How about an Enfeebling Magic thread?

[CapriciousOne]

At this point, most of Red Mage's problems (and more relevant to this thread, defensive enfeebles, and other enhancing based moves) would be solved when they fix the merits.

It would be very easy for them. First remove Phalanx II as a spell. Then replace it with a merit that gives Red Mage a job trait that allows casting most buffs on other party members when under the effects of Composure. This would include Barspells, Aquaviel, Stoneskin, Blink, Phalanx, the Gain-STAT family of spells (but not Temper), and the spikes spells. It could also potentially include Reraise. Additional merits would increase the duration of spells, up to 50% (If I'm doing the math right, its multiplicative with the RDM AF3 gear, which means duration would be increased three fold with the full set, or at least that's the goal).

I know its slightly veering off topic, but that would also help Red Mage when it comes time to give out more defensive enfeebles.

Seriously why you messing with my spell. I agree it shouldn't be a merit but removing this spell completely is bs. Well that is how it sounds per your wording. Hopefully you meant converting Phalanx II to an actual spell not completely removing it. If you want to do all that other stuff most of it is just taken care of by say...um... playing WHM?! OR /SCH and accession or whatever. On the other hand I guess it wouldn't make a difference to me if those spells were allowed because I dont main heal like ever but why add more crap to a rdm spell cycle for which you know everybody will be begging?

[Daniel_Hatcher]

Seriously why you messing with my spell. I agree it shouldn't be a merit but removing this spell completely is bs. Well that is how it sounds per your wording. Hopefully you meant converting Phalanx II to an actual spell not completely removing it. If you want to do all that other stuff most of it is just taken care of by say...um... playing WHM?! OR /SCH and accession or whatever. On the other hand I guess it wouldn't make a difference to me if those spells were allowed because I dont main heal like ever but why add more crap to a rdm spell cycle for which you know everybody will be begging?

I don't like cycles, but I would so merit it if they did a merit to increase duration of enhancing spells by 10% per level, so 50% at 5.

[Economizer]

Seriously why you messing with my spell. I agree it shouldn't be a merit but removing this spell completely is bs. Well that is how it sounds per your wording.

I don't see how it is BS in any logical way.

Phalanx 2, even with full merits, has less potency then Phalanx. So the solution is very simple - remove Phalanx 2, and make a way to cast it, and other spells, on others with increased duration.

Now, I don't actually think Enspells and Temper should be castable on others in any circumstances. Also, spells like Aquaveil, Stoneskin, Blink wouldn't be worth cycling on a whole party, and hardly worth casting on the tank. Phalanx already has a cyclable version with Phalanx 2, so the change would only be increasing the potency and duration (based on the change I suggested).

That would just give Barspells and the Gain Spells as the new things to cycle. As pointed out, if casting the near instant cast Barspells on everyone is too hard a hassle, you could just sub White Mage, or get a White Mage.

Since any good White Mage would just sub Scholar and get the same boosts to Gain/Boost spells as a Red Mage, you could just rely on a White Mage for this if you really don't want to cycle, but it makes it so you don't have to. Additionally, your duration would be greatly increased (Gain spells last 5 minutes currently, with the maximum between gear and full merits, you'd get 15 minutes), and unlike a White Mage, you'd have a much easier time of customizing which Gain spell each party member gets.

Or if you want to mix and match, the Red Mage version doesn't get overwritten, so if for example, one person needs Gain-DEX, and the rest need Boost-STR, you just made the party work that much better. This also applies to barspells, like if a mob has a single target air based move, and an AOE water based move, you could have the tank get Baraero, and the rest get Barwatera.

So basically, you'd just have a merit that increases duration on all your spells, makes Phalanx better, increases the ability of Red Mage's, at the cost of only really adding one more spell line you will possibly be asked to cycle. There is no BS here.

It's what I've been saying for ages. Make all the "merit" spells available via NPC vender and change the merits into "potency / accuracy" merits. Slow II becomes "Slow Potency", Dia III becoms "Dia Potency" and so forth. This way you still get all your spells but also maintain the ability to pimp them out. Currently SE can't create "Tier III" enfeebles or a Dia IV due to the merit spells existing the way they are. It's become such a hindrance that they making lol spells like Break / Addle that mostly do nothing.

It is what everyone has been saying more or less. It would greatly improve the merit categories too, since you wouldn't have to merit one point in things just to get a spell. I hope that when SE changes this, they make all the spells appear at a vendor, but give all Red Mages with merits the spells automatically.