Machinist needs help.

[Rym]

Anyway I've been thinking, what's the point of ranged dps tax when in most encounters everyone is in melee range most of the time or close enough anyway?

[OlanDurai]

When I think Machinist, I think of gadgets and utility. The job is anything but that. Having party utility would make a ton of sense for where it's dmg usually is in each expansion. Probably the best party utility would be 5%/15s vulnerability tied to Wildfire or Chainsaw.

However, after leveling some other job I realized that MCH is the ONLY job that also has ZERO "personal utility".

Self dmg mitigation - none.
Self healing - none.
Move speed increase - none.
Gap closer/opener - none.
Dash - none.

When you look down the list of abilities/weaponskills on the job guide, they're all damage related. That's the only thing MCH can do, and it's not even outstanding at that.

I love machinist as a job, but no one wants to bring to raid progression. Why would you. I'd be holding my group back if I went as MCH.

P.S. Bring back Grenado Shot.

[Dyvid]

Anyway I've been thinking, what's the point of ranged dps tax when in most encounters everyone is in melee range most of the time or close enough anyway?

The ranged dps tax is commonly referred to as movement tax meaning RPDPS have the ability to move about the arena while doing their complete dps rotation. Casters, well most of them, require at some point to stand still and cast but interrupt that cast to dodge AoE. Melee have to stay within the bubble to dps but targets jump away or cast melee range AoE that needs to be dodged.

[Driavna]

Anyway I've been thinking, what's the point of ranged dps tax when in most encounters everyone is in melee range most of the time or close enough anyway?

Why anyone will play any other class if ranged DPS classes in this game did the same damage as everyone else but with better movility and no worries about range?

I know that what I'm about to say is something most players don't want to hear yet current design just make no sense. There is a reason why most other games stick to just ranged vs melee, and most ranged classes (caster or not) have animations that root you in place or some kind of cast bar for certain abilities.

Is either stick to what we have know, rework all physical ranged dps to what I said before o perhaps just prioritise physical ranged DPS for a lot of mechanics that require to move around or bait stuff.

[CKNovel]

Why anyone will play any other class if ranged DPS classes in this game did the same damage as everyone else but with best movility?

Yes.

Once again and it's been proved thousands of time:
Players play what they enjoy the most, not based on meta. That's only for metaslave.

It's been proved countless time, even when DNC and MCH are crap compared to BRD, yet they remain played.
Sure, BRD is more popular but has always been more popular and we're far from 100% BRD.
Same goes with SMN, RDM is more popular and regardless of any counter-argument, BLM remains played by many regardless of RDM/SMN mobility