i am genuinely saying this as nicely as i can here: the only possible way i can imagine someone seriously believing that machinist is easier than the other phys range and not, at minimum, basically identical in difficulty, is if they were so spectacularly bad at pressing their buttons on cooldown that their technical step is drifting by thirty seconds by the time they remember to press it.

especially in a meta where their kinds of buffs are the only things that matters anymore, you can basically completely mess up everything else, both before and immediately following the two minute burst window, and be fine, so long as your steps pop on time and your radiant finale comes after three songs. bard and dancer are not black mages, and they're barely even red mages, yet here they are doing more damage than a red mage is.