On Red Mage melee...

[Seriha]

I'm of 2 minds with a Quick spell. The first being that if it's only DA, it should be like 10%. On the other hand, if it's a rolled up ball of DA/TA/QA, then you can put numbers like 5% for each. In the case of the former, you'd be at 20% with /WAR, and things like Brutal and Atheling can bump you up to 28%. Since both weapons could DA, we stand a better chance of finally antiquating Joyeuse for other weapons. Any other sub, you'll be 13/5/5. I may be mathing wrong, but for every 100 attack rounds single-wielding, that'd be 138 potential attacks while the more DA-minded route would be 128. You'd have some WS carry-over, but the big boys should still better in the long run.

[Supersun]

I actually thought of an interesting idea today, and if implemented right could, solve the Rdm healing issue, add support to RDM melee, and more then justify a reason for Rdm to melee in most settings. Sounds too good to be true, right, well it probably is since this idea sounds like a ***** to actually code, but basically I thought what would happen if we combine the Aura buff idea with Seriha's Enspell damage bonus. Basically you can get a buff like Stoneskin Aura.

Stoneskin Aura works similar to the aura concept where Red Mage has become so proficient at casting spells on himself his spells actually have so much power they can radiate to fellow players around him (like an avatar's favor). Now the exact mechanics of the Stoneskin might have to vary with that the dev team can actually program, but my idea at least is that everyone receives the same stoneskin affect, that is to say any damage that the Rdm's party members take to their stoneskin received from the Rdm's aura are automatically deducted from the Red Mages's Stoneskin. In essence the Red Mage holds a "Super Stoneskin" that the entire party shares. Now what makes this Stoneskin special is that your enspell damage that you inflict to the mob is then ADDED to the "HP" of that stoneskin. In essence your enspell damage directly makes the stoneskin you share with the party stronger and able to absorb more damage. Now obviously the initial starting value of the Stoneskin Aura, how much extra damage resistance your enspells add, and how much said stoneskin should cap at are all up in the air, but I think if the concept is balanced right it could be very powerful.

And why stop there, why not add a "Haste Aura" where your haste is spread to the entire party and the more damage you inflict to the mob the stronger your haste becomes. As long as the final value is at least marginally stronger then the original haste even if the initial value is slightly lower and it doesn't take like a year to reach the cap I could see this VERY easily fixing a lot of Rdms problems. You could even do this with other buffs as well. I myself would love to see a TP Bonus version especially if you add a strong Elemental WS to Rdm. This could synergize especially well if elemental WS damage can also add to the auras power in addition to enspells.

Now people might be leaping out of their chairs screaming that this is broken, well if Rdm is allowed to go overboard with this it easily could be. That's why I also propose a drastic drawback, these buffs while active drain your MP. Now I'm not talking about something like -50 MP/tick, but maybe -1 or -2 MP/tick per buff on the Red Mage (depending on the power of the buff of course, Haste being more expensive then a TP Bonus). This should prevent Rdm from loading up every one of these imaginable and instead limit them to 1 or 2 that the party needs. This in conjunction with Rdms already large variety of tools should allow Rdm to support the party however he needs to. Now this may receive some objections, especially from the people who leveled Rdm to be a pure mage, but really, if you already haven't leveled another mage job because of abyssea you should really look into Whm, Blm, or Sch since they will all be what you want of Rdm and more especially by 99.

[Seriha]

I've dabbled in the buff aura idea before and came to a similar conclusion about requiring perpetuation. However, my biggest hurdle at the time was integrating melee into it, as otherwise it just changes where the RDM stands in a battle and nothing more.

As is, an aura should be enticing to the RDM when you have 3 or more people to buff. Thus, in the case of Haste, you start looking at 120 MP over 180 seconds. However, you made that perpetuation 3 MP every tick, by the time 180 seconds have past you've spent the MP of 4.5 Hastes. Not exactly economical to the RDM. 2 MP would even it out, but we then hit an issue where you start adding other non-variable buffs (Phalanx, Barspells, Enspells, Refresh) in that their MP costs also vary, and demanding something like 10 MP every 3 seconds would drain the RDM fairly quickly if they're also throwing out the occasional nuke or cure.

Instead, I'd rather SE adopt a perpetuation model using more of the timing from Helix spells, also bumping each buff cost down to 1 per. So, for every 10 seconds, you could be charged for maintaining Haste, Refresh, Phalanx, an Enspell, a Spike, a Barspell, a Bar-resist, and a Gain spell. That's 8 MP every 10 seconds if you wanted one spell from all of those. In 9 of those seconds, you will have regained 9-24 MP depending on the Refresh tier. This gives you some more freedom with your MP, and as a bonus, when paired with Composure, we gain a lot more swing time.

The downside is, as mentioned before, is this doesn't quite solve the problem of melee inclusion. Now, our base strikes could be given a "Daze" that builds with subsequent blows, expanding the range of our "aura" from a default 5 to maybe 20, but having this constantly reset from mob to mob will also be inefficient. Thus, it might be better to consider it a non-cast buff on the RDM themselves that is perpetuated by landing successful strikes and maybe decaying every 10 seconds. I guess from here it's a matter of tiering the ranges, like 5/7.5/10/12.5/15/17.5/20. That would be 7 levels of proficiency, maybe going down 1 for every 10s you don't hit. However, since we need to account cast times or delays between pulls, it might be better to make the decay more like 30s. On the other hand, simply making it a hit per level doesn't quite seem right, either. This could be random between 2-4, or maybe we could tie some Enspell factor into it where you need to do like 50 damage per level. I dunno.

