Redmages any good?

Never played one but they look cool, I'm wondering how their damage and support abilities stack up to other classes in a non raiding enviroment

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Originally Posted by Aebel

Never played one but they look cool, I'm wondering how their damage and support abilities stack up to other classes in a non raiding enviroment

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Has less overall damage than Black mage and Summoner, but is better for progression in most raid environments because of their heals and easy revive possibilities. You see them a lot in Eureka and Heaven on High. The rotation is quite simple between building up the two mana bars with black and white magic before doing the sword combo up close and then using the VerHoly or VerFlare. Has a gap closer and backflip too. and some powerful oGCDs.
No Dots, just focusing on dualcasting proc based spells after hardcasting to build mana.
Has one team buff Embolden - that buffs DPS but drops quite quickly.

It's a great casual job but has uses in a lot of settings, just not as much in hardcore endgame instances.

It seems like in situations/trials where everything is scripted/choreographed they're pretty "eh."

But I notice they shine in situations where the fights/ environments can go off the rails but still be recoverable, such as Heaven-on-High and Eureka, and then the ability to whip out an insta-cast VerRaise or back-up heals is a pretty significant tool. They are also pretty comfortable (and sometimes the only/best option) to solo with, in the sparse places that allow it (again, HoH and Eureka).

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Originally Posted by Lubu_Mykono

Has less overall damage than Black mage and Summoner, but is better for progression in most raid environments because of their heals and easy revive possibilities. You see them a lot in Eureka and Heaven on High. The rotation is quite simple between building up the two mana bars with black and white magic before doing the sword combo up close and then using the VerHoly or VerFlare. Has a gap closer and backflip too. and some powerful oGCDs.
No Dots, just focusing on dualcasting proc based spells after hardcasting to build mana.
Has one team buff Embolden - that buffs DPS but drops quite quickly.

It's a great casual job but has uses in a lot of settings, just not as much in hardcore endgame instances.

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Hmm sounds interesting, I'll have to give it a shot. Thanks for the reply!

Red Mage is a fun job. It may not do a ton of damage for a DPS class, but there are people who enjoy using it for its raises in progression, as stated before. I think of RDM as a sort of "self-sufficient" job, in that it has the tools that allow it to do solo content more easily thanks to the fact that you can heal yourself with ease while still having more damage potential than a typical healer and even tanks. The drawbacks, however, are that despite its rezzing capabilities it really doesn't offer much else in terms of support skills as Embolden is a very minor buff that degrades in effect gradually until it runs out. Furthermore, you only get one way to restore your MP, and that's Lucid Dreaming. This makes Lucid even more of a mandatory role skill for RDM, as without it you might just find yourself totally useless for much of a fight, particularly if you do a lot of rezzing. Verraise eats a ton of MP with each use, which puts a limit on the RDM's rezzing utility, something that a lot of people seem to forget.

Overall, I'd still definitely recommend you give it a try. I use RDM frequently for non-raiding content, personally. It's a very forgiving job that's relatively easy to understand the basics. Once you understand the flow of alternating between black/white spells, building your mana gauges up to the right amount while keeping them balanced, and then unleashing your enchanted melee skills to proc your finishing spells, it all becomes second nature before you know it.

Edit: as a side-note, if you don't have Verstone/Verfire procced, you should always hardcast either a Jolt spell or Impact first, then use your Dualcast to use Veraero/Verthunder accordingly. You should almost NEVER hardcast Veraero/Verthunder, except during the countdown before a fight after using Acceleration to ensure you get at least one spell proc in your opening. I've seen many new RDMs try to hardcast those spells. Now you don't have to be one of them.

If you do not raid or just do Ex Trials it is fine even for solo content. At lower levels it does have some advantage over other jobs.
The job is enjoyable and it is a nice break from playing complex jobs.
Having played blm for around 4 years i was feeling like a change this expansion and Red Mage suited me fine.

Rdm is Excellent for short fight because you dont have to keep any buff up ,dots or whatever. For everything solo its one if not the best jobs. Even for raid its pretty decent because the rotation is so easy , so if you play with only casual player : You can be the top dps simply because every other jobs have a much more complicated rotation... Rdm you can basically only screw up if youre not balancing your mana gauge Well enough or if you go OOM

For non hardcore raiding, RDM stacks up fine. Especially in PUG situations like the 24man raids, RDM can save the day when a whole party wipes. When Ridorana first hit I can't tell you how many times I was able to revive half the raid and save a fight (albeit sometimes you end up dying anyway lol).

