On Red Mage melee...

[Daniel_Hatcher]

I just don't invite dancers. Right now my party make up is: WHM BRD MNK MNK THF BLU, and in a second party all by himself: BLM. The MNKs and THF sometimes rearrange jobs to WAR, NIN, THF. Where am I going to fit a melee RDM in that?

I don't think there's a way to buff en-spells enough to make it worth RDMs meleeing. Either the melee and damage mages don't have problems or you don't want the RDM in close range of the mob or giving it TP.

I still think enfeebling, especially crowd control, should be the focus. It takes skill and knowledge for a single rdm to be able to handle a large group of mobs without a blm back-up sleepgaing. I think a rdm keeping a bunch of mobs in hand would be much more stylish than meleeing.

You are aware that RDM's enfeebling spells are on par with NIN's if the RDM puts 5 merits in it right? So even doing the enfeebling rule of RDM they still absolutely suck at it.

Crowd control is rare and certainly should not be the only focus of a RDM. As it stands RDM has nothing it can do in a party, so as far as this game is going they need to fix that, or remove the job.

[Seyrena]

I personally always saw RDM as the master of both Enfeeblement AND Enhancement. I agree that melee only needs small changes to make it acceptable, but when looking at RDM's role as an enfeebler, we should also consider the enhancement role as well. Specifically, where are the gain-ras, or other buff spells that could help an entire party and make RDM relevant once again without changing the dynamics of other classes? After all, RDM has the highest (initial) Enhancing Magic skill too.

[Duelle]

Specifically, where are the gain-ras, or other buff spells that could help an entire party and make RDM relevant once again without changing the dynamics of other classes? After all, RDM has the highest (initial) Enhancing Magic skill too.

Sorry, but I am 100% against further encouraging buff-botting. It's an archaic niche that has been done away with in modern design for good reason.

[Karbuncle]

You are aware that RDM's enfeebling spells are on par with NIN's if the RDM puts 5 merits in it right? So even doing the enfeebling rule of RDM they still absolutely suck at it.

Crowd control is rare and certainly should not be the only focus of a RDM. As it stands RDM has nothing it can do in a party, so as far as this game is going they need to fix that, or remove the job.

Thats a steaming load.

Slow II, Paralyze II , are much more powerful than Hojo: Ni, Kurayami: Ni. Perhaps if you don't cap MND v Enemy MND, you may be on to something, But with 5/5 Merits and capped potency via MND vs Enemies MND, They are far ahead. Its a noticeable difference.

(Blind II I believe is the exception)

[HFX7686]

...

If that's your set-up the only way Rdm would ever be useful to you is if he could proc well.

And given that SE has said they have no immediate plans to add more abyssea related content and that the procing systems in newer endgame content is different then abyssea people may start to realize that the current mentality of what's a powerful job is pretty much soley hinged on how well it can proc.

In fact, in dynamis at least, hybrid jobs are MUCH more valuable then specialist jobs when trying to farm currency and NM pops.

People have already started finding out that trying to approach newer content like you would abyssea content where you have a Mnk tank and a Whm curebomb just doesn't work.

SO yeah, when discussing future balance you are going to have to remove your notions of what's useful in abyssea and look at the merits of the job itself as opposed to how well it can proc or TH.

You misunderstand. WHM BRD MNK MNK THF BLU, BLM is the party set up we use for everything, regardless of being in Abyssea or not. This has been our set up for a couple of years now. It's a very solid set up for pretty much every event in the game. I could change the BRD to a RDM but my MNKs would scream bloody murder for losing their Marches. I could add a RDM to the BLM party but I'm not sure what the RDM would be doing cross party since Enhancing doesn't cast cross party.

You are aware that RDM's enfeebling spells are on par with NIN's if the RDM puts 5 merits in it right? So even doing the enfeebling rule of RDM they still absolutely suck at it.

Crowd control is rare and certainly should not be the only focus of a RDM. As it stands RDM has nothing it can do in a party, so as far as this game is going they need to fix that, or remove the job.

It this is true (and I suspect that it is not quite true sadly) then you present an excellent argument for why enfeebling magic really needs to be buffed.

Crowd control isn't that rare. My group generally has 4-5 mobs going at the same time. We like to be efficient.

I forgot about Enhancing magic. That's another place RDM could be buffed as well, to surpass SCH and WHM. I'd like that.

[Aleste]

Someone mentioned gain-ra's. They're called Boost- spells and they belong to whitemage.

I had always pegged redmage as the single target enhancer, with whitemage being the AOE enhancer, which when looking at their native spell listing makes sense.

Interesting math: WHM/SCH with light arts and gear has a higher enhancing magic skill than RDM with gear. Although the skill difference is minor (~8 skill), rdm's enhancements will last longer due to their af3 cape.

[Neisan_Quetz]

+ Af3 feet + 5/5 Set bonus.

[Daniel_Hatcher]

Someone mentioned gain-ra's. They're called Boost- spells and they belong to whitemage.

I had always pegged redmage as the single target enhancer, with whitemage being the AOE enhancer, which when looking at their native spell listing makes sense.

Interesting math: WHM/SCH with light arts and gear has a higher enhancing magic skill than RDM with gear. Although the skill difference is minor (~8 skill), rdm's enhancements will last longer due to their af3 cape.

6 to be exact, unless you get equipment with the augment "Enhancing Magic Skill" that said, RDM EA+2 gives an increase of ~92.5% duration (why they couldn't just make it 100% I don't know) under composure, so it's a massive pity they gain very little enhancing spells for the party.

[Brytor]

Personally I can not see how anyone has enough room to carry the gear to do your main job as a RDM and still have room to carry Melee gear. Granted I've not played RDM a lot since getting +2 items but before I was at 76/80 before and not even carrying all the gear I wanted. Adding good TP and CdC sets on top of that would be another 23-30 items to carry.

[wish12oz]

All I have to say is RDM melee is about as useful as a screen door on submarine. And beyond that, it is perceived by the community as being terrible and something only bad RDMs do. Don't get me wrong, you're all free to do as you please, but don't expect any good group to allow you to melee, and don't expect to be in any top tier LS.

But really, why not just level another job? BLU is allowed to melee and gets to cast, go play that, or DRK, same thing. Except casting is looked down upon for DRK, since it lowers your damage a lot.