Machinist Needs Mobility and DPS Mitigation/Helaing Option

[CKNovel]

The most I think MCH could do with, is some kind of debuff/crowd control skill, and even that wouldn't be strictly necessary for endgame content, just fluff for openworld/dungeons.
Otherwise, maybe MCH could do with a slight dps buff to solidify it as the selfish-dps of the physical ranged jobs.

I don't think phys ranged need a rez because we already have casters, or the ability to stack their shields, because in any content that you'd need it, you shouldn't have more than one phys ranged anyway.

I'm curious to hear what you have in mind for crowd-control skills.

Would it be like Holy from WHM, it has a stun for fluff but its main purpose remains AoE damage?
A comeback from Palisade could work except it could slow the attack speed of mobs in addition to reducing damages.

[ItMe]

You know what?
I take it all back.
I was trying to think of what SQEX would do if they decided MCH needed more mobility, and realized if they gave it a dash it would probably be with jet boots ♡

More mobility for MCH please! SQEX make it happen!

[Seraphor]

I'm curious to hear what you have in mind for crowd-control skills.

Would it be like Holy from WHM, it has a stun for fluff but its main purpose remains AoE damage?
A comeback from Palisade could work except it could slow the attack speed of mobs in addition to reducing damages.

Some kind of electrical discharge skill that had a stun effect would be cool. Or even a debuff that lowers the damage dealt by the target.
I think it would work well to give MCH a bit more of an identity beyond just 'selfish-dps' in the phys ranged category. A bit part of it's aesthetic is as a mechanic, so why not give it the ability to sabotage enemies?

Wildfire is sort of part way there, or that's the kind of idea behind Wildfire, but it only serves to buff MCHs own damage and so it doesn't feel like a debuff as much as just being part of the rotation.
Maybe it could inherit the Noiseblaster machine in Endwalker, that would serve as an AoE stun.
Then give it the skill 'Sabotage' as a damage down debuff. Maybe 10% for 10s, or 5% for 20s, on a long cooldown like 180s. This extra mitigation would make up for the relative lack of damage. (which is justified for the higher mobility of a phys ranged but still irritating once a party has an uptime strat worked out)

DNC is full on support.
BRD is part support.
MCH has minimal support, but could support via enfeebling the enemy instead.

The Phys Ranged role skills involve enfeeblements already, so this buff/debuff dichotomy is already present in the phys ranged role, and is characteristic of the classic 'ranger' type jobs in the franchise, so why not build upon it?

[CKNovel]

Some kind of electrical discharge skill that had a stun effect would be cool. Or even a debuff that lowers the damage dealt by the target.
I think it would work well to give MCH a bit more of an identity beyond just 'selfish-dps' in the phys ranged category. A bit part of it's aesthetic is as a mechanic, so why not give it the ability to sabotage enemies?

Wildfire is sort of part way there, or that's the kind of idea behind Wildfire, but it only serves to buff MCHs own damage and so it doesn't feel like a debuff as much as just being part of the rotation.
Maybe it could inherit the Noiseblaster machine in Endwalker, that would serve as an AoE stun.
Then give it the skill 'Sabotage' as a damage down debuff. Maybe 10% for 10s, or 5% for 20s, on a long cooldown like 180s. This extra mitigation would make up for the relative lack of damage. (which is justified for the higher mobility of a phys ranged but still irritating once a party has an uptime strat worked out)

DNC is full on support.
BRD is part support.
MCH has minimal support, but could support via enfeebling the enemy instead.

The Phys Ranged role skills involve enfeeblements already, so this buff/debuff dichotomy is already present in the phys ranged role, and is characteristic of the classic 'ranger' type jobs in the franchise, so why not build upon it?

During HW, the silence ability (head graze? forgot the name) was also a damaging skill.
And it was natural to use it on cooldown. If you put utility on a damaging ability, players will use these as damaging ability rather than utility ability. See Energy Drain spam loggers scholar? Copy and Paste.
Even if the original goal was to get rid of Aetherflow stack, you would see player using it increasing their damage.
So first thing, it would have to be a fully utility skill or the primary use to be a damage skill like Holy. It would have to be an ability usable in content where stun is fully resisted otherwise it's another dead button in way too many content.
Silencing wasn't used a lot this expansion for example.

