My thoughts on machinist (Up to level 42)

[SovereignAegis]

UPDATE 6/21:
I played the class to 50 and got it to 50 a little over 24 hours after release. I tried it in raids like WoD, etc and I am not impressed.

Updated post with my numerous criticisms.

Do not think I am trying to bring Machinists down, I LOVE their concept and gunner was one of my fave FF tactics classes. Enjoyed it so much and so I was so excited I leveled MCH first of all!

... However it needs A LOT of improvements across the board to be competitive. At present a MCH will never get a raid group spot, period. I hope this post will bring attention to the fact that there are improvements that can and should be made! I want to love this class, and I have faith that with buffs it can be awesome! But at present it needs that help!

To put it shortly?

For the record I got MCH up to 50 and quit it. If I want to do DPS I will either go summoner or I will level Bard. Machinist is not even close to viable for how much effort it takes to play. The buffs are weak, the debuffs are weak (5% values for real on these all on long cooldown timers!!?!?!?! WTF!!?!! AT LEAST MAKE THAT HORRIBLY LOW VALUE CONSTANT), the 1-2-3 combo requires constant staring at hotbars and for what? Bard does the same damage. (In fact I would argue bard does MORE damage lategame.)

FULL EXPLAINATION:
-The 5% debuffs are pathetic. Too long of cooldowns, too short of durations and too weak of effects. Supervirus is an amazing ability and I don't expect a clone of that (it affects both magic and physical damage mindyou!), but that is an example of a solid situational skill with strategic value. Our debuffs are not. They are too weak to be noticed and fall under the radar.
-The fact our stun/silence share the same cooldown is atrocious. Bard gets a free silence of similar value. Don't even get into the snare because Bard gets that too on a separate cooldown.
-Our DoT (Lead) feels good, but not good enough to mitigate the "non proced" chances damage reduction. Keep in mind Bard gets two DoT's that have a combined potency that is significantly stronger.
-Turret damage is noticeable, shockingly, however even with it on I felt like I was being out DPS'ed by everyone else. Turn on the MP'/TP buff and we have a noticeable decrease in damage. (Arguably maybe similar to 15% decrease from Bard?)
-I finally decided that the 5% buff from hotshot is flat out ridiculous. Dragoon's get a 15%, why can't we get 10%? I mean let's ignore the fact dragoons get a 360 GUARANTEED POTENTCY combo from full thurst. (Our 200 potency combo finale from getting lucky is little more than half that. This is the sharp deviation in damage we face.)

And let us not forget bards' get a 20% increased critical strike chance with super high uptime. That crit strike chance applies throughout skills and we all know a critical > 5%. Oh wait. A crit >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> 5%.

-Our execute is on a much longer cooldown than Bard's (double).
-Our TP and MP regen buff is weaker than bard's from my calculations (I do not have an official parser but it seemed like 50%)
-Bard gets THREEEEEEEEEEEEE SUPERB (240, 240 and 360 potentcy) off gcd burst abilities with super low cooldowns (15s, 2.5s, 60s) while in wanderer's minuet, we get one at 200 potency. Their burst rotation is insanely higher lategame. Oh and let me add salt to the wound, their 240 potency ability with the 15s cooldown (ignoring the 2.5 second cooldown one!) also refresh's their DoT's AND our single "gauss cannon exclusive" ability has a 20s cooldown. 20s vs. 15s.

I literally can not make this up, this is real.
Don't believe me? Read:
http://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Machinist
http://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Bard



****BIGGEST PET PEEVE: I spent 80% of my time playing staring at the hotbars for the procs and reload timers. This. I. Do. Not. Find. Fun. You need to keep full attention on what you're doing with your rotation or your DPS sinks like the titanic.
-But lets be serious, even if we got the perfect combo off 140-180-200 potency combo is pretty "meh". And that only happens 25% of the time without reload. Keep in mind Bard gets 20% more critical chance rate, so even if they spam 150-150-150 that if it crits counts for A LOT.

So why the HELL am I looking at the hotbars nonstop stressing out about a combo when Bard just hops around and can rely on muscle memory/combos to do the same?


ORIGINAL POST:
These are my personal thoughts and I'd just think I'd share them so people can sort of see what it's like. Obviously I don't know everything about it, obviously I've only been playing it since release, etc etc. But I feel this could be something new players might want.

My feelings can be summarized in one sentence:Lemme put it bluntly: This is a "hard version of bard" with no real returns or benefits for the extra laborious amount of work needed to play this class properly.
No, I don't feel like I am doing more damage than a Bard, no I don't feel like I offer much different than a Bard. YES I feel like the amount of work and attention and specific keystrokes needed to do equal damage/etc as a Bard is hilariously higher for a machinist. I am struggling to see what a Machinist offers that a Bard does not offer and offer much easier.




