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

[Reinha]

Red Mage could be a jack of all dps: caster, support dps and melee. Just have a stance for each and require the player to be out of combat to change stances just like AST. Give the class some base abilities and some abilities that change based on the currently chosen stance. Support stance would offer a long duration resource refresh and lower dps, melee stance would offer high single target dps and caster stance would offer high aoe. To further enhance their hybrid properties the Red Mage could have a 5 minute cooldown, 15-20 second duration ability which allows them to temporarily swap stances to cover a different aspect of the dps role. This could be the flavour / defining ability of a RDM while other dps jobs bring something else to the table like physical debuffs (MNK, NIN, DRG), a party crit buff (DRG), threat transfer (NIN), resurrection (SMN) or magic resistance debuff (BRD).

Then why bother leveling anything else up?

Because it's fun? Everything except class/job quest lines in this game can be done as one job anyway so that's all it boils down to.

[CGMidlander]

Because it's fun? Everything except class/job quest lines in this game can be done as one job anyway so that's all it boils down to.

Why bother getting gear for a tank, a healer, and a DPS if RDM can do it all with one set?

How would it be fair if getting a relic for RDM essentially means getting a relic for all 3 roles?

If RDM it at all any good at the three party roles, there would be resource allocation efficiency implications.