Red Mage: Potential adjustments

[Rongway]

I worry about how to adjust it. I suspect if it barely changes in 6.0 and isn't received well it will be reworked in 7.0, for lack of ways to properly expand on its kit.

Jobs that are in a good place don't need to be changed every expansion. There are twenty other jobs that people who want significant change can go play. When a job is solid, just trait up its attacks to keep up with power levels expected at the new cap level.

[Kalaam]

I don't think RDM is in that good of a place to be honest. After all those years it has become quite stale for most of the rotation

[Katie_Kitty]

Jobs that are in a good place don't need to be changed every expansion. There are twenty other jobs that people who want significant change can go play. When a job is solid, just trait up its attacks to keep up with power levels expected at the new cap level.

I don't know who put you in charge of dictating what jobs people play. I also don't think you are the arbiter of what RDM does or doesn't need so let's not get into this "other jobs you can play" nonsense. You don't see us telling you to go play something else, do we?

[Rongway]

I don't know who put you in charge of dictating what jobs people play. I also don't think you are the arbiter of what RDM does or doesn't need so let's not get into this "other jobs you can play" nonsense. You don't see us telling you to go play something else, do we?

I don't know who put you in charge of dictating what opinions people can post on a forum. I also don't think you are the arbiter of how jobs can or can't be designed so let's not get into this "your opinion is nonsense" nonsense. You don't see me telling you to get over yourself, do you?

[Grimoire-M]

Jobs that are in a good place don't need to be changed every expansion. There are twenty other jobs that people who want significant change can go play. When a job is solid, just trait up its attacks to keep up with power levels expected at the new cap level.

If that were true Monk would never have been a problem. The fact is Red Mage is tuned around it’s mana generation mechanic and if that core proves too restrictive in its current iteration to manipulate then yes it does need to be reworked. Not on the level that Summoner or other job reworks have gotten, but enough that it can fit more actions or cooldowns into its core rotation. Despite people’s insistence that they get more Melee actions I don’t see Dualcast or Black/White Mana going anywhere. Nor do I think expanding the current melee combo or adding graphical updates and potency to current skills is an effective way to patch the problem. That plus the procs imposes limits that could force those elements to change, for better or worse.

[Rongway]

If that were true Monk would never have been a problem. The fact is Red Mage is tuned around it’s mana generation mechanic and if that core proves too restrictive in its current iteration to manipulate then yes it does need to be reworked.

That's a very different situation. In early expansions of course you want improvements and additions to jobs, and attempts by the devs to satisfy this want can have the unfortunate effect of making the job worse.

We're going into 6.0. By now, some of the existing jobs are in a good state. At this point, any of the older jobs that are good should be left mostly alone. The risk of making them worse while trying to make a good job better should outweigh the desire for something new and different--people aren't primarily playing the good jobs "because they could be better next expansion"; they are playing them because "they are good now". For those jobs, just trait up their actions and leave them otherwise alone. Let people who want something different play something else.

Note I'm specifically not talking about jobs with highly visible major problems. Obviously for those, they really need work and the risk of making them worse is a necessary one.

Not on the level that Summoner or other job reworks have gotten, but enough that it can fit more actions or cooldowns into its core rotation.

Why? Red Mage opener is weave saturated and after that there are not that many weave windows unaccounted for. In two minutes of combat Red Mage gets roughly:

1 Manafication
1 Embolden
2 Acceleration
5 Fleche
3.5 Contre Sixte
3 Corps-a-corps
4 Disgagement
2 Swiftcast
1.5 Addle
2 Dreaming
1 Surecast
0.4 Potion
===
26.4 oGCDs

At minimum spell speed there are 48 GCDs in a two minute window. For RDM a few GCDs (E.Weaponskills) are shorter than others, so let's round this up to 50. About half of RDM GCDs have no weave window, about half support a double weave, and a few (E.Riposte, E.Zwercchau) only support a single weave, so on average RDM gets 1 GCD : 1 weave.

That puts RDM at about 38 actions per minute, which is probably within ±2 APM of seven of the other sixteen jobs. Considering that during about half of our GCDs we have to do a quick arithmetic calculation to decide whether to Veraero or Verthunder in addition to the normal buff and cooldown tracking that every job has to do, I think where we sit on the APM spectrum is fine.

Despite people’s insistence that they get more Melee actions I don’t see Dualcast or Black/White Mana going anywhere. Nor do I think expanding the current melee combo or adding graphical updates and potency to current skills is an effective way to patch the problem. That plus the procs imposes limits that could force those elements to change, for better or worse.