For the actual endgame, I hear they're not very wanted. I don't have an FC large enough/have a consistent work schedule to do statics, but from what I see around the forums and PF, people prefer SMN for caster DPS.

Now if you go into Eureka? The instance tends to be 75% RDMs.

even in Hardcore enviroments Rdm is fine, .. if you're good at the class, there is no problem

sure, Rdm damage is not high, but its enough, besides thanx to its "easy" rotation and mobility, Rdm have a more constant dps

but its true, most hardcore statis will chose a Smn over a Rdm (since Smn has high damage output and can still rez if absolutly needed, just not near as easy and frequent as a Rdm can)

OP, RDM has always been a jack of all trades class. Its listed as a range class but can easily be turned into a melee style class with the right materia. RDM also has a good AOE output with Scatter, Moulete, and another skill with helps out a lot in dungeon runs.

Tons of people play RDM "untraditionally" or differently then some of the elite players suggest, but even if you don't focus on the play style they suggest you still put out decent DPS and the AOE always help.
With the right materia an RDM can hold their own with a ninja in melee even before the power up the spells give them. Its a great class for anyone who likes to play their own way. You can literally play three different styles, melee, range, or support healer.

If anything else it never hurts to try.

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Originally Posted by Vorx

OP, RDM has always been a jack of all trades class. Its listed as a range class but can easily be turned into a melee style class with the right materia. RDM also has a good AOE output with Scatter, Moulete, and another skill with helps out a lot in dungeon runs.

Tons of people play RDM "untraditionally" or differently then some of the elite players suggest, but even if you don't focus on the play style they suggest you still put out decent DPS and the AOE always help.
With the right materia an RDM can hold their own with a ninja in melee even before the power up the spells give them. Its a great class for anyone who likes to play their own way. You can literally play three different styles, melee, range, or support healer.

If anything else it never hurts to try.

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Can you support this claim with evidence? Such as what you do in melee to make RDM a melee class? Because none of what you said it true at all.

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Originally Posted by Vorx

OP, RDM has always been a jack of all trades class. Its listed as a range class but can easily be turned into a melee style class with the right materia. RDM also has a good AOE output with Scatter, Moulete, and another skill with helps out a lot in dungeon runs.

Tons of people play RDM "untraditionally" or differently then some of the elite players suggest, but even if you don't focus on the play style they suggest you still put out decent DPS and the AOE always help.
With the right materia an RDM can hold their own with a ninja in melee even before the power up the spells give them. Its a great class for anyone who likes to play their own way. You can literally play three different styles, melee, range, or support healer.

If anything else it never hurts to try.

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This post gave me a good laugh. There's no world where a RDM's unpowered melee attacks would even come close to a NIN's melee attacks. There's no world where you can build a melee-only RDM lmao.

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Originally Posted by Vorx

OP, RDM has always been a jack of all trades class. Its listed as a range class but can easily be turned into a melee style class with the right materia. RDM also has a good AOE output with Scatter, Moulete, and another skill with helps out a lot in dungeon runs.

Tons of people play RDM "untraditionally" or differently then some of the elite players suggest, but even if you don't focus on the play style they suggest you still put out decent DPS and the AOE always help.
With the right materia an RDM can hold their own with a ninja in melee even before the power up the spells give them. Its a great class for anyone who likes to play their own way. You can literally play three different styles, melee, range, or support healer.

If anything else it never hurts to try.

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RDM was a jack of all trades in other games, but in the actual 'jack of all trades' sense. Our non-powered up melee potency will never match a melee unless that melee is severely undergeared/underleveled, and our Vercure potency is not high enough to be a full on support healer for longer than a minute or two. MP would also be a problem. I don't get where you think any sort of materia puts us at any sort of melee advantage. We stack the same materia as any DPS (primarily, crit) and it doesn't help our non-enchanted melee output. Not only that, you're gimping yourself hard if you're not using Verflare/holy.

There are plenty of "untraditional" ways to play any class, I'm sure, but your suggestions just aren't feasibly or reasonably possible within the RDM kit. RDM is ranged for gauge, melee to expire that gauge, and heals/rez utility clutch. It does all three but you can't dedicate it to one. That's the whole point of 'jack of all trades--master of none.'

Also, if a RDM can go toe to toe with a NIN in melee without Enchanted in equal gear/level, I'll eat my keyboard and then taunt my sister (as she mains a NIN).

Yeah the guy saying a rdm can match a ninja in melee is either huffing ether or is just clueless. Rdm is a fun class and has a fairly low skill floor. They do decent dps, more then brds and mch but less then next ninja lol. If ya don’t think so just check ff logs and compare the numbers. Overall it’s a fun class that is super easy to use

Again OP don't listen to the elites..

