Quote Originally Posted by Koren View Post
They said GEO will be like BRD and COR so we're probably looking at 2, maybe 3 spheres with certain gear. So 2 debuffs, or 2 buffs or one of each is not so overpowering compared to jobs that can cast all their spells. Not to mention, unless these spheres have ridiculously huge ranges, GEO had better be pretty hardy or their spheres will be limited to mage buffs to keep out of range of danger.

The reason RDM is played less is because everyone have a plethora of jobs at disposal. When we only had one or 2 jobs to use, RDM had an advantage. If there was no healer the RDM could perform their duties reasonably. No tank, and RDM could do a decent job. If for some bizarre reason there were no DD, a RDM could also perform this role. Now everyone has a job for a particular role. Too many DD? Almost all of them have at least one mage in their job list leveled and geared. Practically no one is WHM only or WAR only anymore. In a game where players focus on efficiency, hybrid jobs like RDM which are designed to fill any role are left behind. Would you pick a RDM when you could have them switch to WHM when you need a designated healer? You wouldn't want to pick a perle WAR over a Empy WAR either.

There is nothing fundamentally wrong with RDM, when you look at it compared to other jobs, RDM is really quite powerful. But there are no events tailored to benefit a RDM. Fights are too short to really benefit from enhancing or enfeebling spells. Temp items are actually cutting down our need for healers. Each fight is isolated and people can go change jobs to benefit most from a battles weakness. One fight is magic resistant? Change to DD and zerg it down. Next battle is physical resistant? Everyone change to mage jobs and burn it down. Dangerous AoE moves next? Switch to 2-3 DD and buff the hell out of them and everyone else hit it from a distance or heal.

If you had an event that was built for the benefit of hybrid jobs things would turn around. Say a 1 party series of 3 battles. The monsters come one at a time but each monster will randomly be immune to all damage except either elemental/dark magic, melee, ranged, or holy/healing. You could get 3 melee weak mobs or one magic, one ranged and one healing weak mob. You can't warp out to change jobs or you have to start all over again with quite possibly a different set of 3 mobs. Suddenly hybrids are not looking so bad anymore compared to a WAR or a BLM who have a 1/4 chance of having use per fight.
Well said.