Red Mage: Potential adjustments

[Garnix]

You look at the consequence instead of looking at the cause.
All I heard since the beginning of ShB is that healers press a single DPS button over and over again because the encounters are basically not being designed to have you press your GCD heals a lot.
Which means, that, yes, it can feel lobotomized. And that's probably not great design.
But that's not because the healers kit is braindead easy to use. When I look at the healers toolkit, I think it looks pretty solid and far from lobotomized. It is probably just as complex as any tanks or dps toolkits.
However, because the damages taken are not sufficient compared to your heal-heavy toolkit, or because your heals are too powerful, or both, it leads you to spam the same DPS ability over and over again.
And that is the part which is not great.

[FoxCh40s]

Stupid double post

[Jirah]

Go look at the Healer threads and the majority of complaints. We are complaining about exactly JUST that, that healers have been completely lobotomized.

Imagine if you would, if Monk was just Bootshine for your dps, and Rock Breaker was your only AoE.

.

To be fair this worked with MCH? And lesser extend DRK

[Shurrikhan]

To be fair this worked with MCH? And lesser extend DRK

Wait, wait, what?

The lobotomized versions of MCH and DRK have... "worked" (to the point of not having similarly frustrated complaints)?

Edit: My bad. Post-shift tired misread. I missed the "?"

[FoxCh40s]

Wait, wait, what?

The lobotomized versions of MCH and DRK have... "worked" (to the point of not having similarly frustrated complaints)?

I know you know what I mean, and I know I don't have to explain Healer bs to you.

[Rymi64]

I know you know what I mean, and I know I don't have to explain Healer bs to you.

have you tried healing some savages?

[FoxCh40s]

have you tried healing some savages?

Sure have, extremely dull to be honest.

Malefic, Malefic, Malefic, Combust, Malefic, Essential Dignity -> Malefic.

MEH

[Jirah]

Wait, wait, what?

The lobotomized versions of MCH and DRK have... "worked" (to the point of not having similarly frustrated complaints)?

Edit: My bad. Post-shift tired misread. I missed the "?"

DRK has equal parts POd mains and submissive mains whom "its fine as is" MCH doesnt have nearly as strong as a base for the opposition probably due to how few MCH players exited in SB and even fewer who mained it completely eclipsed by the large number of people maining it now.

Helaers are in a league of their own, as boring as it is to do 1-2-3 its worse doing dot-hardcast over and over

[Dralonis]

Show me a game in the series where RDM's melee attacks were a real 'thing' vs just 'they can use a weapon and their attack isn't completely useless. They weren't even that great at melee in FF1!

It's clear though their inspiration is from FF5's design, where RDM was more about spamming spells fast than being a stabwizard. (Contrast with Mystic Knight, the actual 'melee and magic job')



And the argument isn't 'fun', it's in unnecessary convolution. The BGoT problem isn't one of 'fun', it's of annoying convolution. Turning RDM into a melee doesn't make it a better fit for the role it has, it makes it unnecessarily convoluted (and is detrimental to its place in savage content)

When I look at proposed changes, I look at how it's going to change how I do content. I look at things like Light Rampant, or Add Phase in E8S. I look at how this would feel trying to deal with hard mechanics--and a lot of it does not assist that.

RDM doesn't need a DoT to manage, because that doesn't help its gameplay. RDM doesn't need scuffed balance guage add-on, because that doesn't help its gameplay. RDM doesn't need a 6th burst combo, because that doesn't help its gameplay.


3) Maybe a resource that builds off your physical ogcds, that you can spend on a physical attack, kinda like a RDM-variation of Shoha. It'd do big potency and it'd look cool.

4) A nerfed version of Lost Chaincast, that ability is an RDM classic and way too damn fun. That's your level 90 keystone right there.

5) Upgrading Verthunder and Veraero in a trait at EW launch instead of waiting for patches that end up just doing that anyways... again.

