On Red Mage melee...

[Hyrist]

How about a Slew of Job Traits/Spells that enhance their Close-Range aspect?

I like where you go with this for some of it, but I think we should really sit and decide if we want to go buffing or debuffing with this.

Buffing steps on Aura which I'm not sure we'll get, but, if they support the idea of an Aura Spell JA, I suppose this can work to, in which case, buffing Enspells are a go.

Examples of a full Enspell Buffset:

Fire - Attack or Double Attack
Water - Magic Resistance or MDB
Thunder - Accuracy or Critical Hit Rate/Damage
Stone - Defense or Physical Damage Taken %
Aero - Evasion or Subtle Blow
Blizzard - Magical Accuracy or Magic Attack Bonus

For the Debuff Route
Fire - Magic Defense Down or Magic Accuracy Down
Water Attack Down or Physical Damage Down (%)
Thunder - Magic Resistance Down/Magical Damage Received +%
Stone - Accuracy Down or Enemy Critical Rate down
Aero - Defense Down, Physical Damage received +%
Blizzard - Evasion down, Critical Hit rate received +%

There's some of my ideas as status effects that would be good as a debuff or buff for enspells, but I think we really should just stick to one line or the other.

I don't think we should receive any further melee traits as far as melee goes, aside from scaling adjustments on the amount of accuracy we receive with Composure. (perhaps maybe +20-25 by level 99) This is mainly keeping in mind what we could do with our en-spells.

Another route about this is listed on the mage section. The "Aura" spell JA I mentioned there earlier could be paired with more melee buffs that could benefit us as well. That might lower the threshold of what sort of performance threshold we might additionally need to get utility wise for to justify expanding our Melee capable areas and solidifying the ones we can melee at more.

[Seriha]

Kay. Again i say though, Maybe seri mentioned it in this post, but I haven't seen a single good suggestion come out of this thread in dozens of pages.

Can't say I blame you for missing things, not that much has been said lately aside from the rhetoric. Bluntly, a lot of the ideas probably got tapped out earlier in the thread. More of my initial postings covered the collective issues plaguing the job. Some things people have brought have been from left field. Others are building on what's been established, either on RDM itself (like doing more with Enspells) or referencing things other jobs do and giving it a RDM twist.

While I have read the magic thread, I haven't hopped in yet for a couple reasons. First was to ultimately see what may come of it early on. Second was a mix of RL activities splitting my focus. That said, I've long since been for a tiered trait to extend enhancing magic durations, not so much potencies with nudging the RDM into doing a little more for it. Debuffs were also brought up in a similar manner. Here and elsewhere I've said that I never want Haste II to hit RDM as a spell. I can understand the benefit of it, yes, but individually it puts a strain on the direction I've been shooting for on the job.

When I say things like melee can be integrated into improved enhancing and enfeebling, it takes me back to an old idea I had shortly after the WHM update where we found their cures could later apply to divine magic potency. My spin on it was pretty simple, taking one of two stances, landing an enspell builds toward a pool of points you can use to tap into various spells depending on the stance you chose. The offensive flavor would highlight nukes and debuffs while the defensive would improve the potency and durations of buffs. I fully intended for this to grow with us as we leveled, the beginning iterations showing up around level 30, the second at 50, and the third at 70. Now that we're beyond that, though, the numbers I'd initially conceptualized could be tweaked to include level 90 or beyond. In either case, the max level of application could allow for a 20% Haste spell that'd last 6 minutes without gear/composure or a nuke rivaling that of staves in both accuracy and damage. The only complaints I ever received on this concept? The back wouldn't benefit. Tough.

As is, the above would take nothing away from the RDM of now. I'm not really interested in taking away from the mage side of things, either, outside of frequently cited exploits that over-exaggerate power. Once we flesh out our T4 nukes, I'd pretty much call us done on basic black magic for a 99 cap. People still baww over Cure V, but like a Haste II, I don't want it because it risks repeating our days prior to Abyssea. I can acknowledge the need for some kind of curative supplement, however, and instead favor that approach to lie in either enhanced damage mitigation (like a literal -DT% spell) or a more potent regen that can act as a steady stream of cure 2s or 3s depending on the last damage you'd received. It allows a greater synergy with other healing jobs, where I'm sure we've all too commonly seen wasted MP spent on cures trying to save a damaged party member.

