Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

[LadyPeorth]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

I misread neighbortaru's message:

He said Your TP+3, not 2.

I assumed he meant the TP you gain when getting hit +3, not the TP you gain when you hit +3.

[neighbortaru]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

yeah, yeah, blame the messanger... :sweat:

anyways, yes Peorth you provided an option. however, you admitted yourself it was a less than stellar one (not "beneficial, effective, super good, etc"). why do it then? why waste efforts on something that's of no benefit? you don't.

you seem to be the one focusing on the tree and forgeting the forest...

Double Post Edited:
btw, it's funny seeing Hyrist take a near 180 view on this. didn't you vehemently advocate meleeing a couple of months ago?

[LadyPeorth]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

Well I tried thinking up a possible angle and trying to make it work advantagously even just a little bit. The main argument I kept hearing in my PTs was that the RDM would give the monster TP for very little damage done to it. So I pretty much went down only that alley instead of perusing the rest of the marketplace

[Pounce]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

Getting back to my original point, what, if anything, do you think could be done to improve the skill level of RDM in general?

I used nerfing sword rating as just a random example of trying to discourage RDM from meleeing in exp parties, since that seems to be the main cause of a lot of RDM "suckiness".

[LadyPeorth]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

By improve the skill level of RDMs...do you mean imporve the skill of the people playing the RDM? Or improve the RDM's party prescence?

[Hyrist]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

The biggest difficulty that surround the melee issue of rdm is the simple fact that unless you remove both sword and dagger skills completly from the RDM board, you will get Melee RDMs.

This is due to many settings, not the least of which being the history of RDM both in its orgins, and sence its first appearance in FF1

So, the more immediat solution would be to find the way to make the RDM's who chose to melee more efficent, without completly unbalancing the game while doing so. This is the most difficult factor here, otherwise RDMs would simply have better swords and ratings and SE would have finished with it.

The current Idea I am stuck on, and have stated before is to alter enspells to have similar effects to ice and shock spikes, however with a wider variance of effects. So as opposed to just dealing damage that scales with our level, it also assists our primary enfeebeling. With such methods the TP gain issue would become overlooked, and RDM melee preformance as a really wouldent improve much as a whole.

Other improvments would be the ability to drain MP off of magic based mobs casting, while weilding a sword or dagger weapon (FF6 fans would know this as Runic) There are plenty of ideas but which one would reall work to balance in RDM melee?

[LadyPeorth]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

Hmmm... Enspells could do the elemental enfeebles that BLMs have.

Also Runic was an ability you activate that absorbs the next targetted spell and grants you the casting cost in MP. While this would be good, it could keep a RDM in a lot of mp later in the game. No more "FLARE! STUN!"...the RDM would just activate Runic and get an assload of MP back.

[Karinya]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

And your missing the point. The point is there is no beneficial way for a rdm to melee in a party.

This is overbroad and absurd, and it's statements like this that too often come up in this sort of thread.

First and most obviously, not every party is an exp party. RDM can beneficially melee in skillup parties, farming parties, NM camping parties, escort quest parties, some mission parties, some BCNM parties, etc. You probably know this already but leaving it out of your statement is just the sort of overstated rhetoric that this kind of thread tends to degenerate into.

Second, you don't specify a level range on your statement. This is the source of the fundamental disconnect that underlies most of the threads on this topic - people at wildly different levels talk past each other with completely different and both correct impressions of the effectiveness of melee, nuking and resting. How can completely different impressions both be correct? Because the job changes at different levels. A lot. And anyone who pretends to understand RDM should ALREADY KNOW THAT, and stop giving advice that applies to one level range as if it applied to 1-75.

And third, absolute statements like "there is no way" are generally suspect for overbroadness - they often leave out an exception or two. I think there's no need to belabor the exceptions further.

So a corrected version of this statement:

In general, as level increases, rdm melee becomes less useful in experience parties and other tactics become more useful both absolutely and in comparison to melee. Rdms (especially those at or above level 41) who wish to melee should be careful not to neglect their other party responsibilities in order to do so, since most or all of those other responsibilities are more important to the party's success than melee (this holds even in non-experience parties, generally). It is rarely beneficial to an experience party for rdms at or above level 51 to melee. It is *very* rarely beneficial to an experience party for rdms at or above level 65 to melee.

[Pounce]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

By improve the skill level of RDMs...do you mean imporve the skill of the people playing the RDM? Or improve the RDM's party prescence?

Either or both wouldn't be a bad thing.

