RDM needs a niche.

[Nyarlko]

So, I was talking with an ls member yesterday about RDM. He's a recent returnee who used to love RDM, but is struggling to find any reason for groups to take RDM over anyone else nowadays. RDM just doesn't seem to have any unique niche that demands a RDM in a group slot. Came up with a few adjustments and additions that might be able to create one.

* Temper needs to be changed to party-targetable. This would help raise RDM players' worth over that of RDM Trusts for smaller group content, and potentially push it up high enough to be desirable for alliance content in at least the melee party.

* Add a job trait which reduces the rate that targets build resistance to debuffs, starting at lv50+. One of RDM's core themes since the beginning has been their mastery of debuffs, but at the rate that targets build resistance combined with how often many endgame targets clear their own debuffs reduces their effectiveness too rapidly. A RDM should not have to struggle to land debuffs just as much as anyone /RDM.

* Frazzle needs to be given some sort of innate magic accuracy bonus so that it is more useful in endgame content. It gets fully resisted far too often, and has felt like that since the GEO bugfix awhile back. I don't think there's a problem with designing encounters to heavily favor physical damage over magical (or vv.) but that design should never be a blanket effect over an entire type of content. (Omen Caturae, I'm looking at you. ~_~) It would be perfectly fine if this only applied to Frazzle II/III, in order to make it a uniquely RDM thing.

* I'm not sure that it's possible on a technical level, but a new debuff spell that increases readying time for TP moves (similar to how Addle works with spell casting time,) would go a long way towards RDM reclaiming their niche. Even a mere 1~2 sec increase would be enough leeway to actually allow players to react at least. This would also be a huge boon for high-lag situations and those of us players who seem to be on slower connections or low-end computers. I've personally had instances where the effect of a move in Omen showed up in the log before the readying message... <,<;;

RDM players, chime in! Do RDM mains think that these suggestions would be enough to be desirable in most group content? These come from my conversations with those who've gotten frustrated with the state of the job, as I do not have enough inventory space to give RDM a serious shot personally...

[Sirmarki]

I was never a fan of RDM myself, it just wasn't for me, but I do like the Temper idea.

[ManaKing]

RDM is a luxury support for large groups. It also fits into a 6 man like ambu if you are capable of doing damage and scing well. However you have to be geared to the teeth and to be perfectly frank, i know very few people that have geared their rdm to a competent level. I know it's going to sound snobby but AG your Murgleis or don't expect people to be happy to see you. And if the bar is that high, why not make any other job with a good/better mythic? (The answer is you're obsessed with RDM)

The job is a passion project rather than a required job. In wave 3 dynamis frazzle, distract, and innundation are amazing contributions to an already well stocked alliance that has multiple other supports and buffers. But you need a gross amount of magic accuracy to play the job well and land your spells fast. You need glowy murg, omen shield and ammo, relic +3 head and feet, af+3 body, chironic pants with 35+ macc, raetic bangles +1, stinky ring +1 x2. I have all of the above except the raetic +1 hands, this job is so expensive! Bio3 has also become more attractive to take the edge off wave 2 bosses. Para, slow, and addle will all land on bosses as well but that's all just extras and the more enfeebling magic effect gear that gets put into the game, the better they will help to soften dangerous mobs. Sleepga from /blm or /sch works extremely well on wave 1 and 2 mobs, however no one can sleep wave 3 mobs consistently outside of their pets or the use of Stymie.

RDM isn't going to compete with GEO for overall support, nor will it get close to the total damage contribution of a COR. Those are the popular jobs if you're looking for easy to fit into a group. They are easier to gear and have softer requirements to be effective and contribute to party play. I didn't address how to make RDM great again because it already is if you already have the gear and the ls group to run the job. Otherwise it's nonessential and I'm saying that as a career RDM who barely plays anything but RDM.

Devs don't need to add a bunch of stuff so much as they need to not squander our gearing choices. +20% FC on the new dynamis sword? Who is su5 that would think that is good? We needed more enfeeble magic effect or skill, quick magic II, or immunobreak +1. Hell we could even take critical hit damage or ws damage for when we are low manning. ANYTHING OTHER THAN FC THAT IS GOING TO GO WAY OVER CAP.

