On Red Mage melee...

[Daniel_Hatcher]

Well, If it worked out like Primal Rend (Which was i think the only worthwhile Elemental WS ever, although its not much of a shiner today), I could see it being useful.

I don't think we'll be seeing new Weaponskills however... Although, If they just gave RDM sanguine blade Naturally it could be have some decent uses.

Realistically however, if with your best buffs/WS gear, It would still be painfully weak compared to what other DD can do. But if stacked with strong supportive buffs like the ones i listed above, stronger Enspell damage, etc... It could level the playing field a bit.

really though... Its probably doubtful RDM will get anything Melee related mostly due to how the general community would react. I think its too late in RDMs game for SE to consider adjustments like this. Even if they did come out and boost RDM melee proficiency, people would complain they didnt get a "Real update". (Cause lets face it, people are whiners. So am i though, FU Collaborater range improvement).

Thats the biggest problem to solve it seems..

SE wont give RDM anything melee wise due to one reason, as the developer said before: RDM is kind of powerful as it is.

Now while no one else believes it is, and even the audience chuckled when he said that. The developers seem to think it is, so RDM will get little to nothing by the time we reach lvl.99.

And when that happens, RDM will become a dead job.

[Supersun]

SE wont give RDM anything melee wise due to one reason, as the developer said before: RDM is kind of powerful as it is.

Now while no one else believes it is, and even the audience chuckled when he said that. The developers seem to think it is, so RDM will get little to nothing by the time we reach lvl.99.

And when that happens, RDM will become a dead job.

That was like 3 years ago iirc and when that statement was made it was certainly true.

3 years, 2 dev teams, 9 mini-expansions, and 15 levels later things have changed.
I'd be silly of them to go off what they said at fanfest now.

Well, If it worked out like Primal Rend (Which was i think the only worthwhile Elemental WS ever)

Wildfire

[Daniel_Hatcher]

That was like 3 years ago iirc and when that statement was made it was certainly true.

3 years, 2 dev teams, 9 mini-expansions, and 15 levels later things have changed.
I'd be silly of them to go off what they said at fanfest now.

I suppose, though the most recent update we had on them was 2010:

We intend to ensure that red mages maintain the prominent position they currently enjoy, while closely monitoring their balance with other magic-wielding jobs.
For example, the level cap increase will render both “Convert” and “Refresh” usable by support jobs. If this gives red mages more free time in their parties, we will find ways for them to fill that time productively. If this threatens to deprive the job of its uniqueness, however, we will make sure to cover for this in other areas.

They've not really stuck to that either!

---

I'd love to Melee on RDM if it was worth it, but I really do wonder in what direction the dev's are going with RDM. It's very confusing.

[Seriha]

I'd still like to see a null-elemental WS that changes its element and skillchain properties based on your current enspell. Ideally it should do more than Sanguine Blade since it wouldn't have the curative property attached and it would allow us to adapt the element to the mob in question since, unlike SB, you wouldn't be stuck with a shitty darkness WS on darkness resistant mobs. We could then do an atma build like RR/Beyond/MM and still be generally proficient with an ice WS that could ideally break 2500 with an okay gear set. No, it's not Ukko's or Smite, but I don't think 40% or more of a scrub mob's HP is anything to scoff at. Plus it'd be amber over ruby, since people still have their ruby phobia.

[Hyrist]

Couple problems I see with that idea:

1. We'd never get beyond the level 1 skillchain properties unless we started gaining "Enfusion, Engravitation, Endistortion, etc." as new enspells. Which, admittedly, would be awesome. I'd love to have these instead of a simple tier 3. Otherwise though, the skillchain property variant on the WS would pretty much be worthless. (Unless we got Chainbind as a debuff, which would be a nice way to push a damage boost and allow us to follow up with a burst.)

2. Magic WSes, I don't belive, are subject to DA/TA, Crit, etc. Chances that help other classes push incredibly high spikes.

