Rphys: why slow walk casts (ala pvp) aren't a solution

[Valence]

More mobile than healers? No. Hard disagree on this, for the reasons I explained in the OP. Again: no easy cast cancel unless you go all the way to press escape, then move normally. This is extra cumbersome and usually way too late when you need to move. Walking casts are a big trap in pvp for this specific reason and I don't see how it would somehow be different in pve. No slide casting either so you'll eat the full 1.5s casts or even a little more due to server delays. And the mobility reduction doesn't make it better than no moving at all or barely, because it will never be enough to move for mechanics anyway. Walking casts are more cumbersome to deal with than actual casts and they don't bring any noticeable gain. In pvp i'll take casters fillers ten times over the rphys walk casts as well, because they don't screw you hard if you get caught while casting like walking casts actually do. This is not a FPS and does not work like a FPS, and while it may work for Hanzo in FPS, it doesn't here. I also don't want to play a FPS but a RPG MMO.

I also don't want to have more hypercharge, please no. It's carpal tunnel inducing enough as it is currently playing this job...

Steps on DNC don't ask you to cast anything. If your idea is to place it behind a cast time, then it would be similar to put cast times behind nukes like MCH tools or BRD's Soul Gauge moves. Which is essentially like SAM already does for melee, and this has never been included into the total damage output of the job out of the pretense that "SAM is a caster and lacks mobility", and I have yet to see anyone arguing that SAM should get more damage than other melees either due to it.

People have the mindset that adding any form of cast to Physical Ranged will turn them back into the bowmages and gunmages of Heavensward. Yet even modern day Magical Ranged jobs don't have 'casts' on every action, and you often can choose where you want those casts to occur, such that they occur when movement isn't actually required anyways.

I think that players harbor some illusions about 'mobility'. Bosses spend long periods of time casting tells on their next mechanic sequence. Being able to run around randomly while the boss is hardcasting a new mechanic is irrelevant. It's great that you can get up, stretch your legs, and walk around when nothing is happening. But what really matters is bursts of movement. Smudge is real mobility. You press a button, you dash forward and gain sprint, and you can do this three times per minute.

I don't think having a single hardcast or two would create as much of an issue as people think it does, and every other role has them anyways. Oh no, you have to stand in one place to draw up a jetpack schematic, line up a sniper shot, or perform an aetheric drum solo on the boss' skull when the boss' castbar is charging up with the words 'Mechanic 3'. What matters is if you can dynamically work around where they occur. I think the 'walking cast' concept is really just a way of getting the players on board so that they realize that it was never a big deal to begin with.

I would just recommend adding in a couple of casts and/or walking casts, whatever you're comfortable with. Add in a couple of burst mobility tools similar to Smudge to compensate for the 'reduction in mobility'. And then equalize the dps. Stop treating Physical Ranged like a second-class subcategory of Ranged.

Counterpoint: stop treating rphys like a caster and make it its own role. Casters would be mad if they were told that they should be like rphys, so why should rphys be like casters? Casters are already mad about SMN for that specific reason. If your idea is that every rphys should aim to become a SMN, then no, thank you.

If as you say it changes nothing on mobility, then see my point above on SAM. You're essentially trying to shoehorn something that brings no additional constraint or challenge to justify a damage up. I don't mind the idea of having cast times behind those specific bit hitters though, but what does it bring exactly? Like for SAM, it would be on a case by case basis feel. SAM cast times don't bring any additional challenge, they do bring a feel for iajutsu moves. I'm open to this on rphys actually if it brings that kind of hard hitting feel on specific moves, but it will never bring anything else in the mobility department.