[Job Adjustmentｓ Manifesto] RDM

For the love of God Hyrist, shut up about ye olde FF1. That antiquated image has absolutely no bearing on FFXI.

SpankWustler in FFXI is a mage. Deal with it.

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Originally Posted by Hyrist

This brings the same two questions to the Mage Side of Red Mage, as is presented to the Melee Side.

Why do you play Red Mage as a backline caster?
Would those reasons not be better suited by another job.

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It bloody well would not.

I agree I prefer to be on the front line hacking and slashing as a RDM instead of on the backline curing. When i'm curing I feel like I'm not real contributing to the game especially when a WHM can clearly heal more mp at once and on multiple people. I never mind assisting a WHM keeping them refreshed and throwing in cures when overtaxed, I dont feel its my role to heal the whole party. I personally dont see the point of a partying if all i'm going to do is be on the back line healing gaining experience for practically nothing and still have most of my combat and magic skills falling behind in the process. I guess maybe I'm crazy for thinking that partying is supposed to allow me to improve everything in one fell swoop.

In any case because of the way this job is treated in parties I just accepted that there are just some parts of the game and missions and quests I will NEVER complete because of the attitudes toward the job and will complete all that I can solo or in small parties and say the hell with the rest and just quit afterward. I leveled RDM as a HYBRID MELEE job with the emphasis on melee where I can use magic as NEEDED. It is fine if one wants to neglect a huge part of a job but to fit in but I REFUSE TO DO SO and people act like something is wrong with me for doing so. Just becase my strongs weapon is only a B doesnt make me useless as I can still hit consistently and often as long as my skill is allowed to increase to what my acutal job level but that cant be done IN THE BACK and people complain and kick me out when I go to the FRONT, so why bother helping them at all I say? I'm not saying melee RDM is better than complete mage RDM (though it is and I dont see how they accomplish anything witout a party around but I digress) I dont knock anybody for how they play the game instead I try find a way to make it work. A skilled player can play any job in any fashion whether it is designed to be that way or not. Unskilled players cry and complain if things arent done a CERTAIN way despite there being more than one way to do things and still being successful. If it work for you stick with it and have fun until it no longer does I say.

Only other solution is for RDM that have a problem with the way things are just band together and abandon the others, LOL

What, by virtue of the almighty cure?

When you look at the mage duities that exist, that are PURELY RDM duties. What you are left with are Haste, Refresh, and a handful of spells only available through meriting. WHM WILL have Addle, BLM DOES have Break. Currently Scholar brings far more utility tools to the table, and will have the inclusion of Haste in the final level cap rise, subbing our job.

So that leaves chainspell stun, which isn't even a valid tactic in most endgame content anymore.

So yes, the question is presented: Why Red Mage? That's just a valid question for the Back Line as it is the Front.

And honestly, how many people have hung up the hat and leveled other jobs during this time, because of the exact problems I've listed above? The job needs further definition. SE's answer to that, may not be what some of the previous base wants.

That was the grand total of my post, which you only skimmed.

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Originally Posted by Hyrist

Yet, on the same notion, the job's archtype has it functioning as both, and yet you choose to ignore that concept when you approach the job as a 'pure mage'.

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Why should I care what the job's original concept was? This is how I like playing it, and luckilly, how most other people like me to play it.

That's all there is to it. I am not going to stand in your way of saying "we want the melee side buffed". That's fine, do what you want. But suggesting that everyone wants the melee side buffed, or that anyone who doesn't is lieing to themselves or admitting defeat or something is just wrong. Simple as.

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Originally Posted by Hyrist

Why do you play Red Mage as a backline caster?

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I wanted a backline mage job. I didn't want to purely be a healer. I didn't want to purely be a nuker. I didn't want to be purely a buffer. That leaves me with Rdm and Sch. I chose Rdm because at the time Rdm was more popular and also I thought they looked cooler.

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Originally Posted by Hyrist

Would those reasons not be better suited by another job.

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If I was used as a dedicated healer or nuker, then yes. But 90% of the time I'm not. I'm there as support, and another job couldn't do it better because another job can't land enfeebles with the same accuracy or potency that I can.

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Originally Posted by Hyrist

When you look at the mage duities that exist, that are PURELY RDM duties. What you are left with are Haste, Refresh, and a handful of spells only available through meriting. WHM WILL have Addle, BLM DOES have Break.

