Fencer: Red Mage and Mystic Knight Proposal

[MartaDemireux]

But yet my RDM does have the ability to focus on casting from a distance (or up close)... so I'm not sure what exactly your concern is. If it is that it doesn't gain the use of nukes or cures naturally and only through cross class abilities then I have to present PLD as a counter to your argument. Historically PLD has always received white magic natively but in XIV it only can access it via cross-classing from CNJ. This is no different than a RDM only having access to Fire/Thunder/Blizzard/Aero/Stone/Cure from cross-classing.

The swords are also not just for appearances. They have stats on them that benefit the magical side of the mage. In FFIII the 2 best weapons a RDM could equip gave +15 and +5 to all stats (Ultima Blade and Excalibur respectively). FFXI their mythic weapon has the highest magic accuracy that they can achieve. In FFTA/FFTA2 they could only equip swords and their swords had magic power on them. FFXII:IZJS even went way out there and made them very proficient in great swords so they could use Ragnarok, Ultima Blade and Save The Queen.

Their armor has also been light/leather armor which is contrary to your idea of a mage. RDM-only armor historically has been light/leather armor. Like the Red Jacket in FFIII and artifact/relic/empyrean armors in FFXI. They could equip cloth gear as well but their iconic, RDM-only armor was not cloth.

In my version they'd obviously have physical stats on the weapons and armor (as stated they'd wear BRD gear) but Arcane Stance (named it that due to instances in the franchise where only the RDM can use Arcane Magic) allows them to swap them for magical stats. They'd then function pretty much like you are wishing them to, only they'd be getting the "iconic" magic from cross-classing (exactly like a PLD does now in XIV). Instead of getting powerful casts like BLM or WHM they're getting weaker casts but much faster (30% base before gear and not counting abilities like Dualcast).

In FFI RDM had equal STR and INT. In the original FFIII it had equal STR/MND/INT. In FFV they had equal stats in both strength and magic. FFXII gave them equal parts magic lore and battle lore. FFTA and FFTA2 gave them equal magic and attack.

So essentially RDM has never been an iconic "mage" by your definition. It's primarily been an equal parts caster as melee. I believe you are thinking of Sage which is the magical variant of the RDM in FFIII. In my version, thanks to Arcane Stance, they follow the history of RDM being equal parts caster and melee.

But in any case, thanks for the compliments all

[XanderOlivieri]

snip

Their physical battle capability was only to supplement their lack of mastery as I've stated in every post before. I said they also make up for it by being able to wear better quality armor and have access to swords. As for FF3, the remake of 3 also corrected the Red Mage to being more Magic oriented than physical. Starting off with average all round and ended with Int and Mind both being higher than their Strength, the Vit also becomes just as high as Int and Mind.

The design for them is Magic Class capable of taking hits and has a better survival ability. Its self sustaining with offensive and defensive magics, can take a hit with armor, and if they should run out of MP, they can still defend themselves better than other Mages. They never focused on one as the Red Mage can be seen as a greedy battler. They want a little bit of everything which killed their chances to master anything they learned. Yes, they can wear armor for added protection which puts them better defensively than other mages. They can use swords and daggers to attack when Magic is not an option for them. Their primary role however, like all magic users was their magic focus. This is not the same as a Paladin. A Paladin is a Magic Swordsman. A swordsman that can utilize the most basic holy spells. Everything else goes to their shield bearing skills or sword skills. They were never mages and have poor magic ability. A Paladin is the reversed of a Red Mage. It is a Swordsman who, through faith, gained the ability to use White Magics. They are still limited. Since they learn at a very late time how to use White Magic, they have poor Magic stats and MP, but still are highly regarded as physical fighters. They are Physical by design and are backed up by heavily limited magic set of usually 2 to 3 spells depending on game play. Early games they have about 8 or 9 due to being able to use up to level 3 White Magics. Red Mage and Paladin are two sides to the same coin, Paladin the heads who is Swordsman who dabbles weakly in Magic, Red Mage is Tails who is a fairly competent Mage who got bored of Magic, never mastered it and started taking up the sword to back up his lack of magical power.

Can still use the Arcanist as the base to create the class for a traditional Red Mage and make it work as the Arcanist essentially is the Red Mage by design. Iconically he's a Magic user who's most note worthy skill is his ability to use both Black and White Magics, albeit weakly, his double cast ability, and the ability to wield a Sword should he run out of MP to do moderately low damage but better than that of his brother spell casters.

And yes, its a pointless opinionated issue. If anything I believe it'll be like your's with the current track record shown. Just pointing it out, that the Red Mage if based like this isn't even a Mage. Its a Magic Swordsman so we'd get a DoW Red Mage that most likely would never cross class magic, especially with the current Cross Class limitations of Aero, Cure, and Blizzard 2 being the only possible spells for them to use as DPS basing off what Summoner can get (minus Aero). They'd have to reopen some cross class skills and I don't see Fire and Thunder being added back because of Summoner. So far majority of the Cross Class skills are the same if the class can use them as the cross class focus. People would run it mostly with Fencer Build and Red Mage skill + what ever bonus they get from a physical cross class if there were any.