Enfeebling is still a pretty big open book, though. We've even had a thread on it devoted specifically. Looking around to other jobs, it's not hard to see BLU has a wider variety of debuffs, though, some we don't have access to while others can inflict multiple at once (both in terms of number of debuffs and targets) or even do damage on top. I'm more than aware that BLUs aren't typically called up for this role, but that's for reasons similar to RDM's own debuffs often either not being "needed" or having difficulty landing for their intended effect. Regardless, one of the more popular spells that came up during that thread was one that could literally adjust the target's level. From the statistical standpoint, you could easily call it a universal stat down. The big bonus, though, and something that other debuffs just don't do right now, is actually step into the level correction side of various formula. Another possible bonus in manipulating a monster's level is that it could also inhibit the use of certain TP moves, such as if a mob like Apadamak managed to level up, we'd have a means to counter its access to Fulmination beyond stuns. More passively, bumping a THF mob down so it couldn't have Evasion Bonus V or something would help every physical DD trying to land swings.

In the end, though, it's all about MP. Yes, RDM is a job that boasts a high personal longevity, but all that can go to crap if you're put in a situation where your party members aren't up to speed. We know the back has its advantages, and among them is better MP regeneration. Anyone who's ever been in these taxing situations knows that trying to swing on top would be suicide. This isn't every situation, though. Sometimes our party layouts can allow for more freedoms. Those with solid skills would have no difficulty keeping things running smoothly. It is in these situations where if something can be gained by stepping up, a good RDM should. We're just in the predicament where that kind of "good RDM" doesn't exist in enough commonality for people to have faith. And yes, I place that issue solely in SE's hands because numbers inspire opinions, not the other way around. We can change our opinions, but we can't change the numbers.

[cidbahamut]

I don't know of any, but then I haven't been able to find reliable data on most mobs' stats.

Regardless, to say that locking those slots only affects nuking damage and cure potency is still false.

[Hyrist]

This is incorrect. Your PDT, MDT and max MND sets all take a significant hit by locking down those slots.

Now I know you don't pay attention.

1. DMnd is reached on vast majority of fodder mobs before even touching main/sub slots, it's the exact same argument as for staves.

2. RDM at this point is a minimum hate job, which means your arguments for PDT and MDT are reduced to monsters who AoE a significant amount of damage. Read the full post, I regard this issue when it comes to monsters who can deliver a truck ton of AoE damage. (as in for, if it can, you're likely not going to melee it anyways. Thus, it's overkill just like elemental staves for M.Acc.)

I mean, add them to your personal list if you want to nitpick THAT much. But they're just as moot if not more in the described situations. At least Cure Potency and Nuking damage have a clear, measurable contribution increase even in fast fights. Hitting a vague stat cap on a potency that may or may not even see it's full effect put to use in the fight is not, especially for quick fights.

And if you TRULY wish to nitpick, NOTHING prevents you from taking the hit in TP gain to swap into a PDT MDT or Full MND set, or any other weapon combination if you feel it's worth the loss. That is entirely up to your discretion.

[Greatguardian]

1) You're currently the only Rdm Melee advocate talking about making Rdmelee viable on fodder mobs. This is probably because everyone else here knows that it already is. No one gives a flying crap about fodder mobs.

2) Seriously? Red Mage? Minimum hate job? Christ, I'm hard pressed to find a time when I'm not capping Enmity on Red Mage on anything alive more than 60 seconds. The only thing I'm actually macroing Enmity- into is Cures, and those are hardly the bulk of my casting.

Some of you guys really make me feel like your disgust for Magical Red Mage stems from the fact that you literally just sit there and Haste, Refresh, and Cure over and over. I know Duelle seems to refer to anything non-melee as "Cure botting" or "Refresh/Haste spamming like a robot". This rendition of "Red Mage" is absolutely nothing like the Red Mage that myself, that Aurara, that Eek, that Cid, that Karbuncle, and that every other high-end Magical Red Mage in here knows how to play.

