Quote Originally Posted by MaelleRiou View Post
That just isn't true. The raid is not always 2 tank/2 healer/2 melee/1 ranged/1 caster. There's been a variety of "meta" raid comps over the years with varying numbers of DPS roles. All DPS compete with each other. 3 melee+bard was fairly common for instance.

The meta composition is created based on which DPS are strong and what buffs they bring, not because of roles. Machinist is not just competing with Bard and Dancer, they're competing with every other DPS job.
At the same time, every job has strenghts and weaknesses that have to be taken in DEEP consideration. Ranged DPS jobs have mobility and zero downtime, they easily deal with mechanics; they should bring lower personal DPS than melee jobs while at the same time providing a safer navigation through harder content. The problem is when jobs like MCH (or even BRD) can provide equal if not more DPS than melee. There's no reason to bring a melee in such enviroment.

Just for the record, i main bard. When you are doing progression or running extremes with pugs, you'll see ranged DPS standing at the top 90% of the time. Every single Titania and Innocence ex I entered the last two weeks with party finder, i was standing at the top, except for the occasional godly DPS you'll find based on join RNG. When we reach higher numbers than melee in the top percentile of fflogs, where only the best of the best are taken into account, it's a huge problem. I feel like if we continue to push this kind of arguments, one day every single ranged job will be nerfed into oblivion.