I haven't seen more than 2 Cross Class skill selections, though I only have Mage classes unlocked atm. Ruin, Bio, and Virus would work as temporary substitutes, but still leaves a lot to be desired as a Mage.


To the note of Cross Class skills, What, if anything at this point, would you have as Cross Class skills from the Fencer?

[MartaDemireux]

What I'm saying is in FFXIV the PLD does not get any white magic natively (unlike in every other appearance that it has made in the franchise). RDM could do the same and also not get any white or black magic natively. I'm not and wasn't ever comparing the two any further than that. Also as a side note PLD is not a magic swordsman/mystic knight/rune fencer/spell fencer. That is a separate job in the franchise and PLD has coexisted with it in every one of the mystic knight's incarnations.

How would you balance a RDM yourself to perform equally as a melee and as a caster? Outside of the DS version of FFIII and FFXI just about every other instance has its stats as being equal at melee and casting. FFCC:EoT even gives the RDM notably stronger physical attack than magical. It can also be argued further that the RDM in FFXI is equally as effective at meleeing as it is at casting if geared appropriately.

However it should still be noted that RDM is recognized with a sword in hand and thanks to FFXI a buckler as well. Even the two games in which it had stats toward magic as a general focus (FFIII DS and FFXI) still had their best/ultimate weapons being swords and armor being leather. Even Bravely Default which isn't a FF game gives them one rank higher in magic attack than physical attack but still gives them a rank higher in swords than the magic-oriented weapons to balance it out. If RDM is implemented without the ability to use a sword of some type and be proficient at meleeing I'm willing to bet everything on the community being outraged. If it has a sword it darn well better be up front using it to whenever it can.

Currently every job has two classes for their cross-class skill selection. The reason I haven't noted which of FNC skills would be cross-classable is because SE would need to implement new jobs to current classes, new classes with new jobs, rework current jobs and/or implement a 3rd set of skills for each job to choose from. This is due to every job already having 2 classes to choose from. If I had to pick though it'd be the basic CD suite: Inquartata, En Garde, Reflex and to mirror PGL Riposte. The skills would be good for soloing on any class or for a tank job to cross-class in group play. However, just because certain skills are not cross-classable by certain jobs and classes does not mean it has to stay that way. They removed Thunder from SMN recently and gave them Blizzard instead. BLM in beta had CNJ's Cleric Stance and ACN's Bio. ACN/SMN couldn't have Thunder because it pushed it's DPS into unfair territory making it better than BLM without question. My version of RDM would see use out of it due to not having many DoT's natively and not being able to effectively utilize magic at the same time as melee. It'd set up it's enfeebles with melee and then nuke until they wore off essentially.

I also have to greatly disagree with you on ACN being the same as RDM by design. ACN is all about DoT's, Slowing/Weighing the target down and using a pet. They have no physical prowess in the slightest. This makes it more like FFXI's RDM than anything when using its ability to kite monsters with Gravity and Bind while sticking DoT's on them. FFXI's RDM could also choose to sub NIN and fight toe-to-toe with their enspells and self-buffs. FFXI's RDM was an anomaly compared to the rest of its incarnations though as it was RDM/MYS/TIM all rolled into one which is why they're having such a hard time implementing RUN to be its own job now and why TIM could never make it in.

[XanderOlivieri]

snip

I disagree with how you view FFXI's Red Mage. It is the traditional Red Mage set up. Its a Mage first, melee second as it is intended to be. Its not an anomaly, its the way Red Mages are supposed to work and how they do work. I said Arcanist is how Red Mage is supposed to be because they carry some parts healing, some part damage. The DoTs have enfeebling skills and the Arcanist has other Enfeebling buffs and debuffs (Eye for an Eye and Virus). When you look up info on Red Mage the info almost always says, a Mage who balances Black and White Magic and has the added bonus of being a capable melee fighter.

No I never got to play FFXI but I've been looking up what the Red Mage could do after reading a few things on these forums about FFXI's Cross Class capabilities.

"Red Mages typically cast both Black and White Magic and can also wield swords and equip armor that normal Black and White Mages cannot."

The weapon and armor perk is an after thought when describing them and only really brought up to highlight the difference between the Red Mage from other magic based classes. Traditional use of the Red Mage was support for other Mages and classes with higher survival rating than other traditional mages. Does this mean they were used as intended? No, but that doesn't change how they were made and what they were made to do. FFXI's version was the most traditional version of the Red Mage. That is the version I'd expect to see reoccur in FFXIV.