[Athen]

So, I was talking with an ls member yesterday about RDM. He's a recent returnee who used to love RDM, but is struggling to find any reason for groups to take RDM over anyone else nowadays. RDM just doesn't seem to have any unique niche that demands a RDM in a group slot. Came up with a few adjustments and additions that might be able to create one.

* Temper needs to be changed to party-targetable. This would help raise RDM players' worth over that of RDM Trusts for smaller group content, and potentially push it up high enough to be desirable for alliance content in at least the melee party.

* Add a job trait which reduces the rate that targets build resistance to debuffs, starting at lv50+. One of RDM's core themes since the beginning has been their mastery of debuffs, but at the rate that targets build resistance combined with how often many endgame targets clear their own debuffs reduces their effectiveness too rapidly. A RDM should not have to struggle to land debuffs just as much as anyone /RDM.

* Frazzle needs to be given some sort of innate magic accuracy bonus so that it is more useful in endgame content. It gets fully resisted far too often, and has felt like that since the GEO bugfix awhile back. I don't think there's a problem with designing encounters to heavily favor physical damage over magical (or vv.) but that design should never be a blanket effect over an entire type of content. (Omen Caturae, I'm looking at you. ~_~) It would be perfectly fine if this only applied to Frazzle II/III, in order to make it a uniquely RDM thing.

* I'm not sure that it's possible on a technical level, but a new debuff spell that increases readying time for TP moves (similar to how Addle works with spell casting time,) would go a long way towards RDM reclaiming their niche. Even a mere 1~2 sec increase would be enough leeway to actually allow players to react at least. This would also be a huge boon for high-lag situations and those of us players who seem to be on slower connections or low-end computers. I've personally had instances where the effect of a move in Omen showed up in the log before the readying message... <,<;;

RDM players, chime in! Do RDM mains think that these suggestions would be enough to be desirable in most group content? These come from my conversations with those who've gotten frustrated with the state of the job, as I do not have enough inventory space to give RDM a serious shot personally...

I've been a RDM main for years, and I agree with a lot that you said.

When RDM was first touted to players, the whole idea was that you used your magic to buff yourself and weaken your opponents. Fine, I can get behind that. When you're early level, that's what you do: cast Protect on yourself, Blind, Poison, and Dia on the mob, then start swinging (or spam a nuke). When you join up into parties, the appeal of those debuffs become more apparent, as an enemy who has lower accuracy can't hit you as much, sure, but they can't hit the tank either, or the main healer of the party (which may be you at points). However, as you grow in level, your overall abilities don't expand, as much as grow. Your Cures get stronger, your Protects get stronger, your Refreshes get stronger...but that's it. If you're lucky, you unlock a newer facet of your job (e.g. Enspells, Haste, Spike spells, Raise, Sneak/Invis/Deo, even different enfeebs like Frazzle and Distract, which are still RELATIVELY new), but it's still "I cast on myself to make myself stronger, and I cast on my opponents to weaken them". Luckily some of our buffs can be cast on other people, or else RDM would have fallen to the wayside long ago, I'd fear.

You would think that after leveling to 99 and even acquiring a Master designation, RDM would have figured out how to look outward toward their teammates through their spells and abilities to a greater degree. With the understanding that a RDM is cunning and clever to outsmart their foes through quick spell casting and debuffs, it's unfortunate that we have had a wave of enemies whose every single attack is a TP attack and the proverbial RDM hasn't thought of a solution to how to handle that, other than spamming Cures when people take damage, reapplying buffs, and spamming Dispel.

Anyway, enough ranting. To your points:

Temper should be targetable to other party members. I'm not a fan of spamming the cycle, but everyone who swings could take advantage of it. Heck, add a Double Shot affect to it for ranged DDs (and Triple Shot for Temper II). I won't even say it should be Accessionable; it should be a flat AoE. Up its MP cost if need be, but at its core, it's a RDM specific spell that does zero benefit to RDM when they are relocated to the backline, and no one else can benefit from it.