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I love how you can just dismiss Dia3, slow2 and Paralyze2 like that. The only other job that can cast a Slow effect stronger than ours is Brd, and guess what? they stack. We have the most potent paralyze. Guess what else? Dia3 is 15% Defence down that is up all the time, and that stacks with JA defence-down effects like Angon. No other job can do these. They are significant spells, and the fact that you just dismissed them so easilly without even acknowlegeing them as "a few merit spells" is completely idiotic.

Whm will be getting Addle. Blm has Break. We get both if you haven't realized. Aside from SE needing to come true on their vision of adjusting Enfeebling/Enhancing Magic I feel Red Mage magic is at an acceptable level for being a not main healer.

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I love how you can just dismiss Dia3, slow2 and Paralyze2 like that. The only other job that can cast a Slow effect stronger than ours is Brd, and guess what? they stack. We have the most potent paralyze. Guess what else? Dia3 is 15% Defence down that is up all the time, and that stacks with JA defence-down effects like Angon. No other job can do these. They are significant spells, and the fact that you just dismissed them so easilly without even acknowlegeing them as "a few merit spells" is completely idiotic.

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Awww, sorry you're so offended.

But let me put it flatly for you.

Is Warrior Defined by Warrior's Charge?

Is Dancer Defined by Saber Dance?

Or lets go over to the Mage Side...

Burst II, Freeze II?

Martyr?

No. These are not job defining traits, merely accents, bonuses to what they already preform. For a Red Mage, they're our bread and butter, piratically a necessity to be considered worth ANYTHING outside what someone else could do by simply equipping Red Mage as a subjob.

That's why they're dismissible. You're basically requiring the class to go through an additional 3 levels of work PER SPELL to contribute anything unique to an event. That's Post 75, only IF your spells land land reliably (on monsters with ridiculous levels of resistance, mind you), and only IF you're stacked to hell on dMND for everything but Dia and Bio, and guess what, you can only be fully adequate at two of those spells, and that's not even thinking of Phalanx 2.

If you're not insulted by this, I say you should be. Again, using merits as an excuse for being a definition for a job is a poor excuse to justify a broken design.

So yes, I dismiss the merits on the grounds that these spells rightly should be scrolls instead of merits. You can't depend on a Red Mage to have these spells to the appropriate merit levels, or have them at all in some cases, where with a Black Mage, they don't have to pick and choose what Tier V scrolls to get. Our Merits have turned from crutch to a liability to the development of our job class and if you don't see that, you're flat out blind.

Which is ironic because your typical Red Mage won't even have Blind II merited.

have you ever heard of gear swapping? its not that hard i even did it in a lazy way.

i just made 3 macro's to cover my entire gear and based each set of 3 on a function i need to perform. i have a set for healing, a set for enfeebling, i tweaked mnd-based enfeebling, a set for enhancing, a tweaked mnd-based enhancing, and a nuking set.

nuking and curing are my primary sets, then when i get a resist i just change to enfeebling. of course you should change for enhancing but if i know im not going to get hit then i only cast prot/shell anyways.

-yanno blind doesnt land on every mob right? same with paralyze. the base spells can be pushed far enough that you dont need to 5/5 any of them. i unlocked everything for Viodwatch triggers, except phalanx2. just /sch and phalanx1 or let your pld phalanx himself.

Why would you merit Phalanx II? Are you doing Salvage runs or something?

Because I'm not always coming /Sch or feeling like using a strat for it, at least for me. And in the future I probably will be doing Salvage runs, assuming I'm still playing after the payment issues.

Fair enough.

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Originally Posted by Camate

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Give red mage the “Fencer” job trait!

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We looked into this, however, if we were to add this it wouldn’t be a job trait. The possibility is pretty high that it would be in the form of equipment that a red mage could wear.

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Are you kidding me?! Why not give us RDM Job Trait?! It seems silly to give it to RDM via gear that, depending on where the trait is added, may never be used in favor of Haste Gear...

You're killin' me, man. KILLIN' ME!

I simply don't see the JT being useful outside of solo as things currently stand. It's not as if we get useful shields bar Genbu's - or are tanking with said shield(s) - so as far as I'm concerned Fencer is superfluous at best.

