Anyone else wish RDM was a PURE support class?

[Lambdafish]

Opposite, actually. I'd like every class to have more interplay (or, "support") with others through added undermechanics that they all can play into, and then certain added class and job mechanics that each capitalize on certain of those. I honestly feel like a revision and expansion of the cross system would be more useful to that than its removal, but there are ways back from every path, provided there's enough ambition.

You don't know that this won't be the case. BRD and MCH have TP/MP/damage buff application, NIN has enmity manipulation and TP regen, and I can see RDM having some sort of support function in addition to its damage. I always envisioned RDM as kind of the caster equivilent to NIN, with refresh being the MP goad, and having a few abilities like haste/slow/dia to give the job more utility than straight damage.

[Duelle]

I think part of the problem here is that AST is primarily a healer with added skills on top. You can choose the healer that boosts damage output, or the one that doesn't - there's a clear optimal choice. Replacing a damage dealing job with a support job is a different matter - you can choose the job that deals damage, or the job that boosts it. The end result is still just damage.

I'd say it's more that they tried to use the buffs as an incentive to bring the job, but because buffs easily fall into that trap of being either useless or overpowered, we have the current problem.

As much as some hated the buff overlaps in WoW, I do know why they went that direction. For example, priests had a raid buff that lasted 60 minutes that increased the max HP of everyone in the raid. Except priests aren't the only healers in the game (since at the time you had resto druids, resto shaman and holy paladins), so the devs gave warlocks an aura buff called Demonic Pact that gave the exact same effect to everyone in the raid when the warlock had their imp summoned (the effects, however, would not stack). So even if you didn't have any priest healers in your raid, you had a decent chance of having that buff covered if you brought a warlock with you.

To put it into the current context, imagine if the devs calculated average uptime/DPS increase of Balance and gave SMN an aura that increased damage dealt based on that data when they have Ifrit-egi active, but anyone under the aura's effect cannot receive the benefits of Balance (if AST were to use it, the target players would receive no effect). In theory, your raid is no longer forced to bring AST and you're not kicking WHM to the curb because your buff is covered if you have a SMN in the group. Some may bring up the snag in my suggestion since Balance comes about via RNG, but I'd smugly reply that that's why adding RNG mechanics of that nature is generally a bad idea.

[NocturniaUzuki]

While I agree that pure support - PURE support, is not really possible, there are creative alternatives that amount to 99% support and would fit the role system. I'll see about coming back and writing more when I'm not on my phone 2 minutes before I leave for work! :P

[Pintsized]

I was hoping RDM would be a PURE support class where they don;t have many and are low dmg abilities but really are good for large groups with their support auras/buffs, kinda like BRD but just more supporty.

Good luck playing a job where you only viable role is in 24-man content .. I assume that's what you mean by 'large group', in 8-man the rigid 2/2/4 format means that taking a DPS role out would require serious re-balancing of every 8-man instance in the game .. and RDM would have no udeful place in 4-man content.

Basically, the horribly limiting 4-man core-group design entirely precludes a dedicated support role with crippled DSP a la FFXI RDM.

[loreleidiangelo]

I like support roles, but at this point in XIV's life cycle it would take way too much work to realistically implement them. Leave them to games that are designed around their existence from the ground up, like the upcoming Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen.

[Vexander]

A few things to note:
- RDM channels aether through the magicked crystal medium.

We don't know this for sure or not yet. All we know is that the Magicked Crystal Medium is there. Its function is yet to be determined. While I don't doubt your speculation to be correct, there could be any number of functions it serves from drawing minute amounts of aether from the world and mixing it with the Red Mage's aether, to just being the part of the weapon that enables spellcasting. Old lore from 1.0 stated Conjurers needed tools made from living wood to work their magic (wands/staves) and Thaumaturges needed enchanted stones bound to their weapons to work their magic (gems in rods and staves).

My theory is that RDM works more like SCH, and is a Sharlayan job which is formed from intense study of aether, using the crystal medium as a way to channel aether, and concentrate it, allowing for massive control over the elements, and their aspects.

I'm inclined to agree that Red Mage is a Sharlayan job given the overall aesthetic and the presence of Sharlayan in the narrative as the defacto Mage Nation of the modern age. There have been theories that Sharlayan was formed by dissident White and Black Mages during the War of the Magi, who fled Eorzea to study in peace. The Red Mage would've been the love child of this union, a combination of White and Black Magic. There have also been other theories that the Sharlayans recently uncovered enough information about Mhach and Amdapor and their arts and were able to create a new kind of magic from that knowledge; Red Magic.

Theories and speculation are fun, but I'm rather eager to learn what Red Mage's actual Lore will be.