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Originally Posted by Vorx

Again OP don't listen to the elites..

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It's not even elites telling you what's up. I'm hardly "elite" and I'm saying you're not being realistic about the job. The way you describe a "melee-oriented" RDM you're cutting out 75% of it's abilities and kit. There is absolutely no way it can become comparable to any melee when ignoring 75% of it's abilities. If you're not enchanting your melee rotation, you're ignoring 9 spells and 2 self-buffs, including essentially our party buff, because it buffs magical damage, which iirc your melee combo only becomes magical damage when it's Enchanted.

OP, there's plenty of ways to play RDM and it's a fun class, but it is not a replacement melee or healer. It's a caster DPS with progressive utility and a play mechanic that mimics a caster/melee motion.

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Originally Posted by Kidria

It's not even elites telling you what's up. I'm hardly "elite" and I'm saying you're not being realistic about the job. The way you describe a "melee-oriented" RDM you're cutting out 75% of it's abilities and kit. There is absolutely no way it can become comparable to any melee when ignoring 75% of it's abilities. If you're not enchanting your melee rotation, you're ignoring 9 spells and 2 self-buffs, including essentially our party buff, because it buffs magical damage, which iirc your melee combo only becomes magical damage when it's Enchanted.

OP, there's plenty of ways to play RDM and it's a fun class, but it is not a replacement melee or healer. It's a caster DPS with progressive utility and a play mechanic that mimics a caster/melee motion.

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I think he's trolling. I rememer there was one guy who went around claiming that the best RDM rotation utilized the role action Break.

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Originally Posted by Ryallen

I think he's trolling. I rememer there was one guy who went around claiming that the best RDM rotation utilized the role action Break.

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I honestly had to sit here and remember wtf Break was LOL

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Originally Posted by Ryallen

I think he's trolling. I rememer there was one guy who went around claiming that the best RDM rotation utilized the role action Break.

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Iirc he's the same guy who "built" his RDM for aoe. Never explained how, but he has a good (bad) tactic of othering people who disagree with him as big bad "elites" and not backing up his statements.

I'm curious, Vorx. What materia make melee RDM viable?

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Originally Posted by Ryallen

I think he's trolling. I rememer there was one guy who went around claiming that the best RDM rotation utilized the role action Break.

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Looking at his gear, he's got himself loaded up with Strength materia, so it would appear that be actually believes himself.

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Originally Posted by Darkstride

Looking at his gear, he's got himself loaded up with Strength materia, so it would appear that be actually believes himself.

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Yeah, his ilevel 330-340 gear. Again, I'm positive he's a troll.

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Originally Posted by Aebel

Never played one but they look cool, I'm wondering how their damage and support abilities stack up to other classes in a non raiding enviroment

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RDM is a low damage class that supposedly boasts a good amount of utility, but 80% of that utility is located in its spell Verraise, which is a raise like what healers and SMN have. The only difference is that, the way that RDM is built with Dualcast, it gives RDM a combat rez whenever it wants as opposed to once per minute that healers often have. Hypothetically, RDM is useful in pugs because it can compensate for jackasses running into AoE circles. But in a practical setting my Verraise spell is woefully underused. Yeah, you have your odd healer who thinks the glowing circle gives candy but usually people are capable enough to dodge attacks or avoid drawing too much aggro. I can count on one hand the amount of times that I've used Verraise to rez someone in a 24 man raid and even less times that I've saved a dungeon with RDM.

Its other two utility abilities are Vercure, a 350 potency heal, and Embolden, a 10% up physical damage up buff with a decay. Vercure is even less used than Verraise, as healers rarely don't have it under control. The only time you'd ever use it is if the tank is low enough on health and the healer is either stupid or dead and they can't/won't heal in time. Embolden has a 2 minute cooldown, similar to Manafication. If you don't know what Manafication is, it's an ability that doubles the amount of mana you have in your bars and automatically ends the cooldown timer for Corps a Corps and Displacement. This means that you're supposed to use Embolden at the same time that you use Manafication in order to give yourself more DPS. The issue here is that the DPS you gain and give aren't nearly as useful as you think. The decay on Embolden reduces the damage up you gained by 2% every 4 seconds. Which means that at 16 seconds of Embolden's duration you're now dealing 8% more damage as opposed to 10%. At 12 seconds it's 6% and so on. The cooldown on Embolden is so long and the damage it gives is only worthwhile for so long that Embolden has been more or less ignored for anything other than increasing RDM damage when Manafication is up. Which is only exacerbated by the fact that Embolden only increases physical damage. Any casters you have in your party, including your healers, will not get the damage buff at all.

