Machinist class is dead

[ArianeEwah]

What this patch did to MCH and SAM:

Imagine every DPS in a cantina:
All melees and BLM sit on the popular table, having a feast, the best of the best.
SMN, RDM, DNC and BRD are sitting on another table, drooling when looking at the popular table, then they stare at their own meal; a simple soup with some bread. It's not much, but decent at least.
And then in the corner to the entrance, there is MCH who can't even affort a slice of bread, begging for a dollar, so they can buy some.

Then SqEx comes in and says something disgusting about SAM; they instantly get kicked from the popular table, with DRG spitting them in the face. Looking for company, SAM goes near the unpopular table, but DNC is showing them the cold shoulder, and BRD has this "I am watching you" stare. SAM still sits down, but a SMN in between, so everyone is going to keep quiet.
After that, SqEx turns to the MCH on the ground and sighs "...fine." and gives them 50c... "thanks, I guess?!" It's not enough to buy decent bread, the best the cantina can do is dry bread with some mold on it. MCH now sits on the end of the table, and eats it. They get sick real quick as they are already weak, but at least they ain't starving anymore...

On a serious note: Just buff all Drill and every equivalent action to 600 already! And while you are at it, change Hypercharge to 5 stacks ffs.

[WiccaP]

Well part of the doubt with where MCH should go maybe the result of how it was originally meant to be designed as a combination of FF series Gunner jobs and Machinist jobs. Thus trying to constantly fill the roles and needs of two types of Jobs from the FF series but maybe conflicting with each other with due to the focus of these two jobs in past FF series games. However, this also does open up potential to make the job go far more creative direction if the developers wanted to that past FF games never took.

Still we can't know what are on the minds of the developers beyond just speculating at this point.

I probably view the jobs with a different mentality than. While I know and acknowledge the Jobs in past games, i tend to think of each as a stand alone. I don't typically view mch as a mix of these 2 classes or astro as a mix of those 2. I find doing that leads to too many expectations and negative feelings toward a job because it doesn't work like the nostalgia

[Serenaya]

I can only hope that summaries like that make it easier for the devs to one day pick out the key points we're hitting on over and over. Keep it up.

[Kitfox]

A lot of the problems could be forgiven to some degree if the job balance was better, but there's nothing MCH excels at when compared to other Ranged DPS. It's just not worth playing at the moment.

-Lowest damage
-Worst utility
-Bad synergy with buffs
-Lowest mobility
-Ping problems
-Has a 2660 potency attack that can do zero damage based on bad AI decisions

[gamerseb]

Going deeper into the high-level reasoning of why its damage is so low, assuming devs don't want to add any utility to MCH and keep it a selfish class...

-Is MCH damage low because it's a selfish dps?
I don't think so. SAM and BLM's rDPS is still as high as other non-selfish classes, even without buffs.

-Is MCH damage low because it's a ranged dps, and they're supposed to have low damage due to high mobility and movement tax?
Yes and no. It seems to be that way, but it still doesn't explain why MCH is much lower than BRD and DNC, when they all have almost the same freedom.

-Is MCH damage low because it's a class that's low in complexity?
Not completely. Somewhat understandably, other classes with more to do and have more restrictions, like SAM and BLM, can somewhat be optimized further, and do more damage in the long run and at high skill levels. But Bard and Dancer are arguably of similar complexity to Machinist, and they still do more damage, so this logic doesn't stand. SMN and RPR are also fairly easy to play, but since they're "new", I'm not mentioning them here, since they're buffed. Moreover, the gap between classes is just too big at high skill levels. As a MCH at 72% parse, I'm still out-damaged by a NIN at 42% (log).

-Is MCH damage low because devs don't take into account party buffs into the equation?
Also no. BLM and SAM are balanced with these in mind - even if they don't have buffs, their damage is in line with other roles.

-Then why is MCH damage so low and is not being adjusted correctly?
I believe it's because MCH (like SMN and RPR) are in a process of being turned into the easiest, lowest-complexity, lowest-damage classes for each role - easy for anyone to pick up and play, even at high skill level content. SMN and RPR are temporarily buffed, since they're "new", but I don't doubt that they may follow a similar route to MCH if this is the reasoning behind it.

"The MCH cannot have higher damage because it has high mobility and low complexity". This is what I imagine the devs thinking when they balanced MCH for 6.1.

If this was true, the outcome of this would be that these classes are useful for prog, but will never be competitive with other classes on same roles, since they're the "easy" classes. I really hope this isn't the truth, but this is the only option I see - if we think that the devs are smart and have some reasoning behind changes.

[Jagick]

Going deeper into the high-level reasoning of why its damage is so low, assuming devs don't want to add any utility to MCH and keep it a selfish class...

"The MCH cannot have higher damage because it has high mobility and low complexity". This is what I imagine the devs thinking when they balanced MCH for 6.1.

.

I actually worry this is true even though it makes no sense. We don't even have an ability to put distance between us and the enemy like Bard does. We're even less mobile than they are. As for complexity? Sure we may not have party buffs like songs to manage or DoTs to keep up and running but we do have to time certain heavy hitters appropriately, keep that heat gauge and battery gauge charging, time the wildfire chain appropriately. While not complex, machinist has a lot of busy work. Simple, but busy. I feel that both bard and machinist are both as easy as each other, they both just have specific tasks and machinist's are more repetitive.

I feel like at this point they just need to split machinist into two classes if this is going to remain the status quo. Give Machinist a bit more mobility and utility, turn it into a more supportive class like bard. Shrink the guns into more proper pistol sizes. Then revive the canned "Musketeer" class and turn it into a less mobile heavy hitting selfish ranged DPS. Arm it with rifles and carbines. Anything would be better than their tendency to ignore the class or give it soggy bandaids for its severed arteries.

[Serenaya]

I think a rework would be the only way to address simplicity + phys-ranged mobility vs. damage output, but we don't even know if that's what they're balancing around anymore. MCH is just... a class that makes no sense for its apparent purpose.

[RylaBee]

This problem is starting to be true not just for MCH, but also for RDM and SMN, who are for no good reason trailing way too far behind melee jobs and BLM.

The rotations on melee and BLM seen so many simplifications, that these classes realy are NOT any harder to play/optimize than the rest. The problem with uptime for melee at SOME encounters still exists, but it is quite marginal and certainly not worth the size of DPS difference.

Basically, this expansion started with overpowered RPR and somewhat overtunned BRD, which was followed by panic-buffing (or overbuffing) of all the melee classes and BLM, leaving everything else in dust.
Not saying you cannot play some job in savage with good party, but the discrepancy is showing more and more.

[dartfan]

This problem is starting to be true not just for MCH, but also for RDM and SMN, who are for no good reason trailing way too far behind melee jobs and BLM.

The rotations on melee and BLM seen so many simplifications, that these classes realy are NOT any harder to play/optimize than the rest. The problem with uptime for melee at SOME encounters still exists, but it is quite marginal and certainly not worth the size of DPS difference.

Basically, this expansion started with overpowered RPR and somewhat overtunned BRD, which was followed by panic-buffing (or overbuffing) of all the melee classes and BLM, leaving everything else in dust.
Not saying you cannot play some job in savage with good party, but the discrepancy is showing more and more.

Well, they broke bard for 2 weeks. So get your kicks in while you can!

[CKNovel]

RDM and SMN still brings their own unique weight in the balance.

Additional mitigation and healing BLM can't provide.
In the MCH case, it's the opposite, it's getting outDPS by jobs that provide additional support.

Imagine if BLM would be below SMN or RDM...
Oh wait, it happened and SMN got the nerf into a whole rework that nerfed it even further.