Subtle Hints: Red Mage

[NeoZehel]

2 of everything besides archer?

2 magic dps, 2 melee tanks, 2 melee dps, 2 healers, 1 archer.

[Kiregean]

Second ranged is already in the coding as well, it's called Musketeer. There's a Musketeer Guild in Limsa Lominsa as well, Merlwyb is the leader.

[IMStarbuck]

What? More competition for debuff slot?!

They need enhance the combat system first before introduce more class.

[Gamemako]

Jobs are 5 skills, and you need a base class from them. There are only 4 classes at this time which could become a Red Mage at all due to the need for competent melee: PGL, LNC, MRD, GLA. Of them, only GLA has a traditional Red Mage weapon, and it's the tankiest of the tanks.

-PGL, extending into MNK, already has effective -en self-buffs, which kinda works if you include that one-off role from FF11.. This would be some kind of toe-stepping if you tried to extend that. Not to mention breaking Greased Lightning and ruining DPS.
-LNC... well, why bother? It's a no-downtime DPS. The need to maintain positional abilities for keeping DPS up would result in immense frustration, unlike BRD's any-place-any-time approach.
-MRD is amusingly the most feasible of Red Mages, simply because you can use the off-berserk time for spells. As Maim is not position-specific, you can afford to keep it up, unlike Heavy Thrust. The biggest obstacles here are the horrible lack of PIE and the lack of skill slots inherent in jobs.
-GLA, the consummate tank, has pretty much no synergy with a Red Mage skillset. It actively has 8 tank-specific skills: Rampart, Flash, Convalesce, Provoke, Shield Swipe, Awareness, Sentinel, and Bulwark. 8/17 skills are pretty much totally useless to a Red Mage, and many others are likely to be dubious as well (Shield Lob unless you offer no attack spells, Shield Bash, Tempered Will). You're left with just barebones utility: 4 direct attack skills, 1 AoE attack skill, one damage buff. Not a pretty picture.

Finally, you have 5 abilities. Choosing any of these will not avoid this problem. If you want a role as diverse as a Red Mage, you have to reflect that in 5 skills. Red Mage is a jack of all trades -- and fitting "all trades" in 5 skills isn't pretty. You have to completely club a Red Mage's skill set, making it little more than a Red Mage in name only.

What? More competition for debuff slot?!

Now let's be clear about debuffers. You have two options: class and job. There will be no debuffer class unless that class can offload its DPS onto a pet. This is because a debuffer class would be overpowered in a party or gimped solo, and that defeats the purpose of classes. Debuffing has to be a job, and for the reasons previously described, I find it intensely unlikely that a Red Mage will show up with current classes.

That said, you're missing the point: FF11 is the only title where Red Mage had that role. Once and only once. Jack-of-all-trades in 1, total crap in 3 but same role as 1, doublecast nuker in 5, greatsword-wielding bearer of the most powerful attack spell in 12i. Given that FF11's RDM was such an abortion to begin with, it's not worth bringing Red Mage to FF14 at all if you're going to turn it into that trash.

If it's going to have debuffs they should come from weaponskills similar to the Spellblade class in FFTA/2

That's a Mystic Knight archetype. They actually have a really cool traditional look as well, and certainly could make an excellent job for a dedicated class (e.g. Fencer -> Mystic Knight & Red Mage).

[MartaDemireux]

That's a Mystic Knight archetype. They actually have a really cool traditional look as well, and certainly could make an excellent job for a dedicated class (e.g. Fencer -> Mystic Knight & Red Mage).

I actually had a FNC > MST/RDM idea on my PC. Just posted it here: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...27#post1316727 If you'd like to see it. Funny, great minds thnk alike?

[Evangela]

Arcanist = Red Mage of XIV

[Sebastien]

It isn't a matter of IF there will be a Red Mage in FF14. It's just a matter of WHEN.

SqEnx has a great library of icon jobs to draw from. They know fan favorites like Red Mage and Musketeer are highly anticipated. We'll see them in the game eventually (and the job system will make a lot more sense, at that point, when most classes have multiple jobs to branch into).

[Duelle]

@OP: Those spells were part of a crapton of other abilities that existed in the game before the class revampt that took place after Yoshida was given control over the game.

I wouldn't take those as hints to RDM but rather hints on combat systems and the original armoury system. If you want to see what the original armoury could have achieved, you need not look further than The Secret World, a game that uses the exact same system but with the element of decks. Decks are pretty much class names your character gets based on abilities they set in their action bars (like if you want to be labeled a witch hunter you needed specific abilities set and you'd earn the label as well as a small bonus to the abilities involved).

I have a feeling Tanaka's FFXIV was aiming at something similar. Set certain abilities/spells in your action bar and you'd be a Black Mage, or a White Mage and so on. It would make sense given the abilities in-game as well as the sheer number of jobs in the FF IP, and would also explain why the base classes were not named after the jobs to begin with.

[Arcturius]

Don't hate me for this, but if red mage is gonna be what it was in FFXI then leave it out. That is not a Red Mage. that is some awkward buff/debuff role. FF1 first identified the Red Mage as a Duelist that can use White and Black magic, but does not excel at using any of them, meaning it was by no means the best at any trait. The fact that it could use everything was a force to be reckoned with though. It has been that way in every FF and FFXI was the first, and only, FF game to take the whole whole debuff/buff approach. That type of role would not fit in this MMO style at all. What they should honestly do is go back to what they where. They could have chance of proc abilities where they have a chance to get a free heal to throw on a team member or after doing a combo they get a instant spell cast off GCD or on GCD whatever works. Just make them the melee fighters they are and make magic in their main rotation. I just miss ACTUAL Red Mages.

[Eidolith]

I loved the red mages in Tactics Advance, that double cast summoning was sweet.