Please, NEVER nerf RDM!

[magnanimousCynic]

What weaknesses does Red Mage really have? It has by far the best utility, arguably of all jobs period, absurdly high DPS, full mobility and an easy rotation. The job simply does everything extremely well, which is why people are slightly concerned. It doesn't necessarily need a nerf, however the devs need to reconsider caster balance. Right now, RDM simply does everything the other two do, but better. It's not at BRD vs. MCH levels of one-sided though.

No Allagan/High Allagan/Dreadwyrm Weapon Glamours.

/s

[Airget]

RDM is pretty much volleying between two spell rotations to build up the gauge in order to use melee combo. In terms of overall "stationary" mechanic RDM has the least to worry about when compared to BLM and SMN.

To a RDM they can Jolt and then proceed to move as they cast another spell, they can even use Swiftcast to bypass the first Jolt and use the first combo spell in hopes of proccing a ver spell.

They got a decent instant offensive ability as well, Fleche 420 potency every 25 second. Along with Corps-a-corps and Displacement 130 potency each, 40/35 second recast that give them added mobility.

Got a reliable "Acceleration" spell to force a ver proc and as mentioned for RDM the only momentum they lose is being unable to use a ver proc.

BLM and SMN have a lot more to lose if they lose momentum. If a SMN blast off their Trance, it ticks away and they could lose it after the 15 seconds is up, it becomes a race against the clock to use it once active meaning it's harder for them to ge ta full use out of it compared to RDM.

Perfect example, let's say RDM has 100/100, SMN has Trance ready. SMN uses Trance against the boss and 5 seconds in the Boss becomes untargetable. At the same time the RDM jumped in to use their combo but were only able to get 2 steps in before the boss disappeared.

What you are left with is a SMN that lost 10 seconds of their ability they built up compared to a RDM that still has 45/45 leftover meaning they only need to rebuild the gauge from where they left off and fire off the combo again.

BLM does have a similar issue because they have abilities on timers as well so if they time it wrong they face losing a lot of DPS either by holding it to long or using it at the wrong time, this is the one thing RDM doesn't suffer from which give them a lot of flexibility in all combo because they can be gunho about how they act, they have no need to hold anything during a boss fight because they lose nothing if they time a combo wrong, maybe they lose a ver, maybe they don't get the full melee combo off, but they always know they have a guaranteed dual cast along with only losing what they spent on the combo.

The other thing with SMN, they have to build up to that Bahamut Primal, so it's one trance, two trance and then Bahamut Primal, but this also means that in order to get to that point of dealing the big damage, they could lose out a lot if again they time it wrong. With that in mind maybe SMN's need an ability that allows them to recall the aether so that whatever they couldn't spend is put back into a pot to Summon Bahamut Primal again. Granted that could be a tad tough so my other thought is maybe do away with the time based mechanic of Bahamut and instead have spells cost "Bahamut Aether" and once the aether is spent the Primal leaves.

So The Primal would remain as long as you have aether, and there would be an ability like Flare that uses up the last bit of aether you may have, but at least this way If say you Summoned Bahamut and now the boss can't be targetted, you don't lose out on a huge amount of DPS. Instead you still have said aether to spend, where the RNG can just be focused on Ruin IV proccing rather than the short duration on top of it.

Maybe that's the issue, the Trance and Bahamut egi are to focused on two mechanics that force this period of burst damage if not timed right.

With NIN we saw that it was possible to disable the use of certain abilities while under a certain effect so the Prime could do the same thing. only grant access to the Ruin Spell, Tri-Disaster and Enkindle.

[Higashikata]

RDM can get the same dps if not HIGHER than BLM and SMN with not even a quarter the effort. RDM has laughable punishment for messing up a rotation or dealing with mechanics while BLM or SMN can lose over 40 seconds to 2 whole minutes of setting up. It's just disgusting how over tuned RDM is right now.

[AureliusDraconium]

That isn't in all wrong, but at the same time i don't see it happening. Black and Summoners have a few more skills that are more useful then RDMs have. I personally can only speak for Summoners since its the only other DPS class i was able to get into before RDM (tried the others, eh..) Anyway the summoners have the added party member pet which adds to the over all DPS and like RDM can heal and stuff making them just as useful. the only difference with RDM and Summoners is RDMs can rush in to be an extra melee if needed.
Summonsers also have all the pet skills like Ifrits fire claw and the Titan spirit incase Tank needs some help.

There really is no reason to play a Black Mage or Summoner over a Red Mage currently other then personal attachment since it is that superior. If you play casually sure play what you want to like I do but at the end of the day I still want to play a job that feels fun to play and rewards for the effort put forth.