It's just brainstorming at this point, and I really wish we could get some insight from SE on their purpose for RDM, as otherwise doing all this could be a giant waste of time.

[macbain]

Sorry if this was mentioned but i haven't been able to read the whole thread yet.

I really like the idea of using enspells to increase our melee capability.

What I would be most interested in seeing is an enspell that absorbs the mobs TP.

Its like one spell that encompasses all of the job.
- a reason to melee
- enhances tp for the rdm to increase WS dmg
- it's a new kind of enfeeble
- and reduces the damage output of the mob (healing aspect?)

I think it would be a very simple solution to the problem that really doesn't have to effect anything else already in existence.

[Supersun]

However, my biggest hurdle at the time was integrating melee into it, as otherwise it just changes where the RDM stands in a battle and nothing more.

How did you like the idea of Enspells affecting the potency of the buffs (especially the stoneskin aura one)? I did write that late at night and might not have properly have thought out all the cons, but at least from what i can think of it woud make an interesting healing mechanic that uses our melee that doesn't step on Dnc.

[Seriha]

I can't say I'd ever see SE being okay with a perpetually renewable Stoneskin without giving it a worthlessly low cap or limiting the conversion rate from Enspell damage. In general, they've seemingly been a bit fickle with Stoneskingas in Earthen Ward and Diamondhide being meh in the player's hands. Accession and Stoneskin is a later exception to this, but one might argue the stratagem cost and increased MP/recast was also part of their balancing. The fact items that enhance it don't carry over to the non-caster also seems like a nod toward their dislike of physical invulnerability that isn't a 2 hour or limited to a rare temp consumable.

You're also asking for a bit of a code nightmare since not only will the mob need to store enspell damage done, but then document how it's been applied to other players. One-handers will strike more often, thus you could see them getting 20 here, 20 there, etc.. Two-handers, however, might wind up getting 40 per whack. Without making this consideration, you wind up making the ability better for one-handers, and I'm not really game for prompting segregation amongst the classes.

The above is also why I didn't include Stoneskin, Blink, or Aquaveil in my talk about a perpetuating aura, as these are not fixed effects and vary as you take damage or absorb a hit. I also realize I forgot to include Regen in the category of buffs that would work.

More toward Enspells in general and popular ideas I've seen over time, giving them additional enfeebles is not something I'm totally against, but at times it seems redundant, worthless, or too good NOT to use like if applying Stun to Enthunder, thus making every other Enspell choice a bad one. I've been leaning more to the pool/level/sublimation mechanic ever since those and WHM's Solace came around, but honestly, how SE would decide to convert it is up in the air. I know with my old Elemental Feedback idea, the offensive side was more like a Saboteur on a 10s timer for debuffs (though it favored durations more than potency). The defensive was more like SCH's Perpetuance stratagem, though also offering potency boosts.

...which is all reminding me of how ideas for RDM have come and gone, often finding their ways too other jobs. Bleh.

[Duelle]

More toward Enspells in general and popular ideas I've seen over time, giving them additional enfeebles is not something I'm totally against, but at times it seems redundant, worthless, or too good NOT to use like if applying Stun to Enthunder, thus making every other Enspell choice a bad one. I've been leaning more to the pool/level/sublimation mechanic ever since those and WHM's Solace came around, but honestly, how SE would decide to convert it is up in the air.

Personally, enspells with added effects aren't that great an idea because of the way it can be lopsided in one particular way. I do feel that if you want to do something in the style of solace it'd have to be a bit more direct and a little more passive. I'd be all for some sort of proc while melee'ing that made cures shorter to cast (or instant) to play along with our supposed "support" role, but I don't think the buff system in FFXI would really work with something like that.

[AyinDygra]

Just brainstorming here:

My proposed "status-hit" addition to the En-spell 2's could be removed and simply be a change to calculating of damage based on the initial casting, not on-hit. (I agree the status effects may be more of a deciding factor than elemental damage type)

More importantly,
What if my proposed "Magic Fencer" Job Trait had the additional effect:
While an En-spell is active, and the Red Mage is engaged with a target in melee range:
Grants "Quick Magic" (same effect granted by the Atma of Apocalypse) with an activation rate of 2/4/6/8/10% rising by tier.

[Duelle]

More importantly,
What if my proposed "Magic Fencer" Job Trait had the additional effect:
While an En-spell is active, and the Red Mage is engaged with a target in melee range:
Grants "Quick Magic" (same effect granted by the Atma of Apocalypse) with an activation rate of 2/4/6/8/10% rising by tier.

I'd prefer a proc that can be "saved" and used within a time limit, not something that can just proc whenever it wants and happens to do so when you least need it.

[Supersun]

I like the +Enspell part of magic fencer, but I'm not sure the +critical damage fits it well. Especially given the fact that if we then sub warrior the original fencer will stack on top of it and give us +15% crit rate at 99...that's a lot of +crit%. I was going to suggest TP Bonus but then stopped for the same reason above lol.

One creative idea I can think of is granting "Elemental Affinity +10% of the element that matches our corresponding Enspell. That would additionally enhance our Enspells even more by increasing their damage by +10% AND if SE decides to be awesome and give us an elemental WS that has its element vary depending on the enspell it would also increase that by +10%. And considering this is a fencer trait it would not work with staves which would eliminate the majority of the broken argument against that while at the same time relieving our "dependence" on them since we would also receive a +10% Magic accuracy increase for one element as well. It would also give us more incentive to nuke while meleeing since there's not as much need to switch into a staff since it will only increase your damage by an additional +5% (for an HQ staff).