New Red Mage Spells

[Economizer]

Now you say all this but it goes back to a simple fact, RDM gets little use in endgame outside of Chainspell Stun at this point.

Summoner's new 2hour will allow it to chainstun AoE with Ramuh's Shock Squall right?

Whm's can have a Refresh Idle set and sub Rdm for refresh and convert.

Hey look it's this mistruth again!

Good White Mages don't sub Red Mage unless you need something else Red Mage can do like Gravity or easier Dispel access. Scholar sub has more benefits including MP management on par or better then /RDM.

And if White Mages couldn't manage MP without an outside Refresh source, people would just bring White Mage + Bard, or Scholars instead of both.

There is a sizable gap between jobs that can cast Cure IV natively and those that cannot. There is not a sizable gap between being able to cast Cure IV and Cure V/VI in the vast majority of situations, but there is much bigger gap between being able to cast Cure IV and being able to case Curaga spells. I contend that at this point SE could delete Cure V/VI (and at any point SE could have deleted or never made Cure VI and not a single good White Mage would be affected in a major way, the spell sucks) and White Mage would still be fairly effective due to Curaga spells (and Afflatus Solace allowing them to barely keep up with Scholar's weather advantage).

If you're not one of the best DD, you're not wanted; if you're not the best healer, you're not wanted.

Healing doesn't work the same way, healing works with the bare minimum to get by - then you prioritize anything that ends the fight quicker. The problem isn't that White Mage is better at healing since there are many fights you can just get by with Cure IV and no Cure V/VI or Curaga spells, the problem is either that you can get by with subjob healing in those cases, or that another job that can heal is better at ending the fight quicker in some way. I'd bet it is usually the second one as well.

Since Scholar can heal (and heal better) and end the fight quicker then Red Mage, what Red Mage needs in order to be selected for parties is to be able to end fights quicker then Scholar (somehow I doubt White Mages end fights, where either are adequate to heal, quicker then Red Mages between enfeebles and nukes). There are a few ways you can do this, either increase Red Mage's direct DD compared to Scholar (unlikely between skillchaining nukes and being able to cast tier V spells), or increase Red Mage's buffing ability compared to Scholar (unlikely if 2hours are used; test server testing of RDM's new 2hour indicates against this as well), or increase Red Mage's enfeebling ability compared to Scholar.

I think it is way more likely that Red Mage will become better at ending a fight in comparison to Scholar or even White Mage then it is that Red Mage will become better at healing in relation to its current ability. The only way I could see a major change in this standing (so basically, not talking about Red Mage getting Regen III and maybe even IV like it should get) would be for either Afflatus Solace or Aurorastorm to be subjob useable (if either is to happen, both should happen to retain some parity, but any of these is unlikely).

Hopefully this lengthy explanation helps dispel the ever popular myth about the job, but for anyone wanting an abbreviated soundbite - Red Mage falls short never because of specialists, but because of stanced hybrid jobs like Scholar and Blue Mage that fill the niches Red Mage would fill otherwise while being better at the roles Red Mage does.

Fearing that rdm would steal Whm place they seem intent on never ever giving rdm access to AOE enhancment, even to the point where they willing to waste spell spots just so rdm can get self only spell's,

So stupid. Even if they didn't want Red Mage to get the same spell effects they could have at least given them both the same spells then given White Mage a job trait that makes the buffs AoE to save spell slots. It isn't even like the Protect line where you can cast them on other people (which has obvious tactical uses).

Like many others I'm not sure I really agree with SE on this one, and it even makes me question the reasoning behind barspells a bit too.

Number 2 would be having to use a magian staff to do decent nuking damage. This is pretty annoying when you're meleeing. I still don't understand why there were no sword versions added with similar stats as the staves..

Kinda maybe pushes the idea of a high level (90+) "Chatoyant" Shield of shorts, doesn't it? You'd be giving up Dual Wielding, but you'd be gaining magic damage. It would be a logical tradeoff. It would also make the Enspell tier II make a tiny bit more sense, especially if they got the benefit off of magic affinity that nukes do.

Such a universal affinity shield might drop stats like cure potency and stat boosts in exchange for an Occult Acumen stat or a stat similar to that that works with all spells as well, thus making it a very nice tradeoff with Dual Wield. The shield could even be limited to jobs that use shields like PLD/RDM/WHM (and maybe BST/THF/WAR) if it would be too powerful in the hands of BLU/BLM/SCH/SMN for example.