Lack of decent Red Mage Gear

Ah, a newbie's purity. This is one of those times where a MMO's main strength, playing with others, is also its greatest weakness. For the brief times I've dabbled in other games since FFXI's launch, it's almost been a priority for me to avoid the hardcore element of any gaming community. No matter how different the games have been, those types always share a similar element of condescension and hubris that still manages to bleed into a more casual player's game somehow. Could be a random PUG, public channel chatter, or even some element of market manipulation. Heaven help you if it's a PvP game.

Far as FFXI goes, I'm jaded. Some of it's SE's fault. Some of it's the fault of those I've directly play with over the years (MPKers, claim jackers, camp stealers, line skippers, whatever) and the rest involves forum interactions. While I've personally striven to try and emphasize RDM's flexibility, I won't deny there are times where I've hoped the martial aspect got so good that the naysayers would be the fools to continue with their backline only rhetoric. It'd be one of those moments where we see true colors, who's a hypocrite, who's a bandwagon jumper, and who's possibly brave enough to speak out about something that is legitimately broken in the overpowered way. As is, the current RDM is nowhere near that possibility and MP will always be the ultimate limiting factor in deciding whether or not a RDM can be doing it all, all at once, and for prolonged periods. Either way, as long as I'm actively playing FFXI, I'll soap box for RDM until it's where it needs to be. That "need" might be a catalyst for controversy and newbies reading the job description might be a rarity these days, but I want people to get what's advertised, for the game to be loyal to its themes, as such are the very elements that make the Final Fantasy games a connected franchise.

Thanks a lot for all the replies in this thread. I didn't intend for it to turn into a melee vs. caster fight and honestly, I didn't really know that was an issue. I'll have to consider things a bit going forward, because I kind of enjoyed playing red mage, but I unlocked blue mage, so I might end up going that route. Still, I hope Square Enix really looks at this situation. Telling people they can do something and then not having gear readily available after a certain point is just not good. Especially for new people who don't know any better. It's really just unnecessary frustration.

Anyone have any good ideas where to get some information on decent red mage gear? I looked a couple of posts in this thread, but I'm doing some looking around now and some direction would be good.

Shoot for 25-26% Haste in gear during TPing. Not exactly easy or cheap initially, but the chance of hitting more often typically outweighs hitting a little bit harder through what ATK options offer. If you're still 70 or below, though, you won't have very many Haste options. I'd roughly suggest ACC in spots in you can't wear Haste or get a high ATK value (Like Amemet Mantle +1 or Atheling Mantle), but since mobs vary in stats, a build that's good for one might not be so good for another. Abyssea buffs take the edge off this a bit, but since you're not there, it's not quite applicable.

What you WS in will depend on the WS. If it's a magical WS like Sanguine Blade, you'll want to focus on Magic Attack and INT. If it's a physical WS, things get trickier for us since you need to try and balance STR, ATK, and ACC to make sure all hits land consistently. I'd suggest using FFXIAH.com's Power Search option (upper left under item search) and select RDM for whatever equipment slot you want to look into. From there, put things like Haste, Attack, INT, and so in the description and search. That should pull up everything with the noted stat, which you can then adjust to sort by level by clicking at the top of the column.

A crazy thought.. what if SE gave RDMs a stance like Composure that would increase melee potential in exchange for magic potential?

Mana Sword
* Magic Accuracy from gear and buffs is added to Accuracy, and will not affect offensive magic.
* Magic Attack Bonus from gear and buffs is added to Attack, and will not affect offensive magic.
* Enspell damage receives bonus based on Magic Attack Bonus from gear and buffs.
* MP is drained at 10 MP/tick.
* Regular melee hits deal magic damage instead. (Formless Strikes)

If any job can pull something like this off, it's RDM...

A crazy thought indeed, /vote no.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Doombringer

the new hands are solid. 4% haste and 8 dex. if nothing else i'd cdc in them. then probably tp in them over dusk just to save myself an inventory slot.

alucinor mitts i think they're called. they also have mp+50 and darkness resist +50, so that's just gravy. i only didn't mention them because they're so new and uncommon.

there's also a new haste belt, phasmida. +6% haste with 6 acc and eva. i'd take that over goading, but again, brand new and uncommon. i also didn't mention AV belt cuz that's still fairly uncommon, but i guess it's also better than goading. then i suppose speed belt is a worthy mention as well.

i just tried to keep it "attainable"

edit: and yah, i'm working on a str shamshir now myself. the lvl increase was the final nail in the coffin for chimeric fleuret for me. but considering how easy and fast it can be to get if you have an aby group, i think it's still worth mentioning as a placeholder or stepping stone.

---

Thanks Doom, I knew I remembered seeing some new haste hands when I was looking through the gear dumps. I'm currently using Dusk+1 as it works with every one of my jobs but those other ones would also work with most of my jobs. They are a R/EX drop off the new Tav Diablos? Anyone know how crazy a fight that is? I'm going to have to battle against others to get lotting rights for that it seems.

Which reminds me, we figured out set where the Shiny super sword drops from? Or the Cure Pot +10% sword?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kristal

A crazy thought.. what if SE gave RDMs a stance like Composure that would increase melee potential in exchange for magic potential?

Mana Sword
* Magic Accuracy from gear and buffs is added to Accuracy, and will not affect offensive magic.
* Magic Attack Bonus from gear and buffs is added to Attack, and will not affect offensive magic.
* Enspell damage receives bonus based on Magic Attack Bonus from gear and buffs.
* MP is drained at 10 MP/tick.
* Regular melee hits deal magic damage instead. (Formless Strikes)

If any job can pull something like this off, it's RDM...

---

Only issue with that is Composure is meant to be the melee JA, hence the recast issue. I don't think gimping the magic side is the right way to go about it. We don't need to be as restricted as SCH is in our battle-stances.

I also think Enspells is the right way to go about increasing RDM's melee damage so the best way to go about it IMO is to change composure to augment our Enspells..

May be this is why --->

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GhQg7PC3CDY

XD

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Sama

May be this is why --->

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GhQg7PC3CDY

XD

---

I'm..... not sure what I just saw. >.<
Anyway random unimportant post. I've taken interest in RDM and I'm pretty glad these discussions are here. I've decided to go level mine beyond subjob level.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Soranika

I'm..... not sure what I just saw. >.<
Anyway random unimportant post. I've taken interest in RDM and I'm pretty glad these discussions are here. I've decided to go level mine beyond subjob level.

---

It's a pointless JAP forum, where they basically mock RDM melee, what with all their crazy love of Accuracy on EVERYTHING.