I absolutely don't want any additional melee single target actions; we're already fighting for melee spots in some fights and it would only be a detriment if our rotation to require more melee time. Any changes to the fighter side of Red Mage need to be made without increasing the time spent on melee actions.

That only leaves the mage side of Red Mage open for adjustment, and as you say, the Dualcast and Mana mechanics are core. Because of the Mana mechanic, aspected spells necessarily have to come in pairs. This is a problem because we're already at the limit of how many hotbar actions a reasonable player can press comfortably. For reference, I am a keyboard-only player except when I need to mouseover a Verraise, with actions on 1-5, alt1-alt5, sh1-sh5, shalt1-shalt5, and the nav cluster (ins/home/del/etc), with long cooldown situational actions on unmodified 6 (addle) and = (potion). The only spots left on my bars for new actions are modified long reach keys (alt6, sh6, shalt6), and I would loathe to have to put actions on these keys, as the reach required makes it easy to press alt5/sh5/shalt5 unintentionally, irrespective of whether I actually succeeded in hitting alt6/sh6/shalt6 anyway. Also, I took ten years of piano lessons as a child, so what I consider "comfortable" for keyboard UIs is beyond what would be comfortable for a typical keyboard player.

If we are to get two more aspected spells, they necessarily need to utilize two of the already existing spell buttons. For example but not necessarily for endorsement, a Verquake spell would have to use either the Veraero II or the Verstone button, and a Verburst spell would have to use the Verthunder II or the Verfire button. Another unaspected spell should use the Impact button, though if it were a new button would be slightly less annoying to accommodate than two new aspected spell buttons.



Obviously Red Mage could use some adjustments to AoE--again, as long as it can be done without adding any additional buttons--but besides that, it's a great job that doesn't need any changes to its rotation. Clearly there are people who disagree with me, and that's fine. But of the changes people have suggested beyond traiting up some actions, I don't think any of them are particularly appealing.

"Give RDM a DoT"
Adding a DoT just to add a DoT doesn't add anything of value to our Dualcast/ManaManagement mechanics.

"Give RDM a DoT with Mana ticks."
That makes Mana calculations unwieldy and inconsistent. With a Mana over time effect, two RDMs who do the exact same sequence of actions but just 0.1s apart can end up with different amounts of Mana, which would make such a Mana over time effect a bad design choice.

"Give RDM more melee attacks."
In parties with two melee DDs we already have to delay our combos to non-optimal times because melee DDs get obvious priority for melee spots in mechanics choreography.

"RDM is a caster. Give them less melee."
Red Mage is a fighter mage. Sword use is a deeply ingrained feature of Red Mage history. Yes, I said I don't want more melee attacks; but those that we do have are essential to the Red Mage concept, and you can't take away the swashbuckling altogether without making Red Mage just a Plain Mage. The two melee composition problem is certainly somethign to consider but not a big enough problem to "fix" by going in the opposite direction.

"Make Fleche and Contre Sixte the same cooldown but with single target and AoE versions so we can add something else."
We already have enough redundant buttons. This change would make Contre Sixte useless in raids while still taking up a hotbar slot.

[Reitrenner]

The only thing I don't enjoy about RDM is how long it takes to get to your melee combo. I would take a minor nerf in DPS if it meant I could melee more. The class feels way too mechanical and lacks a lot of player expression some of the other classes have. It's not a boring job by any means. I really enjoy it. It's just not as exciting as it could be.

[Katie_Kitty]

I don't know who put you in charge of dictating what opinions people can post on a forum. I also don't think you are the arbiter of how jobs can or can't be designed so let's not get into this "your opinion is nonsense" nonsense. You don't see me telling you to get over yourself, do you?

I'm not the one telling people to play other jobs if they don't share my vision for RDM - You are.

[Rongway]

I'm not the one telling people to play other jobs if they don't share my vision for RDM - You are.

My advice to play something else is a relevant point. You are attacking my person rather than my points. If you want to argue with me, describe some Red Mage changes that you deem necessary without making it sound like a different job.

[Tulzscha]

Jobs that are in a good place don't need to be changed every expansion. There are twenty other jobs that people who want significant change can go play. When a job is solid, just trait up its attacks to keep up with power levels expected at the new cap level.

While I see where you're coming from there are a couple problems with this logic.

For one, different people have different ideas on what's solid or fun. Everyone's different and there's no pleasing them all, even if they all have similar levels of passion or interest for the same job. Secondly keeping a job the same for a long time will make it boring for most, some change is required to maintain interest and because everyone's different some people will like those changes and some will not.

You're always going to have people who are happy with how things are and others who complain that they haven't gotten anything new or cool recently. When it comes to a new expansion in particular they need selling points and a fresh coat of paint on a stale job is a good one.