Concerns Regarding DPS Balance: Physical Ranged, Red Mage, and Summoner

[Valence]

The rphys role is a glorified de facto 1% buff by result of that design, whether the intention is there or not. There is no subjectivity to be had about it. There is no reason to bring a rphys without that 1% bonus and has never been since ShB knocked at the door. Reducing the gap will not magically make rphys suddenly worth bringing without that bonus. Stating otherwise is absolutely disingenuous.

If the job had raising capabilities, then it would be a totally different story.

[BabyYoda]

Having no standards will always be a flop,

1% wont make the job interesting.

[Aco505]

Right now, you'd bring BRD because it's the best ranged DPS after PCT and you need two. BRD is also quite close to RPR and VPR in cDPS at higher percentiles, highlighting its potential.

The developers are going to have to think long and hard about the p. range role for 8.0. If they're going to be buffers, then they should be the best at them. That should be their role. If they're going to be something else, then they should clarify it.

But closing the gap would certainly reduce a lot of the woes in the short-term. These problems would be way less egregious if the gap was not of 10% or more on average.

[mallleable]

*cough* *cough* Walking casts *cough*

Seriously, the cast times alone would be considerations for increasing potency for physical ranged jobs -- the lightly movement restricted movement would be an extra little consideration. We could do something like replace MCH's Clean Shot combo with Blast Charge spam, and be generous with the potency and make it like 400 potency per hit with a 1.5 second cast time (PCT's 1.5 sec cast RGB GCDS are 400+ potency), same heat generation, and after every three casts you get an oGCD attack that grants 10 battery so you gain gauges at the same rate. And this has a cascading effect because now the potency for Blazing Shot has to go up as well because it is now a burst phase that requires some casting to get to, and because its potency is somewhat balanced around filler GCDs. Also 400 potency Blazing Shot spam that is still instant, and still has a 1.5 second recast time. Queen, and tool potencies would have to go up as well. These would be uhhh huge buffs. Not even mentioning that we could probably bring in the sniper rifle from PVP, give it a short cast time for HUGE damage under buffs (spitballing 1000p+ auto dhcrit with a 2 second cast on a 110 sec CD).

Similar principles can apply to BRD as well.

[Rika007]

*cough* *cough* Walking casts *cough*

Seriously, the cast times alone would be considerations for increasing potency for physical ranged jobs -- the lightly movement restricted movement would be an extra little consideration. We could do something like replace MCH's Clean Shot combo with Blast Charge spam, and be generous with the potency and make it like 400 potency per hit with a 1.5 second cast time (PCT's 1.5 sec cast RGB GCDS are 400+ potency), same heat generation, and after every three casts you get an oGCD attack that grants 10 battery so you gain gauges at the same rate. And this has a cascading effect because now the potency for Blazing Shot has to go up as well because it is now a burst phase that requires some casting to get to, and because its potency is somewhat balanced around filler GCDs. Also 400 potency Blazing Shot spam that is still instant, and still has a 1.5 second recast time. Queen, and tool potencies would have to go up as well. These would be uhhh huge buffs. Not even mentioning that we could probably bring in the sniper rifle from PVP, give it a short cast time for HUGE damage under buffs (spitballing 1000p+ auto dhcrit with a 2 second cast on a 110 sec CD).

Similar principles can apply to BRD as well.

Why would we want to add walking casts and lightly restrict the movement of two jobs that are already the most immobile jobs in the game? Bard and Machinist are right next to Scholar and AST are the only jobs in the game that lack a gap closer or dash to an ally ability. Bard has Repelling shot which most bard players don't even use or have on their bar because no endgame content necessitates it (and half the time your worried it will get you killed) and Scholar has Expedience (another kick between the legs to ranged players that they gave a healer a combat movement buff when ranged has been asking for Peloton to do that in combat forever).

Black Mage is unironically a more mobile job then both Bard and Machinist ever could be, because true mobility is not just being able to walk all over the place while you dont lose uptime, it's having the movement tools to rapidly get to where you need to be and then not move anymore after that moment. If both were given things similar to en avant or slither then sure, you could say they are mobile jobs, but restricting them at this point is like saying I want to put weights on this turtle cause it's moving to fast.

Also walking casts would totally screw up the high APM of both jobs, as you can't double weave with walking casts, and double weaving is central to the feeling of both jobs.

