Machinist needs serious attention

[Kaedan94]

For everyone arguing about healer's out DPSing MCHs... is that taking into account actually having to heal? Or are you purely going by numbers on what's possible if you just DPS and don't heal?

[MrSmiley]

For everyone arguing about healer's out DPSing MCHs... is that taking into account actually having to heal? Or are you purely going by numbers on what's possible if you just DPS and don't heal?

either way, that's bad if premades could just take an extra healer who could pop off cleric stance if needed and they'd do more damage...

[LittleArrow]

@Pocketfox,

Just to give you a comparison, PLDs have a higher potency combo than ours and they do not have to rely on RNG for their combos to go off. Not to sound rude, but if you're basing your DPS purely off of when you have cooldowns, you're missing the point. MCH low dps can be hidden or not noticeable in short bursts with cooldowns. It will show when you're fighting a mob that takes more than 2mins to kill in comparison to another DPSer killing the same type of mob. Unless you have someone else running something to show the difference between yours and the SMNs dps, you can't tell the difference of dps on the same mob. I mean absolutely no disrespect to your SMNer friend, but the SMN should pull ahead of you in DPS after you've gone through your cooldowns. If not, they might want to look at their rotation / gear / or SMNers might just get super beefy at lvl 60.

PLD: Fast Blade (150 potency) > Savage Blade (200 potency / 2.5 recast) > Royal Auth (340 potency / 2.5 recast)
That 2.5 recast is similar to my 2.48 GCD. Either way, they don't have to worry about some weird proc nonsense that we do. Pocketfox, it doesn't seem like we're that bad, but once you start hearing potencies of other job classes you realize how weak we are in comparison, then you take into consideration how long it takes us to use our skills doubled with the horrible proc rates (comparing to BRD now who has similar low potencies but not being dependent on procs aside from freebie shots and they also have incredibly faster shots than we do) you begin to realize that just at a glance our job is too weak.

If you really want to see how bad your dps is, get a friend that's great at their job (try to find an endgame raider who you know is highly regarded - yes, great dpsers don't have to be hardcore raiders, but I don't know who you play with aside from the SMN), and stop comparing your opener. Just use your basic cooldown rotation and try to find 2 mobs that takes you more than a minute to kill. See how you two do.

I don't mean to sound like I"m trying to convince you of something that may not be there. I'm only attempting to point out one major flaw this class seems to be struggling with that is easily hidden beneath a couple layers of red herrings that this job contains (complicated gameplay and really pretty numbers during openers - btw, to compare those 'crits' my BLM bro at level 50 was doing 2000+ crits and on BRD at 50 I was doing 1800 crits).

[Velhart]

I seriously do not know how SE let this get past testing. It is more of a my fault, but I leveled this to 60 and I enjoyed the hell out of playing the job. Unfortunately, when comparing DPS to other jobs especially BRD, I was a tad devastated that my DPS, at a currently accepted optimal rotation is pulling 100-200 DPS less than BRD, which is a job that is even easier to play and puts more out. The job, while fun, does require much more out of you than BRD and it's reward does not even compare. I know these are suppose to be support classes, but at the same time, their DPS in progression raids is just as important as everyone else's.

Sad truth, people are going to shun MCH till it gets fixed and I 100% do not blame them. This is not something that should wait till 3.1, SE needs to set priorities on fixing both BRD and MCH or at least come out and explain the reasoning behind this. I can't believe SE did not check these jobs to make sure they scale like they did in 2.0. I am going to have to just take a hit on this and level up BRD through dungeons/leves and such.

Basically, this needs immediate attention, SE. No waiting for 2-3 patches and do one simple thing that does not help. It needs a WAR like makeover.

[LittleArrow]

Basically, this needs immediate attention, SE. No waiting for 2-3 patches and do one simple thing that does not help. It needs a WAR like makeover.

That's my greatest fear, that SE will wait a few patches (a few months to half a year) to adjust this. The easiest thing to do for now is just up all of the potencies. Change split shot to 150, slug shot to 200-240, and cleaner shot to 300-340. At least give us higher potencies so we can be on par with our tanks for goodness sakes. The turret imo was there to compensate our RNG to some degree and lack of dots compared to BRD. If they don't want to up our potencies then up that turret damage to 100 or 120.