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Originally Posted by Neisan_Quetz

I simply don't see the JT being useful outside of solo as things currently stand. It's not as if we get useful shields bar Genbu's - or are tanking with said shield(s) - so as far as I'm concerned Fencer is superfluous at best.

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You could say the same for BRD, as well.

Just sounds like a slap in the face.

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Originally Posted by Quetzacoatl

You could say the same for BRD, as well.

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Job traits have largely been hit or miss (mostly miss) for jobs ever since level 80. It's almost a lost cause to expect any particular job trait. If you're really serious about melee, it might be time to stop asking for things just to be consistent with a perceived job image, and start asking for things that are actually consistent with what the job has now.

If you want to frontline, you treat yourself like a 1hand weapon user like THFs or BSTs or NINs and you duel wield. Why not start suggesting something like:

Elemental Force JT
Increases Sword Enhancement magic damage and raises Magic Accuracy for the corresponding Sword Enhancement magic element.

There, a job trait consistent with inherent aspects of XI RDM, an existing archetype in Square Enix's JRPG series (we want them to put their foot down and just stick to a direction with the job already, but SE themselves are slow to let go of their "magical swordsman" image), and it serves both a frontline and backline purpose.

How about we start seeing things like that instead of traits most of us won't even have value for? But I know some of you won't like my idea because now you'll just have to start cycling Enspells to raise your magic accuracy for individual spells...Some of you have even asked for nerfs to our magical side of things.

I couldn't care less about Fencer.

Making new enspells sound good, hopefully they fix the old ones too.

If they allow us access to more WS's that alone will fix lots.

New enfeebles that actually matter, I seriously want these.

We'll see how they go about this. Knowing SE they could screw it up badly, really badly. But their actually taking feedback and communicating now, so there is a chance whatever they implement won't be broke.

ITT: Red Mage is a bad mage that isn't unique or user-friendly, that can and should be simply replaced by any of the myriad other mage jobs for whatever content they are doing.

ITT: Red Mage's magical aspect is a haste/buff bot with no personality or activity.

ITT: Scholar is a better mage than Red Mage.

ITT: Red Mage is only powerful during solos, which also don't count because they're cheesy.

ITT: Final Fantasy 1 epitomizes Red Mage. Oh wait. Didn't Red Mage melee suck in FF1? I guess this one was actually pretty spot on.

Seriously, all I'm getting from a lot of posters here is that they plain aren't good at Magical Red Mage. Not to worry. Most people aren't.

Camate's Manifesto response looks pretty solid, and put things a lot more delicately than I would've. I'm looking foward to Gravity II and group-oriented magical buffs.

I'm still wondering about this glorious party play style that seemingly doesn't involve casting buffs or cures, because we know you're not meleeing.

Doesn't involve buffing or curing? Absolutely not.

Limited to Haste/Cure/Refresh botting? Hardly.

Personally, I find it amazing that people can both complain about the monotony of Red Mage magical play while at the same time complaining that they're doing too much. Casting basic party buffs is such an easy task that every single good mage I know doesn't even think about it any more. It's better to apply the brainpower to the magical play that matters. If you can't find something to do between Hastes, you're not looking hard enough.

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Originally Posted by Ketaru

Job traits have largely been hit or miss (mostly miss) for jobs ever since level 80. It's almost a lost cause to expect any particular job trait. If you're really serious about melee, it might be time to stop asking for things just to be consistent with a perceived job image, and start asking for things that are actually consistent with what the job has now.

If you want to frontline, you treat yourself like a 1hand weapon user like THFs or BSTs or NINs and you duel wield. Why not start suggesting something like:

Elemental Force JT
Increases Sword Enhancement magic damage and raises Magic Accuracy for the corresponding Sword Enhancement magic element.

There, a job trait consistent with inherent aspects of XI RDM, an existing archetype in Square Enix's JRPG series (we want them to put their foot down and just stick to a direction with the job already, but SE themselves are slow to let go of their "magical swordsman" image), and it serves both a frontline and backline purpose.

How about we start seeing things like that instead of traits most of us won't even have value for? But I know some of you won't like my idea because now you'll just have to start cycling Enspells to raise your magic accuracy for individual spells...Some of you have even asked for nerfs to our magical side of things.

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Eh, thought it was just worth a shot, y'know?

