Job Adjustments manifesto Discussion

[Karinya_of_Carbuncle]

Red Mage was "intended" to be a generalist that could fill in needed roles in parties while sporting some semblance of versatility. That fell flat on its face when refresh entered the game, which combined with the groups that were already desperate for healers did nothing but sling mud on our job.

Healing is often a needed role in a group. Melee on the other hand... there's how many jobs that melee better than RDM *and* don't have the choice of doing anything else? Melee is basically never something a group needs more of, and if they did, they wouldn't look at a RDM for it even if it meleed better than BLU (which, unlike RDM, has an A sword skill, but would still be not that great a melee if it didn't spend MP on spells to add more damage). That's why it's important for RDM to have the option of nuking or healing decently, and not so important for us to have the option of melee (in group situations).

RDM melee is more of a solo/small group thing than something that should be attempted against VT and up, and it's pretty much always been that way for higher level RDM. Even at lower levels RDM melee is more of a bonus than something you would actually invite the RDM for. This has been our core job design since launch (in fact, since before FFXI existed at all, to the extent that the jobs draw on earlier FFs such as FFV's job system), there's really no excuse for people to try to substitute their own concept of the job for the devs' and just say it's "supposed" to be that way.

This assumes we wanted to be shackled to healing.

I don't want to be "shackled" to healing, I want to have the OPTION of being an adequate healer if that is what the party/alliance needs. That's part of the versatility of RDM. Just like I want to have the option of nuking, or the option of enfeebling (on mobs that aren't immune). Enfeebling isn't very meaningful at the moment, but SE is showing some signs of wanting to improve that in future content.

A game with 20 jobs shouldn't have only 1 of them being capable of being a viable healer for a group. That's bad game design and is going to lead to either way too many people playing the same job and the others being neglected, a massive healer shortage, or both.

On the other hand, I agree with whoever posted upthread that RDM enhancing is kind of weak compared to the real enhancing kings, BRD and COR. Not that RDM enhancing is insignificant, but it's not exactly pivotal (especially when it's made redundant by the much stronger Abyssea buffs). Maybe it could be improved, but BRD or COR level enhancing tends to become the whole job, and I don't really want that for RDM either.

P.S. Have you played any other FF games? RDM has never been more than second-rate, at best, at melee. For years, their signature ability has been to cast more spells faster than other mages, never anything melee-related. In FFV, for example, RDM doesn't have a single learnable ability that improves physical damage. The actual DD jobs are getting things like Dual Wield, Boost (the FFV versions of both of those are *much* stronger), Barrage (works a little differently but insanely strong), Jump for double damage usable every attack round, etc. There is no viable RDM melee build -- at most, you can give them a melee-supporting ability from some *other* job to give them something to do that doesn't cost MP. IIRC, pretty much the same is true in FFIII. I have no idea where people got the idea that RDM were ever supposed to have first-rate melee abilities. First-rate melee jobs don't have a B in their primary weapon.

[wildsprite]

RDM is still an adequate healer outside of abyssea, which I personally despise people that want their jobs adjusted based on that big old mess that nearly destroyed FFXI in the first place(and before you argue that it helped, no it really didnt, we need more players to join the game to keep it going not a big old mess that gives a crap load of EXP that is the only thing most people want to do), RDM has 2 main weapons, sword and dagger, they should have better weapon skill sets and stronger ability to hit, that should be addressed before anything else, and screwing us by making it so we are forced to take less enmity was not a smooth move on SE's part, they went and screwed over one of the few things front line that RDM could do, tank, you all seem to think that RDM was designed to back line, that was not the original idea of RDM, RDM was supposed to be able to effectively take on almost any role in the party, not to be better than those roles but to be proficient at them

[Duelle]

Healing is often a needed role in a group. Melee on the other hand... there's how many jobs that melee better than RDM *and* don't have the choice of doing anything else? Melee is basically never something a group needs more of, and if they did, they wouldn't look at a RDM for it even if it meleed better than BLU (which, unlike RDM, has an A sword skill, but would still be not that great a melee if it didn't spend MP on spells to add more damage). That's why it's important for RDM to have the option of nuking or healing decently, and not so important for us to have the option of melee (in group situations).

You're trying to justify stuffing an archetype that generally has no business doing dedicated healing into the role of healer through demand. Not getting off to a good start, there, seeing that such a mindset is not too far from the asinine and old "you have an MP pool, so start healing".

RDM melee is more of a solo/small group thing than something that should be attempted against VT and up, and it's pretty much always been that way for higher level RDM.

Solo is meaningless in a game designed from the ground up on partying.

I don't want to be "shackled" to healing, I want to have the OPTION of being an adequate healer if that is what the party/alliance needs. That's part of the versatility of RDM. Just like I want to have the option of nuking, or the option of enfeebling (on mobs that aren't immune). Enfeebling isn't very meaningful at the moment, but SE is showing some signs of wanting to improve that in future content.

Just like you want the option of being an adequate healer, I want the option of being an adequate front-liner. We should be on the same side, instead of trying to downplay what we want to do in-game.

A game with 20 jobs shouldn't have only 1 of them being capable of being a viable healer for a group. That's bad game design and is going to lead to either way too many people playing the same job and the others being neglected, a massive healer shortage, or both.

