RDM the unwelcome DPS :(

[RiotSiren]

You are effectively saying the same thing as everybody else here but you are just looking at it from a half-empty perspective. However you phrase it, the disparity remains and it's large. Did you know there is almost a 3000 DPS difference between BLM and RDM in full BiS? You can say that BLM is really strong or that RDM is very weak and it means the same thing mathematically when we compare the two. Nobody wants to see nerfs. We'd like to see RDM brought up a bit. Obviously not to BLM levels but it certainly could use a bit of love in pDPS and/or rDPS.

May I ask you what your static composition, as far as DPS is concerned, is? This is a factor. For instance, any composition not containing at least one meta DPS (BLM/MNK/DRG) is at a huge disadvantage. My static has a RDM/SAM/BRD/DNC so its much more difficult to recover from a death because you don't have the excess DPS from a strong meta DPS or two to allow for recovery. In your parse on E3S, your group managed to have 73k DPS, while having 3 DPS deaths. There is no way that was done if there weren't some meta DPSrs in there carrying the group. In a non-meta composition, mine for instance, if one DPS dies, there's a good chance you aren't clearing. The point is, yeah sure, a RDM can clear while being carried by meta DPS but any composition of DPS jobs should be viable. With deaths and a non-meta composition its just not likely if the group is still around ~i450.

MNK/DRG/BRD/RDM
In the particular fight I brought up the MNK died Twice and the DRG died once so their damage was fairly poor. I'm aware we really should not have made that clear.

Don't get me wrong I'm aware that MNK/BLM/DRG are pretty silly right now, and if you look at top rDPS BLM is about 2k higher then RDM at MAX.
However its also 2k Higher then BRD/MCH/DNC/NIN and 1.5k ahead of SMN. That's less a issue of RDM under-preforming and more a issue of BLM/MNK/DRG over-preforming is what I'm mainly getting at. RDM is fairly in line with most of DPS that no one currently is having issues with.

Edit: Removed a bit about RDM beating MCH in that fight, I was looking at MAX over Eden as a whole

[Kejara]

Same!

Looking at the numbers RDM is actually pretty fine right now and players, ever the hard core ones, should not be excluding it from their groups.

Unfortunately things wont change until the perception that RDM is "weak" goes away.

Comparatively speaking RDM is weak. You compared it to MCH which is a pure ranged DPS that is currently also under performing in my opinion. You should be comparing it to BLM, the top caster job. I calculated the percent difference between BLM and RDM on FF logs for savage Eden content across multiple tiers (max, 90, 75, 50, 25 percentile). There is a 13-14% between RDM and BLM across all tiers. So even arguing that BLMs take more skill and under perform at lower skill levels doesn't apply here. At least not in savage content. A BLM with a 25 percentile parse is still roughly 13-14% difference from a 25 percentile parse RDM. I'm not certain how you consider a caster with that much disparity from the top caster job not weak. What percent difference do you believe is acceptable? I say that the percent difference should be about half of what it currently is and it would be acceptable. To me, the difference is huge.

[Kejara]

MNK/DRG/BRD/RDM
In the particular fight I brought up the MNK died Twice and the DRG died once so their damage was fairly poor. I'm aware we really should not have made that clear.

Don't get me wrong I'm aware that MNK/BLM/DRG are pretty silly right now, and if you look at top rDPS BLM is about 2k higher then RDM at MAX.
However its also 2k Higher then BRD/MCH/DNC/NIN and 1.5k ahead of SMN. That's less a issue of RDM under-preforming and more a issue of BLM/MNK/DRG over-preforming is what I'm mainly getting at. RDM is fairly in line with most of DPS that no one currently is having issues with.

Edit: Removed a bit about RDM beating MCH in that fight, I was looking at MAX over Eden as a whole

Of those you mentioned, NIN and SMN are getting a re-work and likely DPS improvements (5.08, 5.1) . BRD/DNC/MCH could stand to be brought up as well. You see, this isn't just about RDM being weak, which in my opinion is true, its about how much weaker than the "Big Three" all of the jobs are. However, this is a red mage thread and there is another thread discussing the disparity between MNK/BLM/DRG and the other jobs. I can't speak for everybody else but I want to make sure that when buffs, alterations, and/or refinements are handed out that RDM isn't left out. We received very little changes for Shadowbringers and one of the abilities is basically a junk dps-negative movement spell.

[Duelle]

If RDM support is holding back it's DPS, maybe there needs to be a mechanic to discourage it's use over time. Perhaps a stacking buff, one stack given every 30 seconds to a max of three, where Verraise can only be cast at the cost of all three stacks, Vercure costs one? That way there is still utility available to RDM but it's limited, and DPS can be improved to compensate.

