Overall fixes to RDM

I had alot of thoughts on this and most threads had bits and peices on it. My ideas:

1. Melee skills additions: Gives rdm an E or F rating on H2H and staff. Got alot of weapons we rdm's are able to use but no skill. Discussed before somewhere.

2. Increase Sword and Dagger to A- skill or B+ rating. Discussed before

3. give RDM access to vorpal blade. Discussed before

4. Give RDM access to some divine magic natively like Banish/flash. Discussed before

5. New Enfeebles: Terror/plauge/curse/amnesia and any other new diabolical enfeeble u can conjure up

6. Enhancements #1: allow rdms to cast thier self target only enhancements like the barspells/enspells/gain on other party members

7. Enhancements #2: New ones like attack/Acc/macc/mab/racc/ratt gain spells

8. New ability: <insert name> Increases MAB/MACC, decreases acc, weapon delay increases, enhances gained don't last as long (50% less time). Composure or new ability can only be up, not both @ same time.

9. new trait @ 76: Quick magic - occasionally quickens spell casting (instant cast) 10% @ 76, +5% next to upgrades for 20% overall. Discussed somewhat before.

10. Elemental magic: access to tier5 spells from 94 to 99 and comet/meteor. If BLM/SCH's get tier6 spells.

1. Unnecessary
2. Nice but still see 1
3. Don't really need it
6. That's what whm does
7. could be in the works, one was potentially found in the .dats
8. What does this fix exactly?
9. Not as a trait, never as a trait.
10. Doubtful.

fixes is almost like wishes I should have better titled it

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Originally Posted by Metalgod

9. new trait @ 76: Quick magic - occasionally quickens spell casting (instant cast) 10% @ 76, +5% next to upgrades for 20% overall. Discussed somewhat before.

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Absolutely not. This is a terrible, terrible idea.

Agreed. I'd quit the job. A rdm_quik ability was found in the .dats. I'll take it as a controllable JA.

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Originally Posted by Neisan_Quetz

3. Don't really need it

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Our lacking sword WS selection while at the level range others get Vorpal begs to differ.

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8. What does this fix exactly?

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Seems like a caster boost, more than anything. The bandwagoners would be happy with it, I guess.

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7. Enhancements #2: New ones like attack/Acc/macc/mab/racc/ratt gain spells

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Rather than add to the self-cast cycle, I'd say those should be baked into the current Gain spells. As a whole, the gain line needs to be knocked down a couple of levels, as getting those in the 80's is fairly ludicrous.

1) It's hard to get to level 90 (99)?

2) Anyone who isn't a Melee RDM is a bandwagon RDM now?

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Originally Posted by Greatguardian

1) It's hard to get to level 90 (99)?

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Part of proper class design involves proper distribution of spells, abilities, and traits. Gain spells are placed where they are because the devs simply wanted to give RDM something for the sake of being able to say "we gave RDM something". That runs similarly to the whole "zero to hero" thing that has been brought upon us by Almace (which is also bad design); Your performance and relevance is flatlined for 90 levels, then suddenly spikes up the viability chart and plateaus again. Gain spells' location in RDM's growth distribution are badly-placed, as you go for so long not having them and then you suddenly have them in the 80s.

From a design perspective, they should have come into play earlier. I'd say probably at lv55 or 60, with a 5 level spread between each Gain spell, and going with the idea of tacking on additional bonuses per spell, a trait that strengthens the gain line somewhere in the 80's. Then you have proper spell distribution and give the impression of the RDM becoming more proficient as they gain levels.

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2) Anyone who isn't a Melee RDM is a bandwagon RDM now?

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Actually, no. The ones who sing the praises of refresh botting, haste botting and cure botting while denouncing the melee camp as ignorant peasants that know no better, on the other hand...

Okay tried to post my ideas but they fell apart. Even my calculations. But anyway my theory to fix rdm, is to keep it simple, i been reading these forums for MONTHS and while i love some new ideas, simple ideas work better for me, not only are they easier for us to understand and use, but we dont need to sit there and teach a lesson on how a job's new JA works. Anyway, some of you dont like it, but i like stances, and thats my approach, but i do have other ideas too.

