Raiding without caster (no magic dmg or AOE LB) --- DEVs plz look!

[Mishayangg]

Hi!

In the Expansion I want to try Machinist and make that my new main. The problem being the current game-structure. Will the Machinist be physical or magical? Most likely physical right? And what will then happen to the magical only parts in raids like the cube in T11, adds in T13 and so on. Also there is the issue with the LB, will bards and machinists get a AOE LB? (needed för T10)

How will the raids be constructed in Heavensward? Will you still be forced to have a caster (BLM or SMN) in raid for magical damage and AOE LB? Or can a makeup like Machinist, Bard, Melee, Melee work?

I sort of need to know this before the expansion hits since I want to hit the ground running on expansion day and hopefully try out the new raids the same week.

Thank you for your time and I really hope DEVs will give at least a pointer to the answer like: "No, in Heavensward you will not be forced to have BLM / SMN in a raid group to conquer it."

[MrCookTM]

"No, in Heavensward you will not be forced to have BLM / SMN in a raid group to conquer it."

You don't need a caster lb to clear fcob, I know at least one melee x2/brd x2 group that cleared fcob months ago, though a caster makes certain turns/situations easier.

But besides this, it would be an awful decision from a pure party setup standpoint. How it is now, every job/type of job brings something to the table that might be desirable for a raidgroup, melee has the highest dps, caster has magic based dps obviously + aoe lb, pld and war have their own useful abilities and situations where they can shine, so do whm and sch. For this reason party construction is fairly balanced in this game and most groups you see have a pretty similar setup of pld/war/melee(x1 or x2)/caster(x1 or x2)/brd/whm/sch. SE does a really good job at giving the jobs unique strenghts and designing content in a way that everyone can shine. Why would you want to change such a good thing?

Imagine fcob would not have enemys that are weak vs magic damage and aoe lb would be accessible for other jobs than casters. You would see melee x3 + brd dps setups exclusively, because why would you sacrifice dps if you don't gain a certain amount of utility? Would be terrible in terms of job balancing.

[Mishayangg]

I agree, having 5 physical dps and 2 magical is not good design so here's to hoping machinist is magical!

[ruskie]

Well our static works with 2 melee and 2 bards mostly because that's the jobs people want to play and we do this for fun so ideal setups are not a must have.

As for machinist I expect it might be like nin. Some attacks will be physical some magical damage(I love when nins figure this out during levi ex). And I expect similar for dark night.

[Dextro]

Everything in the game can be done with a 4x Physical DPS setup, it's just not ideal or very efficient to set yourself up with such a limitation.

Other than Teraflare in T13, I don't think any fight in the game actually requires LB to win (except early progression of new raid content, since you are undergeared).

It's like how people thought Ifrit HM and T5 wasn't possible without caster LB in 2.0. They both obviously were, but since it required an approach not found in youtube video guides, people pretty much just gave up entirely - since that's the kind of playerbase we have

T10: You simply burn 1 add and melee LB the other. It can be done without LB at this point, though.
T11: The Cube takes 50% damage from melee, but also has 50% of the hp that the Sphere has, so a 2:2 melee split will kill each add at roughly the same speed.
T13: The add that switches between physical/magical damage has ridiculously low hp, you can melt it in like 2 GCDs with everyone on it.

[Frozenbear]

It was my understanding that right around heavensward they were going to make job-specific (ish) lb? the point being that certain aspects of this convo may change dramatically, but i was under the impression that as a gun class machinist would be physical. then again i was under the impression that smn pets would be at least as cool in this game as they were in 11 so where is your logic now? what i do know for certain, in my gut, is that no matter how the gun class is tooled it will be an aoe lb. or ill eat my lance.

[Tex_Mex]

It was my understanding that right around heavensward they were going to make job-specific (ish) lb? the point being that certain aspects of this convo may change dramatically, but i was under the impression that as a gun class machinist would be physical.

So yes, job specific LB's ARE coming. SE has stated that BRD would be the first class to get one since the healing LB doesn't make much sense.

As far as whether or not machinist will be physical/magical, it is VERY likely that it will be physical. this will give:
3 melee DPS - MNK, DRG, NIN
2 magic ranged DPS - BLM, SMN
2 physical ranged DPS - MCN, BRD

This balance looks really solid to me.
The most important thing that SE needs to look at as far as balancing in Heavensward is to give progression raid parties an alternative to BRD. I would love to see SMN completely reworked into more of a support class so that BRD would have some competition.

[AskaRay]

Yuck no I hope MCH is physical, like less-support bard...

they probably have a few magical attacks like all jobs though.

[Dyvid]

Well our static works with 2 melee and 2 bards mostly because that's the jobs people want to play and we do this for fun so ideal setups are not a must have.

As for machinist I expect it might be like nin. Some attacks will be physical some magical damage(I love when nins figure this out during levi ex). And I expect similar for dark night.

I'm glad some people understand the point of gaming ^^

[Sanguisio]

This goes both ways, its very annoying you need both to clear content without too much stress.

Content should be designed so it is clear-able 'for most' with any DPS make up you wish.