To the devs!

[Mageoholic]

It shouldn't even be a merit, it should be a scroll, just like the rest our lulzy bunch of group 2 options. None of them should be merits, they should have been scrolls in the 50-75 region.

[Daniel_Hatcher]

It shouldn't even be a merit, it should be a scroll, just like the rest our lulzy bunch of group 2 options. None of them should be merits, they should have been scrolls in the 50-75 region.

True enough.

[Neisan_Quetz]

If I didn't have to butcher my merits for VW I'd have kept 5/5 Phalanx II, it's better than bio/blind/Para2 above 1 imo. It's tied to Phalanx 1 at 5/5 but loses at every tier under 5/5, that isn't right for a Tier 2 merit compared to a spell you get at level 33. If it's going to be that terrible, turn them all into scrolls and give us better merit categories.

[tyrantsyn]

True, I just wish them damn spell work right.

[TRiPP]

I've noticed that there's a couple of people out there that seem to think you're a troll when you disagree with them. On a side note... who the hell is RCD? I mean, what does it stand for?

I do have to say that I do enjoy how each side takes it to the extreme... It makes me lol.

"HUH WUT U WANT MOR MAGEY STUFF? WELL IM SORY THAT U DNT HAVE EVERY MAGE EQUIPMENT IN THE GAME, OR EVERY MAGE SPELL IN THE GAME. OUR MAGIC IS FINE JUST TEH WAY IT ESS. WE CAN OUTPOWER BLMS AND MAKE BLUS LOOK LIKE WHM WHEN IT COMES TO NUKEZ, LULZ. CURING POWRZ WHO NEEDZ A WHM LULZ, WE CAN HIT THE 150% CURE CAP."
(Yes, that is how you come across to others. I know it's a 50% Cure Cap. Just pointing out how it's coming across as.)

Then there's the other side of the spectrum.
"HUHZ U WANT 2 HIT LIKE A WARRIOR WITH ALL YOUR TP GEAR AND MELEE THINGS?! Y U NO LEVEL WARRIOZ THEN AND LEAVE US WITH OUR MAGE THINGS. WHO CURZ IF U HAS AN ALAMCE. Y U NO GO UKKOS A MOB ON RDM HUHHUH?"
(Again, this is how each side views each other basically, probably a little less intelligent than how I posted it.)

Be more civil with each other. This is like a bad marriage. That means knock it off with the blisting. It's not cute, it doesn't prove anything if anything you just end up making the other guy feel like he's/she's right in what they said. You're man enough to claim this, then be man enough to pull through with it. You can't simply just be "oh well u disagree wit me u must be troll D:< i blist u". At this point, I'm just waiting to get blisted for simply saying "Sup?"

In short, if someone disagrees with you, it's not trolling, perhaps they may not know better and they're going by eyeballing. Hence it's up to you to prove otherwise, and remember, just like yourself if you're going around blisting people on a whim, they may not be fast learners, but they will understand eventually.

As for gears which is primarily a big thing now a days specifically. Remember just because you're lucky enough to have an LS that's willing to put up with your crap to get you an Almace for Red Mage, it doesn't mean that the rest of us have something like that. No, it's not having it handed to us, before someone goes about "OH U WANT IT HANDED 2 U HUHZ? I HAD TO WORK A WHOLE DAY TO GET MY ALMACE, IF I CANZ DO IT U CANZ 2 O THE HORROR OF HAVING TO SIT BACK AND KEY WHILE THE ALLIANCE DOES EVERYTHING." I don't care if you duo'd it, trio'd it, allianced it, flew it in on a truck. Point remains, not all of us are that lucky to have a partner, or duo box, or have an LS to help us when we feel like going on a whim. If only, right?

However, there are a few people who have actually proven things correctly without looking like the other side is taking it to the extreme. (View examples above.) So the question is this, which one are you?

(Also, lol @ the people who are going to blist me after this.) I can just see a few of you with your monocles and your jaw drapping and speaking out "MY WORD, THIS FELLOW REALLY RUFFLES MY JIMMIES."

Conclusion. Ya'll need marriage counselling.

Stay away from dem fractals ya'll.

[tyrantsyn]

Only the Dev's can save us from raging over one another.

We need Susan Sarandon to come in a a do a psa for us. Before we all Troll ourselves to death

[TRiPP]

Despite it looking very trollish, very trollish indeed. I'm not actually trolling that much I can tell you. I'm just putting it in that sense because that's how everyone else's remarks look like to me. Some sort of pissing contest between mage and melee.

Although, I honestly do believe that some people need to research what troll/trolling actually means. I think some just go to google and click on images and type in troll. So they imagine Shrek on the other side of the computer.

Although, I know after posting that, I definitely will get blisted, just because it would be against people's ethics to not blist someone who points things out, or disagrees with them. It's the easy way out button to be honest. "Don't want to confront your problems? Black list them. Someone disagree with you? Black list them. Detect sarcasm in their text? Black list them." The list goes on. I'm not stating names, but there are some major offenders.

All you do when you blist is, you show that you're an elitist, that's all there is to it.
"You disagree with my point, you're obviously a horrible player, I am better than you." Is all that gets stamped on your forehead.

When I say find a common ground, I don't mean something as vague as "We need buffs that's our common ground." I mean be specific, find something that we can all agree on that needs to be buffed. That's what we should do, we find one common ground that needs to be buffed and we go from there.

