Man & Machine: a MCH Thread

[Jirah]

Some Backstory, I actually bought the game with the intent of maining MCH back in 4.0 as I fell inlove with the steampunk aesthetic complimenting Ishgard's more traditional environment nicely and have been a proud sister of the Machine..up until 5.3. MCH isnt a well designed job..where to begin..

Gauges

MCH has two, Heat and Battery. One used for turret summoning and the other for overheating. Both equally toothless. Lets start with battery to put it bluntly this gauge shouldn't exist its nothing more than a shackle to our turrets and doesnt compliment any other skill. we dont interact with it (besdies Overcharge which is only logically used when the mob is close to dying IE detonator/Tornado Kick) just yet another button to press. As for Heat. in 4.0 Heat increased your damage dealt,along side turret hypercharge debuff and MCH other tools like rapid fire, in order to deal the most damage possible under the wildfire window. Heat got demoted to a bland speed boost with a very redundant damage boost that only concerns two skills Heat Blast & Auto Crossbow as if your press any other weapon skill that can potentially aid wildfire in this window your speed decreases. MCH Gauges are disjointed at best and lackluster at worst contributing not to the job but to 1-2 skills which weren't really complex to begin with.

continue...

[Jirah]

Rotation
MCH has the most uninspired rotation in the game, DNC has flourish opportunities, BRD has dots and songs to worry about, SAM technically has 3, DRG and MNK has weakening and buff rotations, even tanks like WAR and GNB have more unique rotations not being DD. its saving grace is its abilities and its 2 not OGCDs. MCH flows so unnaturally as more often then not your 6 freebie skills are on empty as theirs no benefit to keeping them and the only optimal way to use them is to spam em, waste not style. To recharge them isn't so fluid either as its combined with the "optimal" wildfire button so awkwardly and is rather disjointed from the rest of the kit. As for Drill and Anchor, they are GCD skills so they feel like 20 sec/40sec extensions of the rotation but not apart of the rotation and unlike Anchor which gives you 20 Battery, Drill does nothing but halt your rotation every 20 seconds, and for reassemble to pair up with. When your not doing that, your pressing a button, either to summon Queen or its time to Wildfire! Latency issues has been done to death so it goes without saying. As you overheat and Wildfire you do the exact same thing you have been doing Recharging your G/R but make sure to press a 6th weaponskill and as your doing this waste your G/R inbetween blasts. No Guass and Rico dont contribute to wildfire..nor does your turret, and doing any other skill punishes you for some reason and heat blast is locked and acts as literal dead weight on the hotbar instead of transforming from a previous skill since we arent aloud to use anything else with overheat speed. MCH has many of these odd skill choices and its logic comes to question the more you think about it. A good Job flow like a river with every crease ascending the stream, while MCH plays like a 3 different ponds with no link to connect them yearning to be whole.

AOE
A underrated topic is a Jobs AOE capabilities. and as for MCH ...well its better than 4.0 but has the same "disjointed" issue. Ricochet is my personal favorite skill concept and all but doesnt work well as a AOE as MCH has no way of recharging it in a AOE situation unless you Heat Blast a target at least twice but even then it just ends up being clunky and not worth the effort. Flamethrower used to accumulate heat now its one of MCH forgotten skills outclassed by Spread shot+ Auto crossbow. I doubt it would break the game to allow flamethrower to gain 5 heat per tick (55 Heat) with its restricted mobility and every 60 seconds it should suffice for what its doing. Also why does Auto and Spread do the exact same damage? More importantly why is this skill gated behind overheat? When Skill bloat is a common issue youd think SE would replace it, but it wouldn't feel as great to overheat it? idk also Bioblaster is fine as is, its a dot thats its purpose even if its only tie to the rest of the job is sharing a recast timer with Drill.

[Jirah]

Highlighted Issues

Heat and Battery redundancy- Can very easily be replaced with a shallow speed skill IE Rapid fire which was removed in 4.0, Battery as a resource for 1 skill that used to be limitless is a waste of a gauge.

Clunky/Disjointed Skill design- Heat blast has no reason to exist but to trivialize the job. Aoe is poorly designed with some confusing implications like Flamethrower and Ricochet. Drill doesnt flow as well as G/R within the rotation, recharging G/R is awkward and doesnt mesh well being tied to heat blast strict 5 button spam and Wildfire being long and inconsequential

Overzealous Skill distribution: Having 6 OGCDs and 2 GCDs skills right off the bat is a mess in job design and lacks proper job structure, having the heated rotation skills split up between 54-64 is very odd

Loose Turret Contribution- Lack of control or substance to the rest of the kit

lastly latency- been recorded serveal times MCH is not a freindly job to play with bad ping and gets irritating from unplayable real quick


any comments id be happy to hear em as i tried to post my thoughts several times but get too flustered, and if u like 5.0 MCH good for you!

