is my main job, it has gone the way of dodo bird.

[Tamarsamar]

This thread. Is full. Of so much win.

I love the Shield Mastery question, but here's another question: if S-E really wanted to give an incentive for single-wielding Red Mages (you know, the kind who would use a Shield), why in Altana's name have they not given us Fencer instead?

[Kaych]

Just so you know Tassidaru, I have started similar threads like this, asking SE if they can answer some stuff. They rarely do... And its a shame because, its a simple thing really. "We are thinking of this and this. We need more testing tho..." And you have an answer. But they seem to choose what they want to answer.
Things I would like to know.

Is SE satisfied with the way RDMs mele atm?
I know I am not... I would like significantly increase in the En-spells when I have Magic Attack gear on. Maybe even crit trait or Double Attack trait.

Is SE ok with all the things a RDM have to do in a party?
I know they want each job to be "busy", but with all the enfeebles, Enhanching spells, Curings, there is not much room for Meleing. This could be helped by giving use Hastega and Refreshga. When people hear: RDM-mele, they think... "LOL! Lets get a SAM instead" There is nothing wrong with meleing at the same time as you are Enfeebeling, Curing and buffing, but then the problem comes again that you dont get get TP and dont do any dammage cos your sword never hits due to all the other stuff ur suppose to do.

Another thing that could help this is a combination of Enfeebles. Since RDMs is a master of Enfeebeling, maybe its time that they got fused Enfeebels. Like, a spell that gives both Paralyze and Slow, lets call it Paralow (just for fun). This could also help our meleing process^_-

There is so much I want answerd, but I dont wanna make a "Wall-of-text" and scare people away from thread:P

[Eeek]

I've been a RDM for all of a month, but I think I'm the only one who has no interest in DDing. :(

If my Abyssea groups have all the key jobs covered, the first thing that usually happens is that I'm asked to gear RDM.

And I love it.

Even when I can't land all our enfeebles due to mob immunities, the enfeebles that do land still make fights go so much smoother. Also, I like that my friends give me the freedom to evaluate situations mid-battle and react accordingly. It's so easy to seamlessly change focus from curing/status curing to nuking to enfeebling and back again, and I have the gear to do all the above decently well.

I should have leveled this job a long time ago.

I know most of you are into the melee thing, and that's fine, but I really hope SE does not ignore the mage side of Red Mage. I leveled RDM solely because of its abilities and versatility as a mage, and I don't want to see that aspect of RDM take too much of a back seat. I enjoy it thoroughly. xD

[Glamdring]

The problem with the "jack of all trades" term is that people forget the rest of it, "master of none". Now, that's not entirely true of red; you are the kings of enfeebling and although your enhancing is all single target your skill is the highest in it. Now, that single target should really see a visit from the devs, although it might be intentional to keep whm viable; if you had group buffs and all raise tiers about the only utility whm would have is light based single target sleeps and the highest Curaga, i.e, not much.

Granted, that was the rdm complaint before is you didn't want to just be healers, but you had already taken the job of healer from whm in end-game at 75 on merits and most everything else. Perhaps if all the rdm out there refused invites when expected to be the healer, but that didn't happen. Seems to me the devs have simply been following the direction that play-style had taken rdm in.

Now as to tanking, the other "jack" job is dancer. Even though both rdm and dnc are jack jobs, dnc is clearly designed to be more combat oriented; their "MP" is TP and short of a regain ability you only get that by whacking/getting whacked. They have developed into a good eva tank in Abyssea, although I can tell you from personal experience that eva tanking is not particularily viable outside Aby at 90, i.e. we can be the 2nd tank to allow the prime to get shadows up or a cure off, whichever, but full-time tanking we'll be needing a curebomb if we fight VT/IT stuff at XP party speeds. Rdm is less suited to the role of tank than dancer-you can fill in for short durations but don't expect to live long as primary tank. You do have hate tools, Addle|Fire 4 is going to piss something off, and if you spam it you should get hate in a hurry. I think you need rdm/nin to really manage it well, and I've seen it used effectively by several good rdm of my acquaintance.

The big problem is Atma. People keep saying "this job is broken" as if it were. It's not. Abyssea is one segment of the game, roughly 1/32 of the content. Your job still works just the same as it ever did in the other 31/32 of the game. The problem is getting players to leave Abyssea (easy mode) to do anything else (insert brain here). That's not to say that your job was always useful elsewhere; most players read working strats and follow the cookie-cutter approach, so any job not in that build is "useless". The real answer is that they simply haven't figured out (or posted) the working strat for X job on whatever.

Regardless, just wait for the new content to be released, your concerns may already be addressed, not by giving you new balance-destroying abilities but by content that utilizes your abilities to be beaten.

[Carth]

As long as my party are a bunch of nice guys and talkative, I enjoy the backline aspects as well, mainly because I still have a lot to do. (Curebotting during the ToAU-era was just boring though). Like Seriha said some time ago, I'd be fine with how RDM is if they took that A+ Enfeebling and ran with it, but as it stands we're stuck in limbo, and it seems this'll continue due to the Voidwalker update.

Truthfully I just want an update that's worthwhile.

[Duelle]

Granted, that was the rdm complaint before is you didn't want to just be healers, but you had already taken the job of healer from whm in end-game at 75 on merits and most everything else. Perhaps if all the rdm out there refused invites when expected to be the healer, but that didn't happen. Seems to me the devs have simply been following the direction that play-style had taken rdm in.The answer there has always been "buff WHM and make it the better healer, as it is supposed to be", not "leave things as they are". In our case, we want to see content as much as the next guy. We get dragged along as healers because no one will accept us as anything else. Simply saying no won't change anything because for every one of us that want to do something other than heal you have 10 bandwagon jumpers who love the fast invites.

[Supersun]

Granted, that was the rdm complaint before is you didn't want to just be healers, but you had already taken the job of healer from whm in end-game at 75 on merits and most everything else. Perhaps if all the rdm out there refused invites when expected to be the healer, but that didn't happen. Seems to me the devs have simply been following the direction that play-style had taken rdm in.