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Originally Posted by Ketaru

we want them to put their foot down and just stick to a direction with the job already, but SE themselves are slow to let go of their "magical swordsman" image

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Er, sorry, I just noticed this, but as far as I can tell, SE has fairly solidly put their foot down and said that Red Mage is an Enhancing and Enfeebling mage. The only reason they bring up melee at all is because so many people here post about it, and even then they clearly stated that they were looking to improve Red Mage's HNM-level party/group play and focus on its Enhancing and Enfeebling prowess.

It's a niche group of players who are keeping the "Magical Swordsman" archetype alive, that and a 10-year-old character blurb on a website that likely hasn't seen any updates to the old job sections in ... well, 10 years. Everyone else, SE included, is perfectly content with Red Mage as a Buff/Debuff master with a broad range of spells across both the light and dark spectrum.

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Originally Posted by Seriha

I'm still wondering about this glorious party play style that seemingly doesn't involve casting buffs or cures, because we know you're not meleeing.

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Any party play style that didn't involve casting Haste here and there or the odd Cure IV would be a pretty awful play style. They're not there for decoration, they're in the spell list so they can be cast when needed.

Also, a party play style that consists only of casting cures and buffs would get old after a bit, wouldn't it? I guess that's why spells like Dia III, Blizzard IV, and whatnot are also available to SpankWustler. Actually, I think it could out-damage Black Mage and Scholar over time for a brief time between updates/level-cap increases. Between levels 85 and 90, maybe?

New enhancing and enfeebling magic would definitely make SpankWustler more interesting to play, but even at this very moment, you have options other than being a pure healer or scampering up to a monster to flip it's Frankenfurters.

I don't understand why so many SpankWustlers who want to flip Frankenfurters think the only other option is to cast the same three spells over and over. It's not. You have many things you can cast at things.

Along those lines, more things to cast at things would certainly liven the job up a bit. Since that's exactly what SE seems inclined to add to the job, given what's been said so far, I choose to be optimistic for the future of SpankWustler.

It doesn't sound like the ability to flip Frankenfurters is being completely ignored, either. Maybe the new en-spell will be more helpful than the tier II line, which was basically "Additional Effect: Drop the Frankenfurter on a profoundly unclean floor, hope nobody notices, and put it back on the griddle quickly and covertly."

So don't worry, some poor dude at SE definitely knows you guys and your perceived need to flip Frankenfurters exists.

Just did a Translation with Google Chrome of this post from the JP forums:

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Originally Posted by Foxclon

こんにちは。

先日、回避ダウン効果の魔法として上位のグラビデを検討しているという回答をしましたが、更なる検討の結果、上位のグラビデは赤魔道士専用の魔法になり、サポートジョブ赤魔道士の場合も含め、他のジョブでは使用できないものになりそうという方向性になりました。

グラビデの上位版に期待していた皆さんには残念なお知らせで、本当にごめんなさい。

類似効果の学者用新魔法を用意したりする予定は……という点についてですが、せっかく新しい魔法を追加するのであれば学者特有のものにしたいということで、学者には別途専用の魔法（例えばTPスリップとか）を検討しているとのことです。こちらについては今後またご紹介できればと思います。

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Into this:

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Hello. Recently, I have the answer that you are considering a higher Gravity down to avoid a magical effect, the results of further study, the higher will be the magic of Gravity only Red Mage, Red Mage support job even if included in other jobs that direction now likely to be unavailable. I expected everyone to know superset of Gravity is unfortunate, really sorry. New plans or to provide for scholars of magic effects ... but for similar terms, are unique in that we want to scholars if you add a new spell much trouble, only to scholars of magic separately (eg Toka Slip TP) that is considering that. For here I hope to introduce in the future.

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Basically, Gravity 2 will be RDM only. Thanks SE! :)

Oh, and sorry, SCHs. :(

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Originally Posted by Quetzacoatl

Just did a Translation with Google Chrome of this post from the JP forums:



Into this:



Basically, Gravity 2 will be RDM only. Thanks SE! :)

Oh, and sorry, SCHs. :(

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Yeah I didn't imagine SCH was gonna get Gravity II at all, and for damn sure not above RDM.

No apologies necessary.

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Originally Posted by Raksha

Yeah I didn't imagine SCH was gonna get Gravity II at all, and for damn sure not above RDM.

No apologies necessary.

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You, ma'am, are a lady (or gentleman depending!) and a SCH. :P

Although, I am expecting a wave of posts consisting of "YOU LIED TO US!!1!!!!1!" coming from other users. That'll be lovely.