[Cetek14]

I believe 5.0 MCH looks like a few duct taped parts. It feels really lazy, but we already know that devs hate Machinist. MCH deserves final rework to make it work fine, but the biggest issue for me are awful animations. All well made animations with loud gunshots were removed. Gunner is 4th most demanded job according to Official Forum job poll (https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...highlight=poll), and i'm not surprised. MCH was half a gunner in SB, and in ShB its not a gunner at all. And its definitely not Ishgardian Machinist it was supposed to be. Show me one NPC Machinist which is master of acrobatic arts. I will wait.

[CKNovel]

Note: I’m truly sorry about that pâté I am about to serve.

When they reworked Machinist, I always imagine that Yoshi-P asked two job designers to do it.
One would have to design the heat gauge part, the other the battery gauge part. And they both ended up doing something simple. Too simple in fact.
The designed difficulty of Machinist resides in the number of buttons you press per minute, but let's be real, there is no difficulty pressing the same 3 buttons in a 9s window.
The job suffers a massive lack of complexity and bland rotation. As bland as a frozen steak.

Flamethrower
The most blatant issue. Imagine giving a can opener to someone in the kitchen, then a month after the team decide to not use canned food anymore.

Flamethrower is the perfect representation of the MCH rework. It's a lazy redesign, half-baked, it has the same problem as before, it's boring to use. I don't see Flamethrower giving any heat, it would simply complexify DPS optimization. For exemple, the boss is not targetable anymore, you wait exactly -10s before it's targetable again to use Flamethrower. If you manage to do it, you have 50 heat and a tick of 100 damage. The correct solution would be to give 20 heat on cast and cast alone.

The solutions is to either get rid of this artifact from SB MCH that serves more as an emote than anything else, or to completely rework it. I've already shared my dream of Flamethrower being a stance using the Aetherotransformer as an actual Flamethrower for let's say 10 seconds, replacing your GCDs. It could be an interesting way to spend heat, making it a Gauge cost + Cooldown like DRK's Living Shadow.


The Aetherotransformer
That thing is welcomed. It's the best thing out of the Machinist rework.
I love Drill, it's a strong cooldown on a 20s "GCD-CD", you have the rules and planification that comes with it.
"Drill is available in 15s, what can I do before it it available?"
It also pairs up with Air Anchor. You have that very fast process of thinking about how using your resources in that short window, I wish there would be more of it.

The problem I have with it, is that it's barely present in MCH kit. It's always either Auto Cross Bow OR heatblast, Drill OR Bio Blaster. And I really don't want to see another "choice ability" and I can smell Noise Blaster sharing a cooldown with Air Anchor. We would barely see Noise Blaster if it would happen, like how barely we currently see Bio Blaster or Auto Cross Bow: Only in dungeons. Current Machinist is locked with 2 Aetherotransformer abilities when there is 4 of them.

To Continue…

[CKNovel]

Battery gauge
That's a glorified dot.
Is it above 50 battery? Is the ennemy targetable for 10 seconds? Use it. That's not even the most barebone process of thinking accross the Machinist kit.
You can add "Are the Raidwide buffs coming soon?" into the process but that's it. The Queen Wind-up was thought to be a problem but it barely happens.

The Queen needs more interaction, but like Phoenix, not like Bahamut or the other summons unless they completely rework pet behavior.

Reassemble is a great tool. It reduces the dice roll on Drill but is also a great mark to know how far you are from the raidwide buffs. It lines extremely well with Trick Attack, both being 60s cooldown, Reassemble is a good cooldown that has multiple application beyond damage. Without it, you could count every 3 Drill or half wildfire.

Wildfire
Wildfire... Is in my opinion the worst of all usable/viable 60s+ cooldowns in the game.
Here's the complete thought process:
1) Is it available?
2) Do you have 50 heat?
3) Use it, then use Hypercharge.

That's it, you can't make it even less complex. The best way to describe it is an empowered Hypercharge every 120 seconds.
Or a 1200 potency cooldown with a 10 seconds delay.
Not only it doesn't has any AoE potential like the community kept asking, but being reduced to a "powerfull Hypercharge" just stripped anything that was cool about Wildfire (The setup, the execution, the result).

Solution? Get rid of it or completely rework it. I feel that the theme of a "ticking bomb" only hurts Wildfire.

Traits
Look at them.
Increase damages, increase damages, replace 1 GCD with a more powerfull version, replace 1 GCD with a more powerfull version, replace 1 GCD with a more powerfull version, grant 1 additionnal charges on GR/Ricochet, replace 1 GCD with a more powerfull version, increases damages, replace 1 Cooldown with a more powerfull version.

None of the actual traits adds depth to the MCH gameplay. GR/Ricochet should have 3 charges at the beginning, you easily bleed a charge at only 2 stacks.
Goes the same for wildfire, there's no need of gutting its damages just to add a trait "MoRe DAmAgeS" later.