3. Resists. Without an appropriate skillset to use as a base accuracy comparison on elemental WSes, they tend to suck in general. Sure, with Atmas we could push those numbers high enough to be decent in Abyssea. But outside ,we're just going to lose out on the same root problems we have with WSes before.

Now granted, Elemental WSes would save us a bunch on gear swaps, as we could simply use our casting/Nuking gear to WS. But unless the tripping points are addressed, it'd wind up being a half-effort WS that's not all that much better than Sanguine Blade outside Abyssea, which isn't that impressive at all.

[Supersun]

not all that much better than Sanguine Blade outside Abyssea, which isn't that impressive at all.

O.o...

Are you gearing for it correctly?

(I'll respond in more detail later)

[Karbuncle]

That was like 3 years ago iirc and when that statement was made it was certainly true.




Wildfire

I'm quite aware of Wildfire it just slipped my mind :|.

So, if they give RDM a weaponskill natively with the same power and mods of Wildfire, an Empyrean WS, Elemental WS might actually work.

(because if i recall, Inside Abyssea Wildfire is only"good" when you stack MAB/FireMab Atmas, if a RDM did this, they'd severely nerf their Melee-TP Damage phase, Which is not a good trade off. If you're going to advocate RDM melee in abyssea, at least do it right and put on the DD Atmas, any combo of VV, RR, GH, Omni and Apoc. Stacking MAB atmas just for your WS, on a job that would be meleeing for TP, would not be a great idea.)

Still.... We probably wont get any new Weaponskills at all (Well, maybe at 400 skill level), But as is... From 75-80 we got 1 new WS from leveling up, 81-90 We got goose egg. I don't think they'll be giving us anymore from this point. (except Empyreans GAWD, I meant "By leveling up" anyway)

I've been surprised before though XD

That being said, I did quite like the idea of a WS that changes element based on the Current Enspell. however, have to remember even with Beyond/etc we beefed it up to 2,500, We're losing Massive amounts of Damage in the TP Phase by doing this, when we could likely just go full DD Atma and pump out Vorpals/Eviscer for around those numbers.

Its a tricky thing, Outside Abyssea, the Elemental WS would probably serve us better if it had good Acc and decent potency, because outside of abyssea RDM's WS aren't that amazing (chant excluded)

[Duelle]

Well, I can't add much to this part of the discussion, since elemental WS are so dependent on gear that it wouldn't meet my requirement of "must enter the game at the same skill level BLU and PLD get vorpal blade". Still, I find it nice that someone from the outside is taking part on the discussion rather than just tell us we're doing it wrong. :O

[Supersun]

Oh gosh. I wasn't trying to suggest that we get a weapon skill on the level of Wildfire. If SE did that Rdm would be kings of DD outside of abyssea.

But yeah, my vouching for a new elemental WS is more looking forward to 99 and content outside of abyssea. Our current critical WSs work fine for abyssea but like you mentioned we have garbage for options outside of abyssea with AE and Sanguine being our best 2 barring CDC imo.

I've always been a fan of the WS that changes element depending on your enspell. They don't even need to stray too far then what currently exists. 3.5-4 fTP with sanguine's dInt*2 and 30%-50% mods would be nice.

Certainly doesn't need to be 6 fTP with a 60% mof like wildfire lol.

[Karbuncle]

Certainly doesn't need to be 6 fTP with a 60% mof like wildfire lol.

That'd be sexy though Amirite.

I would love another set of Job-Specific Weaponskills (like Mythic Weaponskills), but if we dont see them I won't pout.

Giving RDM a Weaponskill with 4.0fTP, 30%STR/50%MND mod (Magical WS with INT mod is just all the better), Magical, element/Debuff based on current Enspell. But have it mod with TP.

I.e

100% - - - 200% - - - 300%
4.0 - - - - 4.5 - - - - - - 4.75

Secondly, a Debuff for the WS could Depend on the Element. I.E with "Enfire" it would inflict Plague, With Enwater it would inflict Poison, With EnStone it would inflict Slow, so on and so forth.

(Secondary Idea is optional)