FOOD FOR THOUGHT: Will Red Mage be just like astrologian? A fusion between SMN & Blm.

[Warlyx]

RDM in a nutshell...



*brentalfloss TM

[Shurrikhan]

For what I keep hearing Red Mage is essentially a "jack of all trade" class. So my question is, why not letting it be the first class/job/whatever to be a multi-role one?

That creates balance issues. And composition issues. Better to not go down that route at all.

Worked fine for (pre-Guardian spec) Feral, and (SoL) Retribution, and (Tenacity) Beastmaster, and (absorb) Blood and (mini-kite) Frost. And I think the internet's made memes enough to tell how their 'streamlining' down from that went.

Every enfeebler is in some way a tank or healer. Every kiter with the enemy's attention is doing mitigation. If anything, XIV ought to be trying to make use of where these "role" lines already blur, rather than panic-rooming themselves into rigid design models. Personally, I want RDM specifically because it can get us out of that room. And I don't think it'd going to be a real RDM unless it does that.

What I'd hope for from the RDM is more than just XI's alleged "versatility" -- everything that was hinted at but balance left in the dark.

but u never used a retri as raid tank or raid healer, tenacity bst as MT on raid? not even close (adds yeah) , Feral was kinda hybrid thats right still unable to be the best as it could be since it didnt maxed DPS nor Tank talents , DK was able to tank or dps but thats thanks to talents too.

for Rdm they can put it on DEX and put a healer stance all the healing spells are now based on dex , caster stance ditto .... Ninja spells are based around dex .... Cleric stance does kinda that now anyway....

My point was that there's plenty that a job can do that doesn't especially fit its "role", or where there quite simply isn't a particular "role", just stats and effects to do with what one will. Every DK spec could raid-tank in some fight (Unholy fewer than the other two). All it took was a talent swap to MT; as pure DPS they were still damn durable and plenty able to survive add-gathering. A friend of mine Ret-tanked (not always intentionally; he just did ridiculous damage with which to do ridiculous self-healing) Naxx-25 boss adds and sometimes the bosses themselves. I've tanked plenty of adds as an Arms Warrior, and kited plenty to the OT as Frost, hunter, or a mage. I've trash-tanked ICC heroic with a Tenacity pet, and twice made up for a d/ced tank by swapping out my Wolf for one mid-fight to sac or hold for a particular mechanic. Should I just not use these things whatsoever, allowing only a tank to ever have threat, and only a "healer" to heal, just because I wasn't formally of the particular role? In Wrath I tried to do every heroic in a 5-Hunter party, and managed on most. I've no-tank'ed and/or no-healer'ed all of them before over-gear. That might not be wholly applicable to raids, but those have to be serious tools then. And I'd rather not see job identity clipped of those things just because a given community doesn't want to accept anything more than T&S and rigid distribution of responsibility (despite being a game in which healers and tanks both, compared to other MMOs, deal ridiculously high damage).
compared to other MMOs, deal ridiculously high damage).

Ferals still had to gear for one or the other. A bear-focused druid was not going to match the damage of a cat-focused druid. Tenacity pets didn't last long enough to be worthwhile, specially since BM hunters as of the last time I raided were still brought for the exotic pet buffs over anything else. Blood before it was sacrificed to become the tank spec was actually the weaker of the damage specs for DKs (since everyone either went unholy or shadowfrost back when that existed) and didn't have anywhere near the survivability they have now.

As long as it swings a sword and casts magic, it's a Red Mage. The easiest place to fit that archetype in is DPS. The templates for this already exist (see: Retribution Paladins, Enhance Shaman).

ArP Blood cleave ate at right through stuff at lower gear scores, preforming much more well-rounded dps ST/AoE than either Frost or Unholy; it just came out when ArP hadn't yet gained fame, and tended suffered from some poor scalars at high gear scores. It could already tank heroics about as well as a slightly lesser-geared 'real' tank minus the threat generation, even when a pure DPS build. But whatever.