Stances: Doublecast/At Arms.
-Effects in short(doublecast): 50% more mp consumption, 50% more elemental and curing potency

-Balance: Costs more mp, and cure IV still is weaker than cure V, and thunder III is still weaker than IV, but closer, i used those spells with actual numbers but the forum logged me out and i cant be bothered to post it this second. Both become more potent though and get close to the next tier spell none the less. Though then we are almost stepping on their toes. Almost.

-Effects in short(At arms): Ex sword weaponskills, recrunched gain/phalanx/enspell calculations, enhanced combat skills, reduced mage prowesses somehow, convert a little mp to hp (15%?) and possibly some JA haste (5-7% haste?), and swap our native MAB and MDB traits to Attack bonus and Defense Bonus.

-Balance: Lowers mage prowesses to enhance melee, woo.

should be enough i suppose to get things rolling. Simple, effective, easy to understand and use. I have other ideas but dont wanna get logged out again so post go!

I'll pass on both. As I've said before, our backline aspect doesn't really need more incentive, and jacking Cure IVs to the 750 range, even if at higher MP costs, would pretty much be the nail in the melee coffin. Meanwhile, eliminating our MATK and MDB hurts, first, us putting EX magical WS to good use with the MDB loss negating the point we're one of the more sturdy jobs for eating magical AoEs. +28 ATK when we get MAB3 is not really gonna change the game, at best bridging the gap in skill ratings between us and PLD/BLU.

We will have to agree to disagree there, i personally prefer vorpal blade over sanguine blade, so losing 28 MAB when im not performing mage duties for 35 attack (which is what attack bonus III offers and is a pretty decent boost) is a great option for someone like me, additionally, having that would solve our curing woes, and allow us to magicburst better. This afterall though is the "overall fixes to RDM" so i have focused on the mage and melee side, looking at the overall picture, not the melee, even if i too am a melee enthusiast. Though i realize i did neglect enfeeble suggestions. I still honestly believe that stances are a great option.

Though i do agree sanguine blade is a great weaponskill and id like to have some fancy special new gimick to solve our problems, a quicker, if a bit crude option isnt entirely bad. Just less tasteful.

The fact that you can sub most of your suggestions should tell you something. But, your asking for a native ability which eliminates the need for "sub job locking".

I'm remind if the game balance SE established between Redmages and whitemages from day one. Let's take Protect/Protectra and shell/shellra. Both of these spells offer exactlty the same buff I believe, with mp efficiency going to the -ra. How was this balanced? The -ra types should have either been balanced by either lower duration and/or less potency. This wouldn't matter since WHM still have access to individual protect and shell as with RDM.
This same SE "balance" continued with the bar-type spells both elemental and status. Same potency and durations. Followed lastly by the gain/boost spells. Being a RDM has a barely negiliable potency over a WHM that can party buff with one spell.
In any of the cases shouldnt the fact that redmages are locked into solo buffs have been given greater potency and/or greater duration(this voided with composure)? I don't know the number difference both isn't the gain/boost ration something like 7 to 5 or 6?

As far as adding melee capabilities...this is the suggestion for every job. Why are mages asking for even more melee power? Because melee doesn't cost MP is why....I think. It's cheaper Mp-wise to melee than worry about casting...even if 2 nukes can out damage all the melee damage of redmage. If you really want to be a melee RDM I suggest going /DRK. You'll have access to not only strong attacks with job traits, but you have all the absorb spells including absorb ACC AND absorb TP. Not to mention souleater AND vorpal blade. With a good absorb TP, redmages can save themselves from swinging roughly 6-10 times. In fact, they can stay back more often this way and run in to do a vorpal blade every so often after absorbing DEX and STR.
For this reason alone, SE shouldn't ever touch a redmages melee. If not dark, there other options like /THF, /nin, and /warrior(guess what a RDM now gets fencer with this job...stop complaining). Heck, there even /paladin if you want a shield bash.

Red Mages Dark skill is too low to actually land abosrb TP on anything that's relevant without a full set of Dark magic gear and even then it's just useful for exp.

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Originally Posted by Covenant

If you really want to be a melee RDM I suggest going /DRK.

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Stopped reading after that....

Oh im a DRK too, and i love to /drk on rdm. However, again this is overall fixes to rdm, and well, melee is something rdm can do, it is part of rdm, even if deficient, as are other aspects of the job, personally, id like to enfeeble more mobs, but aside from one or two things, id like some more enhancing spells over some enfeebling. Now as to having to chose a subjob to melee, its a nice thought, but unlike say...dancer, or thief, which have standard jobs they sub which allow them to melee equally or better but dont hinder their ability to do anything else. As it stands, theres another approach that can be taken to offer rdm the ability to sub a melee subjob of their choice, status removal, and well, as nice as /dnc is, then it hinders out ability to melee with needing tp to remove statuses. And it harms our damage potential, this is in fact common knowledge.