The trick when designing DPS with utility/off-role skills is to create a clear cost of opportunity for using the said utility. By clear I mean something very visible that mechanically affects the class. Currently, the cost to the RDM is not what I'd consider clear, since it costs you a GCD and affects your DPS on the meters (except this is not visible unless you go on FFXIV logs). Your stack idea might work, but the stacks would need to also be usable for dealing damage. At that point, the decision is made by the player to use a stack to deal damage or use it for utility, meaning you're introducing a whole new mechanic to RDM. Granted, there's several ways to implement a cost for utility, but the way RDM is currently designed doesn't work with a good number of them.

[kajv95]

DM does about 100-200 less rDPS then a MCH at the same skill level, which only amounts to a roughly 1-2% difference, which is not even noticeable.

I really hate to say this is a player issue and not the devs fault but it sort of is. Looking at the numbers RDM is actually pretty fine right now and players, ever the hard core ones, should not be excluding it from their groups.

Unfortunately things wont change until the perception that RDM is "weak" goes away.

MCH is also among the classes that could stand to get a buff, but...

Anyway, the perception that RDM is weak is there for a reason. Comparatively, it just is weak. A lot of jobs in the game are just comparatively weak right now. A player-made issue does not just appear out of nowhere. While I can certainly agree that the raiding base is overreacting, ultimately the current job balance utterly fails to "avoid forcing people into meta compositions" while also screwing over many jobs in the process.

RDM, like the majority of dps jobs, needs to have the gap tightened a little. How we go about this isn't really the issue here. Nerfing the top or buffing the rest, either way the gap between the top and the bottom is far, far too high. Personally I believe buffing the bottom is a better option since it's less re-tooling in the case of rdps skills and such (specifically DNC is easy to break).

[wereotter]

MCH is also among the classes that could stand to get a buff, but...

Anyway, the perception that RDM is weak is there for a reason. Comparatively, it just is weak. A lot of jobs in the game are just comparatively weak right now. A player-made issue does not just appear out of nowhere. While I can certainly agree that the raiding base is overreacting, ultimately the current job balance utterly fails to "avoid forcing people into meta compositions" while also screwing over many jobs in the process.

RDM, like the majority of dps jobs, needs to have the gap tightened a little. How we go about this isn't really the issue here. Nerfing the top or buffing the rest, either way the gap between the top and the bottom is far, far too high. Personally I believe buffing the bottom is a better option since it's less re-tooling in the case of rdps skills and such (specifically DNC is easy to break).

Removing the falloff damage buff from Embolden so it's a straight up 10% buff for 20 seconds while also removing the physical damage restriction would go a LONG way in increasing Red Mage raid DPS contribution.

The only other way is to make the job get some kind of buff that gets removed when they cast Verraise or a debuff after casting it. This could apply to summoners as well, making it so the job isn't punished for having raise in fights where it's never used.

[Kabooa]

I'm not certain how you consider a caster with that much disparity from the top caster job not weak. What percent difference do you believe is acceptable? I say that the percent difference should be about half of what it currently is and it would be acceptable. To me, the difference is huge.

Back when the difference was only 5-7%, Black mages were heavily excluded and not wanted by the general populace.

[Miminming]

No! back then BLM have far less mobility which make most of them a rather meh output, thats the biggest reason BLM is excluded too hard to use in full potencial...

Now? Farrr easier to use lots of teleport wider damage gap so that even a medicore BLM still have higher damage than the greater SMN/RDM

Btw right now in jpn server lots of party exclude RDM but not SMN again the reason is not RDM is bellow SMN in DPS in fact its a little above SMN right now, the reason they excluded RDM is lots of low player skill (at least they think so) and high death rate for RDM (proven by number from a certain site)

[Kabooa]

No! back then BLM have far less mobility which make most of them a rather meh output, thats the biggest reason BLM is excluded too hard to use in full potencial...

Now? Farrr easier to use lots of teleport wider damage gap so that even a medicore BLM still have higher damage than the greater SMN/RDM

Btw right now in jpn server lots of party exclude RDM but not SMN again the reason is not RDM is bellow SMN in DPS in fact its a little above SMN right now, the reason they excluded RDM is lots of low player skill (at least they think so) and high death rate for RDM (proven by number from a certain site)

Black Mages had very few mobility issues in Stormblood. Fact of the matter is they didn't bring enough damage to warrant not having a raise, until Alphascape.

Deny it all you want, but that's the simple truth.

Dump the raise and we'll talk.

[Miminming]

True for the until alphascape part, but still the main reason people exclude them is not just the lack of raise and dps difference (of course that too) its just too many meh BLM... and not everybody is as pro as you BLM mobility is kinda big issue on how hard the class was in stromblood... unlike now