Be careful with this statement because there was some serious Bandwagoning on Rdm during the TouA era. Just as there was a gross exaggeration of Samurais in the TouA era there was also a gross exaggeration of Red Mages. It wasn't that Red Mages didn't refrain themselves from stealing Whms lime light, in fact it was the opposite, most career Red Mages agreed that White Mage should of been buffed. The issue was that there were a lot of people that leveled the job SOLELY to be their merit *****. Simply put Red Mage WAS the best at merit healing at the time and no amount of boycotting would have stopped the bandwagon because the bandwagon always flocks to whatever is the easiest and Red Mage healing was definitely that.


I know most of you are into the melee thing, and that's fine, but I really hope SE does not ignore the mage side of Red Mage. I leveled RDM solely because of its abilities and versatility as a mage, and I don't want to see that aspect of RDM take too much of a back seat. I enjoy it thoroughly. xD

I wouldn't be too worried. SE so far has shown that they are looking to buff melee/mage at the same time such as the gain spells, armor that increases buff durations, ect... And while I am skeptical that they can find an effective way to add to the mage side to keep it new and exciting AND "fix" the melee side they certainly haven't forgotten about the mage side and knows a lot of people play like that.

[Tassidaru]

I feel i should clarify something. My post and, by extension, this thread, is not about asking SE to 'fix' this or 'buff' that. While there are some things I would love to see changed, I do not have a right to demand those changes, nor do I know what SE plans, and cannot say with 100% certainty that any changes i want will keep the current balance, assuming this is the balance SE wants. My post is only some things ive wondered that i cant come up with a good explanation about short of RDM becoming the new black sheep of the XI family, something like how Dragoon was when call wyvern was it's 2 hour. I mean i can make conjecture that SE plans to raise our shield skill back to a C (like it used to be, pre refresh) and maybe give us flash back, but thats just conjecture, on the other hand i could theorize that se simply troll faced us with the same overall accuracy. what i do know is that generally when a job gets nerfed se OPd the job, or made a trait or ability op, resulting in nerf hammer being swung at their head. RDM has either been caught in the nerf hammer or been caught in the backswing repeatedly, but i dont remember a recent time of OPness.

[Glamdring]

I know the boycott wouldn't have worked, that's why it wasn't a serious complaint. To honestly expect every rdm on an entire server to refuse every end-game invite that involved main healing would be ludicrous, especially considerring how hard it can be to find a party invite. Lucicrous or not however, the consequence is that if SE follows the use path in development that is the direction the rdm job will go. However, some of the changes (enmity for cures, etc.) was not intended as a rdm nerf but a boost to other jobs. Unfortunately, with you using the same ability-Cure-as whm, sch and the like you get hit with their benefit, which is unfortunately not a benefit to the style you would like to play. Think of the poor paladins, Curing was one of their best hate control methods, and hate control is the heart of tanking; now they are relegated to Flash, shield bash, cover and whatever they can manage from their subjob.

No tweak is ever perfect. Your Enspells need a big boost in effectiveness if they decide you need to be able to melee to take hate. Otherwise, make it more realistic for you to be able to self-SC>MB. Not likely IMO that it will happen, SE doesn't want that many jobs able to self SC.

[Supersun]

Not likely IMO that it will happen, SE doesn't want that many jobs able to self SC.

>.> almost every job can self SC now days.

[Seriha]

In MMO speak, "Jack of All Trades" means "Suck at them All" depending on who you ask, which is basically every balancemonger that's argued against RDM buffs from the beginning. We're pretty much at the point in relative comparison. WHMs are the superior healers, duh. BLMs are the superior nukers, as they should. BRDs, CORs, and to some degree SMNs are better buffers, as I say Haste and Refresh do not a buff job make. We all know pretty much the majority of other jobs are better at physically DDing. I still call the enfeebler role a farce given merit restrictions and the sheer number of debuffs BLU gets, often AoE and damaging, over RDM's single-targets. We all know the MMO mentality is not to settle for second or third best if you can help it, either, which automatically puts RDM in a bit of a bind since making them top-tier in all aspects would definitely be bad.

So all you can really do is hope to make RDM unique, which is why I've been trying to pioneer ideas where integrating melee helps our other aspects to be better than just purely backlining. That style has its own perks in higher safety and needing fewer pieces of equipment. Those who risk themselves in the front deserve a more beneficial experience on the job, and even if we never individually match a heavy DD, what we should offer should at least multiply the performances of others, be it offensively or defensively.

[Tassidaru]

Think of the poor paladins, Curing was one of their best hate control methods, and hate control is the heart of tanking; now they are relegated to Flash, shield bash, cover and whatever they can manage from their subjob.

Actually Paladins are unaffected by the cure hate change this next update, The job trait is WHM/SCH/RDM only

[Glamdring]

Actually Paladins are unaffected by the cure hate change this next update, The job trait is WHM/SCH/RDM only

missed that, sweet! They noticed pld didn't need another back-handed nerfing...

[Devrom]

lets be honest with ourselves. most of us didnt even care that much about our DD potential pre-abyssea and recent major updates. now with all those broken atmas and cruor buffs coupled with evisceration and cdc, we are like "weeee~ lets kick some ass!". now with the upcoming voidwatch stuff and such, rdm will regain its prosperity and we will go back to "meh, who cares about DDing" because simply it would make things worse. who in the right mind would let a rdm tp on the upcoming end game stuff? no one. would you even seriously ask to do so? no.

for all these years, SE has been modifying the jobs according to the intentions of the player base, like how they thought of war as a main tank, pld and nin as support jobs etc at first. just look at those jobs now (inb4 lolpld). outside abyssea, rdm is simply far more useful than any other caster in most situations no matter how you look at it and you can't say it didn't make you happy that everyone used to look for a rdm before anything else. if they make rdm a better DD, they would nerf the mage aspects and then people would bitch about that. you can never make everyone happy with the changes. would you prefer being a really good mage and a weak DD or a week mage and a mediocre at best DD? like seriha had said, being "jack of all trades", while being fun and all in theory, is not nearly a good thing in an mmo. i would choose being the most useful mage than being a mediocre DD any day. abyssea shouldnt be the norm to decide if rdm needs to be a better DD since that thing is simply broken.

@ OP, i can't agree more. especially, no fencer while even brd has it + shield mastery with F skill = /facepalm

[Seriha]

Someone's stuck in 2005, it'd seem.