Now if we were given some native way to remove statuses, or to cause them to wear faster (a sphere buff/effect? Job trait? a mass debuff purging JA?) this will remain the case. Even in exp, at party or abyssea levels, as it stands, if you sub say...war on dnc, nobody will bat an eye, but if you sub war on rdm, you will be met with disbelief and in some cases hostility.

Now onto the matter at hand, why do rdm feel entitled to be able to melee? Well its a number of reasons. Other ff games where redmages melee come to mind, the fact we start with a dagger as starting equipment is there. However partly too is like people said, we were told we got to be fighter-mages! Oh but things have changed since then? Maybe so, but as many state, theres a lot of compelling arguments against it. Magian swords are a strong reason, as well as our continued featured /rdm tag on new swords. However theres another argument a lot of you havent even mentioned (atleast as far as i can see) that square has made no effort to spell it out that we have been designed to stop meleeing.

Let us take a trip to...oh...say.... www.finalfantasyxi.com shall we? Okay now that we are here we can see they have been updating the content to include abyssea, even selling the abyssea collection through it. Good, now lets go to... "Your Characters" and then "Jobs" to see what they say... Hmm. Something is confusing me here... well it says... "Red Mage; These fighter-mages can utilize both black and white magic, as well as the arts of the sword." So i guess im reading this wrong? Likely its an oversight by square-enix, but its still QUITE possible they have decided to not change it, in a nutshell its what we do. My point is to those that have said time and time again that rdm isnt ment to melee and square didnt "sell" us on anything. Well you are WRONG! They by neglect or by choice are still selling the image of a fighter-mage to new players interested in rdm! So why cant we try to be what they want to be?

Now that ive had my moment. It still stands some simple fixes can solve rdm, or if we want some more inventive ones, we can be a bit silly over it.

Other ideas: Random Buffing!
-What this is? Well lets take a page from plenilune Embrace, where while curing it grants a buff to the target it is casted upon. Well why not add a JA or JT to do the same? Someone dieing? Throw a cure, and if its a JA (stance-ish where it remains active) or a trait, it tells you that it proc'ed and grants a random-esque buff to that party member. Possibly haste? Possibly Refresh? Regen? While not the most effective JT/JA, and i can see it being useless, it still could save mp, and grant a buff to party members and save time. Is it good? Not really. Could it be fun? sure. Or we could get our own creative AOE buff, similar to nameless song from FFT games, that when cast, aoes and grants random buff statuses to nearby party members. Will it save a party from death? unlikely, its a gamble, but pre-battle, it could offer some quick buffs to lighten casting load, or even offer buffs rdm may not natively get (such as reraise?). Anyway just my rambling, feel free to take your turn and share your opinions!

Hp in this topic/battle: 160HP (this will go down as my points are truely defeated if anyone cares to do so!)

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Originally Posted by Supersun

Red Mages Dark skill is too low to actually land abosrb TP on anything that's relevant without a full set of Dark magic gear and even then it's just useful for exp.

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So the question becomes: Why don't you have a set of dark magic gear?

Frankly, /SCH does more for Dark Magic than what gear we have available ever could. Downside, you don't actually have /DRK's spells with this aside from Drain and Aspir. While perhaps not as lulz as us and Shield skill/Mastery, Dark and Divine magic are two of our aspects that have been much slowly antiquated. Depending on future gear additions, my dark magic set will probably be some of the first gear phased out.

Just give RDM C5, you want to melee? Ok, but expect to solo as I wouldn't pick you over a strong DD.

RDM dont need C5, when you want C5 play blm,sch or pup, thats not rdm.
The 3 have much better skill as rdm. And you rly want stay and cast spells when can have better dmg with hits and ws?

Oh and why you want a strong DD? The melees and DD have more from lvl 75>90 as rdm. What have rdm become- lol spells.
c4 spells? when other jobs have c5? and for melee rdm... nothing.

And now the manifest is the best... best buffer...lol, need that game 1 more buffjob?

No DRG for party, anyone?