How would you make RDM more complex?

[JohnnyDevo]

I personally would find it interesting to expand upon the red magic aspect of the class, while mechanically adding to the existing proc management system.

For example: a 2s cast spell that consumes both "fire ready" and "stone ready", has 350 potency, and generates 6-8 white and black mana. Maybe call it "magma". Pair it with a 5s cast time spell that can only be cast after "magma", has 400 potency and generates 8-10 white and black mana. Maybe call it "squall", as if to combine aero and thunder. Unsure if it should proc anything.

Being able to cast those spells represent a higher dps increase for using both your procs, though ideally it wouldn't be enough of a dps increase to justify spamming jolt until you have both procs. This would encourage proc fishing even more than we already do, and also prevent the awkward "too much good rng" situations where you're swimming in procs and can't make good use of your impact.

Additionally, there's room for design in other aspects of the class. At risk of going into a rant, I'm not going to go too far into what I've dreamed up for weaponskills, but a single example would be a weaponskill that branches off of enchanted zwerchhau and applies a 60 second dot. Maybe. Having mentioned DoTs, could just include "verBlizzard" and "verWater" as seperate dots. Nothing too fancy, but duration would have to be fairly high, as even just 20s duration means 1/4 of your casts become dots.

I think my take on this would be that there's a crapton of room for improvement in design complexity, and that I would be disappointed if there were no changes made. But I haven't personally gone into the math implications of any changes, so I can't say if my ideas are particularly good.

[PrismaticDaybreak]

I personally would find it interesting to expand upon the red magic aspect of the class, while mechanically adding to the existing proc management system.

For example: a 2s cast spell that consumes both "fire ready" and "stone ready", has 350 potency, and generates 6-8 white and black mana. Maybe call it "magma". Pair it with a 5s cast time spell that can only be cast after "magma", has 400 potency and generates 8-10 white and black mana. Maybe call it "squall", as if to combine aero and thunder. Unsure if it should proc anything.

Being able to cast those spells represent a higher dps increase for using both your procs, though ideally it wouldn't be enough of a dps increase to justify spamming jolt until you have both procs. This would encourage proc fishing even more than we already do, and also prevent the awkward "too much good rng" situations where you're swimming in procs and can't make good use of your impact.

Additionally, there's room for design in other aspects of the class. At risk of going into a rant, I'm not going to go too far into what I've dreamed up for weaponskills, but a single example would be a weaponskill that branches off of enchanted zwerchhau and applies a 60 second dot. Maybe. Having mentioned DoTs, could just include "verBlizzard" and "verWater" as seperate dots. Nothing too fancy, but duration would have to be fairly high, as even just 20s duration means 1/4 of your casts become dots.

I think my take on this would be that there's a crapton of room for improvement in design complexity, and that I would be disappointed if there were no changes made. But I haven't personally gone into the math implications of any changes, so I can't say if my ideas are particularly good.

I really like this suggestion, delving deeper into the combined magic aspect would be very interesting. You could have it be similar to DoT/Debuff combos where Magma would apply 'Molten' for 30 seconds as a DoT and Squall would apply 'Air Pressure' increasing either magic damage or personal damage on the target. Although as you said duration might need to be increased since we don't want to just hang on to procs detrimentally.

[TarynH]

That's simply not a viable option, you may like it simple but a very large portion of RDM's are going to be upset if it has no mechanical changes from one expansion to the next. Not to mention, that's not a real idea, tbh that's just complacent.

It's not complacency. Complacency would be saying you want no changes to anything ever. I stated it would be wiser to spend more time on the jobs that need it, and give RDM very few changes. RDM was meant to be simple and fun. It's simple and fun. So the old adage of, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it," applies to the job.

As it stands right now, RDM is fine where it's at; for what it is. It doesn't need "mechanical" changes. You also assume a lot, in that they need to change every job with every expansion. Job gauges aside, most jobs changed very little with 4.0, while a few didn't really change at all. Only one had a complete overhaul. So you're rushing to conclusions a little here too.

Yes, it might get a few changes. Or they could just simply add tiers of spells and traits, with one ability/spell at 80. (Assuming they even raise the level cap.) I really don't care, as far as that goes. As long as it stays RDM. I, for one, am perfectly happy with the basic concepts of the job, and don't want to see it become overly complex. So excuse me when I see you write things like "mechanical changes," and "maintenance buffs;" and it gets me thinking you just want the job to have busy work to fit your personal needs and levels of excitement.

And I also don't care if you "don't want a discussion." Writing that does not make your thread the Holy Grail, behind an untouchable glass case. If others don't want to see RDM changed, they're entitled to voice that opinion on here. Especially in a thread where one person wants to control the flow of the discussion like that, or suppress dissenting viewpoints. "Don't change RDM," is every bit as important as your asinine suggestions in the OP.