Points of interest:
1: Mobility +++, extremely mobile just like bard is. Never pinned down.

2: Lead is a requirement in my opinion, the potency of the DoT is very high and is easy to pop around and let tick on a mob of enemies. I suggest strongly keeping it up.

3: There is absolutely no rotation. All of their "1-2-3" combination is based upon pure luck or reloading ammo.

The reloading system I found incredibly irritating and a pain in the rear until I put them into the side buttons of my mouse (there are 2 skills for reloading). I find it interesting now.

But that being said there is no rotation that you can just macro for highest DPS. You need to monitor the environment at all times as well as if you have the benefits proc to the next buffs.

A simple rotation would be like 140-100-100. Whereas one with fully loaded ammo is 140-180-200. Obviously more damage.

That being said a lot of people will COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY DESPISE THIS CLASS FOR THIS VERY SINGLE REASON. You need to pay attention and if you don't you're gimping yourself quite hard.

4: Turret seems... like more of a nusaince than anything. I cannot even discern what damage it IS doing (yeah 80 potency but what are the numbers on the mob? It's all a zerg of blue numbers flying at my face).

And summoning and resummoning is a minor chore mindyou especially when you consider how easy it is to move around with a summoner's pet.

In fact I'd say the turret is basically just like a weaker version of Garuda that just spams that one damage ability.

Yaay...? To me I'm not sure if I am fond of this at all. Feels like a DoT.

I haven't raided with the machinist yet (obviously) yet one major concern spikes to mind... the raid obviously will be on the move a lot. And one massive point to the machinist is their mana-battery turret capabilities. I am a bit anxious to see how this works, it may workout great (10 sec cooldown timer on rook at least)- but that being said if we have the white mages rushing around like chicken's with their head cutoff I am very concerned.

5: I find it hard to run out of TP, I can even spam their AOE (Which is a fabulous machine gun AOE) for a while. But that WILL drain me of TP.

Invigorate is obviously a useful crutch, but I haven't needed it much. Maybe 5 times total from 30-42?

6: It is EXCEPTIONALLY HARDER THAN BARD.
I honestly picked up archer and Bard within a few minutes after playing around in a dungeon, machinist however requires focus on what is going on or your DPS will fall off.

This is NOT a class for people looking to just glide through raids without paying much attention, your DPS will tank through the floor faster than Oprah Winfrey falls through a...

But fact is it shares a lot of similarities with bard but it's more like lady luck + bard = machinist. It's so hard to describe properly, like I found myself overwhelmed with information when I came across more difficult bosses with queues I HAD to pay attention to or die WHILE focusing on getting my perfect "rotation" (It sure as hell is not a rotation out.


7: DPS honestly feels low. I am not going to pretend it feels high because it doesn't. Even if you get off your perfect combo at level 42 I know for a fact I was doing more damage on my level 33 dragoon (for blood for blood cross-class). Like no point in sugar coating it the damage feels flat.

Post-40 with turret things seemed to pick up a bit, but even then my damage numbers did N O T impress me. My bloody scholar does more.

8: This class fortunately does have the redeeming quality that it has a lot of debuffs and CC on demand. Even at present I love the variety of cc I can put out there.

9: 5% Physical increase in damage from "hot shot" is underwhelming. Period.

5% of 100 = 5

If I hit 1000 damage I now hit 1050.

... This is a very sad little skill. And is on GCD.

10: For "rotation" purposes I find "silent shot" (whatever the real name is ingame) useful to spam to add more damage between GCD skills.

---------------------------


MY CURRENT SUMMARIZED FEELINGS?:

This is a DPS? I am dissapointed in the lackluster damage.
I am worried bard songs will simply flat out be more useful / available period in a moving raid.
The debuffs (mind break/weapon break) are pathetically weak at 5% each. Equally as weak as the "hot shot" buff of 5% damage to blow a GCD.
Turret's contributions are hidden beneath the scenes. I can't tell if I am actually helping or making much of an impact or pretending I am because I have some interesting flying gadget.

... At present I am tempted to just go back to scholar because this class simply at this point isn't meeting the threshold in my mind to be viable lategame. This opinion of mine might change with some sleep, but at present if me logging off right now to nap speaks nothing else it is that I am disappointed and don't even feel the desire to level it further. But I likely will after getting some rest. However this class seems incredibly lackluster.


Lemme put it bluntly: This is a hard version of bard with no real returns.

I could not and would not at present recommend this class to my friends, I would suggest they play Bard instead. This opinion may change when I reach level 60 but at present this is my opinion.



Disclaimer yet again: These are just my thoughts.