Basically, the RDM of then is the RDM of now, and we've gained no real "prosperity" of the past 15 levels while other mage jobs can sub us and basically get the same effect of curing through brute force with Convert and Refresh with yet more Refresh gear to wear (Hairpin, Owleyes, Subligar, some bodies with +2, Serpentine Set). I hope we needn't explain how BLM and WHM are superior at their respective roles again, and our primary basically boils down to a few more % from a Slow. If you think SE won't get around this with immunities or lots of DA/TA/AoE Spam, I dunno what to say.

Nonetheless, I agree with the TP feed argument if you're looking at us from a pure damage perspective and the definite "meh" of now. If you give that more utility, people might be able to tolerate it, but without that, MOAR DAMAGE is the default option to curb that opinion.

[Devrom]

Someone's stuck in 2005, it'd seem.

eh? so you want to melee voidwatch, new bcnms and possibly ks99s (unless you do it with so many people that it wouldnt matter) on rdm and expect that your group will be ok with it? it doesn't have anything to do with being stuck in 2005 or whatever. also, playing the way i mentioned is more like 2003-2010 lol. even thieves were told not to melee at all since the damage wasnt making up for the TP feed unless the pt had more than enough healing etc. to begin with, i didn't even say you shouldnt melee pre cap increase stuff at all so please no "stuck in XXXX" comments... now that you can melee fafnir or whatever in low men fights doesn't mean you should be DDing whenever you feel like in new end game outside abyssea.

[Carth]

lets be honest with ourselves. most of us didnt even care that much about our DD potential pre-abyssea and recent major updates.
You couldn't be even farther from the truth.

[Devrom]

You couldn't be even farther from the truth.

well, maybe i should have written "that" in bold or capitals to emphasize :p now please ask yourself, would it be reasonable for rdm to be a match to real DDs? Red "Mage", remember? if you are gonna argue about the hybrid aspects of rdm, compare its melee potential to blu's overpowered spike damage spells, not main DDs. it is a matter of being too weak compared to the other hybrid job, not DDs being a lot more stronger compared to rdm.

[Carth]

The ironic part is no one is asking for that.

As for the mage line:


Oh snap, the "mage" line. Someone tell BLUs to go home.

[Seriha]

eh? so you want to melee voidwatch, new bcnms and possibly ks99s (unless you do it with so many people that it wouldnt matter) on rdm and expect that your group will be ok with it? it doesn't have anything to do with being stuck in 2005 or whatever. also, playing the way i mentioned is more like 2003-2010 lol. even thieves were told not to melee at all since the damage wasnt making up for the TP feed unless the pt had more than enough healing etc. to begin with, i didn't even say you shouldnt melee pre cap increase stuff at all so please no "stuck in XXXX" comments... now that you can melee fafnir or whatever in low men fights doesn't mean you should be DDing whenever you feel like in new end game outside abyssea.

We'd like the option to if prepared, not the door automatically slammed in our face due to game mechanics and sustained ignorance of RDM's martial aspects over the years by the devs. The whole "Shut up and stay in the back!" spiel is exactly the mentality I attacked as it's an arrogant pigeon-holing of the job showing no respect toward its theme and concept. You even went so far as to throwing in the "peace offering" of meleeing old stuff a lot of people probably don't care about anymore like we'd be fighting Fafnirs or doing KS99s every day for hours on end. No, we'd actually like the option to be more than blue moon situational and NOT just a solo toy.

As of now, there's little reason to be a RDM. Stepping out of Abyssea isn't going to change that. Melee is only one aspect of RDM's woes, but simply, it is currently its most inadequate and has been for quite some time.

[Eeek]

You couldn't be even farther from the truth.

It's all anecdotal, but I, and most the people I know, don't care about their RDM's melee capabilities. If we want to DD, we instead play our real DD jobs. When I play RDM, I'm either the main healer or playing as a supplemental mage to flesh out the backline. And my BLM's enfeebles, despite all the gear I carry for it, don't even approach the potency of my RDM's enfeebles (or curing and buffing capacity, for that matter).

I don't have the time or inclination to swap out half my active inventory (75/80 on RDM) in order to melee. When free time presents itself, I'd much rather nuke. The mage responsibilities I look to fill in party play would never allow me the time to melee to 100%TP, much less weaponskill. Besides, a not-insignificant amount of my BLM's nuking gear is equippable by RDM. I don't need a sword or dagger to pump out a decent amount of damage when the opportunities present themselves.

Of course, this is just my outlook on RDM. I aim to play it like a mage.

[Carth]

Of course, this is just my outlook on RDM. I aim to play it like a mage.
More power to you, and I personally don't really care, but it's a very large fact that RDM Melee has been an argument ever since 2004 and continues to be like that today. Only difference between then and now is that the general community is a lot smarter than before and Refresh/Convert is no longer unique to RDM.

[Devrom]

The ironic part is no one is asking for that.

in fact, they are. go read a few pages of that topic about rdm meleeing. you can see many examples of stronger enspells, stronger DD gears, stronger WSs, insta-cast nukes while using enspells under some made up condition and more or even things like "give us this and that but make them spend TP". they ask to be a good DD while sucking as a mage. you know, the melee stance thing. someone suggested that magic attack should have an impact on enspell damage so we can stack up on matt gear and go pew pew? then where did your haste, acc and att go? there are many contradicting ideas. rdm is not even that bad of a DD in itself solo. also, gear options for rdm is not that bad either. walahra turban, nq dusks, goading belt, goliard body, asa pants for 3% haste = 22% if you get a chance of getting zelus and buying hq dusk feet, your haste caps. other than that, you can use the best TP back out there and it is a 100% drop from an easy NM then rajas, brutal, suppa.... your gear options are fine although i accept the fact it can be hard to get goliard body and nashira legs if you cant use asa legs for rdm. but know what?

there is also this big limiting factor we call... inventory space! personally i am carrying gear for enfeebles, nukes, TP, WS and idle sets and with all this stuff filling up my inventory, i dont have any space to carry staves, healing, conserve mp and spell interruption pieces. is this a sacrifice i am actually willing to make to DD more? no but i have to. by making these sacrifices, i am becoming less and less effective of a mage and that will hurt outside abyssea unless i am solo poking some random mob or xxx nm. for this reason, people are asking for stuff like "magic attack should effect attack rating, enspell damage" etc. so they can just melee with their nuke set or whatever but then you would just be a mage nuking in front lines. difference? you take bunch of damage and feed TP, debuffed and thus cost more and more mp and time for your group.