Innate debuff resistances and building resistances have always been a blight toward RDM, since it limits how effectively RDM can be effective. If you're fighting something undead, you will have a harder time landing dark-based spells (Sleep for crowd control, which can be an issue once HP starts dropping, Frazzle/II/III for MEva, and Blind for giggles) which would help you tackle those foes. I hate to suggest that RDM keeps getting a Magic Accuracy buff, but I'd almost want some sort of Job Trait that effectively bypasses a target's building debuff resistance entirely. A clutch situation isn't the time for a debuff to be resisted...a RDM is counted on to keep a mob locked down, and Magic Accuracy only goes so far.

This could also work in favor of the RDM by giving them a spell that is guaranteed to be the first to go if they are hit with a Dispel effect, so that you don't have to roll the dice and hope that everyone doesn't lose Haste. They would lose the other spell first, guaranteed. Make it AoE too, since it may be a clutch situation in which it is used.

I'm glad they are finally giving us a "Dispel +1" option in some gear. As of this post, it's the only thing we have (I hoped it would be in reforged Empyrean armor +2/+3, maybe I'll be surprised). Spamming Dispel, even with FC, is ridiculous when mobs give themselves buffs quickly, either through spells, TP abilities, or just absorbing them from players. I had hoped that Dispel's effectiveness could be boosted, either through higher Enfeebling skill or Enfeebling Potency gear (which would also make it RDM specific most of the time). One thing I'm curious of: if you have "Dispel +1" gear and you cast Dispel, are two checks performed, with a chance to remove 1 or 2 debuffs, or is it an "all or nothing" approach?

To my earlier point about TP moves, I'm surprised they haven't provided a "TP move readying delay" spell for RDM. They had thrown out the name "Ardor" in the past, and while it became Inundation, I think Ardor could be interesting. By definition, ardor is a great feeling of warmth or passion, so I'd just be reminded of that old school Boost macro that was a ton of lines...I'd imagine the mob effected with Ardor would be doing that and getting all excited about performing a Bomb Toss or something (translation: they would just spend more time winding it up, as it were).

I know I complained about it earlier, but if there aren't plans to help RDM by giving them some AoE options, spell and ability growth could be made special with RDM by giving them a 50+ Job Trait that helped break the rules on how their spells are handled. Blink would be able to confer more than 2 shadows (or it would have a higher chance of eating a hit); Stoneskin's max damage would be increased, or it could feature a Schurzen effect; Blind could be percentage-based and not a flat number, so real results could be viewed; Barspells could be a teensy bit more feasible; Haste could scale with Enhancing skill (yeah, I said it)

Or at the very least, RDM needs some Enhancing Potency gear.

Inundation should just be a flat damage increase. If players want to all spam CDC or create intricate skillchains, they should have the freedom to do so, without Inundation's effectiveness being thrown out the window.

Enspell II damage calculations shouldn't be on swing. Make it on cast.

Same with Spike spell damage. People aren't going to idle in Vitiation Tights +3 just to dole out spike damage

We're higher level than most mobs that can use it, so could we have Poison III?

Also, I'll add my tally to the "Merit 2 spells should be innately learned, with the category giving boosts to their potencies and facets". Or at least let us merit them all 5/5. Please?

Stymie should last for more than one spell. Heck, add casts to it based on adding the player's Superiority level (Master could cast 6 spells), so that getting JP would mean more to a RDM in the longer run.

All wishful thinking, of course, with probably too much work involved to make it happen, but it would be cool if they could help give RDM a leg up.

Really, for me, my issue is that RDM, after a while, only grows up, not out, so we become stuck in the rut of "you're just stronger now". Some of what I said could probably be implemented without too much blood, sweat, and tears, since it's just copying and modifying code (e.g. Poison III damage over time). We haven't been able to evolve much by becoming more adaptive as the game has evolved; we haven't evolved at the same pace.

[Jakuk]

No, Temper being party targeted means only one thing, Temper will be getting nerfed and will NOT change RDM being wanted.

RDM needs better enfeebles, give them actual useful enfeebles like they gave GEO and RDM would be fixed in one simple move.

Stymie should be the same as Chainspell, 1:00 duration on as many spells as you want. 1hour to 45 minutes Elemental Seal, are you kidding me.