[Valence]

Right now, you'd bring BRD because it's the best ranged DPS after PCT and you need two. BRD is also quite close to RPR and VPR in cDPS at higher percentiles, highlighting its potential.

The developers are going to have to think long and hard about the p. range role for 8.0. If they're going to be buffers, then they should be the best at them. That should be their role. If they're going to be something else, then they should clarify it.

But closing the gap would certainly reduce a lot of the woes in the short-term. These problems would be way less egregious if the gap was not of 10% or more on average.

Alright, BRD is currently extremely peculiar and definitely not representative of anything when it comes to Rphys. I just rechecked because your reply surprised me and it was definitely not up there earlier in the tier a month ago. It was higher than its counterparts, but definitely way below BLM. Its current position is extremely uncommon and has never happened since shb. I am happy to see it though, but seeing how SE balances rphys, I am inclined to read this as an anomaly right now.

However, if they do take it as a base for the two others for the next buffs to come, then you can colour me surprised. I'm not on copium though.

The reason those problems are egregious is only because they're skirting or outright going over the tipping point where the 1% party bonus is not enough as a guardrail anymore. It has happened in both ShB (BRD) and EW (MCH) already at release. This is only repeating history. When the situation got buffed over time in both expansions the gap was reduced closer to 5%, which is what some people here have been asking. Well, sure, it means that the balance isn't stricto sensu broken with gaps dangerously spilling over the 1% safety net, but it still means that the role is only taken because of that same 1%. It's been a shit sandwich for 6 years now, 5, 10% or 15% gap no matter at how you look at it. Whether the gap is high or lower, to the eye of a rphys player, at least to me, doesn't change the slightest thing on our side. 5% just makes it "look functional", but what an excuse.

Why would we want to add walking casts and lightly restrict the movement of two jobs that are already the most immobile jobs in the game? Bard and Machinist are right next to Scholar and AST are the only jobs in the game that lack a gap closer or dash to an ally ability. Bard has Repelling shot which most bard players don't even use or have on their bar because no endgame content necessitates it (and half the time your worried it will get you killed) and Scholar has Expedience (another kick between the legs to ranged players that they gave a healer a combat movement buff when ranged has been asking for Peloton to do that in combat forever).

Black Mage is unironically a more mobile job then both Bard and Machinist ever could be, because true mobility is not just being able to walk all over the place while you dont lose uptime, it's having the movement tools to rapidly get to where you need to be and then not move anymore after that moment. If both were given things similar to en avant or slither then sure, you could say they are mobile jobs, but restricting them at this point is like saying I want to put weights on this turtle cause it's moving to fast.

Also walking casts would totally screw up the high APM of both jobs, as you can't double weave with walking casts, and double weaving is central to the feeling of both jobs.

I don't feel I have the courage to get back into the argument on walking casts (which are essentially cast times in constraints in the current DDR pve environment), and I do agree with you that this would make both jobs the worst turrets in the game without any new dash or movement ability. And if they get those, well, welcome to our new flavor of casters.

Detractors of rphys always conveniently forget that mobility =/= uptime freedom.

On repelling shot: this ability is absolutely useless unless you feel like weaving fancy flips because the job bores you, for multiple reasons:
1) Unlike elusive jump, aiming with that crap requires a target and be at the correct position by following abstract geometry linked to the center of the target. While the positioning constraint isn't uninteresting, combined with the rest this makes the skill just unusable and taste like a shit sandwich. And to be frank doing a simple back step requiring a target is a weird constraint. It only makes sense in pvp because you're actually binding the target.
2) The ability is one of the most unresponsive in the game, almost on the level of sprint as if it didn't queue much at all. And the animation delay moving you back is absolutely awful.
3) Unlike elusive jump, this ability backflips you to such a pitiful range behind that you actually go as fast or even faster by just running back, because in relation to the point above, it takes so much time to actually move you that yes, running is probably as fast or even faster.
4) Ironically this ability could see a bit more use if the job was an actual caster, for repositioning, but 2 and 3 would still need be fixed for it to be worthwhile. Way too niche.

[mallleable]

The thing is it it has very little to do with movement penalty, and more to do with the cast time. The cast time is essentially a 'do nothing step' -- a delay from when you press the button, and it deals damage. A concept that shows up in many other kinds of games. You can have a turn based game where you can have an extremely powerful attack on your next turn in exchange for skipping your current turn. Or even a card game where you can have an extremely powerful card, but you have to skip a turn before you can play it. When you reload in an FPS, you are doing nothing in exchange for replenishing your damage resources. Even down to something like fire rate where each 'bullet' from a high fire rate, high ammo capacity SMG will deal less damage than say each bullet from revolver that has a lower rate of fire, and can only fire off 6 shots before reloading while we're still on FPS games. Oh no, there are downtime mechanics in my single player FPS game because everything is uptime DDR, it's busted.