[Duelle]

lets be honest with ourselves. most of us didnt even care that much about our DD potential pre-abyssea and recent major updates.Wrong. Discussion on melee has gone on for years. Yes, you had the bandwagon jumpers who were happy for the fast invites, but the melee camp has always existed and trying to push for melee adjustments. The benefit of having these forums is that at least our complains and discussions are taking place right at their doorstep, whereas before it was just the fansites where the community reps could conveniently ignore our discussion threads.

for all these years, SE has been modifying the jobs according to the intentions of the player base, like how they thought of war as a main tank, pld and nin as support jobs etc at first. just look at those jobs now (inb4 lolpld).Admitedly, it would have taken more work to redesign WAR or nerf all the things players were abusing at the time (Utsusemi amongst them) that screwed with party dynamics. Not much of an excuse, though.

outside abyssea, rdm is simply far more useful than any other caster in most situations no matter how you look at it and you can't say it didn't make you happy that everyone used to look for a rdm before anything else.It never made me happy because it was not the magic swordsman I had signed up to play more than 7 years ago. Also, everyone needed RDM because you only have two (three witrh COR) ways to regenerate MP before all that +refresh gear comes into play. BRD happened to be stupidly rare, so people always went for the next best thing.

if they make rdm a better DD, they would nerf the mage aspects and then people would bitch about that. you can never make everyone happy with the changes.Stances could very easily fix this and make both camps happy.

abyssea shouldnt be the norm to decide if rdm needs to be a better DD since that thing is simply broken.What abyssea did is bring to light all the shortcomings of RDM as a class. Yes, it was meant to be FFXI's last hurrah, but it did that as well. And instead of fixing things so that RDM can finally be a true working class (not a replacement for a WHM or a BRD), we seem to be going back to more of the same.

rdm is not even that bad of a DD in itself solo. Repeat after me: Solo is irrelevant in a game built from the ground up on partying.

[Swords]

I think its just we've all heard the feed TP arguement every time the word melee and RDM are used in the same sentence. I know there are situations you just outright shouldn't, and those are the ones no one will be meleeing on anyways. But in this day and age with X-hit weapons and DA/TA traits/atmas/gear, having just 2-3 melee on a mob makes the TP arguement almost entirely moot.

[Devrom]

Wrong. Discussion on melee has gone on for years. Yes, you had the bandwagon jumpers who were happy for the fast invites, but the melee camp has always existed and trying to push for melee adjustments. The benefit of having these forums is that at least our complains and discussions are taking place right at their doorstep, whereas before it was just the fansites where the community reps could conveniently ignore our discussion threads.

people from all kind of jobs ask for something now and then, it doesnt mean they are seriously expecting a big overhaul unless the extreme conditions like the uber rng nerf.


It never made me happy because it was not the magic swordsman I had signed up to play more than 7 years ago. Also, everyone needed RDM because you only have two (three witrh COR) ways to regenerate MP before all that +refresh gear comes into play. BRD happened to be stupidly rare, so people always went for the next best thing.

refresh isn't the only useful buff the rdm can offer <.<


Stances could very easily fix this and make both camps happy.

i agree that stances can make most rdms happy just for the change alone.


What abyssea did is bring to light all the shortcomings of RDM as a class. Yes, it was meant to be FFXI's last hurrah, but it did that as well. And instead of fixing things so that RDM can finally be a true working class (not a replacement for a WHM or a BRD), we seem to be going back to more of the same.

actually, it is even worse inside unless you get the chance to play the DD as long as the situation of the group allows. as we all know, most NMs are immune to slow or para or both and cure 4 is not cutting it


Repeat after me: Solo is irrelevant in a game built from the ground up on partying.

repeat after me: if you really wanna be that good of a DD, just level a real DD. i couldn't hold myself not to say this but after all the similar comments, there is not really much choice... yes, i am showing my true face ; ;

and btw, SE have never given you the guarantee that rdm will be an effective DD in group play. fencers are not warriors. it is simple as that. when you first start playing rdm, you should have taken a closer look at the "mage" part of the name and then decide if you really want to play as one. if war was obviously weaker than the other DDs, then i would agree that it doesn't make any sense.

if there was a war with a hundreds of fencers fighting on the field instead of real soldiers in real life, it would have been really fun to watch... (actually that would be fun in ffxi as well) but again, i am not saying that SE hasn't underlooked rdm as a fencer. E skill in parrying, fencer trait being given to war, bst and brd etc. what i am saying is people shouldn't expect that much in DD aspect.

sorry for the wall of text <.<

[Carth]

insta-cast nukes while using enspells
I got a kick outta that one.

When I see the melee threads I just see that people are voicing their concerns over the job. As it stands now there's nothing unique to it outside of Addle. It's obvious SE wants to keep a tight lid on Enfeebling Magic, so our mastery is "meh" most the time, and Paralyze/Slow/Blind are really the only enfeebles that matter, Paralyze/Slow more than Blind. As it stands people just doesn't know what SE is going to do with the job.

The melee threads are mostly harmless, but of course I don't believe anything will come outta them (and the only reason why I post on them is to give one honest post then troll for the rest of them). However I'm sure anyone with a good sense of reason will say they don't want RDM to be as strong as specialized DDs. As I said before, I don't care how people want to play RDM, not from the melee enthusiasts, not from the mage enthusiasts or anyone else. I just want RDM to have a good update. Fact is, I'll probably still play it like I am now.

I will say one thing though. Right now the usual remark to RDM melee is "Go play a real DD job." Well, I can say:

"You wanna nuke? Go play a real nuke job(BLM, SCH)."
"You wanna heal? Go play a real healing job (WHM)."
"You wanna do both? Go play a real hybrid job (DNC, BLU, SCH)."

And as it stands now those remarks are completely warranted because RDM has nothing worthwhile.

[Seriha]

So, if we wanna DD, level a "real DD". If we wanna cure under that mentality, we really should level WHM. If we wanna nuke, BLM's the go to. Buffing would obviously go to BRD, COR, or SMN. So again, can you answer what point there is to RDM, or are we gonna cling to the "Jack of All Trades, Suck at them All!" line of balance-mongering? If you wanna backpedal and be like, "Well, uh... I'm not sure how you could make it work, then..." then don't even enter the conversation.