During HW and SB (basically every other expansions), MCH used to have the best utility skill, Dismantle.
It used to have a 60s cooldown, reduce damage inflicted by the target by 10% for 5 seconds.
I want this ability back and I think it goes into what you also think of.

As for the mobility, there's many topics that could interest you. Ranged mobility was not exploited this expansion, so much that in the most mobile tier, ranged remained lower but magical created a gap between Magical and Melees. RDM for example was above or near SAM on E8S. We basically talked about it again and again how mobility is never exploited and that the tax is therefore meaningless and by far too high.
As we mentionned previously, uptime strats involve ranged doing extra work so the Melee can benefits higher DPS. It's a gain for the team but it's illogical to a player.

[Kalaam]

I have to say that the idea of each ranged having a different flavor of support is an attractive concept. Dancer focusing stronger buffs on a single party member, Bard buffing the whole party and Machinist supporting by making the ennemy weaker would make them feel very different but equally useful imo. That would be interresting to see.

[CKNovel]

I have to say that the idea of each ranged having a different flavor of support is an attractive concept. Dancer focusing stronger buffs on a single party member, Bard buffing the whole party and Machinist supporting by making the ennemy weaker would make them feel very different but equally useful imo. That would be interresting to see.

There's multiple consequences to that, in past content, buffing your allies defense was stronger in any point for 2 facts:
-Any ennemies would have their damage reduced, including untargetable entities.
-Your group was always close enough.

Now they include Diamond weapon that forces the group to be split around 1/3 of the fight, making buffing allies a weakness due to the range limitation. Now, the received damage isn't high enough to worry about mitigation, but with higher damage debuffing could be a good element.

It used to be the case before. MCH had debuff, Hypercharge that increase the opponent damage taken and Dismantle that reduces damages inflicted. BRD had buffs, Troubadour that reduced physical damage taken and songs used to buffs allies around... And Foes Requiem was a debuff I think.

IMO here's how I see the ranged should be:
MCH High damage, no offensive support but great protective support
BRD, Medium damage, good party wide offensive support, good protective support
DNC, Low damage, great offensive support mostly single target, little protective support.

[LeonKeyh]

I have to say that the idea of each ranged having a different flavor of support is an attractive concept. Dancer focusing stronger buffs on a single party member, Bard buffing the whole party and Machinist supporting by making the enemy weaker would make them feel very different but equally useful imo. That would be interresting to see.

I'll preface this by saying that I love support classes and would absolutely enjoy the ranged physical jobs having more support in general and being "different."

However, the problem with something like that would be uneven value in different content.

DNC being able to buff 1 ally would be great in light party content (you're buffing 1/4 of your party), ok in full party content (you're buffing 1/8 of your party), and mediocre in 24 man content (you see the pattern, 1/24)

BRD being able to buff the whole party likely means their buffs won't be as good as DNC (otherwise, why take DNC?) but what content do you use to balance it? BRD would be better in full party content than it would in Light Party or 24 man content.

MCH debuffing the enemies mean that it will be fairly even amongst all of the content (as you'll be affecting everyone by affecting the enemy everyone is attacking). It would essentially do the same thing as the BRD but be more balanced between content. Having one in 24 man content would be a huge boon though (similar to SCH/NIN) because it's the only job of the 3 that buffs everyone.

IMO here's how I see the ranged should be:
MCH High damage, no offensive support but great protective support
BRD, Medium damage, good party wide offensive support, good protective support
DNC, Low damage, great offensive support mostly single target, little protective support.

The only problem with making a class's identity around protective support (especially in lieu of offensive support) is that it will have a fairly limited time in which it is valuable. Protective support is good whenever you're first doing content, but the value of protective support goes down as people gear up and/or learn mechanisms. On top of that, the amount of damage being dealt in fights isn't high enough to value protection over damage. Offensive support is _always_ useful and always valued.


None of that really matters if the jobs aren't terribly strong in support, but that's basically the complaint now, right? They lack a solid support identity because it's easier to balance that way because you don't run into the issues that I mentioned. They seem to be trying to stay away from it but I would love it if the ranged physical jobs were actually amazing support, that everyone would be excited to see them because they knew that it was going to be a quick run.