RDM is a job that should do all roles adequately, that is its core, so many people what to change its core to suit them. Mainly to be in a back row. Don't destroy a job, if you want that play as the jobs that already do that.

Literally, the only flaw is a lot of jobs had growth past 75, RDM really did not. Same tier spell lines for most of their spells, most of their other niche's passed on to other jobs, even two of their main abilities and traits were handed out everywhere.

Convert same potency useable by anyone /RDM
Fast Cast EVERY job with magic and most without getting it at least 50% is not the cap of 80%.

RDM should have tier III enfeebles by now, and even newer enfeebles that are actually useful and do some detrimental effect to the enemy or a different effect (unlike Gravity II), like Dispel II which would remove the last buff gained by the enemy and work with the Dispel +1 neck.

RDM should have higher tiers of lower level enhancing magic such are Barspell II, Stoneskin II, Enspell III (These should be unique to RDM), and I also argue for Reraise II and Reraise II.

and before people start I have no problem single spell buffing as Duration is massively helped, (Would be amazing if they buffed Empyrean armor to even more duration but unlikely) and I would NOT object to Temper being party targeted if it came at the same potency, but it will not. So IMO the only solution would be to make Temper I party based, and thus nerfed but leave Temper II RDM only and potency intact. (That or disable gear potency when party targeted meaning ~15% Triple Attack party wise)

[ManaKing]

Temper doesn't need to be given to light and heavy DDs. They can gear for their job properly already unlike RDM.

Innundation works great, it sounds like the people that other's are playing with aren't interested in SCing properly. That's no a reason to dumb down the job or relax the requirements. When your 10k ws turns into 50k double light, it should be good enough to get the attention of intelligent people. Plenty of people don't even know Innundation is in the game.

Stymie should be the same as Chainspell, 1:00 duration on as many spells as you want. 1hour to 45 minutes Elemental Seal, are you kidding me.

Stymie is stronger than elemental seal, but i still 100% agree. You can stick sleepga on /blm on wave 3 dynamis mobs, you can't with saboteur + elemental seal. It would be nice to land every enfeeble we have if we are spending our SP to do it.

[ManaKing]

The big problem with a lot of the 'fixes' you are going to come up with are that they made new jobs that now own that space and RDM can't step in there with something useful because it would be broken.

Barspells are owned by WHM with the occasional nullify, BRDs can push it further, RUN is the specialist with their JAs, COR get Runist Roll for magic evasion, and we get addle 2 to lower the mobs magic accuracy. And GEO goes on top, like it does on everything. So barspell 2s don't really make sense when there is already that much protection availlible and people will abuse stacking mechanics.

SCH took our chance at AOE buffs and enfeebles and SMN already partially owned that space before SCH came along. /SCH manifestation and ascession don't work on our best spells. We can't manifest frazzle or distract. We can't spread our +55 stat gain spells that we get from relic +3 hands. No aoe haste, flurry, or refresh. And even though we can have the best Stoneskin in the game, we can't ascession it to others because thats not how stoneskin equipment works and BLU already has a decent AOE stoneskin if you want that. And forget about Sphere effects, those are solely owned by GEO. I don't want to be saddled with /SCH unless they make it prestine, otherwise I'd rather have /BLM for elemental seal and stun if I'm not going to melee.

Our enspells suck compared other options. We don't get the attack or accuracy that we could sorely use like enlight and endark even though we have mediocre divine and dark magic skills to support it. I would take Auspice over our enspells because enspell damage gets reduced against real opponents and I'd rather just be able to use haste samba for easy self SCs. At least with Auspice you get subtle blow, which is worth something even if you're nuking. If you have the Ebers +1 pants, that's 25 subtle blow. I generally use enstone 2 or enaero 2 to lower the resists of my ice and shock spikes so that i can use haste samba instead of worrying about on hit damage because it has no additional benefits. If you want to buff RDM this is a good place to do it, however it's not going to give RDM a niche or party spot because these would have to be selfish stat buffs. They aren't going to give us a good party debuff on our enspells because they gave it away to RUN with Rayke and Gambit and BLM already has -JA spells. They aren't going to let us have something that stacks with that because it would be the only strat.