If RDM could pull off everything (not just the 25m raid-apt components, but everything) that Rets and Enhance could historically do, I'd be pretty okay with that. But XIV being as it's been, without some change in mentality, I doubt we'll be seeing any off-healing (which still hit for a ton in WoD), DPS-taunts, focused suppression, etc. And that would be really disappointing, imo, to leave those less role-locked parts of RDM behind. I'd rather RDM being itself be the excuse to experiment with an otherwise stale mold.

[Warlyx]

Worked fine for (pre-Guardian spec) Feral, and (SoL) Retribution, and (Tenacity) Beastmaster, and (absorb) Blood and (mini-kite) Frost. Every enfeebler is in some way a tank or healer. Every kiter with the enemy's attention is doing mitigation.

but u never used a retri as raid tank or raid healer, tenacity bst as MT on raid? not even close (adds yeah) , Feral was kinda hybrid thats right still unable to be the best as it could be since it didnt maxed DPS nor Tank talents , DK was able to tank or dps but thats tanks to talents too.

U dont see casters healing here since , heals are based around MND , in that "other" game healing was based around the talent tree main stat (STR for Ret , Agi for shaman ) and it took time until devs did it that way and some classes required talents to base heals on that stat...

Nurturing Instinct : Increases your Nature spell power by 100% of your Agility.

different games are different anyway.

for Rdm they can put it on DEX and put a healer stance all the healing spells are now based on dex , caster stance ditto .... Ninja spells are based around dex .... Cleric stance does kinda that now anyway....

[Bablioteca]

Redmage would probably make the most sense as a melee dps that competes with bard and machinist (psuedo-support).

There's room in game for things like a goad for mana.

[Gemina]

I mained rdm in XI for five years. Because it was such a powerful solo job, I didn't mind being put into the caster role in parties. As a matter of fact I was more than happy to sheathe my sword, and was so busy that I didn't have time to be worrying about en-spells. When it became a refresh/haste bot, I lost interest in the job and the game.

RDM has always been a jack-of-all-trades class. Being good at everything, but exceling at nothing. The question is, how does that fit into the holy trinity this game uses, and how will it queue in DF? You can't shoehorn this job into any of the three roles without disappointing someone's idea of how rdm should work.

I was thinking they introduce as a branch out class like acn with the class 'Fencer' but require a certain level to unlock the class like rouge, and let the player choose the direction rdm will go either by leveling conjurer, thaumaturge, or possibly gladiator to determine the 'type' of rdm soul stone they get.

[Kotemon]

Apparently the majority of those remembering RDM are remembering only 2/3rds of the actual class. ....... Tank RDM: To me, a Tank RDM would actually be more along the lines of V's Mystic Knight.

As I recall, Red Mage was just a general all-round filler for a 4 man party in Final Fantasy. It also only had access to some of the low teir spells of White and Black and even then it was a smaller spell list (about half). A light DPS that swung between a backup nurse for the White Wiz or spell caster for the Black Wiz. The shield was just to boost its defense due to the turn based system it used.


If anything something closer to the Mystic Knight/Sword Mage/Rune Fencer would be more tanky. It also wouldn't have mush of ranged magics aside from something like scathe/ruin. If anything taking the cross skills from Thm and Acn would fill out almost all its magic spells and set it as RDM-like with offence and healing magics, and force you to choose between both cross class abilities since they are all useful to some extent. Otherwise as a tank it'll take from Gld/War cause it'll need those skills.

[Duelle]

Worked fine for (pre-Guardian spec) Feral, and (SoL) Retribution, and (Tenacity) Beastmaster, and (absorb) Blood and (mini-kite) Frost. And I think the internet's made memes enough to tell how their 'streamlining' down from that went.

Ferals still had to gear for one or the other. A bear-focused druid was not going to match the damage of a cat-focused druid. Tenacity pets didn't last long enough to be worthwhile, specially since BM hunters as of the last time I raided were still brought for the exotic pet buffs over anything else. Blood before it was sacrificed to become the tank spec was actually the weaker of the damage specs for DKs (since everyone either went unholy or shadowfrost back when that existed) and didn't have anywhere near the survivability they have now.