Otherwise, I'm a hindrance to my coil group than an active member. I shouldn't be punished for having more to do, I should be rewarded as a player. Also, if those numbers seem ZOMGAH OP, just look at the potencies of other jobs. Sure their gear may not scale like ours, but like a previous poster said, our weapons are the lowest damaging weapons in the game. At this point, if SE wants to argue about our damage, at least give me some cures so I can be more of a help to the party.

[Velhart]

snip

In design, the job is great. I think the biggest issue lies in potency and the RNG weapon skills. The thing with MCH is (I am lv.60 with ilvl180 weapon and currently ilvl172) is that while we have good burst damage, we immediately have trouble sustaining the DPS in comparison to other classes and it drops quick when you are hitting Split Shot the entire time and after 8 shots (yes this has happened to me) and I finally get procc'ed for the 2nd combo. This is over the top ridiculous and my entire DPS check is completely depended on the game and not my ability to play the job. No job should ever be designed and balanced where the game decides if you should do good or not. Honestly, they should take out the RNG portion all together, make it a proper 1 > 2 > 3 combo and balance it out where we are the same damage range as BRD. Also as everyone has mentioned, that the job is way more complex and difficult than BRD and gives less in return. It is an insult really, I just can't imagine someone at SE saying this is okay. Anyone who plays the job for a few minutes can already feel how less significant it is to BRD.

Thankfully I have a time window to get BRD to 60. It will be tough, but I need to be able to alternate between the two jobs. I know MCH will -eventually- get fixed, but it is not fair to my fellow static members that we can't push DPS as far as we can because I am determined to keep a job in there that will not put out.It is sad really because I have always wanted a job like this, so hopefully SE will fix this quick so I can play it in raids. Same time, maybe I am overreacting and can make it work in raids depending on how it is set up. I guess we will see soon.

Also, SE, you need to at least -acknowledge- that this there is an issue with BRD and MCH right now. We need to at least know that you see there is a problem.

[SaiahLynn]

It makes me incredibly sad that i devoted everything to MCH.. currently 55, and my WHM leveling partners Stone 3 does more DPS than I do

Why is my Paladin friend doing 100+more dps than me in the 55 dungeon?.. sigh... I am following the rotation with GB on and then off after first Clean Shot too.

Figured id just post here as well.. maybe it can get a little more attention.

[aerialrave]

I'm sorry to say "it is too early" but that is how I truly feel at this point. But I will give my opinion as I have already reached 58MCH.

I do not wish to complain about DPS just yet. I don't use a parser so I can only tell from eyeballing things and watching closely. So far I have seen MNK and NIN do wayyyy more damage than me. Like, approaching double the kind of damage I do. I'm not sure if that's balanced or not, as I like being able to attack from a range. It is expected for melee DPS to outdamage ranged DPS. It makes logical sense. I haven't come across any good DRGs yet (just a bunch of Estinien wanna-bes) but I would assume that good DRGs can outdamage MCH like crazy too. Anecdotally I seem to be outdamaging BRDs, although it's quite possible that I've just been playing with bad players.

Little side story, I strugged on Bismarck with a party of 2 BRDs + 1 MCH. We did not pass the DPS check on the adds and wiped several times and our party disbanded. After requeuing I ended up with the same 2 BRDs and we still had a difficult time. Incidentally I also had a failed party at Dravana that consisted of 3 MCHs (2 of them stayed in GB the entire time while I scratched my head wondering if that was the right thing to do, we ended up running the timer down and failing the duty).

Another anecdote, I just finished leveling SMN to 50 before the expansion came out. I don't like casters in this game, and I had preconceptions that SMN was the laughing stock of the game. I'm sorry to say that actually playing the class and giving it a fair chance only confirmed my suspicions. Because of my poor experience with this I've had more patience for MCH. I don't know what SMN is like post-50, but from my experience 30-50 MCH is better than SMN. You can complain about Split Shot all you want, but I still much prefer it over Ruin (and Ruin2 also!!).

One weird thing about MCH is the 1-2-3 combo, which doesn't exist. It's more like a 2-3 combo when you have ammo. Then when you don't have ammo, it's like "spam 1 and pray for a 2 proc. Then when 2 procs get down on your knees and pray even harder for a 3 proc."

