Machinist needs serious attention

[LittleArrow]

Welcome to support-dps life guys

If that's the case, then MCH should be as easy to play as BRD. One of the points of MCH that I stated in the original post is, if I'm having to watch 12 cooldowns (no joke, I counted them including procs), still participate in mechanics, and contribute to the fight, then the work I put in should be rewarded accordingly. Support DPS doesn't technically exist in this game. We have BRDs and now we have MCH. It seems that SE is trying to turn them into some sort of ranged caster. In all honesty both classes now seem to have even lesser focus than BRD did in 1.0. All the more reason this class needs a serious examination.

If you think split shot doing 500-800 damage at 55 is good, my AST Malefic in cleric stance does around 500-600 non crit at 54.

Solo.

Your MCH should be doing more with that shot, you're a friggin dps class.

And this is another problem, most people see their dps and think, "Oh, that's normal,' or "That's acceptable for my class." When in fact it isn't. You can't outright compare numbers from BRD and MCH b/c BRD has 2 constant dots going and 3 sources to proc Bloodletter. MCH has 1 50% source move to proc the SECOND skill in their combo. It's crazy to me. 50% chance is not that high when you're just trying to start your combo. Reload and quick reload are not resources to managed, b/c once you manage them you've lost dps by trying to hold onto them. I've worked my buffs around my priority moves, but that doesn't change the fact that my base damage is so insanely low.

I feel that the testing for this class was done at optimal conditions, maybe even a program running it and the numbers were high. We're not a computer program. Even the most seasoned player will make a mistake, not to mention the fact we have to deal with mechanics.

[Snugglebutt]

I feel that the testing for this class was done at optimal conditions, maybe even a program running it and the numbers were high. We're not a computer program. Even the most seasoned player will make a mistake, not to mention the fact we have to deal with mechanics.

I'm thinking SE prefers to theory craft, spreadsheets and number crunching on paper instead of actual in game practical testing by staff through the multitude of scenarios including hard group composition dungeons, trials and raid situations.

[aerialrave]

I'm sorry to say "it is too early" but that is how I truly feel at this point. But I will give my opinion as I have already reached 58MCH.

I do not wish to complain about DPS just yet. I don't use a parser so I can only tell from eyeballing things and watching closely. So far I have seen MNK and NIN do wayyyy more damage than me. Like, approaching double the kind of damage I do. I'm not sure if that's balanced or not, as I like being able to attack from a range. It is expected for melee DPS to outdamage ranged DPS. It makes logical sense. I haven't come across any good DRGs yet (just a bunch of Estinien wanna-bes) but I would assume that good DRGs can outdamage MCH like crazy too. Anecdotally I seem to be outdamaging BRDs, although it's quite possible that I've just been playing with bad players.

Little side story, I strugged on Bismarck with a party of 2 BRDs + 1 MCH. We did not pass the DPS check on the adds and wiped several times and our party disbanded. After requeuing I ended up with the same 2 BRDs and we still had a difficult time. Incidentally I also had a failed party at Dravana that consisted of 3 MCHs (2 of them stayed in GB the entire time while I scratched my head wondering if that was the right thing to do, we ended up running the timer down and failing the duty).

Another anecdote, I just finished leveling SMN to 50 before the expansion came out. I don't like casters in this game, and I had preconceptions that SMN was the laughing stock of the game. I'm sorry to say that actually playing the class and giving it a fair chance only confirmed my suspicions. Because of my poor experience with this I've had more patience for MCH. I don't know what SMN is like post-50, but from my experience 30-50 MCH is better than SMN. You can complain about Split Shot all you want, but I still much prefer it over Ruin (and Ruin2 also!!).

One weird thing about MCH is the 1-2-3 combo, which doesn't exist. It's more like a 2-3 combo when you have ammo. Then when you don't have ammo, it's like "spam 1 and pray for a 2 proc. Then when 2 procs get down on your knees and pray even harder for a 3 proc."

Personally I'm still getting used to Gauss Barrel. I knew there was gonna be problems just like BRD is experiencing problems with WM. To me I find it strange to come across many other MCHs leaving GB on all the time. For me, I have it off way more than I have it on. It's like I don't even want to use it unless Rapid Fire is also up. No one's complained about my damage yet (reached lv58, farthest I've completed is The Vault). In fact I've picked up quite a few commendations which is rare for a DPS. Grenado Shot is super awesome and even Spread Shot is pretty cool with a nice sound effect and has its uses. I only got talked down to once by someone who was surprised that I wasn't spamming Blank and knocking everything away... I'm sorry if people have had bad experiences with this but you shouldn't automatically assume everyone's gonna do it...

No defensive cooldowns is an issue. Not a problem, but an issue. Second Wind is a great cross class skill to have that Machinist is missing. Every good Bard has always used this. It's an issue because if the rest of your party isn't playing well there's nothing you can do about it, whereas on other classes it's possible to pick up the slack and take a few hits. Machinist cannot take any hits outside of unavoidable / party-wide AOE damage. I have never used so many X-Potions in my life until I started playing Machinist. Glad I made room for another hotbar in my UI before the expansion came out! I think it's not a serious problem because MCH has a bunch of tools, personally I have found some of the skills to be super valuable. For example Foot Graze + move out of range and attack a different target is a very useful strategy. You can even Lead Shot them first and then bind them after, and they can still take that DOT damage without losing the bind. Blank + Leg Graze + kite is also extremely effective versus single targets. I have fought monsters that if I stand still they bring me down very low (even to the fear of death occasionally), yet if I fight the same targets and kite them I can defeat them with taking little to no damage at all.

