Is Grand Impact disabling JoltIII not good design?

The JP RDM thread has gotten a handful of comments asking to separate Grand Impact from JoltIII so they can hold onto the former and still cast JoltIII.

Right now, JoltIII changing to Grand Impact means that you don't really have a choice but to use it if you don't get VerStone/Fire procs and don't have enough gauge to do the sword combo. I thought it introduced an interesting opportunity cost to it, with you having to weigh the chances you wouldn't be able to hold onto it for mobility/weaving/pots vs keeping VerStone/Fire up. This was already something we had to do with EW Acceleration so it seemed like a fairly natural extension of it.

If the rng is kind to you it can help keep fleche/contre sixte on cooldown, if not it may force you to spend mana to do it. Maybe the win-lose scenario the rng dictates here is a bit much?

It wouldn't be the end of the job if they do separate them, in fact I'd probably be making use of it constantly, but something about the idea rubs me the wrong way

I like Grand Impact how it is too. As you say it just feels like a natural extension of previous Red Mage gameplay with leveraging Acceleration for mobility vs damage.
Plus with two charges on Acceleration it’s not like you’re completely out of options if you do end up using Grand Impact at a time you didn’t want to, so I wouldn’t say its particularly ‘unforgiving’ either in my view.

I don't get the issue tbh. Yeah it's a bit weird, but if it only changed impact it'd be weird rotationally to always reach over to the AoE buttons.

Whether it's good or not I don't think I'm qualified enough to say that. I do however prefer to have Grand Impact replaces Impact alone rather than Jolt III as well because in every AoE'ing situations, Grand Impact will almost always be prioritized over regular Impact. But when it comes to Jolt III, there are few times I'd rather keep casting Jolt III > Verslow spell once or twice because Fleche/Contre is about to come off cooldown. OR I know I'm going to make use of the instant cast within next 30s, just not -right now-. A cast of Grand Impact in that situation would either force me to use (1)Use another Accel; (2)Use Swiftcast; (3) E.Reprise; or (4)One spare melee combo (usually have enough before I lose out 2 melee combo in reopeners!) to realign to not drift Fleche/Contre.

What bothers me about the idea is, Yes, having no option but to use Grand Impact sounds bad on paper, but what they're really asking for and what they're getting at is something more like "I am compelled and should be compelled to always do optimal damage, because in the ideal situation, grant impact is best"

Trouble being, when all buttons are ideal without any drawbacks, situational benefits or detriment, it's that kind of thing that's led to homogenization and the aformented 2 minute meta. We need buttons that are not always the best. Red Mage is actually a really good example of a job working a bit outside the grain and making great use of a players ability to adapt. Veraise is not always the best GCD, but it's powerful when you need it, there's RNG procs constantly leading to making the most of the situation, but if you can they are also powerful.

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Originally Posted by SalamanderIX

What bothers me about the idea is, Yes, having no option but to use Grand Impact sounds bad on paper, but what they're really asking for and what they're getting at is something more like "I am compelled and should be compelled to always do optimal damage, because in the ideal situation, grant impact is best"

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But the whole reason some people asking to remove this Jolt->GI lock is because in some hyper-specific scenarios it'd be more optimal to sit on the GI for a brief moment.

Right, so they want the jolt so they could get their elemental cast proc game aligned, but in either case, if jolt or grand impact is superior, it would remove what makes grand impact a good design and just makes it "more damage" without any cost.

Oh don't get me wrong, I'm not in favor of removing the replacement, exaclty because there is so little friction in the RDM gameplay as-is with the nowadays extremely common procs and long full-mobility burst chain. Need to keep something around that makes people think for a split-second before just hammering their hand flat on the keyboard for the next GCD.

Maybe lowering the Grand Impact window to 10s - 15s to compensate? Idk. It's certainly not much of an issue as it is now. I just find it unintuitive to have it sit on 30s timer when it's quite rare to see it lasts longer than 20s, let alone expires unless you have it up in a middle of melee combo.