Moving will be made to interrupt spellcasting at a point in time...

[kwestro]

1. We're NOT lazy. There are easier classes to play that don't make or break a party nearly as much.
2. Mages being officially 'locked' into one place is going to affect DD's and the Tank WAYYYYY more than it'll affect us.
- Now you will have to stay in range to get heals. In the past, you might not have noticed it, but Mages were CONSTANTLY running behind you all to buff/heal etc.
3. The only battle we really get to 'stand still' in is Ifrit. (and the only reason mages stand still in Ifrit is because it's the safest thing for us to do...DD's do more or less the same thing. Darkhold is just a bunch of crazy running. By the way, Darkhold just hit a whole new level of challenge. Even exp parties are constantly on the move.

Now the only reason many of us are 'crying' is because it's a HUGE change in playstyle. I'm not saying it's a bad change, but we know that it's going to be a huge adjustment not just for the mages casting the spells, but for the other party members to re-learn that 'Hey, the mage can't heal us while we run away from them now.'

Reasons why it might be a good change:
1. Mages will still be able to change positions move etc. Just now we have to do it without casting.
2. We always were only able to semi-move (we always stopped moving as the spell was leaving our hands). This also created issues as tanks and DD's typically would run out of range while we were casting.
3. Mages will be able to quickly move out of harms way. Currently we might try to move (even cancel the spell and try to run) only to get locked into still casting it and getting hurt/killed.

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I believe the Devs don't want Mages to have the boring job of trying so hard to keep the tank alive. The GLA will have increased HP in comparison to MRD. The importance of Aegis Boon, Swift Aegis Boon trait, Rampart, Enhanced Rampart, etc for the GLA has gone up.

After patch, there should be less need to be so close according to... "[dev1206] Magic spells have been unified to strike either a single target or, in the case of AoE, a circular area. Attack range has also been increased, and area of effect broadened."

In general, SE, is changing the whole game style so that everybody can depend on a little bit from everybody, instead of the whole party failing completely because of one person (mage, tank).