On Red Mage melee...

[Datola]

I know i kinda browsed through this forum after page 3 or 4 but an Idea I've kinda always kept to myself is a Job Trait or Better yet Job Ability that we can activate and while Enspell active our Enhancing Spell Duration is x1.5 or better yet x2 and after an Enhancing Spell is cast we gain a fraction of MP split in to 1/2 given to Atk and Acc so haste which I cannot remember the MP amount atm for this Example will be 40mp when said ability is active we'll expend 40 mp but in a sense we get 1/2 back in the form of 10Atk and 10 Acc effects from enhancing magic last per spell so you can cast a few enhancing spells but the same spell will not grant you a bonus and effect last as long as ability. So Said Ability is 5 Min Duration Recast 1Min you cast 3 - 4 different Enhancing spells totaling 120MP you'll get 60 of it in the form of Atk Acc buffs, 30 each, give us a piece of RDM only hybridish gear that augments the effect from 1/2 mp to 3/4 =) Maybe the Tier III Enspells could have stat Boosts for STR DEX and MND too... Not large large bonuses but +3-5 would help and DMG boosts I did like that Enspell/WS idea maybe it could have a Mana Leach bonus and no it wont make RDM OP to all you RDM Haters RDM only seems OP cause it can Kite... very well... melee'ing has nothing to do with kiting LET US MELEE

[Datola]

Another Idea Geared towards the Hybrid gear idea is RDM only Shield with Stats Geared to make using a 1h sub more complimentary towards RDM i prefer RDM/BLU when I melee so give us a shield with some bonus to composure STR DEX MND INT MAcc/Acc i mean there is limitless ideas give it haste or DA honestly as an Elvaan I'd like to see a shield around 70-80 to have something like DEF:30ish STR+5 DEX+5 Macc+5 Acc+10 Auguments "Composure" to whole party.... Hidden Effect Haste+5% when TP >20% and Enspell is active...

[saevel]

As you can obviously see, Sehira doesn't want "hybrid" gear she just wants better gear. And yes "hybrid" automatically means weaker then specialized, its in the fcking definition.

Ex
Ring 1
INT +10

Ring 2
MND +10

Ring 3
INT +5
MND +5

All three rings have +10 to stats, two are specialized while one is a hybrid. There is no circumstance where you would equip Ring 3 over either Ring 1 or Ring 2. If you were not allowed to instantly change gears in FFXI then there would be a very strong argument for "hybrid" gear as you would be forced to balance out your gear prior to engaging in combat. Instead what Sehira is really arguing for is (and trying to hide it),

Ring 1
INT+10

Ring 2
MND +10

Ring 3
INT +10
MND +10

Where in there would no situation where ANY job would chose to wear either Ring 1 or 2 over Ring 3. Ring 3 is simply better in all aspects then either Ring 1 or 2 and thus obsoletes them upon its acquisition. The inventory+1 is just a happy side effect. And the moment you allow non-RDM jobs to equip that gear, its no longer remotely "hybrid", its simply the best. The conclusion to this line of reasoning is that Sehira desires RDM-only super gear that has better stats then all current gear put together. It must have better melee / WS / nuking / enfeebling / buffing / tanking stats, or some combination therein of all currently available options. AFv3 is good, but no job got gear like that. Everyone got amazing gear, but all the "hyrbids" got gear that was spread out a bit. BLU's head / body / legs are amazing TP pieces, but their hands / feet are nuking / s.blade pieces only. The "set" can be considered "hybrid" because the pieces are not all focused on the same thing, but each piece is specialized. WAR is the same way, feet / legs / body are TP pieces with head / hands being WS pieces. The legs can also be used as a WS piece depending on what else you have access to. RDM got a pretty good set, each piece is amazing at what it does and put together with our other casting gear is pretty amazing. Its all pure casting gear but at least each piece is specialized, no more DEX +5 CHR+5 parry +3 stuff.