Edit: Ninja'd! D:

[Devrom]

So, if we wanna DD, level a "real DD". If we wanna cure under that mentality, we really should level WHM.

yes, i did. you should too for pure healing and no, rdm is still a great healer outside abyssea.


If we wanna nuke, BLM's the go to.

depends but unless i really need to kite/nuke something in a safer and steadier way as rdm, yes


Buffing would obviously go to BRD, COR, or SMN.

i would pick rdm before any of those for support outside. brd was only essential in merit parties and people looked for brd first because they were forced to do so due to the rarity not because their contribution was any greater than rdm who had to spam cures, haste, refresh non stop, it wasn't, at least for your average merit party which was the majority. can call it 50-50 (not going into number crunching) distribution for duty if you will.


So again, can you answer what point there is to RDM, or are we gonna cling to the "Jack of All Trades, Suck at them All!" line of balance-mongering? If you wanna backpedal and be like, "Well, uh... I'm not sure how you could make it work, then..." then don't even enter the conversation.

i am not saying they should make it work to begin with. imo, it is pretty good in theory but not really so in practice. i am saying that being a "true" jack of all trades is not a good thing in an mmo in the end, while being fun and all to some extent and i would prefer to be a very useful mage while being a week DD to being a mediocre mage and a mediocre DD. some unreasonable stuff the OP had mentioned should definitely see an update but say, turning enspells into enspells of doom? no, just no.

edit: tbh, if you are advocating the rdm being jack of all trade, you should be complaining about the enmity nerf before the DD aspect being week. before the nerf, rdm was the best tank out there in the right hands and now, you can not seriously (couldnt find a better word) tank at all.

[Supersun]

And my BLM's enfeebles, despite all the gear I carry for it, don't even approach the potency of my RDM's enfeebles.

Why are you casting Slow and Paralyze as Blm?

[Duelle]

repeat after me: if you really wanna be that good of a DD, just level a real DD.This is a stock response. I've heard it enough to know you have nothing better to actually say. Hybrids have multiple roles, and they should be viable if you really want to use them to their fullest. RDM is far from this because the only real benefit a RDM brings is extra cures and refresh. Enfeebles have not made or broken a group's ability to clear a boss fight. Our nukes are second-rate. Our melee is a joke. I don't know about you, but we're way past the point where we should shut up and heal. Melee should be more than just a solo toy.

and btw, SE have never given you the guarantee that rdm will be an effective DD in group play. fencers are not warriors. it is simple as that. when you first start playing rdm, you should have taken a closer look at the "mage" part of the name and then decide if you really want to play as one. if war was obviously weaker than the other DDs, then i would agree that it doesn't make any sense.The old and repeated "mage" argument. Nice try there, though as Seriha put so well, "better tell them BLUs to go home, too".

Yes, the ideology behind the suggestions and ideas in the melee thread come from various directions, and some do indeed stand on their own and are unable to mesh with other ideas. This is fine because we're basically kicking ideas around on how to either improve melee overall or integrate it into what is currently expected of us. The goal is the make our swords worth a damn. Doesn't matter if they go with Swords' suggestions, or my own, or Seriha's, or Carth's, or Supersun's, or anyone else who contributed to that thread, so long as we reach the actual goal.

[Supersun]

if war was obviously weaker than the other DDs, then i would agree that it doesn't make any sense.

Because Red Mage being weaker at melee then White Mage and soon to be Bard makes a lot of sense as well.

[Tamarsamar]

on the other hand i could theorize that se simply troll faced us with the same overall accuracy.

Making a Job Trait called "Fencer" and then giving it to Bards instead of Red Mages was troll-facing us.

The Black Magic Enfeeble nerf (and soon-to-be-implemented Curing nerf), utterly decimating our ability to generate hate even if our lives depended on it, was troll-facing us (or for that matter, anybody who wasn't a Paladin).

S-E, Y U NO STOP TROLLING RDMS?

[Seriha]

I'd hold on the whole "END OF DAYS!" aspect of Tranquil Heart until we see what it does. For all we know, we'll only get level 1. That might be -5 Enmity for cures. Okay, so you change your gear some so you'll have more +Enmity on. Done. Now, the Black Magic aspect was pretty stupid, especially if you consider people /RDM or /DRK getting full enmity for debuffs they very rarely landed, if ever. Ideally they could've made it so you only got full enmity if it landed, but then that's also a bit of a tank nerf since you'd have to wait until stuff wore off to try again.

[Duelle]

I'd hold on the whole "END OF DAYS!" aspect of Tranquil Heart until we see what it does. For all we know, we'll only get level 1. That might be -5 Enmity for cures. Okay, so you change your gear some so you'll have more +Enmity on. Done. Now, the Black Magic aspect was pretty stupid, especially if you consider people /RDM or /DRK getting full enmity for debuffs they very rarely landed, if ever. Ideally they could've made it so you only got full enmity if it landed, but then that's also a bit of a tank nerf since you'd have to wait until stuff wore off to try again.This is why I feel RDM should get Flash back. Still, the healer trait should not be something that's on all the time, which is where most of the ire is coming from, IMO. Sadly, there's not many ways to generate emnity as is unless they start tossing in spells designed only to generate emnity to cover the gap created by cures. Seeing that PLD is unnaffected by this, I have a feeling that is not on their priority list.

[Tamarsamar]

I'd hold on the whole "END OF DAYS!" aspect of Tranquil Heart until we see what it does. For all we know, we'll only get level 1. That might be -5 Enmity for cures. Okay, so you change your gear some so you'll have more +Enmity on. Done. Now, the Black Magic aspect was pretty stupid, especially if you consider people /RDM or /DRK getting full enmity for debuffs they very rarely landed, if ever. Ideally they could've made it so you only got full enmity if it landed, but then that's also a bit of a tank nerf since you'd have to wait until stuff wore off to try again.

You're joking, right?

Even with Cures, we couldn't keep hate if our lives depended on it, anyway. Tranquil Heart is much less the "END OF DAYS" as it is the cockroach that spits on the former location of a civilization that has already been leveled with an atomic bomb. Since it literally serves no purpose but spite, we're naturally going to get as many levels of it as they can fit.