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Originally Posted by Quetzacoatl

You, ma'am, are a lady (or gentleman depending!) and a SCH. :P

Although, I am expecting a wave of posts consisting of "YOU LIED TO US!!1!!!!1!" coming from other users. That'll be lovely.

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Potential ToAU spoilers:

http://img94.imageshack.us/img94/990...0807204636.png

Would've been better if I could've actually solo'd him on SCH ;_;

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Originally Posted by Hyrist

Martyr?

No. These are not job defining traits, merely accents, bonuses to what they already preform. For a Red Mage, they're our bread and butter, piratically a necessity to be considered worth ANYTHING outside what someone else could do by simply equipping Red Mage as a subjob.

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If you are going to choose the bad merits (I don't know about the others, but I don't know a White Mage that fully merits Martyr, and only a handful that merit it once) that don't define a class for some of these examples, you point won't be proven well. A White Mage is defined by having Shellra V fully merited. I don't respect White Mages that have had time to merit that don't choose to merit Shellra V 5/5.

Sure, some merits are debatable in how much they contribute to what a job is, but how many Dancers do you know that don't merit Reverse Flourish to full? Certain merits are part of what a job is, and saying that a job doesn't need its merits (which are easy to get anyways) to function at peak efficiency is a bit of a joke.

Maybe Red Mages don't merit everything the same way, but I'd kill for just one of Dia III, Paralyze II, or Slow II as a White Mage. But those are not spells White Mage gets to even have a shot at, because Red Mage is the proper enfeebler.

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On Red Mage melee, I've seen Red Mages melee things in ways that spit on the image this thread keeps trying to push toward the devs. Red Mage's biggest strength is survivability, and whittling down opponents, but these days Red Mage is also pushing out bigger and bigger damage numbers too. But even then, there is a lot of buffing/debuffing done to make fights go smoothly. I'm sorry if you can't just melee a mob and expect it to auto-attack and win like a WAR or a MNK fighting something, but this is the nature of what Red Mage is. You have to use all your job's roles to the fullest in order to solo, especially if you want to solo things that shouldn't be solo'd, like mythical Red Mages in the days of yore.

There are legit complains about Red Mage melee, but given some of the comments (like saying Red Mage hasn't been given a magical WS) suggest to me that many Red Mages in here might expect to equip their nuking gear, a sword, and be able to outdamage a Warrior. It takes a lot of work and specialized gear to be a proper melee if you are a Red Mage. There is some good news for Red Mage however, as it has some very nice toys available for this purpose, like an Atheling Mantle.

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Originally Posted by Camate

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Add higher tier En-spells.

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Planning to add these during the next version update. However, this isn’t going to be the tier-III version, we are thinking about a different type of En-spell.

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Add an ability that enhances the effect of En-spells.

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We would like to look into perhaps having this take place through merit points.

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Something I'd like to see is both tiers of enspell stacking(as in, both being active) if they are the same element. For instance, Enfire II and Enfire. Enfire II would affect the first hit, and Enfire any additional hits granted by dual wield, Double/Triple/Quadruple Attack or Occasionally Attacks x Times. Currently, this will work for any other non-enspell added effect, but not for tier I enspells. For instance, Twilight Knife with Enfire II active will deal additional fire damage on the first hit, and it's own added effects on any other hits. The same goes with Samba effects, a RDM/DNC will deal additional fire damage on the first hit, while Drain Samba will proc on the remaining hits.

Another thing I've been thinking about, is an ability similar to MNK's Formless Strikes for RDM. All melee hits become non-elemental magical hits, with a notable difference: an active enspell II will change the element of the regular hit to match the enspell II effect. Attack and Accuracy would be replaced by Magic Attack and Magic Accuracy, which would go well with the Empyrean armor set.

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Originally Posted by SpankWustler

Any party play style that didn't involve casting Haste here and there or the odd Cure IV would be a pretty awful play style. They're not there for decoration, they're in the spell list so they can be cast when needed.

Also, a party play style that consists only of casting cures and buffs would get old after a bit, wouldn't it? I guess that's why spells like Dia III, Blizzard IV, and whatnot are also available to SpankWustler. Actually, I think it could out-damage Black Mage and Scholar over time for a brief time between updates/level-cap increases. Between levels 85 and 90, maybe?