Most if not nearly all traits needs to get the hell out. Again, it's the lazy, half baked part of the rework so we could still have the flips.

To Continue…

[CKNovel]

Heat gauge and the GCDs
Here we are, reaching the core of the job.
And the most problematic part.
Heat gauge is bad. Fill up to 50, spend 50 to spam the same GCD. It works for Auto Cross Bow but like previously said, it won't be used at all if there is not 3 targets.
The skillspeed + Cooldown refill is a mistake, but if we remove one of those, we fall in the boring gameplay. And it's already boring.

Limiting the combo to 1-2-3 is exceptionally boring. There is no DPS that has GCD combos limited to 1-2-3. It worked in HW/SB due to the RNG nature of MCH but doesn't anymore. Another remnant of the lazy, half backed rework.

Barrel Stabilizer is a SB remnant aswell, the 50 heat is supposed to synchronize with Wildfire but it doesn't works. Every next wildfire will never be synchronized with Wildfire as Barrel Stabilizer needs to be delayed due to heat already being over 50 everytime. A very easy fix would have been to make the next Hypercharge Free instead of 50 heat. But there was no testing, no changes, so it falls into the lazy rework.

I truly hope 6.0 won't come in with a Confiteor skill to end Hypercharge. No one ever liked the "Stance spam", it hurts more DRK/MCH gameplay than giving them anything. It works with PLD Requiecast and WAR Inner Release as there isa bit more setup required.

To Continue…

[CKNovel]

MCH iterations
Overrall, ShB MCH is a good step in the right direction, but its rework felt as there was nothing gained from Stormblood. You have the 3 new GCDs, the Barrel Stabilizer, Heat blast and the Flamethrower. All of them have been reworked, but none of them feels like they define the Machinist.

The job suffers way too much from past iteration.
In HW it was designed with casts in mind, rapidfire gave it instant casts.
In SB they removed casts, MCH was not designed with permanent instant casts so they added the horrible heat gauges.
in ShB they realized they screwed up and forgot what a Machinist was, so hey, machines after 2 expansions. But they half reworked the job and we now have that empty shell of a job that suffers from a pointless 1 2 3 combo, a bad heat gauge and no interaction with the Automaton.
It feels like a SB job in ShB. One expansion was missed, they erased and redid.

Next to that, you have jobs that are way too loved.
SMN, gets a new pet and it has a full kit. SMN is bad to play due to pet behavior, but it received way too many attention.
BLM received massives QoLs, their traits defined their core and corrected massive problems (0 PM Ice spell, Polyglot charges, Dynamisation cooldown), not simply "MoRe DAmAgeS" traits.
DRG had many of its problems fixed, there was not many, but the Jump is faster, life and blood of the dragon are now maxed which eases the rotation...

MCH remains with a boring rotation and cooldowns completely useless.
There is certainly a bias towards Casters this expansion, some Melee DPS bears great sufferings. MNK will never be forgotten, but DRG, NIN and SAM are definitely complete kitwise.
I also plays SAM from times to times, still learning but the rotation is very smooth, each cooldowns has their uses, except maybe one we know has Kaeshi Higanbana. Funny enough, SAM had a quick response to fix Shôha but MCH was ignored.
Also during SB, MCH was a mess and completely ignore, but SMN and NIN had insanely quick response.
To Continue…

[CKNovel]

My wishlist for 6.0 is simple, it may be slightly too early for that but they might be in the process of imagining what they'll do with the job next:
-Rework Flamethrower, don't make it a trait, rework it, it's a shame to see this cooldown defining most Machinist in such a state.
-Better heat gauge, no one like spamming one ability and Machinist spams the most of it. It's bad, no one likes it and it's not friendly towards latency.
-Wildfire, rework it or delete it, either goes in the trashcan or rework, it's a bad 120s cooldown with no interactivity and no thought process beyong Hypercharge.
-Don't make another Choice GCD there is too much of it on MCH, you'd better not make Noise Blaster useless with a shared cooldown on Air Anchor. Also don't even dare about creating a choice between AoE and Single Target Automaton.
-Interactivity with the Automaton Queen, I know MCH have been asking for Lead Shot or a dot since its removal in HW, but giving a cool looking Automaton to MCH then making it a glorified dot is as fun as making turtle races between each other for a salad.
-Test the job and its rotation, how comes there is no one in Square Enix trying Machinist job and not pointing out how Wildfire has no interactivity, how there is a heat problem with Barrel Stabilizer and how you can't fix it for a simple QoL?
-Show us the "Love" for machines, there is many times where Yoshi-P claims the teams loves Machines but Machinist had to wait a whole Stormblood expansion to fix a broken job and barely any changes happened on Machinist during ShB? Shôha was reworked when it didn't needed to be and could work this way for a whole expansion without bothering anyone.
-Rework the ranged rôle, in HW, ranged were the top of the support DPS. In SB, ranged were the top of the support DPS. Support was the keyword but the rangeds are now in a mess of a spot where they don't have damages, no support and all they can do is bring a 1% bonus stat to the team. MCH is limited to Tactician when it had Refresh, Palisade and Dismantle.