As for Fan Uproar, they are liable to cause an uproar no matter what SE does. You have your extremist on both sides. If they make the wrong class a Tank, the extremists will complain. If they make a Tank into a DPS, they'll complain. They make what should have been a Healer into a DPS, they'll complain. There is no way to please everyone, someone won't like an idea that has been had. I mean despite constant complaints about things, when SE has made an active attempt to fix the issue, the ones who initially complained about something complain that it got changed and want it back the way it was before.

[Clawsome]

1/Thrust/Deliver an attack with 150 potency. Additionnal effect grant Preparation-70TP-Instant-GCD-3Y
2/Ignite/Deal Fire dammage with potency of 80. Additionnal effect Fire dammage over time with a potency of 30 for 9 Sec-6MP-2.5Sec cast-GCD-25Y
4/Heal/Restore Target Hp's. Cure potentcy 300. Additional effect Heal allies in range cure potency 150-8MP-2Sec cast-GCD-30Y-Radius 10Y
6/Shell/Increase group members resistance to all elements-10Mp-3Sec Cast-GCD-Radius 15Y
8/Poison/Deal poison dammages over time with potency of 40 for 18 sec-6MP-Instant-GCD-25Y
10/Ice/Deal Ice dammage with potencty of 160. Additionnal effect Heavy 40% for 10 Sec-6MP-2.5Sec cast-GCD-25Y
12/Lunge/Deliver an attack with 100 potency. Combo action Thrust, 200 potency. Additionnal effect Grant Preparation 2-60TP-Instant-GCD-3Y
15/Balestra/Rushes to the target and deliver an attack with 120 potency. Additionnal effect Heavy 40% for 10 sec.-100TP-Instant-30Sec CD-25Y
18/Ignite 2 /Deal Fire dammage with potency of 80 to every ennemy in range. Additionnal effect Fire dammage over time with a potency of 30 for 6 Sec.-12 MP-3 Sec Cast-GCD-25Y-Radius 10Y

[Clawsome]

22/Riposte/Parry next melee attack reducing dammage to 0 and counter attack with a thrust-N/A-Instant-180Sec Cd-3Y
26/Find Weakness/Deliver an attack with 100 potency. Combo action Thrust, 160 potency. Additionnal effect Grant Preparation 2. Additionnal effect lower target's resistance to magic attacks or 30 Sec-60TP-Instant-GCD-3Y
30/Osmose/Deal unaspected dammages with 50 potency. Restore the caster Mp for 100% of dammages dealt-N/A-Instant-60Sec CD-25Y
34/Tempest/Reduce auto attack time of target by 1/2 for 30 sec.-6MP-Instant-180Sec Cd-30Y
38/Ice 2/Deal Ice dammage with potencty of 140 to every ennemy in range. Additionnal effect Heavy 40% for 10 Sec-12MP-3Sec Cast-GCD-25Y-Radius 10Y
42/Heal 2/Restore Target Hp's. Cure potentcy 550. Additional effect Heal allies in range cure potency 275-14MP-2Sec Cast-GCD-30Y-Radius 10Y
46/Heroism/Raise character mains stat by 5% for 30 min-10MP-3Sec Cast-GCD-30Y-Radius 15Y
50/Drain/Deal unaspected dammages with 200 potency , heal the caste for half the dammages dealt-6Mp-3 Sec-180Sec Cd-25Y

[Clawsome]

Trait
8/Enhanced Intelligence/Increase Intelligence by 2.
14/Preparation/Reduce next casting time by 50% after a melee attack
16/Extended Ignite/Double the time of the Fire dammage over time component of Ignite and Ignite 2
20/Enhanced Intelligence 2/Increase Intelligence by 4.
24/Eavyer Ice/Double the time of Heavy component on Ice and Ice 2
28/Exploit Weakness/Increase the magic resistence reduction
32/Enhanced Intelligence 3/Increase Intelligence by 6.
36/Preparation 2/Reduce next casting time by 100% after a melee attack
40/Enhanced Osmos/Double the Mp replenished to the caster
44/Virulent Poison/Poison spread to ennemies within range of the target
48/Critical Magic/Reduce Mp cost by 100% of your next spell after a melee critical hit

[Clawsome]

Red Mage

30/Double Cast/Enable the caster to cast the next spell a second time with no mana cost and no casting time-N/A-Instant-180Sec CD-Self
35/Renew/Grant healing over time with 100 potency for 21 sec to all allies within range-20MP-3Sec Cast-GCD-Self-Radius 25Y
40/Bane/Send the target in another dimension for 12 Sec-12MP-2.5Sec Cast-12Sec Cd
45/Magic Mastery/Mind becomes equal to intelligence-N/A-Instant-Self
50/Comet/Deal earth dammage with 240 potency, Comet deal dammages 5 sec after being casted-Half total MP-4Sec Cast-GCD-25Y

[Clawsome]

Mystic Knight/Sorcerer

[ThirdChild_ZKI]

Original Post makes me feel good in ways I don't yet understand