Personally I'm still getting used to Gauss Barrel. I knew there was gonna be problems just like BRD is experiencing problems with WM. To me I find it strange to come across many other MCHs leaving GB on all the time. For me, I have it off way more than I have it on. It's like I don't even want to use it unless Rapid Fire is also up. No one's complained about my damage yet (reached lv58, farthest I've completed is The Vault). In fact I've picked up quite a few commendations which is rare for a DPS. Grenado Shot is super awesome and even Spread Shot is pretty cool with a nice sound effect and has its uses. I only got talked down to once by someone who was surprised that I wasn't spamming Blank and knocking everything away... I'm sorry if people have had bad experiences with this but you shouldn't automatically assume everyone's gonna do it...

No defensive cooldowns is an issue. Not a problem, but an issue. Second Wind is a great cross class skill to have that Machinist is missing. Every good Bard has always used this. It's an issue because if the rest of your party isn't playing well there's nothing you can do about it, whereas on other classes it's possible to pick up the slack and take a few hits. Machinist cannot take any hits outside of unavoidable / party-wide AOE damage. I have never used so many X-Potions in my life until I started playing Machinist. Glad I made room for another hotbar in my UI before the expansion came out! I think it's not a serious problem because MCH has a bunch of tools, personally I have found some of the skills to be super valuable. For example Foot Graze + move out of range and attack a different target is a very useful strategy. You can even Lead Shot them first and then bind them after, and they can still take that DOT damage without losing the bind. Blank + Leg Graze + kite is also extremely effective versus single targets. I have fought monsters that if I stand still they bring me down very low (even to the fear of death occasionally), yet if I fight the same targets and kite them I can defeat them with taking little to no damage at all.

The tools are there, you just gotta know how to use them and when. One of the tools though, Suppressive Fire, isn't that great. Before the game came out, I thought to myself "Wow, MCH has stun, silence, slow, bind. That's so overpowered! Ranged stun? Too godly!" Now that I'm actually playing it, I was disappointed to find Stun + Silence using a shared cooldown. To add insult to injury, Suppressive Fire is melee range only, making it have very limited uses in a party role. Think of it this way, as a ranged class, you're expected to fight at a distance. That means you should be out of range of the stun for most of the fight. That means to cast the stun requires movement to get in range. But your movement is limited by Gauss Barrel, where the more you move, the less damage output you'll have. I find myself using the Silence WAY more simply because I can cast it at a range. It's not cool that the stun shares a cooldown timer AND is melee range... They should pick one or the other, with both I almost never use this in a party.

There are some issues but I'm sticking with MCH for now. I hope to reach 60 and complete the storyline in the next day or two. So far I haven't ran into any problems that made me want to quit playing MCH.

[Atlaworks]

I love the aesthetic of machinists. It sucks that their damage is so low, but hey, gotta play for fun, right?

I'll just raid as something else, until it gets buffs. I don't mind dragging myself down, if I'm having fun(Though, I would say not as many people would enjoy it like I do considering the RNG on the 1-2-3 feels less like a reward and more like a tax). But I don't enjoy the idea of dragging others down in serious content, so I'll stick to monk for that until this gets fixed.

How to fix it without really changing much...? Maybe seperate the gun and the fashionable hip-cartridge aetherometer thingy, and make it offhand equipment like a paladin's shield? Then stuff extra weapon attack on that with other benefits. It's probably just better to buff the class in general though. Like, the numbers are bad, but the biggest problem is that you don't feel like the things you do are rewarding- it feels like they cut off chunks of a kit and made us use cooldowns or RNG to earn the same damage everyone else does.

One more thing I'd like to mention is the Turrets. We never received a "remove Turret" skill that we were promised. This isn't a major problem for Rook that doesn't really draw aggro, but for Bishop I've had many problems in the open world with it attacking and aggroing monsters that I did not want to fight. Currently the best solution to this is to recast the turret as Rook and move it somewhere else. But I would like the option to remove it completely. You can dismiss summons, companions, and minions, so why not turrets too?

We do have that actually, you get it when you get your Rook. It just doesn't tell you, for some reason. Check your skill list!

[Avenger]

Over time I expect more players will discover ways to play MCH (not to mention AST and DRK) extremely effectively. Although the dev team has obviously tested it out and believes it to be balanced and viable, they will have tons more data coming in which may lead to changes in the future. It looks OK to me, based on what I've seen of players playing it, but who knows?

An aspect of MMOs that I really enjoy is the "players vs. the dev team" - basically all players in the game are trying to figure out what the heck the dev team was thinking and how to exploit it, while the dev team is keeping it all secret. ;-)