Is RDM bad? No, of course not. I main it, if it was truly awful I wouldn't play it. But it *is* a class that needs severe rebalancing, because every other class can do what it can do only better, especially SMN. Not as badly as SAM but it does need something to make it stand out as something more than a "Rezmage."

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Originally Posted by Vorx

Again OP don't listen to the elites..

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Rdm has one unique way to perform its rotation, and additionnals support tools.
Knowing that isn't being elitist.

If OP has to ignore someone here, it's you for saying pure nonsense.
So please stop that.

Well while these "experts" continue to rip on me and proving my point, i'll address this back to you OP. If you need help figuring out a style for yourself with RDM i'm more then happy to answer your questions and give tips to the things i've found out about it. I've dissected this class from top to bottom and found numerous ways to play it. My style might not be best for you but RDM is the best class to experiment with.
You can contact me here in message form or on PSN. Just be easier that way, less know-it-alls trying to drive down my post as well.

Teach me the ways of the STR RDM, Master Vorx.

Allow me to humbly throw my hat into this ring as well. Message me on discord and I can teach you all I know about RDM. I cannot claim to be as much of a genius at the job as Vorx, but I do like to think I'm not a bad RDM by any stretch.

We aren't prooving anything.
Giving bad advices to new player is just wrong and confusing them for nothing.

So stop.

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Originally Posted by Vorx

Well while these "experts" continue to rip on me and proving my point, i'll address this back to you OP. If you need help figuring out a style for yourself with RDM i'm more then happy to answer your questions and give tips to the things i've found out about it. I've dissected this class from top to bottom and found numerous ways to play it. My style might not be best for you but RDM is the best class to experiment with.
You can contact me here in message form or on PSN. Just be easier that way, less know-it-alls trying to drive down my post as well.

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Ok I was right on both accounts he is huffing ether and is 100% clueless.

maybe he didnt take the ninjas gear or expierince into account, when comparing them or some orher neglect.., can happen

just hope when je posts such in the future, he should post it like "I expirienced this" rather than "this is a fact"

even if the ninja comparison doesn't seem right, his overall mesage was "Rdm is very flexible, and worth experimenting with", which I do agree on

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Originally Posted by Vorx

Again OP don't listen to the elites..

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It isn't elitism to call you out for giving inherently bad advice - in this thread or the other one. Jobs all have a right way to play them, and anything deviating from that - in this game, at least - is incorrect and unoptimal. People are here trying to give a returning player decent advice on RDM, not advocate for them to play the job in a way so against the grain that it would gut their personal performance.

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Originally Posted by Shiroe

even if the ninja comparison doesn't seem right, his overall mesage was "Rdm is very flexible, and worth experimenting with", which I do agree on

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The issue is, the scope of "flexibility" which he was saying was at ice mage level. Melee only RDM is arguably even worse than ice mage.

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Originally Posted by Vorx

Well while these "experts" continue to rip on me and proving my point, i'll address this back to you OP. If you need help figuring out a style for yourself with RDM i'm more then happy to answer your questions and give tips to the things i've found out about it. I've dissected this class from top to bottom and found numerous ways to play it. My style might not be best for you but RDM is the best class to experiment with.
You can contact me here in message form or on PSN. Just be easier that way, less know-it-alls trying to drive down my post as well.

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You've dissected your own arse if you can say RDM can out-melee a NIN.

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Originally Posted by Vorx

OP, RDM has always been a jack of all trades class. Its listed as a range class but can easily be turned into a melee style class with the right materia. RDM also has a good AOE output with Scatter, Moulete, and another skill with helps out a lot in dungeon runs.

Tons of people play RDM "untraditionally" or differently then some of the elite players suggest, but even if you don't focus on the play style they suggest you still put out decent DPS and the AOE always help.
With the right materia an RDM can hold their own with a ninja in melee even before the power up the spells give them. Its a great class for anyone who likes to play their own way. You can literally play three different styles, melee, range, or support healer.

If anything else it never hurts to try.

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Damn dude I didn't think someone would be this misguided until I checked your lodestone page.

I think RDM is fantastic, but I haven't raided with it yet.

RDM has certain gimmicks that give it carry potential in pugs. I've solo healed bosses when the healer has died. One time, we had to do Bardam's Mettle, but the tank left immediately. I ended up tanking the first boss, and when our healer died, I healed the DRG, who finished it off.