New enhancing and enfeebling magic would definitely make SpankWustler more interesting to play, but even at this very moment, you have options other than being a pure healer or scampering up to a monster to flip it's Frankenfurters.

I don't understand why so many SpankWustlers who want to flip Frankenfurters think the only other option is to cast the same three spells over and over. It's not. You have many things you can cast at things.

Along those lines, more things to cast at things would certainly liven the job up a bit. Since that's exactly what SE seems inclined to add to the job, given what's been said so far, I choose to be optimistic for the future of SpankWustler.

It doesn't sound like the ability to flip Frankenfurters is being completely ignored, either. Maybe the new en-spell will be more helpful than the tier II line, which was basically "Additional Effect: Drop the Frankenfurter on a profoundly unclean floor, hope nobody notices, and put it back on the griddle quickly and covertly."

So don't worry, some poor dude at SE definitely knows you guys and your perceived need to flip Frankenfurters exists.

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dude... give it up.. the spankwustler thing wasn't that funny, EVER.. and you're just makin' it sad...

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Originally Posted by Economizer

Red Mage's biggest strength is survivability, and whittling down opponents, but these days Red Mage is also pushing out bigger and bigger damage numbers too. But even then, there is a lot of buffing/debuffing done to make fights go smoothly. I'm sorry if you can't just melee a mob and expect it to auto-attack and win like a WAR or a MNK fighting something, but this is the nature of what Red Mage is. You have to use all your job's roles to the fullest in order to solo, especially if you want to solo things that shouldn't be solo'd, like mythical Red Mages in the days of yore.

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You're speaking of solo play, whereas the melee camp's gripes are in the context of party play and the lack of acceptance due to factors already covered in several other threads.

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There are legit complains about Red Mage melee, but given some of the comments (like saying Red Mage hasn't been given a magical WS) suggest to me that many Red Mages in here might expect to equip their nuking gear, a sword, and be able to outdamage a Warrior.

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Why would you present a false premise like that? You wear melee gear to front-line. It's pretty obvious. The melee gear isn't enough, though. This has also been discussed.

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Originally Posted by Economizer

Maybe Red Mages don't merit everything the same way, but I'd kill for just one of Dia III, Paralyze II, or Slow II as a White Mage. But those are not spells White Mage gets to even have a shot at, because Red Mage is the proper enfeebler.

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Would you trade Cure 5 for them though? You'd be silly if you would considering that they are only marginally better then the T1 enfeebles (10% at best) and Cure 5 is well...Cure 5. It's pretty hard to debate inviting a Rdm JUST for their enfeebles when that's essentially the trade you are making by not inviting another Whm...not like that many things at the moment need more then one Whm anyway.

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Why are people assuming that Enspell damage related merits would be in our group 2 merits. They seem like something that would be added to the group 1 merits which besides convert recast isn't exactly the most stellar category in the world.

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Also, looks like we may be pushed down the Refresh tier list yet again as the Corsair job post made today pretty much inferred that Evokers roll was going to get a boost. Unless we are in for some major buffing Cor/Rdm just joined the ranks of buffing supermen that are looking to completely blow Rdm out of the water by 99.

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Originally Posted by Supersun

Would you trade Cure 5 for them though? You'd be silly if you would considering that they are only marginally better then the T1 enfeebles (10% at best) and Cure 5 is well...Cure 5. It's pretty hard to debate inviting a Rdm JUST for their enfeebles when that's essentially the trade you are making by not inviting another Whm...not like that many things at the moment need more then one Whm anyway.

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You don't ever just invite a Red Mage just for enfeebles. You also invite it for the buffs they use, and depending on how good the Red Mage is at handling these, extra magical and melee damage.

Would I trade Cure V for these enfeebles as a White Mage? No, I wouldn't, because if White Mage didn't have Cure V, there would be very little reason to have one. If either SCH or RDM were to get it, they'd pretty much dominate WHM in most aspects because they have superior MP longevity and they perform other roles like crowd control and buffs better.

Both camps act as if they aren't useful at all without the spell, but they ignore the problem that currently plagues the White Mage class, the prospect that at any moment, the masses will have their way, and White Mage will be useless outside of being needed for certain procs in Abyssea.