Not to mention, have you *tried* gearing for Enmity+ on Red Mage? Are you aware of how absurdly little gear we have for it? I mean, you would've thought that S-E would've added more gear with Magical bonuses on it that came with Enmity+ as a "downside" . . . but the only place that really happens is in mediocre Einherjar equipment with PDT+% on it as well.

[Seriha]

With a lot of tanking being damage-based these days, we're screwed without CDC even if cures are are normal or debuffs were as they used to be. Good luck convincing DDs to /THF to TA on you, too.

Personally, tanking for an alliance was never a role I was particularly interested in as it meant yet another gear set and of course fighting with PLDs and NINs for the spot back in the day. I don't really miss the days of "Gimme a little bit of time to build hate" either, and have plenty of horror stories seeing rival shells take forever and a day to kill crap with RDM tanks. To me, not being able to tank HNMs is like not having Cure V, you might be able to manage under the proper conditions, but it shouldn't be expected. Still wanna tank EXP or the odd quest/mission fight? Go for it. Like it or not, the whole "No Effect" side of enmity gain was pretty much an exploit, though.

[Carth]

Personally, tanking for an alliance was never a role I was particularly interested in as it meant yet another gear set and of course fighting with PLDs and NINs for the spot back in the day.
No different than fighting with the WHMs and SCHs today.


Like it or not, the whole "No Effect" side of enmity gain was pretty much an exploit, though.
"Exploit" is often an overused term that tell others that it's a bad thing. Everyone using Utsusemi as /nin is an exploit, as well as using capped evasion and +evasion gear to solo NMs is also an exploit. As far as I know, RDMs who wanted to tank HNMs needed awesome gear, shell out large amounts of money, and needed to prove themselves worthy of the task. If anything, abusing CE gains through enfeebling spells was the least exploitable out of anything, and even so, that doesn't mean it was bad.

[Devrom]

Because Red Mage being weaker at melee then White Mage and soon to be Bard makes a lot of sense as well.

hexa strike outside abyssea is nothing special, you know that, right?

[Supersun]

It's still a stronger WS then most. It's certainly better then Evisceration. The only reason Whm wasn't exactly a large DD threat before abyssea was simply because they had accuracy issues and that virtually NONE of their gear had accuracy. Certainly outside of abyssea they won't have RR I doubt that they will still have the same accuracy issues they had at 75 just from the fact that they have a crap ton more club skill now due to the increased level cap.

[Devrom]

This is a stock response. I've heard it enough to know you have nothing better to actually say. Hybrids have multiple roles, and they should be viable if you really want to use them to their fullest. RDM is far from this because the only real benefit a RDM brings is extra cures and refresh. Enfeebles have not made or broken a group's ability to clear a boss fight. Our nukes are second-rate. Our melee is a joke. I don't know about you, but we're way past the point where we should shut up and heal. Melee should be more than just a solo toy.

i have given you all kinds of responses. read a bit more instead of nitpicking. the only real benefit a RDM brings is extra cures and refresh? please... enfeebles do make fights a lot more easier overall; safer, faster, call it whatever you like depending on the fight but not useless or i would say you are just clueless. Our nukes are second-grade because the "jack of all trades" thing you and others have been advocating dictates that rdm wouldn't be first-grade in anything. our melee is weak but not a joke unless you dont give a shit to try and get better. about shuting up and healing, i have never said that. i am not even carrying my staves anymore except a few things lol though that is about to change with the next update. TP and WS sets take more than enough space.


The old and repeated "mage" argument. Nice try there, though as Seriha put so well, "better tell them BLUs to go home, too".

actually that wasn't uncommon not to bring BLUs to endgame stuff lol. lets see...tiamat, khimaira, ixion and yilbegan? and you happen to know that BLUs used to be Cannonball bots in those fights, right? khimaira stuff are almost only trophies even when it was first released, tiamat is for people who didnt have blm or smn but blu, fought for gil with a shitty drop rate, ixion is a bit guaranteed gil and that is it and yilbegan is not even worth the effort with shit drop rates and not even appealing drops considering the effort. not even considering the fact that your group have to claim all these for you to spam cannonball and afk inbetween. who cares if they can spam some spells to kill an xp mob faster than an actual DD? even the vast majority of BG (as most people here calls "the home of elitist pricks") agrees that BLU can't be considered as a real DD, especially the people who are into all kinds of number crunching and parse digging, not useless discussions.

i look at this way; rdm: more mage less DD, blu: less mage more DD and you know what? it makes sense. yes, it has "mage" in its name but it had to be the opposite of the first hybrid job not to be a copy of it. would you be happy to see a new job after 3 years only to see that it was just a copy?

there is no difference between saying that cor should be competing with rng in DD and rdm should be kicking ass with their swords. "hey! pirates use guns so why the low skill?!1!?1". it is all about specialty. pirates are not supposed to be that accurate with guns in the first place just like how fencers are not supposed be kicking ass up and down with their pointy sticks.

the point is rdm was created as a fencer playing with magic in mind and so it needs some touch to make it so. the actual point of the thread isn't "rdm sucks on melee, give us this, give us that so we can go pew pew" but it is getting derailed to exactly that. being a part of this, although apparently i am the person here who looks at the matter in a different way, i am sorry OP. i am out.

-end of transmission-

[Duelle]

i have given you all kinds of responses. read a bit more instead of nitpicking. the only real benefit a RDM brings is extra cures and refresh? please... enfeebles do make fights a lot more easier overall; safer, faster, call it whatever you like depending on the fight but not useless or i would say you are just clueless. Our nukes are second-grade because the "jack of all trades" thing you and others have been advocating dictates that rdm wouldn't be first-grade in anything. our melee is weak but not a joke unless you dont give a shit to try and get better. about shuting up and healing, i have never said that. i am not even carrying my staves anymore except a few things lol though that is about to change with the next update. TP and WS sets take more than enough space.Looks like my words stung. Either way, enfeebling has always been a crutch of sorts in terms of role. The primary benefit of our class sadly IS heals and refresh because:

a) the developers were short-sighted enough to create one real healing archetype, causing the populace to be desperate enough to use anyone with an MP bar and heals to cover the healing role (again, this is the game that created SMN/WHM) and

b) MP regeneration mid-combat being a rarity in the span from 41-75 combined with people's desire to squeeze the highest exp/hour, which in effect means never resting or resting as little as possible, combined with the fact that the premium class for this (Bard) was stupidly rare because people who genuinely like support for the sake of supporting itself are far outnumbered by people who like to tank and deal damage, leading everyone to go to the next best thing (AKA the poor sods who rolled RDM not knowing what was coming to them).