Back to FFXIV, there is like a lot a lot of downtime in every fight where no one needs to be running round so the movement penalty from walking casts or any casts in general means very little. Job design, fight design, and yes player skill have improved to such a degree that movement penalties from casted actions is not a problem, like at all. And to such a degree that I don't think that current physical ranged design holds up anymore.

[Lyth]

There are good points on both sides of this. There's nothing to say that you couldn't introduce stationary casts or walking casts on a Physical Ranged job. We have two melee jobs that use casts as well. The primary drawback is that casts come at the cost of APM, so you're left with slower gameplay. You also might risk alienating an existing playerbase if you implement it on a current job rather than a new one. I think the main reason this discussion point comes out is because Physical Ranged is viewed as unilaterally inferior to Magical Ranged, and casts are usually brought up as the point of discrimination (even if an unwarranted one). You could argue that a Physical Ranged job that tears down that boundary would spark a conversation about why we have two tiers of ranged jobs split across three sub-subcategories.

I'm surprised that there isn't an Grappling Shot or Jet Pack movement tool out there yet for BRD/MCH, respectively. Even the healers are getting them now.

[Valence]

The thing is it it has very little to do with movement penalty, and more to do with the cast time. The cast time is essentially a 'do nothing step' -- a delay from when you press the button, and it deals damage. A concept that shows up in many other kinds of games. You can have a turn based game where you can have an extremely powerful attack on your next turn in exchange for skipping your current turn. Or even a card game where you can have an extremely powerful card, but you have to skip a turn before you can play it. When you reload in an FPS, you are doing nothing in exchange for replenishing your damage resources. Even down to something like fire rate where each 'bullet' from a high fire rate, high ammo capacity SMG will deal less damage than say each bullet from revolver that has a lower rate of fire, and can only fire off 6 shots before reloading while we're still on FPS games. Oh no, there are downtime mechanics in my single player FPS game because everything is uptime DDR, it's busted.

Back to FFXIV, there is like a lot a lot of downtime in every fight where no one needs to be running round so the movement penalty from walking casts or any casts in general means very little. Job design, fight design, and yes player skill have improved to such a degree that movement penalties from casted actions is not a problem, like at all. And to such a degree that I don't think that current physical ranged design holds up anymore.

That analogy has nothing to do with cast times. A better analogy would be the PCT motifs : skip a GCD and your next is going to be double/triple more powerful. A cast time, unless going well over the GCD normal recast, is not affecting the GCD structure (turns) in any way, shape or form. The amount of bullets per GCD is also directly tied to the GCD recast speed (old rapid fire, current hypercharge, etc), not the cast times.

I'm surprised that there isn't an Grappling Shot or Jet Pack movement tool out there yet for BRD/MCH, respectively. Even the healers are getting them now.

Because healers are casters. Fast casters sure, but still casters, and with very limited uptime options in comparison to other casters. Some of them also do need to be at melee range for some of their attacks.

This is not the case of BRD/MCH (at the opposite of DNC), and since those do not have any cast times, they do not need any mobility tools. I don't see the point of them getting any in their current state and people asking for them just because other jobs have them is just weird. If anything giving them mobility tools would further enforce the argument that rphys is too mobile and free and needs to be taxed.

[Lyth]

Movement is fundamental to game design, because players often make decisions about whether they want to play a game or not based off of control responsiveness. Games succeed or fail on this point. That's why we've seen a move towards more fixed distance gap closers, and now speed boosts. I think if they want to attract and retain new players, every job needs to have movement tools, even if it's just for zipping around a starting zone.

PCT doesn't need a gap closer to get into melee range. But yet it has the most powerful movement tool in the game despite supposedly being an 'damage' caster and most overpowered job in the game. And tell me, what do you have to lose at this point? It's not like they can tax Physical Ranged any more than they already have. You're in the low end of the same damage tier as Raise Casters who have movement tools, but you don't even have a Raise to show for it. I have no idea why you would defend the status quo. You have every right to demand more; they can take nothing from you.