Man & Machine: a MCH Thread

[CKNovel]

1. Wildfire

Queen doesn't impact Wildfire, it has been tested. You can also test it by throwing Wildfire to a dummy and summon the queen to do damage.
You'll be welcomed with a nice "0".

But the main problem with Wildfire is the lack of interactions.
For example during HW/SB, you have to prepare a wombo combo for Wildfire.
Today, Wildfire is a delayed 1200 potency skill, nothing else at it has no interaction, you only place it, press Hypercharge and continue your rotation.

2. Flamethrower

Summoning a fire-spitting turret/automaton would be an okay idea. I don't like it because we would still have no interaction over the flamethrower but it's better than current Flamethrower.

3. BioBlaster

Having one shared cooldown is not a problem. It's interesting on cooldowns.
The problem is that both are 20s cooldown and Bio Blaster isn't as impactful on a lone target. (60 + (60*5)) * Targets, on a lone target it's a weak 360 potency. On two targets, 720 potency, barely better than Drill.

4. Battery OverCharge Mechanic or Heat Transfer

The problem would remain the same, if not worse.
Battery gauge is designed to be flexible, at any battery spent you have the same damages overrall. Overcharging it to 120 would remove that flexibility. And you'd say goodbye to Queen during every Trick Attacks.
Plus, it wouldn't correct the Automaton that feels like a glorified dot.

With the heat gauge transfer, you worsen the state of the glorified dot. You make the queen a more glorified dot and your heat gauge is also a glorified dot!
I really don't like this idea as you loose more and more interactions. I don't want the job to play itself.

The main problem with MCH is that you're limited to 1 2 3, Drill, Air Anchor, DR/Ricochet, Summon Queen and Hypercharge (Including WF into Hypercharges) phases when it comes to damage.
Sam, for exemple has 3 different combo, Midare, Tsubamegaeshi, Sen'ei, Shôha, Shinten, Seigan and it's still one of the easiest Melee DPS.

Combo is uninteresting, there's too few cooldowns and little to no utility. It's the void compared to SB/HW utility.

[Yani-Madara]

Today, Wildfire is a delayed 1200 potency skill, nothing else at it has no interaction, you only place it, press Hypercharge and continue your rotation.

Having one shared cooldown is not a problem. It's interesting on cooldowns.
The problem is that both are 20s cooldown and Bio Blaster isn't as impactful on a lone target. (60 + (60*5)) * Targets, on a lone target it's a weak 360 potency. On two targets, 720 potency, barely better than Drill.

The problem would remain the same, if not worse.
Battery gauge is designed to be flexible, at any battery spent you have the same damages overrall. Overcharging it to 120 would remove that flexibility. And you'd say goodbye to Queen during every Trick Attacks.
Plus, it wouldn't correct the Automaton that feels like a glorified dot.

With the heat gauge transfer, you worsen the state of the glorified dot. You make the queen a more glorified dot and your heat gauge is also a glorified dot!
I really don't like this idea as you loose more and more interactions. I don't want the job to play itself.

The main problem with MCH is that you're limited to 1 2 3, Drill, Air Anchor, DR/Ricochet, Summon Queen and Hypercharge (Including WF into Hypercharges) phases when it comes to damage.
Sam, for exemple has 3 different combo, Midare, Tsubamegaeshi, Sen'ei, Shôha, Shinten, Seigan and it's still one of the easiest Melee DPS.

Combo is uninteresting, there's too few cooldowns and little to no utility. It's the void compared to SB/HW utility.

I agree with what you said except that Sam is actually the hardest (skill ceiling) melee dps. Because of Meikyo and Tsubame cooldown drifts.

I tried to main MCH after 5.1 ruined Nin for me but felt exactly like you say. It is too streamlined, drill and anchor feel tacked on and I absolutely hate Heat Charge having a time limit instead of 5 stacks.

[AvenoMatt]

So I've been thinking this over and for the most part I think the way Mch plays is fine but I understand how the job can feel boring or simple with it's 123 combo and heat spam.

This is my idea on how to change it.

123 combo still remains but we get 2 proc'd weapons skills. Split shot would have a 50% to proc Lead Shot; lv54, Lead shot making a return, and Clean Shot would have a 50% to proc a new weaponskill, I call it Mercury Shot; lv60.

Hypercharge just lowers the gcd on weapons skills down to 1.5 seconds and gives 100% chance to proc Lead and Mercury. We still have to get 5 hit minimum into Wildfire but instead of Heat Spam we do 12345 or 12435 rotation however you wanna look at it.
I'm also thinking that the heated variants are only accessed during Hypercharge with the 123 being unlocked at lv68 and the 45 unlocked at lv 78.

Heat Blast is now just an ability to dump Heat if you aren't gonna be able to to Hyperchage before the enemies dies. Also Trait that gives Clean Shot a chance to proc Heat Blast without cost.

No more Heat Blast spam means no more bouncing between Ricochet and Gauss instead Lead resets the recast of Gause and Mercury; Ricochet

Lead is still places a dot and my thinking is that if if you get a Lead proc and your enemies is still taking dmg from a previous Lead Shot then it works like Thundercloud on BLM

Auto Crossbow is just a combos off of Spread or it can also be a proc.

Flamethrower is just a turret that shoots flames in a cone before you. Only cost 20 battery.

The return of Dismantle cause I miss it.

[Adventica6]

I don't agree with anything here, it could use a slight buff and that is it.

Always amazed by the amount of people trying to redesign the job, don't like, then quit.

It isn't constructive feedback when all you talk about is what you don't like and having a fit. later.

[ty_taurus]

I don't agree with anything here, it could use a slight buff and that is it.

Always amazed by the amount of people trying to redesign the job, don't like, then quit.

