Would A Rifle Job Ever Be Possible?

[RitsukoSonoda]

*snip*

You can keep telling yourself that if it helps you sleep at night since you've convinced yourself this is why MCH isn't used as much as BRD and essentially refuse to listen to anything saying otherwise. MCH already have utility through their turret to inflict vulnerability however doesn't offer much beyond that outside of role skills that BRD has access to as well. MCH on its own is a fun job to play. However its outshined by other jobs which is something that generally happens on any game online or offline that utilize different characters or classes that occupy the same role or niche. Additionally if you are going to attempt claiming "data shows X%" how about posting us a source because despite being outshined I see MCH quite frequently even in end game/savage content. I've lvled both BRD and MCH. I find MCH more fun to play. However I end up using BRD more because it just does more.

Also using an NPC or boss in game to say the things are already there isn't an argument. The chests and the barrels are battle mechanics. Also NPCs frequently have access to skills a player will not which is evidenced frequently in the MSQ and job quests. Additionally some instances of NPC's having a weapon setup not available to players such as the dual guns pointed out earlier. Also rauhban dual wielded swords before and the ex pirate in the MCH quests that uses a 1 handed hatchet and a pistol.

If you want to focus on aesthetics far more players were asking for engineer from the FFT games as a gun user than there were for a musketeer or gun wielding pirate. So instead of crying they scrap a job because its not the one you wanted, figure out a way to work in the one you want without it just being a turret-less carbon copy of MCH.

[Zojha]

MCH on its own is a fun job to play.

That is subjective. Objectively, you can only measure whether something is "fun" or not by looking at how popular it is relative to its power (or more generally, relative to its reward, because the principle applies to content as well). If something is unpopular in spite of being powerful (or having lots of rewards), chances are it's not very fun. On the flipside, if something is popular in spite of not being powerful, it's safe to say it's fairly fun. And if something is popular and powerful, or unpopular and weak, it's not possible to tell whether the effect is caused by the power or the enjoyability.

As for musketeers or rifle jobs in general, I feel that MCH is pretty much intended to cover that. The guns tend to be on the longer side and the new sprint animation is specifically meant for longer guns (it looks VERY awkward with the Makai Mortar or even the gunblade series). I doubt they'd make a new one.

[RitsukoSonoda]

*snip*

It is subjective though its a shared opinion of a majority of players I've spoken with in game that have actually played and lvled MCH to 70. There are a lot of thoughts on what could be tweaked slightly to make it better and more fluid but its not being abandoned by almost the entire player base because of playstyle and aesthetics like the other person is claiming it is.

Maybe this person just doesn't encounter many of them. Maybe this person's server just doesn't have many. However this person's claims to the causes of MCH being viewed as unpopular come off as fabricated data to cover up that they wanted a pirate themed gun user instead of an engineer based one.

As far as guns go there could easily be another gun user later that causes a split in guns to be rifles and pistols. 1handed swords and knives were both GLA/PLD weapons until SE added ROG/NIN and pulled all the knives from the GLA/PLD weapon list and replaced them with equivalent 1 handed swords. Something that might be warranted as the animations and gauss barrel have issues with the smaller guns currently in game. IMO I think MCH would be the pistol user in this case as the skill animations and attacks utilize the gun 1 handed which makes the run animation seem more out of place.

[Ghastly]

It is subjective though its a shared opinion of a majority of players I've spoken with in game that have actually played and lvled MCH to 70. There are a lot of thoughts on what could be tweaked slightly to make it better and more fluid but its not being abandoned by almost the entire player base because of playstyle and aesthetics like the other person is claiming it is.

Maybe this person just doesn't encounter many of them. Maybe this person's server just doesn't have many. However this person's claims to the causes of MCH being viewed as unpopular come off as fabricated data to cover up that they wanted a pirate themed gun user instead of an engineer based one.

As far as guns go there could easily be another gun user later that causes a split in guns to be rifles and pistols. 1handed swords and knives were both GLA/PLD weapons until SE added ROG/NIN and pulled all the knives from the GLA/PLD weapon list and replaced them with equivalent 1 handed swords. Something that might be warranted as the animations and gauss barrel have issues with the smaller guns currently in game. IMO I think MCH would be the pistol user in this case as the skill animations and attacks utilize the gun 1 handed which makes the run animation seem more out of place.

At least I'm providing solutions


All you're doing is providing personal encounters instead of real data. Real data like the census the dev team conducts every year which shows machinist as the least popular class every year.

If it's not playstyle and aesthetics that is holding machinist down then what is it? It's not raid utility and class effectiveness. In HW they were better than bard and were used for some of their utility as well in the savage content. But outside of savage it wasn't used (according to the dev's official census). In general it's not even something to be disputed, logically it's visible that machinists are rare. Go into any alliance raid, raid, and hunts. You barely will see 1 here and there and could go days without seeing one completely.

But I put the question to you now, if it's not aesthetics and how fun it is to play to then what is it that keeps machinist unpopular? Again, mch was better than bard in HW yet more people played bard so your raid utility excuse holds no water.
Just because you think you're right and like mch doesn't mean that you're right.

[RitsukoSonoda]

*snip*

Then why haven't you posted the census you're supposedly getting your data from? Hmm? Should be easy since you are supposedly quoting a source. This is because I have seen numerous census listings and depending on the date and chart category you are looking at in them Job distribution on MCH ranges from 4%-14%

Also you aren't posting suggestions. The main part of your supposed suggestion is that because you wanted a pirate based gun user and didn't get one then everyone else must feel the same way and just changing this image will make the job popular. This is like saying burger king isn't as popular as mcdonalds because mcdonalds has a clown for a mascot.

There are numerous factors that get the job placed lower in meta than other jobs performing the same role and you've basically said none of it is a factor when it actually is. No matter what part of the game you are at a meta is going to exist because this game has multiple job classes performing the same function with a variation on tools to do it. Because of this certain jobs are going to end up used less than others. This isn't a flaw in the job design itself. This is just something that happens because job interaction synergy is extremely difficult if not impossible to accomplish. Utility, flexibility, and functionality. Additionally learning curve on the job require to play it well factor as well. However you are probably just going to ignore these factors as you have in the past because they don't support your opinion.

I'm also interested in why you feel MCH was far better than BRD in HW as BRD as I didn't find it to be this way and I played and leveled every job to cap and used them in end game. I see them regularly in 8 man raids. I see them regularly in 24 man raids. This is also from using both PF and DF. There were 7 of them in my alliance roulette I did on whm earlier today for exp. I see them frequently during hunts because they can usually stay out of range of annoying AoE's.

But feel free to assume what you want I really don't care. You have stated your opinion and the only reason I'd even bothered addressing it in the first place is because you attempted to push this opinion off as a fact quoting data without providing the actual sources and even then it would be using that data out of context as a census isn't going to explain why a job is being chosen or played more than another and also these census generally don't reflect players that play multiple jobs accurately. At best its a weak speculation on your part.