The tools are there, you just gotta know how to use them and when. One of the tools though, Suppressive Fire, isn't that great. Before the game came out, I thought to myself "Wow, MCH has stun, silence, slow, bind. That's so overpowered! Ranged stun? Too godly!" Now that I'm actually playing it, I was disappointed to find Stun + Silence using a shared cooldown. To add insult to injury, Suppressive Fire is melee range only, making it have very limited uses in a party role. Think of it this way, as a ranged class, you're expected to fight at a distance. That means you should be out of range of the stun for most of the fight. That means to cast the stun requires movement to get in range. But your movement is limited by Gauss Barrel, where the more you move, the less damage output you'll have. I find myself using the Silence WAY more simply because I can cast it at a range. It's not cool that the stun shares a cooldown timer AND is melee range... They should pick one or the other, with both I almost never use this in a party.

There are some issues but I'm sticking with MCH for now. I hope to reach 60 and complete the storyline in the next day or two. So far I haven't ran into any problems that made me want to quit playing MCH.

[LittleArrow]

To be completely honest, after playing this job and reading about it, I get the feeling it's just not finished. There are skills that just need to be taken out. There are other skills that are obviously not balanced properly. There's a fine line between complicated (which I find fun) and convoluted (which I don't think anyone finds fun). There's a red herring with this job, "Hey, so many buttons! No firm rotation. This is going to take a skilled player to play!" In some regards, I agree with this, but with the job as it is, it's just a facade to hide the fact that this job still needs serious work. It does not feel as polished as any of the other jobs I've played. Personally, I'm going to stick with MCH b/c I love an underdog job. I feel terrible for my coil team to have to deal with that, but thankfully I run with amazing people.

There are players out there that won't be so lucky. I foresee a lot of hate, misunderstanding, and frustration with this class. I just hope SE sees that and fixes it before it becomes so much of a problem that the job is completely abandoned entirely.

I apologize if this post seems scathing, this of course is just my opinion. I see amazing potential in the job and just want to get it to a point of polish like the other jobs in this game.

welcome to the awesome world of ranged physical dps :P

sessurea beat me to it D:

Again, I've played BRD since 1.0. I'm not being welcomed to anything lol. Although I get the joke

After having played MMOs for over 12yrs (yeah I know, not that long ;P) this is just on a totally different level. Are there worst instances than this MCH implementation? Oh well of course, there's always worst, but do I find this acceptable from SE? Of course not. BRD was pretty bad, but I loved that class. If it wasn't for my personal feelings about wanderers minuet, I'd still be playing it. This, this is just beyond "welcome to ranged dps."

[Warlyx]

welcome to the awesome world of ranged physical dps :P

sessurea beat me to it D:

[Kiara1]

are you considering the pets damage too? (now I dont know how much damage the pet does though)
I mean just like summoner maybe it "feels" like you are doing low dps.

I read pet does 80 potency with high attack speed
Garuda egi does 100 potency with quiet low attackspeed, and I believe garuda deals 25% of summoners overall damage.

Thats why my ruin wont deal more than 200 damage at lvl 50

[LittleArrow]

are you considering the pets damage too? (now I dont know how much damage the pet does though)
I mean just like summoner maybe it "feels" like you are doing low dps.

I read pet does 80 potency with high attack speed

Yes, every post I make is including the turret. The 80 potency sounds great, higher than BRD dots, but in game it does not add up b/c over all our base damage is just so low and our basic combo is so dependent on RNG when our cooldowns are down. The management of cooldowns are important, but there will always be offtime with cooldowns, which kill this class imo. The super long GCD, the low overall damage, and the RNG is just too much for an 80 potency single target turret to make up for and a ton of cooldowns to shake at to make MCH work as well as it sounds.

[KylePearlsand]

I can get behind many of these points. However, there is also one more I'd like to add. If I recall, most dps jobs have some way to heal themselves. Whether it be through second wind or cure. Machinist on the other hand doesn't seem to have either of these which makes solo content in heavensward in particular a bit of a risk.

[Jandor]

I can get behind many of these points. However, there is also one more I'd like to add. If I recall, most dps jobs have some way to heal themselves. Whether it be through second wind or cure. Machinist on the other hand doesn't seem to have either of these which makes solo content in heavensward in particular a bit of a risk.

Can we have potion cooldown reduction trait please Yoshi, for great flavour and heal potion usage .

I wonder which spot Machinist is supposed to take in a raid party. Is it supposed to compete with BRD for that one support spot? I doubt it, and if not, it should definitely be doing significantly more damage than a BRD.

BRD is the exact spot we're supposed to take, hence the robotic disco balls of MP/TP regen .

[Taika]

I wonder which spot Machinist is supposed to take in a raid party. Is it supposed to compete with BRD for that one support spot? I doubt it, and if not, it should definitely be doing significantly more damage than a BRD.

BRD is the exact spot we're supposed to take, hence the robotic disco balls of MP/TP regen .

At the moment Machinist seems to offer less damage and less utility (no damage boost for other jobs), so I can't see this happening.