[dragonseth07]

You don't know that this won't be the case. BRD and MCH have TP/MP/damage buff application, NIN has enmity manipulation and TP regen, and I can see RDM having some sort of support function in addition to its damage. I always envisioned RDM as kind of the caster equivilent to NIN, with refresh being the MP goad, and having a few abilities like haste/slow/dia to give the job more utility than straight damage.

Why does everyone envision Refresh being a thing? AFAIK, it's only a Red Mage spell in XI. That is one game. Not even a game with a great track record on job identities, either. Ninja tanks of all things...

[Joe777]

Traditionally speaking Red Mage as pure support would not be good. A blend would be nice, but judging from how it's being implemented I don't see it having too much away from raw attacking in the spells department.

[Vexander]

Why does everyone envision Refresh being a thing? AFAIK, it's only a Red Mage spell in XI. That is one game. Not even a game with a great track record on job identities, either. Ninja tanks of all things...

Probably because its the MP version of Goad the game currently lacks, and as per FFXI, it was a Red Mage spell. Doesn't seem like a difficult conclusion to reach, even if the implications are not necessarily all that great. SE could add Refresh as the Red Mage's way of regaining MP similar to how Summoners have Aetherflow and Black Mages have Umbral Ice. It could be an MP version of Goad best used on Healers or perhaps even Dark Knights. Or it could just not be added at all. We'll have to wait and see, but there are some good reasons to give Red Mages an MP restoring mechanic, and the more well known one from past games today, in relation to Red Mages, would be Refresh.

[NocturniaUzuki]

While I agree that pure support - PURE support, is not really possible, there are creative alternatives that amount to 99% support and would fit the role system. I'll see about coming back and writing more when I'm not on my phone 2 minutes before I leave for work! :P

Now that I'm done work, I'll elaborate a bit:

First of all, looking back at what I said, pure support technically is possible within our current 3-role model, but in order for it to work, it would have to be a DPS class (a little strange, perhaps) and the duty finder would have to undergo a small modification to prevent 4-player parties from doubling up on the job. As a DPS, it would function as an offensive support class, with little to no defensive buff capabilities. The basic concept would be to have a DPS job that deals DPS via increasing its allies' damage output. It's not really that far-fetched, when you think about it. As for solo capabilities, the necessity of those is pretty low, seeing as Healers and Tanks don't do all that much solo damage as is. Just giving the job some Healer-level solo DPS capabilities while allowing it to buff the party would work.

As for the "99% support" that I mentioned, that was referring to a Healer job which is primarily support, instead of heals. At first glance, this might not seem possible, since Healers are supposed to heal... right? In reality, though, that's only partially true. The real job of the healer is damage mitigation - it just so happens that Healers accomplish this primarily through recovering HP after someone takes damage. Although it's not realistic to have a Healer that literally cannot heal (because giving a support class so much damage reduction power that everyone can survive solely on their own class' innate sustain would be overpowered), you can certainly have a Healer that inverts the current status quo.

The current status quo is that Healers are roughly 70-80% heals, and 20-30% indirect heals and/or support spells. For WHM, it has the most focus on heals, with powerful indirect heals via Regen. For SCH, it has its own powerful heals and has indirect healing via shields. AST has a bit of both WHM and SCH, plus the addition of more significant support skills via its card system. Therefore, inverting the status quo would give us a job that deals primarily in indirect heals, with less focus on direct healing spells.

Originally, I had envisioned such a class as functioning primarily on a system of simple percentage damage reduction buffs that could be boosted from their low values to higher values for short durations, essentially make it the ultimate preemptive healing class (cast a damage reduction spell shortly before a major attack lands to prevent most of the damage). However, I think that's a little boring and too straightforward. It also has many more potential flaws in its design. After seeing this thread before work though, I had a few new ideas spring to mind over the course of the day, which I think might be more creative as well as more functional. These are ideas like:

1. Damage Reduction via shared damage. For example, casting a protective barrier on the tank that absorbs 50% of the damage dealt and instead of that damage simply vanishing, it evenly distributes it across the rest of the party. If the attack usually deals 10000 damage to the tank, then it only deals 5000, then 5000 is divided across the remaining party members. On the flip side, there could also be a skill that absorbs 50% of the damage taken by the entire party, then redirects that damage to the tank or another target. In both cases, the damage could be subject to the new targets' defensive stats and buffs. So, by having a tank use one of its own damage reduction skills, then redirecting an AoE to the tank, the vast majority of the damage is mitigated.

2. An ability that causes DoT effects to become HoT effects.

Ultimately, I would envision such a job to heal primarily through regen effects, with virtually no powerhealing potential. Instead of power-healing targets through damage, this job would mitigate damage through a variety of creative means, not just straight damage reduction. The resulting concept is that, by maintaining regens on the party and/or a prime damage-soaking ally like an off-tank, then making smart use of damage redirection spells, the healer can keep the party's health up just by juggling who takes what damage, when, how much, and allowing regens to heal people as necessary.