6.0 Red Mage speculation

[Archwizard]

You've alluded that the only way to make the sword more relevant is to increase how often the mana bars hit 80/80 to use the melee combo. The problem I have with this is that the melee combo by design is a finisher. If the "finisher" happens more often, it loses its significance from a mechanics standpoint and begins raising the question "why does this mechanic even exist? This might as well just be a regular ability". That's not mentioning that nerfs would be in order (this assumes you're not just increasing damage dealt across the board, as that would lead to power creep).

While Scorch helps, it isn't much in the grand scheme of things. It'd be a different story if Scorch generated something like 11, 13 or even 15 b/w mana per use.
It's not as simple as just making something happen more often. For example, speeding up Polyglot would require nerfing Xenoglossy and Foul, as their current design relies on their restricted use via a timer. And that would in turn be detrimental because you're reducing the allure of the mechanic. Sort of like how, hypothetically, nerfing Fire/Blizard IV would make the Enochian mechanic seem superfluous because you're not gaining as much by going along with that mechanic.

... Except this is all under the assumption of the same balance of power that we have now, and without assuming room for increasing raw potencies within the rotation.

Y'know. That thing that happens every expansion. The one where healers are up to Rank IV+ of their DoTs and attack spells, all tanks/melee have an AoE combo, and all DPS gain new abilities for their main rotations that uh, checking my notes here, don't regularly cost potency from elsewhere in the kit unless the job ends up jumping ahead of all other DPS and warrants direct nerfs?
Because the devs come up with a small pool of "free potency" to add to every job that gets split across all of their advancements. For us in ShB, it was the value of using Scorch once every 40 sec over another GCD, the damage value of reducing the CDs of Manafication and Contre Sixte, and the potency increase to Displacement; the only things it "cost" us were some small mechanical adjustments that were probably gonna happen anyway, and it was still a net buff.
You call it "power creep", we call it "literally a selling point of the expansions and the point of this thread".

If your concern is that the damage of our combo will be reduced relative to everything else, unless the only advancements the devs choose to add are either another finisher a la Scorch or traits that buff the damage of our combo directly, that's literally going to happen anyway. So long as the bump from the combo remains potent enough to use over our primary rotation, however, it will still retain a position of value in our kits.

Like I said: Doomsaying.

I don't see it that way, since I use it between Dualcasts if Fleche and Contre are on cooldown.

... and you're trying to argue about "power creep" when you're not even optimizing just for the sake of your aesthetic?

Speaking for myself, the benefits are that it uses the sword, it's in melee range, doesn't involve me needlessly jumping around and is not restricted by the mana bars.

Again, my qualifier was "a positive difference in terms of gameplay". Using the sword is aesthetic but not a gameplay difference (Enchanted Reprise does too), restriction to melee is a disadvantage rather than a tangible benefit, and despite not being tied to mana bars it's still implicitly linked to our melee combo by its timer and Manafication. The only positive gameplay effect you listed hinges on it being an alternative to Displacement, which simply feeds my point that it would have no place if Displacement was unlinked from our damage or could be controlled on its own.

Beyond that, there are possible mechanics that can be weaved in between dualcasts if you insert melee oGCD skills. I mentioned one possible example earlier with a melee skill that deals damage and upgrades the next Verstone/Verfire to a bigger spell.

Sure, but you're not addressing the question of why it's relevant that the skill be restricted to melee range in the first place, besides satisfying your aesthetic tastes and making a melee skill for its own sake. "Upgrades your next Verstone/Verfire" seems like the kind of thing you'd want useful at any range where you're hurling Verstone/Verfire (particularly since you wouldn't want to interrupt your melee combo to use them), and such a restriction would be arbitrary.
Displacement and Engagement have reasons built in - Displacement makes a gap when the combo is done, Engagement uses the cooldown when Displacing would be dangerous.

I've also toyed with the idea of turning Fleche and Contre into contextual abilities that change depending on your distance to the target mob (Fleche turning into a melee skill when within 3y of the mob, remaining its usual self when beyond 3y from the mob, with melee Fleche possibly dealing less damage but having some other mechanical benefit).

Oh goody, pseudo-positionals for us that we don't have some True North equivalent for.

See the problem here is, either:
1) The difference between using them in melee versus using them at range is so negligible as to be purely cosmetic for the sake of satisfying the minor subset of people who want RDM to play like a melee job, or
2) The difference between using them in melee versus using them at range actually has a noteworthy damage value that will encourage players to remain at the most beneficial distance at all times and avoid using them when they will be weak.

Now in your case, you mention melee Fleche has less damage and another mechanical benefit, but unless that benefit comes out to a net damage increase in some tangible way -- a buff, a DoT, whatever, bearing in mind it already has a short cooldown so those would essentially be used on cooldown anyway -- it will be avoided under most circumstances, and in fact will probably do exactly the opposite of what you've been pushing for by encouraging people to spend less time in melee so as not to accidentally trade damage. At best it would encourage holding the skill when forced to remain in closed quarters with the boss (or alternately, when pushed to stand some distance from the boss for a given mechanic), provided that it doesn't amount to a sum damage loss, and would incentivize using Displacement; at its absolute worst it would be considered yet another penalty for being in restrictive spaces, just like Engagement.