Lets Talk - Red Mage

[Kiote]

You can also do things to make them 'less boring' as people seem to fear. Generally this would involve short lived, but very powerful enhancements such as a targetable skills that erases enmity generation for a short period or a skills that enhance the damage of a weaponskill or increase the damage of a specific element for a short time. There are defensive enhancements as well such as one time/short lived reflect/nullification of physical or magic damage. Then they could build all kinds of interesting battles that would require good use of Red Mage specific enhancements as well.

I really just don't see a place for RDM on the frontlines in a MMO. It makes far more sense for them to be built as a good, dynamic enhancer.

The problem is, making a class the is centered around short buffs that have to be cast repeatedly is not fun. It's actually incredibly annoying. It is exactly what Red Mage deteriorated in to in XI. Refresh Haste Refresh Haste Refresh Haste Refresh Haste. You spend so much time buffing people that you don't actually get to do anything fun. It sucks. The only reason Red Mage was popular in XI is because of it's ability to Solo. No one really enjoyed playing it in a Party.

Red Mage has a place on the front line. The same place it has since the Beginning. All the way up until XI completely failed to give it reasonable Melee Damage. The Key to making Red Mage a front line Job is by not gimping it's melee skills. Ignorant people would think this over powers the Red Mage, but it doesn't. You can't melee and cast at the same time.

[Shougun]

No one really enjoyed playing it in a Party.

Would just like to give this quote extra face time...

lol except for some very rare moments where you were useful in other aspects (like twitch some other class is failing their job moments).

[Ladon]

I'm pretty sure SE said they dont want to put haste in the game. But you could make a class out of the other spells - then when you make the job class you'd just have to make chain spell work with their TP skills.

Perhaps all spells become combo'd with an attack with chain spell, so if you cast enfire you can start to remove wait times between attacks and for a short time attack 6 times in two seconds, since buff and debuff spells are notoriously short cast times just making instant cast spells isnt enough for their base class. Would also work with the fencer idea. Would also make them stay up front as the attack wont happen at a distance.


May step on samurai territory though - depending on how they envision him in this game.

Actually this made me consider that having some of the enhancements as weaponskill combo procs could make things interesting as well and maybe appease the people that want to see Red Mage in the thick of things. But again, don't see their role as DD but as an enhancer. You could have one combo Enfire all nearby party members (generally the melee) while another will throw out an ATK increase. Then you could throw all of the spellcaster base enhancements as targetable spells so the idea is that the Red Mage melees to enhance melee in the party and casts to enhance the casting of spell casters. Sort of still fits the whole concept behind the job.

Lastly on haste, if they don't want it around as a function of decreasing wait time between auto attack they could still get creative with it. They mentioned the new system will have a global cooldown so you could have haste decrease that a bit or have it just effect cooldown on weaponskills a bit.

[Hulan]

Would just like to give this quote extra face time...

lol except for some very rare moments where you were useful in other aspects (like twitch some other class is failing their job moments).

Oh I don't know, there was something hypnotically relaxing about casting two spells back and forth every 4 seconds.

Who am I kidding, I begged borrowed and stole to make sure I could go as BLM to events instead of RDM.

[Ladon]

The problem is, making a class the is centered around short buffs that have to be cast repeatedly is not fun. It's actually incredibly annoying. It is exactly what Red Mage deteriorated in to in XI. Refresh Haste Refresh Haste Refresh Haste Refresh Haste. You spend so much time buffing people that you don't actually get to do anything fun. It sucks. The only reason Red Mage was popular in XI is because of it's ability to Solo. No one really enjoyed playing it in a Party.

Red Mage has a place on the front line. The same place it has since the Beginning. All the way up until XI completely failed to give it reasonable Melee Damage. The Key to making Red Mage a front line Job is by not gimping it's melee skills. Ignorant people would think this over powers the Red Mage, but it doesn't. You can't melee and cast at the same time.