[PrismaticDaybreak]

Where exactly is your dev testimonial about how simple it's supposed to be? Unless You personally designed RDM I wouldn't deign to make that claim. You said no changes beyond tier spells which aren't actual changes. I didn't say it needed a complete overhaul nor did I say it needed to be overly complex. In fact I specifically stated i didn't want that. Most jobs in 4.0 changed the additional mechanics almost all of them received in 3.0 or added them if they didn't already have them. My suggestions were far from asinine whereas your, "Waah I want it to stay overtly simple," argument ended with 'well play a different class lol'. I don't want a discussion with, yes complacent, people like yourself. It's not controlling discussion I literally didn't want to engage with you in any way but now you've gone and messed up the thread with your pointless panic crusade. If any easy to maintain buff like the one I suggested or either of the long cooldowns I suggested are too complex for you I'm extremely skeptical of your critical thinking skills.

Let me be perfectly clear here, I don't have some dastardly intention to deceive what devs gather as feedback. I don't want to convince everyone that complexity is the only viable option. I literally have 0 to say to the people that want to keep it simple because they're not going to convince me and I'm not going to convince them so why waste the effort on something I don't care about? Plainly the intention was to drum up some interesting ideas about how to add complexity to RDM not fritter away my time with whether or not I should. You're the one controlling discussion. You immediately derailed the topic with the other two in the span of 2 minutes and you could've kept browsing. The onus is on you.

[TarynH]

Waaah

Then don't engage me in discussion, if you don't want to discuss it. Seems to me that you can't help but engage people with differing opinions.

Your thread title explicitly asks, "How would you make RDM more complex?" And you get mad when people say they wouldn't. I never said the devs said it would be a simple job. But they obviously made it a simple job, and have made no hint that it would change. Therefore, atm, it is working as intended.

But I can ask you the same thing. Where's your dev testimonial that states it will become more complex? Nobody has ever said that it will. Nobody has said that they will change it either. Or how about your dev testimonial that states all jobs have to eventually be complex to be enjoyable?

And your suggestions are asinine. You basically gave it an ability to "spend all mana to throw out spells fast to get back to your sword combo." With no ability or compensation to restore the lost mana. It's like an "all in and sit there with nothing to do for awhile" move. And on top of that, you want to decrease the potency as you're "all in."

Your acceleration cascade could be a trait. No need for that to be an extra button push. And applied discipline is just... why? Reduced damage for 15sec? Why not just a free enchanted combo every 2 minutes? It's basically what you want there. It really doesn't even need the damage reduction. Just have it require black/white mana to be over or equal to the opener.

You're just adding button press bulk to the job for some quick burst dps, simply because you obviously like the sword part of it. That's where all three of your abilities lead... to the sword combo. Which is fine. I like the sword combo too. That's my favorite part of the job; zipping in for the sword combo and zipping out. I just don't need it to be more complicated than that to enjoy it.

You immediately derailed the topic with the other two in the span of 2 minutes and you could've kept browsing. The onus is on you.

You actually derailed your own thread by going after the first person that said they didn't want RDM changed. When you could've just let it stand. So onus returned.

[Karshan]

Well, where Taryn sorta have a point, is that it's not like it's a class from the start a lot of people have been playing for years that got oversimplified, and someone is telling you to suck it up and go play something else.

Here it's a new class ; you picked it, doesn't suit your desires in terms of complexity, well... I mean you could feel the simplicity the first half hour.

If you wanted to avoid epidermic reactions, Think you should have made the post : "what changes would you like to see in 5.0 Red Mage ?" With your First post being : I want it more complex.
I think he reacts more to the tone of the first few posts which felt like : "RDM too simple, this has to change, how can it". This doesn't have to. This isn't even wished for by every red mage. That's what he points out. And that's why a lot didn't focus on your actual question that was the "how can it" (what mechanisms would you add to RDM in the future) because it was polluted by the assertion before.

My thoughts on this : I'm not against complexification, but it is the only really simple job (in DPS section) so no more jobs in that niche if they do so. Also, for instance in Shinryu, really helps that with the current kit it doesn't matter what your target is : you just lay your spells on what has priority. Add debuff and dots in there, and you reduce efficiency (and increase frustration) on a "target change" scenario.

So I would avoid dots and debuffs, however self buffs consuming mana might be nice.
And maybe the change on Impact that was proposed : changing depending what you do. Or maybe a change that calls for imbalance. Like go white and impact becomes that really cool skill, but you have to rebalance behind ; you know a kind of benefit/risk thing.
Maybe change Jolt II mana gain so that it becomes a brainer choosing between it or a proc. Like adding more situations where you gain something to use a less potent spell.

