On Red Mage melee...

[Duelle]

1) When life gives you ton of MAB gear use elemental WSs. Really a lot of our pre-CDC sword WS problems would be solved if you gave us a strong native elemental WS. Like mentioned before it would be even more interesting if you let the element of the WS match our current enspell. We can already do some pretty decent numbers with Sanguine and Aeolian Edge (with a martial knife), just create a slightly stronger version of one of those and let all the gear you've already created do the rest.

I can't really see this happening unless the weapon skill in question is added to our skill gain progression. It'd need to show up at around the time other melee get their bread and butter WS to be worthwhile, if not earlier. Could use that as a placeholder WS until Sanguine (which would have to be made native to RDM), which itself would cover for CDC.

2) Create a basic mage "perle" set that Rdm, Whm, Brd, Sch, Smn, and Blm can use. Now by "perle" I don't mean literally perle, but create a basic hybrid set like mentioned before that is easy enough to get and can adequately allow the user to melee. One of the biggest barriers from melee acceptance is simply all those gimps out there meleeing in their convert set. At least this way they have no excuse. There's no need really for a WS set if you create that elemental WS for Rdm. Most jobs can already gear fairly easily for their primary WS.

I don't agree with hybrid gear for one reason and one reason alone: item budgets. An actually workable hybrid set has a chance of being stupidly over-budget, and the alternative to that is having a bunch of gear with a lot of stats spread out.

4) Continue to lighten our casting load. Estoquier's was a good idea, only problem is expecting someone to have a full set just to melee is kind of ridiculous. Now this issue might be solved as the set becomes easier to get, but there should be other ways that we can cast and melee without one or the other affecting the other one so much. I mean what's the point of Rdms versatility if we can't do everything simultaneously (imo this should be the difference between Blu and Rdm, Blus should be great at a lot of stuff but have to pick one or two things, Rdm should be good at everything and be able to use everything. Not saying that each job can't have their niche for specialization obviously).

Estoqueur's set did not really get rid of cycling, which is what needs to dissapear to improve front-line quality of life. The only two things I can think of is some way to AoE Haste and Refresh and overall longer durations when playing RDM as the main job. 10-minute AoE buffs would be a god send for the melee enthusiasts.

The alternative would be to change things in a way that haste and refresh are removed from the equation when front-lining and make up for that elsewhere.

[Supersun]

I don't agree with hybrid gear for one reason and one reason alone: item budgets. An actually workable hybrid set has a chance of being stupidly over-budget, and the alternative to that is having a bunch of gear with a lot of stats spread out.

All depends where you get it.

[Duelle]

All depends where you get it.

Which often lends itself to being way out of reach or something that doesn't reward other people for helping you get it. Like the Chimeric fleuret.

[Supersun]

Which often lends itself to being way out of reach or something that doesn't reward other people for helping you get it. Like the Chimeric fleuret.

Or it could be just as easy to get as Perle. Once again, it's situational with how you get it.

[Xikeroth]

Well all that's being said is well and good, let us not forget that Abyssea will soon be over, the level cap is planned to be raised to level 99 and content for that will come out eventually. Which means we may not always have atma so you can't always count on those buffs.

I do have one thought that would get rid of the elemental staff question... what if we had some job traits that gave us massive magic accuracy bonuses with sword or daggers equipped but didn't work with staves equipped would help solve this problem. This would allow us to work more with swords and get rid of the thought people have that a RDM without elemental staves or magian staves are useless. (again I talk for when we no longer have abyssea buffs.)

Another thought is raising our sword skills to an A to rival Blue mage and give us access to all the same weapon skills. We can NOT be expected to have relic, mythic or even Almace to have a decent selection of WS to chose from in order to melee properly, nor should we have to sub WAR BLU PLD or DRK to have access to said WSs.

Dancer can heal quite well, support the party in their way AND do respectable damage, so whats wrong with us being able to do the same in melee? That's the real question.

Perhaps even add enfeebling effects to our enspells... for example make Enaero lower VIT(by a good amount so its not ignored like Choke is)

There is no reason we should be looked at as nothing but healers, both inside and outside of abyssea. In that respect we have two other jobs that can fill the role just as well, WHM and SCH.

[rog]

Well all that's being said is well and good, let us not forget that Abyssea will soon be over

Did your crystal ball tell you that?

[Xikeroth]

Did your crystal ball tell you that?

No, but it is simple common sense.

What you really expect it to be the final event everyone will do? Look at other more successful MMOs they constantly add new content making older content obsolete. If SE wants people to keep playing FFXI they will have to add content beyond abyssea.

Its no "crystal ball" thing Its called common sense. If it was so many people are basically almost done with their gearsets they will lose the want to do it anymore and just stop playing.

Does SE want this? No they want our money.