It isn't constructive feedback when all you talk about is what you don't like and having a fit. later.

Hi, not really a MCH player here (only recently started leveling it on my goal to get everything to 80 and am at 68 so far). Just wanted to chime in and say this mentality not healthy for game design. Telling players if they don't like things "then don't play it" is not very conductive to actually seeing genuine improvement in game design. Now, there is something to be said about always wanting to reinvent the wheel, but people should be allowed and encouraged to voice their concerns, because if we don't, then the jobs just forever stay the same and almost all the jobs do need at least a little fine tuning. I don't know enough about MCH yet to have any meaningful contribution to this conversation, but I just wanted to call this out because we have to stop destroying each other over these kinds of things.

Criticism does need to be constructive, however, and we can certainly talk about, debate, and even argue over whether things are good, bad, broken, or perfect, but just shutting the conversation down does no one any favors.

[CKNovel]

I don't agree with anything here, it could use a slight buff and that is it.

Always amazed by the amount of people trying to redesign the job, don't like, then quit.

It isn't constructive feedback when all you talk about is what you don't like and having a fit. later.

Can you say you are happy with Flamethrower current state?
Press the button and wait 10 seconds, are you truly happy with it? If that's the case, I recommend you to try idle games. If not, you agree with this topic.
In my case, I can get up to grab some coffee, before it's finished.

There is only criticism, feedback and concerns about the job. We don't want to redesign the job, only to make the next iteration better while keeping the current iteration.

I allowed myself to look at your profile to try to understand where you come from.
Can you claim to be able to fully appreciate, evaluate the job based on your experience? Based on your profile, you are either casual or an alt. The first is not a problem, not at all.
Every opinion matters, no matter where they come from.

But is someone cooking pasta and fries able to fully understand cooking aswell as a chef?
My point is: If you lack experience, you want to open your mind about criticisms and feedback.
Having an open mind is a rule that must applies to everyone. Anyone, even with decades of experience, can still learn or forget the basics.

Flamethrower is the pure basic of it.
It's a relic from Stormblood, it has no interaction, no fun to use.
Wildfire suffers the same problem, you press it and do as usual. It could be a 120s 1200 potency cooldown with a 10s delay, there would be no differences.
Automaton Queen is a glorified dot.

All of those above are not opinion, those are facts.

[Ayanumi]

I don't agree with anything here, it could use a slight buff and that is it.

Always amazed by the amount of people trying to redesign the job, don't like, then quit.

It isn't constructive feedback when all you talk about is what you don't like and having a fit. later.

The irony of this comment is staggering when the job literally just got reworked in a totally different direction which removed almost all of the job elements which previous MCH players enjoyed. (Turrets, ammo, procs, wildfire function, utility)
Didnt like HW and SB MCH? Then just stop crying about MCH being too rigid and complex and pick another job 4head.

[Jirah]

I don't agree with anything here, it could use a slight buff and that is it.

Always amazed by the amount of people trying to redesign the job, don't like, then quit.

It isn't constructive feedback when all you talk about is what you don't like and having a fit. later.

Giving modern MCH mains a bad name

[Payotz]

Imo, there's a lot of things wrong with MCH now.

The lack of complexity and depth, our signature skill(Wildfire) being outclassed by Drill and Air Anchor, and the loss of Midfires in our rotation which I really personally enjoyed and is extremely satisfying to pull off.

They honestly didn't put any effort in the MCH redesign in my opinion. What they did to MCH is pretty much them removing DWT, Bahamuth, Aetherflow and Phoenix from SMN and just replaced them with one button for AkhMorn, one button for Deathflare and one button for Revelation, and then called it a day.

I really don't like the trend of simplifying jobs that they're doing, but the way they did MCH is just ridiculous. They turned it from the highest skill floor job, to literally the easiest job in the game.

Another thing that I have issues with is Queen. It looks cool, it looks hype, but damn is it buggy as hell. Queen can't switch targets in E6S, Queen can kill your doll in TEA for no reason, and Queen can literally glitch out in Uplift, and by the nature of it being melee, if it does glitch for 1.5 seconds, that's you losing out on potency just because of the AI in this game.

And this is my criticism for the role in general but where the hell is our utility? We had this identity of being more of a "Utility DPS" with Palisade, Refresh and what content can we use Leg Graze, Arm Graze and Head Graze on? I was looking forward to actually using Leg Graze on E8S adds but WHOOPS SORRY IT'S IMMUNE LOOOOL.
SE literally just turned us all into a 1% Party buff and called it a day. GIVE ME BACK MY DISMANTLE and my VULN UPs.

I've played 5.0 MCH for about a year now. I gave it an honest shot, and I tried to like it. There are things that I love about it, like how satisfying RA+ Drill is and all that, but it doesn't outweigh my criticisms on the job and the role in general. I just wish that they'll fix the job and the role in the future.

Until then, I'm playing Shadow Priest.

[Jirah]

Snip

Exactly my qupis with the jobs in general, even healer and tanks suffer from this "lobotomy" theirs 101 ways to fix it but MCH...MCH isnt a simple fix or shift in DPS it needs a overhaul which sadly wont happen since the general population thinks it already had one but in rwality it lost more than it gained.

Ranged roles have suffered to this aswell "Physical ranged DPS attack foes from a distance. They excel at inflicting sustained damage, and also provide support for companions."

BRD and DNC are all hunky-dory with buffs and team support but this Information taken directly from FF14 Official site, and MCH has nothing besides "Role action" buff every 120 that literal every ranged has. So its wrong MCH should 100% support! Ranged jobs with DPS capabilities as BLM or MNK but not really isnt what ranged is all about unless they can alter the definition of a Physical ranged DPS