And ultimately inventory is not an issue, ever. You don't need all the staves in a melee set, you don't need most of your casting pieces. A TP set, a WS set or two (Dagger vs sword), a full +enh set and some +Fc gear. The only "mage" gear you need is the big +enf pieces for sleep / bind / grav, you won't be doing maxed out Slow II / Para II while in melee mode. You might include a few -PDT / MDT pieces if your tanking things, that is a situational set. RDM worked at 60 inventory spaces, it can most certainly work at 80. All the complainers did was find 20 more "situational mage" pieces to stuff in those 20 slots, the continue crying about inventory.

[Duelle]

RDM got a pretty good set, each piece is amazing at what it does and put together with our other casting gear is pretty amazing. Its all pure casting gear but at least each piece is specialized, no more DEX +5 CHR+5 parry +3 stuff.

And ultimately inventory is not an issue, ever. You don't need all the staves in a melee set, you don't need most of your casting pieces. A TP set, a WS set or two (Dagger vs sword), a full +enh set and some +Fc gear. The only "mage" gear you need is the big +enf pieces for sleep / bind / grav, you won't be doing maxed out Slow II / Para II while in melee mode. You might include a few -PDT / MDT pieces if your tanking things, that is a situational set. RDM worked at 60 inventory spaces, it can most certainly work at 80. All the complainers did was find 20 more "situational mage" pieces to stuff in those 20 slots, the continue crying about inventory.

Ok, let's try to move on beyond the calling out.

The main gripe with the gear we've been getting is that there's little that actually works for melee. Not to mention that while we are melee mages our AF3 has had next to nothing that reflects that. You're right in that the BLU AF3 is amazing, and I wish RDM had gotten at least one piece like that instead of more casting gear and extensions to buff durations that do nothing for us in the bigger picture (outside of enhancing something the melee camp has been trying to get away from and encouraging buff-botting even more).

The inventory issue was very important when the trends and public image of RDM were being set in stone. You were expected to be super geared and capping INT and MND just to land enfeebles reliably on the IT++ crap people loved to kill. That style of partying died and went away, but the image issues have lingered to some degree. There's other issues that go hand in hand with this, mostly job mechanics and party dynamics.

Either way, we should probably move on to what we consider solutions. I've already stated what I as an individual feel we need. Some have already stated theirs, but we need to move further in that direction. Hell, we might be able to come up with a suggestion or a change we can all agree in.

[Supersun]

Hybrid gear doesn't have to be weaker if it's just different. For example a mage piece might contain +10 Mnd and +10 Int while the hybrid piece instead has something like +10 Macc, +10 Acc, +5% Haste, Enspell+5.

Now neither piece is exactly weaker then the other, they are each situational. Not only that the mage stats are used in such a way on the hybrid piece that they enhance the melee (in this case, the +Macc is making the enspells more accurate).

Now obviously this example shouldn't be the set in stone end all be all example considering there are some obvious flaws like anything that you would actually want to melee on you would probably want to be casting in the first set defeating the purpose of the hybrid set here, but I think you get my example that a hybrid set doesn't have to be just a weaker specialized piece as long as it's adequately different where each one has it's pros and cons depending on the situation and the mage piece tends to be better suited for tougher things while the hybrid piece tends to be better for trashier mobs that are suitable for us to melee on and not get raped by AoEs.

[Seriha]

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No, it's more like your definition of hybrid is "the worst of both worlds" when it comes to gear and performance. Meanwhile, you've offered no counter to why it's fair a WAR might only have to get a set of pants for TP and WS while the RDM would have to get the same on top of ones for nuking, enfeebling, and other "situational" stuff you're so quick to dismiss because you're content with perpetuating the half-assed paradigm. Melee RDMs get a bad rap because, according to others, they don't do their magey stuff well on top of other physical deficiencies myself and others have noted throughout this thread and RDM history. Surprise of frickin' surprises, you're attempting to to promote that gimpness while proposing nothing to help our situation.

So, let's stop pretending I'm asking for +50 all stats on everything or that a given melee piece should beat the snot out a SAM's for any specific purpose. I'm saying RDM needs to get what RDM needs to step away from the bad reputation, poor numbers, and into overall acceptability that's not just some group's last resort. Gear is a part of that issue whether you like it or not.