I would change things in the melee part. here it's just a burst of three skills every now and then, I'd make it more of a mix. I'd dissociate melee from Verholy and flare (that I would replace by void btw), no more mana cost to melee and make Holy / Void cost 60 of a kind of mana.
Add "enchanted blade - Holy" and "enchanted blade - Void" skills. Kind of requiescat, except to do melee stuff. Every 30 secs, you can use a blade and it allows you to do your enchanted melee combo that grants you only the mana of the kind of blade you used (so that it helps you deal with the unbalance provoked by VerHoly / VerVoid in the casting part). The animation of the combo would differs depending on the blade.
Each blade grants a stack and using the 2 stacks gives you access to a powerful melee oGCD. So basically, you'd have 2 combos per minute and around 15 to 20 seconds spend in melee range every minute.

So to sum up : you provoke unbalance with VerVoid / Holy, you benefit from it with different effects on impact and Jolt II, you rebalance it with dualcasting some spells + an enchanted blade of opposite element and a melee combo. What changes here, is that you have a kind of aetherflow effect : you have windows between melee, so you have to reach a certain level of mana within it, and managing your gauge can become more tricky, not rotation wise, but optimization/buff-window-timing wise. Also in that scenario, Acceleration would not be a proc forcing oGCD but a 15 second timer where mana granted by each spell is augmented.

And you have a warrior kinda playstyle, with a bit more messup romm since the amount of gauge gained are variable from source to source, you will be less likely to screw up than say an IRzerk phase, and worst case scenario difficulty is easily fixed by a play on Finisher cost.

[PrismaticDaybreak]

Acceleration Cascade would be a trait, didn't think I needed to specify. Chainspell drains mana. As in not MP as in Black and White Mana, you confused the two, mana is not MP this isn't WoW. And now you're making assumptions about what I want. I like the caster part of RDM, the idea of Chainspell is to go all in on that aspect of it. I noted applied discipline would need more polish, but if you got to do 2 combos back to back each around 1000 potency over 7 seconds obviously it'd need to be toned down a little. Neither of the first two were a bid to make melee mage a thing, I was more focused on RDMs style of rapid casting, which it seems was easily lost on you since you didn't bother to ask for any clarification or questions you just attacked without the slightest clue. I was addressing concerns that anything I said would make the class overly complex and frankly they wouldn't, playing the class would remain largely the same. Excuse me for trying to address the concerns of the 3 exactly the same posts, next time I'll just ignore you

@Karshan I acknowledged that complexity wasn't the only route they could take. It seems evident that people were responding to the title, not the actual content. When I picked up Red Mage I was far more absorbed in the enjiyability of playing a spellsword rather than immediately thinking about complexity and whether or not the gameplay would feel rewarding at the end game. I made literally 0 attempt to convince people that it has to has to has to be more complex. I said my piece and put forth some small suggestions. It's not my fault if people glean meaning that's not there.

[TarynH]

Snip

Sort of. What she responded to is basically the attitude of the OP. Which is clearly present in every post since. That is that they don't seem to care if people DON'T want it more complex, and also assume it will be. So we can just accept it and give in to their brilliant ideas now. It's not up for discussion. (This is what the tone of the OP looks like to me.)

Snip

I never played WoW. But I played FFXI where MP meant mana points. So yes, that is a common misconception. You might want to clarify that in your OP. But then again... why would I want to drain my white and black mana, when I'm trying to get back to a sword combo that needs it? It still doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Why not just Chainspell in itself, with a slight potency loss? Doesn't need to drain anything. That was FFXI style; huge negative for slight positive. But the trait you mentioned would be better than chainspell in that sense, as they could build on the casting speed of RDM altogether. Rather than for a burst.

And I didn't "attack." Get over yourself. I stated an opinion, and you called me out. Thus dragging out the conversation to this point, despite you "not wanting a discussion." Simple as that.

[PrismaticDaybreak]

See, that's the kind of discussion I was looking for, an address of suggestions and offering of others. Sorry for being hot headed, I didn't mean to sound attacking in that first reply, it was just really frustrating seeing the first 3 responses all be the exact same thing with no comment on the content of the OP. I'll admit I probably should've been more clear in my OP and I should've been more open to alternate discussion.

[TarynH]

See, that's the kind of discussion I was looking for, an address of suggestions and offering of others. Sorry for being hot headed, I didn't mean to sound attacking in that first reply, it was just really frustrating seeing the first 3 responses all be the exact same thing with no comment on the topic. I'll admit I probably should've been more clear in my OP and I should've been more open to alternate discussion.

Well that should tell you more about where people stand with the job. :P I'd wager a guess that about 75% of players don't want RDM changed. (Or don't care what happens with it.) A small percentage want it to be BLM/SMN lite. I just don't want to see it bogged down with complexity, for the sake of just having it be complex. Because it's a job I can jump on and not need a spreadsheet open to use it (like BRD). I can focus on, and enjoy, the content more than the job. And that, to me, is the fun part of playing.