We didn't get cura or reraise, those would be easy to argue for but ultimately wouldn't provide us a party spot, so winning those battles would ultimately lose us the war of getting a real party role or spot.

We have phalanx, but now so do all the serious tanks. Their phalanx is better than ours because they have +phalanx gear so don't even cast it on them anymore. We can't stack an extra layer on them like BLU can with mighty guard or SMN can with Shining Ruby. If Phalanx and Phalanx II could stack maybe we could get a party spot with it, but I don't think the devs would want to balance that much straight damage reduction with RUN also having One for All.

Basically SMN, SCH, and RUN took all of our niches. COR and GEO are just staight better than us. We have stacking debuffs in the form of Dia 3, Bio 3, Distract 3, and Frazzle 3. And we have Flurry 2 and Innundation for niche spells. We have the highest tier general enfeebles, a haste that goes outside of party, and we can give 15/tic refresh in party.

I just want them to add critical hit damage and attack to Temper 2 so I can take a real DD spot and still do all of the things in the paragraph above.

[rotflcopter]

So, I was talking with an ls member yesterday about RDM. He's a recent returnee who used to love RDM, but is struggling to find any reason for groups to take RDM over anyone else nowadays. RDM just doesn't seem to have any unique niche that demands a RDM in a group slot. Came up with a few adjustments and additions that might be able to create one.

* Temper needs to be changed to party-targetable. This would help raise RDM players' worth over that of RDM Trusts for smaller group content, and potentially push it up high enough to be desirable for alliance content in at least the melee party.

* Add a job trait which reduces the rate that targets build resistance to debuffs, starting at lv50+. One of RDM's core themes since the beginning has been their mastery of debuffs, but at the rate that targets build resistance combined with how often many endgame targets clear their own debuffs reduces their effectiveness too rapidly. A RDM should not have to struggle to land debuffs just as much as anyone /RDM.

* Frazzle needs to be given some sort of innate magic accuracy bonus so that it is more useful in endgame content. It gets fully resisted far too often, and has felt like that since the GEO bugfix awhile back. I don't think there's a problem with designing encounters to heavily favor physical damage over magical (or vv.) but that design should never be a blanket effect over an entire type of content. (Omen Caturae, I'm looking at you. ~_~) It would be perfectly fine if this only applied to Frazzle II/III, in order to make it a uniquely RDM thing.

* I'm not sure that it's possible on a technical level, but a new debuff spell that increases readying time for TP moves (similar to how Addle works with spell casting time,) would go a long way towards RDM reclaiming their niche. Even a mere 1~2 sec increase would be enough leeway to actually allow players to react at least. This would also be a huge boon for high-lag situations and those of us players who seem to be on slower connections or low-end computers. I've personally had instances where the effect of a move in Omen showed up in the log before the readying message... <,<;;

RDM players, chime in! Do RDM mains think that these suggestions would be enough to be desirable in most group content? These come from my conversations with those who've gotten frustrated with the state of the job, as I do not have enough inventory space to give RDM a serious shot personally...

I like all your suggestions. If Temper / Temper II is too powerful to give to others, how about a big change to Inundation? In addition to skillchain damage, it also increases weapon skill damage? It would make for a unique debuff that could help all other players across all levels of content.

The most important fix I see needed is that Rdm needs to actually be able to enfeeble again. And the enfeebles need to be potent. Everything else have in our kit other jobs already have and can do almost as easy if not more easy (looking at you Smn with long lasting, AoE Haste II).

[Jakuk]

The big problem with a lot of the 'fixes' you are going to come up with are that they made new jobs that now own that space and RDM can't step in there with something useful because it would be broken.

Barspells are owned by WHM with the occasional nullify, BRDs can push it further, RUN is the specialist with their JAs, COR get Runist Roll for magic evasion, and we get addle 2 to lower the mobs magic accuracy. And GEO goes on top, like it does on everything. So barspell 2s don't really make sense when there is already that much protection availlible and people will abuse stacking mechanics.

