Spell Fencer > Red Mage(Concept!)

[Atlaworks]

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I actually did read that. While I was writing this up I had like ten tabs open with every RDM mockup I could find on the forums, and a bunch of wiki stuff for reference. Yours was one of them! But a lot of mockups I found followed a mechanic I didn't like, and that was imbuing magic or elements into physical attacks. It's cool, but to me it's just not what Red Mages do- Mystic Knight, totes, but that's a different can of aether to me. So I tried to follow a sort of "Uses both swords and spells with low potencies, needs to use both to stay effective" line of thought. Likewise, I took my entire mockup from Fencer moves from the FFTA series, a few Red Mage passives and actives, and Aphonia from FFTA assassins. Only the magic attacks I made up, and I just used Primal titles to differentiate the elemental attacks from THM and CNJ skills.

I felt Doublecast was necessary since it's been a RDM staple since FFV, and I didn't want to make a Chaincast mechanic- I felt I made their passive "two seperate GCDs" mechanic plenty close to what chainspell is a bit like, and wanted to avert the mechanics that made the FFXI Red Mage different from the more classic examples in the series. I can see where you think my work is disorganized though; I actually spent a lot of time switching up what skills are learned at what levels and what combo actions to add/prune and honestly I just had a field day and posted it when I thought it looked good so I wouldn't lose the work.

My research I skipped is mostly in balancing numbers; TP costs and potencies probably need to be adjusted so that they're in line with doing a little less/more than half a normal DPS class' skills on average. And I didn't add MP costs because I am dumb and don't know what the scale for those is. But I did do lore work!

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I did design the class to be hard to master- it's difficulty is supposed to be in just how fast you have to input skills correctly to do effective DPS, considering it starts at base twice as fast as any other class and is rife with buffs to attack and skill speeds. I feel it may have Mudra's problem with latency, though. And of course I can't write potencies to save my life.

I gave Nighthawk no cooldown because it can't be executed if bound and it has combo actions that turn it into both a multitude of movement and pushing skills, as well as a looped combo that lets you do damage at a range for more MP/TP costs. I also realized I didn't build any movement mechanic into the class except for Nighthawk- Monks have Fist of Wind and Shoulder Tackle, Dragoons have Spineshatter Dive and Elusive Jump, Bards have Repelling Shot, ninjas have Shukuchi, and casters can just sprint freely. I figured that Nighthawk is a necessity to pull or push yourself out of attacks- and fits in with the RDM style of being highly adjustable at a cost. It's also bindlocked like Repelling Shot. I probably need to increase it's TP cost or something though to discourage overuse.

The only dispelling move currently is Monk's One-Ilm Punch, and I'm pretty sure monks don't use it for much except for PvP. I thought it'd be nice to have it in a more flexible form- even if dispelling buffs on enemies is mostly useless, it'd be awesome in PvP and it keeps the effect from being on only one class, thus enforcing the "Bring the player not the class" mentality. I thought about having it remove debuffs on allies too, but I didn't want the class to invalidate healers in any way. Especially having an AoE Esuna- Man, they've wanted one of those for so long, bwahahaha.

As for heavy and light combos, I actually plugged those in- there's no real heavy TP attack, but they have Inferno as Red Mages, which is designed to have really high MP costs and potent combo actions. You can spam it, especially with things like Swiftcast and Doublecast and Blood Price, but then you'll end up dry on MP(Or HP!) really fast. Then you use Cantrip to restore your MP in exchange for TP. There's also a looping combo of Aetherstrike and Levin that restores MP and TP when it runs dry, since with their attack speed buffs I intend for their resources to run out fairly easy in prolonged fights. Of course, if you're relegated to using Aetherstrike and Levin you'll be doing a whopping 70 potency every GCD, so it kind of punishes you for not being smart with your resources. Zen is also there to make them not feel too throttled when soloing or fighting trash in dungeons- ensuring those resources will replenish before the next pull since they'll naturally burn through them faster than other classes. Pin Down also encourages using your skills as quickly as possible, since Shadowstick is not only a bind and a stun, but combos into Inferno and Checkmate for a really brutal execution combo.

That being said, I love both your points! There's definitely plenty that can be cleaned up with what I did, and god knows I understand how messy it is. Balance is tough, man.

[Eloah]

EDIT INCOMING

Good to hear, if you like I can save my critique until after you make any changes you want to make. Additionally, a good idea might be to label which move is a weapon skil, an ability, or a spell, so we know which one will cost TP, MP or No P, lol. And while TP amounts should ne listed MP ones dont since they scale anyway. Also yes the potencies need to be adjusted.

[Eloah]

Snip

Yay my ideas were helpful. I am wondering though if my Red Mage seemed the way you said others were I know I have magic and melee, but I tried to keep them seperate as well. I did give them an aspir and drain attack as part of a combo, but that might not be mystic knight exclusive, but I would love to hear your thoughts on my red mage as well. Plus I think I was the only one who made them as a tank, lol. I will be working on my critique tomorrow, I hope you like it, and I will try to fit it to the styl you were invisioning.

[Eloah]

Sorry I haven't been able to post my ideas yet, real life has been getting in the way, always a pleasure, yay?