[Greatguardian]

Gimps with 1 pair of pants can be Gimps with 1 pair of pants no matter what job they're on, WAR or RDM or PUP. The fact of the matter is that you only need one pair of specialized pants on at any given time. You have 240 total Field slots to work with, and 80 in your active inventory. As demonstrated already, that's more than enough for a competent "Jack of all trades" build. However, even then, it's a lot more efficient to simply store sets you aren't using and then change your Inventory when you need to change roles.

Melee'ing while Buffing/sub-healing with heavy DDs in the group? Put your staves, PDT, Nuke gear, and HMP gear away. Healing/Buffing a group with heavy DDs? Put your Weapons, TP, and WS gear away. Kiting something? Put your Melee gear away and take out your full PDT and MDT sets.

RDM takes a lot of work to do well. It takes even more work to do well while melee'ing. Melee RDMs don't get a bad rap because their inventories are too small (which becomes a player issue, just manage your sets). They get a bad rap because it's extremely rare to find a Melee RDM who doesn't suck at RDM. It's perfectly acceptable in theory. The hard part is pulling it off with any degree of competence.

[Trangnai]

The Biggest problem with the job at its current stand point is this.
- We are for most gear behind about 2-3 steps to a specialized job. Most of this gear is harder to obtain for multiple reasons. Even without Hybrid gear we lack for most roles we should be able to do.
- Our Job lacks luster is not only outclassed in every role by a specialized job but is always replaced by them in the current game. We arn't even seen as a viable option due to lack of triggers or something else. Even our Highest Skills, Enfeebling and Enhancing our out classed due to our lack of spells in the feild. The Only spell that currently stands out is Refresh II. It's also not needed in Abyssea, nice but not needed.
- For the melee role this is twice as bad. Even assuming Hybrid gear has to be weaker, our current melee gear is probably behind even the hybrid gear that SE would give us at our current level.

Our job should stand out in the fact that it should be the goto job for a role thats needed. And even the ones were currently know for our moot in 99% of the situations in the current endgame. I love how SE and this games players constantly talk about job and game balance, when Abyssea is clearly an example of the exact opposite. Am I saying we can't furfill a role? no not at all, but if you or anyone else has another job, there gonna want you on that, not rdm.

[SnapperTrx]

My input:

1. RDM needs to have it's Parry skill greatly enhanced. If the focus on RDM is 'fencing' (ie, Fencers Earring, Fencers Ring, Fencing Degen, Estoqueur's gear) then we need to have at least a B in parry. I can understand the low shield skill, but Parry is a must.

2. RDM must have the 'Fencer' trait. To not have this trait on a job who's relic armor is obviously based on fencing (Duelists gear, Estoqueur's gear, anything with 'Fencer' in the name) is really just dumb. Sound harsh? Well it is! The equivalent would be giving WHM 'Berserker' and not giving it to WAR!

3. Fencer V. RDM exclusive, make it high level, 80 or 90. Leave the critical hit rate and TP bonus from Fencer IV and instead add 'Occasionally attacks twice' (sword only) and 'Occasionally counter-attacks after parrying'. This would give RDM's a good increase in damage output in a party, but also help out a little (just a little) during solo play.

[Greatguardian]

My input:

1. RDM needs to have it's Parry skill greatly enhanced. If the focus on RDM is 'fencing' (ie, Fencers Earring, Fencers Ring, Fencing Degen, Estoqueur's gear) then we need to have at least a B in parry. I can understand the low shield skill, but Parry is a must.

2. RDM must have the 'Fencer' trait. To not have this trait on a job who's relic armor is obviously based on fencing (Duelists gear, Estoqueur's gear, anything with 'Fencer' in the name) is really just dumb. Sound harsh? Well it is! The equivalent would be giving WHM 'Berserker' and not giving it to WAR!

3. Fencer V. RDM exclusive, make it high level, 80 or 90. Leave the critical hit rate and TP bonus from Fencer IV and instead add 'Occasionally attacks twice' (sword only) and 'Occasionally counter-attacks after parrying'. This would give RDM's a good increase in damage output in a party, but also help out a little (just a little) during solo play.

That's all semantics. It doesn't particularly matter if some names share a similar theme or not.

That said, I don't see any benefit in giving RDM fencer when they are best off subbing NIN and dualwielding if they want to Melee at all.