SCH took our chance at AOE buffs and enfeebles and SMN already partially owned that space before SCH came along. /SCH manifestation and ascession don't work on our best spells. We can't manifest frazzle or distract. We can't spread our +55 stat gain spells that we get from relic +3 hands. No aoe haste, flurry, or refresh. And even though we can have the best Stoneskin in the game, we can't ascession it to others because thats not how stoneskin equipment works and BLU already has a decent AOE stoneskin if you want that. And forget about Sphere effects, those are solely owned by GEO. I don't want to be saddled with /SCH unless they make it prestine, otherwise I'd rather have /BLM for elemental seal and stun if I'm not going to melee.

Our enspells suck compared other options. We don't get the attack or accuracy that we could sorely use like enlight and endark even though we have mediocre divine and dark magic skills to support it. I would take Auspice over our enspells because enspell damage gets reduced against real opponents and I'd rather just be able to use haste samba for easy self SCs. At least with Auspice you get subtle blow, which is worth something even if you're nuking. If you have the Ebers +1 pants, that's 25 subtle blow. I generally use enstone 2 or enaero 2 to lower the resists of my ice and shock spikes so that i can use haste samba instead of worrying about on hit damage because it has no additional benefits. If you want to buff RDM this is a good place to do it, however it's not going to give RDM a niche or party spot because these would have to be selfish stat buffs. They aren't going to give us a good party debuff on our enspells because they gave it away to RUN with Rayke and Gambit and BLM already has -JA spells. They aren't going to let us have something that stacks with that because it would be the only strat.

We didn't get cura or reraise, those would be easy to argue for but ultimately wouldn't provide us a party spot, so winning those battles would ultimately lose us the war of getting a real party role or spot.

We have phalanx, but now so do all the serious tanks. Their phalanx is better than ours because they have +phalanx gear so don't even cast it on them anymore. We can't stack an extra layer on them like BLU can with mighty guard or SMN can with Shining Ruby. If Phalanx and Phalanx II could stack maybe we could get a party spot with it, but I don't think the devs would want to balance that much straight damage reduction with RUN also having One for All.

Basically SMN, SCH, and RUN took all of our niches. COR and GEO are just staight better than us. We have stacking debuffs in the form of Dia 3, Bio 3, Distract 3, and Frazzle 3. And we have Flurry 2 and Innundation for niche spells. We have the highest tier general enfeebles, a haste that goes outside of party, and we can give 15/tic refresh in party.

I just want them to add critical hit damage and attack to Temper 2 so I can take a real DD spot and still do all of the things in the paragraph above.

AoE Barspells are owned by WHM. RDM is single target, this allows them the advantage of having stronger "self" buffs. Barspell II for example, which could have something like BRD's where it nullify's or even absorbs DMG occassionally.

RDM doesn't need AoE buffs if you keep adding more Duration gear, especially if added on gear with Enhancing Magic skill. That said I don't think adding more party based buffs to RDM is the right choice BRD, COR and GEO fill that role.

Enspell III would add more DMG and hopefully work on all hits like enspell I. Also you really don't need something to stack all the time, and again Enspell would be for DMG, and adding more DMG that has no TP gain for the enemy trumps Subtle Blow, all of which matters naught in a game where enemies have CRAZY regain.

Adding buffs doesn't win nor lose a war it simply grants stuff that makes sense. We have Raise I and Raise II but not Reraise...?

Phalanx II should have always been Damage Taken, even 5% Damage Taken is better than what Phalanx II is now, not points of DMG on party member weaker than Phalanx I, that or double Phalanx I.

You again are basing SOLELY on the aspect of RDM as an Party Enhancer, they have as good as said it's not what RDM is. Only the players want to make RDM and enhancer. The augment their own strength with an occassional party buff (Refresh and Haste) while weakening the enemy with enfeebles. This is where RDM should be buffed. (Especially on the enfeebling front) not making it a lacklustre GEO/COR/BRD.

I agree, simply as it's another augmentation, but Savage Blade is still a better weaponskill to Chant du Cygne.

[Halley]

I've always thought personally that enspells should have a special effect, making ddrdm useful. Basically a better version of dancer, since dancer got added to the game instead of fixing rdm.

Something like enfire lowers mab/macc every hit, with no cap. enblizzard lowers attack every hit with no cap. enstone lowers acc with every hit, no cap etc