RDM Ideas, brainstorming and general dicussion

[Morningstar1337]

I am gonna post an idea for RDM. As well as a general discussion for the job in general and other implementations for how it can or cannot work in XIV

To get the ball rolling:

Role: Discipline of Magic (Melee DPS)
Weapon: Rapier
Cross Class: ARC and THM
General Idea: The idea is to have a Caster Class that primarily uses Melee attacks at close range, following up with some long range spells. The mechanics focus on building a specific resource with melee attacks then using it to execute powerful spells. With mechanics similar to SMN Aethertrails, BLM's Enochian and AST's Royal Road

Weaponskills

• Quick Point: Potency 150. Combos into Mana Thrust, or Willful Point
  • Mana Thrust: Potency 100 (210 when comboed) restores MP when comboed. Combos into Energy Drain or Painful Thrust
    • Painful Thrust: 100 (230 when comboed) Grants a stack of Aethercharge and a buff called Charged Magic
    • Energy Drain: Potency 110 (260 when comboed). Restores HP, grants a Stack of Aethercharge and a buff called Decaying Magic.
  • Willful Point: Potency 100 (230 when comboed). Increases Potency. Combos into Breaking Point or Overthrust
    • Breaking Point: Potency 100 (290 when comboed), Grants a Stack of Aethercharge and a new Buff called Radial Magic.
    • Overthrust: Potency 100 (250 when comboed), Grants a stack of Aethercharge and a new buff called “Resourceful Magic”

Magic: How it works if that the Magic has require certain Buffs. The first requirement are buffs with “Magic” in the title which denotes the effect. The 2nd is an Aethercharge, which adds the effect to a certain degree. Since XIV likes to keep its skills exclusive to the classes outside of cross classing this RDM will be using similarly themed spells, having 6 spells (one for each element) and 2 curative spells.

All spells here share a cooldown, with the duration of the coolown being based on the spell used. An offensive spell will make the cooldown 10 seconds while a more restorative one will cause it be be 60 instead. All Spells are oGCD ranged abilities with MP costs scaling by level and the buff. The two traits make it similar to Empyrean Arrow. A player can have up to 5 Aethercharges at a time unless they use a certain ability. Crossclass Skills will not not take Aethercharges or “Magic” Buffs.

• Inferno: 210 potency Fire Attack.
  
• Cocytus: 240 potency Ice Attack. Binds target with a 5% chance of Deep Freeze on Trash (2 seconds)
• Storm: 190 potency Wind attack, applies Magic Resistance down on the Target, Effect doesn't stack with Foe’s Requiem or Promoted Bishops.
• Levinchain: 60 potency Lightning attack. Applies a DoT to the target for 18 seconds (DoT potency: 60)
• Hydrosphere: 190 potency Water Attack. Silences target for 10 seconds
• Groundshaker: 190 potency Earth Attack. Stuns target for 4 seconds
• Restore: Curing Magic. Takes all Aethercharges and restores health, Potency depends on the Amount of Aethercharges used. (100 potency per Aethercharge)
• Banepurge: A removal of 1 Debuff.

The Buffs: As mentioned before, these buffs augment the Magic spells, but they use up all Aethercharges the player has. Changing the spell into something else or in certain cases buffing their own attributes, They are applied by combo finishers and are overwritten by subsequent combos.

• Radial Magic: Turns the Spell into an AoE but halves the potency form the spell. Aethercharges add 5 Yalms per stack.
  
• Decaying Magic: Converts the damage of an offensive spell into a DoT of the respective element (Burns, Dropsy, Frostbite, Electrocution, Sludge and Windburn) Uses 1 Aethercharge. DoT duration is 30 seconds and potency is 70. All other effects are applied, including Levinchain’s own DoT. Aethercharges Add 3 seconds to the DoT per stack
  
• Charged Magic: Removes all Aethercharges. Adds 40 potency to the spell per used Aethercharge but removes all effects. If it is also used under the effect of Energy Release and Radial Magic, the resulting spell's, potency decreases by 10% on 2nd mob, 20% on third and so on until it's at half strength, on top of the penalty inflicted by the spell.
• Resourceful Magic: Applies a debuff to the target that grants those that attack it 50 TP per hit. it is 10 seconds per Aethercharge stack

