Shadowbringers RDM Wishlist

[Archwizard]

What's the recast duration of your Equilibrium ?

Up for debate, though I suspect you're correct that it would be OP at 35 sec - you could use it approximately every melee rotation if so. I simply thought it was a more elegant alternative to these suggestions to have a third Verfinisher. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Definitely not as high as 2 min though. Perhaps 60 sec?

Plus, it makes you lose the intended purpose of Acceleration, which is a bit weird given it's our main tool for proc-fishing.

Not really. Verfinishers initiate a proc themselves if controlled properly, after all - and the fact that each spell initiates the opposite Verfinisher would make that even easier, since you likely won't put yourself high enough to imbalance your mana.

If used right after a melee combo with a properly-executed Verfinisher, for example, it would put you at +21/+21 with both Ready procs, putting you only 2-4 GCDs from a Manafication into another combo. Use with Embolden and you've got a darn strong burst phase.

Besides, we fish for procs to - per the name - accelerate access to our combo, which using a Verfinisher would absolutely have more potency to accomplish. And with Acceleration's value being entirely dependent on RNG, initiating a Verfinisher instead would give it a solid value.

[Mansion]

Not really. Verfinishers initiate a proc themselves if controlled properly, after all - and the fact that each spell initiates the opposite Verfinisher would make that even easier, since you likely won't put yourself high enough to imbalance your mana.

If used right after a melee combo with a properly-executed Verfinisher, for example, it would put you at +21/+21 with both Ready procs, putting you only 2-4 GCDs from a Manafication into another combo. Use with Embolden and you've got a darn strong burst phase.

Besides, we fish for procs to - per the name - accelerate access to our combo, which using a Verfinisher would absolutely have more potency to accomplish. And with Acceleration's value being entirely dependent on RNG, initiating a Verfinisher instead would give it a solid value.

Mmmh. Yeah ok, that makes sense, thanks
Although, I'd find it fair if your Equilibirum was a completely separate ability, with maybe a 90sec CD. Then keep the good ol' Acceleration as it is.

While I agree you trade procs for overall potency, once you've used that equilibrium and all that jazz, you end up in a really dry phase. I don't think it is a gameplay problem it the potencies are balanced, but it would be kind of slow and boring to build up mana Jolt/Aero/Impact/Thunder/Jolt/Aero in an unlucky scenario. I don't like when jobs have that kind of downtime in their rotation (MCH after Wildfire, SMN with no Aetherflow nor DWT...) but it's highly subjective.

[royox]

I would make it so RDM has 2 phases.

The normal one: like now. Balance white and black for a melee + ver finisher.

New one: the ver-finisher gives you a buff. Verholy a White Buff and verflare a black buff. This buff gives +dmg to the same color of the finisher. Then you have to reach 100 magic points of that Color to unleash a super strong elemental melee attack. Then back to normal rotation.

Would love a "balance and unbalace" gameplay :3

[Shewp]

My RDM is still lvl 60 so I don't know how much verholy/flare changes things but I want more melee hybrid rather than the caster with melee finisher we have now.

- Remove potency from the movement abilities and reduce their cooldown and then
- Add a melee combo to use when low/halfway mana. Have it increase mana or give a buff or something

[kidalutz]

Personally, I would like them to make the job fun. I think it's currently one of the most boring jobs in the game.

I would describe your idea of making the class fun. Remember whenever devs read things like make something fun they wonder how and then when the ideas come up thier idea of fun could completely be the exact opposite of what you yourself were hoping for.

[chamberdown]

I'd say the main thing I'd hope for with RDM is more stuff to do with less stuff to do. I'll explain: Currently we have a black/white balancing act with a melee phase and finisher essentially and some self and raid utility sprinkled in. I think it would be cool if there was an AoE and ST stance that turned your skills into one or the other, such as enchanted moulinet being turned into riposte under the ST stance or Fleche becoming Contra Sixte in the AoE stance. Hopefully this would come with a potency increase due to losing some flexibility in usage. Sometimes extra buttons is fun and feels good, and sometimes it doesnt. I think in the case of RDM it doesn't add much depth to the gameplay. I think you could add depth without extra buttons by using triggered buffs. Maybe something like a successful melee combo + finisher resets oGCD skills increases damage by 10% and makes all casts instant for 10s. This effectively extends your "burst window" , adds some flavor outside of the melee combo, and reduces the amount of casting back and forth white and black generation in a given builder/finisher cycle. I would also agree that for RDM, you should do something to make verraise more punishing like doubling or tripling its MP cost, and then increase RDM's damage a bit to compensate. It's neat that it can spam raise, but not even actual healers in the game can do this. Lastly, the fun part about RDM for me is the fast GCD with the melee combo. The quick strikes feel satisfying. Maybe SE could do something like using the same fast GCD from the melee combo and applying it elsewhere in the rotation via either an active buff (add to embolden for 10s?) or a combo result somewhere maybe as a buff after successful melee combo like mentioned above. just some thoughts.

