Everyone's talking about smn buffs. But what about mch

[Akiudo]

Balancing and/or designing class limitations on perceived "difficulty" isn't a good way to go about things. That said, I wouldn't call MCH braindead just because it can shoot while moving.

i'm totally with you there, just wanted to humor the idea as it gets cited a lot.

If boss design forced ranged to stay away from the boss at all times (for example because the boss fires an attack specifically at ranged that does AoE damage within 6 yalms of the target player every 8s), I could see a reason to implement a dead zone. As things are, where most people tend to just pile up behind the boss and move for mechanics, a dead zone would create problems that are simply not worth the change in design. In terms of personal preference, I never liked the idea of dead zones, even when there's skills to mitigate its presence (like how WoW hunters used to have two melee skills because their guns couldn't be used within a certain range; MCH would have to get something like a melee range taser or something).

The problem runs deeper than boss design, for one a boss forcing "ranged" to stay away, does this include casters ? cause than people would still complain that the phys ranged have it soo much easier than casters. Also if it does any 3 ranged combination (which i don't say should be encouraged, but certainly not actively discoraged) would be put at an active disadvantage because now you either have to heal 3 people instead of two or at least 2 people at random instead of knowing beforehand who will get hit, if however it doesn't include casters on the other hand phys ranged would just fall in the range of "liability because of extra mechanic"+it begs the question of how to handle mechanics that actively encourage the group to stack together, or make due with a smaller amount of the arena, saying "a mch could have a small range taser for example" is like saying "the dragoon can simply bait mechanics while throwing spears". However theres also class design in general, heals in this game aren't designed for the group splitting up, neither are group buffs, and you cant simply raise the range because at least for some of these skills things like a decreased ranged are part of their balance.

To emphasize, one of the main issues with Wanderer's Minuet was that it flipped BRD gameplay on its head from what it was from 1-30 on ARC and 31-51 on BRD. It was like playing DRG as a melee 1-51 and then at lv52 SE introduced a skill that built an entire rotation centered on Piercing Talon that forces you to throw spears from range, and you have no choice but to use it because nearly everything you got for the 51-60 level range is tied to that damn lv52 ability. That's what WM felt like to career BRD players. Not even getting into how it was clunky (screwy Bloodletter procs) and didn't feel good.

i actually was main bard from t1-9 so yea, i know exactly how it felt, and it was even worse than screwy bloodletter proccs (which was a big part, mind you), but it was also the total lack of on demand movement aside from turning it off or spamming feint, the pseudo ogcd imperial arrow (for all non bards, it was technically an ogcd but it had a 1,5 second cast bar, you would ideally cast it after using your instant attack so it filled the ogcd window) or how repelling shot had a damage component which would mean ideally you move close to the boss during your 1 second movement windows or when you got an instant cast and than in time use repelling shot after an instant cast to jump back (dealing damage) without losing a gcd, comparing gauss/menuet was night and day if you tried to play even semi serious.

MCH had
-More instants in General
-More on demand instants
-The ability to keep proccs (instant casts) at least for a few gcd's without losing damage by virtue of being able to save the procc on the third shot for a while.
-Maybe not less (really don't remember) but at the least more controlled ogcd's (hello to weaving randomly happening bloodletters)
-No Pseudo-Ogcd skill a la empirial arrow (i actually believe gauß shot originally worked the same way but than got patched to just be a normal ogcd?)

Also, I don't think it's necessary to bring back the cast bars on all three physical ranged jobs. Were I making the call (and for the sake of fairness), I'd put their names in a hat and pick 1 and make that the ranged with cast bars. Foregoing RNG, I'd pick BRD and redesign ARC/BRD from scratch around cast bars, then have MCH and DNC focus on their respective gimmicks. Between draw time and taking aim, cast bars make sense on an archer, not so much on gunslinger MCH or weapon-thrower DNC. I could have also vouched for MCH because of how Gauss Barrel used to work with it, but SE went and made them a hot shot gunslinger-type job, so the idea of them standing still and aiming no longer fits.

gotta be honest here, i wouldn't have minded if mch going into stormblood kept gauss barrel, where i see the problem is that again, People argue that their needs to be restriction on the role, otherwise we would just have this amazing all ranged meta, if you give castbars to one of these jobs no matter which and keep the others as is all that would do is make 1 phys ranged obviously better than the other two (thats assuming that one gets caster damage going with the castbars, the others don't). Again, i'm totally with you that balancing around "difficulty" is a terrible thing to even try for an mmo, the original post i was adressing was basically saying "just make us hard as shit if that means we can finally get to deal damage" which i can totally understand as the desperate plea not to feel shitty for playing a class you like it is, i just think that finding different gimmicks for the three ranged would leave us exactly where we allready are, half the community going "no, thats to easy, you can't deal damage else no one will take me ever again"