Sage's Phlegma 1/2/3 should be a ranged attack

[Mesarthim]

I don't see the tactical usefulness to not be doing more damage than DPS do in trash mob pulls using Dyskrasia (melee range), one single button. Sage is VERY strong in dungeons.

[ty_taurus]

People in here bringing up uniqueness/identity and the availability of Ikarus to deal with it.

It's not even that. All healers, casters, and rangers should be parked closer to the boss than many healer, caster, and ranger players seem to be comfortable with. The biggest error in OP's post is not "Phlegma should have longer range." OP's big mistake is "It's a bother having to approach the target to do this attack skill before running away to a safe distance again where healers belong." Healers don't belong at long range because if they're at long range

1. they don't cover the tanks, and sometimes melee DDs, with their AoEs
2. they have to run farther to get out of cones
3. they have to run farther to get into donuts
4. they have to run farther for stacks

Long range is not a safe place to be. Rangers and casters don't belong at long range because of the same reasons except replace (1) with "they won't receive AoE heals". This is not a unique problem to sage. I've been at the edge of my AoE range almost not hitting the tanks and melees and still had to ask rangers and casters not to stand so far away from the boss because they're not getting AoE heals. I still would have had to ask that if I were playing any other healer because even after the expansion of many actions to 30y every healer still has 15y actions and none of them want to waste resources or GCDs single-target healing stray DDs when they would have been healed to full by the AoE heal if they just weren't out of range in the first place.

To be fair, I see that as a flaw in FFXIV's design. It's weird that despite having roles like "ranged physical DPS" and "ranged magical DPS" that most fights have the entire party parked firmly inside the cheeks of a boss' hitbox. Do aesthetics matter for good gameplay? Not necessarily, but it looks so weird and ugly having everyone standing on the same spot except for spread mechanics. And that's something that wasn't always so prominent in fight design. Ramuh EX, for example, created an environment where the party wanted to stay spread apart for the entire fight, specifically grouping with players to free them from charm, and gave the physical ranged DPS role a specific advantage as they could always bait one of the charm-inducing AOEs since one was based on proximity. They would stay at the edge of the arena, moving in during AOEs to avoid the extra damage taken form standing in the water, then move back out. It's such a disappointment that party positioning isn't something that is almost ever considered with fight design other than the regurgitated clock position spreads.

E9S was another interesting example since there were several segments where the party needed to stay separated for a decent amount of time, and that's a somewhat more recent example.

[SieyaM]

Jobs are so similar that they all even need to be at the same range from the mobs now.

[Post]

They've pretty much always wanted to be in melee range, it's only since 6.4's DRASTIC increase on party buff and heal AoE range increases that it's been sorta not as important anymore.

Speaking of things that aught to be ranged though, SGE's fucking auto attacks shoot lasers. Why is THAT not ranged? Yes, I know every other healer autos in melee. That's fine.

Among casters, only SCH and SMN autos have any measurable impact anyways, so who cares if SGE can shoot? Let em shoot.

[Rongway]

Speaking of things that aught to be ranged though, SGE's fucking auto attacks shoot lasers. Why is THAT not ranged?

They don't. Sage auto attack is just them reaching forward like they're going to kali-ma someone. The nouliths don't participate in the auto attack at all.

[rawker]

They don't. Sage auto attack is just them reaching forward like they're going to kali-ma someone. The nouliths don't participate in the auto attack at all.

I actually like this idea that both shield healers auto attacks are ranged: the SGE with their nouliths and SCH with their pet