That's the beginning and the end of it. What you're doing is trying to sadly justify something that from a class design perspective should simply be a minor facet of the class instead of how we're perceived as a whole, or not exist at all. It's no different than the guys that tried to justify Summoner turning into /WHM because "well, at least I'm powerful when I use astral flow", whereas anyone who actually looked at that damn class and its relation to other elements in the game (including the partying that FFXI was built upon) quickly realized it was a broken job with a ton of incomplete ideas.

The fact that no one outside of PLD and SMN has passive MP regeneration created the demand for refresh, which by extension increased the demand for RDM. Desperation for healers also greatly played a part in this.

actually that wasn't uncommon not to bring BLUs to endgame stuff lol. lets see...tiamat, khimaira, ixion and yilbegan? and you happen to know that BLUs used to be Cannonball bots in those fights, right?Indeed. They inherited the spots MNKs used to get to spam Chi Blast. Don't know what that has to do with anything, as you went for the overused "mage" argument.

i look at this way; rdm: more mage less DD, blu: less mage more DD and you know what? it makes sense. yes, it has "mage" in its name but it had to be the opposite of the first hybrid job not to be a copy of it. would you be happy to see a new job after 3 years only to see that it was just a copy?It's obviously been an attempt to placate the melee enthusiasts. There's a reason some of us speculate that SE tried to use BLU as their excuse to not fix RDM. Problem is, people get tired of imitations and by this point can openly state they want the genuine article. Hence the point behind the RDM melee discussions.

there is no difference between saying that cor should be competing with rng in DD and rdm should be kicking ass with their swords. "hey! pirates use guns so why the low skill?!1!?1". it is all about specialty. pirates are not supposed to be that accurate with guns in the first place just like how fencers are not supposed be kicking ass up and down with their pointy sticks.Believe it or not, COR has a huge amount of leeway given how it was designed. Not to mention the fact that it is a ranged class changes things considerably, as the checks and balances on a ranged class are different from how you balance a melee class. There's also the fact that the sweet spot of hexaguns is different from what the other guns have. COR is pretty good from that stanpoint, and chances are we'd see more of them were it not for the fact that SE still has it in their heads to make the good bullets stupidly expensive/rare or not worth the trouble getting. It's part of why some people play COR with /WHM and using only Quickshot.

the point is rdm was created as a fencer playing with magic in mind and so it needs some touch to make it so. the actual point of the thread isn't "rdm sucks on melee, give us this, give us that so we can go pew pew" but it is getting derailed to exactly that. being a part of this, although apparently i am the person here who looks at the matter in a different way, i am sorry OP. i am out.It's a lingering issue that is connected to the OP. The OP wants the devs to state their intended direction with RDM. I want to hear it as well, because as I said earlier in this thread, it'll hopefully put some of the issues to rest. If Mr. "I made abyssea but I also made the failure that is chocobo raising" came in here tomorrow and told me, "Sorry, Duelle, but Red Mage is intended to spam cures and refresh, with some enfeebles to make it look like you have something else of worth to bring to a group", I'd thank him for the response and move on. In my case, it'd let me bury the hatchet and spend my time elsewhere.

[Duelle]

"Exploit" is often an overused term that tell others that it's a bad thing. Everyone using Utsusemi as /nin is an exploit, as well as using capped evasion and +evasion gear to solo NMs is also an exploit. As far as I know, RDMs who wanted to tank HNMs needed awesome gear, shell out large amounts of money, and needed to prove themselves worthy of the task. If anything, abusing CE gains through enfeebling spells was the least exploitable out of anything, and even so, that doesn't mean it was bad.Wouldn't it have been better to give RDM the means to actually (if only passably) tank instead of having to abuse CE from enfeebles to get the job done? Not to mention the gear you speak of, to my recollection, included a set to become completely immune to spell interrupts. Which was probably an oversight by the devs just like the old haste cap and the old TP floor.

[Carth]

Wouldn't it have been better to give RDM the means to actually (if only passably) tank instead of having to abuse CE from enfeebles to get the job done? Not to mention the gear you speak of, to my recollection, included a set to become completely immune to spell interrupts. Which was probably an oversight by the devs just like the old haste cap and the old TP floor.
Of course it would've. And more specifically you needed -Spell Interruption, Fast Cast/Haste set, -PDT and -MDT for magic-spamming mobs (which is where RDM tanking shined the most).

RDM tanking anything at all probably wasn't part of Square's ambitions post RotZ where they made PLD, but neither was NIN tanking, or any DDs going /NIN to negate any and all damage, or even RDMs abusing DoT kiting to kill HNMs and Gods. Fact is, Square gives the players the tools needed to play the game and the playerbase uses them to every advantage, and Square either gives the stamp of approval or vetoes it. If Square doesn't kill it, who's to say they're wrong?

My point is calling something an exploit doesn't make it bad. Since Square bluntly killed RDM tanking they obviously didn't want it. I'm still baffled as to why it took them five years to do it though.

[Seriha]

It arguably didn't pick up until you started seeing NIN/DRKs floating around, who in part shared some of RDM's hate-gaining tools. If RDMs didn't pick up on this and add things like their -interrupt sets, innate stoneskin/phalanx, and an easier time of capping recasts, it's possible the nerf may have never happened since the NIN/DRKs were at least reliant on an outside source of Refresh, and thus more vulnerable to things that could mess with your MP.

In general, I'm not against the concept of RDM tanking, I'd just like it to be done right. Exploit, loophole, oversight, whatever you wanna call it, the "No Effect" might not have been bad, but it wasn't good game design, either. Instead, consider what would make RDM a unique tank, as for now, we're basically and always have been a pseudo-PLD in this regard.

[Carth]

While I personally agree with your view on it, objectively speaking it's in neither of our stances to judge whether the exploit is right or wrong. Either way though I'll leave the subject alone (since it's dirt dead anyway).