Anyone who says that superior cure potency gear or Cure VI would prevent any job with a better mana pool from being a better healer really doesn't understand how White Mage functions. They also could use a history lesson in FFXI, namely the ToAU era.

Maybe there is something seriously wrong with White Mage being the only job with Cure V, but at this point in time, White Mage doesn't have much else going for it. A bit of a metaphor, I'd still invite a Red Mage to a party even if the job couldn't cure at all. I couldn't say the same for White Mage.

ITT: Cureskin doesn't exist.

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Originally Posted by Supersun

Also, looks like we may be pushed down the Refresh tier list yet again as the Corsair job post made today pretty much inferred that Evokers roll was going to get a boost. Unless we are in for some major buffing Cor/Rdm just joined the ranks of buffing supermen that are looking to completely blow Rdm out of the water by 99.

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RDM with Refresh 2 and AF3+2 pants and COR's Evoker's > COR/RDM with Evoker's and Refresh 1. Don't kid yourself.

True enough, Doom. The joke kind of died half-way through my post, but I wasn't done making my point so I opted to drag it's rotting carcass along with me. Maybe that wasn't the soundest decision.

I still think "SpankWustler" is a perfectly goofy word, though. "The SpankWustler" sounds like a Doctor Seuss book about an awkward, fuzzy, little creature with one tremendous hand.

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Originally Posted by Economizer

Would I trade Cure V for these enfeebles as a White Mage? No, I wouldn't, because if White Mage didn't have Cure V, there would be very little reason to have one. If either SCH or RDM were to get it, they'd pretty much dominate WHM in most aspects because they have superior MP longevity and they perform other roles like crowd control and buffs better.

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Assuming you play White Mage completely naked and with no job abilities; this is a serious concern. Otherwise, it's more of an irrational fear born of a time when people fought pink birds and White Mage had a little over half the resources it has currently.

A 35% Cure-Skin with a cap of 400 is extremely helpful against challenging monsters, and a properly be-pantsed White Mage's cures are extremely MP efficient compared to any other job.

As for MP longevity, unless you need or want Stun you're probably subbing SpankWustler or Scholar. So White Mage generally has some form of MP restoration along with it's far, far more efficient cures.

Yeah, giving more jobs access to cure V might inspire a few folks to bring along a Spankwustler mule to heal themselves on easy content instead of a White Mage mule, but I don't see it affecting White Mage much otherwise. Particularly not on things like Voidwatch that actually offer vaguely hard monsters.

As somebody who is on White Mage 90% of the time, I could care less about having a iron-fisted monopoly on healing. It would make my rolls of fat undulate with joy if a buddy who so desired could heal in Abyssea on SpankWustler or Scholar, so I could at least find out if my new macros for Blue Mage or Corsair even work.

Although, maybe the disparity will sort itself out once Abyssea is just another event instead of the primary event. Our HP outside isn't that much higher now, and it won't be that much higher at 99.

Too-Long-Did-Not-Read-Version: No, other jobs getting Cure V wouldn't have a meaningful, negative impact on White Mage. It's a far more fleshed-out job now than it was five years ago.

In other news, I'd choke a kitten to cast Dia III. While it's only a 5% increase over Dia II, it's a 15% increase over some butt-brained Black Mage's Bio II. I know that's not a good reason, but overwriting that dreadful spell would feel so good.

Not that Spankwustler's merits, Category I and II, aren't a little lackluster otherwise. That's the case with a lot of jobs. Fortunately, that sounds like something the current development team really wants to work on.

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Originally Posted by Greatguardian

Er, sorry, I just noticed this, but as far as I can tell, SE has fairly solidly put their foot down and said that Red Mage is an Enhancing and Enfeebling mage. The only reason they bring up melee at all is because so many people here post about it, and even then they clearly stated that they were looking to improve Red Mage's HNM-level party/group play and focus on its Enhancing and Enfeebling prowess.

It's a niche group of players who are keeping the "Magical Swordsman" archetype alive, that and a 10-year-old character blurb on a website that likely hasn't seen any updates to the old job sections in ... well, 10 years. Everyone else, SE included, is perfectly content with Red Mage as a Buff/Debuff master with a broad range of spells across both the light and dark spectrum.

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Said niche group of players have been around just as long as this game has so you might also want to get used to the unpleasant reality that you share the exact same game with them. For a minority, they are extremely vocal and the ones that are vocal will get their voices heard. That is the entire point of having an Official forum.