All I know is that nearly every RDM I party with these days is bad, and the reason why they are bad is because they melee to the detriment of the party.

I would agree with others who have said that the problem comes from how RDM is touted as a verstatile jack of all trades.

What I find interesting is a comparison with the melee counterpart "jack of all trades" - the WAR.

WAR can tank and DD, but the the higher you go, I think people are in general agreement that WAR makes a superior DD than tank, at least until Utsu: Ni comes into play.

Still, WAR is most definitely a far superior tank than RDM is a melee DD.

Yet, unlike many RDM who insist on meleeing, many WARs insist on not tanking.

[WishMaster3K]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

*cries* I'll advocate this, we have swords for a reason, and it is NOT to add damge to the party. Obviously, everyone in this thread knows this, and there is still a discussion involving it going on

In any case, you all hit your individual nails on their heads, and now we can actually form a working foundation based off of the information used to build it. Otherwise, what would be the point of the argument if there was no resolution ^^

It is often forgotten that our Swords are an important part in our arsenal. However, it is mainly seen that using a sword is for Damage over time. My Ninja and Thief friends pointed this concept out to me as we critique the pros and cons of each jobs soloing style.

Now, DoT is interesting, because while a RDM can suceed in having the Best DoT, while at the same time keeping themselves buffed and the mob debuffed, this style of playing is only suitable for soloing.

No one is going to care that you can solo a VT with your current gear, because parties dont really notice what the RDM has to bring to the table in terms of melee efficiency.

Perhaps if we swap clothes in and out, and use weaps with high base damage and/or effects to our benefit, we can see the meleeing potential of maybe a PLD or even a few steps above a PLD, but the age old thought is that since meleeing for RDM is essentially futile, its better left at home with the rest of the solo gear.

Of course, thats not to say you shouldnt be prepared to fight for your pt if needed. More than once I can remember putting away my staves and switching to my solo gear when certain mobs that linked just refused to stay asleep. So its best to stay prepared. Go ahead and melee as long as you have the proper gear. You may save your pt's chain one day.

[LadyPeorth]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

Well we need to either discourage meleeing RDM in party or improve meleeing. Removing sword/dagger skill conflicts with lore and a non-schooled RDM would want to melee anyway. They'll argue they have enspells and blah blah blah...you've heard it all before.

Here are some ways me and my crazy mind have come up with to improve it:
1) Make enspells give the BLM enfeebles. Choke, Burn, Rasp, etc. However...instead of giving the full effect, they deal additional damage or cast the spell (so it'd be either Ice damage and Frost). The casted spell would be lower power than the BLM counterpart, but would stack (the - stats would get higher, the DoT would increase). So after like... 5 hits of drown, the monster has lost double the stats of a single cast of Drown and is taking 5 damage per second. In order to keep BLMs happy, this effect will not overwrite the BLM spell, but will not provide the stat down if the BLM spell is on it, until the stat down is equal to or greater than the BLM spell. Example: 1st Choke hits, Monster is already suffering -7 VIT from BLM spell, no further VIT is lost till enough Chokes have landed from EnAero to be equal to -7 or more.

2) Make enspells castable on other party members. Simple enough.

3) Make Enspells into enhancing spells that are the opposite of Black mage enfeebles. Like EnAero does the opposite of Choke, giving a boost to Agility and a +1 per tick hp regen. This would stack with BRD songs and the boost would be about between a BRD's 1st stat boost spell and their 2nd stat boost spell. They'd still cost 12mp and last 3 minutes.

[WishMaster3K]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

If Enspells gave bonuses, that would be outrageously overpowered XD. Cause then we'd cast them just for the hell of it depending.

I think it might be more fun if casting the enspell had a hidden effect of increasing the potency of another spell. Possibly making the sword act as an antenna or a generator. Enbliz for Paralyze perhaps. Enstone for Slow maybe. That would be interesting. At least it'd give me more to think about than Refresh - Frost - Shock - Refresh - Dia - Paralyze - Refresh - Slow - Gravity - Refresh or any variation of refreshing, casting two spells and refreshing again.

[Jei]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

i'll be happy if i can see some visual effects on my sword when i use enspells. Enfire glows the sword red with flames, enthunder gives blue sparks flashing around, hmm...

[WishMaster3K]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

Perhaps. I always get compliments on how awsome En Spells look when I do them in exp whilest we stand around. Oh, when are Enlight and Endark coming out? As Well as Barlight and Bar Dark. . .

[Jei]

Re: Nerfing RDM's sword rating...

gimme EnTP, EnEXP