Red Mage looks Incomplete

[Rongway]

This feels like it would work -in theory- in a perfect setting, but if you're a RDM and you're in a party where people keep dying (including the healer), a handful of Verraise feels like it could shut down a Red Mage entirely.

This isn't a problem with RDM. It's a problem with everyone else in the RDM's party.

[Claire_Pendragon]

This isn't a problem with RDM. It's a problem with everyone else in the RDM's party.

Well... you're not wrong haha.

But he just means that the system of not refreshing their own MP is built on their ability to multi raise in a short period of time.

[AsahinaMyLove]

xD I dont plan to play it to begin with. I dont like Magic/Melee hybrids. (to bad.. its not Fencer only ;( )
Im sure It will be the last place on my "Like to play" list ;x Last place is currently Mch. Because I dislike the battlepose and their gameplay.

[AlexanderThorolund]

It is incomplete, the media tour was a development build lol...

[Rawrz]

spending roughly 18 GCDs casting and three using a sword is not what I would call good use of the sword. Melee as a whole cancels Dualcast (didn't see that auto-attacks also removed it), so you can't even mix it up between the single melee combo and building mana with spell spam.

As for MP recovery, it'd be nice if the melee combo without spell blade would recover MP, since then you'd have an actual reason to use it outside of 80/80 mana.

If red mage got a Riot Blade, the raises it could do. @-@

[Slirith]

It is incomplete, the media tour was a development build lol...

Yup, but people will cheerfully ignore this bit of info.

[Aeliott]

Lucid Dream + breaks from using MP in the melee section seem enough. Someone on reddit calced that without Lucid Dream (or MP from other sources) you could last about 5 minutes before you run dry. I think it'll be fine, no harder to manage than SMN.

As for the Cure, it's kinda weak sure, and just a courtesy to its identity - but you can use it to ready a Dualcast when there's no enemy to hit, so you can go straight into a Thunder / Aero when you can start attacking again and thus get more black/white mana sooner than starting from Jolt. The only problem is, funnily enough after the above paragraph, it could be inefficient MP usage in some scenarios. Then again with downtime prompting it in the first place it might not be a bad idea in most situations.

I don't think it seems incomplete at all. The core "rotation" is really dynamic, switching between two sets of spells and prioritising certain procs, that alone is satisfying enough to me, so the relative simplicity of their ogcds is welcome. At most I would've liked maybe just one more party support skill like a brief haste or something to branch their jack-of-all-trades shtick into more utility, but their damage from the pre-release seems sound enough.

[ArcaviusGreyashe]

Sure, it's a shame that, even if it wasn't a build development, RDM has actually some weaknesses, isn't a healer and a tank, and, worst of all, despite being nearly as powerful as the SAM, has a skill that buffs only physical DDs around him...

Do you all even have any idea how broken those classes are, right now ? Step back a little, and accept that RDM isn't a god class, like WAR was from 3.0 to 3.1... Or, if it is, that it will be nerfed anyway...

[Endemerrin]

Not 100% sure I can alleviate many worries, but, I'll try my best! I was at the media event in San Fransisco, and played a fair amount of RDM. I'll also preface this with the fact that the build we played was under development, so any of this is 100% subject to change. Remember, nothing is completely set in stone yet.

1) I'd say my answer to this kind of ties into #5 as well. From what I experienced, Vercure seemed to be a very potent spell - and definitely had to scale off INT. The best example I can give is that when we were running the 4-man dungeon, my Vercure was healing me for around 5k - out of a total of 23k. That being said, due to dualcast, you essentially get two Vercures for the casting time of one. So that's a 10k heal in roughly 2 seconds - at level 64, mind you. That's nearly 50% of your HP.

2) I never ran into any MP issues. I ended the last fight of the dungeon we ran with about 75% of my MP, and I never stopped casting, save for when I was doing my melee combo or when the boss forced it. This was about a 3 and a half minute encounter, with two brief pauses where I couldn't attack anything. Using your refresh cross-class on cooldown + other party member refresh utilities will likely mean you won't have issues unless you are spamming Verraise.

Three and four I can't really comment on. As an FFXI player, I definitely get the want for en- spells, but the thing is RDM is a caster and not a melee. It really wouldn't make much use out of them in their traditional sense. That being said, it does have enchantment spells in name - the upgraded melee combo from spending B/W mana.

Only real reason I could see Embolden being the way it is, is as you said - to stop it from being too appealing. If it was 10% across the board, it'd encourage you to always have a RDM in the party, since it buffs every comp. Their idea for SB seems to be to make it so everything is flexible, with pros and cons. Giving one role an ability that trumps all would encourage the "meta" giving that job a permanent slot.

[NovaLevossida]

spending roughly 18 GCDs casting and three using a sword is not what I would call good use of the sword. Melee as a whole cancels Dualcast (didn't see that auto-attacks also removed it), so you can't even mix it up between the single melee combo and building mana with spell spam.

The nail in the coffin for that dream was seeing the live letter and them doing 74 damage autoattacks. I knew the sword would just be relegated to just a few abilities after that. What I didn't predict was the autoattacks canceling dualcast which is kind of ridiculous. It's just put in there to force a "get in range" "get out of range" mechanics to the job. A job with a sword no less.