Which isn't my problem, but more connected to how FF's job classes were conceived. Sure, someone was bound to get the short end of the stick, I simply expected it to be someone who had a history of being a caster and had no melee inclinations at all.

That aside, most of us know healing is not a popular role. It's no excuse for grabbing a popular class (like Red Mage) and stuffing it into healing to create a pool of healers. All that does is anger a bunch of people and create needless drama.

P.S. Have you played any other FF games? RDM has never been more than second-rate, at best, at melee. For years, their signature ability has been to cast more spells faster than other mages, never anything melee-related. In FFV, for example, RDM doesn't have a single learnable ability that improves physical damage. The actual DD jobs are getting things like Dual Wield, Boost (the FFV versions of both of those are *much* stronger), Barrage (works a little differently but insanely strong), Jump for double damage usable every attack round, etc. There is no viable RDM melee build -- at most, you can give them a melee-supporting ability from some *other* job to give them something to do that doesn't cost MP. IIRC, pretty much the same is true in FFIII. I have no idea where people got the idea that RDM were ever supposed to have first-rate melee abilities. First-rate melee jobs don't have a B in their primary weapon.

Some of us know certain concepts don't work in MMORPGs. The more MMOs you've played and the more design philosophies you've been exposed to, the easier it is to spot. RDM's core design from the console FFs is a prime example of this, because while game balance in the console games ignores min-maxing for the most part (barring bosses designed around min-maxing like the weapons in VII, Ovni in IX and Shinryuu where applicable), that same style will NOT fly in an MMORPG because of how encounter balance tends to go.

That being said, I've seen RDM's plight and issues in other games. For exactly the same reasons and with the exact same community reactions. In plain english, hybrids get screwed over more often than not, and few make the effort to actually make the hybrids viable in more than one role. The worst part is that said hybrids get stuck with mundane and boring tasks with sorry gimmicks to make them "needed" (like Refresh). I personally would not have an issue with any of this if the job had been called oracle, green mage or something that did NOT have a history of being a guy that knows magic and wields a sword. Being a magic swordsman whose only purpose in-game is to buff other players and spam cures is demeaning, to say the least. Try sticking a light-touched warrior archetype into the same situation and see the uproar and complaints. Trust me, it ain't pretty.

[ffxititanplayer]

Is this a joke? RDM does have a big problem right now, but lolmelee isn't it. RDM was never intended to be a primarily melee oriented job at high levels and there's no reason to expect that to change.

The primary problem RDM faces in level 90 content is that RDM (and SCH) is no longer a useful healer! The game has been reduced to only one viable healer job and SE shows no indication of whether they even intended that to be the case. For both RDM and SCH, not a good enough healer + bad selection of yellow procs = unwanted job. Their unique spells are insignificant, or at least unappreciated.

Maybe, if the post-90 endgame doesn't have the enormous HP pools of abyssea, Cure IV will stop being junk, but even so, the fact that you have the same top heal as a BLM or BRD doesn't exactly inspire confidence.

There's no discussion (explicitly at least) of whether SE wants any job other than WHM to be able to heal effectively, or what plans they have to make that possible again at higher levels the way it was at 75.

LOLPLD!!!!

[Olor]

Also....

DO NOT: Make this odin-like ability require the use of call beast (especially with an expensive jug). I don't consider being asked to have no pet for up to 5 minutes so I can buff a party an increase in utility. If SE wants to do this, they either need to give us another way to call a pet other than jugs (see my request to have a free pet) - or they need to make this new ability usable while we have a pet out. I don't want to have to nuke my 14K dipper jug pet so I can use some lame ability (yes odin using the smn's two-hour is lame).

Replacing familiar with a buff on a two hour timer would also be sucky. Don't do it.

[Tsukino_Kaji]

I'll all for more steal.

[Ziyyigo-Tipyigo]

Look, I think we're missing something here. Take the manifesto in its entirety. Look at the pictures.

These adjustments and changes are intend to balance out players who each already have two or three empyrean weapons to their name. They're not for the masses.

If you can't manage at least one empyrean weapon, these aren't intended for you. Go level a useful job, n00b.

[Leonlionheart]

Look, I think we're missing something here. Take the manifesto in its entirety. Look at the pictures.

These adjustments and changes are intend to balance out players who each already have two or three empyrean weapons to their name. They're not for the masses.

If you can't manage at least one empyrean weapon, these aren't intended for you. Go level a useful job, n00b.

In that case these job adjustments are for the severely mentally handicapped, as there is NO SITUATION where you should be using 5/5 AF3+2 for anything on any job other than MNK, BLM, and SMN.

[Leonlionheart]

:[ I was going to post something about emo DRKs being more emo, but I couldn't think of anything clever.

QQ

[Khiinroye]

The ability to change the damage type of a weapon is by far the strongest example ability, being a 25-50% boost to damage on many mob types. Since warrior is already at the top of the DD food chain, implementing that would be devastating to all the other DD jobs.

The example DRK abilities are terrible. Lowering tp gain is a bad thing, and taking more damage to deal more damage with elemental weaponskills is by far the worst of all of them.