Instead, consider what would make RDM a unique tank, as for now, we're basically and always have been a pseudo-PLD in this regard.
Not gaining Tranquil Heart would be a good start.

Without any regard to Ochain, RDM has always taken less damage than PLD, especially against magic attacks. PLD gaining Phalanx doesn't matter much since RDM has a much higher enhancing skill and much more access to +Enhancing gear. However, what has allowed us to compete with PLD (and NIN) in the first place is Fast Cast and Utsusemi.

Above all else however, we can't get around the enmity system. RDM would need a quick hate spike tool in order for tanking to be viable in the first place and we just don't have that in any shape, way, or form outside of spending lots of MP for giant nukes (only to have it ripped way by even stronger damage spikes from DDs)

[Duelle]

Above all else however, we can't get around the enmity system. RDM would need a quick hate spike tool in order for tanking to be viable in the first place and we just don't have that in any shape, way, or form outside of spending lots of MP for giant nukes (only to have it ripped way by even stronger damage spikes from DDs)I think this has more to do with the fact the emnity system has caps. The overt lack of synergy between classes in terms of emnity doesn't help. That and the fact that THF's gimmick of emnity control has cooldowns that are too long and the gimmick itself causes any class that goes /THF to sacrifice a bit too much for such a gimmick never helped.

[saevel]

Things are they way they are because the Dev's themselves disagree with what RDM should and should not be doing. This is plainly obvious in our skill assortment vs our job traits vs our spell, WS and gear selection. One dev thinks something, another dev thinks something else and when implemented you get everything being a twisted mess. And because this rift still exists SE will not make any announcement in regards to RDM, that would just piss of one team member or the other.

[Duelle]

Things are the way they are because the Dev's themselves disagree with what RDM should and should not be doing. This is plainly obvious in our skill assortment vs our job traits vs our spell, WS and gear selection. One dev thinks something, another dev thinks something else and when implemented you get everything being a twisted mess. And because this rift still exists SE will not make any announcement in regards to RDM, that would just piss of one team member or the other.Depends. They could hide behind "We feel Red Mage is a very strong job" like they did at a fanfest developer panel several years ago. Which gets my blood boiling because to them it somehow makes the mess of a class we have in our hands seem alright.

[saevel]

That was a direct response to Avesta's soloing Gods and all the other's soloing every NM they could get near. SE took one look at that and said "they strong, cast closed".

[Duelle]

That was a direct response to Avesta's soloing Gods and all the other's soloing every NM they could get near. SE took one look at that and said "they strong, cast closed".What annoyed me most about that mess is that under anyone else RDM would have eaten nerfs to soloing and the oversights in design for those NMs would have been corrected.

[Nikia]

I read through a lot of these posts and it seems people want to complain about RDM more than they should.
RDM may not get a lot of love in large events where WHM curing is stronger or BLM tier 5 nukes/ja(s) nuke harder or even MNK's fists of might.
However in low man, duo, solo situations RDM shines.
A good RDM can nuke for 2000+ on normal enemies and melee very well with right atmas.
For tanking/kiting RDM is still amazing. Enfeebles RDM wins there also.
As a long time RDM there are things i would enjoy but to hint that RDM has little use is just silly.
Honestly if you want to melee and feel RDM isnt able to then build a better melee/WS set or play NIN lol. Same does go for Nuking / Healing / Tanking. However if you are dedicated to the job then don't doubt the power that RDM has. It is an amazing job and can do things other jobs just can't.
Someone said once "We don't kill enemies we outlast them." We might want to do amazing damage numbers or be equal damage output to other jobs but in the end if we can kill an enemy solo that no other job can then take comfort in that.
Forgive the post if odd at work in middle of the night. Tired.

[Seriha]

If that's your way of saying, "RDM needs nothing because we could solo some stuff!" well, bleh on the sentiment. Nevermind the fact others could likely do the same, sometimes faster and more safely. And if we were so amazing, especially these days, these conversations wouldn't be happening in the first place.

[Nikia]

If that's your way of saying, "RDM needs nothing because we could solo some stuff!" well, bleh on the sentiment. Nevermind the fact others could likely do the same, sometimes faster and more safely. And if we were so amazing, especially these days, these conversations wouldn't be happening in the first place.

We can solo Most things. Also what we want and need are completely different. I cant think of anything that is needed. Something lacking to much that the game/job feels broken. What is wanted for me would be A/- in sword B Shield Tier3 Enspells, More haste/att/acc gear. More stronger enfeebs, which would put a alread powerful job even more over the top.
People love to talk about RDM like it is a broken thing that can't do anything. I am sick of it.

[Daniel_Hatcher]

We can solo Most things. Also what we want and need are completely different. I cant think of anything that is needed. Something lacking to much that the game/job feels broken. What is wanted for me would be A/- in sword B Shield Tier3 Enspells, More haste/att/acc gear. More stronger enfeebs, which would put a alread powerful job even more over the top.
People love to talk about RDM like it is a broken thing that can't do anything. I am sick of it.

People will stop saying that when it's fixed, if you think it's fine as it is that's cool, but the people in this thread do not.

[Seriha]

Technically you can't do anything if people never want to invite you for reasons intrinsic to the job or the events people are doing (Which tends to rule out Abyssea due to lack of procs, strong cures, and little need for Refresh II). Shuffling us off to the soloist pile doesn't legitimize any activity you'd otherwise partake in since, as an MMO, we should be striving to interact with other players and not be hiding in the corner because we're unwanted for whatever reason. Nobody likes watching a soloist tickle something to death, and it doesn't matter if's a RDM, BST, SMN, or someone else doing it.

[Supersun]

People love to talk about RDM like it is a broken thing that can't do anything. I am sick of it.

We aren't complaining that we can't heal better then a White Mage or DD better then a Blue Mage.

We're complaining because we can't heal better then a Blue Mage and DD better then a White Mage.


Yeah...You say we are powerful because of our soloability, but seriously, what job CAN'T solo now. Some jobs solo safer then us. Others solo faster then us. Some do both. The fact is that a large portion of Rdm solos are only possible because the monster's pathing AI in this game is terrible and we have relatively fast casting spike damage yet you ignore the other half of the job base that can just straight up solo a monster in it's face.

The fact is the only reason we outlast a mob is simply because we are running away from it and it can't hit us while other jobs actually CAN outlast the mob face to face.