Red Mage "better"??

[MrKusakabe]

First of all: This thread is fantastic to read through; ingame it seems like I am the only Red Mage fan (even though I am somewhat behind story-wise *cough*), probably a Zodiark thing?

I often (too often) think about RDM and I love not only the FFXIVs version of it, which is finally a real Red Mage and not those pathetic hackjobs and mishmash we had before. We finally stepped up our profession and don't borrow skills like before (Ver[skill]), our sword - the Rapier - is finally a real blade (Tactics for example had Florets, which are laughable) and visually, we have been gifted by beautiful audio/visuals. That's why I am somehow a bit baffled that are still unhappy about the current state. I said it in a "general discussion" thread, but wasn't the difference to the main damage-dealing caster about 9%? Now it's even less after the buffs, but I don't have the FFlogs comparison at hand.

Square Enix is the only company that I know that respects their own design decisions. Red Mage is known for being a "Jack of all Trades - But the Master of none", even on external sites such as TV Tropes. That's because the concept of our beautiful, fantastic profession is old. Red Mages exist since 1987! And I am impressed that Square Enix gave us this incredibly beatiful and fun profession for XIV. I hear that we "need more damage" or "more mobility" or "getting Vercure removed in favour of damage". Stuff like this makes me die inside because that would not only be wrong, but also just means those players are free to change their profession instead of forcing RDM to be something it was never was.

I am not so much into hardcore theorycrafting as I am ingame a normal player, while you guys are certainly much better and play in more competitive environment, but it does not matter how I look at XIV's RDM, I just love it. It seems so complete! Other developers tend to make multi-purpose professions terrible, but Square Enix is on a tightrope right now - and manage to carefully balance it in all directions. And is doing a great job at that! We have fine mobility, we deal fine damage, we can decide wether to fight ranged or closely (e.g. when a boss starts to go apeshit), we can heal fine, we can resurrect, we have Dualcast - And we have our place!

Look, Duelle for example, says in his signature that we are supposed to have more melee, but that would require is to have more defensive stats or health - but we are still mages, so I think it makes sense to have a short melee phase. Rapier duels are quick, it's a charge at the enemy and then attacking swiftly (or evading - that's called a Riposte btw; our opener skill ) and then going back until one is dead. At least real life history. The last time I did the math, we had 70% Magic and 30% Close-Quarters combat in terms of potency. I think that's not quite a turret.

Then I read about damage. As said: About 9% difference to BLM according to those FFLogs from before. If it gets less, people would question why they would choose BLM then except for aesthetics. And want nerfs for that.

Red Mage made me come back from GW2 after I quitted it. I am not here to abruptly end your discussion from the outside, because I highly enjoy reading the input of other RDM fans, but sometimes to me it reads you might forget how beautiful our profession is - audiovisual, our artifact gear, the entire philosophy behind Red Mages. I think I never had so much fun in a videogame, and I have the bad feeling that if Square Enix changes more, this balance could cause an avalanche of changes that cause a irreparable mess.

Sincerely,