Honestly though, both Summoners and Black Mages are having many issues at the moment but Red Mage is in a perfect spot. In my FC alone every dps caster that was a summoner or black mage main is now a red mage. It's a fun job for sure but I got fed up with Black Mage and how seemly enochian will drop for no reason ( confirmed bug). Not to mention currently the 3.0 rotation is yielding higher dps then the 4.0 rotation. I do not play Summoner so I can speak on their behalf but they seemly need a lot of adjustments. I guess the last staw for me was seeing Summoners and Black Mages excluded from a good percentage of extreme farms with a only red mage slot. Sure I could make my own group but honestly goes back to my whole thing of me finding the new changes to black mage just clunky and not rewarding. I will hold out to see what changes are made to the jobs on Tuesday but still Red Mage feels like the "Demon Hunter" of Stormblood. I tried to fight that too but honestly the more simplistic, less punishing job usually wins tbh but we will see what happens. If anything Red Mage is perfect but other jobs need to be buffed with Red Mage coming in last of the dps casters in my opinion.

[JunseiKei]

Because they were beyond broken. They literally outed the top dps significantly on introduction. I'm not saying it won't happen it's just not likely. If anything gets the stick it'll be SAM. Heavy is the head that wears the crown after all...

Pretty much this. RDMs still fall under the general amount of DPS as all the other classes, despite being easy to play. The only one really out there, and kind of way out there, is SAM. I truly expect something of theirs to get toned down, even if it's simply the potency of their DoT bringing them down a little bit, but still ahead of the others (because supposedly 0 utility).

RDMs feel perfect- great mobility second to Summoner. SMN has DoTs to keep up, but otherwise continuously deal damage with them along with a pet. They are middle ground of mobility between SMN and BLM.

Their DPS is middling in comparison. A BLM will do the highest damage, still, in a fight that requires very little movement. V1, Lakshmi, V2, V4 are all great examples of little movement and when you do need to move, you can plan ahead so you're already there and suffer minimal loss.

The biggest discrepancy I've noticed is people unable to separate player skill from job balance. RDMs have a lower skill floor than other casters, so it makes them seem a lot better than they really are.

[Zfz]

I kinda see deja vu with people not being happy with RDM's easy rotation, just like how some people weren't happy with BLM's 2.x easy rotation. Perhaps those people will be happier if in 4.1 RDM mana degrades constantly by 1 every 2 seconds and dual cast only comes into effect when mana is balanced, and mana is only balanced if within 10 points of each other, with Scatter changed to be a PBAoE that spends 10/10 mana.

Sarcasm aside, I love how the RDM plays at the moment. Don't mind dps adjustments as it is bound to happen to every job sooner or later, but the relative ease of the job is perfect.

[KalinOrthos]

RDM needs a nerf, they offer way too much over SMN, BLM, and even MCH, if we're want to throw all ranged together. Their damage is bonkers and their utility, even after nerfing Embolden, is quite strong, and I'd rather bring some classes down and some up, to make sure we are correctly tuned for content, instead of overtuned.

[Bhearil]

Well,rdm aoe is so so, Embolden is around 1% raid damage increase, reviving and healing drains a LOT of mp (and by doing so means no damage dealt is not like they are OGC skills which are the true meat of the utility skills since they allow to do your job+ extras) on a class with the WORST mp recovery (die with LD on cd and you have around 30 seconds left of dpsing unless someone feeds the rdm with mp) and most of people are using a fight like Susano where a rdm will naturally excels to say that rdm outperforms on "every way".

Compared with the aberration of release ninja, rdm seems pretty balanced, maybe smn/blm need some quality of life buffs, but i doubt they will get much more due to risking of making them too strong on relatively static fights People are overrating rdm strong points while ignoring most of the weak ones

[Kling-Klang]

All rdm needs to have done is get the mana glitch fixed. Then its a fine job.

RDM can get the same dps if not HIGHER than BLM and SMN with not even a quarter the effort. RDM has laughable punishment for messing up a rotation or dealing with mechanics while BLM or SMN can lose over 40 seconds to 2 whole minutes of setting up. It's just disgusting how over tuned RDM is right now.

Higher than BLM happens because of the mana glitch, which will probably get fixed in 4.05.

[NorthernLadMSP]

I know something needs to change when a RDM can do the same, if not more, DPS than the other two casters.

It truly is the epitome of OP at this point - high damage, no MP issues at all, very high mobility, super easy "rotation," no apparent downfalls, plus powerful buff, heal and raise.