RDM gives you the tools to pull people through lower level content, but I'll repeat that these are gimmicks. They are not utility.

That's the problem RDM is facing right now.

But that's what I find attractive about it. It's true to Final Fantasy. RDM has always been a self-sufficient class in a game where self-sufficiency isn't needed. Because of that, it's impractical late-game, when everyone is powered up and capable of pulling their weight.

It's impractical, that is, unless something goes wrong. And things always go wrong in pugs.

RDM's rotation is fun and easy to learn, but it's deceptively nuanced, with Displacement usage, Embolden timing, and so on. Optimizing RDM -- which mostly involves when to use certain oGCDs -- varies a little from situation to situation, and that makes it exciting for me.

I like standing close to a boss to get in auto-attacks when I can. Little things like this make it interesting and fun to me, but I can see how some people would find it awkward or poorly designed.

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Originally Posted by Ryallen

Hypothetically, RDM is useful in pugs because it can compensate for jackasses running into AoE circles. But in a practical setting my Verraise spell is woefully underused. Yeah, you have your odd healer who thinks the glowing circle gives candy but usually people are capable enough to dodge attacks or avoid drawing too much aggro. I can count on one hand the amount of times that I've used Verraise to rez someone in a 24 man raid and even less times that I've saved a dungeon with RDM.

Its other two utility abilities are Vercure, a 350 potency heal, and Embolden, a 10% up physical damage up buff with a decay. Vercure is even less used than Verraise, as healers rarely don't have it under control.

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For my part i have a totally difference experience. I can't count the number of times i did get nearly out of mana despite using lucid dreaming, because people were dying left and right and rezzes are such a mp drain. And i use vercure way more often than verraise, the typical case being healers healing only the tank, letting me at half-life from some group or raid-wide unavoidable aoes, and me being like "uh, a big hit from the boss is coming again... better heal myself before i die".

That being said, with Vorx opening to me a world of new possibilities, i now go putting intelligence materias on my ninja. Because you know, ninjas have magic attacks, so i have good hopes to transform him succesfully into a badass ranged caster :cool:

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Originally Posted by Kidria

OP, there's plenty of ways to play RDM and it's a fun class, but it is not a replacement melee or healer. It's a caster DPS with progressive utility and a play mechanic that mimics a caster/melee motion.

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fun only appears in said content, where the simplicity of the cls supports the situational reaction... leveling RDM is kinda boring cause their base rota won't change or evolve at all - not even with their 70 skill - but yeah its a super handy cls for grinding those mindless "new-age-community" content... bad minds could call it the Netflix-Cls lately - just visit Pagos (or Anemos) to become a part ; p

Said as if leveling in general wasn't boring.

I think it's also important to mention that the core design of red mage is overall important to the game. It fills a specific nice that, although not the best in all content, is important to be of use to the majority of players. You see lots of red mages since you get it at level 50
Even as a caster though, the difference in playstyle is good because it acts as a "safety net" for those casual/roulette instances where the fight might be lost if not for fast acting Red Mage. I hope we get more jobs like this in the future, not ones that can heal/res but those that have unique identities and roles even within groupings like Caster DPS.

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Originally Posted by Lubu_Mykono

I think it's also important to mention that the core design of red mage is overall important to the game. It fills a specific nice that, although not the best in all content, is important to be of use to the majority of players. You see lots of red mages since you get it at level 50
Even as a caster though, the difference in playstyle is good because it acts as a "safety net" for those casual/roulette instances where the fight might be lost if not for fast acting Red Mage. I hope we get more jobs like this in the future, not ones that can heal/res but those that have unique identities and roles even within groupings like Caster DPS.

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There use to be a beast class in FFXI if i remember right that could use its beast as a healer or a tank role. Kinda like summoner has now but with nealy identical outputs.
Plus there is always Mimic to look forward to that can change classes at will while in battle.

I also would love Mimes they were my most favorite Cls in Tactics cause strategys were limitless - sadly but most probably they won’t implement a freaking Fun-Cls like Mimes to 14 in that way how do ever cause of balancing... : /

@ Vorx, everyone here is correct though... Red Mage is the lowest dps in the game. Have you played other jobs even? Not judging but your gear on Red Mage would indicate you are fairly new to Red Mage and you do not have other jobs @ 70.
Also what is reasoning behind adding str materia or even spell speed on your Red Mage? It serves Zero purpose in case you did not know you will want crit, DH and lastly Determination
Ninja is not the highest damage but it brings more damage then Red Mage plus support. (Red Mage support is not worth mentioning in a raid environment)

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