On Red Mage melee...

[Seriha]

All merit spells and abilities being level progressed as opposed to merits is something myself and others have been for for a long time. Hell, converting RDM's is easy since Slow II can just become a generic Slow potency that applies to all tiers, maybe even allowing Slow III somewhere between 91-99 if Slow II was somewhere between 60-75. Granted, it would still suck if we're left with too many choices where it's all in or not at all, but the merit situation pretty much reflects our general melee shortcomings with an overwhelming lack of physical perks.

[Dale]

It was a given that I would post on this, so let's get it done with.

The general state of our class' melee has been questionable for a very long time. We're usually stuck with healing and casting refresh/haste because our other faculties never really provided much of a benefit in parties.

Abyssea gave us atma and gear with a lot of support to our elemental spells (+Magic Attack Bonus and +Magic Accuracy on both gear and atma). The problem is that as a result, our martial side was almost completly neglected in the process (barring a couple of pieces). This is very much a shame, as a class that is themed as a fencer/magic swordsman (look at the name on our gear if you don't believe me) is used as anything but.

I know suggestions have been kicked around and back-and-forth discussions on RDM melee have taken place for years, now. At the same time, nothing has ever been really done to make our melee side stand out in a way that we can use our swords as more than just soloing toys. While I acknowledge one or two individuals who tote the melee side of RDM as workable, I also note anyone wanting to do more than just heal, refresh and haste instantly meets notable resistance because the way our class is designed doesn't really help us say "I want to melee in this party and am justified in wanting to do so". To add insult to injury, we are so associated with heals, Refresh and Haste that I've even encountered individuals who say they'd be fine with RDM melee so long as the heals, refresh and haste are still coming from us.

Personally, we kind of need a way to define the roles we choose to undertake. I can't think of anything we as players can do to accomplish that. I'd think a change in mechanics for our class would be in order.

I have my own wishlist of changes for our class, but I just wanted to get that out of my chest and see how other people feel about the matter. I just think it's wasteful to have a class that dresses like a french musketeer and wields magic and a rapier but is used exclusively to heal and buff.

I agree our melee could use some work. Part of the problem is SE is very stingy with weapon skills for Red Mage. We should without a doubt get Sanguine Blade without having to sub certain jobs.

[Hyrist]

Among many other things, Dale.

EX weaponskills do not sight right by me. It never has. Most of them consist of enhances Magical Weaponskills we'd benefit the most from having. Having access to these weapon skills and being able to Dual Wield should not be mutually exclusive.

There are only 3 logical Sword Classes in the game, and only 2 have access to EX Sword skills. If any class should have to speciify a subjob for access to the skills, it probably should be Dark Knight. But I'm in favor of abolishing the Ex system entirely.

[saevel]

Agree with EX Weapon Skills being crap. RDM should natively have access to most of them, but I think we're giving SE too much credit here. The game designers don't actually play the game and thus have no idea what's practical. They draw it on a piece of paper and if the concept seems legit to go with it. Heck Abyssea armor and weapons was them going out on a limb.

[Neisan_Quetz]

Agree with EX Weapon Skills being crap. RDM should natively have access to most of them, but I think we're giving SE too much credit here. The game designers don't actually play the game and thus have no idea what's practical. They draw it on a piece of paper and if the concept seems legit to go with it. Heck Abyssea armor and weapons was them going out on a limb.

It's pretty ignorant to state any gaming company, especially Square-Enix, implements concepts to the game without testing them at all, no matter how much you dislike SE's sense of balance.

[Swords]

They did actually back in 2001, but SE for the most part tests things based on how the playerbase as a whole plays these jobs now. Since society pretty much pigeonholed RDM into the backline position SE decided to focus on the mage part of RDM. Unfortunately even if SE did make RDM into a comparable DD with the moderate/heavy melee classes, I still doubt many would give RDM half a chance to try meleeing.

[Doombringer]

well, whm is a bandwagon job now, so at least some of the pressure should be off as far as players being DESPERATE for healers.

there's at least MORE leeway now than there used to be.. how much that is however is debatable

[Swords]

Aye, it's the mindset of the people as a whole. Many still see RDM as a backline job partily due to the lack of any real support from SE and how people have always seen RDM played rather than how it was conceptualized.

Granted, the lack of power RDM has compared too all the upgrades most jobs have been given, has landed us in the "useless" category where it could work in our favor if SE plays their cards right. RDM no longer being seen as demi-gods gives SE the opportunity to actually get creative with less risk and fear of overpowering the job.

[Seriha]

I can't say I dig the concept of deliberate stagnation for the sake of eventual revitalization. There's way, way, way too much good faith there given what we've seen, what we expect to see, and how we've overall been treated over the years.

As is, the other night I finished off babbling with someone who's under the impression RDM melee is in a good spot and will only get better as the cap rises. Their reason? CDC. One only needs to look to the census to see how many CDC-capable swords are out there, and then guesstimate the odds of bumping into a RDM at any given moment with the weapon (let alone people willing to help a lolmeleerdm without something being in it for them). I argued the zero to hero status reflective of performance between those who have CDC and those who don't is not a good sign of balance, nor is the RDM of back then or now at all welcome on mobs of legitimate difficulty.

Who knows, maybe we will get a new WS at 95 that bridges the gap, or could quest another at 99 that does similar. All I know is acceptance shouldn't begin at endgame, and only after you've endured endgame long enough to earn your piece. When other jobs have gotten yet better gear and more traits while we're still largely using the same, and were shunned with said same, no... I can't buy it. If SE's setting us up to head in any particular direction that isn't down, they're doing a poor job of cluing us in.

[saevel]

Cure's were doing 99999 damage to undead, so no I think we can all agree that SE doesn't actually test things. Not only that, but many of the current game mechanics were made by the same people who created the masterpiece known as FFXIV.

Now the current dev's are much better, unfortunately they have to be very careful about changing or re-balancing old stuff created by the previous guys. In east Asian culture it's a pretty big insult to change things set by your older / more senior predecessors. It would give the impression that the previous guys were "wrong", and you can't do that without upsetting people. So they have to create new stuff and do new things that aren't related to the previous guys, and from the looks of things it seems there is contention inside the design team on what exactly RDM should be doing. Avesta didn't do us any favors.