Can we please stop giving melee bad stigma?

[Nova_Dresden]

Wait, that doesn't make any sense. It might almost make sense if by "ranged" you specifically mean "BRD," but it doesn't make sense as soon as you include casters.

Yes, I include casters in the ranged category and so does SE.

First, it's extremely rare that something targeting the melee dps will also be targeting the tank.

Giant red circles of death aren't picky about who all they affect, but they will never affect the tank if they only target ranged players. In an all melee party there's a much higher risk of the tank taking avoidable AoE damage from not being able to move in time.

Second, melee dps can still dps while dodging, so there's minimal to no loss of dps when they dodge. And that's not even counting the fact that different melee players might be at different parts of their rotation, and thus you might only even see one of them being targeted at a time.

Scathe, Ruin II, and Swiftcast+anything were designed as "movement" fillers to provide the same negligible losses. They may not be optimal, but they're something and better than letting a GCD go empty due to movement. Even then you only move out of the AoE and stop to continue casting so you might miss 1 or maybe 2 casts in extreme situations, but that's why those instant spells were put in the game.

Now, what you're not factoring in for ranged players is that they often have an area they have to stack in. Which means anything targeting one of them is just as likely to target several of them as it is in the melee scenario. This wouldn't be an issue, but it interrupts casting for BLM and SMN. Granted, it's fine for BRD, but I refuse to join a party with 4 BRDs.

Stacking with ranged isn't usually a normal tactic in any other MMO unless it's needed to handle a mechanic (like splitting damage) because of the risk of multiple people dying to the same targeted AoE. They may be relatively close, but ranged usually stay spread out in every other MMO when possible for that reason alone. Whereas melee are ALWAYS near each other because mechanically they have to be and are always at risk of being killed by the same AoE.

As for your assertion that "anything a melee can do a ranged can do without dancing around the boss," no. . .just no. Let me see a BLM or SMN maintain their rotation while dodging. And if you think ranged can maintain optimal dps while dodging, good luck finding four bards who can outdamage competent MNKs and DRGs.

By "dancing around the boss" I don't mean dodging mechanics I mean the perpetual movement around the boss from back to flank in order to do max damage. Casters and Bard only require line of sight and being stationary to be able to deal max damage and one of those doesn't really affect Bard. Could 4 Bards outdamage competent Monks? Probably not since it would mean no limit break, but without that I don't see why not assuming they're just as competent and well geared.