In addition, there are two additional Buffs that boost Speed

• Conquest: A buff that activates when the RDM uses certain spells in a certain cycle. in this case being Groundshaker>Levinchain>Hydrosphere, Hydrosphere>Groundshaker>Levinchain or Levinchain>Hydrosphere>Groundshaker. The Buff increases the Skill Speed of the player and nearby allies. Unlike the "Magic" Buffs, these only last 30 seconds
• Submission: A buff that activates when the RDM uses certain spells in a certain cycle. in this case being Inferno>Cocytus>Storm, Storm>Inferno>Cocytus or Cocytus>Storm>Inferno. The Spell Speed counterpart of Conquest. Also lasts 30 seconds
  

Other Cooldowns:

• Piercing Magic: Increases Critical Hit Rate for 20 seconds. All weaponskills grant the user 1 Aethercharge. 60 second cooldown
• Aetherial Rod: 30 second buff that increases the amount of Aethercharges you can have at a time to 10. Increases MP restoration rate 120 second cooldown
• En Garde: Increases damage of attacks by 25%, increases damage taken by 20%, for 20 seconds. 80 second cooldown.
• Double: The Next magic cast will be cast twice. Detrimental effects will not be applied on the first cast and “Magic” buffs apply to both casts. 120 second cooldown
• Triple: Same effect as Double, but allowing 3 casts and cannot be used on Banepurge or Restore. 400 second Cooldown
• Refresh: 30 second MP regain for a party member. 90 second cooldown.
  
• Energy Release: 30 second buff that allows the use of 2 different “Magic” buffs at a time for the Next cast (Only the new buff gets overwritten by combos until its removal). 210 second cooldown.
• Brains and Brawn: Switches INT with STR. 5 second Cooldown.
• Gather: Grants 5 stacks of Aethercharge, 60 second cooldown
• Ternion: A CD available when under the effect of "Conquest" or "Submission", a 500 potency attack that consumes the buff.
  

Wow, this snowballed into "melee support"...

List of skills obtained by Level (Italics are Quest skills)

• 1. Quick Point
• 2. Brains and Brawn
• 4. Willful Point
• 6. En Garde
• 8.
• 10. Refresh
• 12. Mana Thrust
• 15. Breaking Point
• 18.
• 22. Groundshaker
• 26. Banepurge
• 30. Painful Thrust
• 30. Storm
• 34. Gather
• 35. Inferno
• 38. Energy Drain
• 40. Storm
• 42. Aetherial Rod
• 45. Levinchain
• 46. Restore
• 50. Cocytus
• 52. Overthust
• 54. Double
• 56. Energy Release
• 58. Ternion
  
• 60. Triple

Traits

• 8. Enhanced INT
• 14. Enhanced En Garde Potency increase is increased by 10% (from 15%). Damage taken is decreased by 10% (from 30%)
• 16: Reservoir: Allows a stack of Aethercharge. Combo finishers now grant "Magic" buffs,
• 20: Enhanced INT II
• 24: Reservoir II. Allows a 2nd stack of Aethercharges.
• 24: Enhanced INT III
• 28: Enhanced Refresh: Refresh cooldown decreased by 30 (untraited is 120 cooldown)
• 32: Reservoir III: Allows a 3rd stack of Aethercharges.
• 32:Enhanced Groundshaker: Stun dutation increased by 2 seconds (Untraiited is 2 seconds)
• 36: Might and Magick: Increases Potency of all Spells and Weaponskills by 10%
• 40: Resevoir IV: Allows a 4th stack of Aethercharges.
• 40: Enhanced Inferno: Potency increased by 100 (Untraited is 180 potency)
• 44: Reservoir V: Allows a 5th stack of Aethercharges.
• 48: Enhanced Gather: Effect grants you 5 Aethercharges (Untraited gets you 3)

"Change Log"

• Replaced Phalanx with Refresh
• Indenting weaponskill combos
• Added "Resourceful Magic" and "Overthrust"
• Changed ACN to ARC
• Swapped Groundshaker and Cocytus potencies
• Added partial Leveling list. Will add traits and new skills later (Note that the skill list is taken as the Job at 60, with all traits acquired)
• Added partial Trait list. Will finish this pending additional feedback.
• Adding Conquest and Submission Traits, and with them a reason to use the spells' vanilla forms, Credit goes to Eloah for the idea.
• Retooled spells to require "Magic" Buffs. Credit goes to Duelle for the idea.
• Finished Trait list.
• With the above two, I made Inferno a 210 potency attack with no AoE

[ADVSS]

Pretty Cool! since DoM though i think just making int the primary stat and freeing up brains and brawn for maybe a mp refresh like goad?