Pretty much agree with most of this. RDM melee was really only a thing because MP costs and only getting level 3 magic in FFV and only good until the second world. After that they are weak so people thought it was fine as a melee from there, but it was really only slightly better melee than other casters simply because of the weapons they can use and not nearly as good as any melee, it was just fine as a filler to save MP. They just were able to do OK because chicken knife was OP not really much else.

FF3 RDM has the same drawbacks as FFV's where it's just good at first, great magic, OK melee when you don't want to cast magic/too lazy/overleveled/conserving MP that you just don't want to go through the menus same as when you often would do the same for BLM and WHM melee but you mostly would prefer to use spells for all 3 of those jobs, however, RDM had terrible MP issues, especially for Crystal tower imo. Falls off really fast midway to the point you don't even want to use RDM anymore. The closest comparison to it is probably Sage since it had Black and White magic but sages melee was trash. So who knows if that's supposed to be it's advanced version since Red Mage didn't get an advanced version in FF3. FF1 was the only real time I remember RDM being really strong.

So the idea of RDM being melee is prob just the RDM class design being mediocre mid-late game, at least from my perspective. Maybe some melee with really good weapons, but overall only had melee to make it seem like an all-around job to give it something different than the other casters but it wasn't really about being melee and a carry over from FF1 since it was supposed to be a jack of all trades there The main core of RDM mostly evolved as an identity by sacrificing higher ranking spells to cast them faster and red magic. RDM in FF1 Pixel remaster seems pretty great, kinda want to play it and see. I agree, People who want basically melee RDM actually just want Rune Knight/Mystic knight in FF5 or other characters like Celes in FF6 or Steiner FF9. Some characters took the good of RDM and used it elsewhere since RDM was sorta a half baked job idea overall for end game.

I've wanted something like Lost Chaincast. I'd be fine if melee rotation being somewhat similar to GNB's cartridge combo but having a combo timer so I can still cast other spells before finishing the melee combo, In some way and on a hefty CD, Maybe 90s or closer to 120s if manafication resets it's CD, however, Not having the melee combo tied to our burst. With the existence of resprise, I wouldn't be entirely opposed to the melee combo being 15y. I'm not sure since it would present the issue why reprise was created, unable to get into melee range. Sorta why I think being 15-25y would at least fix it and still sword poking aesthetic to fit its theme.

Maybe something a bit more to give it a unique identity as well as making us gain W/B mana faster with the finisher no longer being tied to melee, so maybe something like fill up W/B til 80, verflare, make verflare give 25 black mana, then you go back through the rotation this time doing verholy, after that you start the "chain magic" phase. Something similar to SMN's pheonix phase and making all of our spells "red magic" instant casts with a Scorch finisher. Possibly making acceleration also make the next 2 or 3 Verthunder/Veraeros instant and still proccing dual cast or at least making the cast time/recast time 1.5 seconds under the duration of acceleration. Something that feels more thematic to the name to me.

[Rongway]

So we are getting:

• Reduced mana cost for single target combo (20|20 + 15|15 + 15|15 = 50|50)
• Reduced mana gain (+2|+2 Jolt, +6|+0 Verslowspell, +7|+0 Verareaspell, +11|+0 Verfinisher, +4|+4 Scorch). Impact appears to remain +3|+3.
• Verfinishers and Scorch are AoE and can be activated after building up three stacks from Moulinet or a single target combo.
• New post-Scorch action grants +4|+4 appears to be a line attack.
• Manafication grants +50|+50 outright to speed up opener
• AoE damage reduction ability

The lightning spell from the benchmark sequence appears to be just a black verslowspell (Verthunder III?) replacing Verthunder.

The demo RDM builds up the three charges for Verfinisher by doing three Moulinet, but their next GCD action is a Jolt and the meter drains, so you can't bank Moulinets for later. I'd wager that (Moulinet during a melee combo) and (E.Riposte after Moulinet) will both reset the charges to 1.