Please balance casters in 7.0 or split role up

[Sequora]

This isn’t a new thought, but with Pictomancer seemingly being close to BLM in terms of its place in a party, I think it warrants discussing.

Caster is literally the only job type that has two distinct sub roles despite it being one category.

Yes, there are two types of healers, but balance is that a party should hopefully have one of each for best results.

Caster has “progress jobs” ie summoner and red mage, and then “speed jobs” ie black mage and likely pictomancer that provide more rdps, but lack the Rez for progression.

This makes it hard to “main” a job like pictomancer, or at least hard to “main” picto for raiding. Most groups are going to want you to play red mage or summoner for prog. Melee DPS don’t deal with this. Viper will be just as viable for a group as SAM, RPR, DRG, MNK, NIN. Balance is always subject to change, but they’ll always all be fine in a raid group.

Maybe call summoner and red mage support casters, and pictomancer and black mage can be called something else. Thoughts?

[Supersnow845]

They just need to remove raise from the casters, raise is already too free and it’s what’s messing up balance

[SieyaM]

I feel like having one group buff and a rez is too little to classify a job as a "support caster" but in XIV support is so bare minimum that I guess it counts.

[Sequora]

They just need to remove raise from the casters, raise is already too free and it’s what’s messing up balance

I don’t disagree, but it’s a controversial opinion. While we don’t know what they have planned for caster balance for 7.0, the fact that they mentioned PIC not having a Rez tells me summoner and red mage still have it.

No utility will ever compare to Rez. They’d have to substantially weaken it somehow.

Maybe put it on a 10 minute CD or something? Even with that change it still makes red mage and summoner better for prog.

[Supersnow845]

I don’t disagree, but it’s a controversial opinion. While we don’t know what they have planned for caster balance for 7.0, the fact that they mentioned PIC not having a Rez tells me summoner and red mage still have it.

No utility will ever compare to Rez. They’d have to substantially weaken it somehow.

Maybe put it on a 10 minute CD or something? Even with that change it still makes red mage and summoner better for prog.

I don’t really know the answer, it’s hard to discuss rezz on casters because there is an overwhelming section of the casual playerbase whos totality of interaction with the casters is “hahaha verraise go burrrrrr” in alliance raids and “modern SMN is good because it looks like a SMN”

Is it actually fair to delete verraise for said people because it unbalances savage, I honestly don’t know the answer to that question, removing raise is objectively the best way to balance the casters in savage, then you just rank their DPS based on complexity (BLM>PIC>RDM>SMN) because magic barrier or pheonix healing isn’t worth enough to alter balance

You could made rezz a caster role action with a massive CD (it wouldn’t really affect BLM’s balance because they get to do the most damage by nature of being the most complex) but that still interferes with the “rezzmage goes burrrrr” idea

The only thing I think would make the majority happy is leave the rezzes as they are now in casual content then restrict them in savage but they have never altered action design specifically for high end before

The OP’s suggestion wouldn’t work because there is only 4 slots, if they did OP’s suggestion then prog would be

-melee
-prog caster
-phys range
-melee/damage caster (only if damage caster did enough damage to equal the melee)

And farm would be

-melee
-damage caster
-phys ranged
-melee/damage caster (only if damage caster did enough damage to equal the melee)

So if the damage casters aren’t buffed to melee level then they are getting excluded from prog (and if they are buffed to that level then we have 8 jobs fighting for 2 slots) and then the prog casters get barred from farm and suddenly we have only 2 jobs for 1 spot and if they equal melee they can also take the 4th slot, it’s unbalanced no matter which way the balance falls

[Sequora]

It would if “support caster” was needed for the 5% damage boost. So party makeup would be healerx2, tankx2, melee DPS, phys ranged DPS, Caster DPS(come up with catchier name), Support caster DPS

[kayll]

At this point, I'm expecting Pictcomancer to have the complexity of SMN and the DPS output of BLM, just to make the whole caster situation a repeat of the SMN and RDM comparisons of Endwalker.

It would if “support caster” was needed for the 5% damage boost. So party makeup would be healerx2, tankx2, melee DPS, phys ranged DPS, Caster DPS(come up with catchier name), Support caster DPS

Don't get your hopes up tbh..
They are adding another melee classes, two expansions in a row, no way they don't expect every team comp to be 2 melee/1 p range/1 caster from now on.

[Heroman3003]

My guess is that with Pictomancer, they'll be trying to make Casters into more of a sliding scale of Damage - Utility, with BLM at the peak damage and RDM at peak utility, with Picto and Summoner inbetween.

[Reinhardt_Azureheim]

Just get rid of caster raise and unshackle the jobs from the Raise tax.

[Sequora]

My guess is that with Pictomancer, they'll be trying to make Casters into more of a sliding scale of Damage - Utility, with BLM at the peak damage and RDM at peak utility, with Picto and Summoner inbetween.

Right but what does “utility” look like? For melee jobs, it’s mostly just extra damage in the form of a buff for party members or a debuff on the enemy. This means at the end of the day, melees are going to warrant two spots in most parties because they’re all interchangeable.

SAM might do the most raw damage, but add in the damage the other melee provide through buffs and they’re all very close.

For casters utility includes things like magick barrier, which while nice, are ultimately unneeded. At the end of the day the reason they’re choosing red mage over black mage is because of rez.