Sage's Phlegma 1/2/3 should be a ranged attack

[Zofian]

Or am I missing something that results in it making sense? It's a bother having to approach the target to do this attack skill before running away to a safe distance again where healers belong. Using Phlegma would be great and not a chore, if it weren't hamstrung by this weird need to be right in front of the target next to the tank in order to use it. Also note that Icarus (gap closer) is not intended/designed to be used in conjunction with Phlegma (before that excuse comes up), although technically you can waste it on gap closing for Phlegma if you want (for style points at best).

Apart from that (and the silly decision to turn all sage skills blue as you level up), Sage is great.

[Supersnow845]

“Healers need to be at a distance where they belong”

Well there is your first problem, unless you are solving a spread mechanic there is zero reason for you to not be in melee range as a healer at all times

[Rongway]

Phlegma's range is 6y which is almost double the melee range. If a boss is 10y across and you're at the very edge of Phlegma range, the tank may be too far away for some of your AoE heals. If you are on the opposite side of the boss as a DD and at the edge of Phlegma range, the DD will be outside of some of your AoE heals.

Phlegma does not need any more range; you just need to stand closer to the boss so everyone is in your AoE radius because some actions are still 15y. Rangers and casters should also park closer to the boss. It makes it much easier to handle cones and donuts when you're closer. People do not need to be spread out any farther than is required to make sure multi-target AoEs don't overlap centers.

[Bun_Vivant]

... to a safe distance again where healers belong.

As others have noted, it is not a widely-accepted that healers (or ranged DPS even) belong at "a safe distance," if there even is such a thing.
And especially not Sage, given how effective Dyskrasia can be on packs of mobs.
Sages have Icarus for a reason.

I main Sage, generally from within spitting distance of the tank -- if not right next to them when there are no cleaves.
It makes some mechanics easier, in fact, especially for Sage, which rarely has to stand still.

[rawker]

Me playing AST casting Gravity on trash beside the tank.

What ranged?

[Valence]

Another post trying to remove job identity and tactical constraints and make everything the same. You even have Icarus on the job to help.

They already murdered half of any remaining tactics on healing by removing all positioning consideration when they extended the ranges of most healing abilities to crazy levels, especially bubbles. Sure, let's bring the killing blow on everything else. We shouldn't have to worry about anything else than just doing the mechanics right? Just press the button to get rid of those pesky positioning considerations and go back to tHe mEcHaNiCs.

[Doragan]

Absolutely not.
We may not (and probably will never have) a melee healer in the game, and this is the closest to it. If you want to get closer without slidecasting, you've got Icaros on a 45s cooldown. As there is essentially nothing to weave in between GCDs, it's basically free. Then, again, generally, you should be slidecasting.

On the contrary, please give us more melee range attacks on healers. It beats being completely static while enduring the glare spam.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

Come to think of it, of course it doesn't make sense to newer SGEs: they never knew that Kerachole, Physis II, Panhaima, & Holos were all 15y in radius alongside today's Ixochole & E.Prognosis/Pepsis in its inception.

That being said, as other's have mentioned, keep Phlegma as it is. It already mirrors Misery in practice alongside its healing side of the kit with SCH's. We shouldn't supply 'carbon copy'-esque approach into SGE's kits any further. Instead, don't be afraid to stick on melee reach. Getting used to this habit makes your life easier.

[ty_taurus]

I love seeing more players clawing away at every semblance of uniqueness Sage has.

"Practice a rotation on a training dummy? Having to adjust that to run an ultimate fight? Bad game design. Practice a melee rotation that requires moving cooldowns around to adjust for downtime? Bad fight design. Having a cast time drop because you messed up your movement? Bad game feel. Because every single little tiny thing that requires any modicum of additional effort or is slightly outside of the exact scenario that's been practiced is frustrating and wasting the time needed to get to the end result."

Oh no! This action requires melee range! Oh no! This action has a cone AOE! Oh no! This action is only 15 yalms wide!

The more you sharpen your pencil in the pursuit of the perfect point, the less pencil you have left to write with.

[Rongway]

People in here bringing up uniqueness/identity and the availability of Ikarus to deal with it.

It's not even that. All healers, casters, and rangers should be parked closer to the boss than many healer, caster, and ranger players seem to be comfortable with. The biggest error in OP's post is not "Phlegma should have longer range." OP's big mistake is "It's a bother having to approach the target to do this attack skill before running away to a safe distance again where healers belong." Healers don't belong at long range because if they're at long range

1. they don't cover the tanks, and sometimes melee DDs, with their AoEs
2. they have to run farther to get out of cones
3. they have to run farther to get into donuts
4. they have to run farther for stacks

Long range is not a safe place to be. Rangers and casters don't belong at long range because of the same reasons except replace (1) with "they won't receive AoE heals". This is not a unique problem to sage. I've been at the edge of my AoE range almost not hitting the tanks and melees and still had to ask rangers and casters not to stand so far away from the boss because they're not getting AoE heals. I still would have had to ask that if I were playing any other healer because even after the expansion of many actions to 30y every healer still has 15y actions and none of them want to waste resources or GCDs single-target healing stray DDs when they would have been healed to full by the AoE heal if they just weren't out of range in the first place.