Melee is decent as it is, sure we just need one TP body, but is that it? I mean, you're neglecting everything else for just a TP body? That it? When resources can be placed in other parts of Red Mage that truly need them? Yes, I agree that we need more sword weapon skills. This is what it just seems like the melee enthusiasts are fighting about. What you want your epeenmace to dispense brews that can be used inside and outside of abyssea?

Remember this, you're a Red Mage. You're a mage first and foremost. You're not a Warrior, you're not a Samurai. You're a Mage first and foremost. Yes, you can melee, but not as efficiently as other jobs.
Blue Mages can use swords, and they can fight, yashure. Your point? None, because they deal the majority of their damage via Blue magic. Don't expect to see a Blue Mage pull out a 7K WS, expect it with their magic.

I'm not against a bit of a melee boost for Red Mage, however with that in mind remember we're mages first, and everything else second. I understand that for either side that gets boosted, the other side needs a boost as well to comply with both spectrums. However, put this into consideration, how would you feel as another job if you saw a whole update to just Red Mage?
"This update we're going to focus mainly on Red Mage. We're giving you native Vorpal Blade, several TP bodies, several pieces of equipment that you can focus on either spectrum of the job. To the mage spectrum we're going to add these spells; <insert x amount of spells here.>" Imagine how salty the other jobs would feel? Specially since we just finally got rid of most of the White Mages that came here and objected to us getting Cure V, because they feel as if suddenly the world would shatter if that were to occur.

Yeah, I get it... It's occurring to us right now. However, we don't know what SE is planning or what they're going to do. How salty do you think a Warrior would feel if suddenly we ranked them in damage? Pretty damn salty. ( I know that some of you are going to state "But we don't want to be as strong as Warrior, we just want a small boost.") Well, it doesn't work that way, and small boost that we get, we'll have an outcry from several jobs that we're overpowered and that suddenly their seat has been nabbed from under them. Kind of how we feel right now.

I'm not saying let's place trust in SE, because as we've seen time and time again they're made fools of us all.
I'm just saying let's get under one banner that we all desire to see fixed and propose that. While it will go unheard for a while, eventually the devs will realize "Well, they're not being childish anymore." We need one thing to be fixed, and then we can continue with the rest. That's what I mean by find a common ground.

[Daniel_Hatcher]

Big wall of crap.

How.... fascinating.

[TRiPP]

I'd make a suggestion, but I'm sure that it would be either taken out of context, or simply disagree'd upon. I'd say let's choose someone to be the Red Mage representative. One that can convey the thoughts to the Devs. So that it gets heard loud and clear. However, it's tedious and annoying and possibly a lot of work, and not to mention who here doesn't really have a secret agenda as to what they want Red Mage to be? We need someone who'll look out for the best interest for Red Mage all around, and not one that'll just simply focus on one aspect because they do it on their down time. There's obviously something else I want to say. (As you've all gathered, I don't really make one liner posts.) However, that's just taking it to a personal level.

[ManaKing]

I'd make a suggestion, but I'm sure that it would be either taken out of context, or simply disagree'd upon. I'd say let's choose someone to be the Red Mage representative. One that can convey the thoughts to the Devs. So that it gets heard loud and clear. However, it's tedious and annoying and possibly a lot of work, and not to mention who here doesn't really have a secret agenda as to what they want Red Mage to be? We need someone who'll look out for the best interest for Red Mage all around, and not one that'll just simply focus on one aspect because they do it on their down time. There's obviously something else I want to say. (As you've all gathered, I don't really make one liner posts.) However, that's just taking it to a personal level.

My secret agenda is that I want RDM to be good. You figured out my secret.

I'm sorry for our collective lack of apathy, but we've been doing this for awhile. A lot has been talked about and Devs haven't done much at all...ever...to RDM. If you want to go back and read through 'On RDM melee' (http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/th...Red-Mage-melee...) you'll find 150 pages of us discussing ideas and raising hell. That is only 1 thread, there are 7 total pages on RDM forums right now. There has been plenty of discussion and plenty of feedback. If you want to discuss something specific, then start a thread and make it clear what you want discussed. There is no magic way to petition Devs or affect change other than bringing up what you are personally concerned with.

As you've seen, organizing RDMs makes them fight like demons. You're essential doomed from the start if you think we will elect a representative in a democratic manner to represent the republic of RDM.


ALSO, if everyone would please stop saying that RDM is a Mage first and foremost. We aren't first at anything. We are second at everything and in many cases marginalized to much worse than that. The only thing we are actually even 2nd best in the game at is toughness, right behind PLD. We aren't the 2nd best healer, nuker, or melee. I'm in no way speaking to the idealism that we all hold to be true, but the actuality that you have been given in game by our Dev Team.

A RDM is a composite job that was given enough diversity to allow it to create additional game play elements like kiting solos and TP-less melee with ceremonial daggers. That diversity was pruned off by the Dev team and was left in the horrible state it is today. Our Enfeebling was torn to shreds and that was our only A rank Skill. The only realistic action we should be taking is continuing to tell the Dev team they are doing it wrong and they still have work to do. I have almost no faith in their ability to properly fix Enfeebles so that RDM is desirable at all, even though that is all they have to do to pull RDM out of the gutter.

It's not like I don't still love playing RDM, but I don't love playing it in real groups because it has nothing to contribute against higher difficulty NMs. If you think your RDM is contributing, just realize every other job doesn't share your opinion. You just aren't good enough by design and you bring nothing unique or significant to the table that can't easily be eclipsed by another job.