Please Square Enix, it was a good beginning but give us the other half of the rework.
It's tiring to see that the Machinist only shined in only half of an expansion. It was bad in SB and brought nothing in ShB and is a bore to play. The only reason you want to bring a MCH over the other ranged is because it's the best thing in the trash can. It's not the rotten meat named Bard, it's the half eaten apple.

And that’s it.
Sorry about the pâté, but 3k characters is way too low to have a correct debate.

[Tizzy_Tormentor]

I kind of disagree on Heat Blast being "spam" mostly because when you Hypercharge, you aren't just hitting Heat Blast, you are alternating between 3 buttons very quickly since you are expected to weave Gauss/Ricochet between Heat Blasts. I disagree with it being "clunky" I think the flow of MCH is really smooth, with the only problem being the Barrel Stabilizer/Wildfire thing, but I do agree that Wildfire itself does need a looking over.

Honestly, when it comes to jobs, pretty much all of them have had their complexity toned down, MCH is no exception, I firmly believe that any problems MCH has now are the result of how terrible it was in SB, which took the fairly engaging and dynamic style of HW MCH and made it unreasonably strict and rigid, with baffling decisions such as using flamethrower on a single target to slip into overheat, which was by far the worst latency problem MCH has ever faced, they basically fucked it up when streamlining the jobs in SB, I genuinely don't believe it was playtested properly, practically no one enjoyed playing it, MCH players were laughably low at this time, even when they buffed it hard, no one wanted to put up with it, the devs had to apologize for the absolute state of it and had to promise a rework to unfuck it. I played quite a bit of SB MCH and I firmly believe it was a failure in terms of design and execution. Bear in mind, this is coming from someone who absolutely adored HW Machinist.

ShB MCH by comparison is much simpler, but it takes MCH in a solid direction thematically, you play more like a master of machinery, but there were problems, like Wildfire feeling inconsequential with the rest of the kit, with it being 120s for a hit that won't even be as much as the very common drill if it crits or direct hits and even when using it with your hypercharge window, nothing really changes, you just perform your hypercharge loop as normal.

I actually enjoy the gameplay loop of MCH due to its high APM, taking a job that has fewer buttons but you have periods where you move much faster and more often than before, I enjoy the speed, even with complaints of latency, an obvious quick fix for hypercharge is giving you 5 charges of Heat Blast while changing little about it, since I actually like the resets on gauss and ricochet, my only real complaint is that Heat Blast feels like a very "meh" skill, again, blame SB MCH for this. I get that 1-2-3 can be seen as boring, but honestly, its hardly any worse than mashing Burst Shot and praying for Refulgent procs. MCH has to keep an eye on cooldown timers closely to ensure no overlap, which I do enjoy, I do think there could be a few more actions in there, still hoping for Edgars Chainsaw.

I do miss some thematic elements of the job, like reload, rend mind/dismantle, old hypercharge, I really liked MCH's old identity as a debuffer, could give a vulm to the enemy with old hypercharge and lower incoming damage by debuffing the enemy with rend mind/dismantle, as opposed to protecting the party with a party buff, making a "selfish ranged dps" was never gonna work because of the ranged tax on dps.

I do echo the "choice GCD" though, I really dislike having a single-target/aoe equivalent, demonstrated greatly with Samurai with Senei, it shares the same cost/recast with Guren, literally nothing about your rotation changes in the slightest, you simply push Guren for aoe, Senei for single-target, I found it to be a very poor parlor trick by the devs to make you think you are getting more skills than you actually are (as well as removing skills and giving them back later like Divine Seal -> Temperance)

Sadly, the battery gauge being a glorified DoT is a trend in the current design philosophy, they nixed almost all meaningful interactivity with the pets for SMN/SCH and even DRK's Living Shadow is just a fancy looking DoT, its less a problem with the job itself and more how the devs are aiming to remove any and all interactivity with pets/turrets.

I don't want to write out any large essays on the subject, but on the whole, I think ShB MCH is still a very fun and fast paced job and the rework for the most part has proved popular, though really, saying its an improvement over SB MCH isn't saying much, the bar was so low to begin with, but I think MCH has a very solid foundation to work on going forward assuming they look at what works and what doesn't for the job, I don't feel it needs any sort of rework, more that it gets some kinks ironed out. It isn't like 5.0 NIN or SMN, where their rotations were flat out broken at times, MCH is ultimately working as intended, so its unlikely we will see any big changes before the next expansion.