Machinist needs help.

[Dyvid]

That has been their general philosophy for a while. Its another discussion but I think the "ranged tax" is outdated personally and as you say MCH doesn't bring any utility or raid buff.

The problem right now is that even within the ranged tax + utility tax philosophy MCH damage should be maybe a few percent lower, not 10% lower.

It's not so much as a ranged tax but rather mobility tax. Think of it in terms of Casters. Without it's utilities a BLM has to stand still for 2.5s to 3s to cast a powerful attacks. If they need to move for any reason, that is a DPS lose for the job. In turn if say a melee has to leave the target's bubble, that is a DPS loss. Physical Ranged can dodge and DPS at the same time so they don't suffer the same DPS lose. Now if the jobs where balance correctly, the BLM, SAM, and MCH would be doing the same damage averages even though the MCH would have the lowest Potency per skills.

You are correct that the old Role penalties are outdated. BRD and MCH would provide rDPS from 3.0 thru 4.0 but ShB changed the roles and SE screwed the pooch. DNC and BRD still provide rDPS and suffer the cost yet MCH no longer buffs yet still carries the rDPS penalty.

[_Shadowsong_]

It does need a fix, it feels like all ranged were changed for the worse this expansion.

[CKNovel]

I'll sound like a broken recorder but E5S to E8S were the most mobile savage of Shadowbringers.
Physical ranged stayed at the bottom and casters were at the top, RDM was above most melees and flirting with SAM from 5.2 to end of 5.3.

It's a mobility tax when it should be a ranged tax. Ranged also lost 10% damage on piercing debuff brought by DRG and I don't think they ever balanced that difference.

Then the layer added by EW... I mean that trait for Tactician(s) to 90s CD while other jobs gets upgrade for free, Reassemble should also be a free upgrade from the start like triplecast.
BRD gets a 3rd charge when Mage's Ballad is nerfed and only restores 15s on Bloodletter.
DNC lost its melee damage during Flourish.

Physical ranged often gets the short end of the stick, even role action wise.

[Jandor]

Wildfire:
Covers target's body in a slow-burning pitch. Action is changed to Detonator for the duration of the effect.
Deals damage when time expires or upon executing Detonator.
Potency is increased by 150 for each of your own weaponskills land prior to the end of the effect.
Potency is increased by 150 for each weaponskill landed by yourself and party members prior to the end of the effect.
Duration: 10s

[gumas]

Wildfire:
Covers target's body in a slow-burning pitch. Action is changed to Detonator for the duration of the effect.
Deals damage when time expires or upon executing Detonator.
Potency is increased by 150 for each of your own weaponskills land prior to the end of the effect.
Potency is increased by 150 for each weaponskill landed by yourself and party members prior to the end of the effect.
Duration: 10s

let say you pull 5 heatblast + 1 extra weaponskill, that alone is already 900 potency for 10 seconds...

now the other dps pull 3 weaponskill because they dont have 1.5 gcd during our heatblast moment... and the tank manage pull the same amount too...

thats a whooping 1800 potency not counting crit or any debuff like TA from nin... thats not a wildfire anymore, thats a nuke lmao

[Jandor]

thats a whooping 1800 potency not counting crit or any debuff like TA from nin... thats not a wildfire anymore, thats a nuke lmao

I know right! Lets blow some sh*t up!

I mean it's not really a serious suggestion, but honestly I think Machinist should get some party boost ability. It's fine for it to be the most selfish of the ranged physical DPS, but making it as selfish as SAM and BLM doesn't really work when the other two don't and won't get slapped with a mobility tax.

[CKNovel]

Wildfire being affected by teammates would need a hardcap.
Otherwise you would have synergy with high skillspeed job and anti synergy with DRG (The irony).
Then, what about spells? You would have to be careful with RDM and PLD magic rotation would not affect Wildfire.
DRK AoE wouldn't trigger the effects.

And if you want to make it so the Queen affect Wildfire... Don't.
I can picture thousands of nightmare scenario where the Queen don't punch the same target or where the boot-up/animation/jankyness of the queen will miss 2 or 3 Weaponskills.

[gumas]

Wildfire being affected by teammates would need a hardcap

what iam thinking is increase slightly the duration of wildfire to 12 seconds and hardcap it at 1000 potency, 12 seconds should be good enough to pull a guarantee 6 weapon skill and with some min max and good timing, you can pull 7 weapon skill which result in 1000 potency.

as for hypercharge i got 2 in mind...
1. hypercharge now give 5 heatblast stack once actived, increase the hypercharge duration to 15 seconds or something, still reduce the cd for gauss and ricochet, remove the increase single target weapon skill by 20 but increase the heatblast potency to 190 so nothing is lost (or 200, i dont like odd number lol)

2. remove heatblast and the additional effect, hypercharge still give 8 seconds duration but remove the 20 potency increase, now give all weapon skill (and weapon skill only) the 1.5 gcd effect, basically during hypercharge, instead of spamming heatblast now you spam your 1-2-3 combo (the result is still more or less the same total damage when you pull 5 heatblast + 3 gauss during current hypercharge)

[CKNovel]

In my very own opinion, the best of world would be wildfire working on stacks.
Weaponskills reduces that stack, at 0 it explodes.

Both ideas for Hypercharge are good but I have a preference for 2.
Reducing wildfire and hypercharge to 3 GCDs would also makes the MCH more flexible while also creating a lot of rooms for future expansions.

6.08 is planned for next Tuesday but those will mainly be potency increases.

[jrollins89]

+20 Potency to Drill, Chainsaw, and Air Anchor.
Haha. MCH saved!