I'm not really sure where this idea of Red Mage came from. Even in the single player games they were supporters filling many roles so it's completely valid to branch them from any of these roles to fit a MMO.

This concept of being boring is also subjective. You could make the same argument with White Mage since its just Cure Regen Cure Regen Cure Regen Cure Regen Cure. Actually ANY class can be broken down into this. In reality it's the enemy mechanics that make a role fun. As I mentioned, they just need to make enemies that play to the strengths of an enhancement class to make them fun just like with any other class.

[Kiote]

Oh I don't know, there was something hypnotically relaxing about casting two spells back and forth every 4 seconds.

Who am I kidding, I begged borrowed and stole to make sure I could go as BLM to events instead of RDM.

Literally made me LOL

[SwordCoheir]

I disagree with the few who claim that you could not build a jack-of-all-trades style RDM with the current system. You just have to uses all of the tools provided (and re imagine RDM a bit). The following assumes that skills will be given in ARR in the same number and types as 1.x.
Obviously this is a grossly inaccurate assumption, but lacking any other information, it's a necessary evil.

Not hatin on your creativity, but as it stands every job has it's own unique abilities and spells and can stand on it's own two feet fulfilling it's primary role without the use of cross-class abilities. In order for RDM or any job worth two salts to work they have to be able to stand on their own and utilize cross-class abilities to enhance their game not be restricted to it.

Going with this method also means you have to level multiple jobs to even operate halfway-decently beforehand, making it ineffective to level if you don't level CON/THM first, nor does it give you much to any room to use support abilities from those classes like Sacred Prism when all your cross class slots are being eaten up by T1 nuking/healing spells.

This is mostly why I've been saying it would be nigh impossible to really have a carbon copy of classic/FFXI's RDM without making it worthless.

[Kiote]

Even in the single player games they were supporters filling many roles

No they weren't. They were always very very powerful front line fighters. Most debuffs were completely ignored in early final fantasies and buffs were only ever necessary in boss fights.

This concept of being boring is also subjective. You could make the same argument with White Mage since its just Cure Regen Cure Regen Cure Regen Cure Regen Cure. Actually ANY class can be broken down into this.

No, it's not subjective. It is quite objective. There must always be a thrill for a class to remain enjoyable for an extended period of time. Tanks constantly have to worry about keeping the hate and wondering if they will survive. This minor paranoia creates a thrill that draws people to the class. Melees and Nukers have the thrill of seeing large number fly off the screen while always being at risk of pushing things to far and getting killed. Healers have the thrill of the whole fight depending on them and everyone's lives being in their hands. One bad mistake and its all over.

Nothing depends on a Buffing class. Nothing. The difference between a good buffer and a bad buffer is a 30 second fight instead of a 40 second fight. There is no thrill and no rush on any level. In XI Bards had to figure out how to both buff and pull just so they weren't so bored they wanted to die. In the end, they mastered the task leaving Ranger without a Job.

The same problem applies for Debuffers. Yoshida saw this. I can guarantee it. Now summoners don't have to settle for commanding a Pet once a minute or becoming backup healers. They have taken One really boring task and mixed it in to one Really popular Class and now Debuffers do not have to be bored anymore. Everquest used this same tactic on buffing class with Enchanters. By mixing them in to a Pet Class, the horrible boredom was eaten away by the thrill of having a pet to command in the midst of the fight.

[Shurrikhan]

The same problem applies for Debuffers. Yoshida saw this. I can guarantee it. Now summoners don't have to settle for commanding a Pet once a minute or becoming backup healers. They have taken One really boring task and mixed it in to one Really popular Class and now Debuffers do not have to be bored anymore. Everquest used this same tactic on buffing class with Enchanters. By mixing them in to a Pet Class, the horrible boredom was eaten away by the thrill of having a pet to command in the midst of the fight.