[Enkidoh]

Very well thought out Morningstar, however one ability needs to be addressed, and that is Phalanx - Phalanx was an ability that previously appeared in version 1.0 as a GLA ability which worked completely differently to your idea (in 1.0, it was an effect that would make the character automatically counterattack if the player successfully blocked an enemy's weaponskill with their shield, making it somewhat like Shield Swipe). Thus I think SE are deliberately keeping Phalanx in reserve for later use with GLA/PLD with future level cap increases, along with other 'missing' 1.0 abilities.

But other than that, your ideas are well thought out and workable to me. Good job!

[Morningstar1337]

Pretty Cool! since DoM though i think just making int the primary stat and freeing up brains and brawn for maybe a mp refresh like goad?

The idea is to utilize both melee and magic, so I figured that using both INT and STR would be a decent fit, and that Cleric Stance-like effect would fit to that end. With that said I can fit an MP regin effect somewhere

Very well thought out Morningstar, however one ability needs to be addressed, and that is Phalanx - Phalanx was an ability that previously appeared in version 1.0 as a GLA ability which worked completely differently to your idea (in 1.0, it was an effect that would make the character automatically counterattack if the player successfully blocked an enemy's weaponskill with their shield, making it somewhat like Shield Swipe). Thus I think SE are deliberately keeping Phalanx in reserve for later use with GLA/PLD with future level cap increases, along with other 'missing' 1.0 abilities.

But other than that, your ideas are well thought out and workable to me. Good job!

Okay, and thanks

[Nihility]

I still think if they do red mage to fit in with the way this games mechanics function and want it to be kind of hybrid-ish to fit red mage style

the only real option would be something of a melee-bard hybrid

like the base could be a melee fighter that has the enfire/enice/enthunder self buffs that are akin to ninja poisons along with the damage buff
and a somewhat bard or black mage-like rotation of skills that are magic based melee attacks with kind of generic names because they would double for mage mode
would be rather easy to set up with a basic attack that procs things, and a couple dots, a couple debuffs, an ogc, some utility, etc etc

then add in a skill that is like wanderer's minuet that adds cast times but also range
but your en-spells get changed to aura's like refresh, regain, phalanx
so in essence your losing some damage while gaining range and group support

Maybe even set it up so mage mode skills use mp while melee mode uses tp to limit your aura time and give a way to let tp replenish

could even give them a healing skill that is a bit restrictive like clemency, maybe it has a 10-15s cooldown on it or something. black mage already can use physick so its not that weird

[Simpicity]

RDM is already in the game you just have to realize it.

[ADVSS]

This is pretty close to how id see red mage honestly, though some things id have done slightly different, i think melee to refresh mp and mp for burst moments as a dps, with this utility is where id see it, the comment about bard-esque support, yeah i sort of would draw their dps along those lines making them true to the jack of all nature, where yeah they were not big burst kings or glass cannons, but they could deal damage, heal, and in some cases take a hit(most melee can take at least a hit or 2 unless its tha t busterrrr) Not gonna add any more suggestions though, im curious to see what others can come up with, and how close they are to what i would suggest. Keep up the good work!

[AlphaFox]

Only thing that seems to be missing are the traits, which honestly I think Double would get upgraded to Triple much like Archers Barrage. Otherwise looks good, not sure how the TP charge would go about though, seems like a lot of TP to gain back for both skills and auto-attacks.

[Nyerieri]

Thank you morningstar for making this thread. Now we can actually have a meaningful discussion about how red mage may function without facerolling other jobs. Reading your template so far and will post feedback!

[CookieMonsta]

considering most top tier casters go to melee range for autoattacks anyway, this concept of RDM isn't too bad at all.