Quote Originally Posted by Mecia View Post
Im expecting 8.0 to delete magical ranged DPS at this point.
They won't need to, because they likely view the roles differently from us. We're looking at it as Ranged and Caster, ie, one has full mobility and one has cast times to add an additional mechanic to work around. But if you instead look at it as 'Phys Ranged and Magical Ranged are different, because while both attack from range, one deals their damage primarily via physical damage type, and the other deals their damage primarily via magical damage type', things start to make a lot more sense. Back in HW, they gave Bard and Machinist cast times on some actions. Obviously, people weren't very enthusiastic about the change, for the most part. But it makes sense when you use the second view rather than the first: There's nothing about giving BRD cast times that goes against 'the Job is a Physical Ranged, because it primarily deals damage via Physical damage type'. Similarly, there's nothing about new SMN having 4 cast times per 60s (3 if you use Swiftcast on one) that goes against Magical Ranged, because it still deals its damage as Magic damage type

They should increase the 1% that each role provides to 2.5% (rescaling damage checks going forward to factor that in) and merge the bonus from PhysRanged/MagicRanged. So you can have parties of 2 Melee, 2 Ranged, with no 'hard requirement' for a PhysRanged vs MagicRanged. BRD/DNC comp, BLM/PCT comp, MCH/RDM comp, whatever, all of them would provide the same %bonus to the party, which would help alleviate role demand in the PF. Last tier, I kid you not, the PF I was in for M8S that got the clear, waited for EIGHT hours for a PhysRanged. When we finally got one, it was the PhysRanged we had the night before. We got the clear on that second night, but the issue remains: SE has removed a lot of the 'reason' to play a PhysRanged beyond 'I just like X PhysRanged more than any of the Casters', but they haven't done anything regarding the 'requirement' for one to be present for highend content. So either SE needs to address the Role's purpose, or just merge the Phys/Magic Ranged bonuses so you can run double Caster if needed/preferred. I'd expect the latter to be far less work for SE (and therefore preferable as a solution from their POV), but it does run the risk of making BLM a locked slot (moreso than it currently is) due to it being Melee damage output, as a Ranged Job (which could be addressed somewhat by SE waking up to the reality that the Ranged Tax is a very silly design)