[Archwizard]

I would make it so RDM has 2 phases.

The normal one: like now. Balance white and black for a melee + ver finisher.

New one: the ver-finisher gives you a buff. Verholy a White Buff and verflare a black buff. This buff gives +dmg to the same color of the finisher. Then you have to reach 100 magic points of that Color to unleash a super strong elemental melee attack. Then back to normal rotation.

Would love a "balance and unbalace" gameplay :3

I mean, we already have two phases - spells vs melee - and what you're describing would really add two more.

However, the "unbalance" gameplay you suggest just leaves us long periods of ignoring spells of the opposite element in favor of spamming the same black or white spells and Jolt/Impact.

But I think the major issue with something like this - much like the problems with suggesting a third Verfinisher to encourage alternating between Verholy/Verflare - is that it gives us the same issue Summoners have, where the peak of our output comes after several minutes of ramp-up, and an interruption like death (or possibly even just encountering a non-attackable phase) would not only inflict Weakness but set us back to the start of a very long chain.
I would much rather attempt to build off the base of our rotation rather than just its peak, especially considering how much buildup it takes to achieve our melee rotation in the first place.

My RDM is still lvl 60 so I don't know how much verholy/flare changes things but I want more melee hybrid rather than the caster with melee finisher we have now.

- Remove potency from the movement abilities and reduce their cooldown and then
- Add a melee combo to use when low/halfway mana. Have it increase mana or give a buff or something

I'm torn on this. My biggest conniption here is that at best we're making the base rotation more hectic by means of alternating between melee and range twice as often, and that being forced to significantly more time in melee range is not beneficial to us in any way.
Plus, giving us an entire extra builder combo would mean way more buttons for one goal.

While I understand you want a more magical melee class, the RDM is fundamentally a Disciple of Magic, and the addition of the melee finisher set is more just flair and flavor on top of our core spellcasting.

[Leidiriv]

Archwizard's right. Adding phases onto our rotation like with SMN's Bahamut phase just makes death even more punishing, while reducing the relative impact of our Holy/Flare casts because we'd be inevitably balanced around the new capstone. On top of that, it makes the length of our rotation even more variable based on our procs, as each "phase" has approximately a 5 second variance based on how many procs we get. Adding phases for the sake of having more phases just makes a lack of procs even more devastating than it already is.

[Shurrikhan]

While I understand you want a more magical melee class, the RDM is fundamentally a Disciple of Magic, and the addition of the melee finisher set is more just flair and flavor on top of our core spellcasting.

Okay, but... does it have to be? And ought it to be? Is RDM made more fun by having its sword be basically an ornament?

[Kalise]

Okay, but... does it have to be? And ought it to be? Is RDM made more fun by having its sword be basically an ornament?

Have to be? Probably. For balancing reasons. Otherwise they'd have to try and figure out how to give them the toughness of a melee without making its ranged too good with that toughness (Or something like that)

Ought to be? Arguable. Personally, I felt a little let down when RDM was touted as a Caster/Melee hybrid but then its gameplay was merely Caster with a melee burst CD (That, until level 50 is actually not worth using because its DPA is lower than your spells...)

Then there's also some other oddities, like at level 1 (Which is literally only relevant in PotD) RDM only has Riposte and no actual spell. Jolt is learned at level 2. Which would suggest some more melee focus. But alas, that is not the case and the class ends up feeling quite BLM-y as a result (Especially given how GCD's function with "Instant Casts" so you don't even feel like much of a spell slinger with rapid casts... Especially if you use a high SpS build on your BLM...)