A Proposed small change to MCH

[foyboy]

Just to preface this, I have no idea how balanced/imbalanced this would be.

I think a small Qol change that could be made to the MCH moveset would be to make it so that rather than having 3 charges each of gauss round and ricochet, they could instead make it so that we could have 6 charges total that could be spent on either attack, and then slightly buff gauss round while slightly nerfing ricochet.

The reason I say this is mainly because in order to keep your dps up, you HAVE to use ricochet, an aoe attack, often even in a single target rotation, which can be a pain in situations where you don't want to be attacking surrounding enemies. A change like this would both fix that issue as well as reward the player for using the correct skill for the situation.

[Jonnycbad]

Same for all jobs with forced aoe though. DRG, DNC, BRD, RDM, PLD, WHM, SMN, to name a few. Lot of jobs have skills that are integral to their damage rotation that happen to be AoE.

[CKNovel]

So...
It's a good idea.

But not for MCH.

Why that? We already have too many skills based on AoE/Single Target choice (ACB&Bio-Blaster). Your idea would basically remove one button from the already barebone rotation.
Also, I played most content and... I haven't seen any content where I did not wanted to attack a target in ricochet range. As far as I can remember, the Dolls in TEA (Phase 1) are spread enough to not aoe them by mistake. Garuda and Ifrit in E6S are also spread out.

In my opinion the idea is good. But not in this context, not for MCH.
It doesn't bring anything to the table, it only removes a button to correct a problem no one ever had and remove an additionnal button from the barebone rotation.

[Gallus]

MCH's smallest problem is ricochet hitting multiple targets TC...

[Jirah]

Disagree

Ricochet as a aoe is severely segregated from any aoe complimentary skills to fix this the charge system, or what little is present, needs to be fine tuned not so much the charges themselves even if they have issues all their own but lets stay on topic. Ricochet and Gauss do the exact same damage so in ST fights its just two of the same skills and in aoe circumstances youll spam rico but only use it on regular CD which is weirdly off hand. Having said system be tied down to a ST Skill that is only available during overheat and is recommended to spend during said overheat is ridiculous layers of clunky and poor job design.

Also having 6 free OGD skills right off the bat is also clunky and far to generous. like having DNC start with all feathers, or some other insta resource with its only real purpose is to blindly spam to oblivion.

[Ultimatecalibur]

Having said system be tied down to a ST Skill that is only available during overheat and is recommended to spend during said overheat is ridiculous layers of clunky and poor job design.

Thing is Richochet and Gauss Round are not intended to be used during overheat (overheat only affecting weaponskills and not abilities). All of those rotations that interweave ogcds during overheat are the result of low ping that allows for weaving an unintended extra ogcd between gcds. The clunk as you call it is the result of players figuring out an unintended rotation that generates more damage because SE designs jobs to function with high ping and not low ping.

[CKNovel]

Thing is Richochet and Gauss Round are not intended to be used during overheat (overheat only affecting weaponskills and not abilities). All of those rotations that interweave ogcds during overheat are the result of low ping that allows for weaving an unintended extra ogcd between gcds. The clunk as you call it is the result of players figuring out an unintended rotation that generates more damage because SE designs jobs to function with high ping and not low ping.

It is the intended rotation.
Don't look at this guide, but it is intended to weave-in between the heatblast, otherwise GR/Ricochet uses would be lost. If it was not intended, maximum charges would be 4.

The image is from the official guide released by SQEX.
There's major errors in it, but you can see how they intended the job to be played.

EDIT:
I'd like to see your sources about the job designed with high ping in mind.
In this same guide, there's a mistake:
Drill is used as the last GCD during Wildfire Window. The problem is that Drill has/had (if they fixed it) a delay before applying damages. If you have above average ping, the damages would apply after the Wildfire Window. In other words, it was tested and validated in a low ping environment.

[Raikai]

I would love this suggestion. Even if they nerfed Ricochet damage to compensate you being able to use it 6x in a row in AoE scenarios. There are def. some times when I do not want to use Ricochet in single target, especially when fighting stuff on my own out there.

Maybe they could re-implement ammo in the interface as charges for these OGCD skills.

[Seraphor]

Or how about:

Heat Blast:
Additional Effect: Reduces the recast time of Gauss Round by 30s and Ricochet by 15s

Auto Crossbow
Additional Effect: Reduces the recast time of Gauss Round by 15s and Ricochet by 30s

This would have a similar effect, in that in single target, you can just hop between Heat Blast and Gauss Round, and similarly for AoE, Auto Crossbow and Ricochet.

It might be a bit too OP for AoE right now, but as a trait upgrade in 6.0 post level 80, it could be good.

[Jirah]

Or how about:

Heat Blast:
Additional Effect: Reduces the recast time of Gauss Round by 30s and Ricochet by 15s

Auto Crossbow
Additional Effect: Reduces the recast time of Gauss Round by 15s and Ricochet by 30s

This would have a similar effect, in that in single target, you can just hop between Heat Blast and Gauss Round, and similarly for AoE, Auto Crossbow and Ricochet.

It might be a bit too OP for AoE right now, but as a trait upgrade in 6.0 post level 80, it could be good.

MCh has the least amount of skills surely theirs room to fine tune each mechanic rather than trying to tie every single aspect to overheat and heat blast, heat blast shouldnt exist its a waste of a skill under normal circumstances being its saving grace are charge refuel which can easily just be tied to overheat where it resets endlessly until the overheat bypasses.

I seriously dont understand to what benefit exist to keep such a drab skill, rotation is fine as is gaining the speed boost not just one skill and one skill alone disregarding aoe of course