Retribution is an entirely different story, since the bulk of what we had access to was native to the paladin class (hence the whole "plate bubble healz" argument that was used against paladins back in vanilla and TBC). We also weren't about enfeebling as much as dealing additional damage from attacks (holy damage or proxys to holy damage), very easy-to-maintain-buffs and utility that didn't intervene with our role as DPS.

Every enfeebler is in some way a tank or healer. Every kiter with the enemy's attention is doing mitigation. If anything, XIV ought to be trying to make use of where these "role" lines already blur, rather than panic-rooming themselves into rigid design models. Personally, I want RDM specifically because it can get us out of that room. And I don't think it'd going to be a real RDM unless it does that.

As long as it swings a sword and casts magic, it's a Red Mage. The easiest place to fit that archetype in is DPS. The templates for this already exist (see: Retribution Paladins, Enhance Shaman).

[MaethusXion]

As I recall, Red Mage was just a general all-round filler for a 4 man party in Final Fantasy. It also only had access to some of the low teir spells of White and Black and even then it was a smaller spell list (about half). A light DPS that swung between a backup nurse for the White Wiz or spell caster for the Black Wiz. The shield was just to boost its defense due to the turn based system it used.

Dunno if they made RDM physically stronger in the remakes(never did a 4RDM party on the NES version), but I've done a couple RDM parties with the PS remakes. Yeah, aside from the skills not being the same as the full Fighter/White Mage/Black Mage it was fairly decent. Though, again, single player games. Heck, you could go almost full attack with a WHITE MAGE/WIZARD...

[AnaviAnael]

I'd personally like RDM to either be a mage tank or a melee mage with their swords.

[Welsper59]

but u never used a retri as raid tank or raid healer, tenacity bst as MT on raid? not even close (adds yeah) , Feral was kinda hybrid thats right still unable to be the best as it could be since it didnt maxed DPS nor Tank talents , DK was able to tank or dps but thats tanks to talents too.

U dont see casters healing here since , heals are based around MND , in that "other" game healing was based around the talent tree main stat (STR for Ret , Agi for shaman ) and it took time until devs did it that way and some classes required talents to base heals on that stat...

Nurturing Instinct : Increases your Nature spell power by 100% of your Agility.

different games are different anyway.

for Rdm they can put it on DEX and put a healer stance all the healing spells are now based on dex , caster stance ditto .... Ninja spells are based around dex .... Cleric stance does kinda that now anyway....

When you really think about the situation that the games combat system is in, healing really isn't much more than aesthetic differences. I mean, yes, we have the obvious high output heals vs shield mitigation but there really isn't a whole lot more that this games combat could really support. The only thing I can think of right now is on-contact heal triggers, but that's essentially a gimmick heal mechanic. The main attraction about AST is honestly the visual difference combined with a very lackluster (RNG) buff mechanic.

We've always had both heal type extremes since the beginning (WHM vs SCH), so all that's left is the in-between, which AST half-assed fills. Isn't any further additions going to make the situation kind of... pointless? We're playing a game where the holy trinity is an absolute with small numbered party types, but there's a significant focus on DPS throughout that party. They can't really make one healers output so amazing that, for efficiency, you wouldn't want to take anyone else.

That being said, RDM for XIV is honestly better suited as DPS. Think of it like a Mystic Knight from other FF games. RDM would likely be better suited for melee combat in this game, than it would be for ranged, due to the typical outlook that RDM use swords that they enhance through magic and able to equip heavier armors than other casters. A melee with a fusion of magic and physical strength. Maybe they could even be the first job to balance out two different primary stats as a focus (INT to enhance added magic output through their enchanted swords and STR to enhance physical damage per swing). Players find a balance between the equips and the stats.

Maybe they could even be a ranged "melee" of sorts, if caster style is better, where the enchanted sword acts in a similar fashion to something like the Master Sword at full health in Zelda games. Projectile stuff... heck could get away with the visuals of a caster too if they wanted to.

Seeing as how there's no true support role, RDM can't shine in that aspect and honestly should just be forgotten about on that end. Unless we want another non-top tier DPS job that is kept down because of "support" mentality. If that's the case, then they're going to need some sort of aura business about them. Being a magic based job though, I'd imagine draining MP would be kind of... counter productive.