[CKNovel]

The only problem with making a class's identity around protective support (especially in lieu of offensive support) is that it will have a fairly limited time in which it is valuable. Protective support is good whenever you're first doing content, but the value of protective support goes down as people gear up and/or learn mechanisms. On top of that, the amount of damage being dealt in fights isn't high enough to value protection over damage. Offensive support is _always_ useful and always valued.


None of that really matters if the jobs aren't terribly strong in support, but that's basically the complaint now, right? They lack a solid support identity because it's easier to balance that way because you don't run into the issues that I mentioned. They seem to be trying to stay away from it but I would love it if the ranged physical jobs were actually amazing support, that everyone would be excited to see them because they knew that it was going to be a quick run.

Oh don't worry about protective abilities.
What I meant about damage was about single target, BRD always takes the crown against 2 bosses. What I also meant is that 100% of MCH output should be for MCH alone, BRD output would be 90% from himself, the remaining 10% from his teammates, DNC 90% from itself, 10% from the dance partner + teammates and in the end, they'd all bring the same rDPS to the group.

Second about protective abilities, during this last tier there was a lot of strategies cumulating shields to ignore mechanics. If you loose no HP, you don't get the damage down HP. It would help melee uptime. Of course such strategies are currently limited to comp, gated behind gear for bigger shields and requires to burn a lot of resources for 2 extra GCDs for each melees.

All ranged should be equal on DPS they bring to the group, they shouldn't be equal on how they bring it to the group.
And their utility should be unequal to create different jobs. For example, the mitigation action could have extra effects, MCH Tactician could grant a shield, BRD Troubadour increase healing received, Samba heal for a small amount the team members.

[ForteNightshade]

The only problem with making a class's identity around protective support (especially in lieu of offensive support) is that it will have a fairly limited time in which it is valuable. Protective support is good whenever you're first doing content, but the value of protective support goes down as people gear up and/or learn mechanisms. On top of that, the amount of damage being dealt in fights isn't high enough to value protection over damage. Offensive support is _always_ useful and always valued.

To be fair, the way around this would be to weaken the utility of tanks and healers, thus making them more reliant on that support. Which I think needs to happen, regardless. Healers have far too many options for the lackluster amount of outgoing damage. Even tanks have become needlessly bloated. One aspect of tanking I sorely miss is having to plan out my CDs, deciding which buster to put x, asking for Palisade for another and taking y attack raw. Nowadays, I often slap CDs on every buster because who cares, I'll always have one.

They really need to go back and readdress support and how to make it better compliment the game design.

[Raikai]

To be fair, the way around this would be to weaken the utility of tanks and healers, thus making them more reliant on that support. Which I think needs to happen, regardless. Healers have far too many options for the lackluster amount of outgoing damage. Even tanks have become needlessly bloated. One aspect of tanking I sorely miss is having to plan out my CDs, deciding which buster to put x, asking for Palisade for another and taking y attack raw. Nowadays, I often slap CDs on every buster because who cares, I'll always have one.

They really need to go back and readdress support and how to make it better compliment the game design.

Wholeheartedly agree.

Before they address utility, they NEED to change tanks and healers design.

I think it would be nice to just balance healers and have them with just defensive utility - it makes sense with the role. For example, AST cards could all have unique effects again if all of them would be related to non-offensive things. Like Ewer boosting Piety. But for that to work, MP management would have to be relevant for healers again. I don't necessarily think Tanks should have their AoE defensive like Heart of Light... That seems way overkill with the amount of AoE healing going around. TBH as a GNB I mostly use that for my own personal need.

I think most of the dmg+ support related stats should be with the aiming jobs (+ Ninja with their TA). The rest of the dpsers could still have Addle, Feint - those abilities that are kind of "subpar" utility, but still nice to have.

On top of that, I would love to have some situational utility added back to jobs. Things that aren't necessarily useful in a Savage fight, but are QoL niche things, for example, Holy's stun. I remember that Monk's first AoE stage caused silence, and it was quite cool. A monk in your 4-man would mean more interrupts to caster trash. Stuff like that.