[Supersun]

He's not the only one that believes that Rdm should be able to melee on non HNM mobs. "Melee Fodder, Magic Bosses" Has been a fairly common motto for a while now.

The issue is that for fodder, and by fodder here I mean non HNM level stuff, a good portion of our arsenal is rendered unnecessary. As long as you have that white mage all of our defensive spells, especially all our our non Dia III enfeebles, don't mean jack ****.

You might say that you are lightening the white mages MP load, but be realistic. If your defensive spells are really going to be the difference between victory and defeat I can guarantee you that you have bigger issues with your set-up.

I mean list the spells that you will realistically use to actually contribute to the offensive side of things. Haste, Refresh, Dia III? I missing anything? Maybe dumping some nukes before a convert? Sure if you are in abyssea nuking might be viable, but outside where even Blms are laughed at as a DD until they fix nukes outrageous MP cost melee is infinitely more efficient then nuking.

I know how to play the never stop casting game. I also know that besides the Haste/Refresh botting 99% of that game is completely pointless on 99% of mobs because it's pretty much all defensive in nature on monsters that you would almost have to try to die on if you have a whm.

Also, everyone can easily cap enmity in under 60 secs in abyssea.

Edit: Did you really just say that Haste Samba is better then the spell haste. 15 > 10 and spell haste > JA haste until it's actually possible to cap spell haste outside of soul voice.

Seriously, Drks would like a word with you if you think JA haste is better. Probably misread what you meant though.

[Greatguardian]

Magic Haste is so unbelievably hard to find. I mean, like, there's totally never going to be anyone else capable of casting magical Haste around when a Red Mage is on the front lines meleeing with only basic support spells. 10% JA Haste is infinitely better than a redundant 15% Magic Haste in any scenario where someone else is perfectly capable of giving people Haste spell. I don't see anyone here at all advocating a 5 DD + 1 RdMelee setup where the RdMelee is only doing backup heals with a severely reduced spell load.

Same reason Summoner's Hastega is only good for conserving MP.

Honestly, I think you highly underestimate Red Mage's nuking and situational control capabilities. It doesn't require Abyssean demigod-mode in order to be decent. We've had this conversation before, and the only thing that came of it was it becoming abundantly clear who had the better nuke set.

Calling the difference between Slow 1 and Slow 2 negligible is ignorant at best. Slow eliminates entire potential attack rounds, and significantly decreases potential damage taken over time. Am I going to really stress over Slow2'ing every monster in an EXP scenario where things die in 10 seconds? Naw. But if I'm fighting a low-end NM, or an IT monster, is it worth the time and MP to cast? Definitely.

Finally, is it that hard to grasp the concept that Red Mage is already a viable melee on total crap fodder mobs that nobody cares about? When a Rdm has gear that isn't complete and utter crap, they can DD circles around Pickup Gimps (Doom proved this). You don't need to adjust Red Mage to make melee'ing viable on fodder because it already is. It simply isn't viable on anything above EM-T level. We've only said that a few dozen times now.

Edit: Dark Knight is the only job in the game that can cap JA Haste. They are unbelievably broken from a Haste perspective and have nothing to complain about in that department. Don't confuse the whining of the craptastic masses who are only concerned about their lack of Critical Hit WS in Abyssea because they're too crap tier to ever move beyond easy-mode content with the legitimate problems that the Dark Knight job faces (Yes, it has some. Haste isn't one of them.)

[TybudX]

The issue is that for fodder, and by fodder here I mean non HNM level stuff, a good portion of our arsenal is rendered unnecessary. As long as you have that white mage all of our defensive spells, especially all our our non Dia III enfeebles, don't mean jack ****.

Let me get this straight, you want RDM melee to be good enough that they will be invited to a party when similar buffs/debuffs are already present?

...

I'm not going to explain why people are laughing at you. You are using the exact same logic as Dallas as to why he thinks melee SMN is teh awesum.

