Setting sights on the future of physical ranged DPS

[Carighan]

I'm still curious actually. What would caster DPS think about getting positionals on their jobs? Or as you just proposed, a melee with slow casts on their main filler? Are you sure that's what people would like to play with?

Personally, It Depends™️.

Back/Flank positionals would be weird. Yeah we all stack in melee range anyways so it's not a big deal 99% of the time, but it's a bit constructed. A casting tank would automatically be fine with front positionals but they'd also be utterly pointless I suppose. What would be interesting would be if such a caster had a codified system of Near and Far positionals instead. We already have far-type stuff on PvP Bards, and near-type indirectly on how the Red Mage melee combo interrupts your casting, so I guess we have precedent for both, but as a variable concept on a caster with actual cast bars it'd be super funky to explore. I'd love that.

[CKNovel]

Personally, It Depends™️.

Back/Flank positionals would be weird. Yeah we all stack in melee range anyways so it's not a big deal 99% of the time, but it's a bit constructed. A casting tank would automatically be fine with front positionals but they'd also be utterly pointless I suppose. What would be interesting would be if such a caster had a codified system of Near and Far positionals instead. We already have far-type stuff on PvP Bards, and near-type indirectly on how the Red Mage melee combo interrupts your casting, so I guess we have precedent for both, but as a variable concept on a caster with actual cast bars it'd be super funky to explore. I'd love that.

And then you end up on P7, P8 or Valigarmanda and just can't do any of the "Far" positionals.
There's a lot of mechanics that forces the player to stay in near melee range for share purpose, even M4S has phases where you're forced to remain at close range for a long time.

A Near/Far has been a debate in the past and we quickly figured there would be too much conflict with melee DPS, Healer range (just think about Sacred Soil or Asylum) or game mechanics.

[Carighan]

And then you end up on P7, P8 or Valigarmanda and just can't do any of the "Far" positionals.
There's a lot of mechanics that forces the player to stay in near melee range for share purpose, even M4S has phases where you're forced to remain at close range for a long time.

No? Because Valigarmanda has no positionals?

I would also add that I want a temporary "failure state". Because the success is boring if there is no possibility of failure. Meaning that yes, Melee DPS absolutely ought to dominate damage if they can stay 100% in melee range. And Caster DPS absolutely ought to dominate if they can stand still 100% of the time. Only... neither should be possible. Not in a meaningfully reliable way. And that brings the damage down, which is where sub-par movement tools (like Reprise on Red Mage) and ranged attacks on melee ought to come into play, which should not be as trivial as they are now. However, likewise, movement tools should never be optimal to use rotationally, a weird FFXIV-specific side effect of how oGCDs can be woven between GCDs and how that interacts with casted vs instant GCDs.

[CKNovel]

No? Because Valigarmanda has no positionals?

I would also add that I want a temporary "failure state". Because the success is boring if there is no possibility of failure. Meaning that yes, Melee DPS absolutely ought to dominate damage if they can stay 100% in melee range.

It's only in the hypothetical scenario if we had a "far" positionals mechanic to show the potential conflict.
Another example is that you sometimes put tank and ranged together in NE/NW position to share damages because it allows melees to hit positionals. But in that case, either tank wouldn't be able to hit or ranged wouldn't be able to fulfill the "far" requirement.

You can take P9S that forces everyone at max melee range in some mechanics, same goes for P11S, P12S, M2S, M3S... All encounter that have positionals available.
Every "donut" type of mechanic would instantly deny that "far positional".

[Carighan]

It's only in the hypothetical scenario if we had a "far" positionals mechanic to show the potential conflict.

But... on enemies with a full ring positionals always count as "hit"? I think I get what you're poking at, but I was thinking that just like flank/rear positionals these would disable on oversized mobs etc.

[CKNovel]

But... on enemies with a full ring positionals always count as "hit"? I think I get what you're poking at, but I was thinking that just like flank/rear positionals these would disable on oversized mobs etc.

Yes, I've added examples encounter where the ring isn't full.
In any cases, you'd see conflict with job mechanics such as Asylum, Cure III, Wheel of Fortune from Collective Unconscious and Sacred Soil, I don't think anyone would like to see those abilities getting another range increase.