People who post here for our magical side of things only do so only as a reaction to the people who want to push us to the front. Is wanting a melee update really so terrible? Would it be a problem to at least ask for a cost-of-living-adjustment sort of update? We did, after all, always used to have a wide range of gear selection to choose from. Did that gear selection really have to shrink after Abyssea? Is the fact that people stay so mum about our casting testament to our proficiency as a mage being A-OK? Maybe "perfectly content" is what's the problem here.

BLU got a spell that allows them to temporarily increase the Attack and Magic Attack Bonus. Where are the requests for a similar spell that allows us to raise the Accuracy and Magic Accuracy of a fellow player? Why don't we take a cue from Abyssea and ask how a spell that raises Critical Hit Damage might work? Or hell, why don't take SE's intent on giving more jobs endgame roles the whole way and get some spells that directly enhance a player's pets? We ought to be expanding the amount of jobs we can work well with instead of this systematic nonsense of excluding pet jobs simply because they don't get the full benefit of player enhancements.

Even ignoring new spells, we've still got a situation where Saboteur is problematic in how it doesn't guarantee an Enfeeble will land. That's fine, but how about at least making it so Saboteur doesn't get consumed until an Enfeeble is successfully landed?

You seem to have missed the point. You specifically talked about SE themselves putting their foot down.

I'm telling you that they already have, multiple times. It's not my fault people are shoving their heads in the sand about it.

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Originally Posted by Economizer

You don't ever just invite a Red Mage just for enfeebles. You also invite it for the buffs they use

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You mean Refresh and Haste? Because besides Phalanx II there not exactly many other buffs that Rdm can cast on other people.

Oh wait, one of those is subbable by 99 and the other one is inferior to every other form of refresh due to it not stacking with Refresh.

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Originally Posted by Quetzacoatl

RDM with Refresh 2 and AF3+2 pants and COR's Evoker's > COR/RDM with Evoker's and Refresh 1. Don't kid yourself.

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Considering I expect Evokers roll to likely be buffed to 5~7 MP tick... Cor/Rdm 8~10 > Rdm 7

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You seem to have missed the point. You specifically talked about SE themselves putting their foot down.

I'm telling you that they already have, multiple times. It's not my fault people are shoving their heads in the sand about it.

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Apparently not, seeing as they've decided to entertain the notion of a melee adjustment, instead of simply ignoring it. It's easy really. Quote the question, then give this very polite response:

"At this time, we have no plans for adjusting Red Mage's Sword proficiency."

That isn't what was said. In fact, the very opposite was said. It actually took up the majority of Camate's response and it wasn't said in vague possibilities of "maybe in the future". Seemed to me like there actually definitive expectations for the next version update.

I would love to know how some of my ideas for party enhancement spells would work. I think it's a long time coming that we finally see something that makes us work alongside pet jobs, in fact. And all I got was Gravity II.

The viability of Cor/Rdm in general is going to depend a lot on how consistent Wildfire continues to act outside Abyssea. It's highly unlikely that a Cor/Rdm will be able to keep up a high-maintenance Refresh cycle as well. Refresh itself is only 110 MP for the caster, meaning that over the duration of the spell, the Corsair will only be able to consistently Refresh 3 other people.

No good Corsair will ever have Evoker's roll on them for more than 20-50 seconds, ever, so you can't count on that as a source of self Refresh. While it may look decent on paper, Cor/Rdm is never going to be able to fulltime Refresh spell on any full caster party without seriously gimping themselves in some form or another (Be it fulltiming Evoker's on themselves, or Resting, or whatnot).

Edit: Welcome to the Official Forums. They're looking into WS adjustments across the board, for every job. If Red Mage gets Vorpal Blade out of it, more power to them. If not, whatever. That does not mean they are looking into RDM-specific melee adjustments. It simply means that the melee crowd may be getting a bone when the Dev team completes their game-wide revamp of all sub-75 Weaponskills and their accessibility.

The Devs have stated quite clearly that they are looking into improving the group aspect of Red Mage, which consists of its Buffing and Debuffing prowess. That's an incredibly polite way of saying "No". I'm sorry if you just don't see that, or want to look for things that just aren't there. Who knows, you may get lucky. For those of us who understand the delicacy with which news like this has to be handed to people like those who post on this subforum, the message is abundantly clear.