If you want to go into specifics, RDM was a generalist, and as such mediocre at everything. That didn't fly and will never fly in the MMO context because generalists tend to suffer horrible fates in being excluded from meaningful content or relegated to a function that was both menial and ridiculously far away from what the players wanted out of the class when they rolled it. Since the generalist approach doesn't translate well into MMOs, pieces of the hybrid have to be adjusted to make it work.

You are absolutely correct. I'm pretty sure this is why SE made RDM extremely good at everything... except melee. Also, not quoting one of your posts again, but because you repeatedly bring it up:

Stop insinuating that RDMs were only capable of soloing because of cheesy tactics and oversight in game design. RDMs are/were good/better at soloing (than other jobs) because of Fast Cast, and to a lesser extent Enspells, and because of access to a wide variety of gear. Referring to solos that are possible because somebody has movement speed (not job specific) and a DoT spell or JA (anybody with a support job) as part of your argument makes you sound like you have never actually played RDM before, at least not in anything close to it's full capacity.

I'm going to sit and thow this back at you. Because this is the topic for discussion since the beginning, and instead of contributing your idea as to what would, you've been trying to knock down everyone elses.

Speaking in the general sense, and as somebody who doesn't typically say things like "I told you so". I got into an argument about RDM melee a few years back on the Alla forums and suggested that Quick Magic (like in T.O., Conserve RT or some such) would probably be the biggest improvement RDM could get for it's melee improvement due to it being an outright % increase in available TP phase time. I even showed math for it. Of course, not being an outright increase in att/acc/enspells/ja:sordzaretehawsum, I got rated into the ground. The pro-RDM melee crowd can go *** themselves if people like you are the best they have to show for themselves.

[Supersun]

The issue is that for fodder, and by fodder here I mean non HNM level stuff, a good portion of our arsenal is rendered unnecessary. As long as you have that white mage all of our defensive spells, especially all our our non Dia III enfeebles, don't mean jack ****.

Let me get this straight, you want RDM melee to be good enough that they will be invited to a party when similar buffs/debuffs are already present?

...

I'm not going to explain why people are laughing at you. You are using the exact same logic as Dallas as to why he thinks melee SMN is teh awesum.

That's a hell of a stretch to make a conclusion...

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Is slow II worth the time and the MP to cast on low end monsters? That entirely depends on efficiency. Sure, it'll cut down on DoT that the party takes, but if the party is in no risk of dying why would you waste time and MP on something that won't help you kill faster. I mean at that point all you are really doing is lowering the chance of one of your DDs to counter the monster.

Can Rdm outmelee a bunch of gimps on fodder? Well, yeah, so can just about every other job. The issue is that equally geared Whms and Brds can out DD a Rdm as well. Solo potential or not.Rdm shouldn't be offensively weaker then a whm. I'm not sure how this doesn't concern you since I remember reading in voidwatch how part of your spectrum enhancement is related to how much damage you do on a proc iirc.

Seriously at minimum there shouldn't be a problem with SE changing 5 lines of code to fix simple things that never should of happened in the first place to actually give Rdm enough DD potential to beat a Brd that will especially help Rdms on the lower end of the gear spectrum.

[Hyrist]

Guardian's already expressed his opinion and he's fine for it. We're never going to convince each other of the stance and attempting to do so detracts away from the point of the thread. Please find another thread to argue your points at Great, they'll find no reception here, where the concepts to discuss the tie ins that would make it more functional in the front lines are being made.

I stoutly do not believe the solution to the problem of RDM's frontline performance is leveling another job. I level another job to play that job on it's own merits, merits that fit with it's archtype. And I am far from alone in this sentiment as illustrated by many here.

"Melee Fodder, Magic Bosses" has been a mantra of Red Mages since pretty much it's inception in FF1. And it's a subject you cannot simply shout down by having the more stubborn opinion. SE would be doing a disservice to a good number of it's RDM player-base if it ignores it completely, although, I will acknowledge that it would be a disservice to a greater number if it were to outwardly harm it's magical capabilities as a trade off. But there is NOTHING stating that you must melee, which, given the MMO common wisdom of Minmaxing even a generalist job, is what leads to the opinion that you 'shouldn't'.