Seems like they could have figured out a more immediate way to fix the idea of Buffer / Debuffer gameplay than simply sticking something good enough atop it so that the pain is alleviated. I can't think of any exact examples right now, but I really, really doubt this is any new concept:

Forenote: with this the role of buffers / debuffers usually seems heavily integrated, able to fulfill roles of both long-term backing of reserves and general strength and twitchy, short-term empowering with the purpose of being able to do something otherwise impossible or usually taking twice as long.

The games this is based on usually have their party casts very visible to other party members. If you can keep track of past casts and the likelihood of future casts, you would basically feel, as a buffer, that you are playing the entire team at once, and capitalizing on the best parts. The debuffer, similarly, feels as if it's playing the entire enemy force at once, slapping hands, cutting tendons, and breaking jaws as it sees the oppertunity (all that usually in more a magical or metaphorical way -- though RDM could do both).

The biggest difference between most MMOs and these takes on derivative/tertiary gameplay (buffing/debuffing) was that these had measures (periods of time, not necessarily intervals) of combat small enough that short-term buffs could change the outcome of an attempted action. For example, a 4-second haste buff allowing a monk to strike a mob before it's shield is raised, and the monk's own abilities then interrupting the mob, reapplying with each hit faster than the interrupt can diminish. Without the precise placement of the ability, the strategy would have to be changed.

For example, let's say the mob will block 100% of attacks once it enters that guarding ability, and turns quickly. Either the monk would need enough movement speed to slip behind and stun or someone else (without leading enmity) would have to lead the attack. Or else the monk would then need some way to bash through the shield more effectively, likely through yet another, different buff.

The purpose here isn't to make the party dependent on buffs. These are things you'd have to go through anyways without a buffer, and probably felt fine with. Mostly, it adds new parameters to combat, adding mechanics or effectively removing the enemy's, whether through buffing or debuffing in either case. This can be used in a battle-wide field of gameplay, or else something up close, like two RDMs rushing with each other, and switching off simultaneous buffs before one's strike, or a MNK or a DRG or a BLM.

The closer in you get, the more you can capitalize on the quirks of a class or composition of classes in a sort of "fireteam". The further out you are, the more you mess with the larger picture. In either case, it shouldn't feel like chaining refresh.

The decision for how many buffers you'd want really first comes down to this:
1. Are there any mechanics in the fight that would be easier (in terms of players * combat time) to target specifically and ease or nullify?
2. How many attackers do you need, in terms of actual number of abilities going off, and utilities available.
3. Then just look at the difference between expenditure on buffs vs. more pure dps. In most cases, it will probably be about equal. It's likely to be the other things the pure dps classes have (other than dps) that buffing or buffing-dps (RDM) classes don't that will make the difference, and that will usually be on a individual class basis.

However, all the above really does also depend on having stronger, less RNG-based AI mechanics, benefits greatly from having force-based defenses (i.e. trying to parry a 12-ft boss's blade would normally be impossible -- it would take immense force even if your RNG started the parry action), and more realistic diminishing returns and deadzones to defensive stats, features and abilities.

Some of the addition complexity in buffing / debuffing classes comes simply from not using a single resource (i.e. mana). Instead, you'd have a way to build time-magic, use it. Something's building fire, and perhaps fueling or supplying fire spells and perhaps other types along the same motif. Over-segregating the types can become an annoyance rather than an addition of enjoyable complexity, but the range of resources in use, and how those resources connect (levels of abstraction vs. immediacy; type vs. situation) can be good way to differentiate between buffing / debuffing classes in addition to fighting style and role niche.

[moriandrio]

No they weren't. They were always very very powerful front line fighters. Most debuffs were completely ignored in early final fantasies and buffs were only ever necessary in boss fights.

So you want a very very powerfull frontline job, that gets nuke/heal/buff/debuff skills. This will never happen, if they implement RDM it gotta be a backline job that actually does the same it allready did in ffxi and not more.

Most ppl that want RDM, want a overpowerd solojob they can kite everything to death like it was possbile in FFXI but i doubt SE gonna be so stupid doing this again.