RDM's Weak Auto-Attack

[Rongway]

No, RDM is a magical ranged dps and melee auto attacks conflict with that

One could argue, with good reasons, that RDM is a swashbuckling fightermage and that melee auto attacks should be part of that.


That aside, the reason RDM has such weak auto attacks is that they're pigeonholed into the caster role and functional auto attacks would be a significant source of lost damage for many people. Currently, total auto attack damage for an 8 minute fight is less than a single spell cast. If RDM had auto attacks that actually scaled on INT (and spells adjusted downward to compensate), living outside of melee range would result in a loss of 15%~18% of DPS, and fights that force half the DDs to fight at range would make RDMS even less wanted. A 300 damage-per-swing auto attack would be "okay" maybe but the total damage of auto attacks in an 8 minute fight would still be less than two spells, so it's mostly a why even bother.